text
stringlengths 316
100k
|
|---|
The largest biometric identification projects in the world — India’s attempt to give an ID number to 1 billion people linked to fingerprint and iris scans — may be going ahead under the new government.
According to Computerworld U.S., the winning Bharatiya Janata Party had said during last spring’s election campaign that it would review the controversial program for a secure ID to get government benefits. However, this week it approved a 2015 target for voluntary enrollments, signalling that it will back the project.
The story quotes the government saying in a statement on Wednesday that the project “aims to ensure inclusive growth by providing digital, online, verifiable identity to all residents, including marginalized sections of society.
The biometric ID gives a person a 12-digit number called the Aadhaar number. The government requires the prints of all 10 fingers, iris scans and the usual personal information (name, date of birth and address).
The Aadhaar number is designed to replace traditional paper ration cards that are usually inaccurate, and misused to benefit people who do not qualify for subsidies.
One problem has been a ruling from India’s Supreme Court, which issued an interim order last September that people cannot be required to have the Aadhaar identification to collect state subsidies.
Before the government can expand the scheme, according to the report, it will have to be backed by a law passed by India’s Parliament, rather than the current executive order, legal experts say. It will also have to get the Supreme Court to change its order. |
"Well look who finally woke up rise and shine" says a relaxed rasmus coming from the nearby alley."Damn we got pretty fucked up tonight at least it wasn't a total loss tonight" as rasmus say smiling in delight with a missing tooth gesturing to Axton arm. Axton sat on the curb puzzled by his mysterious friend who seems to remember something from last night. Axton checks his right arm where crudely written in sharpie is a number and a name: Alyssa 645-245-2164. "well hey Don't worry there a hot nice pair of twins" as rasmus rolls up his sleeve to reveal a similar one. "dude where the fuck are your pants? where's the that drunken leprechaun that was with us also dude clean yourself up you don't want cops to arrest you".rasmus pulls out a handkerchief and hands it to Axton to clean the remaining coke of his nose. |
Bonhams
Ayrton Senna is perhaps the most legendary driver in Formula 1, and he’s undoubtedly a hero to anyone who follows international motor racing. Come February 5, fans will get to bid on a piece of Senna history that played a crucial part in his career: The very last racing kart he ever competed with.
Advertisement - Continue Reading Below
Bonhams has the details on the notable kart: Fielded by the DAP team, Senna drove it in his final karting competition, the 1981 World Championship in Parma, Italy. At the time, Senna had already begun racing Formula Fords, and left karting to focus on open-wheel formula racing full-time. The kart was purchased from DAP in September of 1981 without an engine, and has been owned by the purchaser since then. An engine identical to Senna’s has since been installed.
It may not be the McLaren Honda F1 car that became Senna’s most recognizable ride, but this kart is a historically important artifact in Senna’s legendary racing life. And hey, it’s closer than any of the rest of us will get to sitting in Senna’s old seat; the best we can do is play the Ayrton Senna Tribute expansion pack on Gran Turismo 6. Want it in your garage? It crosses the auction block tomorrow, with an estimated value reaching $32,000.
A version of this story originally appeared on roadandtrack.com via Autoblog. |
Special to GC
AUBURN, Ala. – Florida’s men’s swimming & diving team won the program’s third-straight and 36th overall Southeastern Conference Championship behind three SEC titles at the James E. Martin Aquatic Center in Auburn, Ala. The program’s 36 SEC team championships ranks second amongst all sports in the history of the SEC (Kentucky Men’s Basketball, 45).
The Gators finished in front of second place Georgia (1,134.5) and third place Auburn (1,084) with a total score of 1,314.5 points. Florida was strong in all events, capturing individual victories in the 100-yard butterfly (Caeleb Dressel) and the 500-yard freestyle (Mitch D’Arrigo) and earned a relay gold in the 800-yard freestyle event (Wallace, Werner, Alexiou, D’Arrigo). The Gators pulled away on the last day of competition after entering the final day up only 132 points.
On the women’s side, the Gators ended their conference championship in third place behind Georgia (1,450) and Texas A&M (1,166) for the second year in a row. UF’s women won four SEC championships, as Florida captured the 100-yard (Natalie Hinds), 200-yard (Amelia Maughan) and 1,650-yard freestyle (Jessica Thielmann) titles and the 200-yard individual medley crown (Theresa Michalak).
Overall, Florida won seven SEC championships, broke three school records and registered 25 NCAA automatic qualifying marks as each team will now prepare for next month’s NCAA men’s and women’s championships.
Coaches Corner:
Head Coach Gregg Troy:
On the men winning the SEC Championship…
“It was a great week. We stood up and raced tough the whole way. It (tonight) was a great way to finish. It was five days of tough racing.”
On who was the surprise of the meet was and who had the swim of the week for the Gators…
“The surprise of the meet was Amelia Maughan winning to 200 freestyle. I think the swim of the meet was either Jessica Thielmann’s mile tonight, or Natalie Hinds 100 free swim.”
On getting ready for the NCAA meet…
“In the end, this is just another swim meet, as we have to go back to work on Monday and make sure we’re ready for the next one.”
Talking Gators:
Junior Jessica Thielmann:
On her race plan in the mile and when she knew she won her first-career SEC Championship…
“It was a good race. I had a plan and for probably the first time ever, I stuck to my own plan, as I waited and bided my time. Then I made my move at the right time. I didn’t know I won until I touched the wall. I knew those girls had a very fast back-end, so once I made my move, I knew I had to keep going.”
Junior Natalie Hinds:
On winning the 100-yard freestyle…
“I was nervous going in, but what I learned from the 50 (freestyle) is that I need to relax. That’s what Coach Troy told me. In the prelims this morning, I just needed to do what I know I can and tonight, I just needed to stay relaxed. I just wanted to do the best that I could and I was really hurting towards the end so I just went as fast as possible.”
Day Five Finals Recap:
Florida set itself up for a great night in the first event of the finals, as the Gator men finished second and third in the 1,650-yard freestyle race, as sophomore Mitch D’Arrigo and junior Arthur Frayler clocked times of 14:39.90 and 14:40.05, respectively. The runner-up finish was D’Arrigo’s second of the week and his time ranks him second all-time in school history.
In the women’s event, junior Jessica Thielmann avenged her runner-up finish in the 500-yard freestyle a few day ago by winning her first-career SEC crown tonight. The Newcastle, England native won the women’s mile in an outstanding time of 15:47.95. Winning the mile ended a 12-year drought for the Gator women without a championship in that event. In addition, Thielmann’s mark ranks her second all-time in school history.
Freshman Caeleb Dressel and junior Natalie Hinds followed their lead by finishing the 100-yard freestyle in the same fashion. In the men’s race, Dressel clocked a school record time of 41.90 seconds but earned his second runner-up finish of the week.
In the women’s race, Hinds broke her own school record and placed first with a mark of 47.26 seconds. This was her second-career SEC title, as she won her first as a freshman at the 2013 championships in the 100-yard butterfly.
In the men’s and women’s 200-yard backstroke, juniors Corey Main and Ashlee Linn paced the Gators as they finished in eighth and fourth place with times of 1:43.16 and 1:52.62, respectively. Linn’s mark ranks sixth in UF history.
Seniors Eduardo Solaeche-Gomez and Matt Elliott capped off their outstanding week at SEC’s by finishing fifth (1:54.31) and sixth (1:54.42) in the men’s 200-yard breaststroke.
Florida’s men (Caeleb Dressel, Mark Szaranek, Pawel Werner, Dan Wallace) and women (Natalie Hinds, Ashlee Linn, Amelia Maughan, Lindsey McKnight) placed third and second in the lone relay event of the evening, the 400-yard freestyle. The men’s time was 2:50.31, which ranks second in school history, meanwhile the Gator women clocked the sixth-fastest mark in UF history, 3:14.12.
Final 2015 SEC Championships Standings
MEN WOMEN Rank Team Score Rank Team Score 1. Florida 1,314.5 1. Georgia 1,450 2. Georgia 1,134.5 2. Texas A&M 1,166 3. Auburn 1,084 3. Florida 963.5 4. Tennessee 918 4. Tennessee 793.5 5. Alabama 911.5 5. LSU 725 6. Missouri 768 6. Auburn 722 7. South Carolina 567 7. Kentucky 608 8. Texas A&M 555 8. Missouri 592 9. LSU 538.5 8. Alabama 531 10. Kentucky 407 10. Arkansas 465 11. South Carolina 355 12. Vanderbilt 171
SEC Champions:
Men’s 800 FR (Wallace, Werner, Alexiou, D’Arrigo – 6:12.85) – SEC & UF record
Mitch D’Arrigo (500 Free – 4:10.77) – 2nd in UF history
Theresa Michalak (200 IM – 1:56.09) – 3rd in UF history
Caeleb Dressel (100 Fly – 45.28) – 2nd in UF history
Amelia Maughan (200 Free – 1:44.68) – 7th in UF history
Jessica Thielmann (1,650 Free – 15:47.95) – 2nd in UF history
Natalie Hinds (100 Free – 47.26) – 1st in UF history
Day 5 – B & C Final Top-3 Finishers:
Sophia Batchelor won the women’s 200-yard backstroke C Final with a mark of 1:55.49.
In the men’s 200-yard backstroke B Final, Christian Homer placed third in a time of 1:42.70.
NCAA Qualifiers:
Florida notched 25 NCAA automatic qualifying marks at the SEC Championships, including: |
From time to time, it’s easy for a Green Monster to despair over human beings’ treatment of this planet and all of the creatures within it. When stories of horrendous animal cruelty seem to abound everywhere we turn, and the fight against issues such as rapid species extinction and ag-gag legislation seems never-ending, it could be easy to believe that we are all doomed.
However, sinking into pessimism will change nothing. With that in mind, we’ve set out to profile a selection of amazing animal rights organizations around the globe – to let it be known that countless, passionate activists are out there, fighting the good fight!
Advertisement
1. Activists for Animals Africa
Activists for Animals Africa works tirelessly to bring about positive legislative change for animals in South Africa (where they are based), and throughout the rest of the continent. Their campaigns cover a variety of issues, including rhino and lion poaching, seal culling, the fur trade, and factory farming. Find out how you can show your support here.
The group’s three-pronged tactic for advancing the cause of animal rights is as follows:
To bring about legislative change through advocacy and lobbying as legislation prohibiting cruelty to animals is sorely lacking and where legislation does exist, it is not enforceable.
Raising awareness among the public and media through protests, boycotts and press conferences regarding suffering and exploitation of animals.
Create an education program for school children and the general public which highlights options that give you the choice to live a life that is free of cruelty towards animals and creates global sustainability.
In conjunction with Youth 4 African Wildlife, they plan to hold a large protest march on Oct. 3, aimed at drawing attention to the plight of endangered elephants, rhinos, and lions.
Advertisement
Advertisement
2. Youth 4 African Wildlife
Speaking of Youth 4 African Wildlife (Y4AW) … this group’s work is also well worth checking out. Founded in 2013, they are a collective of “passionate young conservationists” led by South African businessman and photojournalist, Dex Kotze. Funds raised by the group since their inception have been vital in the sourcing of tracking dogs, vehicles, telecommunications and aviation communications, and pilot training to assist wildlife workers in the fight against illegal poaching. In 2014, Y4AW raised a total of R500,000 (approximately $38,870) for StopRhinoPoaching.com.
Advertisement
And if that isn’t enough to make you love them, you are sure to be impressed by their succinct explanation of the true causes of the Sixth Extinction:
It is likely that this extinction began around the Industrial Revolution. In the early 1900s, cities and civilizations began to grow at an extremely rapid rate, and species have since been disappearing 100 times faster than what is considered sustainable. … Now is our time to make that change. We must stop being so careless with our use of resources – it isn’t sustainable to cut down thousands of acres of rainforest to grow palm trees for palm oil; killing thousands of animals for decorative horns, or medicinal properties, is careless; overfishing is depleting our oceans of diversity; and farming at massive scales is polluting the world. Every country has its own issues with resource supply and demand; therefore every country can make its own changes.
Advertisement
3. Animal Rights Center Japan
Animal Rights Center Japan (ARCJ) are dedicated to tackling a wide array of animal rights abuses, such as factory farming, the animal entertainment industry, vivisection, the fur trade, and wildlife conservation. They also promote veganism as the ethical alternative to factory farming through their partner website, Hachidory.com. ARCJ’s mission statement is:
Advertisement
(We are) a specified non-profit organization working for the protection of animal rights and dignity; for animals to be treated ethically and with respect, just as we expect to be. Our activities started in 1987, with a focus on resolving various animal rights abuses in Tokyo and Kanagawa. We are working to change the human-centric approach to understanding the rights of animals. … Through relating the present conditions of animals in our society and asking people to consider their actions towards animals, we hope to encourage a more ethical and sustainable way of life. We may have to change the social structure. For people, this is only a small concession in the luxury of modern life. However, it makes all the difference to the animals saved from suffering or death. With courage and faith, we will continue spreading our message in the hope that we CAN save the lives of many millions of animals.
You can help this group by donating or becoming a member.
4. Young Palestinians for Animal Rights
Back in April, we covered the amazing efforts of Young Palestinians for Animal Rights, a groundbreaking program founded by the Palestinian Animal League (PAL) and Al Quds, Bir Zeit and Al Najah universities in the West Bank.
Advertisement
In 2015 to date, fifty-two student volunteers have been trained by the PAL team in leadership skills and were given the opportunity to partake in workshops on animal rights campaigning. These students then worked in fourteen schools across the West Bank, engaging in a series of vegan outreach initiatives, as well as theatre and art projects which helped to educate 280 schoolchildren on the importance of animal protection.
Speaking of the program, student activity coordinator Sameh Arekat said, “(Young people) want to create change and they feel the need to make it happen. They are ready to take responsibility to lead the change, so the first objective of the program is to enable and mobilize young people in the Occupied Palestinian Territories to bring change into their communities. Young people are the majority of the population in Palestinian society, living under occupation, siege and daily violations of their human rights. But even in the midst of these circumstances young people can make a positive change for the better.”
Luckily, thanks to a recent grant allocation of £2,000 ($3,138) from the International Fund for Animal Welfare, the program is now set to continue into 2016!
5. The Centre for Animals and Social Justice
The UK-based Centre for Animals and Social Justice (CASJ) is focused on research, education and social policy engagements that seek to elevate the status of non-human animals. They describe their mission as being directed toward the “moral progress” of society, explaining:
Many nonhuman animals are intelligent, aware individuals with rich mental lives that can be more complex than those of some humans. As sentient beings whose lives are profoundly affected by the actions of individuals, businesses and states, animals should be an essential concern of social justice. … The CASJ believes that there is a huge potential for moral progress. Public attitudes towards animals are generally more compassionate and enlightened than those implicit in actual behavior, industry practices and public policy, which continue to cause widespread and extensive harm to animals. Complementing and supporting the activities of existing NGOs, the CASJ occupies a vital niche in the animal protection cause, producing the knowledge and advocacy that is essential to both persuade society to respect animals and translate ethical aspirations into effective animal protection.
They are currently working with the Politics Departments at the Universities of Leicester and Sheffield to research the representation of animals’ interests in law and public policy. Dr. Dan Lyons, CEO of the organization, has also written a new book, The Politics of Animal Experimentation, that explores how animal research policy is formulated, and the adverse impacts that this has on animals. If you would like to donate to the CASJ, click here.
6. L214 Éthique et Animaux
L214 Éthique et Animaux (known simply as L214) is one of France’s best-known animal rights groups. The organization is named after a clause in the French rural code called Article L214, which stipulates, “Any (non-human animal), as a sentient being, should be placed in conditions compatible with the biological requirements of its species.” Regretfully, this article has never been taken seriously in practice or in law.
This group’s approach is as follows:
Raise awareness of the reality of the most common (abusive) animal practices, and make them evolve or disappear through information and awareness campaigns. Identify and try to punish illegal practices by legal action.
Demonstrate the negative impact of consumption of animal products (this includes land- or water-based animals) and propose alternatives.
Promote public debate on animal welfare and speciesism, curb the consumption of animals and other abusive practices.
Together with the Vegetarian Society of France, L214 have launched a website called Viande.info, which details the harmful impacts of the meat industry on non-human animals, human health, and the environment.
So there you have it, Green Monsters! Next time you feel yourself sinking into despondency, remember some of these awesome groups – their passion, their dedication, their unswerving commitment to be a voice for those who are voiceless – and be inspired.
Lead Image: Youth 4 African Wildlife/Facebook |
Image copyright Reuters Image caption Former British PM Tony Blair was speaking to a French radio station
Tony Blair has said he thinks Scotland will leave the Union if the UK votes to break away from the European Union.
The ex-PM said he hoped voters in the forthcoming referendum would choose to stay a part of the 28-member bloc.
And speaking to French radio, he added: "In my opinion... if the United Kingdom votes to leave Europe, Scotland will vote to leave the United Kingdom".
Earlier, the UK government tabled a motion in the House Commons setting out some of the rules for the referendum.
There had been speculation Prime Minister Cameron was preparing for a vote as soon as June if his renegotiation plans were approved by European leaders next month.
The UK government will hold a vote on membership by the end of 2017.
'Trigger demand'
On Sunday, Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said a June EU referendum would be "disrespectful" given the number of elections in May.
She also repeated her belief that a UK vote to leave the EU, but a Scottish vote to stay, would lead to an "overwhelming demand" for a second independence referendum.
Following Mr Blair's radio interview, SNP MP Stephen Gethins said his party believed it "unacceptable for Scotland to be dragged out of the EU against its will".
He added: "If Scotland is taken out of the EU against its will then obviously there will have been a fundamental breakdown in what should be a partnership of nations and it is highly likely that this would trigger an overwhelming demand for a second Scottish independence referendum." |
A user experience expert has put together a video showing that the longer animations introduced in iOS 7 and continued in iOS 8 have a small usability cost: user input is ignored while the animation is running, making the user interface seem slower. The video compares it to iOS 3 running on the original iPhone.
While William Van Hecke believed that the issue was that animations used to be interruptible, this isn’t actually the case except for Springboard. In other cases, iOS has always ignored input until animations are complete, it’s just that they used to be shorter. If you’re fast with your fingers, there will now be times when you’re trying to do something while the animation is still doing its thing.
The new spring-based animations also make it less clear when the animation has ended, so the device seems unresponsive to input, but in reality it’s that the animation hasn’t quite finished.
Do you see this as an issue in real-life use? Let us know in the comments. |
Diamond Dallas Page spoke with CBS Denver on a number of topics in and outside of pro wrestling. Here are some of the highlights:
Vince McMahon potentially getting back into football:
"McMahon has always been a visionary. But, again, they're a multi-billion dollar company, and it really comes down to the talent. So I don't know how you do that. But if he's got a plan I'm sure he's got a plan, because the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting a different result. Some of my biggest victories have come directly after some of my biggest failures. If McMahon is going back into football again, then he's got some master plan."
Helping Justin Credible after he got drunk before an appearance at a wrestling event:
"I didn't get a phone call from him, I made a phone call to him. Because of helping Jake, and Scott, Vader, and Mick Foley just by reaching out and helping the guys, when someone is hurting, they'll contact me. So I know about it pretty much right away. I always loved PJ. He's a great kid who just made some bad decisions...
"I told him if he gets to work doing the [DDP Yoga] program five days a week, we'll talk every day or a minimum of every other day. I told him, if he gets on track for a month, then I'll bring you down here, and we'll work together, and I'll start to really treat him this time. I'll actually teach him how to teach what I do."
See Also DDP Reveals Who Is On His Mt. Rushmore Of Wrestling
If he would make another Royal Rumble appearance:
"If they call me, I'll be there. But if I never get in the ring again, I am so happy to have had the run I had. Didn't really have the greatest run when I first got to the WWE, but the last five years were unbelievable. They let me come out in the Rumble a couple of years back and drop a bunch of diamond cutters. It blew the roof off."
Source: CBS |
Sliders suck. “Little too far to the left. Ugh. Little too far to the right. ARRHGH!!!” The mouse can be a frustrating controller for Photoshop, Final Cut, AutoCAD or even Spotify. But a new input device called Flow lets you play your computer like an instrument, with infinite dexterity through feeling rather than sight.
The Y Combinator startup Senic’s ~$100 wireless Flow puck offers four types of control: motion by waving over its infrared sensor, a programmable touch-sensitive pad on top, haptic response for pushing Flow like a button, and a physical cylinder around the sides that you can twist for ultimate precision. It already works with 30 apps like some of the Adobe Creative Suite, and cunning developers can build custom Flow interfaces for anything they want.
Co-founder Tobias Eichenwald thinks there are better ways to work than squinting at a screen. He wants Flow to let you control your computer “blindly, unconsciously, naturally” — like a guitar. Normally, designers have to dig through Photoshop menus, then use a clumsy mouse or hit the bracket button, which changes things in increments that are too big.
“You can never do pixel-perfect graphics” says Eichenwald.
With Flow, you can bump up or down the hue or brush size in Photoshop, alter model angles in AutoCAD, switch layers in Illustrator, select frames in a video editing app, and more.
Beyond work, the startup wants you to stay in Flow while spending quality time with your friends. “We’ve had 40 years of screens. They’re not always the best designed interface,” Eichenwald explains. “They’re not good in social settings because they require your full attention.”
That’s why Flow is built to work with Spotify, YouTube and SoundCloud. You could hover your hand above Flow to adjust volume, or wave over it to skip to the next song without disconnecting from your friends or the task at hand to stare into a screen. Phillips Hue smart lightbulbs can also be controlled much quicker with Flow than digging up the remote app on your phone.
I’ve played with Flow and the device is well-constructed. The tension on the spinning cylinder gives just the right resistance so you can feel the slightest movement. It combines motion with less tiring gestures rather than just tiringly keeping your hands in the air, which is why Leap Motion never took off. Integrating Flow into your habits will take time, and not everyone has a professional need for it. But at the very least, Flow looks downright beautiful sitting on a desk.
Flow is on Indiegogo for $100, and Eichenwald says its added efficiency as an input means that designers could quickly recoup the cost. The crowdfunding money will go to hammering out manufacturing and hiring an embedded software engineer to deal with firmware updates.
It seems inevitable that laptops will offer motion control. I can imagine my MacBook’s trackpad or webcam working like Leap Motion eventually. But it’s fine if some of Flow’s features get integrated elsewhere, as the startup has big ambitions.
“We want to create a new generation of natural user interfaces,” says Eichenwald. With hardware costs, connectivity, and Wi-Fi chips all getting cheaper, anything could be turned into an input. Eichenwald asks “Why not the table? Why not the wall? Why not the objects around you?” It’s that philosophy that makes me wonder if Flow-maker Senic will get acquired by Apple or Nest one day.
Most gadgets we invent distract us or add to our cognitive load. Yet researchers keep saying we’re terrible at multi-tasking, and everyone works better when they can focus. Finally there’s a device that helps us maintain Flow. |
British Antarctic Survey (BAS) has decided not to winter at Halley VI Research Station for safety reasons. The station, which is located on the floating Brunt Ice Shelf in Antarctica, will shut down between March and November 2017. Changes to the ice, particularly the growth of a new crack, presents a complex glaciological picture that means that BAS scientists are unable to predict with certainty what will happen to the ice shelf during the forthcoming Antarctic winter. As a precautionary measure BAS will remove its people before the Antarctic winter begins.
Halley VI station is in the final stages of being relocated 23 km from its present site to put it upstream of a previously dormant ice chasm that began to show signs of growth in 2012.
In October 2016, a second crack appeared some 17 km to the north of the research station. Since then glaciologists have monitored the growth of this crack using a network of GPS instruments that measure the deformation of the ice, together with European Space Agency satellite imagery, ground penetrating radar, and on-site drone footage, which show that the recent changes to the Brunt Ice Shelf have not been seen before. They have run computer models and created bathymetric maps to determine whether or not a large iceberg will calve, and the impact that could have on the remaining ice shelf. They conclude that they are unable to predict with certainty what will happen to the ice shelf during the forthcoming Antarctic winter and beyond.
There is no immediate risk to the people currently at the station, or to the station itself. However, there is sufficient uncertainty about what could happen to the ice during the coming Antarctic winter for BAS to change its operational plans. BAS is confident of mounting a fast uplift of personnel during summer months if a fracturing of the ice shelf occurred. However, access to Halley by ship or aircraft is extremely difficult during the winter months of 24-hour darkness, extremely low temperatures and the frozen sea. The Director of BAS has therefore decided that it is prudent for safety reasons to shut down the station as a precautionary measure and remove its people before the Antarctic winter begins. There are currently 88 people on station including summer-only staff working on the relocation project and 16 who were scheduled to over-winter.
Every effort is currently being made to ensure the continuity of long-term scientific data capture in these circumstances. Options to temporarily redeploy research and technical support teams to other parts of BAS are being explored.
Halley VI Research Station is an internationally important platform for global earth, atmospheric and space weather observation in a climate-sensitive zone. In 2013 the station attained the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Global Atmosphere Watch (GAW) Global station status, becoming the 29th in the world and 3rd in Antarctica.
Director of Operations Captain Tim Stockings says,
“Halley VI Research Station sits on a floating ice shelf. It was designed specifically to move inland if required. The current work to relocate our station is going very well. This challenging engineering project is scheduled to complete as planned by early March 2017. We want to do the right thing for our people. Bringing them home for winter is a prudent precaution given the changes that our glaciologists have seen in the ice shelf in recent months. Our goal is to winterise the station and leave it ready for re-occupation as soon as possible after the Antarctic winter.”
ENDS
Issued by the Press Office at British Antarctic Survey.
Athena Dinar, Senior PR & Communications Manager, British Antarctic Survey, tel: +44 (0)1223 221 441; mobile: +44 (0)7909 008516; email: [email protected]
Sarah Vincent, Senior Communications Manager, British Antarctic Survey: tel +44 (0)1223 221445; mobile +44 (0)7850 541910; email [email protected]
Notes to Editors:
For images and interview requests please contact the BAS Press Office
About Halley VI
Halley VI Research Station sits on Antarctica’s 150-m thick Brunt Ice Shelf. This floating ice shelf flows at a rate of 0.4 km per year west towards the sea where, at irregular intervals, it calves off as icebergs. Halley is crucial to studies into globally important issues such as the impact of extreme space weather events, climate change, and atmospheric phenomena. It was ozone measurements at Halley that led to the discovery of the Antarctic Ozone Hole in 1985 — they are now being used to evaluate its recovery.
Long-term monitoring of the natural changes that occur in the ice shelf has revealed changes, including recent growth of a chasm that was previously dormant for around 35 years. Preparatory work for the re-location was carried out during the 2015-16 Antarctic Summer season (Nov-March), and moving the station is almost complete. This involved uncoupling the 8 station modules and using large tractors to transport each module further inland.
There have been six Halley research stations on the Brunt Ice Shelf since 1956.
About closing the station for winter
Whilst BAS is confident of mounting a fast uplift of personnel during summer months if a fracturing of the ice shelf occurred the same cannot be said for winter.
Between now and early March science and technical teams will complete the relocation of the station modules and prepare them for winter and ready for recommissioning next season. Remote instruments will continue to capture and store data about movement of the ice shelf. A staged removal of summer-only personnel whose work on the relocation is complete is expected to begin in early-February. All remaining personnel are scheduled to leave by early March.
About Halley science
Ozone measurements that have been made continuously at Halley since 1956 (which led to the discovery of the ozone hole), contribute to the WMO’s Earth Observation strategy for co-operation and integrated systems for monitoring of the atmosphere.
Space weather data captured at Halley contributes to the Space Environment Impacts Expert Group that provides advice to Government on the impact of space weather on UK infrastructure and business.
During recent winters, Halley has participated in a European Space Agency research experiment into prolonged human space flight. This project seeks to test how people can adapt to life in remote and isolated locations.
About the re-location project
Halley Research Station is modular. Each module is being de-coupled from the others and towed across the ice by tractors
In 2015/16 field season, glaciologists and operational teams conducted a survey to identify a new site for Halley Research Station which is located 23 km upstream on the Brunt Ice Shelf.
The relocation project is being carried out over three years. Work began in 2015-16 with in-depth site surveys, detailed ice monitoring and initial preparations to de-couple the modules.
During the 2016-17 Antarctic summer season temporary camps for housing the workforce were established and station modules and other infrastructure moved to the new site. These will be removed by the end of summer.
Temporary containerised science facilities and accommodation units were set up to keep science projects going during winter.
Britain in Antarctica |
What middle-aged male raised in the British Commonwealth wasn’t entranced by stories of the Blue Bird land speed racers, attempting to break the ‘Flying Mile’? Or the streamlined Golden Arrow? Numerous airstrips and Royal Air Force bases in the United Kingdom have played host to record attempts over the years, a list which is about to include a Donhou Bicycle.
To build a serious land speed record breaker you need to be both a brilliant engineer and a little nutty, perhaps less so if it’s a bicycle. Still, Tom got the bug and, with a disused airstrip just near his house and the skills to fabricate any beautiful bicycle he likes, designed a contender for the British land speed record on a motor-paced pushie.
Tom maintains that despite appearances, this is a relatively ‘normal’ bike, similar in construction to one he’d build for any customer. There’s extra rake on the forks to increase stability at speed, assisted by the frame’s oversized Columbus Max tubing and the extra low bottom bracket supporting that incredible chain ring.
The 104-tooth ring was machined by Cliff Polton and the team of four engineers that make up Royce UK LTD, who also donated the rear hub to the project. The hubs were laced into tubular ENVE SES rims by August Wheelworks, to minimize the risk of losing a clincher tire at untested speeds. Naturally, an Avid disc brake was used to brake the front wheel and avoid cooking the rim.
By the way, I came up with the name ‘Flying Miler’ myself, as Tom’s land speed bike didn’t have a romantic title such as ‘Bluebird’ or ‘Golden Arrow’. Perhaps it should be named ‘The Gannet‘, after one of the United Kingdom’s fastest birds—although it can be used as reference to someone who eats too much, similar to ‘glutton’. Still, that chain ring does bear a certain resemblance. What do you think?
For the full build process and complete component list, head to the Donhou Bicycles website. Tom is also producing a short film in association with Spindle Productions. The full length version will be released shortly but here’s a teaser to tide you over:
Donhou Bicycles: Experiments in Speed from SpindleProductions on Vimeo. |
"School resource officers, detectives and school officials conducted a detailed investigation and spoke with the students involved and witnesses to determine the circumstances involved in the fight," the department said in a Facebook post, adding that the incident doesn't appear to be related to the victim's disability.
"Officials learned the victim, who has a degree of visual impairment, and suspect know each other and have a history of not getting along," the department said.
Police said the initial attacker — who has not been named — was arrested for misdemeanor battery and released to his parents. The student who intervened is not expected to face arrest.
The brother of the alleged bully, however, told NBC Los Angeles that he believes his brother was the victim.
"This so-called hero, he comes up and punches him in the back of the head," he said. "Pretty wrong, if you ask me. He could've killed him."
Huntington Beach High School said it “firmly believes that all students are afforded an opportunity to learn in a safe and secure environment.
“Safety is the highest priority,” it said in a statement. “Huntington Beach High School has a very strong anti-bullying code of conduct and will not condone this type of behavior.” |
HOLLYWOOD — Seven-time Emmy-nominated actor Hugh Laurie received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame Oct. 25, six days after the premiere of his Hulu psychological thriller “Chance.”
Speaking to a crowd at the ceremony in front of the Pig ‘N Whistle British pub on Hollywood Boulevard, Laurie attributed his success largely to luck.
“So if you don’t mind, I’m just going to take a moment of silence to absorb this extraordinary thing,” he said, pausing. “It’s absolutely extraordinary.”
“I don’t know if you Yanks fully understand what this means to someone who was born and raised 5,000 miles away from here, who for the first 30 years of his life only knew anything of this country because of the records I listened to and the films I saw and the television shows I watched,” he said.
“That’s all I knew. The reach of American entertainment, the power of American entertainment, is awesome.”
Born June 11, 1959, in Oxford, England, Laurie was a British national junior champion rower. When mononucleosis knocked him out of rowing while a student at Cambridge University, he joined the university’s dramatic club, the Cambridge Footlights, where he met Emma Thompson.
Thompson introduced him to Stephen Fry, who became his comedic partner. The two principally wrote the club’s annual revue, “The Cellar Tapes,” which propelled them to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, winning its Perrier Comedy Award, London’s West End, and a television version, broadcast in 1982.
Laurie and Fry went on to star in such ground-breaking British television shows as “A Bit of Fry and Laurie,” “Blackadder” and “Jeeves and Wooster.”
Laurie first became known to American television audiences as the acerbic Dr. Gregory House on the 2004-12 Fox drama, “House, M.D.,” which brought him six Emmy nominations as outstanding lead actor in a drama series.
Laurie also received a nomination for a best supporting actor Emmy in a limited series or movie for his work in the AMC miniseries, “The Night Manager.”
In “Chance,” Laurie stars as San Francisco-based forensic neuropsychiatrist Eldon Chance, who reluctantly becomes sucked into a violent and dangerous world of mistaken identity, police corruption and mental illness.
Laurie’s film credits include “Tomorrowland,” “Sense and Sensibility,” “The Man in the Iron Mask,” “101 Dalmatians,” “Stuart Little” and its sequel, “Stuart Little 2.”
Laurie is also an accomplished singer and musician, releasing the New Orleans blues albums “Let Them Talk” and “Didn’t It Rain,” and touring extensively with his group, “The Copper Bottom Band.” |
While North Korea’s missile test on August 28, reportedly of the intermediate range Hwasong-12 (KN-17), broke up into three pieces during flight only flying 2,700 kilometers—far short of its 4,000 kilometer range—the launch was a disturbing development in Pyongyang’s continuing program to develop long-range missiles.
Why Fly Over Japan?
The test launch had two primary objectives. First, Kim Jong Un likely sought to take measure of the international community’s response to the overflight of Japanese territory. Though North Korea twice before attempted to launch a satellite using a flight path that passed over Japan, the Hwasong-12 is the first ballistic missile to overfly the island nation. If the US response to the test firing is judged to be mild by Pyongyang, North Korea may feel that future flights will be similarly accepted by Washington and its regional allies.
Second, the flight was likely intended to evaluate the missile’s performance and reliability under operational conditions. Before the Hwasong-12 and the intercontinental range Hwasong-14 can be deployed, engineers must demonstrate that they work reliably when flown to maximum range. To date, the two missiles have been launched on steep flight paths that reach high altitudes, ensuring that the mock warheads land in the sea just short of Japan. Much can be learned from the tests, but full-range flights replicating the conditions a combat-capable missile would experience are needed. This flight begins to address that requirement.
Is North Korea Testing a Post-Boost Vehicle (PBV)?
The most recent Hwasong-12 flight ended with the mock warhead landing in the Pacific Ocean about 2,700 km from the launch site, well short of its maximum range. North Korean engineers may have shut the Hwasong-12’s engine down early, resulting in a shorter flight. Turning off the engine roughly five seconds early would yield a range and apogee matching the reported values. Or the payload mass of the first test may have been considerably lighter than that of North Korea’s nuclear warhead, allowing the missile to achieve a much higher altitude, thus exaggerating the derived maximum range when the missile is flown on a standard flight path. For example, if the May flight carried a payload of 250 kg, and the most recent test fitted the Hwasong-12 with a 1,250-kg package, the range is reduced to about 2,700 km, with a peak altitude of roughly 550 km. Finally, the Hwasong-12 may have been flown on a non-optimal trajectory, one that was steeper or flatter than a normal flight path employed to maximize achievable range. However, the reported apogee of the Hwasong-12 flight is inconsistent with this explanation.
An alternative disturbing hypothesis is that tests of the missile have included a small post-boost vehicle (PBV) to provide extra boost to the payload after the main stage is discarded. The May 14 test of the Hwasong-12 was previously modeled, but could not replicate the flight’s reported apogee and range, without the addition of a small PBV. The increased velocity provided by the PBV allows the payload to reach an apogee of 2,000 km and travel about 700 km in range. The hypothesis is consistent with observations made by others, including Norbert Brugge, who identified the existence of fuelling ports located just under the Hwasong-12’s reentry vehicle.
There are logical reasons for employing a PBV. In addition to boosting range, it can be used to make fine adjustments to payload’s velocity after engine shut-down. ICBMs fielded by the US, Russia, France and China all employ PBVs to achieve better accuracy. PBVs also provide a platform to carry a warhead, plus lightweight decoys or other penetration aids capable of impairing effectiveness against missile defenses.
The presence of a PBV on the Hwasong-12 is just a hypothesis for now, although reports that the missile “broke into three pieces” are consistent with PBV engine failure. As the PBV separates from the main booster, its engine should activate and accelerate the reentry vehicle to the pre-defined velocity. If the PBV’s engine fails to initiate, and the reentry vehicle separates from the PBV, all three components (main booster, PBV and warhead) follow an approximately similar trajectory. To a distant radar, the missile appears to separate into three disparate pieces at the end of boost for no obvious reason. Without the added velocity provided by a properly functioning PBV, the reentry vehicle along with the main stage and PBV, land in the ocean 2,700 km from the launch site—well short of the missile’s maximum range. In other words, the dead weight of the non-functioning PBV, if it was fully fuelled, is equivalent to launching the missile with a 1,200 to 1,300 kg payload, as described above.
While it is impossible to know with certainty why the most recent test flew only 2,700 km, if it was the result of a failed PBV, its use on North Korea’s long-range missiles is ominous. It is another sign that Pyongyang is deadly serious about developing and fielding nuclear-tipped missiles capable of striking the US mainland, and critical US military bases in the Pacific Ocean. North Korea has much work remaining—perhaps a year or two—before it matures the technologies and systems needed to credibly threaten the US. |
• Immediate and full ceasefire in particular districts of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts of Ukraine and its strict fulfilment as of 00.00 midnight (Kiev time) on Feb. 15, 2015.
• Pull-out of all heavy weapons by both sides to equal distance with the aim of creation of a security zone on minimum 50 kilometres apart for artillery of 100mm calibre or more, and a security zone of 70km for MLRS and 140 kilometres for MLRS Tornado-S, Uragan, Smerch and tactical missile systems Tochka U.
– for armed formations of particular districts of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts of Ukraine, from the contact line in accordance with the Minsk memorandum as of Sept. 19, 2014
• The pullout of the above mentioned heavy weapons has to start no later than the second day after the ceasefire and finish within 14 days.
• This process will be assisted by OSCE with the support of the Trilateral Contact Group.
• Effective monitoring and verification of ceasefire regime and pullout of heavy weapons by OSCE will be provided from the first day of pullout, using all necessary technical means such as satellites, drones, radio-location systems etc.
• On the first day after the pullout a dialogue is to start on modalities of conducting local elections in accordance with the Ukrainian legislation and the Law of Ukraine “On temporary Order of Local Self-Governance in Particular Districts of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts,” and also about the future of these districts based on the above mentioned law.
• Without delays, but no later than 30 days from the date of signing of this document, a resolution has to be approved by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, indicating the territory which falls under the special regime in accordance with the law “On temporary Order of Local Self-Governance in Particular Districts of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts,” based in the line set up by the Minsk Memorandum as of Sept. 19, 2014.
• Provide pardon and amnesty by way of enacting a law that forbids persecution and punishment of persons in relation to events that took place in particular departments of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts of Ukraine.
• Provide release and exchange of all hostages and illegally held persons, based on the principle of “all for all”. This process has to end – at the latest – on the fifth day after the pullout (of weapons).
• Provide safe access, delivery, storage and distribution of humanitarian aid to the needy, based on an international mechanism.
• Define the modalities of a full restoration of social and economic connections, including social transfers, such as payments of pensions and other payments (income and revenue, timely payment of communal bills, restoration of tax payments within the framework of Ukrainian legal field)
• With this aim, Ukraine will restore management over the segment of its banking system in the districts affected by the conflict, and possibly, an international mechanism will be established to ease such transactions.
• Restore full control over the state border by Ukrainian government in the whole conflict zone, which has to start on the first day after the local election and end after the full political regulation (local elections in particular districts of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts based on the law of Ukraine and Constitutional reform) by the end of 2015, on the condition of fulfilment of Point 11 – in consultations and in agreement with representatives of particular districts of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts within the framework of the Trilateral Contact Group.
• Pullout of all foreign armed formations, military equipment, and also mercenaries from the territory of Ukraine under OSCE supervision. Disarmament of all illegal groups.
• Constitutional reform in Ukraine, with the new Constitution to come into effect by the end of 2015, the key element of which is decentralisation (taking into account peculiarities of particular districts of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts, agreed with representatives of these districts), and also approval of permanent legislation on special status of particular districts of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts in accordance with the measures spelt out in the footnotes, by the end of 2015. |
: A man was found dead, believed beaten to death, for allegedly stealing a pair of sports shoes worth RM200 from a second hand clothing shop in Jalan Merlin, Tampin, early today.Tampin district police chief Supt Hamazah Abdul Razak said the man's brother reported that he was driving along Jalan Batu Satu, Tampin at 4.45 am when he saw a crowd."He stopped and saw his younger brother,27, lying on the road. He rushed his brother to Tampin Hospital where doctors said he had died," he said in statement here, today.Earlier, at 2am, police received a report from a second hand clothing shop owner that he caught a man stealing a pair of sports shoes by wearing them.Police have arrested four men aged 30 to 34 years, namely the shop owner, two shop assistants and the victim's brother to aid investigation.The case was investigated under Section 302 of the Penal Code for murder. --BERNAMA |
Recent media coverage and human rights campaigns illustrating the conditions of North Korean workers in Europe seem to lead to one conclusion: that we must eliminate this problem instead of exhausting all means with which to improve the workers’ situation.
Reports suggest that Poland and Malta have both ceased to issue new visas for North Korean workers, with many suspecting that those already working in Poland will not be able to extend their visas, meaning they must soon return to the DPRK.
At present, nobody has doubts that the labor conditions of North Korean workers in Europe do not meet many EU or ILO standards. They do not receive their full wages, they have no right to organize and bargain collectively, not to mention the violation of safety standards, working hours, and the right to rest. Due to limitations imposed on them in terms of contacts with outside world, they are unable to report abuses, such as sexual harassment, if it happens. In addition, their living conditions are far lower than minimum; whatever allowance they receive is far from sufficient for daily sustenance, as is their access to medical care.
An easy, obvious response is to prevent further violations of this kind by sending these workers back home. But is eliminating the problem in this way actually going to improve their human right at home, or when they are inevitably sent again to other countries? Is their expulsion from Europe going to accomplish the designated goal of limiting the cash flow to the North Korean regime?
I suspect not.
As for the North Korean government, it will respond by simply directing its workers to other countries, where perhaps the wages are lower, the official regulations are below international labor standards, and where media or civil society monitoring capabilities are poor or non-existent. In such countries, the international community will have limited capabilities to monitor the workers’ situation and will lack the diplomatic leverage to demand improvement of conditions.
ANOTHER WAY
There is a second, maybe more difficult, but achievable solution to deal with this problem. The EU, with its high standards of labor rights, is in fact in the best position to impose conditions on those companies receiving workers from North Korea. As such, the presence of North Korean workers in Europe is an opportunity for us to show North Koreans what international standards mean, to practice what we preach.
The presence of North Korean workers in Europe is an opportunity for us to show North Koreans what international standards mean
Otherwise, how can we expect any improvement of the situation inside North Korea, if we do not reinforce our own high human rights standards? And what if we let companies that continue illegal labor practices go unmonitored and unpunished? Doing so only proves to North Korean workers that the working conditions in Europe are not so different to those of their own country.
This situation obviously calls for change, and Poland, which is presumably the country receiving the most North Korean workers in the European Union, has a moral obligation to lead this change. After all, Poland is a hub of the Solidarity movement and has a long history of fighting for workers’ rights during the communist dictatorship. Therefore, when North Korean workers are in our territory we should impose our own laws and not succumb to the conditions imposed by a country known for its abysmal human rights record.
However, sending these workers back home is not going to improve their lives, or buy us their understanding. Several years ago, when I interviewed a North Korean manager in charge of a female workforce contingent in the Czech Republic, he mentioned that the workers did not want to go back to North Korea and were extremely agitated by the media campaign against their presence there.
Not only because the workers were saving money from the meager allowance that was given to them monthly – 100 dollars in savings could go a long way to improve their lives back home – but also because they feared they would suffer repercussions. Moreover, I was told that they were informed by North Korean minders that foreign companies were making cuts to their salaries.
A North Korean manager in the Czech Republic (told me) the workers did not want to go back to North Korea and were extremely agitated by the media campaign against their presence there
These workers should be aware that it is the North Korean government that is stealing their hard-earned wages from them. At present, no one has defined any conditions, either bilaterally or supported collectively by the EU, that state employers and monitoring agencies must be given unconditional individual access to these workers.
It is the EU’s responsibility that workers must be informed of their rights and receive their salary in an individual account, and to know exactly the amount they are supposed to earn. Also, a system should be devised so that a portion of their salary is given to them individually upon departure. It will be more complicated for the North Korean government if the North Korean minders have to take money directly from the workers. And all companies where North Korean workers are hired should be identified separately, so that government labor inspection agencies and NGOs can regularly monitor the conditions and have access to the workers.
An important guideline of human rights activism is that we do not cause harm to those we are trying to help, the individuals whose rights we are advocates for. As such, we should use the present situation as an opportunity to negotiate for better work and living conditions of these North Korean workers, not call for their expulsion, which may cause harm upon their return home. We need to show these workers that we are trying to improve their situation and that we are not working against them.
Residing in a foreign territory gives them slightly more freedom than in their own country. But they need to be aware that the situation in other countries is vastly different for its citizens, not only in terms of the economic standards they see on the streets or when they go shopping in the supermarket; this is not enough. They also must be educated and have direct experience that workers in European countries have better rights.
Main picture: NK News |
.- Bishop Bawai Soro was on Tuesday appointed Bishop of the Chaldean Eparchy of Mar Addai of Toronto, which serves Canada's estimated 40,000 Chaldean Catholics.
The Oct. 31 appointment fills the vacancy left by August's transfer of Bishop Emmanuel Shaleta to the Chaldean Eparchy of Saint Peter the Apostle of San Diego.
Bishop Soro was born in 1954 in Kirkuk, Iraq, and was baptized into the Assyrian Church of the East, a non-Chalcedonian Church based in northen Iraq. His family emigrated to Lebanon in 1973, and then to the US in 1976.
He was ordained a deacon in the Assyrian Church of the East in 1973, a priest in 1982, and a bishop in 1984. Whila a priest he served as pastor of a parish in Toronto, and was bishop of the Assyrian eparchies of San José and Seattle.
He obtained a master's degree in theology from the Catholic University of America in 1992, and a doctorate from the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas in 2002. While a bishop, he was actively involved in ecumenical dialogue between the Assyrian Church of the East and the Catholic Church.
Bishop Soro was received into communion with the Catholic Church in 2008, along with nearly 1,000 families of his Church.
He was received into the Chaldean Catholic Church, which is the Catholic analogue to the Assyrian Church of the East. Both Churches use the East Syrian rite. They are both derived from the Church of the East, a non-Chalcedonian Church which experienced a schism in 1552.
In 2014 he was appointed protosyncellus, or vicar general, of the Chaldean Eparchy of Saint Peter the Apostle of San Diego.
Bishop Soro has been outspoken about the persecution of Christians in his native Iraq, and has applauded their perseverance.
In June, he told CNA that “the story of suffering of Iraqi Christians is an ongoing phenomenon.” He reflected on his family's perseverance in the face of the Ottoman's Assyrian genocide, saying that “if my grandparents survived this difficulty and were able to hand their faith to the next generations, this suffering generation will do the same.”
The Chaldean Eparchy of Mar Addai of Toronto was established in 2011. It consists of 10 parishes and missions, and is served by 10 priests and two deacons. |
China’s debt boom, or “credit boom” in more palatable terms – whose true extent remains purposefully obscure – and what it might do to the Chinese economy and by extension to the global economy is starting to worry some folks at the New York Fed. This is how their article starts out:
Debt in China has increased dramatically in recent years, accounting for roughly one-half of all new credit created globally since 2005. The country’s share of total global credit is nearly 25 percent, up from 5 percent ten years ago. By some measures (as documented below), China’s credit boom has reached the point where countries typically encounter financial stress, which could spill over to international markets given the size of the Chinese economy.
The data points can give you the willies:
Nonfinancial debt in China has soared sevenfold in a little over a decade, from about $3 trillion at the end of 2005 to nearly $22 trillion.
Banking assets (mostly loans) have soared sixfold during the same period to over 300% of GDP.
In 2016 alone, credit outstanding jumped by over $3 trillion; the pace of growth was about twice that of nominal GDP.
The report:
The international experience suggests that such a rapid buildup is often followed by stress in domestic banking systems. Roughly one-third of boom cases end up in financial crises and another third precede extended periods of below-trend economic growth.
The surge in nonfinancial sector debt kicked off with corporate borrowing, mostly in the infrastructure and property sectors. More recently, household debt began to surge, mostly mortgages; again the property sector.
Lending by banks is still the largest component of the credit boom, but as authorities are trying to keep it from spiraling out of control, “shadow” lending by nonbanks (trust loans, entrusted lending, and undiscounted bankers’ acceptances) has surged:
Nonbanks, often in cooperation with banks, have found ways around authorities’ efforts to restrict lending to certain sectors (such as real estate and industries with excess capacity like steel and cement) following the initial surge in credit in 2009.
This shadow credit accounts for about 15% of total credit, or 31% of GDP, up from 5% ten years ago. Authorities have been trying to contain this shadow credit boom since 2013 via macroprudential measures. But where there’s a will, there’s a way: these efforts likely “caused credit to migrate to other lending channels.”
Meanwhile, in line with the house price bubble, mortgage lending became the latest driver in the debt boom: At the end of December 2016, residential mortgage loans were up 35% year-over-year.
But debt may be ballooning even faster.
The increasing complexity of China’s financial system has made it difficult to estimate the true level and growth rate of credit. Official data put nonfinancial debt at roughly 205 percent of GDP. However, adjustments for additional sources of credit not fully captured in the official data suggest total credit could be higher.
One way that the growth in debt could be underestimated:
[T]he pace of total credit growth is higher when swaps of local government-related bank loans for municipal bonds are included. China’s credit measure excludes swapped bank loans but does not add back the municipal bonds they were exchanged for.
The annual growth in the People’s Bank of China’s measure of “total social financing” – which includes bank loans, off-balance-sheet financing, trust loans, and net corporate debt issuance – is now around 12% (about half of what it had been during the blistering surge after the Financial Crisis). That’s the official figure.
But with the muni bonds swapped for bank loans added into the equation, annual credit growth would be above 15%.
The smaller banks are doing it.
Chinese authorities have had some impact trying to control credit growth at the big four state-owned banks, ranked among the five largest banks globally by assets. But the smaller banks “have been growing their total assets at two to three times the pace of the largest commercial banks.” And they have some special products. The report:
Joint stock commercial banks (JSBs), city commercial banks (CCBs), and other smaller-scale institutions have increasingly used less stable funding sources to finance their balance sheet expansion, primarily by tapping the interbank market and issuing wealth management products (WMP)…. WMPs are predominantly short-term investment products sold by banks and nonbank financial institutions that provide investors with higher rates of return than bank deposit rates. WMPs can have a range of underlying assets, including bonds, money market funds, and even a limited amount of bank loans. Official data on banks’ WMPs show an almost sixfold increase since 2011, to the equivalent of about $4 trillion or 37 percent of GDP. The growing reliance of Chinese banks on this type of funding has increased concerns over potential shocks to market-based funding, a risk highlighted by the International Monetary Fund in its October 2016 Global Financial Stability Report.
But “less bang for the debt,” so to speak.
As debt ballooned, its effectiveness in stimulating economic output has declined. The “credit pulse” – the change in the flow of new credit as a percentage of GDP – “appears to be providing less bang to output for each additional yuan of credit, underscoring questions over how much lending is going to unproductive ‘zombie’ companies”:
But authorities might keep the plates spinning for a while longer, and waiting for that financial crisis in China, and what it might do to the global economy, might require some patience. According to the report, China’s financial system sports some features that for the moment lower the risks of “a financial disruption,” among them:
Unlike credit booms in other emerging markets that ended in financial crises, China’s high domestic savings have funded much of its credit boom.
Chinese authorities can drag this out with their liquidity tools, “including high required reserve ratios,” central bank liquidity injections, “and a financial sector dominated by state-owned lenders and borrowers.”
The government gross debt (including off-balance-sheet borrowing implicitly guaranteed by the state) was 60% of GDP at the end of 2016, lower than in most advanced economies. And the government still sits on about $3 trillion of dwindling foreign exchange reserves.
So the government has some capacity “to absorb potential losses from a financial disruption.” But worries persist.
Still, the speed and increasing complexity of the country’s credit growth suggest that there could be significant benefits for China in addressing its banking system and financial reforms.
And do so presumably before contagion spreads to the rest of the world.
It started with a whimper and has turned into a roar: China and other foreign governments are dumping US Treasuries. Read… Foreign Governments Dump US Treasuries as Never Before, But Who the Heck is Buying Them?
Enjoy reading WOLF STREET and want to support it? Using ad blockers – I totally get why – but want to support the site? You can donate “beer money.” I appreciate it immensely. Click on the beer mug to find out how:
Would you like to be notified via email when WOLF STREET publishes a new article? Sign up here. |
Drillers on the Deepwater Horizon began having trouble with pressure from the Macondo well about 20 minutes before the fatal explosions that killed 11 workers, destroyed the rig and caused the largest oil spill in U.S. history. But no one tried to shut off the well until after the fire erupted, according to testimony from several survivors at hearings Thursday in Kenner.
New testimony from Chief Mate David Young raised questions about why the well wasn't shut down before a kick of gas shot up the rig's riser, spewing mud and seawater and taking the vessel's senior officers by surprise. The top two Transocean officers on the rig at the time testified Thursday that anyone who had a concern about safety could have called a "timeout" to shut off a well that might go out of control, but that was never done.
A joint investigative panel of the Coast Guard and Minerals Management Service held its fourth day of hearings to determine what went wrong on April 20. The hearings have been long and complex because of the technical nature of the drilling industry and because several companies' employees played a role in the disaster; BP owned the well, but leased the rig from Switzerland-based Transocean, which provided most of the rig workers. Halliburton was hired to place cement seals in the well, M-I SWACO provided drilling mud, Schlumberger had a team on the rig to run tests and other companies provided key pieces of equipment.
Young, whose job included providing cement slurry to Halliburton contractors, said he stopped by the rig's drill floor about 9:30 p.m. on April 20 to see when they would need the cement. He said he found drilling supervisor Jason Anderson and chief driller Dewey Revette there, trying to analyze some problematic pressure readings from down in the well.
Anderson and Revette were among the workers killed in the accident.
"They had a concern with differential pressure," Young said. "They said it would be a little longer to figure it out, for the cement job meeting. They were seeing a differential pressure. I didn't ask any questions about it."
Young said that after he went to another office to report that the cement job would be delayed, he heard a release of gas. "I knew something was up so I went to the bridge," he said.
Also on the bridge was the rig's master, Curt Kuchta, who was giving a tour to BP executives who had flown in to celebrate the rig's safety record. Kuchta testified the VIPs were "basically playing a video game," using a simulator of rig controls on the bridge that was usually used for crew training. The other top officer on the rig, offshore installation manager Jimmy Harrell, was in the shower when the first of several explosions happened about 9:49 p.m., he testified.
It wasn't until Harrell stumbled out of the shower, put on some clothes, arrived on the bridge and consulted with Kuchta that the captain said he ordered the activation of shear rams on the blowout preventer and the emergency disconnect system at 9:56 p.m., according to their testimony.
Harrell said he believed the explosions somehow disabled the blowout preventer's control panel and the emergency disconnect system, neither of which worked.
Young wrote in a statement to Coast Guard investigators immediately after being rescued that the drillers were "having well issues," but he testified Thursday that he didn't realize that meant they "had lost control of the well."
Capt. Hung Nguyen, chairman of the joint Coast Guard and Minerals Management Service investigative panel, has raised concerns in the hearings about a lack of clarity over who was ultimately in charge on the oil rig. Noting that Transocean puts the offshore installation manager in charge when the unit is drilling, and that the captain is in charge when the vessel is "under way," Nguyen said that neither top official seemed to have "visibility" of the events that led to the disaster.
Harrell testified that BP was constantly changing the well plan over the final days, including the significant addition of a 9 7/8-inch metal casing that tapered to 7 inches at the bottom and lined the inside of the well.
A draft of BP's internal investigation, which was released Tuesday by the House Energy and Commerce Committee, says that particular casing suffered a "loss of integrity" and "created a path" for gas to shoot up to the rig.
Harrell said cement used to close in the casing was infused with nitrogen, and it was the first time he'd ever seen this relatively new type of faster-curing cement used at such depths. He said he'd heard of problems with nitrogen getting into the well and acknowledged he may have reacted to the planned use of that type of cement by saying, "Well, I guess that's what we have those pinchers for," referring to the last-ditch shear rams that would be needed to shut the well in an emergency.
But when pressed, he denied being worried about the cement plan.
Harrell also said he was handed a plan on the morning of the disaster that called for his crew to displace drilling mud with lighter seawater without conducting a critical negative pressure test on the well. Harrell said he would never do such a thing and discussed it with BP's company man, Robert Kaluza.
He was ultimately successful at getting BP to authorize the negative pressure test and, in fact, the test was performed twice.
Harrell said he was happy with the results of both tests, which, ideally, would have shown no drilling mud being returned to the rig. BP's internal investigation said the initial test, done several hours before the accident, showed a return of 15 barrels, when "normal compressibility" is 5 barrels. The BP report said the second test showed no more than 3 barrels returned.
Through it all, Harrell said he wasn't concerned.
Kaluza was scheduled to testify at Thursday's hearing, but declined by invoking his Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself. His lawyer, Shaun Clarke, professed Kaluza's innocence Wednesday.
The other BP company man on the rig at the time, Donald Vidrine, also was scheduled to testify but postponed until July, citing an illness, Nguyen said.
In testimony before Congress earlier this month, Tim Probert, a top executive for cement contractor Halliburton, said that if there's any concern with pressure tests, a rig should do a definitive test of the well's cement job, called a cement bond log.
But BP sent home a crew it had on stand-by to run that test without performing it. A spokesman for the testing contractor, Schlumberger, said his firm's crew was sent home at 11 a.m. on the day of the accident, more than six hours before the first negative pressure test was ever run.
Harrell also testified that BP decided not to run a bottoms-up test, which takes a sample of the drilling mud from the deepest part of the well to measure pressures and temperatures there. Donald Godwin, an attorney for Halliburton, asked Harrell if he was aware that Halliburton had "recommended running substantially more mud than BP decided to run," but Harrell said he was not aware of that and wasn't concerned about the lack of a bottoms-up test.
Other testimony Thursday turned one of the great ironies of the accident on its head. It's been widely reported that top BP and Transocean executives were visiting the rig to congratulate its crew on seven years without any lost-time accidents, and that was confirmed by the rig workers who testified Wednesday and Thursday in Kenner. But Jason Mathews, representing Minerals Management Service on the investigative panel, introduced MMS records that showed the rig had in fact reported a lost-time accident in August 2008, although the witnesses all said they weren't aware of it. |
Getty Images
The night shift isn’t usually anyone’s first choice, but in some professions — and in this economy — it can’t be avoided. About 26% percent of the American workforce, including health-care workers and sanitation staff, clocks in after dark, and the schedule may be taking a toll on their health.
Past research has shown that working when you’re supposed to be in bed disrupts your circadian rhythm, raising the risk of heart disease, obesity, ulcers and even depression. Now, reporting in the journal PLoS Medicine, scientists also find that rotating night-shift work can increase the risk of developing Type 2 diabetes. The backward schedule can mess with the body’s ability to use insulin properly to break down sugars in the blood, according to Dr. Frank Hu, a professor of nutrition and epidemiology at Harvard School of Public Health.
In a study involving nearly 177,000 middle-aged women enrolled in two Nurses’ Health Studies, women who worked rotating night shifts for 1 to 2 years increased their risk of developing diabetes by 5% over a 20-year follow-up period, compared with women who didn’t get assigned these shifts. Women who kept up night work for 10 to 19 years increased their risk by 40%. Working on and off at night for more than 20 years boosted the risk of diabetes by 60%.
Certainly, body weight is part of the problem, since excess weight is a risk factor for diabetes. People who work at night may snack more when they should be sleeping — and our bodies are metabolically trained to slow down as the sun sets. So the calories we take in during the evening and night hours are less likely to get burned off efficiently, and more likely to be stored as fat.
It’s not just night work that causes a problem. Simply not sleeping when you’re supposed to, or not getting enough sleep, can also wreak havoc with your metabolism, by pushing up levels of the appetite-stimulating hormone ghrelin and suppressing the appetite-curbing hormone leptin. Our circadian clocks also regulate body weight indirectly, by controlling body temperature and blood glucose levels. “The bottom line is there are probably multiple mechanisms through which disrupted sleep patterns or long term rotating night shift work can influence the risk of Type 2 diabetes,” says Hu.
The study focused on people who rotated night shift work, so they weren’t working nights routinely, but perhaps once every few days or weeks. Hu says it’s not clear whether those who regularly work at night (and therefore sleep during the day) can adjust their body clocks to avoid this increased risk of diabetes.
What intrigued Hu and his team the most was the cumulative effect that night work had on diabetes risk. The longer people worked irregular hours at night, the higher their risk of developing the disease. “It’s something people should keep in mind,” he says. “If they minimize or reduce the time they work on night shifts, they may be able to attenuate their risk.”
That’s an important lesson for those who have to work at night. They might not be able to avoid the late hours, but they should remember that sticking with a night shift schedule for too long can be harmful for their health. And because these individuals may be at higher risk of developing diabetes, they should pay more attention to things that can lower their risk, such as watching their diet, exercising and getting screened for the disease more regularly.
Alice Park is a writer at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @aliceparkny. You can also continue the discussion on TIME’s Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME. |
Toil is no longer king. To a large degree, agricultural success these days is reserved for those who have the time and capacity to figure out which technologies will benefit their farms the most and for those who can implement them in the best way possible.
In a climate-controlled cab, while listening to the Blue Jays game, a farmer can control a machine approximately the size of a small house with a simple joystick. He or she doesn’t need to steer because the machine does that by itself. The farmer has full control over the machine’s thousands of moving parts via a touchscreen monitor.
Most combines in circulation now are capable of threshing hundreds of thousands of dollars-worth of crop per day. They are also capable of processing and displaying a phenomenal amount of information. The farmer knows exactly how many bushels per acre his or her combine is processing.
Farming has become a vocation for the detailed, the tech savvy, the geek. From seeding to spraying to harvesting, and all the minute processes in between, farms are relying on machines capable of gathering and processing awe-inspiring amounts of information.
A sprayer that increases dosage in areas of a field that are more disease-prone will increase yield potential, increase profits, and allow that plot of land to generate more food. It’s called variable-rate technology. And it’s only one example of the way farms have evolved into digital playgrounds to grow more food on a finite supply of acres, feeding a hungry market, and offsetting rising land prices.
Companies such as Case IH, John Deere, Caterpillar, and many others have invested millions (if not billions) in developing cutting edge technologies previously used in military applications for the agricultural market.
In many ways it’s a brave new world. And an intimidating one.
Robotics will find their way onto farms sooner than you and I think. Technology is advancing at a pace advantageous to those waiting for what’s new to become affordable.
In 2014, Grainews reported on ag-based technology that involved an advanced drone mapping a farmer’s field for specific weeds then sending that data to a fleet of unmanned tractors that would use it to locate and kill specific weeds on the field.
When such technologies become accessible to farmers like, say, me, the farmer will be nearly unrecognizable from a generation ago. And while I’m loath to call technological advancements progress without looking at them critically, I do believe that machinery allowing us to be more precise and effective in our use of chemicals is a good thing.
In August 2016, Case IH unveiled an unmanned, autonomous, high-horsepower tractor, a first for the industry. Previous attempts at robotic tractors were on smaller machines. The company has expressed its desire to market this technology to farmers.
Right now, on my farm, the tractors we use the most steer themselves. Our combine is a constant learning curve. And what we have is old. The return on investment for a farm this size must be high and nearly immediate for us to consider purchasing the kinds of technology the ag industry would consider new.
What is accessible and has my undivided attention is the use of drones for basic agronomy. While there are drones available for mapping and some even have the capacity to spray weeds themselves, my interest in them is much more pedestrian: field scouting.
To fly a video drone over areas I can’t access via truck, tractor or atv could be a valuable exercise.
Last spring, gophers ate a few acres of my then newly planted soybeans. This problem was new to me. I did what I could to mitigate the damage once an agronomist helped me determine what the problem was (it bewildered a lot of people), but the result was a loss of about two acres, which, at last year’s yields and prices, equaled a loss of more than $1,000.
In the southwest corner of the field, in an area I couldn’t get to nor see, gophers kept eating, a problem I only took stock of once combining.
Had I scouted that field and that area with an entry-level drone capable of taking video or stills, it would have paid for itself.
Toil is still very much a part of any successful farm, but in many ways it’s taking a back seat to buttons, switches, programs, and monitors. This means increased precision and less waste. And it means increased food production on a finite amount of land.
Next time you see a farmer, thank them, then assume they are handling technologies that put most things in your house to shame. |
Naomi Watts is a part of the season three cast…
For this week’s installment of fan theory Friday I’m citing myself, going back to an article I wrote last year for One Perfect Shot.
It has always seemed to me that Twin Peaks was a turning point in the career of David Lynch, a point at which he developed the themes and ideas that would ripple through the rest of his work. Twin Peaks feels like Lost Highway feels like Mulholland Drive feels like Inland Empire in ways his earlier work doesn’t share. There are currents of duality, dream states, dubious identities, the symbiotic relationship between sex and violence, and betrayal in each of these films, but two in particular I’ve come to believe share more than thematic similarities. Brace yourselves: I think Twin Peaks, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, and Mulholland Drive all exist in the same universe, because I think Mulholland Drive, like those other works, is ultimately about The Black Lodge.
Okay, before I get into this, it isn’t a theory for the casual fan, you have to have at least a cursory knowledge of the plots of Twin Peaks the series, its movie prequel Fire Walk With Me, and Mulholland Drive. Furthermore, you need to accept that Mulholland Drive has two parts: the dream part had by Diane Selwyn (Naomi Watts) in which she is Betty and her lover Camilla Rhodes (Laura Harring) is amnesiac Rita that constitutes the first 2/3rds of the film, and then the final third of the film in which Diane is returned to her actual reality, which is pretty much the opposite of her dream. If you know all that, then we’re cool to proceed.
It all starts with Diane/Betty, because both are the same: Betty is a combination of who Diane was when she came to Los Angeles to pursue her dream of acting, who she thought she could be, and who she really is at present. When we finally meet the real Diane, we see this combination in her appearance, body language, and attitude: she isn’t just jaded, she’s bitter, she hasn’t been disillusioned by Hollywood, she’s been broken. She can’t get any good parts, her lady lover is falling for another, of the opposite sex, no less, replacing her in a way she can’t counter, and everything she wanted from life is getting further out of her reach every day, while the sickly simple reality of her meager existence becomes clearer. She’s not the special person she dreamed of being. She has gone from being a bright-eyed, naïve young woman upon arrival – the woman we see at the start of her dream – to the opposite, dour, desperate, and all-too aware of the harsh realities of her chosen profession and its environment. This sense of duality marks her as similar to Laura Palmer, who was simultaneously a charitable homecoming queen and a drug-abusing sex pot. Also like Laura, and for that matter like Teresa Banks and Annie Blackburn, Diane is young, pretty, and blond. It is the corruption of Diane’s pure soul by failure and heartbreak that make her a viable target for The Black Lodge, I think, which taps into people’s greatest fears to claim their souls. By the structure of Mulholland Drive, it can be interpreted that Diane’s dream happens after a fight with Camilla that resulted in the latter woman leaving in a way that threatened the relationship. After Diane wakes, we see them reconcile slightly, only to soon after see Camilla’s advancing relationship with the director of the film they’re both working on (Justin Theroux), Camilla as a lead and Diane in a much smaller and less significant role. When this relationship between Camilla and the director culminates in an engagement announcement, cruelly done in front of Diane, it pushes Diane to the breaking point, priming her soul for seizure by the spirits of The Black Lodge.
This tipping point manifests itself in the scene at Winkie’s Diner in which Diane is hiring Joe to kill Camilla. As the Devil would when offering a deal, Joe makes sure she knows exactly what she’s doing in setting this up, warning her that once she agrees, it can’t be undone. This is a binding agreement, in other words. Joe then produces a blue key, and tells her when the deed has been done, she will find it. She asks what it opens. Joe laughs, but says nothing. This key serves the same purpose as the Owl Cave ring in Fire Walk With Me, it is the totem that binds or weds a soul to a possessing spirit of The Black Lodge, but only if accepted willingly. The key, as we already know at this point of the film, will open a corresponding blue box. What we don’t yet know but are about to learn is what the box holds. But the fact that the key is given to Diane by Joe makes him, as mentioned, either possessed by the Hobo behind the diner, or the Hobo himself just differently manifested. Either way, by hiring a hitman, Diane is giving into her fears of rejection and loneliness, she is allowing these fears to guide her, and once the action these fears have set in motion is accomplished, once her soul has forever crossed that line, she will be ready to be taken by The Black Lodge. All that will be left to do is for her to willingly part the curtain.
For the rest of my argument, one simply needs to take a close look at the final sequence of the film, which begins just after the above scene in Winkie’s. We start with another slow approach to the rear of the diner, where earlier in the film the crusty Hobo was revealed. It’s nighttime now, in contrast to the previous scene between Diane and Joe, in which it was daylight. The Hobo is there again, this time holding the blue box. It is placed in a paper bag and set on the ground. Seconds later, a miniaturized elderly couple runs out of the bag, presumably out of the box. These are the possessing spirits of The Black Lodge, the same elderly couple we met at the beginning of Diane’s dream. You’ll recall from both Twin Peaks and Fire Walk With Me that one of the first ways The Black Lodge tries to stake a claim on souls is by coming to them in weakened states of consciousness like dreams or delusions. In Diane’s dream, the couple sees her off towards the warping of reality and fiction that will eventually cause her fragile psyche to shatter, thus making her ripe for their consumption.
The next thing we see is the blue key in Diane’s apartment. So the deed has been done. Camilla, Diane’s lover – and her rival – is dead. Diane has accepted this, she has taken the key as it were, and thus unknowingly, she has invited the spirits of The Black Lodge to come for her soul. It’s important to note we don’t see her discover the key, we come into the scene with her having already found it, sitting on the couch staring at it. The discovery and subsequent acceptance of the key happened, like Camilla’s murder, in the interim between the scenes in and behind Winkie’s Diner. Diane’s fate is all but sealed, the only thing left is the possessing.
Diane in this moment is the worst we’ve seen her yet, she’s expressionless, emotionless, trembling and pale, a shell of a person with no love anywhere in her life, no prospect of love or happiness or contentedness or even basic goodness ever again, only fear and hate ahead of her. At this point it’s hard to tell if Diane knows what’s happening, but the way she stares at the key indicates she knows it is something to fear, something that could unlock something even more horrible than the life her fears have carved out for her. There’s a knock at her door. The tiny elderly couple are seen to crawl under it. The knocking continues but Diane pays it no mind. The light in the room starts to strobe blue – just like it did in Laura’s bedroom when BOB would come to her in Fire Walk With Me, or in the train car when she was murdered, or when Coop was in the waiting room in his dream and again in the final episode of season two – which is a clear sign that The Black Lodge and its denizens have taken over this reality. Screaming starts, and suddenly Diane is on the run from the spirits, full-sized now and aggressively pursing her with extreme and ravenous prejudice. They are giddy this close to possession, to consumption of the “garmonbozia” that constitutes her soul.
Blue light. Screaming. Blue light. Screaming. All so horribly and frighteningly familiar. Diane is cornered by the spirits in her bedroom. Their moment is at hand. But at the last second, the very last second, Diane makes one final decision, and though violent, I believe it saves her soul from eternity in The Black Lodge: she shoots herself. The spirits vanish into smoke that fills the room and the blue light slows its strobe to a twitching glow. The Hobo is seen again, then Diane as Betty – her ideal version of herself – the details of her face washed out by a blinding white light, just like the one Laura was washed in at the end of Fire Walk With Me, which I think means her soul was claimed by The White Lodge instead of The Black, as was Laura’s when she rejected her possession by willing her own death; suicide by another, you could say. There in the white light of The White Lodge we see Diane/Betty reunited with Camilla as Rita – Diane’s ideal version of her lover, with no memory of any other affection. It makes sense Camilla would be there too because if she was killed by Joe and Joe is a possession or some other manifestation of the Hobo, an agent of The Black Lodge, then The White Lodge would have a claim on her soul as she wasn’t killed for possession, but to aid in the possession of another. Camilla/Rita is just a collateral victim, like Ronette Pulaski was intended to be.
https://medium.com/media/2f2cecd02c1d42b47b2c9001e2c7fcd7/href
All of the above is punctuated, I believe, by the very last scene of the film in which we are returned to Club Silencio – where a thick red curtain hangs as a backdrop, the emcee wears a red suit, and there is always music in the air, even when no one is singing.
Any of that sound familiar?
That’s because Club Silencio is the waiting room of The Black Lodge in Los Angeles. If you recall, it’s Rita and Betty who visit the club, which means it happens in the dream. The first time Laura and Coop both see their waiting room is also in a dream (in Fire Walk With Me and Twin Peaks, respectively). And what happens this last time in the club? We see the singer, but there’s no music, no song, and all she says is, “Silencio.” The silence is because there’s also no fresh soul to torture, the jig is up, the game is over.
The waiting room is silent because it is empty.
This is all obviously speculation, informed speculation to be sure, obsessively so, but it’s not like I have actual evidence to give my theory a little support or any–
Oh. Wait. Yeah I do. Check this out:
Image from Cult Faction
That is Ronette Pulaski (Phoebe Augustine) and Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee) sitting in Club Silencio in the dream when Rita and Betty visit. I mean, why even put them there, what’s the point if not to make an allusion to Twin Peaks? And not just any allusion, it’s not Big Ed and Norma sitting there, it’s BOB’s victims. And yes, I know Ronette Pulaski wasn’t killed by BOB, but her soul was certainly scarred by him and The Black Lodge, and we don’t know what happened to her after season two, which would have been a decade before this. Trauma like what Ronette went through could lead to mental issues that could lead to suicide or accidental death, and it isn’t improbable to think The Black Lodge has some claim on her given her experiences with it and its agents. And in case you think this isn’t real and that’s not really them, think again. Phoebe Augustine, who played Ronette, is listed in the credits on IMDB (but not in the film) as “Woman in Club Silencio.” Sheryl Lee is not listed either place, but I wouldn’t list her either if I was Lynch and trying to keep this connection on the down low: her name is synonymous with Twin Peaks.
Further, in an interview with The AV Club a few years ago, actress Sherilyn Fenn (Audrey Horne) said that Mulholland was originally conceived at the time of Twin Peaks as a spinoff for her character that never came to be:
“The Audrey spin-off that would’ve come about, it really ended up being the original idea for Mulholland Drive. That was either in between the first and second season or after the second season, but they were like, ‘What if we did a movie, and it’s Audrey in California?’ And they talked about an opening scene of her driving along Mulholland Drive, and how she’s a little bit older. Whatever it was going to be, it never ended up happening for me. But I was young, and I thought it sounded weird, because no one ever really did that. I was, like, ‘Okay, but do people do that? Go from TV to a movie as the same character?’ Then all those years later, David made the other one, and I didn’t have anything to do with it.”
I mean – so even if everything I laid out above is utter and total bullshit, at the very, very least we know that Mulholland Drive in its original concept was linked to the series. Could the idea have gone that you can take the girl away from Twin Peaks but not Twin Peaks from the girl? You gotta admit, Rita/Camilla is a dead ringer for older Audrey, and the girlish naiveté of Betty is also similar to Audrey’s disposition. Add to that the inclusion of Laura and Ronette in Club Silencio, and if Mulholland Drive isn’t a Twin Peaks story, I’ll eat my copy of The Secret Diary of Laura Palmer with a cup of coffee and a slice of cherry pie.
So if true, what does this mean for the third season of Twin Peaks? Well, keep in mind Naomi Watts, Sheryl Lee, and Phoebe Augustine are all in the cast, as is Robert Forster, who has a small role as a detective in Mulholland Drive. The roles of Watts and Forster are yet unknown by name, but we do know Forster is playing a cop. We also know – and this is really tantalizing – that there was some filming for season three done in an exclusive Parisian club conceived and co-owned by David Lynch. Know what that club is called? Do I even have to tell you? It’s called Silencio.
And then there’s this thing I’ve kind of been ignoring until now. Diane. As in, like “Diane, I’m holding in my hand a small box of chocolate bunnies.” What if, just what if Diane Selwyn before she moved to L.A. to follow her dreams took a more practical route of employment and worked as a secretary for the FBI? And what if following the disappearance or whatever happened to her trusted, beloved boss, Special Agent Dale Cooper, Diane just couldn’t work for the Bureau anymore so took off west to start a new life? It’s a stretch, I already admitted that, but it would certainly explain in part why Diane was targeted by The Black Lodge – she would know almost everything Coop did about it via his reports.
In the end, there’s no absolute interpretation of Mulholland Drive, the film was never intended to be just one thing, that’s pretty much the point of it. And I know that Mr. Lynch isn’t fond of fan interpretations of his films, but if that’s the case, he shouldn’t make his films so damn obtusely-fascinating. This is mostly just an exercise in extrapolation, a hypothesis that got stuck in my mind and just wouldn’t go away until I did something about it. But you have to admit, my theory isn’t impossible. Nothing is when we’re talking about the art of David Lynch. |
Donald Trump’s victory in the presidential race is probably bad news for Edward Snowden if he was hoping for a chance to leave Russia for a warmer climate or a more open political environment. Trump, in his typically over-the-top blustery manner has more than once called the man who exposed the NSA’s massive program for monitoring the electronic communications of Americans and even of the leaders of our purported foreign allies, a “spy” who should be “executed.”
But his election should be good news for Julian Assange, founder of Wikileaks. It was the Wikileaks disclosure of hacked copies of Hilllary Clinton’s secret speeches to the country’s big banks, and of the emails to and from Clinton campaign chair John Pedesta, describing among other things her campaign’s, and the Democratic National Committee’s sabotage of Bernie Sanders’ insurgent primary campaign, which almost certainly handed the presidency to Trump. (In one leaked email, Hillary Clinton asks if Assange could be “droned.”)
Snowden is fine and safe living in asylum in Russia, but Assange has for four years been trapped in the Ecuadoran Embassy in London, which is really just a large apartment in a ritzy section of the city. There London Metropolitan Police stand guard round the clock ready to grab him if he tries to leave. Assange is being sought by an Ahab-like right-wing Swedish prosecutor with links to US intelligence for questioning about a trumped up pair of dodgy “rape” complaints long since debunked and withdrawn by two Swedish women, but because of the continued extradition demand from Sweden and a British arrest warrant issued on orders of a complicit right-wing British government, he is trapped. His understandable fear is that, with a sealed warrant for his arrest on espionage charges which is being held at the ready by the US Justice Department, the whole Swedish case is really about getting him delivered to Sweden, from which country he could be extradited to the US. (Assange has offered to voluntarily go to Sweden to be questioned by prosecutors if the Swedish government would promise not to extradite him to the US, but the Swedish government has refused such a guarantee, making the whole scheme apparent.)
Clearly, what Trump should do is announce that he intends to have his Justice Department drop all charges against Assange and Wikileaks.
Trump claims he wants, in his first 100 days as president, to “clean out the swamp” in Washington, DC. If he’s serious about that Herculean, and immensely popular task, he should reverse the Obama policy of, for the past eight years, vigorously prosecuting and jailing government whistleblowers. President Obama’s administration has been the most secretive and the most aggressive prosecutor of whistleblowing of any administration in history, and that Nixonian obsession with secrecy has been one of the primary reasons for the endemic corruption in the nation’s capital.
But even if Trump is not serious about rooting out government and political corruption, he still owes it to Assange to stop the US government’s hounding of him publishing leaked government documents, given how his own campaign benefited from some of those very leaks.
If the new president-elect really does want to be the “president of all Americans,” and wants to try and win over the majority of US citizens who polls show don’t trust him and didn’t vote for him (Trump, like G. W. Bush, lost the popular vote, remember), a good place to start would be to end the hounding of Julian Assange. |
On April 2, the television network A&E premiered 8 Minutes, a "reality" show premised on "trying to save prostitutes," as executive producer Tom Forman put it. The network cast Forman, cop-turned-pastor Kevin Brown, and their team as heroes, undertaking "harrowing undercover missions" around Houston, Texas—"the epicenter of human trafficking in the United States," according to A&E. Pastor Brown would pose as a client and lure sex workers to a hotel room, where he revealed that his true aim was rescue. "Brown has determined that eight minutes is the maximum amount of time to safely convince these women to leave with his team—any longer puts everyone's lives at risk," said A&E.
But women who worked with 8 Minutes tell quite a different story, challenging the show's claims to both reality and altruism. This week, A&E quietly cancelled the program entirely and removed all episodes from the A&E site.
Even before it aired, 8 Minutes was controversial. In marketing the show, Pastor Brown and producers routinely conflated consensual commercial sex with sex trafficking and portrayed all sex workers as victims of violent pimps. This tone continued in the opening episodes, which were also rife with sensationalist and sexualized imagery.
Then, in late April, a woman calling herself Kamylla came forward with even more damning info about the show. A Texas mother facing eviction and no job prospects, she had taken to prostitution secretly and reluctantly. Kamylla was not forced into sex work, but neither did she relish the situation. When 8 Minutes offered her a seeming way out, she was excited about the opportunity.
No one from the show pretended to be a client, said Kamylla. The caller, a woman, identified herself as an assistant producer with 8 Minutes and after several phone conversations in November 2014 they met in person. On the phone, the producer had promised compensation and help getting out of sex work but been vague about specifics.
In person, she said the show would pay just $150-$200 on the day of filming. But she also promised Kamylla job placement, medical, and housing assistance. When Kamylla agreed to be on the show, the producer told her there was no need "to go back to 'life,'" she says.
On the day of 8 Minutes' "harrowing undercover mission" shoot, producers staged a call between Kamylla and Pastor Brown to arrange a meeting, with Brown acting like a client. At the hotel room, Kamylla was told to act surprised when Brown revealed his true identity and ignore the myriad TV cameras all around. Afterward one of the women drove Kamylla back to a friend who had given her a ride and only paid her $200 when Kamylla brought it up. When she asked about housing assistance, she was told not to worry—and not to go back to sex work—someone from the show would contact her the next day.
That never happened. When Kamylla called them a week later, they told her there was nothing they could offer by way of eviction or other assistance, save for giving her the number of a counselor. They did get in touch once more—to ask if Kamylla could recommend other women for the show.
Kamylla found Pastor Brown's number and contacted him directly. "When I said I am being evicted, I need a laywer, I feel like you guys used me, he started to pray," Kamylla told me.
Buzzfeed's Ariane Lange interviewed several sex workers who had worked with 8 Minutes. One woman, going by the pseudonym "Jazzy," said producers did not honor her request that her face be blurred in the broadcast. Another's husband was filmed posing as her pimp. None of the four women Lange spoke to were given a copy of the contract that they signed.
"8 Minutes also did not keep the sex workers' information particularly discreet," notes Lange. "It took less than an hour for this reporter to find contact information for three women using only the information A&E broadcast on television."
Gina, featured in 8 Minutes premiere episode, told Lange that she, too, was promised assistance from the show—in her case, getting a car and finding housing—that never materialized. An A&E rep told Lange "This show is no longer on the air, so we will have no comment."
After stopping sex work for a couple weeks waiting for producers' promises of assistance, Kamylla went back to it—and was soon arrested and jailed. Her first "client" turned out to be a sting operation by cops who responded to her online ad. She wonders if using the same phone number she used with 8 Minutes may have led to targeting by police.
To help cover her legal and living expenses right now, prominent sex-worker rights activists like Mistress Matisse and Domina Elle have helped Kamylla start and publicize a crowdfunding campaign via Crowdrise. Initial campaigns through GoFundMe and then Tilt were taken down by site administrators (a common problem for sex workers of all stripes trying to crowdfund anything, from art projects to medical expenses to constitutional challenges).
Though those helping Kamylla are themselves happily engaged in sex work, they have not pressured her to stay with it or publicly profess enjoyment for it. Rather, they've mobilized to help highlight her story and immediate finanacial needs, as Tits & Sass bloggers Lane Champagne and Bubbles pointed out recently. "Imagine if A&E had given even a fraction of the production costs to crowdfunding campaigns for sex workers, sex worker-run organizations, or even job training programs that would enable sex workers to enter the formal economy."
"Kamylla's story is one that sits at the messy intersection of failed rescue ideologies, misguided and often violent law enforcement, the reality of profoundly unhappy sex work experiences, and a sex worker rights' community that is at times removed from the realities of criminalization and survival sex," Champagne and Bubbles continued. "But [the sex work] community ... was there to support Kamylla when others discarded or ignored her reality."
Domina Elle, a Denver-based dominatrix, artist, and sex-worker rights advocate, suggests that "8 Minutes is a perfect allegory for the rescue industry." By rescue industry, Elle refers to the myriad organizations, from nonprofits to religious groups to government-funded task forces, that have sprung up around the alleged epidemic of U.S. sex trafficking.
"Many of the stories told by rescuers have proven to be completely false," notes Tara Burns at Alternet. "High-profile trafficking activists like Somaly Mam (one of Time's 100 Most Influential People of 2009) and Chong Kim have built careers and raised millions of dollars with their own fabricated stories."
"There's a great deal of rhetoric around 'rescue' 'restoration' and 'help' but we aren't finding much in the way of actual services for people, despite the millions some of these organizations receive," writes Elle.
Many people working in the rescue industry know that most sex workers don't want their 'rescue.' This doesn't stop them from applying for federal grants or accepting donations. The money is predominantly used for hotlines and raising awareness. Watching a person like Kamylla fall through the cracks, being a person you'd assume the rescue industry would love to assist, is very telling. [It] exposes the narrative for what it is, a ruse to be able to generate more funding for the rescue industry that never seems to manifest into tangible services.
The U.S. Senate recently passed a major package of anti-human-trafficking legislation that has bipartisan support in the House also. It's packed with funding for "rescue"-mission type organizations, be they police or private, as well as "awareness raising" efforts— like posting trafficking-hotline numbers at truck stops and strip clubs or training school principles and TSA agents on how to spot the signs of trafficking. In other words, the kinds of things that keep law enforcement agents, government paper-pushers, and the nonprofits touting this legislation in things to do and money to spend on it. But the bill contains little in the way of impact on the immediate needs of those it claims to help.
Like the producers of 8 Minutes, state and federal lawmakers talk a good game about how they're planning to help victims of sexual violence, trafficking, and coercion. But in focusing so exclusively on the victim/evildoer/savior paradigm, their version of "reality" bears little resemblance to people's actual lives, experiences, or needs. And this ultimately doesn't matter, because the "victims" are just props in the perpetuation of this rescue charade. Lights, camera, action, roll call.
"I do not have a job. I see my arrest like a criminal in my mind all the time," Kamylla says. "I am a person before the show who needed a chance. Now it's after the hurricane." But the online sex-work community is "little by little doing what the TV should have done" in terms of helping her get her life and finances back together, she says.
A&E has not publicly commented on the women's allegations or the show's cancellation. |
The first rule of war propaganda bureau is that you don't talk about war propaganda bureau. A dream team of the greatest authors of the day were secretly called up to the WW1 war effort in 1914 - names like Arthur Conan Doyle, J. M. Barrie - and later John Buchan. They were to write propaganda pieces for the government while pretending it was all their own idea. You'd think the government would have called up their fictional creations: Sherlock Holmes, Peter Pan, Richard Hannay... but it wanted them to write worthy pamphlets on German barbarism and 'why we fight' to win over American opinion-formers and make sure the USA didn't back Germany in the war. Meanwhile the less-famous names at the bureau pumped out a steady stream of jingoism, atrocity and 'Beastly Hun' pamphlets, plus cartoons, post-cards and even children's colouring-books and ink blotters in the same vein. Against this backdrop, the themes of the bureau bled into the war-time fiction of the stars, so it's hard to see where government propaganda leaves off and personal sentiment starts. What happened when the authors took up their pens and went to war? Writer Val McDermid finds out.
Show less |
This list provides names given in history and traditions for people who appear to be unnamed in the Bible.
Old Testament [ edit ]
Wives of the antediluvian patriarchs [ edit ]
Patriarch Wife Cain Âwân
Nod[1] Seth Azûrâ Enos Nôâm Kenan Mûalêlêth Mahalalel Dinah Jared Baraka Enoch Edna Methuselah Edna Lamech (Seth's line) Betenos Noah Emzârâ
Naamah[1]
The Book of Jubilees provides names for a host of otherwise unnamed biblical characters, including wives for most of the antediluvian patriarchs. The last of these is Noah's wife, to whom it gives the name of Emzara. Other Jewish traditional sources contain many different names for Noah's wife.
The Book of Jubilees says that Awan was Adam and Eve's first daughter. Their second daughter Azura married Seth.
For many of the early wives in the series, Jubilees notes that the patriarchs married their sisters.
The Cave of Treasures and the earlier Kitab al-Magall (part of Clementine literature) name entirely different women as the wives of the patriarchs, with considerable variations among the extant copies.
The Muslim historian Ibn Ishaq (c. 750), as cited in al-Tabari (c. 915), provides names for these wives which are generally similar to those in Jubilees, but he makes them Cainites rather than Sethites, despite clearly stating elsewhere that none of Noah's ancestors were descended from Cain.
Cain and Abel's sisters [ edit ]
Name: Calmana (or Aclima or Luluwa) source: Golden Legend,[2] which also tells stories about many of the saints Appears in the Bible at: Genesis 4:17
Name: Delbora source: Golden Legend,[2] which also tells stories about many of the saints Appears in the Bible at: Genesis 4
See also: Balbira and Kalmana, Azura and Awan for alternate traditions of names.
Noah's wife [ edit ]
Name: Naamah Source: Midrash Genesis Rabbah 23:4 Appears in the Bible at: Genesis 4:22; Gen. 7:7
Daughter of Lamech and Zillah and sister of Tubal-cain (Gen. iv. 22). According to Abba ben Kahana, Naamah was Noah's wife and was called "Naamah" (pleasant) because her conduct was pleasing to God. But the majority of the rabbis reject this statement, declaring that Naamah was an idolatrous woman who sang "pleasant" songs to idols.
See also Wives aboard the Ark for a list of traditional names given to the wives of Noah and his sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
Ham's wife [ edit ]
The Mormon Book of Abraham, first published in 1842, mentions Egyptus (Abraham 1:23) as being the name of Ham's wife; his daughter apparently had the same name (v. 25).
Nimrod's wife [ edit ]
A large body of legend has attached itself to Nimrod, whose brief mention in Genesis merely makes him "a mighty hunter in the face of the Lord". (The Biblical account makes no mention of a wife at all.) These legends usually make Nimrod to be a sinister figure, and they reach their peak in Hislop's The Two Babylons, which make Nimrod and Semiramis to be the original authors of every false and pagan religion.
Mother of Abraham [ edit ]
Name: Amthlai bath (daughter of) Khrubu Source: Babylonian Talmud Tractate Baba Bathra Chapter 5[3] Appears in the Bible at: Book of Genesis
Lot's married daughter [ edit ]
Name: Paltith
Lot's wife [ edit ]
Laban's wife [ edit ]
Adinah redirects here. For other uses, see Adinah (disambiguation)
Potiphar's wife [ edit ]
Name: Zuleikha Source: The Sefer Hayyashar, a book of Jewish lore published in Venice in 1625. [1] Also, the Persian mystical poem "Yusuf and Zulaikha" by Jami. Appears in the Bible at: Genesis 39:12
Potiphar's wife attempted to seduce Joseph in Egypt.
Pharaoh's daughter [ edit ]
Name: Merris Source: Eusebius of Caesarea (Preparation for the Gospel 9.15)
Name: Merrhoe Source: Eustathius of Antioch (Commentary on Hexameron MPG 18.785)
Name: Thermutis Source: Flavius Josephus
Name: Bithiah or Bitya Source: Jewish tradition Appears in the Bible at: Exodus 2
Pharaoh's daughter, who drew Moses out of the water, is known as Bithiah in Jewish tradition (identifying her with the "Pharaoh's daughter Bithiah" in 1 Chronicles 4:18).
Simeon's wife [ edit ]
Name: Bunah Source: Book of Jasher 34:36[6] Legends of the Jews Volume 1 Chapter 6[7] Appears in the bible at: Genesis
Name: Dinah Source: Midrash Bereshit Rabba 80:11. After Simeon and Levi slaughtered the men of Shechem, Dinah refused to go with them unless someone married her and raise the child of prince Chamor she was carrying as his own. Simeon did this.
Pharaoh's magicians [ edit ]
The names of Jannes and Jambres, or Jannes and Mambres, were well known through the ancient world as magicians. In this instance, nameless characters from the Hebrew Bible are given names in the New Testament. Their names also appear in numerous Jewish texts.
The Cushitic wife of Moses [ edit ]
Name: Tharbis Source: Flavius Josephus, Jewish Antiquities, Book II, Chapter 10 [10] Appears in the Bible at: Numbers 12
Name: Adoniah Source: Book of Jasher, 23.5–25.5
King of Jericho [ edit ]
Name: Source: Appears in the Bible at:
Job's wives [ edit ]
Apocryphal Jewish folklore says that Sitis, or Sitidos, was Job's first wife, who died during his trials. After his temptation was over, the same sources say that Job remarried Dinah, Jacob's daughter who appears in Genesis.
Name: Raḥma Source: Islamic tradition[18]
The source does not tell which wife of Job has this name.
Jephthah's daughter [ edit ]
The Liber Antiquitatum Biblicarum falsely ascribes itself to the Jewish author Philo. It in fact did not surface until the sixteenth century; see Works of Philo.
Samson's mother [ edit ]
David's mother [ edit ]
The Witch of Endor [ edit ]
Name: Sedecla Source: Liber Antiquitatum Biblicarum Appears in the Bible at: 1 Samuel 28
The Man of God [ edit ]
The wise woman of Abel [ edit ]
The Queen of Sheba [ edit ]
An Ethiopian fresco of the Queen of Sheba travelling to Solomon.
Name: Makeda Source: Traditional Ethiopian lore surrounding Emperor Menelik I; see the Kebra Nagast
Name: Nicaule Source: Josephus
Name: Bilqis Source: Islamic traditions
Appears in the Bible at: 1 Kings 10; 2 Books of Chronicles 9
According to Ethiopian traditions, the Queen of Sheba returned to Ethiopia pregnant with King Solomon's child. She bore Solomon a son that went on to found a dynasty that ruled Ethiopia until the fall of Emperor Haile Selassie in 1974.
Jeroboam's wife [ edit ]
Name: Ano Source: Septuagint Appears in the Bible at: 1 Kings 14
Naaman's wife [ edit ]
Name: Source: Appears in the Bible at:
Naaman's servant girl [ edit ]
Name: Source: Appears in the Bible at:
King of Nineveh [ edit ]
Name: Source: Appears in the Bible at:
Haman's mother [ edit ]
Name: Amthlai daughter of Urbthi Source: Babylonian Talmud Tractate Baba Bathra Chapter 5[3] Appears in the Bible at: Book of Esther
Old Testament deuterocanonicals [ edit ]
The Deuterocanonical books, sometimes called the "Apocrypha", are considered canonical by Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox (though these churches' lists of books differ slightly from each other).
The woman with seven sons [ edit ]
The woman with seven sons is a Jewish martyr who is unnamed in 2 Maccabees 7, but is named Hannah, Miriam, Shamuna and Solomonia in other sources. According to Eastern Orthodox tradition, her sons, the "Holy Maccabean Martyrs" (not to be confused with the martyrs in the Ethiopian book of Meqabyan), are named Abim, Antonius, Gurias, Eleazar, Eusebonus, Alimus and Marcellus.
The seven Archangels [ edit ]
Tobit 12:15 reads "I am Raphael, one of the seven holy angels, which present the prayers of the saints, and which go in and out before the glory of the Holy One."[22] Of the six unnamed archangels, Michael is named in the Book of Daniel, and Gabriel is named in the Gospel of Luke.[23]
The Book of Enoch, deuterocanonical in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, names the remaining four archangels Uriel, Raguel, Zerachiel, and Ramiel.[24] Other sources name them Uriel, Izidkiel, Haniel, and Kepharel.[25] In the Coptic Orthodox Church the names of these four archangels are given as Suriel, Sedakiel, Sarathiel and Ananiel. Several other sets of names have also been given.
New Testament [ edit ]
The Magi [ edit ]
Names: Balthasar, Melqon, Gaspar Source: Armenisches Kindheitsevangelium [26]
Names: Balthasar, Melchior, and Caspar (or Gaspar) Source: European folklore
Names: Basanater, Hor, and Karsudan Source: The Book of Adam, an apocryphal Ethiopian text
Names: Larvandad, Hormisdas, and Gushnasaph Source: Syrian Christian folklore
Names: Manatho, Alchor, and Gaspar Source: White Shrine Of Jerusalem - Masonic
Appear in the Bible at: Matthew 2
The Gospel does not state that there were, in fact, three magi or when exactly they visited Jesus, only that multiple magi brought three gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Nevertheless, the number of magi is usually extrapolated from the number of gifts, and the three wise men are a staple of Christian nativity scenes. While the European names have enjoyed the most publicity, other faith traditions have different versions. According to the Armenisches Kindheitsevangelium, the three magi were brothers and kings, namely Balthasar, king of India; Melqon, king of Persia; and Gaspar, king of Arabia. The Chinese Christian Church[clarification needed] believes that the astronomer Liu Shang was one of the wise men.
The Nativity shepherds [ edit ]
The Shepherds
Names: Asher, Zebulun, Justus, Nicodemus, Joseph, Barshabba, and Jose Source: The Syrian Book of the Bee Appear in the Bible at Luke 2
The Book of the Bee was written by Bishop Shelemon in the Aramaic language in the thirteenth century.
Sisters/step-sisters/female cousins of Jesus [ edit ]
Names: Maria or Anna, Salomé Source: Epiphanus[28]
The fact that Jesus had at least two sisters/stepsisters/female cousins is mentioned in Matthew 12:50 and Mark 3:32–34 though their exact number is not specified in either gospel. In addition, the various versions of Epiphanus differ on whether one of the sisters was named Maria or Anna.
The Innocents [ edit ]
The Massacre of the Innocents was the infanticide of all young male children in the vicinity of Bethlehem ordered by Herod the Great so as to avoid the loss of his throne to a newborn King of the Jews whose birth had been announced to him by the Magi. None of the victims are named by Matthew, but a number of supposed victims were identified some centuries later, when their purported relics were found.
Herodias' daughter [ edit ]
Name: Salome Source: The Jewish Antiquities of Josephus,[33] although that reference does not connect her with John the Baptist. Appears in the Bible at: Matthew 14, Mark 6
Syrophoenician woman [ edit ]
Name: Justa Source: 3rd century pseudo-Clementine homily [34] Appears in the Bible at: Matthew 15, Mark 7
According to the same source, her daughter was Berenice.
Hæmorrhaging woman [ edit ]
Name: Berenice Source: The apocryphal Acts of Pilate
Name: Veronica Source: Latin translation of the Acts of Pilate
Appears in the Bible at: Matthew 9:20–22
Veronica is a Latin variant of Berenice (Greek: Βερενίκη). Veronica or Berenice obtained some of Jesus' blood on a cloth at the Crucifixion.[citation needed] Tradition identifies her with the woman who was healed of a bleeding discharge in the Gospel (see also: Veil of Veronica).
Samaritan woman at the well [ edit ]
Name: Photini Source: Eastern Orthodox Church Tradition
Appears in the Bible at: John 4:5–42
In the tradition of the Eastern Orthodox Church, the name of the woman at the well when she met Jesus is unknown, but she became a follower of Christ, received the name Photini in baptism, proclaimed the Gospel over a wide area, and was later martyred. She is recognized as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church.
Damned rich man [ edit ]
Name: Nineveh Source: Coptic folklore
Name: Phineas Source: Pseudo-Cyprian, De pascha computus
Name: Dives Source: European Christian folklore
Appears in the Bible at: Luke 16:19–31
Dives is simply Latin for "rich", and as such may not count as a proper name. The story of the blessed Lazarus and the damned rich man is widely recognised under the title of Dives and Lazarus, which may have resulted in this word being taken for a proper name.
Woman taken in adultery [ edit ]
Name: Mary Magdalene Source: Western Christian tradition Appears in the Bible at: John 8
A long-standing Western Christian tradition first attested by Pope Gregory I identifies the woman taken in adultery with Mary Magdalene, and also with Mary of Bethany.[35] Jesus had exorcised seven demons out of Mary Magdalene (Mark 16:9), and Mary Magdalene appears prominently in the several accounts of Jesus' entombment and resurrection, but there is no indication in the Bible that clearly states that Mary Magdalene was the same person as the adulteress forgiven by Jesus. Roman Catholics also have identified Mary Magdalene as the weeping woman who was a sinner, and who anoints Jesus' feet in Luke 7:36–50, and while the Church has dropped this interpretation to a degree, this remains one of her more famous portrayals.
The Eastern Orthodox Church has never identified Mary Magdalene as either the woman taken in adultery, or the sinful woman who anointed Jesus' feet.
The man born blind [ edit ]
Name: Celidonius Source: Christian tradition Appears in the Bible at: John 9:1–38
Money changers [ edit ]
Name: Source: Appears in the Bible at:
Pontius Pilate's wife [ edit ]
Name: Claudia, Procla, Procula, Perpetua or Claudia Procles Source: European folklore; Dolorous Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ (as "Claudia Procles")[36] Appears in the Bible at: Matthew 27:19
During the trial of Jesus the wife of Pontius Pilate sent a message to him saying, "Have nothing to do with that just man; for I have suffered many things this day in a dream because of him."
The proposed names of Procla and Procula may not be names at all, but simply a form of Pilate's official title of Procurator, indicating that she was the Procurator's wife.
Thieves crucified with Jesus [ edit ]
Names: Titus and Dumachus Source: Arabic Gospel of the Infancy of the Saviour
Appear in the Bible at: Matthew 27, Mark 15, Luke 23, John 19
The good thief is revered under the name Saint Dismas in the Catholic Church and the Coptic Orthodox Church.
Soldier who pierced Jesus with a spear [ edit ]
circa 1440), Dominican monastery of San Marco, Jesus' side is pierced with a spear, Fra Angelico 1440), Dominican monastery of San Marco, Florence
In tradition, he is called Cassius before his conversion to Christianity.[38] The Lance of Longinus, also known as the Spear of Destiny, is supposedly preserved as a relic, and various miracles are said to be worked through it.
Man who offered Jesus vinegar [ edit ]
Guard(s) at Jesus' tomb [ edit ]
Names: Issachar, Gad, Matthias, Barnabas, Simon Source: The Book of the Bee
Appears in the Bible at: Matthew 27:62–66
Ethiopian Eunuch baptized by the Apostle Philip [ edit ]
Name: Simeon Bachos Source: Adversus haereses (Against the Heresies, an early anti-Gnostic theological work) 3:12:8 (180 AD)
In Eastern Orthodox tradition[40] he is known as an Ethiopian Jew with the name Simeon also called the Black, the same name he is given in the Acts of the Apostles 13:1.
Appears in the Bible at: Acts 13:1
Daughters of Philip [ edit ]
Name: Hermione; Eutychis; Irais and Chariline Source: Traditional. See Daughters of Philip
Appears in the Bible:Acts of the Apostles 21.8-9
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ] |
More than five lakh workers in West Bengal’s biggest labour-intensive industries of tea and jute have not got wages since Wednesday when the union government withdrew two high-denomination currency notes.
A similar predicament exists in neighbouring Assam and the rest of the Northeast, which has tea estates in remote areas where currency notes will take days to arrive.
In Bengal, owners of several tea gardens and jute mills have request the state government and Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on the newly introduced ceiling of withdrawal of money. None has received a response amid already existing issues that are leading to deaths owing to suspected malnutrition.
In Assam, too, tea industry captains sought Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s intervention for enhancing cash withdrawal limit. A day later, the RBI on Friday allowed banks to release money for wage payment to plantation workers, but the situation is nowhere near normal.
The Darjeeling hills and Dooars region of Bengal have 283 tea gardens, employing 3.5 lakh permanent and casual workers, who earn Rs 132.50 per day. The belt has another 40,000 small growers who employ one lakh labourers.
“We have written to senior state government officials,” Sandeep Mukherjee, principal advisor to the Darjeeling Tea Association, told HT. “We are apprehending workers’ unrest; we have alerted the police. We have requested the trade unions to appeal to the workers to maintain law and order and cooperate with the management.”
As for the state’s jute industry that has 2.5 lakh workers, payments are mostly made in cash on a fortnightly basis. Most mills pay the first instalment in a month between the 7th and 10th.
Some mills did disbursed payments on November 7 and 8, but most of the workers came back in the subsequent days to return the payment made in Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 currency notes that had been withdrawn from the economy.
“Hardly anyone has received payment since the prime minister’s announcement,” an owner of a jute mill in Hooghly district told HT.
The Indian Jute Mills Association has also written to Bengal finance minister Amit Mitra and the RBI seeking urgent help.
RBI had limited Rs 20,000 cash withdrawal per week from current accounts and Rs 10,000 from savings accounts. Wages are paid from current accounts of tea estates in the case of Assam.
“Understanding such financial complication is beyond most tea garden labourers. They are not willing to wait and there are chances of their turning violent,” a planter from central Assam’s Jorhat said.
The Tea Board of India said restrictions on daily and weekly cash withdrawals can lead to a serious problem. For, “almost all tea gardens (about 800) in Assam pay wages on a weekly basis — on Fridays or Saturdays,” according to Bidyananda Barkakoty, the board’s vice-chairman.
The region’s remote areas, where ill-equipped banks take time to stock cash, have been feeling the pressure. The demonetisation hit the November 7-9 Mechukha adventure festival in Arunachal Pradesh, its organiser Moyir Riba said. “We could not pay technicians and suppliers of adventure gear,” she told HT.
Mechukha takes two days by road — chopper service is infrequent and expensive for most people — from Itanagar and more than a day from the nearest major town in Assam.
An official of the lone SBI branch at Mechukha said his office had exhausted smaller-denomination notes. “It will take us more time than banks in the plains to provide the new notes,” he added.
First Published: Nov 12, 2016 15:00 IST |
UMD – 208 points (17 first-place votes) Denver – 187 (7) North Dakota – 183 (4) Omaha – 148 Miami – 142 (2) St. Cloud State – 117 Western Michigan – 60 Colorado College – 35
Media that cover the National Collegiate Hockey Conference have spoken and they collectively see the University of Minnesota Duluth as the team to beat in 2015-16.UMD received 17 of 30 first-place votes from the media and totaled 208 points to place first in the NCHC Preseason Poll, which was released today. The University of Denver was picked second with 187 points and seven first-place votes followed by the University of North Dakota, the defending Penrose Cup champions, (183 points and four first-place votes), the University of Nebraska-Omaha (148 points.), Miami University (142 points and two first-place votes), last year's NCHC Forzen Faceoff champion, St. Cloud State University (117 points), Western Michigan University (60 points) and Colorado College (35 points).UMD returns 21 lettermen back from a year when it went 21-16-3 overall, placed fifth in the final NCHC standings at 12-9-3 and advanced to the NCAA Northeast Regional finals. The Bulldogs will officially open preseason practice a week from this Saturday (Oct. 3) before taking on Lakehead University the following night in an exhibition clash at AMSOIL Arena.This marks the first time since the 2004-05 season that the Bulldogs have been picked first in any preseason league poll. UMD was then a member of the Western Collegiate Hockey Association.A total of 30 ballots were submitted by local media members from each school, as well as select national media. Points were awarded on a descending scale with a first-place vote worth eight points, a second-place vote worth seven points and so on. |
It looks like an open-and-shut case. Miller-Young told a police officer who interviewed her after the incident that she had seized and torn up the sign, and there's a video posted on YouTube that appears to record the March 4 altercation (warning: copious use of the "F-word"). The alleged victim, Thrin Short, told Fox News that Miller-Young had pushed her out of an elevator where Miller-Young and several UCSB students had taken the sign, and that she had suffered several scratches during the ensuing melee. Short had been among a group of about a dozen antiabortion protesters, most of them students at Thomas Aquinas College, a small Catholic institution in Santa Paula, who said they had gathered in UCSB's "free speech zone" on campus, where such activities are permitted, to hand out information to UCSB students. |
by Kevin Rennie
New York is far ahead of Boston in the competition for Hartford-based Aetna’s new headquarters, Daily Ructions can report. After 164 years in Hartford, the insurance giant invited proposals from Boston and New York. The city that never sleeps is soon expected to win a public acknowledgement of its victory.
The move from Hartford will initially involve several hundred top corporate jobs moving to a new home base in Manhattan. The decision has involved many factors. One is the cultural shift to large urban regions favored by young talent. Another obstacle for Hartford has been dynamic Aetna CEO Mark Bertolini’s famously frosty relationship with surly Governor Dannel P. Malloy. Senator Richard Blumenthal’s opposition to Aetna’s merger with Humana confirmed Connecticut’s top political leadership’s hostility to a company trying to grow in an industry facing urgent challenges in and out of the marketplace.
Aetna executives and representative have begun to inform public officials that the headquarters search process is close to a conclusion. The announcement should provoke a searching examination of the policies that have caused Aetna–on the heels of GE–to leave Connecticut. |
Edward Snowden could soon have the option of a new home if Iceland’s Pirate Party comes to power in the country’s parliamentary elections on Saturday. The insurgent political movement, which is currently running neck-and-neck in the polls with the Independence Party of the current ruling coalition, has promised to make Iceland a haven for whistleblowers, including the world’s most famous.
Iceland has long had favorable policies toward those looking to expose government wrongdoing. Snowden wouldn’t even be the first high-profile American to flee prosecution in the United States by settling in Iceland. Former chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer was given Icelandic citizenship in 2005 after the U.S. issued a warrant for his arrest following his participation in a chess tournament in Yugoslavia, breaking sanctions against the country.
The current leader of the Pirate Party, Birgitta Jónsdóttir, was an activist who supported Fischer’s relocation and was also a former collaborator with WikiLeaks. In fact, Iceland was the former home of the whistleblowing organization, and it was WikiLeaks that in 2010 helped draft one of the most favorable laws toward investigative journalism anywhere in the world.
Unsurprisingly, the affection between Iceland and whistleblowers has been a mutual one.
“My predisposition is to seek asylum in a country with shared values,” Snowden told The Guardian in 2013 shortly after his first trove of leaked documents was released while he was in Hong Kong. "The nation that most encompasses this is Iceland. They stood up for people over internet freedom.”
A bill to give Snowden citizenship was even introduced later that year in Iceland’s parliament before being struck down. And his hopes were dealt a further blow when the 2013 Icelandic parliamentary elections saw the center-right alliance of the Progressive and Independence parties came to power.
The Pirate Party won just three seats in Iceland’s 63-member parliament in that election, but as a result of a disclosure in the Panama Papers released earlier this year which led to the resignation of Iceland’s then prime minister, public distrust of the political establishment has grown yet further.
The Pirate Party, and Snowden, who has spent the past three years in Russia, could now be set to benefit.
The party, which started just four years ago with a call for total government transparency, has already announced that it would be prepared to form an alliance with the three other center-left or left-wing parties, which could take it over the 50 percent threshold to form a government.
As well as transparency, direct democracy and decriminalizing drugs, the Pirate Party has made freedom for whistleblowers a key part of its platform.
“Make Iceland a global pioneer when it comes to protecting freedom of information, freedom of expression and freedom of the press,” it reads.
With the difficulties of applying for asylum abroad, Jónsdóttir has made it clear that granting Snowden citizenship is her preferred option.
“I think it’s dangerous to just give him asylum because asylum does not give you the same protections as citizenship,” she told Forbes last year.
For citizen status to happen, though, the Pirate Party would also need to get the approval of parliament, where it could face a challenge for approval given the likely impact on relations with the U.S. |
The new MacBook Pro’s premier feature is its Retina Display. This new Retina Display also comes with a new way to alter the Mac’s display settings. For the first time, this new Mac’s display settings are a list of options, rather than a list of numbered resolutions. The standard resolution is Retina mode, which is a pixel enhanced, HIDPI variant of a 1440 X 900 pixels of screen space. This comes out to the new MacBook Pro’s 2880 x 1800 resolution. However, users – by default – are unable to actually run their new MacBook Pros at a native 2880 x 1800 pixels of screen space. Until now. Read on to learn how:
Software developer Wineskin has put together a simple utility to run the new MacBook Pro at its full native resolution. Simply click here to download, then run the script. To revert back to Retina mode or another resolution, just go to Display settings in System Preferences. We must warn that text and images look incredibly small in the native 2880 x 1800 resolution, but it can be helpful when working with multiple files. The tweak also truly shows how many pixels this new Retina display MacBook Pro really packs into a small amount of space.
You can also use a quick method through the app QuickRes. |
The thwarting of an alleged Valentine’s Day massacre in Halifax underlines the fundamental absurdity of Canada’s anti-terror laws. According to police, three alleged plotters planned to shoot and kill dozens Saturday at a Halifax shopping mall. Had such a plan succeeded, the effect would have almost certainly been mass terror in the Nova Scotia capital. Yet Justice Minister Peter MacKay says this was not a terrorist crime. “The attack does not appear to have been culturally motivated, therefore not linked to terrorism,” he told reporters Saturday. MacKay’s comments caused some puzzlement. Why would the government deem the murder of Cpl. Nathan Cirillo in Ottawa last fall an act of terror, but not this?
Article Continued Below
In fact, except for his inexplicable use of the word “culturally,” MacKay was technically correct. Canada’s anti-terror laws don’t criminalize actions that might cause terror. Well before the current law was enacted in 2002, it was illegal in Canada to murder people or blow up trains. Rather, they criminalize intent. It may be illegal to kill people in Canada. But it is even more illegal to kill people for a religious, ideological or political purpose.
What do you think?
More important, it is left to the state to decide — in the first instance at least — which murderous conspiracies have a political motive and which do not.
Thus Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, the Muslim gunman who killed Cirillo, is deemed a terrorist for the simple reason that the RCMP and government say he was. Conversely, alleged Halifax plotters Lindsay Souvannarath and Randall Shepherd (the third suspect, James Gamble, died before he could be arrested) are not terrorists because the federal justice minister says they are not. Had police found Islamic State propaganda on their computers, Souvannarath and Shepherd almost certainly would have been charged with terrorism. But social media sites said to belong to the suspects show an interest only in Nazis and violence. That, it seems, is insufficiently ideological to merit a terror charge.
Article Continued Below
So that’s the first point about the terror laws: They are unusually arbitrary. The second is that the government’s interpretation of these laws is infinitely flexible. Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government, with the backing of Justin Trudeau’s Liberals, proposes a new anti-terror law that would give the security services even more power and citizens even fewer rights. Critics point out that the government has made no case as to why this Bill C-51 might be necessary. As evidence, they point to the Halifax arrests. The alleged plot was discovered not by a newly empowered Canadian Security and Intelligence Service bugging email traffic, but by an ordinary citizen who then made an anonymous call to police. The hapless MacKay was asked about that, too, this weekend. He produced an even more baffling answer. No, the masterminds of the alleged plot were not terrorists whose capture was hindered by limited CSIS powers. Rather, they were “murderous misfits” apprehended through normal police methods. Still, he went on, this apparent contradiction proves why stronger anti-terror laws are needed: Run-of-the-mill murderous misfits might, at some unknown point in the future, be attracted to the Islamic State. Or, to put it another way, the fact that extraordinary security powers were not needed here proves that they are needed. It is a complicated logic. A final point on flexibility. Critics of the new anti-terror bill, including Green Party Leader Elizabeth May, argue that the proposed law is so broad that it would sweep up not just Islamic terrorists but anti-pipeline protestors who use civil disobedience to take on the Conservative government’s economic agenda. A 2014 RCMP memo obtained by La Presse last week suggests that May is not being paranoid here. “There is a growing, highly organized and well-financed anti-Canada petroleum movement that consists of peaceful activists, militants and violent extremists who are opposed to society’s reliance on fossil fuels,” the document, which echoes a similar RCMP assessment dated two years earlier, reads. Radical environmentalists, it seems, are among the real enemies the government plans to crush. Alleged neo-Nazi mass murderers? Fie on them. They’re just random misfits.
Read more about: |
The FCC and its chairman, Ajit Pai, are taking some intense heat these days—and for good reason. Pai has put forth a proposal to roll back the hugely popular net neutrality framework and return to the halcyon days of letting internet providers do as they please under some misguided faith that the market will police itself.
Misguided FCC “Logic”
The FCC has embarked on a public relations campaign to try and sway public opinion on the matter, including a propaganda piece sent to the media that claims to lay out the “myths” and “facts” of net neutrality.
The bias of the document is immediately apparent from the adjectives used to describe net neutrality. The first “fact” states, “The Internet was free and open before the Obama Administration’s 2015 heavy-handed Title II Internet regulations, and it will be free and open after they are repealed.”
Another “fact” in the FCC document claims, “Repealing the Obama Administration’s heavy-handed Internet regulations will promote consumers’ online privacy. Those regulations stripped the Federal Trade Commission of authority to protect Americans’ broadband privacy. The plan to restore Internet freedom, by contrast, will put the federal government’s most experienced privacy cop back on the beat.”
Most of the arguments laid out in the FCC propaganda document rely on the flawed logic that everything was fine for two decades up until 2015, so returning to the rules in place at that time will be fine. That ignores the fact that, even though it was true for years that things worked fine under that framework, ISPs like Comcast and Verizon had begun to rock the boat and start to explore how to extort tolls from content providers, or throttle or block access to specific content, or offer tiered services with internet fastlanes or bundled packages of websites the way cable TV is sold.
Here is an analogy that illustrates that argument. Let’s say you’ve lived in your house for 20 years. One day, the pipe to your kitchen sink springs a leak so you replace it. Putting the broken pipe back is a horrible idea. Arguing that everything was fine for 20 years up until the new pipe was installed is a silly argument, because the preceding decades are irrelevant to the fact that it was broken at the time it was fixed.
Why Repeal Net Neutrality?
The FCC isn’t alone in its anti-net neutrality media campaign. Comcast has also been marketing heavily in favor of repealing net neutrality. Oddly, the Comcast plea seems to center around the idea that destroying net neutrality will be fine, because Comcast totally pinky-swears that it will play nice and put customers first and it won’t do anything to undermine or harm the internet. Comcast—and the current FCC—seem to have forgotten that it was shady behavior by Comcast—throttling traffic and extorting tolls from content providers like Netflix—that sparked the net neutrality debate in the first place.
There was a tweet making the rounds recently that sums things up fairly well. Comcast tweeted, “We do not and will not block, throttle, or discriminate against lawful content. We will continue to make sure that our policies are clear and transparent for consumers, and we will not change our commitment to these principles.”
In response, @loresjoberg tweeted, “We never will, but it’s very important that we be able to. But we won’t. So let us do it. Because we won’t do it. Which is why we’re spending so much money to make sure we can. But we won’t. But let us.”
Precisely. Follow the money and try to understand the motivation. If ISPs like Comcast had continued to behave the way Comcast promises to behave, we never would have had net neutrality in the first place. If ISPs like Comcast are committing to not doing anything shady if net neutrality is repealed, why do they need to repeal it?
I reached out to Comcast in response to an email promoting blogs Comcast executives wrote promising to protect the open internet and asked if they acknowledge in any way that they were already guilty of doing the thing they claim they will never do. I did not receive a response.
There is nothing good for consumers and average users of the internet, or for the nation as a whole in repealing net neutrality. Returning to the way things were means that ISPs can act the way they did before net neutrality—which is why we needed net neutrality to begin with.
If the FCC continues to ignore the demands of the public it is supposed to represent and proceeds with handing the internet over to corporate interests, hopefully companies like Netflix, Google, Facebook and others—or even just smaller, regional startups—will just band together and offer us a net neutrality-friendly alternative and we can just cut ties with the anti-net neutrality ISPs. |
Recently, an adventurous fellow named Serge spotted a little red 1991 BMW 318is sitting forlornly in the parking lot of a repair shop. Serge asked if it was for sale, and was told yes, it wouldn’t start and could be his for the cost of scrap! Fantastic! Then, he got it home, opened the trunk, and found a mystery.
The mystery is pretty simple: what the hell is the big-ass contraption of boxes, wires, tubes, and pipes that’s sitting in the trunk? What did this thing do, and who did it do it for? Is it here to help humanity, or hasten our downfall?
Advertisement
Let’s see if we can figure this thing out.
The thing looks home-made, but purposeful; it doesn’t appear to be some sort of automaker emissions-testing equipment or anything like that.
Advertisement
The thing appears to be two black metal boxes joined by a smaller aluminum-looking box-section piece. There’s a large rubber hose on the ‘top’ of the box, connected via a 90° tube and terminating in a large screw-on cap.
The ‘lower’ black box has a fan on one side, and an intake grille for the fan on the other. The unit also has a large electrical connector composed of two sets of 15 wires, and some wires in between. The warning sticker on the base reads “WARNING CAUSTIC PRESSURIZED LIQUID/LIGHT SENSITIVE COMPARTMENT/HAZARDOUS CURRENT” which gives a nice variety of hazards to be worried about.
The aluminum middle section also has a bit of house plumbing-type copper pipes and fittings which seem to feed into some sort of fitting and then into the ‘upper’ box.
Advertisement
There’s a bunch of now unconnected wires and hoses about, in the trunk and and under the hood. Serge told me that there was a hose that went into a port on the intake in front of the throttle body:
“... it first goes [through] an aluminum tube that looks like ac accumulator and from there into the intake.”
Advertisement
Serge also provided this handy annotated picture of where the hose was connected.
Whatever this thing is, it appears to be doing something to the intake, possibly adding something. There’s been speculation it was a device to let the car run on fuel vapor, though it seems like there’s an awful lot of electronics on this thing for that.
Perhaps it’s some sort of water-methanol injection system? But there don’t appear to be any fluid bottles or tanks, so that’s maybe not the answer.
Advertisement
Commenters on Serge’s Facebook post about this have suggested that maybe its one of those hydrogen-extracting electrolysis units to let a car ‘run’ on water, even if it’s not really running on water at all.
I’m really not sure, but this seems like a fun Friday afternoon challenge for all of you, the automotively-smartest collection of oil-stained geeks on the global compu-net.
Serge just hopes it’s not a bomb or a shitty tracking device of some sort, and I’m pretty sure it’s neither of those things.
Advertisement
But what the hell is it? |
The Tennessee Titans scored on five consecutive drives to open the second half, pulling away from the Jacksonville Jaguars and cruising to a 37-16 victory. The two teams are tied atop the AFC South with twin 1-1 records. Here's what we learned:
1. Switching from a two-tight end to a three-wide receiver attack, the Titans seemed to lose their identity behind a tentative and sluggish DeMarco Murray in the first six quarters of the season. Upon turning to second-year power back Derrick Henry in the final two quarters Sunday, the offense finally clicked. Blowing the game open with a tackle-breaking 17-yard touchdown run in the third quarter, Henry finished with 92 yards -- and an unofficial changing of the guard in the backfield. After fading down the 2016 stretch run and battling a hamstring injury in preseason action, Murray has lacked the agility and explosiveness he showed upon breaking out of the gates last September and October. Henry is the better player right now, and the Titans seem to realize it.
2. The Jaguars desperately want to pound opponents into submission with a talented young defense and the piston-churning rushing tandem of rookie Leonard Fournette and veteran Chris Ivory. It's a formula with the potential to propel Jacksonville out of the AFC South basement and into the driver's seat had the team's braintrust bothered to install a backup plan at the sports' most important position. In contrast to the season opening victory in Houston, the Jaguars ran headlong into the ugly reality that they cannot hide Blake Bortles if they don't jump out to a comfortable lead. Don't let Bortles' typical garbage-time production fool you; he was just 5-of-12 for 41 yards, a pair of interceptions and a 16.3 passer rating at halftime.
3. Carrying the weight of a dysfunctional passing game, the back of Jacksonville's defense broke in the third and early-fourth quarters. That said, it's fair to point out the disappearing pass rush. After generating a staggering 10 sacks versus a slow-motion Tom Savage and inexperienced Deshaun Watson last week, the Jaguars managed just one takedown and two quarterback hits against the more elusive Marcus Mariota, operating behind a stout offensive line.
4. Jaguars cornerback Jalen Ramsey won the battle of the last two No. 5 overall draft picks, holding rookie wideout Corey Davis to four yards on one reception in the first half. Davis exited with hamstring injury in the second half as the Titans leaned on the ground attack and the tight-end duo of Delanie Walker and Johnnu Smith. Davis' status is a concern for next week's bout with the Seahawks, as he missed the bulk of August with a hamstring issue.
5. The Jaguars sorely missed deep threat Allen Robinson, who suffered a season-ending ACL tear in Week 1. Marqise Lee assumed No. 1 receiver duties with 12 targets, but dropped a third-down pass when the score was tight early in the game. Bortles' second interception, thrown behind Lee, bounced off the receiver's fingers and into the hands of Titans safety Da'Norris Searcy. The majority of the 158 yards generated by Lee and Allen Hurns came after the contest was decided. |
Show full PR text
LG Display Mass-Produces World's First Flexible OLED Panel for Smartphones
LG Display, the world's leading innovator of display technologies, today announced that it will start mass-production of the world's first flexible OLED panel for smartphones. This state-of-the-art panel represents another milestone following the company's commercial rollout of the world's first 55-inch OLED TV display earlier this year.
"LG Display is launching a new era of flexible displays for smartphones with its industry-leading technology," said Dr. Sang Deog Yeo, Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of LG Display. "The flexible display market is expected to grow quickly as this technology is expected to expand further into diverse applications including automotive displays, tablets and wearable devices. Our goal is to take an early lead in the flexible display market by introducing new products with enhanced performance and differentiated designs next year."
LG Display's flexible OLED panel is built on plastic substrates instead of glass. By applying film-type encapsulation technology and attaching the protection film to the back of the panel, LG Display made the panel bendable and unbreakable. The new display is vertically concave from top to bottom with a radius of 700mm, opening up a world of design innovations in the smartphone market. And only 0.44mm thin, LG Display's flexible OLED panel is the world's slimmest among existing mobile device panels. What's more, it is also the world's lightest, weighing a mere 7.2g even with a 6-inch screen, the largest among current smartphone OLED displays.
In March 2012 LG Display developed the world's first 6-inch Electronic Paper Display (EPD) based on e-ink which utilizes a plastic backplane. Having previously showcased the world's first curved 55-inch OLED TV panel at CES 2013, today's announcement highlights the company's leading position in advanced flexible display technologies.
According to research firm IHS Display Bank, the global flexible display industry will see dramatic growth and become a USD 1.5 billion market by 2016, exceeding USD 10 billion by 2019. LG Display plans to advance flexible display technologies and bring innovation to consumers' daily lives with the introduction of rollable and foldable displays in various sizes. |
PROVIDENCE, RI—Due to budgetary constraints, the State of Rhode Island was forced to shutter a number of its aviary facilities Sunday, resulting in hundreds of mentally ill sparrows, pigeons, chickadees, pelicans, kestrels, and penguins being put out on the street. "These birds are incapable of making the decisions necessary to navigate through everyday life," Providence Aviary administrator Margaret Lyons said as a disturbed grackle pecked at a spot on the ground where there was clearly no food. "With nowhere to go and no one to look after them, they roam the streets, sleep on telephone wires, and fly uncontrollably and repeatedly into large-frame plate-glass windows. Frankly, it's irresponsible and inhumane to release a kiwi that hears voices into a world where it could be a danger to itself or to others." Gov. Lincoln Chafee has promised swift action, stating that he would close the state's cat shelters in order to rectify the situation.
Advertisement |
A Virginia lawmaker has won re-election to his seat in the state’s House of Delegates – even though he is serving a six-month jail sentence following accusations that he had sex with his 17-year-old secretary.
Joseph Morrissey, 57, won re-election on Tuesday. He ran as an independent in the race for the Richmond-area seat, earning 42 percent of the 6,720 votes cast. His Democratic and Republican challengers received 33 and 24 percent, respectively, according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch.
Morrissey was sworn in today.
BREAKING: Morrissey being sworn in by House Clerk Paul Nardo #VA74pic.twitter.com/dEgjbxhM84 — Markus Schmidt (@MSchmidtRTD) January 14, 2015
Last month, Morrissey was sentenced to six months in jail upon entering an Alford plea – in which one does not admit to a crime but acknowledges that evidence would likely lead to a conviction – to a misdemeanor charge of contributing to the delinquency of a minor, avoiding a possible felony conviction after he was accused of having a sexual relationship with his young secretary.
Morrissey would have faced more than 40 years in prison if a grand jury had convicted him on multiple counts.
After his plea deal, Morrissey agreed to resign his seat, which he had held since 2007. Yet the former Democrat angered the political establishment in the state when he announced he would run for re-election as an independent in the special election to fill his seat.
Given the Henrico County Jail’s work-release program, Morrissey was able to campaign for 12 hours during the day and report back to jail by 8 p.m., according to reports.
Leaders in the state legislature said they are discussing ways to oust Morrissey from the General Assembly for “actions [that] fall grievously short of the standards of a public servant in the House of Delegates,” Speaker of the House William J. Howell told the Times-Dispatch.
"Mr. Morrissey's election tonight does not change the fact that his actions fall grievously short of the standards of a public servant in the House of Delegates," the House’s top Republican said.
"As speaker, I have an obligation to faithfully and impartially discharge my duties as presiding officer and a responsibility to protect the honor and integrity of the House of Delegates as an institution,” he added.
"There are a number of options available to the body to address questions of conduct regarding its members. These options are set out in the Constitution of Virginia and the rules of the House. Working with House Minority Leader David Toscano and other members of the House, we will begin the process of assessing these options in order to determine the appropriate path forward."
Top House Democrat Toscano echoed Howell’s sentiments.
“Joe Morrissey chose to run as an Independent; he is not a member of the Democratic Party, nor is he a member of the House Democratic Caucus,” Toscano said.
"His conviction and actions over the past two months were reprehensible, and we will be exploring every avenue in regard to his status as a member of the House of Delegates."
I think it's ridiculous for the Virginia House of Delegates to try and bar Joseph #Morrissey from serving. #VA74 — Tommy (@FirstTeamTommy) January 14, 2015
House of Delegates rules allow for a member to be expelled by a two-thirds majority for undefined “disorderly conduct.”
Morrissey’s majority-minority district consists of parts of Richmond, Henrico County, Charles City County, according to the Times-Dispatch. |
Abortion policy wrong, cardinal tells Trudeau
Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau asks a question during Question Period in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Wednesday May 14, 2014 . THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld
OTTAWA - The Roman Catholic archbishop of Toronto is asking Justin Trudeau to reconsider his decision to bar would-be Liberal candidates who do not endorse the party policy on abortion.
Cardinal Thomas Collins wrote to the Liberal leader Wednesday to say he is deeply concerned about the controversy.
Collins said he understands the need for party discipline, but questions whether that discipline can extend to matters of conscience.
"Political leaders surely have the right to insist on party unity and discipline in political matters which are within the legitimate scope of their authority," Collins wrote.
"But that political authority is not limitless: it does not extend to matters of conscience and religious faith. It does not govern all aspects of life."
Trudeau has said the party won't accept new candidates who are unwilling to vote pro-choice on relevant Liberal legislation, although sitting MPs will be allowed to run even if they oppose the practice.
The party issued a statement late Wednesday that acknowledged Collins's perspective while gently declaring it would not be moved.
"Like all other Canadians, Cardinal Collins has the freedom to express his deeply held beliefs," said Trudeau spokeswoman Kate Purchase.
"We obviously respect the cardinal, and his views. This is a matter of rights, and Canadians need to know that when they vote Liberal they will get representative who supports and defends women's rights."
In his letter, the cardinal reminded Trudeau — who was raised in the Catholic faith of his famous father — that the patron saint of politicians, Thomas More, was executed for following his conscience against the political authority of his day.
Collins pointedly mentioned that there are two million Catholics in his diocese. He said he encourages them to get involved in politics as both voters and candidates.
"It is not right that they be excluded by any party for being faithful to their conscience." |
NgAutoComplete / Example
Light-weight autocomplete component for Angular.
https://github.com/sengirab/ngAutocomplete
Installation
npm i ng-auto-complete --save
Styling !Important
First thing to note, i've created this package to be as simple as possible. That's why i don't include any styling, this is so you could style it the way you want it.
If you like the styling i did for the example .gif shown above, you can copy it from here.
Classes
.ng-autocomplete-dropdown (.open .is-loading .is-async)
.ng-autocomplete-inputs
.ng-autocomplete-input
.ng-autocomplete-placeholder
.ng-autocomplete-dropdown-icon (.open)
.ng-dropdown (.open .is-initial-empty)
.dropdown-item (.active)
Responses !Important
Response when selected
" {group: AutocompleteGroup, item: AutocompleteItem} "
Response when cleared
" {group: AutocompleteGroup, item: null} "
Note that when calling completer.ResetInput('completer'), this will clear the input. This means that the completer will emit {group: AutocompleteGroup, item: null} . If your listening to this within your component keep in mind that each clear the item will be null
The input will also emit "null" when the input reaches a length of <= 0 .
Usage
import { BrowserModule } from " @angular/platform-browser " ; import { NgModule } from " @angular/core " ; import { FormsModule } from " @angular/forms " ; import { HttpModule } from " @angular/http " ; import { AppComponent } from " ./app.component " ; import { NgAutoCompleteModule } from " ng-auto-complete " ; @ NgModule ( ) export class AppModule { }
import { Component , ViewChild } from " @angular/core " ; import { CreateNewAutocompleteGroup , SelectedAutocompleteItem , NgAutoCompleteComponent } from " ng-auto-complete " ; @ Component ( ) export class AppComponent { @ ViewChild ( NgAutoCompleteComponent ) public ; public ; constructor { } Selected { console . log ( item ) ; } }
< ng-autocomplete ( selected )= " Selected($event) " [ classes ]= " [''] " [ group ]= " group " > < / ng-autocomplete >
Remove selected values
public selected : any [ ] = [ ] ; Selected ( item : SelectedAutocompleteItem ) { this . selected . push ( item . item ) ; this . completer . RemovableValues ( ' completer ' , this . selected ) }
Turn off completion
In some cases you may want to disable auto completion. e.g you want a html select element.
Example
Usage
public group = [ CreateNewAutocompleteGroup ( ' Search / choose in / from list ' , ' completer ' , [ , , , , , ] , , ' ' , false ) ] ;
With children
Usage
public group = [ CreateNewAutocompleteGroup ( ' Search / choose in / from list ' , ' completer_one ' , [ , , , ] , , ' ' ) , CreateNewAutocompleteGroup ( ' Search / choose in / from list ' , ' completer_two ' , [ , , , , , , ] , , ' completer_one ' ) ] ;
Within a form
import { Component , OnInit , ViewChild } from " @angular/core " ; import { FormArray , FormBuilder , FormGroup } from " @angular/forms " ; import { CreateNewAutocompleteGroup , SelectedAutocompleteItem , NgAutoCompleteComponent } from " ng-auto-complete " ; @ Component ( ) export class AppComponent implements OnInit { @ ViewChild ( NgAutoCompleteComponent ) public ; public ; public ; constructor { } ngOnInit { this . form = this . _fb . group ( ) ; } Selected { this . form . controls [ ' items ' ] = this . _fb . array ( [ ... this . form . controls [ ' items ' ] . value , item . original ] ) ; console . log ( item ) ; } }
Changelog - (Read before updating.)
ExpressionChangedAfterItHasBeenCheckedError Fixed this error in a previous version, this ends up in propagating the error, this isn't user friendly. Since i must check something in the ngAfterViewChecked there is no escaping this error unless setTimeout is used (which i did now).
Internal changes The way how the first value was selected is changed. Package used to wait until view was checked, this was checked periodically via a interval. Now a subject has been created to emit this value to all their subscribers.
BREAKING: FindInput function has been removed.
Updates regarding angular 7
Important. Breaking changes!
NgAutocompleteComponent renamed to NgAutoCompleteComponent
Very big changes internally. Stopped using rollup to create my npm package. Using angular libraries now instead.
Updated to newest version of angular.
Fixed an maximum callstack exceeded bug.
Added searchLength to options when create an autocomplete group, it configures when to fire a search. The number given is the amount of characters in the input.
Removed dropdown it's own comparison when using Async. Assuming the user will probably filter the results.
Added new classes to wrong element.
Changes to behaviour of the dropdown (mainly for async). Dropdown now only opens when there's a default value at start. It will stay closed until it has a list to show. -- Represented by the class: is-initial-empty. Dropdown now has a loading class; is-loading. Internal changes to keep the new code compatible with new behaviour.
New Functionality.
Support for async functions. Useful for when you want to use your own API to return results. @ ViewChild ( NgAutoCompleteComponent ) public completer : NgAutoCompleteComponent ; ; this . completer . SetAsync ( ' completer ' , async ) ;
New Functionality.
Created new functions to add custom ng-templates. Every ng template receives a context that's equal to an AutocompleteItem type. Except for the dropdownValue, this receives a hightlight too. see example template parameter must be of type: dropdownValue | placeholderValue | noResults @ ViewChild ( NgAutoCompleteComponent ) public completer : NgAutoCompleteComponent ; @ ViewChild ( ' dropdownValue ' ) dropdownValue : TemplateRef < any > ; @ ViewChild ( ' placeholderValue ' ) placeholderValue : TemplateRef < any > ; @ ViewChild ( ' noResults ' ) noResults : TemplateRef < any > ; this . completer . SetTemplate ( ' completer ' , ' dropdownValue ' , this . dropdownValue ) ; this . completer . SetTemplate ( ' completer ' , ' noResults ' , this . noResults ) ; this . completer . SetTemplate ( ' completer ' , ' placeholderValue ' , this . placeholderValue ) ; < ng-template # dropdownValue let-value let-hightlight = " highlight " > < div [ innerHTML ]= " hightlight " > < / div > </ ng-template > < ng-template # placeholderValue let-value > {{value.title}} </ ng-template > < ng-template # noResults let-value > Hey, you searched for: {{value}}. But there are no results! </ ng-template >
Big performance refactor. Instead of using arrays, now uses objects. Search by object key.
New @output, (no-results) emits GroupNoResult.
A lot of internal changes & bugfixes.
In some cases when the a view has a hidden ng-content, that shows if an expression evaluates to true and a completer function has been used e.g( SelectItem('completer', 5) ) it would give an error; completer view is not initialized. Functions that are called before the completer view has been initialized are now queued to be fired when the view is actually initialized.
) it would give an error; completer view is not initialized.
Added tab to submit events. (not preventing default, so still goes to the next input, if there's one).
Added better support for navigating with arrows. Dropdown list now navigates to the selected item if the items exceed the dropdown its given height.
Internal code cleanup.
Mobile update: Remove mouseover when mobile. This prevents the user from needing to double tap the options.
Styling
Some internal styling has changed. When completer is turned of, input used to be disabled. This doesn't work on all browsers. Input now get pointer-events: none;
Browser compatibility.
Fixes
Value has to be set on input (equal to ngModel). This created an issue on safari, when an item was selected, the placeholder didn't go away.
Styling
There's a new element span.ng-autocomplete-dropdown-icon this replaces the dropdown icon i did with css only.
Other changes
Increase of internal performance.
Had some issues with Element refs. #fixed.
New Functionality.
It's now possible to instantiate CreateNewAutocompleteGroup with an empty array and set its value later. This can be useful when you're waiting for an async task to complete. const component = NgAutoCompleteComponent.FindCompleter('completer', this.completers); component.SetValues( 'late', // <-- NOTE: this is the key of the input. You can call this what you want. [ {title: 'Option 4', id: '1'}, {title: 'Option 5', id: '2'}, {title: 'Option 6', id: '3'}, {title: 'Option 7', id: '4'}, {title: 'Option 8', id: '5'}, {title: 'Option 9', id: '6'}, ] )
Created new pipe to highlight search query. class dropdown-item-highlight
Changes
CreateNewAutocompleteGroup now accepts {id:string|number}, before only {id:string}
Some small changes.
KeyEvents now preventDefault
Close dropdown on tab.
Open dropdown on focus - was only on click.
Updated README.md.
Maintain active option when input is blurred - also for disabled completion inputs now.
Updated README.md.
Maintain active option when input is blurred.
Updated README.md.
Updated README.md.
Fixed an issue; when selecting a option from a completer that is parent, active child option didn't reset.
Updated README.md.
New Functionality.
SelectItem(key: string, id: string) NgAutoCompleteComponent function - Set value manual, by id. This can be useful when the list is loaded but there's a value set in the database. When the data is fetched from server, this method can be used. @ ViewChild ( NgAutoCompleteComponent ) public completer : NgAutoCompleteComponent ; this . completer . SelectItem ( ' completer ' , ' 1 ' ) ; ### Or if multiple completers in component. @ ViewChildren ( NgAutoCompleteComponent ) public completers : QueryList < NgAutoCompleteComponent > ; ; completer . SelectItem ( ' completer ' , ' 1 ' ) ;
Only groups with parents did a reset when the input reached a length <= 0. Now all inputs do, input with parents still get set to initial value.
[1.0.0] - 2017-07-11. Releasing since it's being used.
Renamed Functions.
ResetCompleters to ResetInputs.
ResetCompleter to ResetInput.
FindCompleter to FindInput.
TriggerChangeCompleters to TriggerChange.
New Functionality.
<ng-autocomplete [key]="'group1'"> - Added key on component.
static FindCompleter usage (NgAutoCompleteComponent.FindCompleter()) (not to be confused with the old FindCompleter, now FindInput) (key: string, list: QueryList): NgAutoCompleteComponent. This can be useful when you have multiple ng-autocomplete components in one component. Note that this can only be used when the view has been init.
NgAutoCompleteComponent Functions
I have made all NgAutoCompleteComponent and CompleterComponent functions public, so you could do a lot more than i'll show you
I've documented the functions of which i think their useful:
Usage
@ ViewChild ( NgAutoCompleteComponent ) public completer : NgAutoCompleteComponent ;
Function Description FindCompleter((key: string, list: QueryList)) (Static function) Finds completer ResetInputs() Resets all rendered completer inputs FindInput(key: string) Find completer input by assigned key RemovableValues(key: string, list: {id: string or number, [value: string]: any}[]) Remove options from rendered list (by id) SelectItem(key: string, id: string or number) e.g set an initial value on the completers input SetValues(key: string, {id: string or number, [value: string]: any}[]) Sets values for the input. Useful in async situations.
CompleterComponent Functions
Usage
@ ViewChild ( NgAutoCompleteComponent ) public completer : NgAutoCompleteComponent ; public input = this . completer . FindInput ( ' completer ' ) ;
Function Description ClearValue() Clears found completer's input.
Contributing
Do you like to code?
Fork & clone
npm install
ng serve
git checkout -b my-new-feature
component lives in src/app/ng-autocomplete/*
Submit a pull request
Do you like organizing? |
The mood in Miami has changed. Optimism, excitement, pride, resilience and defiance are dominating the emotional narrative across South Florida.
If you had shut yourself off from the outside world for the last two weeks - and heaven knows it has been tempting at times - you would assume such positive feelings could be associated with just one thing; LeBron James re-signing with the Miami Heat.
But it isn't. And he didn't.
As a sports fan, there have been few sinking feelings quite like that Sports Illustrated ‘essay' landing in my Twitter feed last Friday. Like most of you I felt crushed - heartbroken I'd never see James in a Heat jersey again.
But then something unexpected happened. Within hours there was renewed hope. Seemingly every hour since has brought another reason to be cheerful. In fact, it can be argued that the mood is more optimistic now than it would have been had the King remained on his South Beach throne. Here's why.
Once the initial euphoria and the accompanying cacophony of pots and pans had dulled, it really wouldn't taken very long for everything to return to that post-Finals status quo. You've probably heard it all before.
"There's no financial flexibility to get him the help he needs"
"Short term deal? He'll leave next year anyway"
"The East is still terrible, but this team can't beat the Spurs"
"Danny Granger and Josh McRoberts? Really? Is that it?"
"Dwyane Wade's finished, he can't hack it anymore."
"When will Chris Bosh step up?"
I haven't heard any of that this week.
I don't know about you guys, but when Bosh recommitted on Friday afternoon, I strutted around punching the air repeating the words "Chris ‘effin' Bosh!" for about an hour. It was a quick pick-me-up of Bloody Mary proportions, washing away what would have been an ugly Hangover from four years chugging Double LeBron and Cokes.
The Bosh Instagram snap with the Heat ballcap and Championship ring that followed? Forget about it. New #1 jersey ordered. Now, instead of the talk of Bosh's diminished impact in a Big Three, there's excitement over his potential as the leading light.
And what else can be said about ‘Mr Miami' Dwyane Wade? "My Home. My City. My House" was a rallying for the ages. Suddenly, no one talking about his knees, they're talking about how lucky they are to have him.
Udonis Haslem? There's massive gratitude once again. Mario Chalmers? A feeling that things could and will should better now LeBron is no longer berating him at every turn. Bird? It's good to have you back, man. People are looking at the potential upside of those McRoberts and Granger acquisitions too.
There's also pride in the stirring reaction of Pat Riley and the Heat organisation since last Friday. Instead of sitting in the corner punch-drunk, unwilling to leave the corner, Riley simply spat out the blood and came out swinging like a grey, gnarled, slicked-back Rocky Balboa. That spirit has reverberated around the organisation and the fanbase. With Riley lacing up his gloves, there's a believe Miami will always go that one more round.
The Heat organization could have easily pulled a Boston Celtics and curled up into a trembling, weeping mass of green. Many expected it to happen. It didn't happen. Instead Riley locked that chiseled jaw and set about luring Luol Deng and pretty much everyone else before the weekend was over.
From staring into the abyss of irrelevancy, one week ago, Miami isn't just clinging to the faint hope of "remaining competitive", there's belief the Heat can still go toe-to-toe with Chicago, Cleveland, Washington, Indiana and anyone else in the East who thinks they can wrest away the crown.
For the first time since the 2011 Finals, there's a thirst among the fanbase to prove everyone wrong and to throw it back in the faces of those outsiders hoping the empire will completely crumble.
Personally speaking, this is a way more enticing and exciting prospect than idly expecting a fifth straight trip to the Finals. The hope Miami could defy the odds, exceeds the fear of failure that comes with expecting triumph.
While we're unlikely to see anything like the Big 3 era again, it still feels like a good time to be a Miami Heat fan. Few would have predicted that a week ago.
Thanks for everything, LeBron, but the Heat Nation is ready to move on without you. Actually, we're kinda looking forward to it. Let's Go Heat! |
The US is strong enough to financially discriminate against European companies, but it lacks the capacity to bring peace to Syria, French President Francois Hollande said.
“The US has enough power to get money, but not enough – to establish peace (in Syria),” Hollande told L'Obs magazine on Wednesday.
In his interview, the French leader slammed Washington for imposing multibillion dollar fines on major European companies, while, at the same time, shielding American firms.
Read more
As for the situation in Syria, Hollande said that he doesn’t expect any decisive actions from the US until the end of the year because US President Barack Obama, who promised not to engage US in new conflicts abroad, will soon be leaving office.
The French leader promised that France will “not abandon Aleppo” after Russia vetoed its UN Security Council resolution proposing a ‘no fly zone’ over the strategic city, which remains split between government forces and the militants.
“The first condition is that the bombing stops,” he said, adding that Paris will keep pressing for the ceasefire to be reached “in the coming days” to allow humanitarian aid deliveries to Aleppo and the beginning of talks between the interested parties.
Hollande also expressed regret that Russia’s proposal to destroy Syrian chemical weapons averted airstrikes against the government of President Bashar Assad three years ago.
“August 2013 will remain a key date in the history of this conflict. France was ready to hit the Syrian regime, which had crossed a red line,” he said.
But “another route” that was taken by the international community which laid the foundation for the current state of things in the country,” the French leader said.
READ MORE: 'Moscow is being obstructive': French PM Valls doubles down on Russia policy after criticism
Assad sensed the weakness of the West and asked for military assistance from Moscow, while Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) reduced the numbers of moderate opposition, he explained.
“Aleppo today is a challenge for the international community. It’s either honor or shame,” he concluded.
Lavrov: Russia, US not on brink of war https://t.co/W9L2b2Zgct — RT (@RT_com) October 12, 2016
On Wednesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that he believes a peaceful resolution to the situation in Aleppo is still possible. Speaking to CNN's Christiane Amanpour he said that Russia still “strongly supports the initiative by [UN Special Representative for Syria] Staffan de Mistura, who proposed that Al Nusra fighters should be [allowed] to leave eastern Aleppo with the weapons ‘in dignity’” along with the moderate rebels that want to “stay with them.” Rebels who want to stay in Aleppo, meanwhile, should join in with the cessation of hostilities, he said. |
UK authorities reportedly raided the Guardian’s office in London to destroy hard drives in an effort to stop future publications of leaks from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. The action is unlikely to prevent new materials coming out.
Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger revealed in a Monday article posted on the British newspaper's website that intelligence officials from the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) told him that he would either have to hand over all the classified documents or have the newspaper’s hard drives destroyed.
After more talks, two "security experts" from GCHQ - the British version of the National Security Agency - visited the Guardian’s London offices.
Rusbridger wrote that the government officials then watched as computers, which contained classified information passed on by Snowden, were physically destroyed in one of the newspaper building’s basements.
"We can call off the black helicopters," Rusbridger said one of the officials joked.
Another source familiar with the event confirmed to Reuters that Guardian employees destroyed the computers as UK officials observed.
During negotiations with the government, Rusbridger said that the newspaper could not fulfill its journalistic duty if it satisfied the authorities’ requests.
But GCHQ reportedly responded by telling the Guardian that it had already sparked the debate, which was enough.
"You've had your debate. There's no need to write any more," Reuters quoted the unnamed official as saying.
In the article, Rusbridger explained that because of existing “international collaborations” between journalists, it was still possible to report the story and "take advantage of the most permissive legal environments."
“I explained to the man from Whitehall about the nature of international collaborations...Bluntly, we did not have to do our reporting from London. Already most of the NSA stories were being reported and edited out of New York. And had it occurred to him that [reporter Glenn] Greenwald lived in Brazil?” wrote Rusbridger.
“The man was unmoved. And so one of the more bizarre moments in the Guardian’s long history occurred – with two GCHQ security experts overseeing the destruction of hard drives in the Guardian’s basement just to make sure there was nothing in the mangled bits of metal which could possibly be of any interest to passing Chinese agents.”
Rusbridger pointed out that the whole incident felt like a “pointless piece of symbolism that understood nothing about the digital age.”
The news comes after Sunday’s international incident during which David Miranda, the partner of Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald, was held at Heathrow airport under the UK Terrorism Act for the maximum time allowed before pressing charges. Greenwald was the reporter who exclusively broke the Snowden story.
The editor promised that the Guardian will “continue to do patient, painstaking reporting on the Snowden documents, we just won’t do it in London. The seizure of Miranda’s laptop, phones, hard drives and camera will similarly have no effect on Greenwald’s work.”
Another US security source told Reuters that Miranda’s detention was meant to send a message to those who received Snowden’s classified documents, about how serious the UK is in closing all the leaks in relation to the whistleblower’s revelations.
Greenwald, who first published secrets leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, responded by promising to release more documents. He added that the UK would be “sorry” for detaining his partner for nine hours.
Snowden, who has been granted asylum by Russia, gave Greenwald up to 20,000 documents with details about the US National Security Agency and the UK’s GCHQ surveillance operations.
‘US is the intellectual author behind detention of Miranda’
Lawyer Eva Golinger told RT that the UK has violated all concepts of freedom of the press. “We are talking about a media outlet. Journalists and their spouses and partners being detained and interrogated. So clearly there has been a decision made that everything related to Edward Snowden must be captured no matter what, violating anyone’s right under any country’s laws.”
Golinger believes that government's pressure on journalists could inspire some to cover the topic of government surveillance even more, instead of discouraging them to do so.
“The more principled the people reporting are, the more they will continue to pursue that work in the face of threat. Such cheap threats and intimidation give people even more reasons to continue doing what they are doing because it shows that those in power are clearly frightened of the information that is being put out,” she explained.
“At the same time it could certainly intimidate other journalists and create the environment of self-censorship, where many would be unwilling to take the risks that are involved with national security reporting, particularly when it comes to the US.”
Golinger argued that US is the “intellectual author behind the detainment of Miranda.”
“We are talking about a search and capture that is going on for Edward Snowden and it is the US that is leading that effort. It is not the UK or other European nations, they are merely abiding by the wishes of the US…What I believe is that Washington has simply put out a request to all of its allies that anyone related to Edward Snowden must be detained if they come into your territory and the UK abided by that and did their duty.” |
The Orlando Magic interviewed Adrian Griffin for their vacant head-coaching position today, the Orlando Sentinel has learned.
The interview took place in New York, where Magic GM Rob Hennigan will attend the NBA Draft Lottery tonight.
Griffin, 41, spent the 2015-16 season as the Magic’s lead assistant coach on Scott Skiles’ staff.
Skiles resigned last week, creating the job opening.
The Magic also have reached out to former Indiana Pacers head coach Frank Vogel.
It is unclear if the Magic have additional candidates in mind for the job.
Griffin played nine seasons in the NBA, with stints with the Boston Celtics, Dallas Mavericks, Houston Rockets, Chicago Bulls and Seattle SuperSonics.
Griffin worked as a Bulls assistant coach from the 2010-11 season through the 2014-15 season. Before that, he worked for the Milwaukee Bucks under Skiles as an assistant coach for player development.
In NBA.com’s 2014-15 GM Survey, general managers were asked to name the league's best assistant coach. Griffin tied for second place in that poll, along with the Cleveland Cavaliers' Tyronn Lue, the San Antonio Spurs' Ettore Messina and the Los Angeles Clippers' Mike Woodson.
The Magic are one of four teams with head-coaching openings. The others are the Rockets, Memphis Grizzlies and New York Knicks.
Josh Robbins covers the Orlando Magic and the NBA for the Orlando Sentinel. You can reach him via e-mail at [email protected] and connect with him on Facebook at facebook.com/JoshuaBRobbins. Follow him on Twitter at @JoshuaBRobbins. |
Wildrose MLA Nathan Cooper rose from his seat Monday afternoon and read a question scrawled hastily on a scrap of paper as an unusually sleepy question period wrapped up in the Alberta legislature.
"In just a few minutes from now, the NDP in British Columbia and the Green Party are set to announce that they are about to cut a deal to form (a) government," said Cooper.
"It’s clear that this will not be good for the interests of Alberta. Both parties said that they oppose Kinder Morgan."
Before question period, the Speaker had warned members to stay off their cellphones, but nobody paid much attention as news broke on Twitter of a deal between B.C. NDP Leader John Horgan and B.C. Green Party Leader Andrew Weaver.
The deal would see the Greens support the NDP as a minority government in B.C. for four years. The Alberta legislature was debating the issue 20 minutes before it was officially announced.
Kinder Morgan plans a $7.4-billion expansion of the Trans Mountain pipeline that would get more Alberta oil to West Coast tankers.
The project’s approval has been a success story for the Alberta government and it has credited the politically unpopular carbon tax for creating an environment that made it possible.
In response to Cooper, Environment Minister Shannon Phillips accused the Wildrose Party of "getting out their pompoms and cheerleading for Alberta’s demise."
Fielding questions from B.C. reporters after the announcement, Weaver said blocking the Kinder Morgan expansion was critical to his party and its members, but the terms of the deal between the two B.C. parties — and how it addresses the pipeline — won’t be available until both caucuses vote on the political partnership Tuesday.
Alberta deputy premier Sarah Hoffman told reporters it would be "very difficult" for the new B.C. government to obstruct the pipeline, given it has already been approved by the National Energy Board and federal cabinet.
Two weeks ago, Premier Rachel Notley said any government in B.C. would be over-reaching if it tried to block the pipeline.
In the wake of the B.C. agreement, Wildrose Leader Brian Jean called on the government to remove two environmentalists who have opposed the Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion from the government’s oilsands advisory group. |
States ranked by the prevalence and seriousness of depression among residents, from the least at the top to the most at the bottom. 1. South Dakota 2. Hawaii 3. New Jersey 4. Iowa 5. Maryland 6. Minnesota 7. Louisiana (pre-Katrina) 8. Illinois 9. North Dakota 10. Texas 11. Georgia 12. Vermont 13. Nebraska 14. Florida 15. California 16. Massachusetts 17. Pennsylvania 18. Virginia 19. New York 20. New Hampshire 21. Alaska 22. Michigan 23. District of Columbia 24. Delaware 25. Arizona 26. Alabama 27. North Carolina 28. South Carolina 29. Kansas 30. Wisconsin 31. Tennessee 32. Montana 33. Mississippi 34. Colorado 35. Washington 36. New Mexico 37. Oregon 38. Connecticut 39. Indiana 40. Arkansas 41. Maine 42. Wyoming 43. Ohio 44. Missouri 45. Idaho 46. Oklahoma 47. Nevada 48. Rhode Island 49. Kentucky 50. West Virginia 51. Utah Source: Thomson Healthcare State Ranking on Suicide Rates Suicides per 100,000 residents** 1. District of Columbia: 5.3 2. New York: 6 3. Massachusetts: 6.4 4. New Jersey: 6.8 5. Rhode Island: 7.5 6. Illinois: 8 7. Connecticut: 8.2 8. Maryland: 8.9 9. Hawaii: 8.9 10. Nebraska: 9.5 11. California: 9.6 12. New Hampshire: 9.8 13. Minnesota: 10.1 14. Texas: 10.6 15. Michigan: 10.8 16. Virginia: 10.9 17. Delaware: 11.0 18. Pennsylvania: 11.1 19. Georgia: 11.1 20. North Dakota: 11.2 21. Indiana: 11.3 22. Ohio: 11.3 23. South Carolina: 11.3 24. Iowa: 11.5 25. Alabama: 11.8 26. Wisconsin: 11.9 27. North Carolina: 11.9 28. Louisiana (pre-Katrina): 12.1 29. Mississippi: 12.2 30. Missouri: 12.4 31. Maine: 12.4 32. Arkansas: 13 33. Florida: 13 34. Kentucky: 13.2 35. Tennessee: 13.2 36. Washington: 13.2 37. Kansas: 13.5 38. Vermont: 14.2 39. Oklahoma: 14.4 40. South Dakota: 14.9 41. Oregon: 14.9 42. West Virginia: 15.4 43. Arizona: 15.6 44. Colorado: 17.1 45. Utah: 17.1 46. Idaho: 17.5 47. Wyoming: 17.6 48. Montana: 18.7 49. New Mexico: 18.8 50. Nevada: 19 51. Alaska: 23.1 **Numbers are age-adjusted, as states vary in number of residents at the most and least vulnerable ages for committing suicide. The totals take account of these differences. Data are from 2004, the latest year available. Source: Thomson Healthcare from National Center for Health Statistics and Bureau of Census data Conversation guidelines: USA TODAY welcomes your thoughts, stories and information related to this article. Please stay on topic and be respectful of others. Keep the conversation appropriate for interested readers across the map. |
The world's first major tidal power station is to be installed in a deep, but sheltered, channel between two Scottish islands, providing electricity for up to 10,000 homes.
The array of 10 underwater turbines will be placed between the inner Hebridean islands of Islay and Jura, both well known for their malt whisky. They will generate about 10 megawatts (MW) of electricity, enough to power twice the number of homes on the islands, and to power the island's distilleries.
The devices, underwater versions of a wind turbine, will be placed on the ocean bed in the Sound of Islay, a kilometre-wide "canyon" with one of the strongest and most reliable tidal streams off the UK coast, flowing at almost 11 kilometres an hour (6.7mph).
"It's like a funnel," said a spokesman for ScottishPower Renewables, the energy company behind the £40m project. "It's a very strong tidal stream, and it's very predictable. It's one of the best we could have in Scotland."
The project has been authorised by John Swinney, the Scottish finance secretary, because the scheme is sited within the Holyrood constituency of the energy minister Jim Mather. Swinney said it was the largest scheme of its kind in the world.
"With around a quarter of Europe's potential tidal energy resource and a tenth of the wave capacity, Scotland's seas have unrivalled potential to generate green energy, create new, low carbon jobs, and bring billions of pounds of investment to Scotland," Swinney said. "This development – the largest tidal array in the world – does just that and will be a milestone in the global development of tidal energy."
The Islay scheme will use a turbine developed by Hammerfest Strøm AS, a Norwegian company part-owned by ScottishPower Renewables' parent company, the Spanish energy giant Iberdrola. A scaled-down, 300kw, prototype has already been tested off Norway and the same 1MW model is now being tested in the Pentland Firth off north Scotland.
Philip Maxwell, chairman of the community-owned Islay Energy Trust, said the islanders were "delighted" by the project. "It's great, and there's a feeling on the island that the people own the project," he said.
Similar to onshore windfarm projects paying rent to local communities, the trust will receive a cut of the profits from the tidal scheme and has already had other funding from ScottishPower Renewables. It has also promised to use local contractors. The first turbines could be in place from 2013, with the full project running by 2015.
The trust's share will be reinvested in green energy projects on Islay, including subsidised solar photovoltaic panels and wind turbines, and may be used to fund offshore wind and marine power projects in the future. It may also experiment with electric cars.
ScottishPower Renewables has also signed a deal with the drinks giant Diageo to provide it with all the electricity needed for eight of its whisky distilleries and maltings on Islay from the tidal array.
Alex Salmond, Scotland's first minister, has claimed that this marine energy source could help the country to become the "Saudi Arabia of offshore renewables".
While environmentalists are very enthusiastic about the potential for marine power, many believe Salmond is heavily promoting offshore energy to avoid taking far more politically challenging steps to tackle emissions from transport, industry and homes.
Successive Scottish governments have been reluctant to take measures to curb rising car use, cut road building programmes or to push for new, greener forms of transport such as low-carbon vehicles. One of the Scottish National party's core areas of support is the North Sea oil industry-dominated region around Aberdeen. |
Having beaten Wladimir Klitschko on an unanimous points decision to claim the WBA, IBF and WBO belts on a sensational night in Germany last Saturday, Tyson Fury is now taking some well-earned downtime.
But despite the fact that he is due to earn an estimated £2.4million from his success in Germany, the new, unified heavyweight champion of the world has chosen to embark on a modest retreat to Scotland, on a trip which has already included a stay at £55-a-night bed and breakfast, Red Brolly Inn.
Fury tucked into a cooked breakfast at 'Perthshire's Newest Cosy Wee Inn' but apparently failed to completely immerse himself in the country's culture, turning down Scottish staple, haggis, in favour of an American classic of bacon, fried eggs and pancakes, smothered in maple syrup.
Tyson Fury (left) had his photograph taken with Red Brolly Inn manager and chef Tommy McPhee (right)
The Red Brolly in Ballinluig, Perthshire is described as an 'all day cafe, restaurant and bar and a wee inn'
Fury frustrated Wladimir Klitschko with an unorthodox style - often holding his hands behind his back
Described as an 'all day cafe, restaurant and bar and a wee inn' on its website, the hotel in the village of Ballinluig has no room service or satellite television but a full cooked breakfast is included in the price of the room.
Staff were left flabbergasted when Fury wandered into their establishment en route to a mystery location for his quiet getaway, considering his Dusseldorf victory has transformed the Mancunian into one of the most recognisable - and feared - sportsmen in the world.
However, despite his 6ft 9in frame, the 27-year-old decided not to tackle a full Scottish breakfast containing haggis, black pudding and a tattie scone at the B&B.
'He was going to have the full Scottish breakfast but I think I swayed him with the mention of the pancakes so he opted for that,' explained inn manager and chef Tommy McPhee.
Members of Fury's entourage, including the boxer's proud dad, were rather more adventurous and did go for the full Scottish version.
'I am a boxing fan so I recognised Fury's father too as he is a regular ringside fixture at the fights,' McPhee continued.
Fury shunned five star luxury and checked into the Red Brolly Inn where rooms start at a modest £55-a-night
The stay is located just off the A9 and 'dedicated to providing great all day accommodation experiences'
The Scottish establishment offered a wide selection for breakfast for Mancunian Fury to choose from
'Tyson must have enjoyed his choice as he called it one of the best hotel breakfasts he had ever had.'
McPhee admitted staff were left rubbing their eyes in disbelief when Fury booked in.
'We got a call at around quarter to midnight on the Wednesday night asking if we had any rooms for one night as Tyson Fury was in the area and wanted to come and stay,' he told The Courier.
'We were indeed able to oblige him and shortly afterward he turned up.'
He may have a fearsome reputation, but Fury turned out to be something of a charmer.
'He was really chatty and down to earth, a lovely guy and delighted to be in Scotland for what he called 'a real get away from it all' following all the attention and media furore of the past week,' McPhee said.
Fury now has to face Klitschko again after the Ukrainian triggered the mandatory rematch clause
'We were delighted as it's a real coup for us to have someone of his calibre stay here - a world champion at the top of his game, who then complimented us on the food and service.'
The surprise visit has certainly left McPhee with a knock-out tale to tell for years to come.
'It has given us all a real boost and brightened up a Wednesday evening in December,' he added.
Fury has since headed off into the wilds - although fans across the country are sure to be keeping their eyes peeled following news of his Perthshire appearance.
'We are assuming he is somewhere in Scotland,' said Tommy,
'But we are not exactly sure as he did not say where he was going and we would respect his privacy.
'It is little wonder he wanted a relaxing break and it is great that he has chosen to come to Scotland, although how incognito you can be when you are six foot nine inches is another matter.' |
The Post’s guide to the 2016-17 NFC East the Giants will face this season.
Dallas Cowboys
Coach: Jason Garrett (seventh season)
Biggest newcomers: Jerry Jones was conspicuously quiet in terms of his roster this offseason — especially after a 4-12 disaster. The most prominent addition was first-round pick Ezekiel Elliott, a talented RB from Ohio State. Why Jones didn’t pursue a veteran backup QB with Tony Romo’s fragile collarbone just a hard shot from ruining another Cowboys season remains a mystery.
Biggest losses: On the plus side for Dallas, their roster didn’t suffer many notable defections, either. Jones jettisoned volatile DE Greg Hardy, but that probably will end up being a case of addition by subtraction. G Mackenzy Bernadeau, a middling talent, left for the Jaguars in free agency.
Camp outlook: When moving into a glitzy new practice facility is the biggest highlight, you know it’s been a rough offseason. The start of camp couldn’t come fast enough for the Cowboys after an ugly winter and summer filled with injury concerns and discipline matters.
The defensive front seven will start the season in disarray, thanks to NFL suspensions of LB Rolando McClain and DEs Randy Gregory and DeMarcus Lawrence that came in rapid-fire succession last month.
But Romo is by far the biggest worry, coming off repeated collarbone injuries and surgery that caused him to miss all but four games last season — the primary reason Dallas slumped from 12-4 to 4-12. The only backups are Kellen Moore, who went 0-2 while completing just 59 percent of his passes last year, and rookie Dak Prescott, a read-option quarterback at Mississippi State.
How they fared vs. Giants last season: The teams split the series 1-1.
Preseason schedule
Aug. 13: at Rams
Aug. 19: vs. Dolphins
Aug. 25: at Seahawks
Sept. 1: vs. Texans
Philadelphia Eagles
Coach: Doug Pederson (first season)
Biggest newcomers: Pederson is a coaching unknown and curious choice to replace the axed Chip Kelly. Player-wise, the Eagles caused one of the biggest commotions of the offseason, mortgaging their future to take QB Carson Wentz No. 2 overall out of North Dakota State. The Wentz move was controversial, coming just weeks after Philadelphia gave Sam Bradford a lucrative new deal and signed veteran backup passer Chase Daniel. Other key additions include G Brandon Brooks (Texans), S Rodney McLeod (Rams) and ex-Giants WR Rueben Randle.
Biggest losses: After Kelly was fired, newly re-empowered GM Howie Roseman wasted no time in putting his mark on the franchise, trading RB DeMarco Murray to the Titans and LB Kiko Alonso to the Dolphins. Murray was a bust in his lone season in Philly, and the Eagles still have Ryan Matthews and Darren Sproles in the backfield.
Camp outlook: Change is in the air for the Birds after three years of Kelly’s unorthodox stewardship, that included missing the playoffs in the past two seasons.
The roster is thin, especially at wide receiver and throughout a defense that ranked third-worst in the NFL last season. But all of the focus in camp — and no doubt beyond — will be on the Eagles’ extremely crowded quarterback situation. Bradford already has shown his displeasure with Wentz’s arrival by boycotting part of the offseason workouts, and the team’s talk of giving Wentz a redshirt year seems far-fetched based on the high price it paid for him and the pressure it is facing to win now.
How they fared vs. Giants last season: Philadelphia swept the series 2-0.
Preseason schedule
Aug. 11: vs. Buccaneers
Aug. 18: at Steelers
Aug. 27: at Colts
Sept. 1: vs. Jets
Washington Redskins
Coach: Jay Gruden (third season)
Biggest newcomers: What had been an uncharacteristically quiet offseason for Washington blew up in May, when they swooped in to sign Pro Bowl CB Josh Norman after the Panthers suddenly decided to lift his franchise tag. The Redskins also fortified their defense by signing ex-Broncos S David Bruton and added depth at tight end with former Broncos and 49ers TE Vernon Davis.
Biggest losses: His incredible flameout with the Redskins finally complete, Robert Griffin III is now in Cleveland. That won’t be considered a detriment by Gruden, who never warmed to the mercurial quarterback. The only other prominent departure was by DT Terrance Knighton, who signed with the Patriots.
Camp outlook: The surprise Norman signing sent a jolt of adrenaline into the Redskins and could make them the favorite to repeat as division champions.
But that is assuming QB Kirk Cousins continues the sudden improvement he flashed at the end of last season — a big question even to the team’s management, which refused to sign him to a long-term extension in the offseason.
As Cousins goes, so go the Redskins.
How they fared vs. Giants last season: The teams split the series 1-1.
Preseason schedule
Aug. 11: at Falcons
Aug. 19: vs. Jets
Aug. 26: vs. Bills
Sept. 1: at Buccaneers |
Image copyright EPA Image caption Police have been holding security drills in Kuala Lumpur ahead of the Southeast Asian Games
More than 400 people have been detained in a counter-terrorism operation in Malaysia, authorities say.
Those held in a series of raids in the capital Kuala Lumpur were mainly from Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, officials said.
Machines to make fake passports and to forge Malaysian immigration documents were among the items seized.
Security in the city is being tightened up ahead of the Southeast Asian Games which begin in just over a week's time.
Monday's raids saw police break down doors and lead scores of people away in handcuffs to waiting buses. They were taken to police stations for investigation and screening.
Authorities said they were targeting anyone with missing or fraudulent travel documents or who was believed to be affiliated with terror groups in Syria and Iraq.
"We will detect and take action against foreigners suspected of having links with terrorists, especially those involved in activities in Syria," police counter-terror official Ayob Khan Mydin Pitchay, said, quoted by Free Malaysia Today.
Officers were also equipped with devices to detect radioactive materials, police said, although no such items were found. |
CORAL SPRINGS, Florida, August 10, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --
Industrial hemp known as a hardy and renewable resource (one of the earliest domesticated plants known) is quickly becoming a required resource for various industrial applications, including paper, textiles, and cordage. Sustainable hemp seed, fiber and oil are being used in raw materials by major companies, including Ford Motors, Patagonia, and The Body Shop, to make a wide variety of products as a few select Hemp manufacturers race to increase operations as the demand continues to grow.
Hemp, Inc. (OTC: HEMP) executives announced today they expect the first 200,000 pounds of Lost Circulation Materials (LCMs) in inventory to go to market in the next 2 weeks. David Schmitt, COO of Hemp, Inc.'s wholly owned subsidiary, Industrial Hemp Manufacturing, LLC (IHM) is meeting with specific companies next week to ensure the LCMs will be ready to go to market. The company's LCMs are expected to potentially sale for two to three dollars per pound which could bring in revenue of four to six hundred thousand dollars. Schmitt has also been overseeing the final stages of Hemp, Inc.'s 70,000 square foot multi-purpose industrial hemp processing facility and milling operation on 9 acres, in Spring Hope, North Carolina, that is in the final stages of completion. "Hemp, Inc. is strategically positioned at the forefront of the industrial hemp industry and continues to remain ahead of the curve to be able to process industrial hemp and manufacture products made from hemp fiber due to its commercial size and by it being the only one in the United States. Once the milling machinery is operational, Hemp, Inc. will be able to produce thousands of pounds of LCMs a day along with other oil absorbent products," said Bruce Perlowin, CEO of Hemp, Inc.
Read the full Hemp, Inc. (HEMP) Press Release at: http://financialnewsmedia.com/profiles/hemp.html
According to Schmitt, the first shipment of machinery to finish the mill is expected to arrive on August 25, 2016 and the remaining of the machinery will arrive 30 days after the first shipment. The milling machinery parts that were already in the warehouse have already been positioned in its permanent location and will be secured once all the machinery arrives. "Our meeting with the air handler manufacturer, a little over two weeks ago, went extremely well so we are looking forward to the shipments. Once the air handler and dust collector are on-site, we're looking to hire specialized contractors to assist with securing all of the equipment in place which should save us over 3 to 4 weeks in time. Once the rest of the machinery is here, my best guestimate would be 3 weeks for us to have both mills operational," says Schmitt. Schmitt has also been working with Duke Energy to install a new transformer because of all the amperage that will be used. "Everything is really coming together nicely."
In other Hemp, Legal Marijuana & Cannabis news and developments: Medical Marijuana, Inc. (OTC: MJNA) announced that Penny Howard, a Dallas mom who from her own volition has become a spokesperson for the Company's subsidiary HempMeds®, was featured on Fox News Channel's Health Talk with Dr. Manny Alvarez, who interviewed Howard about her daughter Harper's battle with the rare genetic condition CDKL5. In the Aug. 4 segment, "Harper's Legacy: Family Donates 5-Year-Old's Brain to Science After Death From Rare Condition," Howard tells Dr. Alvarez about how her family found out about HempMeds® Real Scientific Hemp Oil™ (RSHO™) after weeks and weeks of research online.
Terra Tech Corp. (OTC: TRTC), a vertically-integrated, cannabis-focused agriculture company, last week announced the Grand Opening of its latest Blüm retail dispensary, to be located on 3650 South Decatur Boulevard, Suite 6 & 7, Las Vegas, Nevada, will be held on August 20, 2016. This is Terra Tech's second retail location in Nevada and follows the opening of the Western Las Vegas Dispensary in April 2016. The Company also operates a Blüm dispensary in Oakland, California.
Cannabis Science, Inc. (OTC: CBIS), a U.S. company specializing in the development of cannabis-based medicines, earlier this month announced they are in the final stages of escrow to transfer the 20-acre Northern California cultivation property into its name and commence indoor/outdoor cultivation and production on the land. This is another separate property the Company has secured for cultivation, production, and extractions for its proprietary formulations.
22nd Century Group, Inc. (NYSE: XXII), a plant biotechnology company that is a leader in tobacco harm reduction, released the Company's second quarter 2016 financial results and announced that it will provide a business update for investors on a conference call to be held on Wednesday, August 10th, at 4:00 PM (Eastern Time). Henry Sicignano, III, President and Chief Executive Officer of 22nd Century Group, together with John T. Brodfuehrer, Chief Financial Officer, will conduct the call. Interested parties are invited to participate in the call by dialing 800-768-6570 and using Conference ID 8455411.
FinancialNewsMedia.com is leading provider of third party publishing & news dissemination services. If you would like more information regarding our news coverage solutions, please visit financialnewsmedia.com for more details. Get an edge on the market with our Premium News Alerts that are FREE for a limited time at financialnewsmedia.com. Follow us on Facebook: facebook.com/financialnewsmedia and Twitter: twitter.com/FNMgroup.
DISCLAIMER: FN Media Group LLC (FNMG) is a third party publisher and news dissemination service provider, which disseminates electronic information through multiple online media channels. FNMG is NOT affiliated in any manner with any company mentioned herein. FNMG and its affiliated companies are a news dissemination solutions provider and are NOT a registered broker/dealer/analyst/adviser, holds no investment licenses and may NOT sell, offer to sell or offer to buy any security. FNMG's market updates, news alerts and corporate profiles are NOT a solicitation or recommendation to buy, sell or hold securities. The material in this release is intended to be strictly informational and is NEVER to be construed or interpreted as research material. All readers are strongly urged to perform research and due diligence on their own and consult a licensed financial professional before considering any level of investing in stocks. All material included herein is republished content and details which were previously disseminated by the companies mentioned in this release. FNMG is not liable for any investment decisions by its readers or subscribers. Investors are cautioned that they may lose all or a portion of their investment when investing in stocks. For current services performed FNMG has been compensated three thousand seven hundred dollars for news coverage of the current press release issued by Hemp, Inc by a non-affiliated third party. FNMG HOLDS NO SHARES OF ANY COMPANY NAMED IN THIS RELEASE.
This release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended and such forward-looking statements are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. "Forward-looking statements" describe future expectations, plans, results, or strategies and are generally preceded by words such as "may", "future", "plan" or "planned", "will" or "should", "expected," "anticipates", "draft", "eventually" or "projected". You are cautioned that such statements are subject to a multitude of risks and uncertainties that could cause future circumstances, events, or results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements, including the risks that actual results may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements as a result of various factors, and other risks identified in a company's annual report on Form 10-K or 10-KSB and other filings made by such company with the Securities and Exchange Commission. You should consider these factors in evaluating the forward-looking statements included herein, and not place undue reliance on such statements. The forward-looking statements in this release are made as of the date hereof and FNMG undertakes no obligation to update such statements.
Contact Information:
Company: FN Media Group, LLC
Contact email: [email protected]
Phone: +1-(954)345-0611
URL: http://www.financialnewsmedia.com
SOURCE FN Media Group LLC |
Excluding “boots on the ground” and leaving combat missions to local and regional “partners,” President Barak Obama and his administration say the United States keeps “all options on the table” to respond militarily to the terrorists’ threat to “American interests” in Iraq, which are now in “danger.”
Similarly, former UK Prime Minister, Tony Blair, on TV screens and in print has recently urged western governments to “put aside the differences of the past and act now” and to intervene militarily in Iraq “to save the future” because “we do have interests in this.”
Both men refrained from indicating what are exactly the “American” and “western” interests in Iraq that need military intervention to defend, but the major prize of their invasion of Iraq in 2003 was the country’s hydrocarbon assets. There lies their “interests.
On June 13 however, Obama hinted to a possible major “disruption” in Iraqi oil output and urged “other producers in the Gulf” to be “able to pick up the slack.”
The United States has already moved the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush, escorted by the guided-missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea and the guided-missile destroyer USS Truxtun, from the northern Arabian Sea into the Arabian Gulf (Persian according to Iran) “to protect American lives, citizens and interests in Iraq,” according to Rear Admiral John Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman, on June 14. Media is reporting that U.S. intelligence units and air reconnaissance are already operating in Iraq.
The unfolding collapse of the U.S. proxy government in Baghdad has cut short a process of legalizing the de-nationalization of the hydrocarbon industry in Iraq, which became within reach with the latest electoral victory of the Iraqi prime minister since 2006, Noori al-Maliki.
Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki
Anti-American armed resistance to the U.S. proxy ruling regime in Baghdad, especially the Baath-led backbone, is on record as seeking to return to the status quo ante with regard to the country’s strategic hydrocarbon assets, i.e. nationalization.
De-nationalization and privatization of the Iraqi oil and gas industry began with the U.S.-led invasion of the country in 2003. Al-Maliki for eight years could not pass a hydrocarbons law through the parliament. Popular opposition and a political system based on sectarian distribution of power and “federal” distribution of oil revenues blocked its adoption. Ruling by political majority instead by sectarian consensus was al-Maliki’s declared hope to enact the law.
Al-Maliki’s plans towards this end together with his political ambitions for a third term were cut short by the fall to armed opposition on this June 10 of Mosul, the capital of the northern Ninawa governorate and second only to Baghdad as Iraq’s largest metropolitan area.
Three days on, with the fighting moving on to the gates of Baghdad, “the most important priority for Baghdad right now is to secure its capital and oil infrastructure,” a Stratfor analysis on June 11 concluded.
The raging war in Iraq now will determine whether Iraqi hydrocarbons are a national asset or multinational loot. Any U.S. military support to the regime it installed in Baghdad should be viewed within this context. Meanwhile this national wealth is still being pillaged as spoils of war.
Al-Maliki is not now preoccupied even with maintaining Iraq as OPEC’s No. 2 oil producer, but with maintaining a level of oil output sufficient to bring in enough revenues to finance a defensive war that left his capital besieged and his government with southern Iraq only to rule, may be not for too long.
Even this modest goal is in doubt. Al-Maliki is left with oil exports from the south only, the disruption of which is highly possible any time now.
Worries that fighting would spread to the southern city of Basra or Baghdad have already sent oil prices to nine-month high on Thursday.
Legalizing the de-nationalization of Iraqi hydrocarbon industry has thus become more elusive than it has ever been since 2003.
On June 1 forty two years ago the process of the nationalization of the hydrocarbon industry kicked off in Iraq. Now Iraq is an open field for looting its only strategic asset.
On April 15 last year the CNN, reviewing “The Iraq war, 10 years on,” reported: “Yes, the Iraq War was a war for oil, and it was a war with winners: Big Oil.”
“Before the 2003 invasion, Iraq’s domestic oil industry was fully nationalized and closed to Western oil companies. A decade of war later, it is largely privatized and utterly dominated by foreign firms,” the CNN report concluded, indicating that, “From ExxonMobil and Chevron to BP and Shell, the West’s largest oil companies have set up shop in Iraq. So have a slew of American oil service companies, including Halliburton, the Texas-based firm Dick Cheney ran before becoming George W. Bush’s running mate in 2000.
The international rush for the Iraqi “black gold” by trans-national oil and gas corporations is at its height with no national law or competent central authority to regulate it.
Iraq’s “oil industry” now “operates, gold rush–style, in an almost complete absence of oversight or regulation,” Greg Muttitt wrote in The Nation on August 23, 2012.
Nothing changed since except that the “rush” was accelerating and the de-nationalization process was taking roots, squandering the bloody sacrifices of the Iraqis over eighty two years to uproot the foreign hold on their major strategic asset. The ongoing fighting is threatening to cut this process short.
Tip of iceberg
Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq has been awarding hydrocarbon contracts to foreign firms independently without reference to the central government in Baghdad.
Since early 2014, it has been pumping crude to Turkey via its own independent pipeline built last December. On this June 4, Turkey and the KRG announced the signing of a 50-year deal to export Iraqi oil from Kurdistan via Turkey.
Hussein al-Shahristani, Iraq’s deputy prime minister, threatened legal action against firms that purchased “smuggled oil” via the Turkish-KRG arrangements; he accused Turkey of “greed” and trying “to lay (its) hands on cheap Iraqi oil.
Baghdad filed for arbitration against Turkey’s state-owned pipeline operator BOTAS with the International Court of Arbitration of the International Chamber of Commerce in Paris.
Baghdad says those Turkish-KRG arrangements are illegal and unconstitutional, but its own contract awarding is also unlawful. Should a change of guard occur in Baghdad, al-Maliki and his government would be held accountable and probably prosecuted.
The dispute between Baghdad on the one hand and Turkey and the KRG on the other is only the surfacing tip of the iceberg of the “gold rush–style” looting of Iraq’s national wealth.
One of the main priorities of al-Maliki all along has been to legalize the de-nationalization and privatization process.
Muttitt, author of Fuel on the Fire: Oil and Politics in Occupied Iraq, wrote a few months before al-Maliki assumed his first premiership that American and British governments made sure the candidates for prime minister knew what their first priority had to be: To pass a law legalizing the return of the foreign multinationals. This would be the vital biggest prize of the U.S. 2003 invasion.
Al-Maliki is the right man to secure a pro-privatization government in Baghdad. Thomas L. Friedman described him in the New York Times on this June 4 as “our guy,” “an American-installed autocrat” and a “big gift” the U.S. occupation “left behind in Iraq.”
Various drafts of hydrocarbon privatization laws failed to gain consensus among the proxy sectarian parties to the U.S.-engineered “political process” and the “federal” entities of Iraq’s U.S.-drafted constitution.
Al-Maliki’s government endorsed the first draft of a privatization law in February 2007 and on August 28, 2011 endorsed an amended draft which the parliament has yet to adopt.
Iraqi trade unions, amid popular protests, opposed and fought the privatization draft laws. Their offices were raided, computers confiscated, equipment smashed and their leaders arrested and prosecuted. Nonetheless, the parliament could not pass the law.
Al-Maliki government began awarding contracts to international oil and gas giants without a law in place. They are illegal contracts, but valid as long as there is a pro-privatization government in Baghdad.
U.S. Executive Order 13303
Former British and U.S. leaders of the invasion of Iraq, Tony Blair and George Bush junior, were on record to deny that the invasion had anything to do with oil, but the U.S. President Barak Obama has just refuted their claim.
On last May 16, Obama signed an Executive Order to extend the national emergency with respect to Iraq for one year. His predecessor Bush signed this “order” for the first time on May 22, 2003 “to deal with the … threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States posed by obstacles to the continued reconstruction of Iraq.”
Details of Bush’s Executive Order (EO) No. 13303 are still kept out of media spotlight. It declared that future legal claims on Iraq’s oil wealth constitute “an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.”
Section 1(b) eliminates all judicial process for “all Iraqi petroleum and petroleum products, and interests therein, and proceeds, obligations or any financial instruments of any nature whatsoever arising from or related to the sale or marketing thereof, and interests therein, in which any foreign country or a national thereof has any interest, that are in the United States, that hereafter come within the United States, or that are or hereafter come within the possession or control of United States persons.”
EO 13303 was rubber-stamped by the UN Security Council Resolution No. 1483, which protected the U.S.-controlled governmental institutions in Iraq.
Muttitt wrote in August 2012:
“In 2011, after nearly nine years of war and occupation, U.S. troops finally left Iraq. In their place, Big Oil is now present in force.”
“Big Oil” is now the only guarantor of the survival of the U.S. proxy government in Baghdad, but the survival of “Big Oil” itself is now threatened by the escalating and rapidly expanding armed opposition.
Obama said the “threats” and “obstacles” to U.S, interests in Iraq have not changed eleven years after the invasion; Iraq has not enacted yet a hydrocarbon law to legalize the privatization of its oil and gas industry.
The developments of the last week in Iraq vindicate Obama’s renewal of EO 13303. The U.S. war on Iraq is not over and it is not won yet. Hence Obama’s recent extension of the national emergency with respect to Iraq for one year.
Since Great Britain granted Iraq its restricted independence in 1932, the nationalization of Iraqi oil wealth was the national and popular battle cry for complete sovereignty. It is now the battle cry of the armed opposition.
Iraq has been targeted by western powers since the “republic” under the late Abd al-Karim Qasim enacted law No. 80 of 1961, which deprived foreign companies of the right to explore in 99.5% of the Iraqi territory, but mainly since the Baath regime led by the late Saddam Hussein decided to nationalize the hydrocarbon industry on June 1, 1972. |
A number of factors inspired me to take a closer look at the Yubikey. For starters, it is such a simple and elegant solution to two of the major problems the security industry is facing these days: authentication and identity management. Furthermore, I really like how Yubico, the manufacturer of Yubikey, is trying to integrate the Open Source movement into its business strategy. In this article, I cover three topics related to this little device. First, I explain what the Yubikey does and how to use it. Second, I examine how it works. Third, I show how to integrate the Yubikey authentication service into your own infrastructure without too much trouble.
What Is It? A Yubikey is a small plastic rectangle that basically consists of a USB connector and a button. It resembles a tiny USB Flash drive, and as it measures only 18x45x2mm and weighs only 2 grams, it easily can be carried on a keychain or in a wallet (Figures 1 and 2). When you plug it in to your machine's USB port, it identifies itself as a keyboard, implying that the Yubikey is platform-independent as long as the host device supports data entry via the USB Human Interface Device (HID) specifications. It draws power from the host device and, thus, does not have to depend on an internal battery. The whole device is quite compact and can be attached to an actual key ring using the small hole near the top of the device. The gold surface connectors are quite robust and are expected to last the lifetime of the device. According to a Yubico representative, Yubikeys still were usable after running them through a washing machine's cycle. Figure 1. Yubikey Plugged In Figure 2. Yubikey Size Each time you press the button on the device, it generates a one-time password and sends it to the host machine as if you had entered it on a keyboard. This password then can be used by the service to authenticate you as a user.
How Do You Use It? I use RoundCube to read my e-mail when I don't have access to my own system. RoundCube is an AJAX-centric Web-based e-mail client. You use it via your Web browser just as you might use Gmail or most other major on-line e-mail providers. Fortunately, RoundCube is open source and based on PHP, so it didn't take too much work to add Yubikey authentication. Normally, RoundCube asks you to enter your e-mail address and password to log in. However, following a few modifications, the login screen now features a third field: Yubikey OTP (one-time password). Now, all you have to do is enter your e-mail and password as usual, position the cursor in the newly added text field, and put your finger on the Yubikey's button. After a second or so, the Yubikey magically spits out a 44-character sequence followed by a newline character. The newline character causes the form to be submitted. And, assuming that your Yubikey is indeed associated with your account, you will be logged in. Take a look at Figure 3, which shows the slightly modified login screen. Figure 3. Modified RoundCube Login Form UI For obvious reasons, the Yubikey should not be used as the only method of authentication. If that were the case, someone getting a hold of your Yubikey then would be able to access your Yubikey-enabled accounts provided that person also knows your corresponding login. However, if you use the Yubikey to add another attribute to a multi-attribute authentication scheme, it can increase security significantly. Imagine if you will, people monitoring your network traffic without your consent. They may be able to glean your password by examining captured TCP packets, but the Yubikey password they capture will be of no use to them, because it can be used only once! After you use a Yubikey password to log in somewhere, it becomes useless. In the next section, I explain exactly how this one-time password scheme works.
More Details Let's take a closer look at the character sequence the Yubikey transmits to the host machine. Here's an example of a sequence generated by my Yubikey: tlerefhcvijlngibueiiuhkeibbcbecehvjiklltnbbl The above is actually a one-time password that is secured using AES-128 encryption and ModHex encoding. Let's take a look at how the Yubikey constructs this string. For the purpose of this discussion, refer to Figure 4. Figure 4. Yubikey Token Construction The device starts by creating a 16-byte sequence (Figure 4) where the individual bytes are allocated as follows: The first six bytes hold the key's secret unique ID, which is assigned when a Yubikey is programmed. This ID is known only to the entity that assigned it and cannot be retrieved from the Yubikey. Six bytes translates into 2 (6*8) = 281,474,976,710,656 unique combinations of bits, which is the number of Yubikey IDs that can be issued before Yubico has to think of a new scheme. Considering that this number exceeds the current world population by a factor of more than 42,000, Yubico is not likely to run out of unique IDs for some time, unless its business model is more successful than anyone could anticipate.
The next two bytes in our sequence, bytes 7 and 8, are used to store a session counter in nonvolatile memory. The counter starts at zero and is incremented each time the device is plugged in. Two bytes for the session counter allows for 2 (2*8) = 65,536 sessions. In other words, you can plug in the Yubikey three times a day for almost 60 years before running out of session counters. Note that you can generate a significant number of OTPs during each session (see below).
The following three bytes, bytes 9 through 11, are used as a timestamp, which is stored in volatile memory during each session. That means each time the device is plugged in, the timestamp starts at zero and continuously increases. Because it is incremented by an internal 8Hz clock, timestamp values will be exhausted after about 24 days. At that time, you need to unplug the Yubikey and plug it back in.
Byte 12 in the sequence is a session counter that starts at zero and is incremented by one each time a token is generated. When it reaches that maximum value of 255, it wraps back to zero.
Bytes 13 and 14 in the sequence are pseudo-random numbers provided by a free-running oscillator. These bytes are used to add additional entropy to the plain text before subjecting it to the cypher.
The last two bytes, numbers 15 and 16, contain a checksum using the CRC-16 algorithm over all values of the token with the two checksum bytes set to zero. This checksum is used for data-integrity checking. Each time the Yubikey is invoked, it generates the 16-byte sequence described above. However, if you look at the sample Yubikey output previously listed in this article, you will notice that it actually consists of 44 characters. That is because we still are missing three crucial steps before the Yubikey is ready to spit out the final token. First, the 16-byte token is encrypted using an AES-128 key that is unique to each Yubikey. Second, the Yubikey prepends the encrypted 16-byte token with a six-byte plain-text public ID. This public ID is completely different from the secret ID used to construct the 16-byte sequence. The public key does not change and can be used to associate a Yubikey token with an account. Finally, the whole 22-byte sequence (16 bytes encrypted plus six bytes public ID) will be encoded using the not-so-well-known ModHex algorithm. Yubico chose this algorithm simply because it is limited to characters that are common to many different keyboard layouts. Because the Yubikey impersonates a keyboard, it tries to use characters that work with the various keyboard settings it might encounter in the wild. The disadvantage is that ModHex encoding is somewhat inefficient in that it requires two characters for each byte it encodes, which is why a 22-byte sequence turns into a 44-character sequence. However, as the Yubikey does all the typing, this does not translate into an inconvenience for users.
More about Encryption Let's take a closer look at the encryption step of generating the token. In contrast to asymmetric algorithms used in public-key encryption schemes, such as PGP, AES is a symmetric algorithm. This means both the party encrypting the token and the party decrypting and validating it will need access to the AES-128 key! This sharing of the AES key happens when the device is programmed. Similar to the device's unique ID, the unique AES-128 key is generated and stored on the device by Yubico before it is shipped out. The company maintains a database where the unique public as well as secret IDs are associated with their corresponding AES keys. This way, Yubico is able to offer an authentication Web service. Using a symmetric algorithm has the advantage that it is typically very fast. Also, you don't need to rely on third parties for key management or to vouch for identities. If you want to be in charge of your own AES key, you have two options. First, you can request your AES key from Yubico. At the time of this writing, Yubico will send you a CD containing the AES key, but the company also is working on a more convenient solution of retrieving the key on-line. Second, you can use Yubico's development kit to program the key yourself. This way, you can assign AES-128 keys, as well as public and secret IDs, according to your own naming conventions. If you supplement this approach by running your own authentication Web service, you eliminate any dependence on Yubico as a third party in your authentication procedure.
The Validation Algorithm: Order Matters It's not surprising that the process of validating an OTP resembles reversing the steps necessary for constructing an OTP. A basic validation routine might look something like this. First, you ModHex decode the string. Next, you split the string into public ID and 16-byte token. Then, you use the public ID to look up the corresponding AES key. After using the AES key to decrypt, you have the original 16-byte token in plain text. Next, you would verify the CRC-16 checksum (the last two bytes). Then, you would compare the secret ID to the one you retrieved from the database using the public ID. Using the session counter and the session token counter, make sure that the current token was generated after the last successfully authenticated token. Although you don't know exactly when any two tokens were generated, you always can tell in which order they were generated. If the token passes all these tests, you can send a response signaling successful validation to the client. Otherwise, the token is rejected. Optionally, you can harden the validation algorithm further. For example, you can try to calculate how many sessions or tokens have been skipped since the last successful validation and consider that information in your decision to validate or reject the token. You can use the session timestamp in a similar manner.
Yubico's Open-Source Approach One thing I find really attractive about Yubico's business model is that it tries to provide all software in the form of open source. According to Yubico's statements, it plans to profit from the manufacture and sale of the devices, but intends to keep all software open source. For example, the source code for the aforementioned Web service is freely available as a reference implementation. Furthermore, Yubico offers client libraries needed for implementing Yubikey authentication in various applications and platforms. Currently, there are client libraries available in Java, C, C#/.NET, PAM, PHP, Ruby, Perl and Python. All these libraries and programs are set up as Google Code projects. Additionally, there are projects for libraries to decrypt OTPs in C and Java, as well as an Open ID server and a personalization tool to allow you to program your own Yubikey. Although all these software projects were initiated by Yubico, you already can see others contributing. Moreover, a number of independent open-source projects using the Yubikey technology have surfaced. Yubico's discussion forum is a good place to keep tabs on such projects and get support.
The Yubico Authentication Service When you order a Yubikey, it comes ready to take advantage of Yubico's authentication Web service. Because Yubico maintains a database of all API keys, as well as public and secret IDs with which the Yubikeys have been programmed before shipment, Yubico has decided to offer an authentication Web service against those credentials. Developers then can use the Yubico authentication Web service to validate OTPs captured from the device. Yubico has a Web page where you can request an API key. Anyone can get an API key. The only requirement is that you have to submit a valid Yubikey OTP. This is merely a measure to avoid database bloat from too many bogus requests. The API key also comes with an ID number. The purpose of the API key is to sign/verify requests to/from the Yubico authentication Web service using the HMAC-SHA1 hashing algorithm. This is done because support for SSL is often spurious in the various environments in which the Web service client libraries have to function. Note that it is not strictly necessary to use SSL, because the token already is encrypted! However, as an added precaution, SSL should be used as a transport layer whenever it is available. In the PHP client library, for example, all you have to do is add an s to http where the authentication server URL is specified.
Adding Yubikey Authentication to Typo Now that we have a solid understanding of the underlying technology, let's add Yubikey authentication to an existing application. I use Typo to blog. Typo is developed using Ruby on Rails, and you can check out its latest codebase via the project's public Subversion repository. Whether or not you like the structure RoR imposes on the developer, it works to our advantage in this case, because it makes it easy to locate the files we need to modify. Take a look at Figure 5 for a basic outline of the validation routine we will be implementing. Figure 5. Yubikey OTP Validation Flow To start, let's drop the Ruby Web services client library, yubico.rb, into the project's lib directory. After adding the corresponding require command to the config/environments.rb file, we can be assured that the library will be available throughout the application. Two groups of settings are necessary to configure Yubikey authentication. First, there are the site-wide settings, namely the API key and corresponding ID necessary to submit authentication requests to the Web service. There also is a switch for enabling or disabling Yubikey authentication on a blog-wide level. Typo stores these blog-specific settings by serializing them and persisting them to the blogs.settings column. Lucky for us, that means we don't have to make any changes to the database. However, we do need to amend the UI and data model used to store these settings within the application. Listing 1 shows how to add these three Yubikey configuration options to the respective HTML template in the admin user interface. Similarly, Listing 2 shows how to add those same settings to the model. That's all it takes for Rails to render a form to input those settings and store them in the database for each blog. Figure 6 shows the final result.
Listing 1. Typo: Blog-Wide Yubikey Settings HTML filename: app/views/admin/settings/index.html.erb ... <!-- Yubikey authentication - start --> <fieldset id="authentication" class="set" style="margin-top:10px;"> <legend><%= _("Authentication")%></legend> <ul> <li> <label class="float"><%= _("Require Yubikey OTP")%>:</label> <input name="setting[yubikey_required]" id="yubikey_required" type="checkbox" value="1" <%= 'checked="checked"' if this_blog.yubikey_required%> /> <input name="setting[yubikey_required]" type="hidden" value="0" /> </li> <li> <label for="yubikey_api_id" class="float"><%= _("Yubico API ID")%>:</label> <input name="setting[yubikey_api_id]" id="yubikey_api_id" type="text" value="<%=h this_blog.yubikey_api_id %>" size="6" /> </li> <li> <label for="yubikey_api_key" class="float"><%= _("Yubico API Key")%>:</label> <input name="setting[yubikey_api_key]" id="yubikey_api_key" type="text" value="<%=h this_blog.yubikey_api_key %>" size="50" /> </li> </ul> </fieldset> <!-- Yubikey authentication - end --> ...
Listing 2. Typo: Adding Blog-Wide Yubikey Settings to Model filename: app/model/blog.rb ... # Authentication setting :yubikey_required, :boolean, false setting :yubikey_api_id, :string, '' setting :yubikey_api_key, :string, '' ... Figure 6. Typo: Blog-Wide Yubikey Settings UI Second, there are two user-specific settings: Yubikey ID and Yubikey Required. The former is necessary to associate a Typo account with a user's unique public Yubikey ID; whereas the latter allows users to enable Yubikey authentication selectively for their accounts only. Now, let's make both options available from the user's preference settings within the application's admin interface. To make the new options appear in the UI, I added a new section to the partial HTML template that renders the form for editing user options (Listing 3). Thanks to RoR's ActiveRecord support, we don't need to write any code to save these new options to the database; however, we do need to make sure that we add the correspondingly named fields to the user table to which all values on this screen are being persisted. In Rails, this is done by adding a database migration, which is nothing more than an abstract way of describing an incremental modification to the database. In our case, we are adding the fields yubikey_id and yubikey_required to the user table by creating the migration shown in Listing 4. Now, all you need to do is run the rake utility from the command line and tell it to upgrade the database: rake db:migrate . The nice thing about Rails' migrations is that they are database-provider independent. The migration we created in Listing 4 can be used with any of the underlying databases that Typo supports. At the time of this writing, this includes MySQL, PostgreSQL and SQLite. Finally, you can admire the new settings in the account-specific options in Figure 7.
Listing 3. Typo: Account-Specific Yubikey Configuration Options HTML filename: app/views/admin/users/_form.html.erb: ... <li> <label class="float" for="user_notify_on_new_articles"><%= _("Send notification messages when new articles are posted")%>? </label> <%= check_box 'user', 'notify_on_new_articles' %> </li> <!-- new options for Yubikey authentication - start --> <li> <label class="float" for="user_yubikey_required"><%= _("Yubikey Required")%>? </label> <%= check_box 'user', 'yubikey_required' %> </li> <li> <label class="float" for="user_yubikey_id"><%= _("Yubikey ID")%>: </label> <%= text_field 'user', 'yubikey_id' %> </li> <!-- new options for Yubikey authentication - end --> </ul> </fieldset> <!--[eoform:user]-->
Listing 4. Typo: Yubikey Settings Database Migration filename: db/migrate/071_add_yubikey_columns_to_user.rb: class AddYubikeyColumnsToUser < ActiveRecord::Migration def self.up add_column :users, :yubikey_id, :string, :null => false, :default => '' add_column :users, :yubikey_required, :boolean, :null => false, :default => false end def self.down remove_column :users, :yubikey_id remove_column :users, :yubikey_required end end Figure 7. Typo: Account-Specific Yubikey Configuration Options UI Now that we have the setup all taken care of, we can focus on the actual authentication during login. First, let's add a Yubikey OTP input field to the login screen provided that Yubikey authentication is enabled for the whole blog. I have done this by modifying the partial template that renders the login form in Listing 5. Notice that we always have to show the Yubikey OTP field during login, because until users supply their user names, we don't know whether Yubikey authentication is required for a particular user. Figure 8 shows the modified login screen. When the login form is submitted, Rails routes it to the login method of the AccountsController class (Listing 6). This is where we add the logic to check whether we need to handle Yubikey authentication. After the existing code has verified the regular login and password, we now have an instantiated user object that can tell us whether Yubikey authentication is required for this user. If so, we invoke the static method authenticate_yubikey of the user object. Looking at Listing 7, we check that neither the Yubikey OTP from the login form nor the user's public Yubikey ID are blank. Moreover, by definition, the first 12 characters of the OTP have to match the public ID associated with the account. If everything is in order, we instantiate a Yubico object, which will handle the Web service authentication request for us. The method simply returns a boolean. True means the user was authenticated successfully. Conversely, false implies an invalid OTP or an attempt by an unauthorized user—possibly an attempt to hack into the account.
Listing 5. Typo: Modified Login Form HTML filename: app/views/shared/_loginform.html.erb: <% form_tag :action=> "login" do %> <ul> <li> <label for="user_login"><%= _('Username')%>:</label> <input type="text" name="user_login" id="user_login" value=""/> </li> <li> <label for="user_password"><%= _('Password') %>:</label> <input type="password" name="user_password" id="user_password" /> </li> <!-- Yubikey authentication - start --> <% if this_blog.yubikey_required %> <li> <label for="yubikey_otp"><%= _('Yubikey OTP') %>:</label> <input type="text" name="yubikey_otp" id="yubikey_otp" /> </li> <% end %> <!-- Yubikey authentication - end --> <li class="r"><input type="submit" name="login" value= "<%= _('Login') %> »" class="primary" id="submit" /> </li> </ul> <p><%= link_to "« " + _('Back to ') + this_blog.blog_name, this_blog.base_url %></p> <% end %>
Listing 6. Typo: Yubikey Authentication Part 1 filename: app/controllers/accounts_controller.rb: ... def login case request.method when :post self.current_user = User.authenticate(params[:user_login], params[:user_password]) # check whether Yubikey authentication is required and perform # authentication if logged_in? && (!this_blog.yubikey_required || !self.current_user.yubikey_required || self.current_user.authenticate_yubikey( this_blog, self.current_user.yubikey_id, params[:yubikey_otp])) session[:user_id] = self.current_user.id flash[:notice] = _("Login successful") redirect_back_or_default :controller => "admin/dashboard", :action => "index" else flash.now[:notice] = _("Login unsuccessful") @login = params[:user_login] end end end ...
Listing 7. Typo: Yubikey Authentication Part 2 filename: app/model/user.rb ... # Authenticate a user's Yubikey ID. # # Example: # @user.authenticate_yubikey(this_blog, 'thcrefhcvijl', # 'thcrefhcvijldvlfugbhrghkibjigdbunhjlfnbtvfbc') # def authenticate_yubikey(this_blog, yubikey_id = '', yubikey_otp = '') if (yubikey_id.empty? || yubikey_otp.empty? || !yubikey_otp[0, 12].eql?(yubikey_id)) return false else begin yk = Yubico.new(this_blog.yubikey_api_id, this_blog.yubikey_api_key) return yk.verify(yubikey_otp).eql?('OK') rescue return false end end end ... Figure 8. Typo: Modified Login Form UI That's it! My Typo blog is now Yubikey-enabled. I will be submitting a patch to make these changes permanent by integrating them into the Typo codebase.
Implementation Variations You might want to consider a few variations when implementing Yubikey authentication. First, you can choose to omit the user name, because the Yubikey token already includes a public ID that can be used to link to the user's account. This scheme works as long as you are not allowing users to associate a single Yubikey with multiple accounts. Second, you can minimize modifications required to the UI of existing systems by including the Yubikey token in the password field. Because the OTP is of fixed length, it stands to reason that the remaining characters belong to the password. Also, as the Yubikey appends a newline character to the token, users would have to type their password first, followed by the OTP—rather than the other way around. Third, you might want to consider making login a two-step process. First, prompt the user for the OTP and validate it. If the validation request is approved, prompt the user for the regular login and password. To see the advantage of this approach, consider the scenario in which user name, password and OTP are submitted simultaneously. If malicious parties are able to intercept the submission and prevent the OTP from being submitted to the validation server, they effectively have all three pieces of information they need to penetrate the system to which you are trying to authenticate. However, if you submit the OTP only during the first stop of the login process, malicious parties can intercept the token without gaining access to the system because they do not have the corresponding user name and password. To make you supply the user name and password, they need to let the OTP pass through and be validated, which also makes the OTP useless for subsequent uses. Thus, the attackers' task will be complicated significantly.
Yubikey in the Wild On its Web site, Yubico maintains a growing list of applications and services that take advantage of the Yubikey. There is a plugin for WordPress, SSH integration, phpBB forum access and Windows login (commercial beta). As the above example of integrating the Yubikey into the Typo blog software's authentication routine shows, the process is fairly straightforward. Hopefully, this article inspires you to use this as a starting point to make your favorite piece of open-source software more secure by adding Yubikey authentication. |
Senate Rejects Fast Track Bill For TPP Agreement: Back To The Drawing Board
from the good-to-see dept
Democrats that are supportive of Obama’s trade efforts huddled on Tuesday afternoon to plot their strategy. After nearly an hour, led by Senate Finance Committee ranking member Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the bloc of about 10 Democrats said McConnell has not offered them sufficient guarantees.
“The group is concerned about the lack of commitment to trade enforcement, which is specifically the customs bill,” Wyden told reporters after the meeting. “Until there is a path to get all four bills passed … we will, certainly most of us, will have to vote no.”
Democrats want McConnell to package the so-called fast-track Trade Promotion Authority legislation with three other pieces of legislation, including one that would help workers affected by the massive trade agreement and one to crack down on currency manipulation.
But McConnell is refusing to guarantee that TPA, Trade Adjustment Assistance, the African Growth and Opportunity Act and a customs enforcement bill, which includes the currency manipulation provisions, will all be passed as part of a deal to open debate on the trade bill.
The customs provision in particular is viewed as veto-bait for the White House, potentially complicating the trade package’s future if it is approved. The measure could force the administration to designate China as a currency manipulator, which the White House fears would spark a trade war with Beijing.
Hatch, though, sounded pessimistic about another round of deal-making with Wyden. A visibility agitated Hatch told reporters that the bill had become a “mess,” adding that he was “through talking.”
“I’ll always be open, but we’ve just been jerked around here too much,” Hatch said. “I expect people to live their word just like I do.”
In a somewhat significant procedural move, the Senate failed to move forward on debating "fast track authority" or "trade promotion authority" after the Senate failed to come up with enough votes. The move to hold a debate on the fast track bill needed 60 votes, but only got 52 (with 45 against). Perhaps somewhat surprisingly, Senator Ron Wyden -- who had sponsored the fast track bill -- went against it as well, noting that he (and others) needed more promises on other issues before they'd move forward:And thus, we have this weird situation, again, where it's basically Republicans pushing for giving up the Senate's Constitutional authority on trade agreements, and handing it to a Democratic President. Either way, today's vote came down to a bit of horse trading:What happens next, should be interesting. There will likely be a lot more negotiating and some more horse trading, but it seems that Senator Orrin Hatch, who has been the driving force behind the fast track bill, is pretty angry with Wyden for the situation today:It still has a chance of things moving forward, but for the moment, the big push to get fast track through in order to allow the TPP agreement to be completed has had to hit the brakes.
Filed Under: fast track, orrin hatch, ron wyden, senate, tpa, tpp |
After an off-season full of Marshawn Lynch, Gareon Conley, Reggie McKenzie and now Sebastian Janikowski drama, football is finally here. Real regular season football! Last year, Derek Carr and the gang pulled off a dramatic win against Drew Brees and the New Orleans Saints in week one, this year? It’s Marcus Mariota and the Tennessee Titans. Here’s are the Oakland Raiders keys to victory for week one.
Week One Oakland Raiders Keys to Victory
Under Pressure
In order to beat Mariota and the Titans, the Raiders need to do something they couldn’t do at all outside of Khalil Mack last year, apply pressure. Nobody in the NFL registered fewer sacks than the Raiders last year, and that was a big part in why quarterbacks were able to tear the defense apart. Mariota is coming back from an injury, and even though the Titans have added to the offense with the likes of Eric Decker and Corey Davis, their quarterback hasn’t had a ton of time to mesh with them.
The best way to throw a quarterback coming back from injury off his game? Pressure him. If the Raiders can keep Mariota unsettled, it’ll be even harder for him to connect with his new weapons. Then again, pressuring a quarterback is a good idea regardless. It was a wise man that once said the “quarterback must go down, and he must go down hard.”
Carr Insurance
Ironically enough, another key to victory for the Raiders is making sure that Carr stays upright. Mariota isn’t the only quarterback in this game coming back from a leg injury. Carr was hurt the exact same week, and despite an exceptional preseason, Carr hasn’t played a full game since Christmas Eve. It’s week one, so the takeaways are simple. Get Carr back in a rhythm, introduce Marshawn Lynch to the Raider Nation, and facilitate what could be the best season yet for Amari Cooper. It’ll be interesting to see just how involved Jared Cook, Clive Walford, and even Lee Smith get as well.
Divide and Conquer
One of Tennessee’s biggest problems last year was their secondary. They had one of the worst pass defenses in the NFL last season, and while the additions of Logan Ryan and Adoree Jackson can help, there’s still a lot they have to prove. One way that the Raiders could really pull away in this is to exploit this mismatch. With Cooper, Michael Crabtree, Seth Roberts, Cordarrelle Patterson, and the tight ends, they have no shortage of weapons. If Carr and company can spread out the offense, they can pick and choose their match-ups all afternoon long.
Just Win, Baby
The obvious keys continue, but this time, there’s more to the story. Last year, the Raiders won far too many games by the narrowest of margins. There were far too many games where the Raiders had to come back at the last minute, and as the saying goes, you live by the sword, you die by the sword. It would really cement the Raiders as legitimate contenders if they were able to play sixty minutes and earn a convincing win against a team that many are predicting to make a playoff push. |
Lord Grantham may think he can take arms against the slings and arrows of 1920s Britain that threaten Downton Abbey and its outrageous fortune, but he faces a mighty adversary: the immutable laws of economics.
When Mrs. Patmore tussles with the new mixer, or Grantham frets over “death taxes,” or “poor Molesley” loses his post and resorts to patching up the pavement, Downton Abbey is paying homage to economic forces that transcend early 20th-century Britain and apply just as neatly to the 21st-century world.
Downton’s soap opera characters are wrestling not only with their emotions, but also with basic Downtonomics: the threat and promise of technological change, burden of inheritance taxes, foreign investment, danger of speculation, need for retirement planning, virtue of investing for growth, and inadequacies of the social safety net. Is the cook, Mrs. Patmore, any less adept with that mixer than your grandmother is with a tablet?
A primer in Downtonomics:
1. New technology demands adaptation — and not everyone can manage it
Mrs. Patmore, left, wasn’t the only one in post-World War I Britain struggling with new machinery. (Nick Briggs/PBS)
Take the lowly mixer. It arrives in a modest brown box labeled “mixer-beater,” with its shiny metal body and a pair of mixing heads. Ivy and Daisy are fascinated.
Patmore “sees this as the kiss of death, the nail in the coffin,” as Lesley Nicol, the actress who plays her, says in the online special feature. The electric mixer will make it easier and faster to prepare food. And while bottom-rung scullery maids Ivy and Daisy adapt easily to the new gadget, as young people often do, Patmore can’t quite master it; she breaks a bowl while trying to use it, declaring that she “must have put those rotty prongs in wrong.”
The mixer is only the beginning. Patmore is slow to adapt to a new sewing machine and refrigerator, which she is told will help reduce costly waste. Lady Grantham asks the reluctant Patmore, “isn’t there any aspect of the present day you can accept without resistance?” And Patmore says of Lady Grantham, “nothing can stop her from dragging us into the new age.”
Patmore wasn’t the only one in post-World War I Britain struggling with new machinery. The Great War had helped propel technological change as the country imported machine tools from the United States to help meet war needs. University of California at Berkeley professor Barry Eichengreen (whose wife is a fan of the show) wrote that Britain at the time “took a first tentative step down the road that led to modern mass production à la the United States.”
Will Patmore find her way down that road?
2. Workers who don’t adapt slide down the economic ladder
Mr. Carson, Downton’s senior butler, offers Mr. Molesley a job as footman, a position demanding fewer skills and offering less money. (Joss Barratt/PBS)
Molesley was trained as a butler, and a butler was a skilled position in those days, requiring someone who knew how to manage the staff. When Matthew Crawley died, however, Molesley lost his position as a valet and couldn’t find another until the house’s senior butler, Mr. Carson, offered him a job as footman, a position demanding fewer skills and offering less money.
“I have come down in the world, Mr. Carson,” Molesley says. “I am a beggar and so, as the proverb tells us, I cannot be a chooser.”
“I see Molesley as the 1920s counterpart of the contemporary highly skilled worker in manufacturing — left behind by changed circumstances,” says Eric S. Maskin, a Nobel Prize-winning economist who teaches at Harvard University. Today’s Molesley might be a former printing press machinist now restocking shelves at Wal-Mart.
3. Estate, or inheritance, taxes can be useful
Taxes threaten Downton and force Lord Grantham to consider extreme measures to save the estate. (Highclere Castle/PBS )
Patmore’s battle pales in importance next to the overarching theme of the show: the crushing tax burden that threatens Downton and forces Lord Grantham to consider extreme measures to save it. Most Americans call them estate or inheritance taxes, but like today’s critics of the tax, Grantham calls them “death taxes.”
His wife, Cora, an adaptable American, is philosophical. “The world has changed. A lot of people live in smaller houses than they used to,” she says. But her husband tells his accountant, “I’ve sacrificed too much to Downton to give in now. I refuse to be the failure, the earl who dropped the torch and let the flame go out.”
Britain imposed inheritance taxes in 1894 at a modest 8 percent top rate, but during World War I, Britain’s public debt ballooned to 150 percent of GDP. So the Finance Act of 1919 raised the top rate to 40 percent on estates whose value exceeded 2 million pounds, according to the Tax Foundation.
“The inheritance tax issue creates a nice tension,” Maskin writes in an e-mail. “We fans naturally root for the family to hold on to the estate. But Lord Grantham’s economic judgment is terrible, and so getting the place out of his control (through taxes or otherwise) might be the best outcome — not only for progressives but for proponents of efficiency.”
“The taxes do make sense economically — but still we take the family’s side,” says Maskin. “That’s one reason the show’s so compelling.”
4. The wealthy should do some estate planning.
When Lady Mary’s husband died, he left her with his half-share of Downton, putting his wife in a pickle because of inheritance taxes. She asks her brother-in-law Tom Branson what to do. (Nick Briggs/PBS)
Grantham’s son-in-law Matthew Crawley — in an emotional but costly gesture — wrote a note (not a formal will) leaving his half-share of Downton to his wife, Mary. Today, that would be good planning, because a spouse does not have to pay inheritance taxes until his or her death. That wasn’t the case in Britain back then; all Mary received was a 100-pound exemption . And it meant that Matthew’s half of the estate would be taxed twice, once on Matthew’s death and once on Mary’s, before passing to their son, George.
“Seems odd really,” says Tom Branson, the Irish former chauffeur who married into the family, “that you have to pay just as much tax as if he’d left it to Mrs. Tiggywinkle down the road. That’s how it works.”
“So what are we to do?”Mary asks.
Tom says, “Your father believes we should sell land and pay it off in one lump.”
According to the London Telegraph, the family living in the real-life estate of Highclere, where Downton is filmed, was forced to sell its extraordinary art collection — including works by da Vinci and Gainsborough — at Christie’s in 1926 to save the property.
Luckily, Tom has another plan (see below).
5. Beware of speculative bubbles fueled by cheap foreign capital
Lord Grantham married his rich American wife, Cora, to gain access to foreign investment, namely her family money. (Nick Briggs/PBS)
Grantham might not be in such a fix if he hadn’t been such an atrocious business manager and investor.
Faced with cash-flow problems for years, he married his rich American wife, Cora (a sort of corporate merger that only later grew more sentimental), to gain access to foreign investment, namely her family money. Nothing wrong with that: China in its early economic-reform days tapped U.S. and other foreign investment, and now many U.S. companies are looking for investments by successful Chinese firms.
Alas, Grantham violates the basic rules of financial management and fails to put his wife Cora’s injection of capital to good use. Instead of investing in his family business (the estate and its many tenant farmers) or diversifying his investments, Lord Grantham gets swept up in a speculative bubble, sinking virtually all of his wife’s money into a Canadian railway scheme that goes bust. Had he been alive today, he’d have been buying subprime mortgages or giving all his money to Bernie Madoff.
More trouble is on the horizon. Cora’s brother Harold has written a letter about losing a lot of money in oil leases that Grantham says has something to do with a Sen. Fall. That is undoubtedly Sen. Albert Fall, who as President Warren G. Harding’s interior secretary took kickbacks for leases in what became the Teapot Dome scandal.
6. Invest in your company; don’t suck it dry
Downton had been starved of investments for decades. Luckily for Lord Grantham, right, Matthew Crawley comes into another inheritance and Tom Branson persuades him to invest it the estate. (Nick Briggs/PBS)
Downton in the early 1920s was a business that had been starved of investment for generations. It had introduced no mechanization, no new crops or livestock, and no new lines of business.
Luckily for Grantham, Matthew comes into another inheritance and Tom Branson persuades him to invest it in the estate, which has done little besides collect rents from its tenant farmers. The modernization details are sketchy, but it seems to have something to do with sheep and pigs. First Tom gets Matthew on board, and later Mary. And they fortunately ignore Grantham’s urgings to invest with an American named Charles Ponzi. Yes, that Ponzi.
7. Treat workers well and they will repay your loyalty
Lord Grantham lends a tenant farmer money to repay the delinquent rent his father ran up. (Nick Briggs/PBS)
With Matthew gone, Tom and Mary want to reduce the number of tenant farmers and increase productivity. When one of the farmers dies, they decide to take over the lease. “The world moves on, and we must move with it,” says Mary, sounding heartless.
At the funeral, the man’s son begs to be given a chance, reminding the landowners that his family has farmed there since the Napoleonic wars. Mary says he has no legal rights. But he finds a sympathetic ear with Lord Grantham, who lends him the money to repay the delinquent rent his father ran up. Unlike most contemporary executives, who seem to feel little compunction about slashing the number of workers, Grantham feels a social and moral obligation toward the people working on his estate.
That’s a lucky thing for the tenant farmer’s son. Post-World War I Britain was suffering from high unemployment — 12 percent in 1921. The British pound at the time was the world’s reserve currency, much as the dollar is today. That helped sustain the high standard of living among those with money. But it also hurt British industrial competitiveness at a time when France and others were letting the value of their currencies sink. That is one reason the farmer’s son and the people in the Downton kitchen and servants’ quarters are so desperate to hang onto their jobs.
Trade union membership doubled to 8 million between 1913 and 1920. But there is little sign of their strength in Downton. In an earlier season, Daisy goes on strike in a battle of wills that turns farcical.
8. Can an old lumbering enterprise re-create itself for a new economy?
Daisy’s father-in-law urged her to quit her job at Downton and help him run his tenancy. “ Do you think these great houses like Downton Abbey are gonna go on?” he asks. (Nick Briggs/PBS)
How it will all end is hard to say.
The British prime minister of the day, David Lloyd George, had long favored taxing the great estates, but he was also worried about the impact their collapse might have on the economy. Britain was a food importer, and shortages had pushed prices sharply higher after the war. By 1922, prices had dropped somewhat, but 20 percent of arable land went out of production over the course of the decade, according to a history of the British diet titled “From Plain Fare to Fusion Food.”
“The government is aware that up and down the country, estates are being sold in large numbers,” a dour government official, Charles Blake, tells Mary, adding that the government wanted to know how it “will it affect food production and so on.”
“You don’t care about the owners, just about food supply,” Mary says, adding that that seems “mean-spirited.”
“Mr. Lloyd George is more concerned with feeding the population than rescuing the aristocracy,” Mr. Blake replies. “That doesn’t seem mean-spirited to me.”
You didn’t need to be a government economist to doubt the viability of Downton Inc.
In an earlier season, Daisy goes to visit Mr. Mason, the father of the young man named William she married as he lay dying of war wounds. Mr. Mason had treated Daisy like a daughter since William’s death, and in vain he urged her to quit her job and help him run his tenancy, promising that he’d leave his property and savings to her.
“Do you think these great houses like Downton Abbey are gonna go on?” he asks. “Because I don’t!”
Will Mason be right? Can Tom and Mary invest wisely? Can inheritance taxes be paid on the installment plan? Is another infusion of American money on the way? Can Patmore adapt to new technology? Must Downton become more lean and mean?
Stay tuned! |
The Pentagon's mad scientists have concocted a plan to keep the miniature, stacked brains of tomorrow's advanced computers cool enough to power next-gen technological advances. It involves the world's smallest bath.
Advanced new microchips are now stacking up like pancakes. This new turn toward stacked chips promises huge improvements in computing power for everything from advanced cameras to new smartphones. But the Pentagon is concerned about these new stacks of chips being too powerful – that is, they risk melting down because they get too hot.
Darpa's plan: embed them with tiny fluid channels to circulate really, really small blobs of water. This month, the agency released a solicitation asking the industry to come up with designs for "microfluidic" cooling systems which can be embedded into microchip stacks, called ICECool. The specifics are painfully complicated, but the project would involve using tiny "microgaps" between "chips in three-dimensional stacks" (more on this in a minute) that can be used to pump "naturally-circulating flows as well as directed liquid jets" to keep the microchips cool.
To describe why Darpa is interested in this, in a crude and simplified way, we should start with Moore's Law.
Microfluidic channels within a 3-D microchip stack. Illustration: Darpa
According to the "law," the number of transistors – which transmit information inside a computer – doubles about every 18 to 24 months, thereby doubling computing power. It's really more of a rule of thumb, but one that's largely held up since the 1960s. Its further development is also necessary for efficiently and rapidly building more advanced computers like smartphones – with battery lives that last long enough for them to remain practical – and for ever-larger server farms and data centers. The maximum number of transistors stored on a single chip may also be coming to an end, requiring ever more strange and creative ways to get more computing power in less space.
To keep up with Moore's Law, engineers have for years made individual components on microchips smaller. But for most memory chips, individual capacitors are still stacked next to each other like buildings on a city street, one after another. But a 3-D stacked version would place the capacitors vertically, like a skyscraper, giving the stack a lot more room and allowing a computer to multiply its processing power with less overall space. Even better than that would be stacking whole microchips on top of each other, a process called "3-D chip packaging," with super-thin silicon wafers pancaked together and connected by hair-thin electrical wires.
They're horribly complex to make. But it's been done. And for your next smartphone battery and the Pentagon's data centers, it's almost perfect. You have more computing power in less space, with less latency thanks to the shorter wires, and with lower demands on electrical power compared to what you were using before – which means longer battery life. IBM is even working on 3-D microchip adhesives that could potentially make microprocessors that compute at 1,000 times the speed that they do now.
The problem is that 3-D stacked chips can get really, really hot – too hot for cooling fans to chill. That can damage or outright destroy the microchips, and at the least slow down their computing power. (There goes the next generation of smartphones you were waiting for.) More worrisome, the lack of a cooling mechanism for the stacked chips threatens to freeze their promise, inhibiting future technological leaps. "These thermal limitations have compromised the decades-long Moore's Law progression in semiconductor technology," the Darpa solicitation warns, "and threaten to derail the technology engine which has been responsible for much of the innovation in defense and commercial microelectronic systems."
Enter Darpa's extremely small liquid spritzes.
Obviously, developing microfluidic cooling systems won't be easy. The scale is extraordinarily small, with droplets circulating through these channels at the microliter and nanoliter levels. To stop the water from interfering with the electrical flow of the chips, there will likely need to include an insulator coated with water-repellent material. The microchips' electrodes also have to be insulated from the drops in order to keep up a steady flow.
There's the question of how to keep the pressure steady in order to prevent the water from drying or burning up, and how to transfer excess heat away from the microchips. In theory, microfluids may work much better than current air-cooled systems at evening out temperature across the whole chip, allowing heat to dissipate fairly quickly. One way, according to Duke University Professor Krish Chakrabarty, is to automatically switch off electrodes in areas that get too hot (.pdf). Water near those electrodes is then dropped on an indium tin oxide plate between the electrode and the fluids channels, which then absorbs the heat and dissipates it away.
Darpa doesn't specify what kinds of military systems it wants to cool with water. But there's no shortage of them. Some experimental cameras are now in the 50-gigapixel range, and with growing demand for ever-more-powerful smartphones, smaller and smaller devices are being required to capture enormous gobs of data. For the military, that means figuring out how to get enough bandwidth to pull down enormous streams of data from cameras placed high in the sky.
"More generally, proposed approaches should be crafted to be scalable and adaptable to the environment of a modern military electronic system," the solicitation noted. If it works, it could mean that a lot of those advanced military projects will have a lot more power to get going, and not have to worry about burning up. But left unsaid is how the military's taste for advanced projects hasn't cooled at all. |
The FCC is planning to sue AT&T for apparently misleading consumers about data plan services. File Photo by Rob Wilson/Shutterstock
WASHINGTON, June 17 (UPI) -- The Federal Communications Commission will fine telecommunications company AT&T $100 million for apparently misleading consumers about unlimited wireless data plans.
AT&T apparently sold unlimited data plans to costumers but then capped and slowed their data speed after customers used a set amount of data each billing cycle. The company continued this practice without telling the consumer, according to the FCC.
"Consumers deserve to get what they pay for," FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said in a statement. "Broadband providers must be up front and transparent about the services they provide. The FCC will not stand idly by while consumers are deceived by misleading marketing materials and insufficient disclosure."
The FCC received thousands of complaints from consumers of AT&T's unlimited data plan since 2011. The company responded by stating it slowed down the speeds of some users who used data heavily to make sure services ran adequately.
The company also asserted it was "fully transparent" with customers.
"We will vigorously dispute the FCC's assertions," AT&T spokesman Michael Balmoris said in a statement "The FCC has specifically identified this practice as a legitimate and reasonable way to manage network resources for the benefit of all customers." |
Hey so I do some of the biking stuff in Austin and I thought it would be nice to have a Reddit ride. possibly meet up at the ped bridge next to lamar and ride out from there? if we end up doing this often enough and with enough people we can likely find a bar who will give us a good deal for bringing a crowd. Seems like I have seen a few meetups at dog and duck. or how about bangers on rainy? im thinking the ride would be about 10 miles or so at a slow pace not leaving anyone behind. likely meetup a around 7:30 wheels at 8 so were not in the blistering sun drinking early and all the white collar folks can join. Just tossin ideas out there lets make it happen!
as with any drinking activity you should drink responsibly and never bike if you've had to much.you can always walk your bike to the bus stop or ask a friend for a ride. |
State Dept: Clinton may not testify on Benghazi next week
The House and Senate foreign relations committees have already announced that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will testify on Benghazi next week, but the State Department said today that’s not a done deal.
Moreover, the State Department may not even share the report of its own internal review on Benghazi with Congress, a top State Department official said today.
Congress expects Clinton to testify Dec. 20 about the results of the Accountability Review Board, State’s internal review on the events leading up to and during the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi that resulted in the death of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans. But the State Department said today that the work of the ARB, led by Tom Pickering and Adm. Mike Mullen, isn’t complete yet and so the State Department can’t confirm she will testify next week.
"We ask our diplomats and development personnel to operate in some of the most dangerous places on the planet," Sen. John Kerry, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said in a statement today announcing the hearing. "We owe it to them, and we owe it to the memory of Ambassador Chris Stevens and his three fellow Americans who lost their lives in Benghazi to get past the politics and focus on the substance of what happened and what it tells us about diplomatic security going forward."
The House Foreign Affairs Committee has also already announced its Dec. 20 hearing featuring Clinton’s testimony. The title of the HFAC hearing is "Benghazi Attack, Part II: The Report of the Accountability Review Board"
But State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said today that the ARB is not complete, might not be complete by Dec. 20, and Clinton has not agreed to testify on Dec. 20.
"The Hill has talked about a planning date on the calendar. That presumes that the ARB is finished," Nuland said. "That’s dependent on all of the work getting done between now and then… The ARB is continuing to do its work, to my knowledge it has not yet completed its work."
Clinton has agreed to brief the House and Senate foreign relations committees on how she interprets the ARB report, whenever it surfaces.
"After the ARB reports to the Secretary, then she will have consultations with Congress in terms of the conclusions that she draws about how we need to go forward from there," Nuland said. "I don’t have any dates to announce until we have firm dates on when the ARB is coming forward."
The Cable asked Nuland if the State Department will share the ARB with Congress at all. Nuland responded that they may not decide to give the actual report to Congress.
"The ARB’s responsibility is to brief the secretary. The secretary has said she will be transparent to Congress," Nuland said. "What is required, Josh, is that the secretary’s response to the ARB’s conclusions has to go to Congress within 90 days of her receiving the report." |
Or, what am I supposed to do with Animation Playables?
Ever since they were introduced as experimental in 5.2, Playables have been mysterious beasts. Many of our users have been curious, and have asked us, “What am I supposed to do with those?” We answered, “Anything!” but we didn’t have any concrete examples to start from… yet.
After multiple API rewrites and Unity versions, Playables were moved out of experimental in 2017.1, along with the release of Timeline. At that point, the answer became “anything you want, including custom Timeline tracks, or even something as complicated as your own Timeline”.
While this answer is certainly exciting (customizability is always nice), making your own Timeline is something very few will even attempt, and we were still missing examples of the other category: “Anything you want”.
Why not an Animation Component?
On the Animation team, one common feedback we receive is that the Animator component and the AnimatorController are often unnecessarily complicated for simple cases where you want one or a few animations on an object.
Another frequent request is more complex Playables examples. A few basic examples were made to show simple API usage, but they are not very useful to show what can be accomplished using Playables.
Therefore, we decided to address both issues at the same time, and make a simple Animation Component, all in C#, and Open Source it so that it could also serve as a living, functional Playables example.
(If you’d rather jump directly to the code or try it for yourself, you can find the implementation here.)
Something old, something new
The Animation Component is already well documented, still widely used, and except for a few more advanced features, has a simple and straightforward interface. As far as examples go, reimplementing something our users already knew and could intuitively understand seemed like an obvious choice.
As is visible in the above Inspector screenshot, the SimpleAnimation inspector is very similar to the Animation inspector, except for one thing: the SimpleAnimation Component requires the Animator to run. As the designed Animation output for Playables, the Animator is required by Playable Graphs. That, however, is the extent of its use. By adding a SimpleAnimation Component to a GameObject, the Animator will automatically be added for you. You can then simply fold it away and forget about it.
On the scripting side, the interface is almost identical to the Animation Component’s interface. You can find an in-depth explanation of the differences on the project’s wiki here.
Retro exterior, new engine
Graph Visualizer view of the SimpleAnimation Playable Graph
While the SimpleAnimation Component looks like the Animation Component on the outside, under the hood, all the Animation logic is implemented through Playables. This way, the component is compatible with Timeline, with other playable graphs, and, the Animation logic can be reused in other Playable graphs.
Not just a playable example
Simple Animation tests in Unity test runner
To ensure a smooth transition from the Animation component, we had to make sure that the SimpleAnimation Component’s behavior was as close as possible to that of the Animation Component. Since some of the test tools we use internally at Unity are now public, it was very easy for us to create tests and include them in the project. The project contains a suite of more 100 comparative tests that validate that both Animation and SimpleAnimation components behave the same. When you clone or download the SimpleAnimation GitHub project, the tests can be found under Assets/SimpleAnimationComponent/Tests. If you decide to customize or extend the Component, you can use those tests to validate your work.
The Simple Animation Component is compatible with Unity 2017.1 and subsequent versions, and it’s available now on GitHub. Please try it out and give us feedback. |
Shoukath Ansari in Master of None.
The 2016 Emmy race has begun, and Vulture will take a close look at the contenders until voting closes on June 27.
It’s not often in entertainment journalism that your subject can only talk between seeing patients. But then, Shoukath Ansari isn’t your typical subject. The India-born, South Carolina-based gastroenterologist (with a stellar HealthGrades score, by the way) became a surprise pop cultural star last year with the release of Master Of None, the celebrated Netflix show loosely based on the life of its creator and star, Aziz Ansari: aka Shoukath’s son.
Along with his wife Fatima, Shoukath charmed precisely because of his naiveté in front of the camera. He was a type at once familiar and new to American audiences, his dad jokes delivered in a genuine South Indian accent. Casting his parents as themselves paid off for Ansari, who drew huge praise for bringing attention to the stories of some of America’s newer immigrants, as in the episode “Parents,” whose scenes took from Shoukath’s actual life: from working in a zipper factory in an Indian village to becoming an outsider in a mostly white medical practice in America.
Pulling it off had as much to do with Shoukath’s unusual charm as it did the novelty of the casting. And so it was that during a recent hospital break the accidental star gave his first true interview. Vulture spoke with Mr. Ansari over the phone about how he auditioned against more than a dozen actors to play himself, all the selfie requests he gets now, and Donald Trump [Editor’s note: After this interview was conducted, Aziz wrote an op-ed in the New York Times about how Trump makes him fear for his family].
Let’s talk about how you got to the screen in the first place. I’d read that you were interested in acting even when Aziz was on Parks And Recreation.
Yep. When Parks and Rec came into production, I saw that in one of the seasons they wanted a father to come in to play a role. I was just joking with Aziz, “Can I play that role?” He said, “Are you serious about it?” I said, “Yeah, give me a chance. I will work on that.” So in fact, I was having a conference in Chicago when he called me and said, “OK, they want you to play the role of one of the actor’s fathers.” I was supposed to go in [to the studio] but the next day he called me and said, “No they gave it to somebody else.” Henry Winkler or somebody came into that role.
Tough to beat the Fonz.
Welcome to Hollywood! The changes are so dynamic.
How did Master of None happen?
I never thought I will be coming in Master of None. [It takes from] my life story in a sense, you know, how it’s a story of the immigrant and how they come here. What the immigrant’s children, the first generation, do for them. That is the theme behind it, and some of the incidents — like how I went to medical school and worked in the zipper factory — most of them are real.
But you weren’t immediately cast.
[Aziz] said, “Why don’t we audition you for that role?” Initially I was called. About 18 of them were auditioning. He gave me a few lines. I read it and then he said, “You would be the right person to do that.”
You beat 18 people to play yourself?
About 18 people. Because it came natural to me. In fact, my first scene starts with me playing with — what do you call that? — the iPad. I always have a problem in getting the computer in positions and all these things. As a child, [Aziz] used to help us. That thing really happened at home. So the first thing he said, “Dad, you don’t need to do anything. Be yourself. You don’t need to act.” That’s the way it is. I don’t know whether I did the right thing or not, but he came a couple of weeks after the editing and said it came out good.
You were convincing.
I was myself!
Was it a fun experience?
Oh yeah. The best part of it is, you know, you go there. Day one I went there the first time, I had to go by myself, without my wife [who wasn’t cast yet]. [Aziz] said his agent will arrange everything, and I [fly] there at 11-o-clock in the night. At almost 12:30 we are in the hotel. My name is not there. Somebody messed it up. [Aziz] said if anything happens wrong, call this man. I called somebody, they called another hotel they put me there. I went there at 2 in the morning. At 5:30 or 6, [Aziz] called me and said, “Daddy, how was the trip? I’m sorry they messed up.” Aziz had a thing, some 5 o clock pickup for me scheduled. He said, “If you’re up, why don’t you come to the set and we can rehearse some of the scenes?”
The best part for me is, I’m on the set, but I’m with Aziz and I’m with my wife. It’s all at home.
So it was natural to do the filming. Was it strange later, when you saw the final product?
Oh yeah. First time when I saw it was [at the premiere]. Unbelievably, you are seeing it on a big screen and the first word I use is, “shit!” It was fun. But the best scene was the scene we had with parents night, where they’re two families. We all got a kick together. We talked about it. We were in a Chinese restaurant. I really, really enjoyed it.
That scene is about giving back to parents’ who quietly gave so much to their kids. It seems like Aziz took the imperative to heart, even in making Master of None. It feels almost like a gift to you and your wife.
Definitely. See, the tradition where we grew up, in Indian society, the children have a moral obligation to take care of their parents, no matter what. So they give them the financial support and everything. They help them out. They take care of their parents. As we migrated to America, the children all have a different sort of life and different things. That kind of the love for the parents is still there, but the moral obligation is not.
The show was a gesture towards that obligation.
That is the whole idea of the second episode. The parents night is to emphasize that your parents are coming from hardship and they worked hard to give you a better life, so it’s your turn to keep them happy and in comfort.
In making that point, Aziz has became kind of a torch bearer for South Asian first-generation kids in the U.S. Does it make sense to you that he’s breaking ground in terms of representation of Indian-Americans on TV, talking about things that haven’t really been said before?
It does. It makes a lot of sense.
Did you encourage him to explore his career options? I’m also the child of Indian immigrants, and in my community, so many of the kids are pressured to become doctors. Did you and Fatima see early on that Aziz had an actor’s soul?
The whole thing is, he came and he asked me, “Can I do this show business as a permanent thing?” I said, “If you like it. You have a passion for this, go for it.” If boy comes and says, “I can do very well,” and he’s studying Seinfeld and the other big guys, as long as you can support yourself, go for it. We wished him good luck.
What was it like to watch him perform?
He did a couple of stand-up comedies, and next thing he came in Parks and Rec. And he was doing a lot of stand up-comedy in so many towns, and [then] Carnegie Hall. I was really thrilled to see him in Carnegie Hall. There were about 3,000 audience members. It’s not an easy thing to talk to them for one hour. And then the best thing happened. He took us to Madison Square Garden. It was the second show, and at the end he took us to the stage and introduced us: “Ladies and gentlemen, meet my parents!” We were very proud to see that many people are here to see him and admire him.
Did it make sense to you? Was he funny growing up?
Ah, no. The thing is, in front of us he’s always obedient. “Yes sir, no sir.” He will be very nice. He won’t joke with us. But when he gets out of the house, he’s always surrounded by friends and telling his jokes. His friends only make him try these things. Today Aziz is a famous man but I know how he started. He worked hard and sold tickets in the middle of the night. Zero degrees outside, Times Square and all. He’s always worked hard.
As a child, his goals were different. When he was in the first grade he was moved to the second grade in six months. And when he moved to second grade, they called me and said, “We want to talk to you.” I said, “Did Aziz do anything wrong?” “No, we want him to speak in the Parents’ Night.” He was about seven years old and he gave a small talk. They gave him a paper and asked him to read it. I said, “You cannot read. You just memorize that.” And so he rehearsed it two or three times and he took the mic and just rattled it out.
Has life changed for you since the show?
Yeah. Too many people asking us to take selfies and all these things. We did come into that. It happens. People are stopping us in the middle of the road, in the airport. They’re proud of Aziz. We are recognized in many places. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s a nuisance. But it’s OK. For us, it’s not so bad.
Obviously, you’ve become a symbol of the immigrant story in America. You’re also Muslims, so I have to ask: What do you think about Donald Trump’s rhetoric?
Listen. This country is foundationally strong. The country is built by immigrants, and America is great because of the immigrants. OK? You cannot shake the foundation! [Laughs.]
Especially, he’s trying to say that Muslims should not be allowed in the country. The whole thing is, in every religion there are fanatics. If you take Christianity — Timothy McVeigh went and bombed Oklahoma but we never address him as a Catholic terrorist. If somebody can kill Gandhi — such a noble man — and he was killed by a Hindu. That kind of fanaticism is there in every religion. At the end of the day, we are children of Adam. That’s what the Bible says, that’s what the Koran says. I don’t care how rich he is, I don’t agree with his principles. We are ready for him.
This interview has been edited and condensed. |
BELGRADE (Reuters) - The politically-sensitive Euro 2016 qualifier between Serbia and Albania was abandoned on Tuesday following a brawl between players from both sides after a flag stunt.
Players of Serbia (in red) and Albania scuffle during their Euro 2016 Group I qualifying soccer match at the FK Partizan stadium in Belgrade October 14, 2014. REUTERS/Marko Djurica
The Group I game, with no away fans permitted, was interrupted when a flag depicting so-called Greater Albania, an area covering all parts of the Balkans where ethnic Albanians live, was flown over the terraces and pitch by what appeared to be a remote controlled mini drone near the end of the first half.
A Serbian player eventually grabbed the flag at the Partizan stadium, prompting an angry reaction from Albanian players and an unsightly melee ensued.
Riot police then moved in when around a dozen fans invaded the pitch and attacked the Albanian players, forcing them to retreat into the tunnel as flares were thrown from the terraces.
After a delay of around half an hour, English referee Martin Atkinson abandoned the game, which stood at 0-0.
“What happened is something we can’t comprehend at the moment,” Serbia captain Branislav Ivanovic told reporters.
“On behalf of my team, all I can say is that we wanted to carry on and that we shielded the Albanian players every step of the way to the tunnel (after the riot broke out).
“The Albanian team said they were unfit physically and mentally to carry on after talking to the officials and they will now decide the fate of this match. We can only regret that football took a back seat but it is difficult to draw any conclusions or make any comments now.”
Albanian captain Lorik Cana told Albanian television: “I saw my players being attacked and hit even inside the tunnel, and even by the stewards. We were not in the right psychological or physical state to continue playing.”
“POLITICAL PROVOCATION”
Serbian state television reported that Olsi Rama, the brother of Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama, was arrested in the VIP section on suspicion of instigating the flag stunt.
Albanian Interior Minister Saimir Tahiri said that to the best of his knowledge Olsi Rama had left the stadium for the airport, according to information he had from Serbia’s interior ministry and Albanian officials in Belgrade.
Asked if he had been arrested on suspicion of organising the drone stunt, Tahiri told Reuters: “Not to my knowledge. It’s speculation.”
Security was tight for a game at which no away fans were present and held against a backdrop of long-running Serb-Albanian tensions over Kosovo, a majority-Albanian former Serbian province that declared independence in 2008. NATO waged a 78-day air war in 1999 to halt the killing and expulsion of ethnic Albanians in Kosovo by Serbian forces fighting a two-year counter-insurgency war. Serbia does not recognise Kosovo as independent.
Slideshow (3 Images)
Serbian Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic was quoted on the website of Serbian daily Blic as saying: “This was a political provocation.
“The main question for me is how will the European Union and UEFA react, because if someone from Serbia had unveiled a flag of Greater Serbia in Tirana or Pristina (capital of Kosovo) it would already be on the agenda of the U.N. Security Council.”UEFA match delegate Harry Been said: “It is a regretful situation on which we will report; the referee, myself and the security advisor. The circumstances were such that we couldn’t continue the match.
“You all saw what happened and I cannot comment on who is to blame or what to blame. I will submit a report with my colleagues to UEFA and UEFA will decide what will happen further.” |
On 29th June 1537, Henry Algernon Percy died at around the age of thirty-five. He was buried at Hackney Parish Church, and his will appointed the King as Supervisor and Edward Fox, Bishop of Hereford, and Thomas Cromwell as executors.
Henry Percy was the eldest son of Henry Algernon Percy, 5th Earl of Northumberland, and of Katherine Spencer and was born in around 1502. He was brought up in Cardinal Wolsey’s household and it was while he was there that he fell in love with Anne Boleyn on her return to the English court in late 1521. However, his father had already planned Percy’s marriage to Mary Talbot, daughter of George Talbot, fourth Earl of Shrewsbury. In addition, Anne was meant to be marrying James Butler, son of Piers Butler of Ireland. As a consequence, Wolsey and Percy’s father put a stop to the relationship between Percy and Anne Boleyn. Percy married Mary Talbot in 1524 but the marriage was not happy. In 1532, Mary accused her husband of being pre-contracted to Anne Boleyn and Percy was examined by the Archbishops of York and Canterbury. He swore that there was no truth to the story.
Percy served Henry VIII as warden of the east and middle marches, and was one of the peers appointed to judge George and Anne Boleyn in May 1536. He collapsed after Anne’s death sentence was pronounced, and his illness prevented him from taking an active role on the Pilgrimage of Grace, which may have been fortunate, since his brothers, Thomas and Ingram, were arrested for their involvement, and Thomas was executed. Ingram died in prison in the Tower of London.
Antiquary John Weever, in his book Ancient Funerall Monument, mentions the tomb of Henry Percy at Hackney and records that it had the following inscription: “Here lieth interred, Henry lord Percy, earl of Northumberland, knight of the most honourable order of the Garter, who died in this town the last of June 1537, the 29th of HEN VIII.”
You can read more about Henry Percy’s relationship with Anne Boleyn in my article The Early Life of Anne Boleyn Part Seven – The Butler, Chaplain, Courtier and Poet.
Also on this day in history…
1509 – Death of Lady Margaret Beaufort, grandmother of Henry VIII and the matriarch of the Tudor dynasty, died at Cheyneygates, the Abbot of Westminster’s house. Click here to read more.
1536 – Thomas Boleyn, Earl of Wiltshire, was stripped of his office of Lord Privy Seal. Cromwell succeeded him and was formally appointed 2nd July 1536. Wiltshire had held the office since January 1530. Click here to read more about this.
1540 – Bill of attainder passed against Thomas Cromwell for the crimes of corruption, heresy and treason, stripping him of his honours and condemning him to death. The bill can be found in the Journal of the House of Lords: Volume 1, 1509-1577 (London, 1767-1830), p. 149 see http://www.british-history.ac.uk/lords-jrnl/vol1/p149a.
Categories: Early Life, Tudor Characters |
What makes some of us uncomfortable with bisexual women? It is because we think they're either lesbians having straight sex or straight women testing out their fantasies on us before returning to men?
In today's post-modern, queer-focused world, bisexuality is being promoted to lesbians as the latest fashionable trend. This has resulted in lesbian politics, namely feminism, being passed over for sexual hedonism, where the only thing that matters is sexual pleasure and desire. Similarly, bisexuality is sold to heterosexual women as some type of recreational activity far from their "natural home" of straight sex. It is seen as "temporary lesbianism."
It is more à la mode to have sex with a man if you are a lesbian than if you're a straight woman, who is merely doing what she is expected to do "naturally." Lesbians having heterosexual sex are seen as transgressive, when in fact they are simply reverting to a traditional way of being a woman. For a straight woman, having a girlfriend on the side is almost like having the latest Prada handbag.
Camille Paglia, the most famous "anti-lesbian lesbian," has written reams about how she worships the penis and cannot understand those of us who do not. In fact Paglia, like many lesbian tourists who sleep with women on the weekend and go back to hubby on Monday morning, thinks lesbian sex needs to be "spiced up" by the odd "het" shag:
Women, I think, are naturally bisexual. You know I'm not telling lesbians to stop sleeping only with women, but to leave open a part of the brain toward men and accept male lust and find men extremely attractive and get horny in relation to men and ogle their bodies and do something with them, then sex with women will be hotter.
Has Paglia internalized so much anti-lesbian oppression that she, too, thinks that all lesbians need is a good bit of heterosexual-style shagging?
But many lesbians, and even bisexual women themselves, mistrust the concept of swinging both ways. One U.S. study of bisexuality, which draws on interviews with 400 self-identified lesbians and bisexual women, found that a substantial number of bisexuals prefer to hang out with lesbians instead of other bisexual women in social situations, and have greater political trust in lesbians than they do in other bisexual women. It was also found that "[s]ome bisexual women actually doubt whether bisexual women exist at all."
Whatever our views and politics about lesbianism may be, we cannot deny that women face compulsory heterosexuality from birth. Despite huge progress since I came out in 1977, it is still not really acceptable to reject men and choose not to live under their guardianship, whether you are in Saudi Arabia or the U.K.
When I write about making a positive choice to be a lesbian, and that I believe there is no gay (or for that matter bisexual) "gene," I am accused of being an ideological robot and therefore not genuinely sexually attracted to women. That is nonsense. I personally feel that straight women are missing out on the best sex on the planet, but that is their choice.
If we put aside lesbian feminism, the way most people approach sexuality is that they think we are straight, gay, or attracted to both sexes. For bisexual women living under the tyranny of sexism, choosing to be lesbian is a liberatory act. |
The Denver Sheriff Department, the largest in the state of Colorado, has been chastised by the U.S. Department of Justice because it made American citizenship a requirement for deputies during a hiring push in 2015 and 2016. As a result, the sheriff’s department will be required to pay a $10,000 fine and also sort through old applications for employment in order to identify persons who were tossed out of consideration because of their citizenship. Moreover, Denver must also reconsider those applicants when advertising for jobs in the future.
In a statement, the Denver Sheriff Department declared that it is committed to treating “all people with dignity and respect, and is proud to have one of the most diverse workplaces in Colorado.” The statement continued, saying, “While we didn’t commit this violation intentionally, we accept responsibility and are taking steps to clarify policy and amend language in hiring documents.”
Vanita Gupta
The Department of Justice determined, under the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Act, that the sheriff’s department should have considered job applications from any work-authorized immigrant. Instead, the department made citizenship a job requirement in its employment postings.
We are taking steps to clarify policy and amend language in hiring documents. https://t.co/SmPIO2tSra — Denver Sheriff (@DenverSheriff) November 22, 2016
The settlement with the justice department also requires the sheriff’s department to provide re-education training to its human resources staff on anti-discrimination provisions of federal immigration laws and also review procedures to ensure that they are consonant with federal law, read a DOJ press release.
In 2015, the department began hiring 200 deputies as part of its ongoing reform effort at inclusiveness. A larger staff was needed to minimize officers’ fatigue and reduce the millions spent on overtime pay. It was expected that sergeants on the force would thus have more time to supervise deputies, rather than serving in the department’s two jails.
According to the DOJ statement, the Denver Sheriff Department was in violation the Immigration and Naturalization Act because it required U.S. citizenship on the part of applicants. “The INA’s anti-discrimination provision prohibits employers from limiting jobs to U.S. citizens,” read the statement, “except where the employer is required to do so by law, regulation, executive order or government contract. The Denver Sheriff Department was not subject to one of the INA’s exceptions.”
“We commend the Denver Sheriff Department for its cooperation and commitment to removing unnecessary and unlawful employment barriers,” said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Vanita Gupta, head of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “Eliminating this unlawful citizenship requirement will help ensure that the Denver Sheriff Department hires the best and most qualified individuals to protect and serve. The entire community will benefit from these reforms.” Gupta has been on the forefront of similar lawsuits in the past. She was once an attorney for the ACLU and the NAACP. |
U.S. officials have become increasingly concerned that American military aid to the Lebanese army is arming the Iranian-backed terror group Hezbollah, which has been amassing a large cache of advanced arms on Israel's border, according to multiple current and former U.S. officials who spoke to the Washington Free Beacon.
Following the resignation of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who fled the country and disclosed that Hezbollah controls the entirety of Lebanon, the U.S. government has continued its support for the Lebanese military, which multiple sources say has long been under the thumb of Hezbollah militants.
The ongoing policy is said to be fueling diplomatic tensions between the United States and Israel, which has found itself allied with Saudi Arabia as the American government advances a host of policies that have contributed to Iran's regional dominance, including in Iraq and Syria.
The Trump administration's State Department is coming under increased pressure from lawmakers and other foreign policy insiders to halt all military aid to Lebanon in light of Hariri's resignation and new evidence that Hezbollah is benefiting from the American arms and aid.
Multiple U.S. officials and other national security insiders who spoke to the Free Beacon about the situation criticized the Trump administration for continuing a host of policies that they say have emboldened Iran's grip on the region, including in Syria and Iraq, where U.S. arms have recently been detected going to Iranian-backed militia groups.
"It is clear that the State Department and [Defense Department] operate on the false construct that Lebanese Hezbollah and the Lebanese State are two distinct entities when in reality the information available to decision makers points to the dominance of Hezbollah within the state," one former senior U.S. defense official familiar with the matter disclosed to the Free Beacon.
"Our Gulf allies and the Israelis are intimately familiar with the internal dynamics of Lebanon and clearly understand that Hezbollah is the defacto Lebanese state today, but we refuse to acknowledge this unfortunate reality even when confronted with obvious evidence," said the source, who would only discuss the sensitive information on background.
Accusations that the Trump administration is helping to preserve Hezbollah's grip on Lebanon come just days after a large, bipartisan delegation of lawmakers petitioned the Trump administration to present them with a plan on how it will stop Iran's growing military presence in Syria, where the Islamic Republic has been building weapons factories that arm Hezbollah.
The situation is said to have fueled ongoing diplomatic tensions between the Trump administration and regional allies such as Israel, which has warned for some time that Iran's presence across the region is emboldening Hezbollah and setting the stage for a brutal regional war.
Some experts have conceded in recent weeks that the United States has found itself more in line with Iran's interests than those of allies such as Israel and Saudi Arabia, who have been seeking to combat Iran's military efforts across the region.
Congressional officials are already examining ways to force the Trump administration into using current sanctions laws on the books to halt all U.S. aid to the Lebanese military, which these sources say is fully under Hezbollah's control.
"The resignation of Lebanese Prime Minister Hariri is the latest consequence of Iran's increasingly pervasive influence in Lebanon through its terrorist proxy Hezbollah," Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas), said in recent remarks. "Given these developments, it is time for the United States to reassess the military assistance we provide to Lebanon, including to the Lebanese Armed Forces, and conduct a formal review of our strategy there."
Rep. Brian Mast (R., Fla.), a combat veteran and member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told the Free Beacon in a recent interview that Congress must play a more active role in reassessing U.S. military aid to Lebanon in light of the situation.
"What can be done can be undone and maybe nobody wanted to undo this for the last eight years," Mast said, referring to U.S. aid programs to Lebanese forces "This is exactly the role that foreign affairs is meant to play."
It remains unclear what steps the Trump administration is willing to take.
Current and former U.S. officials who spoke to the Free Beacon about the situation said the State and Defense Departments continue to operate under the false belief that Lebanon can be separated from Hezbollah.
"It's time for the U.S. to cease supporting this mirage of a Lebanon as an independent state given the penetration and dominant influence of the Iranian proxy Hezbollah," the Defense source said.
A White House National Security Council spokesperson denied that Hezbollah has benefitted from any U.S. assistance to Lebanon's Armed Forces, telling the Free Beacon the U.S. government has emphasized there "there must be absolutely zero cooperation between the LAF and Hezbollah."
"The United States is focussed on continuing aid to the LAF to strengthen it and ensure that it alone is the sole defender of Lebanon," according to the NSC official. "The United States remains committed to strengthening Lebanon’s legitimate government institutions, including the LAF."
The administration official praised the LAF as a "well-trained, well equipped, and fully capable fighting force" that has been legitimized by U.S. aid, which has topped $1.5 billion since 2006.
"Many of the highest ranking officers in the LAF have attended U.S. professional military education courses at various points in their careers, building professionalism in the LAF’s officer corps," according to the NSC official, who maintained "U.S. training and weapons" have helped mitigate "the destabilizing effects of the Syrian conflict."
State Department officials declined to comment on the situation, only telling the Free Beacon that they "must refer all questions regarding the presence of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri in Saudi Arabia to the governments of Saudi Arabia and Lebanon."
The Treasury Department, in comments to the Free Beacon, said the United States has multiple sanctions in place against Hezbollah.
One senior congressional official familiar with the efforts to thwart Iran's regional takeover told the Free Beacon the Trump administration must immediately impose new sanctions on Hezbollah and halt U.S. military aid to the Lebanese Armed Forces, which have already been accused of letting these weapons flow to Hezbollah.
"The United States must counter Iran's growing control of Lebanon through its terrorist proxy Hezbollah through enforcing and imposing new sanctions to dry up the group's ability to finance its terrorist operations," said the official, who would only speak on background about the efforts.
"Furthermore, the U.S. must ensure that the progress against ISIS does not distract us from countering and stopping Iran's goal to fill this vacuum to further threaten our allies in the region, especially Israel," the official said. "This step should therefore include reassessing whether U.S. military assistance is in U.S. national security interests and take additional steps to ensure the assistance that has already been provided does not unintentionally fall into the wrong hands."
The situation has become particularly pressing in light of recent accusations by many leading lawmakers that the United States also has played a role in arming Iranian-backed militia fighters in Iraq, where the American military has been running a program to train, fund, and equip various Iraq militia groups.
"We should reject the idea that its banking system needs to be protected from the consequences of its own corrupt behavior or that the Lebanese Armed Forces deeply influenced by Hezbollah can function in the best interest of all the Lebanese people," said the former official quoted above.
One veteran foreign policy adviser close to the White House told the Free Beacon that the Trump administration is still taking advice from current officials who served in the Obama administration and have an urge to continue that administration's policies.
"President Trump has been publicly and fully backing our Saudi and Israeli allies, who are on the front lines against Hezbollah," said the source, who would only speak on background because policy deliberations are ongoing. "They assess that Hezbollah has full political and military control over Lebanon and they've been acting accordingly."
"But there are parts of the Trump administration that still live in the fantasy world created by Obama, where Lebanon is up for grabs and maybe we can push out Iran if we finance these puppets over here that Iran has installed, but sanction these other puppets over here," the source said. "The result is we're paying to boost Iran."
Israeli officials have expressed concerns to the Trump administration about the situation in Lebanon, according to multiple sources.
A Treasury official, speaking only on background, said it continues to implement sanctions on Hezbollah, though it is waiting for direction from the State Department about future actions.
"Hezbollah is designated under multiple sanctions authorities as are its members, operatives, and supporters," the official said. "While we do not comment on specific cases or potential future actions, Treasury is committed to imposing sanctions against Hezbollah, and we will continue to expose, block, and disrupt Hezbollah's finances and deny this terrorist group access to the U.S. and international financial systems."
The administration continues to consider Lebanon's Central Bank "as a valuable partner in the fight about Hezbollah," according to the official.
"Treasury continues to work with the Central Bank of Lebanon and Lebanese banks to expand their capability to protect the Lebanese financial system from abuse by Hezbollah in order to maintain connections with the U.S. financial system," the administration official said.
This stance, however, is coming under question in light of former Prime Minster Hariri's claim that Hezbollah controls every facet of the Lebanese government.
"The most important point about Hariri's resignation—and the Saudi position—is the admission that Hezbollah controls the state," said Tony Badran, a writer and prominent authority on Lebanon who serves as a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. "There is no distinction between Hezbollah and the state."
"This acknowledgment has direct bearing on U.S. policy in Lebanon," Badran explained. "It puts paid to the conceit that we can distinguish between Hezbollah and this theoretical construct called ‘the Lebanese state,' which is supposedly not only independent of Hezbollah, but perhaps even opposed to it. This is myth. "
"The premise of the support to the LAF [Lebanese Armed Forces] is that we are strengthening the ‘Lebanese state,' and in so doing, we are somehow undermining Hezbollah," Badran said. "How that is, nobody has ever come up with an actual answer." |
AT&T May Try To Charge FaceTime Users, Raising Net Neutrality Questions
from the or,-time-to-find-another-carrier dept
One of the main concerns of those who worry about net neutrality is how a network provider might block or charge extra for competing services. For example, telcos who still make a fair bit of money from voice services might not like competing services like Skype. Or... Apple FaceTime. So it's interesting to see a report from 9to5Mac suggesting that AT&T may be planning to charge extra to use FaceTime over cellular . This came out when testing iOS6 and receiving a popup requiring "activation." Here's the screenshot of what 9to5 saw:This does not absolutely mean that they're going to charge. Currently, FaceTime only works over WiFi, but iOS6 is set to enable it for cellular. It'sthat this popup is just because iOS6 is still in beta, and it's just a generic message for a service that is not yet available. But it's at least raising concerns about the intentions of AT&T, with groups like Free Press already warning that this would violate existing (if contested) FCC rules on net neutrality (which, it should be noted are very, very limited when it comes to mobile services). To be honest, I'm not sure why AT&T would actually go down this path. It's already trying to cap and/or meter mobile bandwidth, so it already has a natural restriction on usage. Furthermore, since the iPhone is now widely available on other platforms, charging extra for FaceTime seems like a perfect strategy for driving iPhone users to other mobile operators.
Filed Under: charges, competition, facetime, ios, iphone, net neutrality
Companies: apple, at&t |
The Ontario Hockey League issued a release this afternoon regarding referee Joe Monette and his recent comments on Twitter regarding Sault Ste. Marie. After working a game between the Soo Greyhounds and Windsor Spitfires on Jan.
The Ontario Hockey League issued a release this afternoon regarding referee Joe Monette and his recent comments on Twitter regarding Sault Ste. Marie.
After working a game between the Soo Greyhounds and Windsor Spitfires on Jan. 25 at the Essar Centre, Monette posted on his Twitter account: "Soo Saint Marie, two words, Slim Pickens #noteeth #hicktown #allfaties.”
He later issued an apology before making the settings on his account private.
Monette has beed suspended from "any future OHL officiating assignments" for the remainder of the regular season and playoffs.
Full details are as follows:
****
OHL Announces Disciplinary Action
For Immediate Release – Toronto, Ontario
Wednesday, January 30th, 2013
The Ontario Hockey League today announced the results of a review of an incident involving OHL referee Joe Monette as it relates to his Twitter message of Friday, January 25th, 2013.
In making the announcement, Commissioner David E. Branch stated “all individuals who are associated with the Ontario Hockey League, either in a management, coaching or officiating position with both Member Teams and the League have been apprised of the League’s Social Networking Policy and understand that there is a responsibility to ensure that at all times we conduct ourselves in a most professional manner. Mr. Monette displayed extremely poor judgment and the “tweet” not only contravened the League’s Social Networking Policy, but as well was detrimental to the welfare of the League, the officiating staff and fans of the OHL. The League apologizes to those that may have been offended by such comments”.
As a result of the review, referee Joe Monette has been suspended for any future OHL officiating assignments for the balance of the 2012-13 regular season and playoffs.
**** |
A Florida police department is increasing its patrols at the house of a man identified by social media as appearing in the violent shark-dragging video that went viral this week.
The 21-year-old’s name is being withheld by Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission officials while the investigation is ongoing, but his personal information has been widely publicized on social media.
Palmetto Police Chief Scott Tyler said the man and his family made the patrol request following the social media outrage. There have been no incidents at the man’s home, but officers will increase patrols as they would if any citizen made a similar request, Tyler said.
“There aren’t any crowds gathered outside,” Tyler said. “We’re just keeping an extra eye open.”
Tyler said he would prefer people not rush to judgement, and be careful about what they post to social media.
Second shark video shows beer poured into hammerhead’s gills.
He said he learned about the video over the weekend.
“I immediately was thinking, ‘I hope they’re not from Florida,'” he said. “I didn’t realize there were ties to my community.”
Tyler said he’s not surprised by the outrage.
“I think we all have some strong emotions about the video,” he said. “Let’s just let law enforcement conduct its investigation and find out what, if any, laws were broken.
Previous story: A man seen in the disturbing shark-dragging video that went viral earlier this week has a history of posting troubling photos with wildlife in the past and has been previously investigated by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission confirmed Wednesday that there was an open investigation in 2015 of the previous photos, but is not linking the man in the shark-dragging video with that investigation. The investigation was closed this year with no charges filed.
Related: Shark-dragging video shows lack of empathy, need for power and control.
Social media has not been shy about publicizing the man’s identity, including posting his name, date of birth and address in Palmetto, Fla., on multiple message boards and websites.
The Palm Beach Post is not naming the 21-year-old because he has not been identified officially by authorities.
FWC does know who the men are in the shark video, but is not releasing their identities, and isn’t sure any laws were broken by violently dragging the shark at high speeds behind a boat.
Check The Palm Beach Post radar map.
“However, the FWC would like to state that the lack of respect shown in this video for our precious natural resources is disheartening and disturbing, and is not representative of conservation-minded anglers around the world,” said spokesman Robert Klepper.
In one photo, the man is seen hugging a pelican, tightly gripping its beak. In another, he is seen holding up a protected spotted eagle ray.
Still, some fishermen said that although the shark-dragging incident was cruel, it may not have broken any laws.
Marvin Steiding, owner and captain of Reel Candy Sport Fishing in Jupiter, said dragging the shark was “unnecessary and totally ridiculous.”
“A few captains are pretty upset,” said Steiding, who does allow clients to catch and release sharks. “I’m not a fan of killing them because they have no edible value except Mako and from an ecological value they are very important to our reefs.”
But because it’s hard to tell what kind of shark was being dragged in the video – not all species are protected – it could be difficult to levy any charges, Steiding said.
Blacktip, bonehead, bull, blue, nurse oceanic whitetip, shortfin mako and thresher are among the species that can be harvested, although some have size limits. About 25 species, including the tiger shark, are prohibited from harvest. That means if they are snagged by fishermen, they must be released as quickly as possible.
Download the Palm Beach Post WeatherPlus app here.
“I don’t know why it’s not covered under animal cruelty,” he said. “It’s just very unfortunate.”
According to CNN, the video was made public by Miami charter fisherman Mark Quartiano. Quartiano said he thinks the men sent it to him so he would publicize it and get them more attention.
Instead, Quartiano said he thought it disturbing. The men responded “with a picture of the shark’s head and remains after it had been dragged through the water,” CNN wrote.
“They thought it was funny, they thought it was cool,” Quartiano said to CNN. “Even if the shark was dead, you don’t do that. It’s totally disrespectful.”
If you haven’t yet, join Kim on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. |
Your Bitcoin transactions The Ultimate Bitcoin mixer made truly anonymous. with an advanced technology. Mix coins
Advertised sites are not endorsed by the Bitcoin Forum. They may be unsafe, untrustworthy, or illegal in your jurisdiction. Advertise here.
TomUnderSea
Offline
Activity: 126
Merit: 100
Full MemberActivity: 126Merit: 100 Re: [ANN] Bitcoin on Blueseed, the international waters startup ship May 08, 2013, 09:27:22 PM #6
Section 922.132 a.2
http://montereybay.noaa.gov/intro/mp/regs.html#prohibitions
Mooring one of these:
in the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary will be an interesting exercise in dealing with 14+ different oversight agencies. I recommend a careful study and discussion of how BlueSeed will comply withSection 922.132 a.2Mooring one of these:in the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary will be an interesting exercise in dealing with 14+ different oversight agencies. Every little BTC helps. 14P3TfbttSpQ3BxUjwrUrmNU6F4mB9aMS5
TomUnderSea
Offline
Activity: 126
Merit: 100
Full MemberActivity: 126Merit: 100 Re: [ANN] Bitcoin on Blueseed, the international waters startup ship May 08, 2013, 09:46:43 PM #8
Here is a link to the point forecast for your advertised location
http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?w0=t&w1=td&w2=hi&w3=sfcwind&w3u=0&w4=sky&w5=pop&w6=rh&w9=swlp&w10=swlm&w11=swlp2&w12=swlm2&w13=wwh&w14=wvh&w15=fzgspy&AheadHour=0&Submit=Submit&FcstType=graphical&textField1=37.46500&textField2=-122.76000&site=all&unit=0&dd=0&bw=0&marine=1
Here is a link to the nearest meto buoy.
http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/station_page.php?station=46012
Here is a link to the Climatic Summary Plot for peak wind gust:
http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/view_climplot.php?station=46012&meas=pw
And finally significant wave heights:
http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/view_climplot.php?station=46012&meas=wh
The pretty pictures on your website do no justice to the wind, temperatures and sea state 12 nm off the coast of CA.
It would be good to not end up like these guys who were racing around the Farallon Islands.
You might also want to make sure your graphics reflect the actual expected conditions of your planned location.Here is a link to the point forecast for your advertised locationHere is a link to the nearest meto buoy.Here is a link to the Climatic Summary Plot for peak wind gust:And finally significant wave heights:The pretty pictures on your website do no justice to the wind, temperatures and sea state 12 nm off the coast of CA.It would be good to not end up like these guys who were racing around the Farallon Islands. Every little BTC helps. 14P3TfbttSpQ3BxUjwrUrmNU6F4mB9aMS5
BTCLuke
Offline
Activity: 524
Merit: 505
My other Avatar is also Scrooge McDuck
Hero MemberActivity: 524Merit: 505My other Avatar is also Scrooge McDuck Re: [ANN] Bitcoin on Blueseed, the international waters startup ship May 08, 2013, 10:02:37 PM #11 Hi Dan! Thanks for the opportunity to ask questions directly.
The most obvious question I'm sure you'll need to answer at bitcoin2013 is: what currency will be dominant onboard? Will items in the shops there, such as food, be denominated in USD but BTC is just as welcome/preferred? Will companies use BTC to trade between each other for B2B services?
It should go without saying that if you could somehow make BTC the Primary currency onboard, blueseed would be doing bitcoin a HUGE service to help stabilize and legitimize the fledgling currency.
The prospect that interests me the most here is about a possible tenant onboard offering bitcoin services like an exchange to rival MtGox. (Or something even more shady, like Casino.) Assuming you have no problems with energy nor internet connections, I wonder if there are any bitcoin-central business models that would have an advantage in that environment?
Best of luck to you and the boat. I hope to visit it myself. Luke Parker
Journalist, BraveNewCoin
Anon136
Offline
Activity: 1652
Merit: 1206
LegendaryActivity: 1652Merit: 1206 Re: [ANN] Bitcoin on Blueseed, the international waters startup ship May 08, 2013, 10:30:10 PM #13 Quote from: Elwar on May 08, 2013, 09:59:35 PM Quote from: Anon136 on May 08, 2013, 09:44:37 PM my biggest concern is how you plan to deal with hostile governments. If an anonymous torpedo were to happen to be fired from an unknown submarine would you have any means to protect yourselves? If you dont think this is at all likely to happen than why not? I mean surely you are doing something that governments dont like here, or else they never would have created the laws that forced you into international waters to begin with.
A submarine coming into US waters shooting a torpedo at a ship flying a US flag?
I think someone would have something to say about that.
Edit: It appears that they will be using a more freedom friendly nation for their flag. But they are still within the US's EEZ.
A submarine coming into US waters shooting a torpedo at a ship flying a US flag?I think someone would have something to say about that.Edit: It appears that they will be using a more freedom friendly nation for their flag. But they are still within the US's EEZ.
im more worried about the US than anything else. Its US laws that this is attempting to circumvent.
the bluesseed wouldn't really need a way to stop this sort of attack, all they would need is a way to identify the attacker. If they could do that than i expect they would be perfectly safe. im more worried about the US than anything else. Its US laws that this is attempting to circumvent.the bluesseed wouldn't really need a way to stop this sort of attack, all they would need is a way to identify the attacker. If they could do that than i expect they would be perfectly safe.
If one can not confer upon another a right which he does not himself first possess, by what means does the state derive the right to engage in behaviors from which the public is prohibited? Rep Thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=381041 If one can not confer upon another a right which he does not himself first possess, by what means does the state derive the right to engage in behaviors from which the public is prohibited?
MoonShadow
Offline
Activity: 1708
Merit: 1000
LegendaryActivity: 1708Merit: 1000 Re: [ANN] Bitcoin on Blueseed, the international waters startup ship May 08, 2013, 11:21:27 PM #15 Blueseed will be no worse, nor better, protected from unidentifiable attacks than any other naval vessel in international waters. Admirality law applies in this context, and firing upon any ship flying a legally recognizable flag is an act of war. That doesn't mean that it can't happen, but there are a number of less risky methods of undermining the Blueseed project than attacking the ship itself. With the right kind of insurance coverage, sinking the ship won't even end the project. Just make sure that the underwriting company is a major US corporation, so any losses that Blueseed takes can be translated directly into tax losses for the US tax base. "The powers of financial capitalism had another far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent meetings and conferences. The apex of the systems was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the world's central banks which were themselves private corporations. Each central bank...sought to dominate its government by its ability to control Treasury loans, to manipulate foreign exchanges, to influence the level of economic activity in the country, and to influence cooperative politicians by subsequent economic rewards in the business world."
- Carroll Quigley, CFR member, mentor to Bill Clinton, from 'Tragedy And Hope'
Anon136
Offline
Activity: 1652
Merit: 1206
LegendaryActivity: 1652Merit: 1206 Re: [ANN] Bitcoin on Blueseed, the international waters startup ship May 09, 2013, 12:42:45 AM #17 Quote from: MoonShadow on May 08, 2013, 11:21:27 PM Blueseed will be no worse, nor better, protected from unidentifiable attacks than any other naval vessel in international waters. Admirality law applies in this context, and firing upon any ship flying a legally recognizable flag is an act of war. That doesn't mean that it can't happen, but there are a number of less risky methods of undermining the Blueseed project than attacking the ship itself. With the right kind of insurance coverage, sinking the ship won't even end the project. Just make sure that the underwriting company is a major US corporation, so any losses that Blueseed takes can be translated directly into tax losses for the US tax base.
insurance duh.
thanks. insurance duh.thanks.
If one can not confer upon another a right which he does not himself first possess, by what means does the state derive the right to engage in behaviors from which the public is prohibited? Rep Thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=381041 If one can not confer upon another a right which he does not himself first possess, by what means does the state derive the right to engage in behaviors from which the public is prohibited? |
Toronto Police Try To Uncover Riddle Of Mystery Tunnel
Enlarge this image toggle caption Aaron Harris/Reuters/Landov Aaron Harris/Reuters/Landov
Police in Toronto are asking for the public's help to solve the riddle of a mysterious tunnel discovered more than a month ago. Investigations have so far been unable to determine who built the tunnel or its purpose, but its discovery has fueled security concerns ahead of the Pan American and Parapan American Games in Canada this summer.
During a news conference Tuesday, Toronto Deputy Police Chief Mark Saunders said the hand-dug tunnel is about 33 feet long and contained a gas-powered generator, moisture-resistant light bulbs, and food and beverage containers.
Saunders said the tunnel appeared to be well-constructed and that there were still tools inside, along with a wheelbarrow and a pulley system, when it was found. Police also found a rosary and a Remembrance Day poppy nailed to a wall.
But Saunders said the tunnel doesn't appear to go anywhere. There are questions about whether it was just unfinished or was it meant to be a single chamber.
There's also speculation about why it was built in the first place — was it for criminal purposes, such as drug smuggling or terrorism? Saunders told the news conference that it wasn't against the law to dig a hole.
According to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, it was a conservation officer who first discovered the tunnel. He noticed a large mound of dirt in a wooded area by tennis courts at York University, which is one venue for the games, on the north side of Toronto. He found that a piece of wood was covering a hole, and there was a ladder leading down into a chamber. The conservationist called the police.
Police have been investigating for more than a month but haven't come up with any answers. So on Tuesday they appealed to the public for help. According to the Toronto Sun, that's also when local leaders found about the tunnel. The newspaper says that neither Toronto's mayor, John Tory, nor Ontario's public safety minister, Yasir Naqvi, knew about the mysterious tunnel until the police announced it.
Naqvi says he does not believe the tunnel represents a security threat to the games in July and August, but that he will be receiving updates from the police going forward. |
What comes after the Apple Watch? The Apple Watch 2? A new fitness- and health-focused wearable? Something else entirely? That’s not yet clear, but Apple is hard at work on whatever it is, as a handful of new hires and job postings suggest.
Apple demonstrated its interest in health and medicine last spring and summer by releasing the Apple Watch, whose biometric sensors make the device an activity and heart rate tracker, and ResearchKit, a software framework that lets researchers conduct clinical trials through iPhone apps. And the company's efforts in the wearable space are likely to continue: An Apple Watch 2 with updated features is rumored to arrive sometime this year, and, late last year, Cook hinted that Apple may have a separate health-related project in the works.
“We don’t want to put the watch through the Food and Drug Administration process,” he told The Telegraph. “I wouldn’t mind putting something adjacent to the watch through it, but not the watch, because it would hold us back from innovating too much, the cycles are too long. But you can begin to envision other things that might be adjacent to it — maybe an app, maybe something else.”
Cook’s interview ran Nov. 10. Since November, Apple has posted at least four job listings in its health technology division, among them listings for biomedical engineers and a lab technician, mostly focused on devices that measure physiological signs. And since October, at least five people with medical research and development experience have joined Apple, according to a review of LinkedIn profiles.
A similar biotech hiring spree previously took place in spring 2014, when the Apple Watch was still in development. An Apple spokesperson declined to comment. But the latest crop of hires and job postings give some clues as to what Apple’s next health project might be. |
Toronto Football Club,[3] commonly referred to as Toronto FC is a Canadian professional soccer team based in Toronto, Ontario. The team competes in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Eastern Conference. The team plays its home matches at BMO Field, located at Exhibition Place on Toronto's shoreline. Toronto FC joined MLS in 2007 as an expansion team and was the first Canadian-based franchise in the league.
The team is coached by Greg Vanney and operated by Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment, which also operates the USL League One affiliate team Toronto FC II, the Toronto Maple Leafs, the Toronto Raptors, the Toronto Argonauts, and other teams.
In 2017, Toronto FC won the domestic treble with the MLS Cup, Supporters' Shield and Canadian Championship. They are seven-time winners of the Canadian Championship and were runners-up of the 2018 CONCACAF Champions League.
History [ edit ]
Expansion [ edit ]
MLS awarded Toronto an expansion team in 2005. Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment (MLSE) paid $10 million for the team.[4] The name of the team was announced on May 11, 2006.[5]
The announcement followed an online consultation in which the public was invited to vote on the name during a limited period. The voting options were "Toronto Northmen", "Inter Toronto FC", "Toronto Reds", and "Toronto FC". MLSE's strategy in choosing "Toronto FC" following this process was based on two reasons. Firstly, over 40 percent of the online vote supported the simple Toronto FC name during the consultation; secondly, MLSE hoped that the fairly generic name would help the new team earn a more organic nickname from the Toronto fans rather than having one imposed upon the team.[6] The team has been called "TFC" and "the Reds" by the media and the team. The "FC" in the team's name became the conventional initialism for football teams.[7]
Early years (2007–2010) [ edit ]
Despite a long scoreless streak to start the team's history, Toronto FC quickly began to establish itself as a team with significant fan support. The team's first win came on May 12, 2007 at BMO Field as Danny Dichio scored the team's first goal in the 24th minute of a 3–1 home win over the Chicago Fire.[8] Though TFC slipped to the bottom of the MLS standings with a record of 6–17–7 , the team built a foundation as the first Canadian team in MLS. In the team's second season in 2008, Toronto hosted the 2008 MLS All-Star Game. The team finished last in the Eastern Conference with a record of 9–13–8, but the enthusiastic fan base continued to fill BMO Field to capacity.[9] To determine the Canadian Soccer Association's representative in the CONCACAF Champions League, Toronto FC played in the inaugural Canadian Championship in 2008 competing for the Voyageurs Cup. TFC were the favourites to win the championship in its first year, but the Montreal Impact prevailed.
The last-place New York Red Bulls defeated Toronto FC 5–0 in the final 2009 regular season game, leaving TFC one point out of the playoffs.[10] Despite bringing in some high-profile talent, the Reds could not seem to field a consistent side. Dwayne De Rosario became an immediate scoring influence and Amado Guevara was a strong playmaker and established MLS veteran, but the Honduran's future at the Canadian team seemed murky with looming 2010 FIFA World Cup duties. Rookie goalkeeper Stefan Frei quickly replaced Greg Sutton as a regular starter and immediately became a fan favourite. TFC only scored two goals in the final 15 minutes of games all season (last in MLS). During the same 15-minute period, they gave up 16 goals (most in MLS), thus creating a −14 goal differential during the final 15 minutes.[11]
In the 2009 Canadian Championship, Toronto FC required a four-goal victory over the Montreal Impact in the final game of the competition to nullify the Vancouver Whitecaps' +4 goal differential. Anything less would result in Vancouver winning the championship. Toronto FC went down 1–0 early, but overwhelmed an under-strength Impact side 6–1 on the back of a hat-trick by De Rosario. Guevara added two, scoring in the 69th and 92nd minute. Chad Barrett scored the decisive goal in the 82nd minute, which gave TFC the lead over Vancouver. The unlikely victory was dubbed by fans and media as the "Miracle in Montreal".[12] Toronto FC subsequently participated in the 2009–10 CONCACAF Champions League, but lost 1–0 on aggregate to the Puerto Rico Islanders in the preliminary round of the tournament.[13][14]
After failing to qualify on the final day of the 2009 campaign, Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment said anything short of a playoff spot in 2010 would be unacceptable. With that directive, former director of soccer Mo Johnston hired Preki[15] and made wholesale changes to the roster to reflect the U.S. Hall of Famer's plan to play a tough, defensive style. Despite scoring troubles, TFC played well at the start, going undefeated in seven games at one time. The team struggled following the World Cup break. Sensing problems in the locker room and to try to salvage the season, MLSE dismissed both Johnston and Preki on September 14, naming Earl Cochrane interim director of soccer and Nick Dasovic interim coach.[16] The players responded to Dasovic's more open flexible style, but it was not enough as the team was eliminated from playoff contention with three games left in the season. Off-field issues with season-seat holders over the 2011 season ticket package added to the fans' frustrations, forcing MLSE to hold a series of town hall meetings.[17]
Toronto FC played C.D. Motagua in the preliminary round of the 2010–11 CONCACAF Champions League. TFC won 1–0 in the first leg on a goal by Chad Barrett, and tied 2–2 in the second leg on goals by De Rosario and Barrett, qualifying for the group stage. Toronto FC won their first group stage match 2–1 against Cruz Azul on August 17, 2010.[18] However, the team failed to qualify for the championship round after finishing in third place behind group winners Real Salt Lake and second place Cruz Azul.
Highs and lows of Ajax culture (2011–2012) [ edit ]
On November 3, 2010, MLSE announced the hiring of former German international and coach Jürgen Klinsmann, and his California-based company, SoccerSolutions, to fix the team's game.[19] Over the next six months, Klinsmann assessed the team, identifying a playing style and recommended a candidate for the director of soccer position.[20] On January 6, 2011, the new management team for Toronto FC was announced. Aron Winter was hired as head coach with his compatriot, Bob de Klerk named first assistant coach.[21] Paul Mariner was named as director of soccer. Winter was selected to bring the Ajax culture, possession and 4–3–3 system to Toronto FC. Management made wholesale changes to the roster before and during the 2011 season, trading numerous players and eventually their captain and Toronto native De Rosario.[22]
Toronto FC used its remaining two designated player slots on two notable European players, signing Torsten Frings and Danny Koevermans to 2.5-year contracts. The team went on to set a record for most players used in a MLS season with 39. Despite a strong finish to the season with only two losses in their last 12 games, TFC missed the MLS playoffs for a fifth straight year. Nonetheless, they earned a win in their final group stage match of 2011–12 CONCACAF Champions League at Toyota Stadium (then known as Pizza Hut Park) against FC Dallas, securing a berth in the knockout stage versus LA Galaxy. After a 2–2 draw in Toronto before 47,658 fans at the Rogers Centre,[23] Toronto FC defeated the Galaxy 2–1 in Los Angeles to reach the CONCACAF Champions League semifinals, the first Canadian team to do so.[24] They were defeated by Santos Laguna in the semifinals 7–3 on aggregate.[25][26]
On June 7, 2012, Aron Winter resigned from the team upon refusing to be reassigned from his head coaching role after the team started the season with a nine-game losing streak, setting an MLS record for worst start to a season.[27] Under Winter in 2012, the team's league record was 1–9–0 and in all other competitions was 3–1–4, including a fourth-straight Canadian Championship. He was replaced by Paul Mariner, but TFC continued to struggle finishing with a 4–12–8 record in league play under him.[28] Toronto FC also failed to advance in the CONCACAF Champions League, finishing second in its group with a 2–2–0 record. Overall, they finished the MLS season on a 14-game winless streak and ended up in last place, with five wins and 23 points.
Building a foundation (2013–2014) [ edit ]
It was announced Kevin Payne would be leaving D.C. United for the general manager position at Toronto FC on November 27, 2012.[29] First-time coach Ryan Nelsen replaced Mariner as of January 7, 2013.[30] On April 25, 2013, Payne signed the first young designated player in MLS, Matías Laba.[31] On July 9, Payne controversially traded Luis Silva to D.C. United for an undisclosed amount of allocation money.[32] The team fired Payne on September 4.[33][34] Following the removal of Payne, recently appointed MLSE president Tim Leiweke[35] reasoned that there were philosophical differences between them as to how Toronto FC should move forward.[36] Leiweke, who brought David Beckham to the LA Galaxy in early 2007, quickly revealed that he intended to make TFC more competitive with similarly ambitious, blockbuster signings.[37] On September 20, Toronto FC announced that the vacant general manager position had been filled by Tim Bezbatchenko.[38]
Under Bezbatchenko, Toronto FC made several high-profile moves during the 2013–14 off season. Among the transfers were MLS veterans Justin Morrow and Jackson; Brasileiro star Gilberto, United States international Michael Bradley of A.S. Roma, and the return of Toronto FC leading goal scorer De Rosario.[39][40] On January 10, 2014, Tottenham Hotspur announced they had agreed a deal with the team over the transfer of England international Jermain Defoe for a reported fee of £6 million, and an Advertising Rights Agreement with Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment Ltd.[41] Defoe would earn a reported £90,000 a week, making him the highest earner in MLS.[42] These moves required the trade of Matias Laba to Vancouver to comply with MLS's maximum of three designated players per team. On February 7, 2014, Brazil national team keeper Júlio César joined on loan from Queens Park Rangers.[43] The team started the year with promise, but much like 2010, they floundered after the World Cup break. On August 31, Nelsen was fired by Bezbatchenko a day after a 0–3 defeat to the New England Revolution at BMO field, where Nelsen criticized Bezbatchenko in his post-match press conference for putting the players under needless pressure in the media. The head coaching position was filled by former American international and Chivas USA assistant, Greg Vanney.[44] Although the team won the most games in its history, it failed to reach the playoffs for the eighth consecutive year. After completing only 11 months of his four-year contract with TFC, Defoe joined Premier League club Sunderland on January 16, 2015. On the same day, Toronto received Jozy Altidore from Sunderland to complete the other half of the player swap.[45][46] Three days later, the team signed Italian international Sebastian Giovinco from Juventus on an annual salary of $7 million.[47]
Contenders in the league and domestic treble (2015–2018) [ edit ]
Sebastian Giovinco broke the MLS record for most combined goals and assists in a season in his debut season in 2015. He is also Toronto FC's all-time top scorer, with 83 goals in all competitions.
On September 26, 2015, Giovinco scored and assisted in a 3–2 win over Chicago, putting him on 35 points for the season, breaking Chris Wondolowski's league record.[48] Giovinco's totals of 22 goals and 16 assists, for 38 total points, made him the first TFC player to win the MLS Golden Boot,[49] MLS MVP[50] and MLS Newcomer of the Year Award.[51] He was named to the MLS All-Star Game and the MLS Best XI and became the first player in MLS history to lead the league in both goals and assists in a single season.[52] Toronto FC clinched a playoff berth on October 14, for the first time in franchise history.[53] The team were eliminated in the knockout round of the 2015 MLS Cup Playoffs by a 3–0 loss at Canadian Classique rivals Montreal Impact.[54]
On June 29, 2016, Toronto FC won its fifth Canadian Championship against Vancouver 2–2 on aggregate, winning on away goals.[55] Giovinco scored a hat-trick against D.C. United, on July 23, 2016, in a 4–1 home win, surpassing De Rosario's previous all-time record as Toronto FC's top scorer by two goals to 35 goals.[56] In October 2016, Toronto FC clinched a playoff spot for the second straight season. The team proceeded to defeat the Philadelphia Union at BMO Field in the Eastern Conference Knockout Round to record their first-ever playoff win[57] and to secure entry into the first Eastern Conference Semifinal in franchise history. Toronto FC defeated New York City FC 7–0 on aggregate to reach an all-Canadian Eastern Conference Finals derby against Montreal Impact.[58] Montreal won the first leg of the Conference Championship, 3–2 at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal on November 22. Toronto beat Montreal 5–2 in extra time in the return leg at BMO Field in Toronto on November 30, winning on an aggregated score of 7–5, making Toronto FC the first Canadian team to compete in an MLS Cup Final.[59] On December 10, Toronto lost the final at home to the Seattle Sounders 5–4 in penalty shoot-out following a goalless draw after extra-time.[60]
On June 27, 2017, Toronto FC won their sixth Canadian Championship 3–2 on aggregate over Montreal, earning them a spot in the 2018 CONCACAF Champions League.[61] On September 30, Toronto FC won their first Supporters' Shield with a 4–2 home win over New York Red Bulls to clinch top of the league with the most points that season. By doing so, they also became the first Canadian team to win the Supporters' Shield.[62] On October 22 the final day of the season, they played to a 2–2 away result in Atlanta, where Toronto FC set a new MLS regular season points record with 69, eclipsing the 1998 LA Galaxy by one point.[63] On November 29, 2017, Toronto FC won the Eastern Conference Finals for the second time in a row, with a 1–0 aggregate win over Columbus Crew, also entering the MLS Cup Final for the second time in a row.[64] On December 9, 2017, at home, Toronto FC defeated Seattle 2–0 in the MLS Cup, which was a rematch of the previous year's MLS Cup.[65] Toronto FC became the first MLS team to complete a domestic treble with their win, as well as the first Canadian team to win the MLS Cup.[65]
Toronto FC started the 2018 season with a 2–0 away win over the Colorado Rapids in the 2018 CONCACAF Champions League round of 16 on February 20.[66] After a goalless draw in the return leg against Colorado on February 27, TFC were matched up with Mexican side Tigres UANL for the quarterfinals, where they won the first leg 2–1 at home.[67] In the return leg on March 13 in Mexico, TFC lost the match 3–2, however progressed to the semifinals for the second time in its history since the 2011–12 Champions League, on away goals, following a 4–4 draw on aggregate.[68] On April 10, TFC drew 1–1 to Club América at the Estadio Azteca in the second leg of the semifinal after a 3–1 home win on April 3 in the first leg, to advance 4–2 on aggregate to the finals for the first time in their history.[69] After a 2–1 home loss to Guadalajara on April 17 in the first leg of the CONCACAF Champions League final, TFC would win the return away leg 2–1 on April 25, leading to a draw on aggregate, but lost 4–2 in the penalty shootout.[70] Later in the season, on September 19, Toronto FC played against Tigres UANL in the inaugural Campeones Cup, losing the match 3–1 at home.[71] They failed to qualify for the playoffs after a 2–1 home loss against Vancouver on October 6, 2018, with three games left to play in the season.[72]
During the 2018–19 offseason, on January 4, 2019, Toronto FC announced the appointment of Ali Curtis as general manager after the departure of Bezbatchenko.[73] After failing to reach a contract agreement with the club, on January 30, 2019, Toronto FC sold Giovinco to Saudi Arabian club Al-Hilal for an undisclosed fee.[74]
Stadium [ edit ]
BMO Field in July 2007, pre-expansion, during the 2007 FIFA U-20 World Cup
BMO Field in 2016
BMO Field; Toronto, Ontario (2007–present)
Before the 2007 Major League Soccer season, construction was completed on a new stadium at Exhibition Place in Toronto at a cost of $62.5 million.[75][76] On September 20, 2006, MLS's official website announced that BMO Financial Group had purchased the naming rights for the new stadium.[77] It is the largest soccer-specific stadium in Canada. It is owned by the City of Toronto, while MLSE, the team's owner, operates it.[78][79]
Following criticism of BMO Field's use of FieldTurf and its rapid deterioration, MLSE agreed to a deal with the city to replace it with a natural grass surface in time for the 2010 MLS Season. Along with the grass, a heating and drainage system was also installed at a cost of $3.5 million to MLSE.
In March 2012, TFC played its first-ever match in the Rogers Centre, the 49,982-capacity home of Major League Baseball's Toronto Blue Jays and former home of the Argonauts, hosting the LA Galaxy in the home leg of the 2011–12 CONCACAF Champions League Championship Round.[80] The retractable roof stadium was also the venue for a friendly against Liverpool of the English Premier League in July of that year.[81]
Expansion [ edit ]
Expansion to the north end that cost $2 million, added 1,249 seats and was completed for the start of the 2010 MLS Season.[82] A $120 million renovation to the stadium was officially announced September 23, 2014. It includes a second tier of seating that would add 8,400 seats, raising the capacity of the stadium to 30,991. New suites, washrooms, concourse and a roof would also be added. Construction began in September 2014 and would be divided into two phases; the completion of the project was set for May 2016.[83] The expansion would accommodate a Canadian football field with artificial turf end-zones when the Toronto Argonauts move to BMO Field in 2016,[84][85] along with hosting the Grey Cup that year.
Club culture [ edit ]
Supporters [ edit ]
Fans celebrate at a Toronto FC match
Toronto FC's initial seasons saw TFC fans set the standard for MLS fan support,[86] selling out its first three seasons. Referred to as the model franchise off the field by MLS commissioner Don Garber, the team was credited for starting "MLS 2.0" for their embrace of supporters' culture.[87][88] Lack of on-field success caused frustration among the fanbase, spurring fan protests against ownership.[89] In response, MLSE acknowledged the lack of quality on the on-field product, lowering ticket prices in 2013 to 2007 levels.[90] Following a resurgence of interest in the team due to the major signings of Jermain Defoe and Michael Bradley, the team capped season tickets at 17,000 for the 2014 season.[91]
Toronto FC's recognized supporters' groups are the Red Patch Boys, U-Sector, Kings in the North, Tribal Rhythm Nation and Original 109.[92] On August 23, 2018, Toronto FC permanently terminated Inebriatti's supporter status for a fire they started at TD Place Stadium in Ottawa during their match-up with Toronto FC in the Canadian Championship earlier that year on July 18.[93]
Mascot [ edit ]
Bitchy the Hawk is a female Harris's hawk employed by BMO Field falconry staff to sit perched atop the field to ward off seagulls.[94] Originally brought to work in 2007 to prevent seagulls from attacking patrons, the hawk has become a fixture of BMO Field. She has also been employed at Budweiser Stage in Ontario Place to the south to prevent seagulls from attacking concert-goers since the 1990s.[95] While no official word has come from the club about her status, she has been called the official mascot of the team.[96]
Rivalries [ edit ]
Toronto FC's biggest rival, Montreal Impact, joined MLS in 2012. In the years leading up to this, they emerged as fierce rivals during the Canadian Championship. The proximity of the two cities and the fact that Toronto and Montreal are long-standing rivals in the National Hockey League (NHL) contributes to these meetings being combative. Since both teams have joined MLS, the rivalry has intensified and the matches have become a Canadian soccer classic, nicknamed the 401 Derby after Ontario Highway 401, which links the two cities.[97] The rivalry is also known as the Canadian Classique.[98][99][100]
On March 16, 2013, Toronto FC fans set an MLS record for travelling support with 3,200 away fans in Montreal to watch TFC lose 2–1, eclipsing their own record of 2,400 at Columbus Crew in 2008.[101]
The 2016 MLS Cup Eastern Conference Finals were part of the 401 Derby as well, with Toronto FC winning the series 7–5 on aggregate.[59]
Columbus Crew and Toronto FC have competed for the Trillium Cup since 2008. Although a manufactured rivalry, albeit linked by the fact that the official flower of both Ontario and Ohio is the white trillium (Trillium grandiflorum), the meetings have since sparked bitterness. On March 28, 2009, approximately 1,700 Toronto FC supporters travelled to Columbus Crew Stadium and witnessed a 1–1 draw, during which they lit a number of flares and allegedly committed vandalism.[102] Following the game, some altercations broke out between the two supporter groups. Overwhelmed security called police who ended the melees and made arrests, at which time a TFC fan was tasered while being subdued.[102] The first rematch back in Columbus Crew Stadium following the incident was boycotted by Toronto FC supporters in wake of restrictions imposed on them by Crew officials.[102]
The 2017 MLS Cup Eastern Conference Finals were part of the Trillium Cup as well, with Toronto FC winning the series 1–0 on aggregate.[103][64]
Toronto FC also have a rivalry with the other Canadian team: Vancouver Whitecaps FC.[104][105][106][107][108]
2007–08 2009–10 2011–12 2013–14 2015–16 2017–18
2007–08 2009–10 2010–11 2012–13 2014–15 2016–17 2018–
The official team colours include red as the primary colour, with black, grey and white as secondary colours.
The primary uniform (jersey, shorts and socks) is red with alternating lighter and darker horizontal bands, black sleeves with red trim, and a vertical black band below each sleeve extending the full length of the jersey. The secondary uniform includes white jerseys with a large red horizontal band below a smaller blue band across the chest with blue and red trim, white socks with blue trim, and with either red or blue shorts (the choice of which is subject to the opponent uniform). In its first three seasons, Toronto FC's secondary uniform colours were light and dark grey. In the following four seasons, the team wore white secondary uniforms, whereas in 2014, the secondary uniforms were changed to onyx. As with all MLS teams, the uniforms are produced by Adidas. In 2013 and 2014, a shadow-print maple leaf was featured on Toronto FC's primary jerseys.[109][110]
Since the team's formation in 2007, it has been sponsored by the Bank of Montreal (BMO). The sponsorship was worth $1–1.5 million per season, but in 2010, a new five-year deal worth $4 million per season was signed.[111] In February 2016, it was announced that BMO had extended its sponsorship agreement by another ten years.[112]
Ownership [ edit ]
Toronto FC are operated by Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment, which also operates the National Hockey League's Toronto Maple Leafs, the American Hockey League's Toronto Marlies, the National Basketball Association's Toronto Raptors (and the NBA G League's Raptors 905 by extension) and the USL League One's Toronto FC II. MLSE also own and operate sports ventures like Leafs Nation Network, NBA TV Canada and GolTV Canada.[113] The company is also involved in real estate and property management, owning such sports venues such as the Scotiabank Arena and being a partner in the development of Maple Leaf Square. The partners of Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment are Larry Tanenbaum and rival media outlets Rogers Communications and Bell Media; Rogers and Bell own each of the primary sports television outlets in Canada (Sportsnet and TSN respectively), while Tanenbaum and Bell share ownership of the Toronto Argonauts, who share BMO Field with Toronto FC beginning in 2016.[84] In January 2018, MLSE acquired the Argonauts.[114]
Players and staff [ edit ]
Current roster [ edit ]
Where a player has not declared an international allegiance, nation is determined by place of birth. Squad correct as of January 31, 2019.[115]
Current staff [ edit ]
As of October 2015[116][117]
Head coaches [ edit ]
As of January 24, 2019
General managers [ edit ]
As of January 30, 2019
Youth development [ edit ]
Toronto FC II [ edit ]
Toronto FC II was established in November 2014 and is the farm team of Toronto FC. Toronto FC II competes in the USL League One, the third division of the American and Canadian soccer league system. The team serves as a reserve team for TFC and a bridge between the Academy and first team.[118] The team began play in March 2015. Their home stadium was the then-newly constructed 3,500-seat stadium at the Ontario Soccer Centre in Vaughan, just north-northwest of Toronto.[119][120] Jason Bent is the team's first head coach.
Toronto FC had previously had a one-year partnership with the Wilmington Hammerheads of the USL.[121][122][123]
For the 2018 season, TFC II moved its home games to BMO Field and Lamport Stadium.[124] On July 2, 2018, the team announced they would move down from the United Soccer League to USL League One for the league's first season in 2019.[125] With their drop to division 3, the team moved their home games to BMO Training Ground.[126]
TFC Academy [ edit ]
Toronto FC's BMO Training Ground (then known as Kia Training Ground) and academy in Downsview Park in 2013.
TFC Academy is the youth academy and development system of Toronto FC that was established in 2008.[127][128] The academy consists of multiple teams spanning different age groups, from U12 to U20. Starting September 2018, the senior academy squad (known as Toronto FC III) plays in the U.S. Soccer Development Academy.[129][130]
In June 2012, TFC academy moved to their new practice facility originally named Kia Training Ground, but subsequently renamed BMO Training Ground as the former's naming rights expired at the end of 2017, located in Downsview Park,[131] in North York. Built at a cost of $21 million to MLSE, the facility has seven pitches: three full-sized grass pitches and four artificial turfs with two capable of being bubbled for year-round use. The 36,000-square-foot (3,300 m2) facility also contains first team facilities, gym, kitchen, and offices.[132]
TFC Juniors [ edit ]
The Toronto FC Juniors, also known as the TFC Juniors, is part of the youth academy and development system of Toronto FC. The program holds camps regionally and has held camps in Toronto, Pickering, Vaughan, Stoney Creek in Hamilton, Oakville, and Markham. The Toronto FC Juniors program is one of Toronto FC Academy's main sources for prospects alongside their network of scouts.
Broadcasting [ edit ]
As of 2017, Toronto FC games are exclusively broadcast by TSN, with certain games (typically against other Canadian MLS franchises) also shown on CTV. Prior to 2017, Toronto FC games were broadcast exclusively by TSN and Sportsnet. Games that were not covered under national broadcast contracts with MLS or other competition organizers were divided evenly between the two broadcasters, pursuant to agreements between their parent companies (Bell Canada and Rogers Communications, respectively) in connection to their joint 2011 purchase of MLSE.[133] Radio broadcasts are divided between Sportsnet 590 and TSN 1050.[134][135]
Honours [ edit ]
[136]
Record [ edit ]
CONCACAF Champions League [ edit ]
Toronto has qualified for the CONCACAF Champions League six times.[149]
Scores and results list Toronto's goal tally first.
Individual awards [ edit ]
MLS Golden Boot [ edit ]
Player Season Goals Sebastian Giovinco[184] 2015 22
MLS MVP [ edit ]
MLS Newcomer of the Year [ edit ]
MLS Coach of the Year [ edit ]
MLS Cup MVP [ edit ]
CONCACAF Champions League Golden Ball [ edit ]
CONCACAF Champions League Golden Boot [ edit ]
Attendance [ edit ]
Average attendance
Season Reg. season 2007 20,134 2008 20,108 2009 20,344 2010 20,453 2011 20,267 2012 18,681 2013 18,131 2014 22,086 2015 23,451 2016 26,583 2017 27,647 2018 26,628
Attendance for Toronto FC dipped during 2012 and 2013 due to continued poor results by the team. Attendance bounced back in 2014 and in following years due in large part to the major signings of players such as Michael Bradley, Jermain Defoe and Sebastian Giovinco.[91][190]
The largest attendance for a Toronto FC game at the team's home stadium, BMO Field, was on December 10, 2016, when they hosted the Seattle Sounders in the 2016 MLS Cup Final in front of 36,045 fans; the stadium was expanded beyond its capacity to accommodate that year's Grey Cup.[191] The highest overall attendance for a home game was on March 7, 2012, when they hosted the Los Angeles Galaxy in the 2011–12 CONCACAF Champions League quarterfinals at the Rogers Centre in front of 47,658.[192]
See also [ edit ] |
Fox News’ Brit Hume under fire for saying Clinton 'not necessarily attractive'
CLOSE Fox News's Brit Hume generated controversy with comments about Hillary Clinton's appearance during the presidential debate. USA TODAY
Fox News’ host Brit Hume came under fire late Monday for comments about Hillary Clinton’s appearance during the presidential debate.
Hume, who has been hosting On the Recordsince Greta Van Susteren left Fox earlier this month, described Trump as looking "annoyed” and “put out,” but the host didn’t stop there.
He added that Clinton seemed "composed, smug sometimes,” but “not necessarily attractive." Hume later clarified that he was was "talking about demeanor."
On social media, many were quick to point out that Hume said nothing about Trump's attractiveness, but was quick to critique Clinton's debate performance alongside her physical attractiveness.
"Brit Hume", whose face looks as if it is melting downward, appoints self as a judge of attractiveness. — Adam W. Gilreath (@awgilreath) September 27, 2016
Sexist dinosaurs! @dandrezner: On @FoxNews, Brit Hume just complained that Clinton looked "composed, smug, not necessarily attractive." — Hilary Escajeda (@HilaryEscajeda) September 27, 2016
Brit Hume says Hillary Clinton looked smug and not always attractive - what kind of description is that of the Dem nominee for president? — wendy schiller (@profwschiller) September 27, 2016
Hey @FoxNews, you gonna post an apology for claiming that Hillary Clinton didn't "necessarily look attractive"? — Celine Robinson (@svuceline) September 27, 2016
Others pointed out that in the wake of sexual harassment allegations aimed at Fox News' ex-CEO Roger Ailes, the last thing Fox needs right now is anything that could be perceived as misogynistic rhetoric.
Hume's comments weren't the only ones focused on Clinton's "look." Toward the end of Monday night's debate, Lester Holt asked Donald Trump about his comment that Hillary Clinton didn't have a "presidential look."
He focused his response on his contention that the Democratic nominee doesn't have the "stamina" to be commander in chief.
“I don’t believe she does have the stamina," he said.
Contributing: Cooper Allen.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/2dgLVcm |
The Tunisian turmoil – and its potential ripple effects - reaffirms the critical significance of the Judea and Samaria mountain ridges to the national security and survival of the Jewish State.
The Tunisian turmoil is a reminder of the nature of Israel's neighborhood, the Middle East - the role model of domestic and global terrorism, volatility, instability, unpredictable violence, intra-Arab treachery, tenuous compliance with commitments, short-lived intra-Arab agreements, shifting alliances internally and externally, uncertainty, oppressive totalitarianism and divisiveness.
Israel's high security threshold and extremely slim margin of error are determined by such regional phenomena.
The more violent and the less predictable the region, the higher the security requirements. Moreover, the prime test of a Middle East peace accord is not its conclusion, but its capability to withstand the worst-case Middle East scenarios, such as an abrupt violation by a concerted unpredictable attack. For example, would the slim 9-15 miles waistline of pre-1967 Israel be able to fend off a 1973 Yom Kippur-like offensive?!
The Tunisian turmoil constitutes a prelude to potentially stormy 2011-12, fueled by a series of aging Arab rulers on their way out, a retreating US, increasingly assertive Russia, China and North Korea, bolder Muslim terrorist organizations and explosive disenchantment among oppressed Arab/Muslim masses.
Thus, the approaching departure of the aging/ailing President Mubarak could produce a pro-US regime, but it could also yield a radical Islamic takeover, followed by volcanic eruptions in the Middle East at-large, in the eastern Mediterranean, Horn of Africa, the Red Sea, Sudan, North Africa, devastating Western interests, providing a tailwind to terrorism and radical regimes and consuming the Israel-Egypt peace treaty.
Base policy on realistic scenarios
The scheduled US retreat from Iraq, the expected evacuation of Afghanistan and the switch of US policy from confrontation to engagement with rogue regimes are perceived by US rivals and enemies as an extension of the US retreats from Iran (1979), Lebanon (1983) and Somalia (1993), adrenalyzing radical and subversive veins. The retreat from Iraq could trigger a lava-effect, threatening the survival of pro-Western regimes in Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman and the UAE, but benefitting Iran, Syria and regional terrorism.
Turkey's about-face from a Western-oriented policy to Islam-driven policy has transformed the former leader of the Muslim World from a stability-generating ally to an unrest-perpetrating opponent of Western democracies. It has undermined regional stability, advancing Russian, Iranian and overall Islamic ambitions at the expense of vital US interests.
Middle East turbulence could force the Hashemite regime in Jordan to abandon its pro-Western policy and its peace treaty with Israel. For instance, regional constrains forced King Hussein to collaborate with Saddam Hussein's 1990 invasion of Kuwait. Regional pressures led Jordan's King Abdullah and King Hussein to join the wars on Israel in 1948/9 and in 1967 and 1973 respectively.
During 1968-1970, King Hussein provided its arch-enemy, the PLO, with logistical and operational bases for anti-Israel terrorism. How would Israel's border with Jordan be impacted by a radicalized Iraq and/or Egypt?! How would it be affected by the toppling of Jordan's Hashemite regime?!
Mideast precedents – and sober assessments of Middle East reality - behoove the Jewish State to base its policy on realistic Mideast scenarios and not on lethal wishful thinking.
The Mideast requires (especially) Israel to maintain a high security threshold, which secures its most vulnerable eastern border: the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria, which constitute the "Golan Heights" of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, the most effective tank obstacle in the region (3,000-feet steep slope dominating the Jordan Valley in the east), a dream platform for invading the 9-15 miles sliver along the Mediterranean Sea (2,000-ft moderate slope over-towering 80% of Israel's population and infrastructures in the west). |
Video Detailing How US Chamber Of Commerce Deceives The Public In Its Support Of SOPA & PROTECT IP
from the lies,-damned-lies,-and-the-us-chamber-of-commerce dept
A few weeks ago, we did a step-by-step detailed debunking of the claims by the US Chamber of Commerce's Steve Tepp. He had gone on PBS News Hour to defend the illegal domain name seizures, as well as the plans for SOPA and PROTECT IP. He made claims about how "huge" a problem "rogue sites" are, and quoted some big sounding numbers in a very serious voice. We went through the details for where those numbers came from and discovered (spoilers!) that he was being extremely disingenuous in presenting the numbers. The details actually showed that he was conflating a few different issues, using ridiculously shoddy methodology, and mixing in a few dodgy assumptions on top of that. In fact, the actual numbers suggested the-- that of dangerous counterfeit goods being sold, was a fairly tiny problem.Techdirt reader Nick Dynice thought that the post would work well as a short documentary, and took it upon himself to use the post as a script to create the following video about how Steve Tepp and the US Chamber of Commerce mislead with statistics in a dishonest way to garner support for the illegal domain seizures, as well as the unconstitutional proposals for SOPA and PROTECT IP.Thanks to Nick for putting this together.
Filed Under: copyright, domain seizures, misleading, sopa, stats, steve tepp
Companies: us chamber of commerce |
Why wait until tomorrow to see which games you’ll be attending at the Citrus Bowl this season?
One of our fellow Twitter followers found on Tuesday that TicketMaster had released the list of all Orlando City home games for the 2015 Major League Soccer season, one day before the full schedule was set to be released by the league.
Good job ticketmaster pic.twitter.com/oIrP9CcrHI — tim allen (@sportstime407) January 6, 2015
As we already knew, the Lions will open up their debut season against fellow MLS newcomer New York City FC at home on March 8. Their next home game will be about two weeks later on Saturday, March 21 against the Vancouver WhiteCaps. So we can probably figure they’ll be on the road for Week 2.
You can see all the matchups from the pictures above, but some of the most notable games will be against the LA Galaxy on May 17 — that’s a Sunday night match, so it looks like it’ll be nationally broadcasted. The week before features the New England Revolution in town on Friday, May 8.
Assuming this is, in fact, the true schedule, Orlando City will play just about all of their home games over the weekend (Fri-Sun) with just one weekday game scheduled — Wednesday, June 24 against the Colorado Rapids.
The New York Red Bulls will come to town in July, and Dom Dywer, Orlando City legend, will make his return to O-Town on September 13 with Sporting KC.
Finishing the season just as they started it, Orlando City will close out it’s home schedule on October 16 against NYCFC — possibly Frank Lampard’s first visit to Orlando, if he actually shows up in July as suggested.
Given the names of Western Conference teams visiting Orlando — based on the new conference alignment this winter — Orlando City is expected to make trips to visit Seattle Sounders, Portland Timbers, Houston Dynamo, San Jose Earthquakes, and Real Salt Lake. Those will surely be some tough road matches in their first MLS season.
There you have it. If you search around for other teams’ schedules you might be able to find some Orlando City road games. If not, you’ll have to find the whole thing tomorrow when MLS releases the list themselves.
Until then, tell us what you think about the home schedule by commenting below or tweeting us at @OTowns11! |
Back in November, I had the opportunity to attend a tasting event and meet Tom Bulleit in person. I was even luckier in that I was able to spend a good amount of time with him one-on-one after most of the guests had left for the evening. One of the things that resulted from our conversation was Tom promising to do a little Q&A for the Bourbon & Banter community. It’s taken a little longer than planned due to travel schedules and the holidays, but I’m thrilled to finally share the results of that promise with you today. The questions Tom has graciously answered are a combination of my own and those sourced directly from the Bourbon & Banter community.
Bulleit is a brand that’s benefitting immensely from Bourbon’s increased popularity and with Diageo’s support is poised to make some significant contributions to the Bourbon industry. From the recent launch of their Bulleit 10-Year Bourbon to the recent news about the Stitzel Weller distillery being reopened, Tom is definitely one to watch. Let’s read what he has to say on these very topics and more below.
One of the things I love about Bourbon is the combination of history and folklore that goes into a brand’s marketing. Can you tell us a little more about how you “fell uphill” into your relationship with Diageo? And how did that change things for you compared to what you had originally envisioned for the Bulleit brand?
My relationship with Diageo has provided Bulleit an incredible opportunity to partner with a company that delivers marketing and distribution expertise. It was important to me that we find an avenue to take our family business to the next level and we have been able to do just that with the recent launches of Bulleit Rye in 2011 and Bulleit 10 just this year. I look forward to working with Diageo for many years to come.
What’s the official plan and timeline around the Stitzel-Weller tour experience? What can visitors expect if they come for a visit?
While there has been speculation surrounding our plans at Stitzel-Weller, I can assure you that you will be one of the first to know when we have news to share. Bulleit will continue to be made the way with the same quality and commitment to excellence as it has since its beginnings.
(Editor’s note: I’ve reached back out to Tom to see if we can get a little more information since we all know that the distillery is planning on re-opening distilling operations.)
One of Bourbon & Banter’s reader’s bar has had problems obtaining different rye whiskeys due to a shortage of supply. Do you foresee that being a problem with Bulleit Rye?
We have adequate of supply of Bulleit Rye.
What should Bourbon lovers know about the upcoming Bulleit 10-year release? Will it become your favorite whiskey in the Bulleit product line?
The same quality and commitment to our 10 Year Old goes into the production of both Bulleit Bourbon and Bulleit Rye. The difference between the base counterpart, Bulleit Bourbon and Bulleit 10, is the age factor of three to four additional years. In my tasting, I would note that the vanilla tones in our bourbon have changed to caramel tones in the 10 Year Old. The liquid is spicier and more influence of the wood, which gives more oak in the finish. We encourage our customers to make their own evaluations since everyone’s palates are different.
How do you prefer to drink your Bourbon?
I remember drinking bourbon on the rocks with my father; however, with the recent cocktail culture revival, the ways to enjoy bourbon have expanded exponentially. The bartenders and mixologists who have embraced both Bulleit Bourbon and Bulleit Rye continue to create cocktails that exceed my expectations.
Outside of the work your doing with Bulleit, what brands do you feel are doing the most interesting and innovative work right now?
I am a particular fan of the craft distilling movement and intend, in the future, to explore that territory with aged straight whiskies.
Facing unavailability of Bulleit Bourbon, what Bourbon would you bring to a party if required?
People often ask what my favorite bourbons are and my wife, Betsy, reminds me that “it’s Bulleit, Tom.” I also enjoy providing my friends with a tasting experience that compares other bourbons, such as Maker’s Mark and Knob Creek, to the flavor portfolios offered in Bulleit.
Diageo’s decision to walk away from negotiations with Jose Cuervo has turbo charged interest in Diageo/Suntory talks about purchasing Beam. Any thoughts on how acquisition of Beam’s whiskey brands would impact Bulleit’s future?
A tremendous amount of strategic evaluation and capital needs to go into such action. At this time I’m focusing on our continued growth and the launch of such innovative new products, as seen most recently with Bulleit 10 and previously with Bulleit Rye.
The Bourbon industry is on fire right now. What are you enjoying most about the resurgence of Bourbon’s popularity?
For us distillers in Kentucky, the resurgence is gratifying in that it commemorates the work of so many entrepreneurs across many generations .
What do you think is the Bourbon industry’s greatest challenge moving forward for the next 3-years now that demand has
increased?
It will be up to all of us distillers to continue providing bourbon lovers with innovative and quality products that offer consumers with the opportunity to further develop their whisky tasting palates.
What’s next for Bulleit and yourself?
We look forward to continuing to provide our consumers with quality products. This was most evident with our recent launch of Bulleit 10 that has already received accolades among many bourbon enthusiasts.
I’d like to thank Tom for taking the time to respond to our questions. We very much appreciate it and are looking forward to what he has planned for Bulleit’s future.
If you’re interested in learning more about Bulleit 10-year stay tuned. I’ll be posting a review next week and comparing it directly against regular Bulleit to see if it’s worth the extra money.
Until then…cheers! |
The Justice Department will monitor the investigation into the controversial shooting death of a black man by a police officer in the St. Paul, Minn. suburb of Falcon Heights, according to Gov. Mark Dayton who said Thursday he was "heartbroken for Minnesota."
Officials say the state's Bureau of Criminal Apprehension will take the lead on the investigation into the shooting death of Philando Castile on Wednesday. Video of the aftermath appeared on Facebook Live.
In the video widely shared online, Castile's girlfriend is sitting in the vehicle next to him. Castile's shirt appears to be soaked in blood and his girlfriend is heard telling the camera "police just shot my boyfriend for no apparent reason." She said officers had pulled them over for a broken tail light.
Dayton said that based on the evidence, the police response was "way in excess of what the situation called for." He added, "Would this have happened if the passengers were white? I don't think it would've."
The Justice Department will assist Minnesota officials as needed and is ready to investigate further, a spokesperson told Fox News.
The girlfriend, Diamond Reynolds, said Thursday that other officers at the scene didn't check on Castile after the shooting, but that they tried to calm the officer involved as they put her in a police car.
State investigators said they were interviewing the officer who fired his weapon and would release his name soon. "The officer involved has been placed on paid administrative leave as per standard city procedure," officials in Falcon Heights announced.
"I grieve for Philando Castile, his family, friends, and community, and especially the child, who was in the car with him. I pray for everyone touched by this tragedy, including our law enforcement officers," Lt. Gov. Tina Smith said in a statement.
St. Anthony Police interim police chief Jon Mangseth said the incident began when an officer pulled over a vehicle around 9 p.m. Wednesday. Mangseth said he did not have details about the reason for the traffic stop, but that at some point shots were fired. The man was struck but no one else was injured, he said.
As word of the shooting and video spread, relatives of Castile, a 32-year-old cafeteria supervisor at a Montessori school, joined scores of people who gathered at the scene of the shooting and outside the hospital where he died.
Hundreds of demonstrators braved the rain and gathered to protest the shooting outside the Governor's Mansion in St. Paul, where a crowd had also convened the night before. The group swelled to over 1,000 for a time as people marched from the school vigil. Dayton waded through the crowd as protesters chanted: "What do we want? Justice. When do we want it? Now."
Police use of force, particularly against minorities, has returned to the national spotlight since the video-recorded fatal shooting earlier this week of 37-year-old Alton Sterling by police in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The U.S. Justice Department on Wednesday launched a civil rights investigation into the shooting, which took place after Sterling, who was black, scuffled with two white police officers outside a convenience store.
Castile's cousin, Antonio Johnson, told the Star Tribune that he believed that because Castile was a black man driving in Falcon Heights, a largely middle-class suburb, he "was immediately criminally profiled and he lost his life over it tonight."
The video posted Wednesday night on Facebook Live appeared to show Castile bloodied and quietly slumped in a seat. His girlfriend describes being pulled over for a "busted tail light" and Castile being shot as he told the officer that he was carrying a pistol and was licensed. A clearly distraught person who appears to be an armed police officer stands at the car's window, telling the woman to keep her hands where they are and intermittently swearing.
In the video, Castile's girlfriend says the man she identified as her boyfriend was reaching for his ID and wallet when the officer shot him. Police said in a statement that a handgun was recovered from the scene.
The officer tells her to keep her hands up and says: "I told him not to reach for it. I told him to get his hand out."
"You shot four bullets into him, sir. He was just getting his license and registration, sir," the woman responds.
The video goes on to show the woman exiting the car and being handcuffed. A young girl can be seen and is heard saying at one point, "I'm scared, Mommy."
The woman describes being put in the back seat of the police car and says, "The police just shot my boyfriend for no apparent reason."
Clarence Castile spoke to the Star Tribune from the Hennepin County Medical Center, where he said his nephew died minutes after arriving.
He said Philando Castile had worked in the J.J. Hill school cafeteria for 12 to 15 years, "cooking for the little kids." He said his nephew was "a good kid" who grew up in St. Paul.
Fox News' Matt Dean and The Associated Press contributed to this report. |
None of The Witcher games have yet had multiplayer, but CD Projekt Red's futuristic RPG Cyberpunk 2077 will.
"It will be a story-based RPG experience with amazing single-player playthroughs, but we're going to add multiplayer features," CDPR managing director Adam Badowski told me.
Whether there will be any multiplayer in The Witcher 3, we don't yet know. "We're thinking about something" was all Adam Badowski said.
Rumours began about multiplayer when CDPR advertised for a Multiplayer Programmer last year. The studio then attempted to brush off the attention by saying it was exploring all possible angles for its games.
Badowski told me that Cyberpunk 2077, like The Witcher 3, will also be an open world game - albeit in a very different setting. "The first and most important environment for Cyberpunk is the city, obviously," he said. "But not only the city: you can expect some more environments in the Cyberpunk game. We want to start in the Night City, which is cool. And yes it will be an open world game as well."
Unlike The Witcher 3, however, Cyberpunk 2077 won't revolve around a pre-defined hero. This means there will be more freedom to the open world, to who you are and to what you can do. In The Witcher 3, for example, hero Geralt can't massacre civilians because that wouldn't adhere to The Witcher fiction. "We'll have different situation in Cyberpunk," said Badowski. "Cyberpunk will have different character classes."
Having different character classes and no pre-defined hero loosens constraints on multiplayer, too. When I asked Badowski if there would ever be a Witcher MMO, he dismissed the idea with a chuckle. Simply, it wouldn't make fiction-sense to have 10 white-haired Geralts running around.
Cyberpunk 2077 is still a very long way off, and the team that's building it is still being established. One of the reasons the game was announced so far in advance of its 2015 release date - and with an eye-catching CGI trailer - was to attract development talent to the team.
The renowned Witcher team at CD Projekt Red is separate, although I'm sure resources will be pooled if and when the need arises. There's also another team at CDPR of Red Engine developers, QA specialists and technical support. The staff count at the Polish studio numbers 150, and the bulk of that - and the studio's focus - is on The Witcher 3, due 2014.
Eventually the Cyberpunk 2077 team will be the same size as The Witcher 3 team, said Badowski, but he doesn't want CDPR to be bigger than 200 employees. Also, the Cyberpunk 2077 team is "smaller right now" because it needs to be. "We don't want to grow too big on the prototyping stage because it's much easier to manage," Badowski told me.
"It's the crucial moment for Cyberpunk," he explained, "because we have tonnes of ideas and we need to have the perfect direction and we have to be in-line with the global vision of the game.
"We need to have precise, good, well-organised strike teams for that. The guys are working together brainstorming a lot, so a smaller team is better. And then we will go out to full production speed."
"It's the crucial moment for Cyberpunk, because we have tonnes of ideas and we need to have the perfect direction..." Adam Badowski
Cyberpunk 2077 will be a PC and next-gen consoles game just like The Witcher 3. Those next-gen consoles haven't been specified in Cyberpunk's case, but we know for definite that The Witcher 3 will be on PS4, and we can expect both games to also be on the next Xbox.
It's a big step for the previously PC-led studio, both in terms of production capabilities and the audience it reaches out to. "I don't think that the gaming world is split between PC and consoles," Badowski shrugged. "I'm a console player and I was a PC player and ... I don't want to be treated as stupid or less smart than a PC player. It's not like that. We definitely want to bring mature and ambitious gaming experience to the wider audience."
CD Projekt Red has its hands full, then, but Badowski said the studio was also "working on some prototypes" presumably for other games. "But again, sorry for that Robert - it's too early [to tell you what they are]," he apologised.
"We have some prototypes and we'll see if we can deliver something cool to the players. But every studio should have good R&D, especially independent studios. It's good to know what you may do in the future."
But, he concluded, "We have two leading projects, and they are the two hearts of our company." |
I’ve recently discovered Quest bars. How I’ve been doing keto for so long and not eaten or heard of them, I don’t know. They are by far the best keto bar I’ve had. Previously I would get Atkins bars for when I was in a pinch but these are far superior. They come in a variety of different flavors and start at 3 net carbs. One of the primary reasons I like them over the Atkins bars is that they have a gooey, nougat-like consistency. As a result, they get BETTER when they are melted and heated up. See, I travel a lot for work and often get these sorts of bars as emergency meal replacements. They often sit in my suitcase or backpack for days or even weeks before they are needed. With these, you’re good to go but with the Atkins bars, which are more of a granola type product, you’d be left with a hot mess. So today, I show you a cool way to cook the Quest bars down into little, mini cookies! Note: These are only so low in carbs because they contain sugar alcohols. Some people report this amount of sugar alcohol as kicking them out of keto. I’d experiment and try to make this sort of thing a nice treat rather than a daily snack. Here is the glorious bar itself. There are a ton of different flavors but this is my favorite amongst the ones I’ve tried. Also, they vary a lot in terms of the amount of net carbs so I generally stick to the 3g net carb bars. Start by microwaving the bar for 10 seconds to warm it up. You can skip this step if the bar is already malleable. Then split the bar in half, then in half, then in half to get 8 equal balls. Place them on a cooking tray. I used my convection oven since this is a small task and the thing heats up super fast. Now set a timer for 3 minutes. My previous go to timer, a cheap magnetic one from Ikea, just died on me. As a result I picked up this new TimeStick from Thermoworks, the same people that make the rediculously good and fast Thermapen! So far I like it. Its waterproof and magnetic and counts up or down. Another cool feature is it keeps counting up after the timer stops, so if it takes you 3 minutes to find the remote and pause the DVR after the alarm goes off, you’ll know the actual cooking time instead of just what the time was set for. After three minutes in the oven, you’re left with some glorious cookies! Who ever thought you could eat cookies again while on keto!!
Quest Cookies Author: Caveman Keto Nutrition Information Serves: 1 Serving size: 8 pieces
Calories: 190 Fat: 8g
Saturated fat: 3g
Unsaturated fat: 0g
Trans fat: 0g
Carbohydrates: 20g
Sodium: 280mg
Fiber: 17g
Protein: 21g
Cholesterol: 5mg Prep time: 1 min Cook time: 4 mins Total time: 5 mins Print Ingredients 1 Quest Bar Instructions Preheat your convection oven to 450 Start by microwaving the quest bar for 10 seconds to warm it up Break the bar into 8 equal parts and roll into balls Place on a cooking sheet and bake for 3 minutes Eat! 3.2.2708 |
GETTY • AFP Hayastan Shakarian caused an internet blackout in three countries with her garden spade
Hayastan Shakarian sliced through an underground cable while digging to scavenge copper. As she sliced into the fibre optic cable – the elderly woman single-handedly triggered a internet blackout for millions. "I have no idea what the internet is," she would later claim.
Ms Shakarian was digging in the village of Ksani – some 37 miles outside the capital city of Tbilisi – when she left neighbouring Armenia without Internet access for twelve hours.
I have no idea what the internet is Hayastan Shakarian, the Spade Hacker
The pensioner also caused major internet outages across Georgia and Azerbaijan. In total, more than three-and-a-half million people were left sat in front of blank screens and error codes after the then-75-year-old sank her spade into the backbone cable. Television reports showed footage of reporters working for a news agency in the capital Yerevan slumped in front of blank screens.
GETTY • AFP The elderly Georgian woman claimed she had "no idea what the internet is"
GETTY • AFP At the site where 75-year-old Hayastan Shakarian severed the internet connection to Armenia
Hayastan Shakarian was quickly dubbed the Spade Hacker for the devastating damage she caused. "The woman was hunting for some copper lines that she was hoping she could to sell," a police spokesperson said at the time. The cable damaged by the elderly Georgian runs through a slew of eastern European countries – connecting these countries to western Europe. |
When we enter the political debate sphere of the online world, I think we consider people holding these beliefs to be unreal. The information age means almost anybody can become informed about any topic, right? Someone who believes in these conspiracies has got to be a troll or using their anonymity to espouse harmful beliefs they’d never talk about in-person. They’re an edgy teenager, a kid who hasn’t learned to navigate the harmful trappings of the internet; they’re an old codger, still holding onto the good old days where they had all the privilege; they’re just uninformed, and need to study it out.
Approach any of these belief holders and you’ll find they’re fully informed. Plenty of them have just as much time spent online as the most prolific social media celebrities. They’ve spent that time researching the same topics as you and I. Ask for their sources, and you might even be given a wall of links. Studying it out is exactly what they’ve done, and they’re probably more prepared than us. I don’t even have a list of links for any single topic that I can source from for an argument; the majority of my bookmarks are TVTropes pages I moved into a folder after going far enough down that rabbit hole to have 40+ tabs open. My beliefs are pretty strong and founded on research but I guarantee I’ll have to spend a few minutes googling to find something proving my point.
Is the Trump supporter uninformed? Not really. I have a feeling he might have opinions you’d agree with, just like my grandpa. In fact, both shared opinions that I’ll see from all parts of the political spectrum on any given day. Do you think poor people are getting taxed too much? They agree. Do you think property taxes are too high? Ditto. Are there criminals in Washington who get away with murder? I’m sure some of you would toss out the same names as grandpa and the Trump supporter. And I’ve met a fair share of liberals who believe Obama is a war criminal and should be locked up. The Trump supporter at the barbershop might disagree on the details of the why, but shares the common goal of how he should be punished.
What often counts as being informed is the information you’re willing to stand by. The information age’s biggest flaw is how all information is treated as equal in value. Take, for example, the recent Planned Parenthood scandal:
A group known as the Center for Medical Progress published videos which claimed to show Planned Parenthood associates engaging in the sale of body parts from aborted fetuses. The videos were proven to be edited and falsified, with members of CMP impersonating government officials and having created a dummy corporation that pretended to deal in the very same body parts PP was accused of selling.
Texas held a grand jury to potentially indict Planned Parenthood. Instead, the creators of the videos were indicted and Planned Parenthood was found to have committed none of what was levied against them.
Has any of this made a difference? Multiple states are still voting to remove any funding of Planned Parenthood, cutting a lot of people off from their only source of healthcare. Congress is still considering stripping the company of all funding. Any comment section or Twitter thread you visit about Planned Parenthood is likely to have a lot of people calling them baby killers selling baby parts. A shooter in Colorado went on a killing spree at a Planned Parenthood and used those same words when he was arrested.
Just because the information is there, doesn’t mean the person reading it will believe it. And this is, again, nothing particular to any part of the political spectrum. I’m not going to believe anything I read from certain sites and I’m going to dismiss most of what gets said on certain channels. That means that there are times I’ll refuse to believe something that is objectively true. The same is done by you, by grandpa, by the Trump supporter, and everyone else. Only when there’s a consensus from sites I trust will I feel comfortable repeating what’s claimed. Those who believe Planned Parenthood are baby-killing flesh merchants believe any claims to the contrary are part of a conspiracy, because the sites they trust haven’t told them the videos were confirmed to be falsified. |
25 July 2015
We FINALLY having a working queen in the B-hive. This hive has been without a queen since we bought it (10 April). They raised a queen which couldn’t mate because the weather was too cold. We introduced a mated queen which they rejected. We kept the hive ticking over with brood from another, well functioning hive and last week it looked like they had a really good queen cell on the go again. And lo and behold, today we found plenty of evidence of a laying queen. Before the inspection we had discussed taking the bees from this hive and dividing them over the other two. But thank goodness that was not necessary.
We inspected the other two hives as well. The C-hive has the original, hard working queen which we didn’t spot today (but we did see new brood) and we added a half height honey super on this hive (in addition to the full height already there).
The A-hive has had a laying queen since last week – we did spot her and she’s working hard.
So in the space of two weeks we have three laying queens instead of one. This calls for bubbly tonight I think!
Advertisements |
|Jade|
A cold wind bites my cheeks, weaving through my hair and across my bare shoulders. I didn't bring a jacket because I like the way goosebumps feel when they crawl over my flesh. It doesn't ever get too cold in California, but the fall months do provide chilly nights and fogs of breath to cloud outdoor conversations. The steam of my black coffee rises from the cup clasped in my hands. It smells thick of mornings I hate waking up to and late nights spent memorizing a monologue or revising a draft for a play. The drink is so intricately woven to experiences I despise, and here's another one I can add to the list, another espresso-related moment I can scribble down and cringe at whenever it comes up.
Sometimes, I just really fucking hate everything.
Beck's face is solemn. His head is bowed, black hair a jagged shadow, elbows on his knees, and his own coffee is sitting forgotten between us. Neither of us are talking. It's just the sound of footsteps rumbling in and out of the Starbucks behind us and the traffic vibrating the road. There's a streetlight alternating between stop and yield and go and I stare at the changing colors like it's a kaleidoscope. A car tries to jump the green, a sleek, red vehicle that's pulsing music far too loudly, only for it to rock back on its brake as a truck zooms across the intersection. There's some yelling, a raised middle finger, before the driver is off.
"Say something. Please."
I bring my coffee to my lips. It's really far too hot to be drinking it quite yet but I don't care; I let the scalding liquid sear the roof of my mouth, my tastebuds frying away. I lower the cup to my knees, pinching it between them. My mouth is throbbing, blood swelling, and I suck it down my throat.
"Jade. Please."
"What do you want me to say?" I tear my eyes from the streetlight, that stupid fucking indicator that has probably lead to more deaths than any war, that has malfunctioned or prompted people to go without looking and it's probably their fault but, Jesus, sometimes life is distracting and you just don't think to look up. Beck meets my eyes, dark and ringed with sadness - not the same sadness that settled there after his Gran died, not the same sadness that plagued him when he didn't get a callback for a commercial he desperately wanted to star in. It's different, new, thick and heavy in his eyes like black-out curtains. "Honestly, Beck. What the fuck do you expect me to say? 'Thanks for everything? No hard feelings? We'll be the best of friends?'"
"Don't be like that." He looks away again, a sigh rattling his shoulders.
My usual answer to prolonged anger is violence. Everyone who has pissed me off has learned that the hard way. I have an insane urge to punch him right in the nose until I hear it crack, or black his eyes, or slam my boot between his legs until he begs for mercy. Anything to even come close to what's tearing my insides to shreds, plucking every tendon and ligament until they snap.
But he's Beck, and I've never physically hurt him before. I've never swung at him, even when he's done nothing but piss me off for days. Because I love him. Because I've loved him for two years. Because he's Beck and he's been with me forever and I'm so in love with him I don't know how to picture my life without him in it but here he is, cropping himself out of the photograph.
"Fuck you." There's no real malice in my words. I try, really, to generate the anguish that's ripping me apart somewhere in my chest into a tone of complete and total hatred, but it just breaks and shatters and the pieces litter the bottom of my lungs. My throat is tightening. My eyes are stinging. I've always been vulnerable with him, have always let him settle in my soft spot. But now he's puncturing it, digging deep, clawing, all with a frown on his face. "Fuck you, Beck."
"I did love you, Jade. I really did. And I still do. I just, it's not - it's not working. This isn't working."
I glare at him like I want him to set on fire. What's not working? I love him. He loves me. We kiss, we talk, we hang out, we laugh, we do things together. How is it not working? We fight. We bicker. I'm jealous and overbearing whenever he so much as looks at another girl, but he always said he liked that about me, that he felt protected. Just the night before he kissed me before I went home, hot and soft on the lips, and the same spark that has jolted me with every brush of contact had airplanes colliding in my stomach.
"What's not working? Everything's been absolutely fine. How can you just -" I bite my lip. It's quivering, and my voice is cracking, and for fucks sake I am not crying on top of everything else. Not in front of a busy Starbucks with possible life or death choices going on at the streetlight not that far away. "I don't understand."
"You're my first real girlfriend. I've never dated anyone else. I - I just don't feel the same. I don't want to lead you on until I'm absolutely sure. It wouldn't be fair to you."
"Is there another girl?" I turn back to him, giving up on keeping myself from crying. It's not going to happen. Tears swell in my eyes and spill over. Beck scoots closer to me, moving the coffee out of the way so he can put his thumbs on both of my cheeks, brushing the tears away. His hands are hot against the cold wind.
"No. Jade, I swear, there's no one else. I'm just feeling really conflicted right now and I just - I don't know where you fit. As a friend or as more." He removes his hand but remains close, brown eyes piercing into mine. "I have loved you more than anything for two years. You're beautiful and funny and smart and my best friend. None of this has anything to do with you. It's just me and my head and trying to figure out where my feelings lie." A hand runs through his hair, yanking it back. "We're seniors. We graduate in nine months. I need some time to figure out what I really want to do with the rest of my life. I need some time for myself so I know my choices aren't being influenced by anyone else." His hand claps on my knee. "I need to do this, Jade. For me. I'm sorry."
I know he means it. Beck is a genuine guy, and I've known him long enough to understand that he wouldn't do anything if he didn't think it was right. I shake my head, though, because I don't want to believe it, I don't want him to say these things with such sincerity. I want him to laugh, to say he's joking, that he's going to marry me and star in movies with me until we're old and wrinkled. I want him to say forever and mean it.
I kiss him. I kiss him hard and hungry and desperate, like it'll convince him to stay. I hold his face and he touches my hair and people are staring at us but I don't care. He tastes and smells just like coffee and he's always been my weak spot, the chink in my armor, my Achilles heel. And he's severed the muscle, torn it up to leave me gimp and limping, all while saying he was sorry, that he had to do it for himself.
He drives me home in silence. I hold his hand on the console and try to breathe, to think of something to say that could possibly make him change his mind. But I don't because it'll only make me feel like more shit than I already am. We drive slowly through streetlights, Beck ever cautious and always aware of his surroundings, subconsciously checking for reckless drivers. The red lights are frequent, always stop and go, yielding for intersecting traffic and moving along at a safe place when we're ushered to. I breathe in the familiar smell of his car, of him, and pray that the apocalypse drops its hell on us before we get to my house.
It doesn't, though, and we don't crash, and Beck is the same good driver he's always been. He parks in my driveway, my empty house looming over me like a prison. I stare through the windshield, not moving, my grip on Beck enough to cut off his circulation. At least he did it on a Friday. At least I have a few days to pull myself together before Monday forces me to walk down the hallways alone.
"I love you." I've said the words so many times in fleeting conversations, whispers in the sheets of his bed, the walls of my house. I've always meant them. They have always been true.
"I love you, too. And I know that either way -" (if he wants me or not - he doesn't say it but we're both thinking it) "- we'll be okay."
"I doubt it." I crank the door open before he can say anything. My fingers squeeze his as I stand, my body turning so I can look back in at him with our hands still linked. I stare at them, my eyes already sore from crying and I can feel tears dripping down my jaw. And then I let go and shut the door and he pulls slowly away. I stand with my arms crossed, watching him drive carefully down my street, his back lights beaming red before disappearing.
I consider falling to the grass on my knees and howling at the moon like a dramatic romance movie. I consider going inside and burning everything Beck has ever touched. I consider curling up in my bed and snotting all over my pillow like normal people would do.
But I grab my keys from the kitchen counter and sprint to my car.
Andre and Robbie are out of the question. I don't particularly like either of them for various reasons. That, and I know neither of them would know what to say or do. I don't even know what I want to hear and I'm the one seeking out another person. There's Cat, but she wouldn't be able to fully grasp it, she'd just try to give me ice cream and pat my back and put her yappy dog in my lap. She'd be just as clueless as the boys, and that only leaves me with one choice.
I mentally curse as I pull out of my driveway. I fucking hate needing anyone, anyone except Beck, and here I am for the second damn time driving to Tori Vega's house while crying my eyes out. But I have no one else and I know she'll help me because Tori's anything if not a goddamn saint. She'll tell me what I need to hear, she'll coddle me and balance it with enough sternness to help me.
I'd sooner swallow razor blades soaked in acid before I ever admitted out loud that I need Tori, but that wouldn't make it any less true.
And so I drive, and every stoplight I reach, I think about speeding through a red light, just for the thrill, just because I fucking can.
A/N: Finally! I'm dedicating myself to another multichapter Jori story. It's about time.
It'll alternate between Jade's POV and Tori's. Enjoy~ |
The Emacs dumper dispute
Please consider subscribing to LWN Subscriptions are the lifeblood of LWN.net. If you appreciate this content and would like to see more of it, your subscription will help to ensure that LWN continues to thrive. Please visit this page to join up and keep LWN on the net.
The Emacs editor is, at its core, a C program, but much of the editor's functionality is actually implemented in its special "Elisp" dialect of Lisp. Starting the editor requires loading a great deal of Elisp code and initializing its state, a process that can take a long time. To avoid making users wait for this process, Emacs has long used a scheme whereby the Elisp code is loaded once and a memory image is written to disk; starting Emacs becomes a matter of reading the memory image back in, which is a much faster process. Supporting this "dumping" functionality (also known as "unexec") has never been easy; beyond the technical challenges, it now appears that it may lead to a significant split within the Emacs community.
As covered here in January, the Emacs dumping (and "undumping") mechanism has long depended on some low-level hooks in the GNU C Library's memory allocation subsystem. The Glibc developers would like to modernize and improve this code, improving the library overall but removing the hooks that Emacs depends upon. At the end of the January discussions, the Emacs developers had decided to move to a workaround implementation that allowed the dumper to continue to work in the absence of Glibc support.
Note: it seems the actual breakage happened with : it seems the actual breakage happened with this commit for Glibc 2.24; thanks to Florian Weimer for the correction.
What nobody realized at the time is that the loss of the Glibc hooks, which happened in October for the 2.25 release (expected in February 2017), would affect existing Emacs releases in a surprising way. In particular, they fall back to an older interface called "ralloc", which does not perform well at all. The result is well summarized by Emacs co-maintainer Eli Zaretskii in October:
Based on what we've learned the hard way during the last couple of weeks, I'd say that all the Emacs versions before 25.2 (including 25.1) will be unstable on such GNU systems to the degree of making them almost unusable.
"Unstable" is the sort of behavior that users of text editors normally go well out of their way to avoid; it's also the sort of thing that could give vi a definitive advantage in the interminable editor wars. So something clearly needs to be done to make the Emacs dumping facility more stable and, preferably, more maintainable going forward. What that "something" would be is unclear, and the posting of a possible solution appears to have simply muddied the waters further.
That solution comes in the form of the "portable dumper" patch from Daniel Colascione. This patch is not small; it adds over 4,500 lines of code to Emacs and it is not yet complete. Rather than try to capture the state of the C library's memory-allocation subsystem, it simply marshals and saves the set of Elisp objects known to the editor. The file format is designed for performance and, in some settings at least, Emacs can start by simply mapping the file into memory and initializing a set of pointers.
Colascione describes the result this way:
The point of this gargantuan patch is that we can rip out our unexec implementations and replace them with loading a data file that contains an Emacs heap image. There are no dependencies on executable rewriting, disabling ASLR, or saving and restoring internal malloc state. This system works with fully position-independent executables and with any malloc implementation.
It also, he says, matches the startup performance of the current "unexec" system to within 100ms, and he has not yet had the time to collect a bunch of low-hanging optimization fruit. In other words, it seems like an interesting solution to the problem, but a patch of this size is always going to generate some discussion.
Some of that discussion focused on how this dumper works when address-space layout randomization (ASLR) is in use. Current Emacs binaries must disable ASLR entirely, thus losing the security benefits that ASLR is meant to provide. The new dumper does not require disabling ASLR, but it does contain an optimization that can be applied if the dump file can be successfully mapped at a specific address: most of the data therein can be used directly from the mapped image, without the need to allocate storage for and copy it. That should speed the startup process considerably, at the cost of always mapping the dump image at the same location.
Paul Eggert worried about the potential security implications of losing ASLR protection for the bulk of the editor's data. Colascione responded that, since no part of the data image is marked executable, there is little risk of attackers running code from there. But, as Eggert pointed out, that view overlooks an important detail: that memory is full of Elisp bytecode that is executed in the editor itself, and which can do just about anything an attacker might want. So, if this approach is adopted, the fixed-location mapping might have to be turned off, at least by default.
There is, however, a bigger disagreement involving Zaretskii, who described this work as "a wrong direction." His objection, in short, is that this patch adds a lot of low-level complexity, implemented in C, that will be a maintenance burden going forward. That is, he said, a threat to the future of the project:
The number of people aboard who can matter-of-factly hack the Emacs internals on the C level is consistently going down, and is already so small they can be counted on one hand. We must make Emacs depend less on people from this small and diminishing group, if we want the development pace increased or even kept at its current level. To me, that means keep as many features out of low-level C, and limit futzing with C-level internals of Lisp objects and the Lisp interpreter to the absolute minimum.
It makes sense to put thought into the maintainability of the code base and how it can be evolved to attract more developers. It is not entirely clear, though, that C programmers are actually a dying breed — or that the long-term supply of Elisp developers is more certain. In any case, the Emacs community needs to fix the startup problem; those who oppose the portable dumper solution presumably have something else in mind.
Zaretskii's preferred solution would be to make the Elisp loader faster, to the point that it can be used to read Elisp code directly at startup time. That is a solution that others might like to see as well, but it has one significant shortcoming: no code toward that goal exists, and there are no signs that anybody is working in that area. Colascione's solution, instead, does exist and has an interested developer behind it. In almost any development project, working code and ongoing maintenance carries a lot of weight.
Zaretskii feels strongly enough about this issue that he has threatened to resign as co-maintainer if the portable dumper is adopted. He appears to be nearly alone in this stance, though. Colascione has said repeatedly that he sees no other way to get the required performance. Richard Stallman is guardedly favorable to this solution, noting that it will be far easier to maintain than the current unexec code. John Wiegley, the other Emacs co-maintainer, also favors going with the portable dumper code.
The wind thus appears to be blowing in the direction of adopting the portable dumper patch. Nobody seems to want to see Zaretskii relinquish the co-maintainer role (a role he only accepted last July), so, if the portable dumper is merged, the community can only hope that he will change his mind. Any large development project will occasionally make decisions that are opposed by some of its developers, even when those developers are maintainers. But the venerable Emacs editor will still be there, and will still have no end of other problems to solve. |
Photo: Stocksy
by Bethany Ramos
I’ll admit it. Now that I have kids and am knee-deep in parenting, I forget that not everybody cares about my kids as much as I do. Not everybody wants kids, and that is a perfectly valid decision. For those of us who have forgotten how the other side lives, child-free Redditors have some important insight to share.
First, it helps to know that there is a distinction between child-less and child-free. A child-less couple may plan for kids in the future or struggle to conceive. According to the child-free sub-Reddit, “‘Childfree’ refers to those who do not have, and do not ever want, children (whether biological or adopted).”
The child-free sub-Reddit is one that every parent should read. Even if you already have kids, a child-free point of view can provide an outside perspective on parenting and keep you sensitive to your single friends.
Here are the top 10 takeaways from the child-free community.
1. Adult time is for adults
Image: Giphy
Harsh but true. One child-free Redditor explains why most people don’t appreciate parents bringing their kids out at 10 p.m.: “Went to a very obviously adult event at a bowling alley, crappy family comes in with sick kids, kids are obnoxious, mom tries to force feed her baby birds chicken soup… Ended up leaving and forfeiting the rest of our games we had paid for just because that family was so out of control.”
2. Child-free is a conscious choice
Image: Giphy
Some smart, self-aware adults know from a young age that they never want kids: “As a little girl, I never played with baby dolls or played 'Mommy.’ I always played with stuffed animals instead. When I was about 10, I told my parents that I never wanted kids, just dogs and horses. They laughed and told me, 'That will change!’ Eleven years later, and nothing has changed.”
3. Child-free people are still human |
YANGON (Reuters) - Myanmar’s ruling military changed the country’s flag, national anthem and official name on Thursday, just over two weeks before the country’s first election in 20 years, state media said.
The new state flag of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar is hoisted at the mast at the City Hall of Yangon, former capital and commercial city of Myanmar, October 21, 2010. REUTERS/Aung Hla Tun
The changes were outlined in a new constitution published in 2008 but the government had not announced a date for their introduction.
The country’s new name is the Republic of the Union of Myanmar, instead of the Union of Myanmar.
The military, which has ruled since a 1962 coup, changed the country’s name in English from Burma to Myanmar in 1989, a year after widespread protests against military rule were crushed, and a year before the last election.
That election was won by the party of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi but the military ignored the result. Suu Kyi has spent 15 of the past 21 years in detention.
The new flag has a horizontal band of light green at the top, dark green in the center and red at the bottom, with a white star in the middle. There has been no official explanation as to what the colors or the star represent.
Nor has there been any explanation as to why the changes, which include a new state seal, were being made.
Officials in various government departments told Reuters they were ordered to change the flags.
“We were caught by surprise when we got the order at short notice. There was also an order that the old flags must be burned,” said one official who declined to be identified.
The order stipulated that the old flag had to be lowered by someone born on a Tuesday and the new flag had to be raised by someone born on a Wednesday, he said.
“It must have been instructed by astrologers,” he said.
Myanmar’s secretive military rulers, who will retain ultimate power no matter who wins the November 7 parliamentary election, are widely believed to consult astrologers.
Several dozen passers-by watched the formal ceremony to change the flags at Yangon City Hall.
One, who declined to be identified, said the change was akin to putting old wine in new bottles: “The label has changed but what is really needed is a change of the wine.” |
Huawei has just unveiled its latest Honor smartphone, the 7i. The handset looks like another decent mid-ranger from Huawei, but with one quite unique feature – a rotating rear camera than pops up for higher quality selfies. I’m going to nickname it the periscope.
Typically, smartphones include a lower resolution front facing camera for video calls and pictures, but these have never really been that great. Some newer phones have begun including higher resolution front facing sensors, but the Honor 7i’s 13 megapixel, f/2.0, Sony Exmor based rear camera simply flips up to take selfies, saving on component costs while also eliminating the quality difference between your scene and selfie shots.
Huawei also states that the hinge is sturdy enough to withstand heavy use. The mechanism will last at least two years of use, even if you flip it up and down 132 times a day! Huawei isn’t the first to experiment with a dual purpose front and rear camera. We also quite liked the rotating camera that was included with the Oppo N1.
The rest of the specifications are what you would expect from a smartphone looking to bridge the gap between the mid and high-end tiers. The Honor 7i features a 5.2-inch display with a 1080p resolution. The handset is powered by an octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 616 processor, 2GB or 3GB of RAM depending on if you pick the 16GB or 32GB internal storage option, and a 3,100mAh battery. To sweeten the deal, Huawei has thrown in a fingerprint scanner, which is oddly attached to the side of the smartphone rather than on the back or front.
The Honor 7i will cost around $250 for the 16GB model and $300 for the 32GB variant in China, but the international handsets could cost somewhere between $300 or $400.
What do you think about the unique “periscope” camera? |
Swede told he had cancer and forced to have penis amputated following a YEAR of misdiagnosis
An elderly Swedish man has had to have his penis amputated after doctors misdiagnosed his condition.
Rather than being the urinary tract infection doctors had thought, he had contracted cancer, and medics had missed the signs for over a YEAR.
As the disease had been undetected for so long, the cancer had taken hold and doctors were left with no option other than to lop off his manhood.
Taking the snip: The elderly Swede, who thought he had urinary infection, in fact had contracted cancer, and doctors were forced to amputate his penis
The sexagenarian originally visited his local clinic in Blekinge, southern Sweden, in September 2009 for treatment on what he was told was an infection.
When he returned in March 2010 complaining of foreskin irritation, the doctor on duty at the time diagnosed the problem as a simple case of inflammation, the local paper, Blekinge Läns Tidning (BLT), reported.
After three weeks passed without the prescribed treatment alleviating the man’s condition, he was instructed to seek further treatment at Blekinge Hospital.
Misdiagnosed: The man, in his 60s, went to a clinic in local Blekinge, southern Sweden
But it took five MONTHS before he was able to schedule an appointment at the hospital.
When he finally met with doctors at the hospital, the man was informed he had cancer and his penis would have to be removed.
It remains unclear if the man would have been able to keep his penis had the cancer been detected sooner.
But the matter has been reported to the National Board of Health and Welfare in Sweden.
Two years ago Philip Seaton also suffered a similar fate when went to be circumcised at a hospital in Louisville, Kentucky, but awoke to find his penis had been amputated.
Mr Seaton filed a lawsuit against the doctor who performed the procedure and the anesthetist, claiming mental anguish and pain.
He also said he has lost the enjoyment of life, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit says doctors only received consent to perform a circumcision and that Mr Seaton did not consent to his penis being removed.
His lawyer, Kevin George, said the organ was cut off after cancer was found, but that doctors only had consent to remove the foreskin.
Mr George said: 'Sometimes you have an emergency and you have to do this, but he could very easily closed him up and said, "Here are your options. You have cancer," and the family would have said, "We want a second opinion. This is a big deal."' |
IBM will hire 25,000 workers in the U.S. over the next four years, the company's CEO said Tuesday on the eve of a meeting between technology industry leaders and President-elect Donald Trump. The pledge comes just over a month after Trump criticized IBM for moving some jobs out of the country, an allegation IBM denied.
Domestic job creation is likely to be a major topic at the meeting. Trump has called for U.S. corporations to keep jobs in the country and last month asked Apple CEO Tim Cook to build iPhones in the U.S.
Ginni Rometty, who is on Trump's business advisory team, made the promise in a commentary for USA Today and didn’t say whether the hiring plans represented a change in strategy. She did say IBM would hire 6,000 out of the total number by the end of 2017. The company has thousands of open positions at any moment, she said.
IBM will also invest $1 billion in training and development for U.S. employees over the next four years, she said. IBM was not immediately able to confirm whether the hiring or investment plans were new.
Tech investment pledges in the wake of Trump’s election last month may not necessarily represent the boost in domestic spending that he has promised to deliver. Earlier this month, Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son, whose company owns Sprint, said he would create 50,000 jobs through a $50 billion investment in U.S. startups. But that money reportedly will come out of a previously announced $100 billion investment Softbank had set up with Saudi Arabia.
IBM had 377,757 employees worldwide at the end of last year and earned just over $13 billion in net income that year. The company sold its PC business to China’s Lenovo in 2004 and its x86 server business to the same company in 2014.
Rometty’s article highlighted “new collar” jobs she said could be filled by people without advanced degrees. Those jobs, like cloud computing technicians and services delivery specialists, are being created as the economy is transformed by data science and cloud computing, and they're hard to fill, she said.
IBM supports new approaches to education to help fill such jobs in the future. It designed a new educational model with a six-year high school that combines traditional subjects with skills training from community colleges, mentoring and real-world job experience, Rometty said. A school on that model, Pathways in Technology Early College High School, or P-TECH, opened five years ago in Brooklyn.
Rometty also called for an update to the Perkins Career and Technical Education Act on federal support for vocational education, and for collaboration between companies, schools and government. “We will not always agree, but progress in job creation will come from open discussion and engagement,” she wrote. |
Today’s leak of country-by-country positions on the Trans Pacific Partnership reveals the strong isolation of the U.S. on many intellectual property issues and the wide ranging Canadian opposition to many U.S. proposals. With International Trade Minister Ed Fast heading to Singapore for a ministerial round of negotiations, Canada is apparently far apart from the U.S. on many key issues. The areas of disagreement run throughout the IP chapter and include positions on copyright term, digital locks, criminalization of copyright, parallel imports, patents, trademark scope, pharmaceutical protection, and geographical indications. Moreover, there is a notable disagreement on a cultural exception, which Canada wants but the U.S. does not.
A look at the areas of disagreement from the Huffington Post leak:
Chapter
Issues of Disagreement
Market Access state-owned commercial importing enterprises
state-owned exporting agricultural enterprises
annex on cheese
annex on biotechnology Rules of Origin certification without backing documents Customs De Minimis of US$200 (all TPP countries oppose the US on this) Technical Barriers to Trade Incorporation of WTO TBT agreement Government Procurement Market access for SMEs Investment Central Reserve Bank
Land appropriation annex E-commerce Privacy obligations (US reserves position) Environment MEAs: cooperative focus and not subject to dispute settlement
Dispute settlement for chapter
Biodiversity (elimination of para 3, 4, 5)
Climate change (shorten the article) Labour Dispute settlement Legal Medicines annex
Tobacco exception (Canada reserves)
Cultural exception
Extension of obligations: weaker formulation
US proposal for entry into force Intellectual Property Patentability criteria
Supplementary protection (all TPP countries oppose US)
Extend protection to new uses
Pharmaceutical linkage
Pharmaceutical data protection
Copyright Technological protection measures
Copyright term (all TPP countries oppose US)
Copyright parallel importation (all TPP countries oppose US)
Copyright ISPs (US and Australia isolated)
Criminal offences for unintentional copyright and trademark infringement (all TPP countries oppose US)
Camcording
Ratification of other IP treaties
National treatment (maintain TRIPS exclusions)
Trademarks inclusion of scent marks
Geographical indications – system for nullification
Geographical indications – no prohibition on third party use of translated GI
Geographical indications – existence of GI not reason to reject trademark registration |
Weatherman: Bob Dylan sings about the climate more than any other musician, with 30 per cent of his songs referencing the weather
He is one of the most influential musicians of his generation.
And yet Bob Dylan seems to have found a great deal of inspiration in that most mundane of subjects – the weather.
Research has found that 163 of Dylan’s 542 songs reference the climate – almost a third – making him the musician most likely to mention weather.
Dylan famously sang Blowin’ in the Wind, while the song Subterranean Homesick Blues includes the lyrics: ‘You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.’
It took climate scientists from five leading universities, including Southampton, Oxford, Newcastle, Nottingham and Reading to come up with the findings.
The Beatles came in at number two, mentioning the weather in 48 of the 308 songs they wrote or sang – 16 per cent – including Good Day Sunshine and Rain.
‘Rain’ by John Lennon and Paul McCartney was inspired by a trip to Melbourne when Lennon said ‘he had never seen rain like that except in Tahiti and was inspired by ‘people moaning about the weather all the time’.
George Harrison wrote ‘Here Comes the Sun’ after he left a business meeting in April 1969 on what he said was the ‘first sunshine of the year’.
The scientists note that April 1969 had 189 hours of sunshine, a record not surpassed until 1984.
Researchers suggest Dylan may have been so influenced by weather because he grew up in the harsh climate of the northern state of Minnesota.
Here comes the sun: The Beatles come a close second, with 16 per cent of their songs mentioning the weather. No even comes close to the two leaders, so the researchers haven't named a third, fourth or fifth place
The researchers – who were working in their spare time – analysed database KaraFun, which stores 15,000 songs.
They found 419 songs about the weather – 190 times as a main theme and 229 where it was a theme, repeated line or chorus.
HOW TO LISTEN TO THE WEATHER The Beatles - Good Day Sunshine The Beatles - Rain The Beatles - Here Comes The Sun Bob Dylan - A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall Bob Dylan - Blowin’ In The Wind Bob Dylan - Shelter From The Storm Bob Dylan - Rainy Day Women #12 & 35 Bob Dylan - Hurricane Bob Dylan - Idiot Wind Bob Dylan - Buckets Of Rain
But only 7 per cent of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time for example compiled by Rolling Stone magazine mention the weather.
Lead author Dr Sally Brown, from the University of Southampton, said: ‘We were all surprised how often weather is communicated in popular music, whether as a simple analogy or a major theme of a song, such as Bob Dylan’s Blowin’ in the Wind or the Hollies’ Bus Stop, where a couple fall in love under an umbrella.’
Sun and rain featured in 37 per cent of the references to weather, with wind in third place.
The researchers found more extreme weather, such as tornados and blizzards, barely feature.
The researchers said they found the sun ‘portrayed positive feelings and is more likely to be in a major key, whereas rain could frame either good or bad emotions, so has a higher likelihood than sun of being in a minor or mixed key’.
And many of the songs with secondary references in the database had little or nothing to do with the weather, such as Ice Ice Baby by Vanilla Ice, Daddy Cool by Boney M, and Benny and the Jets by Elton John.
No one has taken nearly as much inspiration from the weather as Dylan or the Beatles, meaning there is not a number three, four or five in the list.
But other songwriters who refer to climate include Taylor Swift, Bruce Springsteen and the Beach Boys.
Climate inspiration: Other musicians that sing about the weather a lot include Taylor Swift and Elton John
The researchers found that 30 bands had weather-related names, such as Coldplay and Wet Wet Wet.
They wrote: ‘Sun is the most popular weather type, appearing in seven band names, followed by cold (four) and heat (three).’
Most songs are about emotions, particularly falling in love and break-ups, the researchers found.
The researchers concluded: ‘Taken together, these findings suggest that there is a universal and strong effect of weather and popular musical culture.
'Further research could include a deeper analysis of weather-related music.’ |
CHENNAI: Private medical colleges in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry charge up to Rs 1 crore as capitation fee for MBBS courses, says a PIL which wants Madras high court to ask state and Central governments to form statutory committees to curb the racket.Tamil Nadu and its neighbouring Union territory of Puducherry account for more than 50 medical colleges, half of the run by the government.If left unchecked, these 'factories' would churn out money-minded medicos to the detriment of public welfare and people, it said.The first bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Satish K Agnihotri and Justice M M S Sundresh has ordered notices to the Centre and the state.The PIL of M Swaminathan said that while admission process and fee structure were as per rules in government colleges, the private unaided institutions charged up to Rs 1 crore for medical seat.Shady deals are struck, all ethics are thrown to the winds and huge black money transactions are done in MBBS admission profess, according to the PIL said.It said the errant colleges conducted their own farcical entrance tests by supplying both question papers and answer keys to students who had paid capitation fees.It said even the CBI had not properly conducted a probe into the racket. The CBI had not booked any purchaser and sellers of medical seats involving huge black money, it added.It was a cruel joke played on the future of millions of brilliant and innocent students from poor family background, the PIL said.Describing it as mother of all maladies, it said private medical colleges and deemed universities were the biggest culprits.Calling for an overhaul of educational policy, the PIL wanted the court to ask the state and central governments to constitute committees to monitor medical education admissions and curb the practice of capitation fee collection."If capitation fee and profiteering are to be checked, the method of admission has to be regulated so that the admission is based on merit and transparency, and students are not exploited," the PIL said. |
The normally bland face of Uranus has become increasingly stormy, with enormous cloud systems so bright that for the first time ever, amateur astronomers are able to see details in the planet's hazy blue-green atmosphere.
"The weather on Uranus is incredibly active," said Imke de Pater, professor and chair of astronomy at the University of California, Berkeley, and leader of the team that first noticed the activity when observing the planet with adaptive optics on the W. M. Keck II Telescope in Hawaii.
"This type of activity would have been expected in 2007, when Uranus's once every 42-year equinox occurred and the sun shined directly on the equator," noted co-investigator Heidi Hammel of the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy. "But we predicted that such activity would have died down by now. Why we see these incredible storms now is beyond anybody's guess."
In all, de Pater, Hammel and their team detected eight large storms on Uranus's northern hemisphere when observing the planet with the Keck Telescope on August 5 and 6. One was the brightest storm ever seen on Uranus at 2.2 microns, a wavelength that senses clouds just below the tropopause, where the pressure ranges from about 300 to 500 mbar, or half the pressure at Earth's surface. The storm accounted for 30 percent of all light reflected by the rest of the planet at this wavelength.
When amateur astronomers heard about the activity, they turned their telescopes on the planet and were amazed to see a bright blotch on the surface of a normally boring blue dot.
'I got it!'
French amateur astronomer Marc Delcroix processed the amateur images and confirmed the discovery of a bright spot on an image by French amateur Régis De-Bénedictis, then in others taken by fellow amateurs in September and October. He had his own chance on Oct. 3 and 4 to photograph it with the Pic du Midi one-meter telescope, where on the second night, "I caught the feature when it was transiting, and I thought, 'Yes, I got it!'" said Delcroix.
"I was thrilled to see such activity on Uranus. Getting details on Mars, Jupiter or Saturn is now routine, but seeing details on Uranus and Neptune are the new frontiers for us amateurs and I did not want to miss that," said Delcroix, who works for an auto parts supplier in Toulouse and has been observing the skies - Jupiter in particular - with his backyard telescope since 2006 and, since 2012, occasionally with the Pic du Midi telescope. "I was so happy to confirm myself these first amateur images on this bright storm on Uranus, feeling I was living a very special moment for planetary amateur astronomy."
Interestingly, the extremely bright storm seen by Keck in the near infrared is not the one seen by the amateurs, which is much deeper in the atmosphere than the one that initially caused all the excitement. De Pater's colleague Larry Sromovsky, a planetary scientist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, identified the amateur spot as one of the few features on the Keck images from August 5 that was only seen at 1.6 microns, and not at 2.2 microns. The 1.6 micron light is emitted from deeper in the atmosphere, which means that this feature is below the uppermost cloud layer of methane-ice in Uranus's atmosphere.
"The colors and morphology of this cloud complex suggests that the storm may be tied to a vortex in the deeper atmosphere similar to two large cloud complexes seen during the equinox," Sromovsky said.
Such vortices could be anchored much deeper in the atmosphere and extend over large vertical distances, as inferred from similar vortices on Jupiter, including its Great Red Spot.
An expanded team of astronomers led by Kunio M. Sayanagi, an Assistant Professor at Hampton University in Virginia, leveraged the amateur observations to activate a "Target of Opportunity" proposal on the Hubble Space Telescope, which imaged the entire planet on Oct. 14. Observing at a variety of wavelengths, HST revealed multiple storm components extending over a distance of more than 9,000 kilometers (5,760 miles) and clouds at a variety of altitudes.
De Pater, Sromovsky, Hammel and Pat Fry of the University of Wisconsin will report the details of their observations on Nov. 12 at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society's Division of Planetary Sciences in Tucson, Ariz.
Ice giant
Uranus is an ice giant, about four times the diameter of Earth, with an atmosphere of hydrogen and helium, with just a bit of methane to give it a blue tint. Because it is so distant - 30 times farther from the sun than Earth - astronomers were able to see little detail on its surface until adaptive optics on the Keck telescopes revealed features much like those on Jupiter.
De Pater and her colleagues have been following Uranus for more than a decade, charting the weather on the planet, including bands of circulating clouds, massive swirling storms and convective features at its north pole. Bright clouds are probably caused by gases such as methane rising in the atmosphere and condensing into highly reflective clouds of methane ice.
Because Uranus has no internal source of heat, its atmospheric activity was thought to be driven solely by sunlight, which is now weak in the northern hemisphere. Hence astronomers were surprised when these observations showed such intense activity.
Observations taken with the Keck telescope by Christoph Baranec, an Assistant Professor at the University of Hawaii on Manoa, revealed that the storm was still active, but had a different morphology and possibly reduced intensity.
"If indeed these features are high-altitude clouds generated by flow perturbations associated with a deeper vortex system, such drastic fluctuations in intensity would indeed be possible," Sromovsky added.
"These unexpected observations remind us keenly of how little we understand about atmospheric dynamics in outer planet atmospheres," the authors wrote in their paper.
### |
news An analysis of Senate voting patterns put together by supporters of Labor’s all-fibre NBN policy has shown parties supporting the fibre to the premises model received more support in the Federal Election than the Coalition’s alternative, calling into question Malcolm Turnbull’s claim to have a mandate to change the NBN rollout to fibre to the node.
Since the Coalition won power several weeks ago, a vigorous online movement focused on getting the new Abbott administration to abandon its own National Broadband Network policy and support Labor’s existing vision has been gaining force. Supporters of Labor’s vision argue that it will serve Australia’s long-term interests much better, as it features an all-fibre NBN, delivering a more reliable network and faster speeds.
The Coalition’s version of the NBN policy will see part of Telstra’s existing copper network maintained, in what is termed a ‘fibre to the node’ deployment. The model has been extensively and successfully deployed in countries such as the UK, but Australian proponents of Labor’s policy have highlighted the fact that it offers limited speed boosts over currently available broadband in Australia (up to 100Mbps as a top-end limit), compared with Labor’s NBN, which will offer enhanced levels of reliability and speeds up to 1Gbps, coupled with significantly enhanced upload speeds.
Telecommunications industry experts have consistently stated that they believe Labor’s NBN policy to be highly technically superior to the Coalition’s more modest vision, and having the potential to deliver Australia superior long-term outcomes in terms of service delivery and boosting Australia’s economy through productivity gains.
In addition, questions have been raised about the extent to whether it’s possible to deploy the FTTN technology the Coalition is focused on in Australia and whether it will perform as the Coalition has claimed. There are also questions as to whether Telstra, which owns the copper network which would need to be used as part of the FTTN rollout, will consent to modify its existing $11 billion arrangement with the Labor Federal Government and NBN Co, along the lines the Coalition plans.
A petition placed on popular website Change.org on the issue following the election, demanding the Coalition reconsider the FTTN technology and focus on the superior FTTP option, has already garnered in excess of 250,000 signatures.
In addition, an online poll taken by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation last week showed Australians overwhelmingly believe focusing on the National Broadband Network should be Prime Minister-elect Tony Abbott’s highest priority in his first 100 days in office, eclipsing issues such as education, the carbon tax, border protection and the environment.
However, Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull — formally sworn in to the role this morning — has rejected the online sentiment, saying that it would not be “democracy” for the Coalition to walk away from its fibre to the node-based NBN policy.
In the wake of Turnbull’s comments on the issue last week, a number of online critics of the Coalition’s NBN policy have put together and are promoting a comprehensive, data-based analysis of actual Senate voting patterns. It is believed that Senate votes give a better overall picture of which political parties Australians support, given the fact that very few parties run candidates in seats for the lower house.
Despite the low primary vote of primary NBN supporter Labor, the analysis shows that parties supporting a FTTP-based NBN received about 49.4 percent of the total vote. The list of parties supporting a FTTP-based NBN includes Labor, the Greens, the Nick Xenophon Group, the Australian Sex Party, Family First, the Democratic Labor Party, the Wikileaks Party, the Rise up Australia Party, the Pirate Party, the Democrats, the Socialist Alliance and others.
In comparison, those parties which supported a FTTN-based NBN, including the Liberal and National parties (including the LNP variant in Queensland and the Country Liberals, received only 39.9 percent of the total vote.
The analysis also lists a number of parties, such as the No Carbon Tax Climate Skeptics, which said the issue was not the Government’s responsibility (4.5 percent), those that supported Labor’s NBN policy but questioned its projected benefits, including the Palmer United Party and Katter’s Australian Party (6.2 percent) and parties which had no known policies or statements on the NBN (5.9 percent).
“Yes, the Coalition won the election. Labor’s NBN won it too, with an even larger margin,” the original author of the analysis, ‘quink’, wrote. “The petition never asked anyone to ignore the election result. Instead, we think you should honour it. Democracy? I think so.”
A Reddit user named ‘Geronimouse’, who created a more sophisticated graphic based on quink’s analysis, wrote that if the election had been based purely on Internet policies, “the LNP would have lost in a landslide”. They added: “Do not let the LNP force us to pay for inferior technology that will be ultimately more expensive.”
The news comes several days after Turnbull savagely attacked a University of Queensland lecturer for a seemingly innocuous article analysing rising online dissent towards the Coalition’s NBN policy, inaccurately labelling the academic’s article as “false” and “misleading”, and claiming that it was “a disgrace”.
Turnbull said the election did not close down debate on the NBN, and that Australians were “perfectly entitled” to urge him to abandon the Coalition’s NBN policy and take up Labor’s. “… but they should not take offence when we point out that we did take a very detailed NBN policy to the election, that we won the election and that were we to abandon it a week after that election Australians would thing we had taken leave both of our senses and our integrity,” the Member for Wentworth wrote.
opinion/analysis
What legitimacy does quink’s analysis have? It’s really quite impossible to know. Australians typically don’t vote for one party based on a single issue, even one as powerful as the NBN. Statistically, I’d say that experienced pollsters such as the ABC’s Antony Green would pour cold water all over this one. We just can’t simply posit that the NBN was as big an issue in the election as many people seem to think it was, merely because of these Senate voting figures. And I’m sure Turnbull would come back with this kind of line, should he be asked about the issue.
(I would have asked him about it today, but I believe his office is a tad busy getting established in Conroy’s old digs ;) I didn’t get much of a reply yesterday when I asked about TPG’s fibre to the building rollout. Plus, Turnbull was only sworn in this morning.)
However, neither can we discount this analysis entirely. If you look at the pro-FTTP parties which garnered most of the Senate primary vote, what you’ll see is that they are often very progressive parties. Certainly the Greens, Nick Xenophon, Wikileaks, the Pirate Party, the Democrats, Bullet Train for Australia, Drug Law Reform and the Future Party all fall within this description, and I’m sure Labor and the Socialist Alliance would like to believe they were progressive.
What this indicates is that there is a very large portion of Australians who voted for progressive parties in the election; parties which are likely to have technology-positive policies like the NBN. Even the Palmer United Party, usually seen as conservative, is broadly in favour of Labor’s NBN, although it broadly questions its benefits.
Then too, we don’t just have to rely on the election data in analysing the NBN’s popularity. The Federal Election is only a poll, after all, if a very sophisticated and binding one. A long-running series of other polls have consistently shown that a proportion of the population as high as 75 percent supports Labor’s original FTTP-based NBN policy. To the extent that you believe the NBN was an election issue, this analysis really isn’t anything out of line for long-term NBN polling. The truth is that all the evidence has consistently shown that the Australian population overwhelmingly supports Labor’s version of the NBN and has rejected the Coalition’s.
Turnbull may insinuate that the Coalition has a mandate to deploy FTTN and reform NBN Co along its planned lines. But the truth is that the evidence shows that he does not. All the evidence shows that the Coalition won power several weeks ago despite its NBN policy, not because of it. The veracity of the online dissent which has arisen towards the Coalition’s policy in the wake of the election is just further indication of that rather obvious fact.
Image credit: Geronimouse |
Watch Vince Staples' Epic Freestyle Over Kanye West's 'Get 'Em High'
The Ramona Park rapper went in.
Vince Staples dropped by the Capital XTRA studios to deliver an epic freestyle on Tim Westwood's show.
The Long Beach artist went in over the Kanye West produced 'Get 'Em High', which featured on his 2004 album 'The College Dropout'.
Vince rode the notoriously difficult beat with ease, touching on topics as diverse as racism, poverty and growing up in his Ramona Park neighbourhood.
"They used to put my people in nooses for what I publish," Vince raps in the nearly three-minute long freestyle.
The 'Señorita' rapper recently released his ambitious debut double album, 'Summertime '06'.
Watch Vince's full freestyle above.
(Warning: This video contains strong language that some people may find offensive.)
You might also like... |
Subsets and Splits
No saved queries yet
Save your SQL queries to embed, download, and access them later. Queries will appear here once saved.