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Video has surfaced appearing to show a New York City police officer taking $1,300 from a man who says he was robbed and then pepper-sprayed by the cop during a stop-and-frisk last month that ended without arrest.
The New York Daily News published exclusive video of the September 16 incident on Wednesday this week and reported that the Brooklyn district attorney’s office is now investigation allegations of wrongdoing concerning the action exhibited in the clip.
Attorneys for Lamard Joye, the man who is seen on film being frisked, robbed and assaulted by the cop, told the Daily News that the footage demonstrates disturbing conduct not just on the part of the one officer, who has yet to be named by the New York Police Department, but his fellow colleagues as well amidst a series of scandals that has surrounded the agency for ages.
“One of the most disturbing things about the video is the other cops standing around watching and doing nothing to stop the wrongdoing,” lawyer Robert Marinelli told the paper.
According to the NYPD, the incident started to unfold on Sept. 16 when police were dispatched to respond to a call concerning a man with a gun.
“When officers arrived at the scene, they encountered numerous people at the location. As a result of the allegations, the matter is under investigation by the Internal Affairs Bureau and CCRB,” or Civilian Complaint Review Board, the NYPD told the New York Times.
Marinelli provided a copy of the videotape to the Brooklyn DA’s office, he told the Daily News, and the borough’s top attorney, Kenneth Thompson, told the Times that he’s “aware of the alleged incident and it is being actively and thoroughly investigated.”
Until a proper probe concludes, however, what happened last month to Joye and the reasoning behind it remains up for discussion: according to Marinelli, his client was not arrested after being frisked, his money was never returned and an explanation has not been offered by the NYPD or any official agency.
“I believe that this officer made an assumption that any money Mr. Joye possessed was obtained illegally and therefore he would not report the theft,” Marinelli told the Times. “This assumption was wrong. Mr. Joye is a hardworking taxpayer. An incident like this would never occur in a more affluent section of the city.”
According to the Daily News, Marinelli provided the DA’s chief civil rights prosecutor with the not only the video footage, but also pay stubs and other visual evidence that he says will show that his client withdrew cash he earned from his construction job in order to celebrate his birthday with his wife on the evening the incident occurred.
Video footage recorded on an eyewitness’s cell phone does not show a celebration, though, but instead an apparently fruitless stop-and-frisk procedure gone awry.
“Gimme my money!” Joye is heard in the clip yelling at the cop before being doused with pepper-spray,
“How ya gonna take his money?” “That’s robbery” and “Get his badge number,” an onlooker is heard saying in the Daily News clip.
When Joye’s sister tried to find out the officer’s identity — an interaction also caught on tape — she was sprayed as well.
“I went to get his badge number and name,” Lateefah Joye told the Daily News. “I leaned over to see his badge. He pushed me away. I saw a two and a one and that’s when he pepper-sprayed me in my mouth and my whole face.”
“I’m outraged,” she told the paper. “It’s very outrageous. I’ve witnessed a lot of things cops have done. But what can you do? I’m not a violent person. I’m an athlete.”
The NYPD’s tactics have increasingly landed the agency in the spotlight as of late thanks to the routine sharing of amateur video footage showing officers behaving in a barrage of questionable conduct. In July, NYPD officers were videotaped choking a man who was later pronounced dead. |
V. Nanammal is a 97-year-old woman from Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu. Even at her advanced age, Nanammal practices the art of yoga, and what's more, also teaches it to other enthusiasts.
Image source: Deccan Chronicle
Possibly the oldest yoga instructor in India, Nanammal teaches yoga to more than 100 students on a daily basis, and her students include people from all age groups. Nanammal started to learn the basics of yoga from her father, who was a martial artist, from the early age of eight. Being a natural early riser, she drinks 500 ml of water as soon as she wakes up, and uses neem sticks to brush her teeth, and even carries a few when she goes out of town. She eats healthy food at all times of the day, like fruits, milk with honey, and turmeric powder.
Speaking with Deccan Chronicle, she said,
My husband was a Siddha practitioner and was into agriculture and cultivation. This is how my liking for naturopathy had its inception, even after my marriage. I never stopped practising yoga at any point in my life. That’s the secret of my health. The food I consumer every day is highly rich in fibre and calcium. I have kanji with a different vegetarian dish every day. All the vegetables we use are from our own farm.
According to a Deccan Herald report, Nanammal attempted to get on to the Guinness Book of World Records by teaching yoga to over 20,000 students and enthusiasts in Coimbatore. Right now, her objective is to create awareness among women, mainly girl students, about yoga techniques by going to various educational institutions to solve several health-related problems, especially after marriage. Her son, V. Ellusami, said,
She had rejected offers from several yoga federations across the world as she does not know English.
Around 600 students who learnt yoga from Nanammal are are now into yoga instruction all around the world. Right now, 36 members from her family are serious practitioners. Nanammal strongly conveys that there's never any excuse or limit if there is the right intent.
Do you have an interesting story to share? Please write to us at [email protected]. To stay updated with more positive news, please connect with us on Facebook and Twitter. |
Gwinnett County is expected to add nearly half a million people in the next two-plus decades. If projections hold, those new residents will push Gwinnett past Fulton as Georgia’s most populous county.
Commission Chairman Charlotte Nash knows all that, and she believes Gwinnett needs more transit options. A transportation system able to serve the county’s still-growing populace must be planned for, she said. And the county will need buy-in from its long-reticent — but rapidly evolving — residents.
Because it could be now or never.
“Some people think [transit expansion] can happen a lot quicker than it can,” said Nash, who wants the county to have some kind transportation referendum on the ballot in 2018. “… It’s going to be a long, drawn-out process. And if we don’t get started soon, it means it’s just going to be that much harder to get done.”
Gwinnett recently began in earnest a comprehensive transit development plan, a months-long study to determine what kind of transit additions might be most feasible, and palatable, for the county.
The Atlanta Regional Commission projects that, by 2040, Gwinnett will boast more than 1.35 million residents, an influx of nearly 500,000 people. Projections show the county only getting denser along already crowded corridors like I-85, Ga. 316, Buford Highway and Peachtree Industrial Boulevard.
Like many suburban counties, Gwinnett has resisted transit for decades, citing fears of increased crime or decreased property values. Voters rejected proposals to join the MARTA system in 1971 and 1990 and, in 2012, helped shoot down a regional sales tax proposal that would have provided money for transit and transportation projects.
While there are still many Gwinnettians dead-set against any kind of new transit, Nash believes the group of folks willing to even broach the subject is “bigger now than it’s ever been.” About 44 percent of Gwinnett residents that participated in a 2016 survey from the ARC said expanded public transit was the best long-term solution to the region’s traffic woes.
It’s not only current conditions that Gwinnett should consider when deciding what, if any, new transit options should be provided, officials said — because 2040 isn’t as far away as it sounds.
“You need to start doing the planning now, to know what’s priority so you can have the infrastructure in place,” John Orr, manager of the ARC’s transportation section, said.
“I think the county certainly recognizes that, with the amount of population growth, that they need to take a fresh look at some of the possibilities for transit moving forward,” he added.
Part of Gwinnett’s comprehensive transit plan process, which started last month with stakeholder meetings, will be educating voters on what various types of projects might cost.
The county estimates that heavy rail, for instance, would run at least $250 million per mile. Light rail could fetch $150 million per mile. Bus rapid transit, buses that operate in dedicated lanes and make fewer stops than local routes, would likely cost more in the area of $25 million per mile.
Those rough figures don’t include operating costs.
Funds from generic special-purpose local option sales taxes — which Gwinnett voters have approved during multiple referendums, including one in November — would cover only capital expenses. As state law is currently written, special single-county transportation SPLOSTs could be used to fund operating costs but are permitted to last for only five years.
There’s been talk at the Georgia General Assembly of extending that time period, but the current law is a dicey proposition for something like transit funding, which Nash called a “forevermore commitment.”
“I still run into people who will kind of put together a scenario for a lot of improvements,” said Alan Chapman, the director of the Gwinnett Department of Transportation. “And we’ll really get into the details of the cost and maybe the light bulb goes off that it may not be affordable as they thought it was.”
Compilation of the county’s comprehensive transit plan will shift into high gear later this summer, Chapman said, with an online survey and county “bus tour.”Officials will stop at community events and gauge opinions by speaking to locals on tap. A phone survey is also a possibility.
Officials hope to create an actual list of recommendations to present for even more public input sometime in early 2018. Nash’s hope is that some kind of referendum on some kind of transit expansion would be on the following November’s ballot.
“Quite honestly, as part of this process, we’re looking for public participation. But we’re also looking at it as a chance to educate the public,” Nash said. “… And part of that will [help create] a more realistically founded list of recommendations.”
Gwinnett has local bus routes and a handful of commuter buses that run from local park-and-rides to various places around Atlanta. But Orr, the ARC manager, said the county still has “an awful lot of infrastructure needs” moving forward.
“A lot of it is going to boil down to what’s cost-effective and right for their community,” he said. “I think that’s something they’re going to have to be wrestling with the rest of the year.” |
We are going to need some restraint and careful explanation for this one.
Google is making life a little easier for developers. Today a post on the official Android Developers Blog announced a new rule for OEMs that insist on skinning Ice Cream Sandwich: You must also include the unmodified ICS "Holo" Theme files. Regular users still have to deal with a skinned OS, but developers can opt out of the skinned parts for their app. Observe:
This is what developers currently have to deal with. Apps will look wildly different depending on what skin your phone has. On the left is Motoblur, on the right is stock ICS. It's the same APK, but everything looks different because apps take many parts of their UI from the OS. OEMs mess with these files, and the result is a consistency nightmare for developers.
This will fix all that. Google is requiring all ICS devices to have a set of stock UI parts that developers can access for their apps. The result is a nice, consistent look for apps across all devices. Developers will have one less headache to deal with.
Now I know what you're thinking. And you can just drop it right now. Google went out of their way to pour cold water on the idea of a full-on skin lockout:
We have no desire to restrict manufacturers from building their own themed experience across their devices.
Darn. Manufacturer skins will still be around, but developers can opt to not let them touch their apps. On the plus side though, updates for OEMs should be a little easier (and hopefully, faster):
Formally separating these theme families will also make future merges easier for manufacturers updating to a new platform version, helping more devices update more quickly.
Translation: "Since there are now two sets of UI pieces on every skinned phone, skins and the stock UI are now separate. That should make updates a little easier on OEMs, because new Google files will no longer overwrite their skin files." I know its really easy to read this and think "Rom developers could easily activate a stock UI!", but the thing is, we don't know how much of the stock UI is covered in this new requirement. We'll have to see a completed, skinned ICS rom to find out. Cross your fingers.
Developers should hit up the source link for full instructions on how to opt out of UI skins in their apps. Consistency rules!
Source: The Official Android Developers Blog |
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Emmanuel Mutai produced a stunning performance to win the men's race in a London Marathon course-record time of 2hr 4min and 38sec.
The Kenyan beat the previous best of 2:05.10 set by Samuel Wanjiru in 2009 and also recorded the fifth-fastest time ever.
The 26-year-old, second last year, broke away at around the 21-mile mark with the three-time winner Martin Lel and Patrick Makau, making it a clean sweep for Kenya, Lel just edging out his compatriot in a sprint finish.
Mutai's victory also completed a Kenyan double, with his compatriot Mary Keitany earlier smashing her personal best to seal a commanding victory in the women's race.
Keitany broke away after 15 miles and never looked like being caught as she clocked an unofficial time of 2:19.17, almost 10 minutes quicker than her debut in New York last year.
The 29-year-old began the year by setting a world record of 1:05.50 for the half-marathon, becoming the first woman to run under 66 minutes.
And she proved equally adept at double the distance to push the defending champion Liliya Shobukhova of Russia into second, with Kenya's Edna Kiplagat in third.
Jo Pavey enjoyed an excellent marathon debut, finishing 19th in 2:28.23, comfortably inside the qualifying times for both this year's World Championships in Daegu, South Korea, and next year's Olympics. The 37-year-old may opt not to compete in Daegu, but seems certain to concentrate fully on the marathon rather than returning to the track. |
100% Renewable Energy's solar scorecard reveals MPs in seats with the highest take-up are less supportive of solar energy
The areas in Australia with the strongest take-up of solar energy have MPs who largely don't support the sector, according to a new scorecard of federal Australian MPs that grades them on his or her attitude to solar power.
The 100% Renewable Energy's solar scorecard has ranked each House of Representatives member on various criteria, including their commitment to the renewable energy target, carbon pricing and support for large-scale solar projects.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Adam Bandt, the only Greens member in the lower house, came out on top, with full marks in each of the categories.
Liberal Alby Schultz, who has called the renewable energy target "the biggest government sponsored fraud in the history of our country" came bottom of the rankings.
The top half of the rankings are dominated by Labor MPs, with Graham Perrett, Julie Owens and former speaker Harry Jenkins all ranked as strong supporters of solar.
However, there are exceptions. Four Liberals, headed by shadow communications minister Malcolm Turnbull, are ahead of environment minister Tony Burke, who is deemed to have uncertain support for large solar projects.
Interestingly, in terms of electorates with the highest solar panel take-up rates, Wright, Mayo, Kingston, Grey and Fisher lead the way. Ironically, only one of these electorates has a Labor MP, with the rest presided over by Coalition members who are ranked lowly on the solar scorecard.
100% Renewable Energy said solar power in Australia has created 15,000 jobs, saved three million tonnes of CO2 and knocked $551.6 million off household power bills.
However, Lindsay Soutar, national director of the advocacy group, said that many MPs were generally unaware of these benefits.
"Politicians realise that solar is popular with people, especially as the price of rooftop panels has come down, but the coal and gas industries still have a huge influence over them," she said. "There isn't much understanding of solar among politicians. Many don't understand that a 1.5KW solar system for your roof costs $3000 now when it cost $12,000 just a few years ago. The price drop is significant."
Russell Marsh, policy director at the Clean Energy Council, said he was confident that solar energy would continue to grow in Australia regardless of the federal election outcome in September.
"You can't say either side of politics treated it differently. The Coalition is very interested in rooftop solar and large-scale solar too and they have signed up to the 20% renewable energy target," he said. "There's a common myth that household solar is installed by rich people and paid for by poor people. But when you look into it, you can see that the highest levels of take-up are in the mortgage belts with retirees. Those on lower incomes are benefitting from solar PV."
"You'd hope that as those individual MPs realise the benefits of solar in their electorates, their views may change."
Despite a winding back of feed-in tariffs – the amount paid to solar households for generating energy for the grid – across Australia, around $8 billion has been invested in the domestic market on panels, encompassing 2.5 million people.
Soutar said that misinformation about solar, and policy uncertainty around issues such as the carbon price and the renewable energy target, are holding back the sector.
"Politicians use solar schemes and the carbon price as a scapegoat for energy price rises when the independent evidence shows that most of the rise is driven by investment in poles and wires," she said.
"We know there are anti-renewable energy warriors in the Coalition and we are concerned what the position will be after the election. There needs to be policy certainty, especially around the support of the renewable energy target, or people won't invest on a large scale.
"Rooftop solar is popular in mortgage-belt marginal seats, as well as rural and regional Australia. But this doesn't correlate to political support. I can't understand why, for example, the Nationals don't support renewables far more, given the jobs and investment wind and solar can provide for those areas." |
The Chicago Bears’ most disruptive defensive force in the 2015 season is rehabilitating from arthroscopic surgery on his left knee.
Outside linebacker Pernell McPhee was hobbled throughout the second half of the season when he missed two games and had his practice and playing time significantly reduced. McPhee’s surgery was performed by Dr. James Andrews, according to a source close to the player, and while it’s not known if he’ll be ready to go full speed when the offseason program begins in April, there shouldn’t be any restrictions by the time training camp rolls around.
McPhee, the biggest acquisition for general manager Ryan Pace in free agency last year, had six sacks and five of them came in the team’s first seven games. He finished with 25 quarterback pressures and those numbers were also slanted to the beginning of the year as 16 came in the first eight games.
The former Baltimore Raven proved to be a rugged run defender and while he doesn’t have the kind of quickness a lot of edge pass rushers possess, his power makes him difficult to solo block. The Bears listed McPhee at 6-foot-3, 275 pounds, and there has been talk of asking him to play at about 10 pounds lighter in 2016.
McPhee, 27, had two arthroscopic procedures on his right knee in 2012 and rebounded to be just fine after that season. But he was always a role player for the Ravens and never played in more than 50 percent of the snaps.
What’s going to be interesting for the Bears to determine is what kind of workload McPhee can handle. They hesitated to take him off the field at some points early in the season. Through the first eight games, he was on the field for 81.4 percent of the snaps. He missed two of the final eight games and played in only 47 percent of the snaps in the six games he did appear in as he gutted it out down the stretch.
The Bears praised McPhee for his toughness and willing to play through pain as the season wore on. The good news is he’s expected to be healed up and ready to go well in advance of next season. |
A state senator wants Hoosier students to be able to start their school day by reciting the Lord’s Prayer—but his proposal faces an uphill battle.
Sen. Dennis Kruse, R-Auburn, has filed a bill that would give school districts the authority to require students to say the Lord’s Prayer at the beginning of each day.
According to Senate Bill 23, students would recite the prayer to “recognize the importance of spiritual development in establishing character and becoming a good citizen.” The bill would allow students to be exempt from the prayer if they choose not to participate or their parents don’t want them to say it.
The bill has been assigned to the Senate’s rules and legislative procedure committee—a move that likely means the proposal won’t go very far. That committee is typically a “burial ground” for bills.
Kruse pushed unsuccessfully last year to teach creationism in schools. |
Fans are eagerly awaiting the release of The Weeknd's new album Starboy, and the Canadian singer sat down for an interview about it with The Wall Street Journal. Hhe discussed how he drew inspiration from the death of David Bowie when making the album. “I just love Bowie, I think he’s the ultimate inventor,” The Weeknd said, noting that his album title is partially in reference to Bowie's own 1972 song "Starman."
The biggest thing to come out of Starboy so far is its title track in collaboration with Daft Punk, and The Weeknd had a lot to say about working with the legendary electronic duo. “Their studio is like a spaceship, there’s a lot of gear,” he said, “but the way they make music, the way they explain it, is very cinematic. It’s like they’re reading a page out of a novel—‘We want to make sure that at the end, it feels like the sun’s coming up, and maybe there’s a car chase.’ They can get technical, but it was interesting how they visualize making music.”
Interestingly, The Weeknd also said that he was scheduled to get in the studio with Prince before he tragically died of an opioid overdose in April. As the article points out, Prince's last appearance on television was to present The Weeknd with one of his American Music Awards last November.
POST CONTINUES BELOW
Starboy is due out in late November, and The Weeknd claims that the project is currently about 90% done. You can read his entire interview with The Wall Street Journal here. |
Mick Mulvaney, hater of math.
White House budget director Mick Mulvaney is furious with the Congressional Budget Office. Inconveniently for Mulvaney, but quite intuitively, the CBO estimates that the Republican plan to eliminate a trillion dollars in subsidies for health-insurance coverage will result in a very large number of people no longer being able to obtain health insurance. This latest provocation is enough for Mulvaney to vow, in an interview with the conservative Washington Examiner, that the CBO should no longer be taken seriously as a budget forecaster.
Mulvaney charges the CBO with hopeless liberal bias. “We’re hearing now that the person in charge of the Affordable Health Care Act methodology is an alum of the Hillarycare program in the 1990s who was brought in by Democrats to score the ACA,” he says. (In fact, the CBO’s 2010 forecast of the ACA proved highly accurate.) Mulvaney suggests that Congress stop paying so much attention to the biased liberal CBO.
Instead, he proposes that any legislation should instead be measured by different groups of economists — the president’s own forecast would be one, partisan think tanks’ would be others — and Congress could pick which numbers to believe:
“I would do my own studies here at OMB as to what the cost and benefits of that reg would be,” he said. “And other folks would do their studies from the outside. And those would come with their natural biases. The Heritage Foundation comes in and says it’s going to cost a lot. Brookings comes in or the Center for American Progress says the benefits would be great. You and I and other lawmakers can sit down and say, ‘Okay, we think that this is where it is, and we’ll make our decisions based upon that.’”
So Mulvaney’s ideal system would have Congress stop relying on the CBO and start listening to forecasts cooked up people like Mulvaney.
A sense of what the budget director has in mind comes from another portion of the same interview, which, fortunately for Mulvaney’s dignity, the Examiner has published in a separate article. The backstory to this portion of the interview is that Mulvaney wrote a budget that assumes Trump’s tax policies will increase revenue by $2 trillion. Given that Trump is not proposing anything like this, this is either an absurdly simply math error (if you make a generous assumption) or a grotesque lie (if you don’t). In his interview, Mulvaney cops to “lie” over “childish error.”
“We assumed for purposes of the budget that whatever we did would be paid for with the offsets by way of the exemptions, the loopholes, the deductions, so forth. We just made an assumption,” he explains. But that assumption is not accurate. Indeed, Mulvaney concedes that it’s not accurate. “That is not an indication of what our preference is, as far as tax policy. In fact, several folks in the White House have said they are interested in pushing a larger tax bill that would add to the deficit,” he admits.
So Mulvaney decided that, to make Trump’s budget add up, he would assume that it consisted of different policies than the ones Trump is proposing. He is not even hiding this. Here is possibly the most astonishing sentence ever uttered by a government budget official: “I wouldn’t take what’s in the budget as indicative of what our proposals are.”
What? Of course the budget is indicative of what their proposals are. That’s what a budget is. It is a document that records the president’s fiscal proposals. You can’t just release a budget containing a bunch of proposals, boast that the budget fulfills some goal, like eliminating the deficit, and then casually admit that the president doesn’t endorse the policies in it.
These comments tell you all you need to know about Mulvaney’s dismissal of the CBO. Forecasting budgets, like forecasting anything, inherently involves uncertainty. The CBO is not going to be perfect. But it does take its nonpartisanship seriously (the agency dealt a serious and possibly even fatal blow to Bill Clinton’s health-care plans in 1993). And it does consist of competent professional forecasters who at minimum are trying to produce accurate forecasts. Mulvaney proposes to ignore those numbers and instead rely on numbers made up by people who don’t even pretend they’re real. |
Sir Dave Brailsford talks us through Chris Froome's preparations for the Tour de France Sir Dave Brailsford talks us through Chris Froome's preparations for the Tour de France
Two-time winner Chris Froome will lead Team Sky along with three other Britons at this year's Tour de France.
The race gets going on Saturday July 2 at Mont-Saint-Michel, ending on July 24 in Paris, and Froome is in fine spirits after securing his third Criterium du Dauphine, an event he won before his two Tour victories in 2013 and last year.
Froome will be joined on the start line by Sergio Henao, Vasil Kiryienka, Mikel Landa, Mikel Nieve, Wout Poels, Luke Rowe, Ian Stannard and Geraint Thomas.
Thomas, who finished 15th overall last year, Stannard, one of the strongest riders in the peloton, and rising star Rowe are the other Brits in the nine-man team.
Froome, 31, whose Dauphine title was his third in four years, is one of the hot favourites to secure a third Tour crown.
"The Tour de France will always be the pinnacle of our sport," said Froome.
"I feel in good shape coming into the race and am fortunate to have a strong team around me - both on and off the bike. Every rider obviously starts every new Tour equal and what has gone before counts for nothing. This year I am hungrier than ever for success.
"There is not a trace of complacency in the team. We know how hard this race will be and how much we will have to give if we want to win it again. But we have trained hard.
"We're ready for the challenge and can't wait to get back racing in front of the millions of people in France who make the race so special."
Spanish duo Landa and Nieve will provide plenty of climbing support, as will Colombian Henao and Dutchman Poels, with Belarusian time-trial specialist Kiriyenka picked for his all-round ability.
Team Principal Sir Dave Brailsford told SSNHQ: "Froome has been here before and he knows how to deal with this experience. He's confident, ready to go and is very hungry and wants to win.
Chris Froome is gunning for a third Tour triumph this summer
"I'm absolutely confident this team will pull together and give everything to win this race. They will be completely together as a unit and there will be no squabbles.
"Their feedback will be fantastic and they will be very blunt with each other. In terms of support for Chris, they will optimise his chances of winning and I'm very confident."
Team Sky members at the Tour: Chris Froome, Sergio Henao, Vasil Kiryienka, Mikel Landa, Mikel Nieve, Wout Poels, Luke Rowe, Ian Stannard, Geraint Thomas |
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Feb. 19, 2016, 7:40 PM GMT / Updated Feb. 19, 2016, 7:40 PM GMT / Source: Associated Press By The Associated Press
VATICAN CITY — A spokesman for Pope Francis insisted Friday the pontiff was "in no way" launching an attack on Donald Trump nor was he trying to sway voters by declaring someone who advocates building walls isn't Christian.
The Rev. Federico Lombardi, in an interview on Vatican Radio, stressed that Francis often speaks about building bridges, not walls, and that his remark on Thursday wasn't "a personal attack" on the business mogul running for the Republican presidential nomination.
Related: Trump Joins List of Politicians Who Have Tangled With Religious Leaders
Flying back to Rome from a pilgrimage that included Mass at the Mexican side of the border with the United States, Francis, answering a reporter's question, had said that a person who advocates building walls is "not Christian."
Trump, who has repeatedly called for a wall to divide the U.S. and Mexico while campaigning for November's election, quickly retorted it was "disgraceful" to question a person's faith.
On Friday, Lombardi sought to put the pope's comments in context, saying they were "in no way a personal attack or an indication on how to vote." The radio interviewer told Lombardi that many have seen the comment as a kind of "excommunication, if we can call it that," of Trump.
"But the pope said what we well know, when we follow his teaching and his positions: that one mustn't build walls, but bridges," Lombardi said.
"He has always said this, continuously. And he has said it also about migration issues in Europe, very many times. Thus, it's not at all a specific question, limited to this case," the spokesman said.
Trump appeared pleased with the comments, referencing them at a campaign rally Friday.
Related: Pope Francis to Donald Trump: Building Mexico Wall Is 'Not Christian'
"Yesterday, the pope was great," Trump told an audience in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, where he is campaigning. "He made a beautiful statement this morning. They had him convinced that illegal immigration was like a wonderful thing. Not wonderful for us. It's wonderful for Mexico."
Some European countries have erected fences or raised the possibility of building fences and other barriers on their borders after hundreds of thousands of asylum-seekers reached the continent by sea and land, fleeing war or poverty.
"The pope said clearly that he wasn't stepping into voting issues in the electoral campaign in the United States," Lombardi added. He said the pope was also "giving the benefit of the doubt" on what Trump had said.
Trump alluded to this context as he softened his rhetoric about the pope, saying at a town hall event on CNN that he believes Francis' remarks were "probably a little bit nicer" than first reported. |
Serpent-handling pastor dies hours after he's bitten by a RATTLESNAKE - nearly 30 years after his father died the same way
Mack Randall Wolford, 44, died after being bitten at 'homecoming' service on Sunday
Neighbours say Wolford was aware of the danger posed by handling rattlesnakes
Had been bitten three times before, but never sought medical attention
A Pentecostal reverend known for preaching with the help of a rattlesnake coiled around his arm lost his life when one of the creatures suddenly bit him.
Mack Randall Wolford, pastor at the Full Gospel Apostolic House of the Lord Jesus in Matoaka, West Virginia, died hours after receiving the deadly bite on Sunday - the day after his 44th birthday.
Wolford’s father, who was also a serpent-handling pastor, died in the same way nearly 30 years ago.
Scroll down to watch a video of Wolford preaching
Deadly bite: Mack Randall Wolford, pictured at a previous service, was killed hours after receiving the deadly bite on Sunday.
Wolford had been bitten three times before, but never sought medical attention, saying that a bite was a test of his faith. It was his wish not to be taken to a hospital unless absolutely necessary.
But by the time he was taken to Bluefield Regional Medical Center, it was too late.
Wolford was holding a 'homecoming' service outdoors at Panther State Forest about 70 miles away from Matoaka while handing the rattler, which is seen by his followers as a sign of faith.
The gathering was a yearly occurrence for Wolford, who joined relatives to celebrate faith and family before sitting down together for dinner during the Memorial Day weekend.
He leaves behind his wife Fran and three stepchildren.
The Bluefield Daily Telegraph reported that Wolford had set the serpent down during the service when it suddenly jerked forward and bit him on the thigh.
Celebration: Wolford clutched the rattlers during his congrgation as a sign of faith
Serpent: Rattlesnakes are seen in Wolford's congregation as a test of faith
Wolford had reportedly owned the timber rattlesnake, named Sheba, for several years, taking care of it in his home and introducing it to his followers during his services.
Videos posted to YouTube show the preacher dancing in previous services while holding the snake.
His unique celebrations were held regularly for his followers - who numbered between five and 30 - most of whom were members of his family.
Wolford owned several snakes, which he cared for in his home, according to filmmaker Kate Fowler, who was shooting a documentary about him called With Signs Following.
Ritual: Wolford danced with rattlesnakes during his outdoor services in West Virginia
In an interview with MailOnline, Ms Fowler, who has worked on the documentary for about a year, described Wolford as 'articulate, well-read, intelligent and charismatic.'
She said that despite handling venomous snakes, he did his best to make his guests feel comfortable.
Ms Fowler said: 'It was pretty scary the first time I was at a service, but I've never seen him put anyone in a bad situation.'
A young resident of Matoaka, who wished to remain anonymous, told the Telegraph: 'I know [Wolford] was really bad off before he died... it was really bad. He’s worshiped at that church all his life.
Fearless: Wolford did his best to make guests at his services feel comfortable, even though he handled venomous snakes
'His daddy passed away the same way, from a rattler. He knew the risks. All of us around here are that way.'
Wolford was only 15 at the time of his father's death, but later took on his mantle.
His devastated mother, who was present at the service when he was bitten, was always fearful for her son, but was extremely proud of his work with those who battled alcoholism and addiction, Ms Fowler said.
BEWARE THE RATTLER
There are dozens of species of rattlesnakes across the U.S., and they are the largest among venomous snakes. They usually only sound their noisy rattles if they feel cornered, threatened or taken by surprise. Rattlesnake bites are usually not fatal, as long as they are treated quickly. If bitten, victims are advised to remain calm, as a quickened heart rate can spread the venom throughout the body faster. Rattlesnakes love to sun themselves, and can be found near logs, boulders, or open areas, and in areas like mountains, prairies, deserts, and beaches, according to the CDC.
A nursing supervisor at Bluefield Regional Medical Center told the Charleston Daily Mail that Wolford was admitted to the facility at about 10:30pm on Sunday night.
The supervisor told the paper: 'He was a snake handler. It looked like it happened maybe during church, but by the time he got here, it was a bad situation.'
Ms Fowler was in the process of a final edit With Signs Following, but is still deciding how to approach Wolford's death in the documentary.
Neighbours told the Daily Telegraph that Wolford, like other snake-handling preachers, was fully aware of the danger posed by the reptile.
There are dozens of species of rattlesnakes, which are the largest of all venomous snakes in the U.S, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The timber rattlesnake, widely regarded as the most dangerous of the species, are common to deciduous forests as far north as Connecticut and as far south as Texas.
It is unlawful to kill a timber rattlesnake, as it is an endangered species.
While rattlers are behind the most common snakebite injuries in the United States, they are rarely fatal if treated quickly.
Dangerous: Wolford owned a timber rattlesnake, similar to the one shown here |
Presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump Donald John TrumpHouse committee believes it has evidence Trump requested putting ally in charge of Cohen probe: report Vietnamese airline takes steps to open flights to US on sidelines of Trump-Kim summit Manafort's attorneys say he should get less than 10 years in prison MORE on Saturday compared himself to a supermodel, citing media exposure.
"I feel like a supermodel, except like times 10," Trump said during a rally Saturday in Arizona.
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"It's true. I'm a supermodel. I'm on the cover of these magazines — I'm on the cover of the biggest magazines. I don't even know about it. I can't even read the story, because if I did, I wouldn't get any work done."
Trump said he had never seen anything like it.
"It's not about me ... I'm doing a good job as a messenger," the candidate continued.
"But I'm a messenger."
During the event, the presumptive GOP nominee also offered praise to Republican Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, calling her an "amazing person."
"You know, it's not nice to say about a woman, but you are tough, aren't you?" Trump asked. "She is tough; she's smart," he said. |
The Price of Oil
Nigeria should be a massively rich country. It's the most populous country in Africa, and is the world's sixth leading oil producer. Over a quarter trillion dollars in oil has been lifted from Nigerian soils and waters in the last 40 years. But after years of military rule and rampant corruption, fueled by these oil monies, the country is mired in billions of dollars in debt and is wracked with poverty.
This especially is the case, ironically, in the region where 100% of Nigeria's oil comes from — the Niger Delta region. Filled with dozens of traditional farming villages and ethnic minorities, the Delta region has almost no representation in government and yet provides 80% of Nigeria's revenues with its oil. Villages without basic services watch helplessly as billions of dollars in oil flow from their lands — and then are left to deal with the environmental and health effects of oil spills and towering gas flares. Huge amounts of natural gas emissions are an inevitable byproduct of oil drilling, and there are several options for dealing with it. Gas can be harnessed for power, or, if that's not possible, be re-injected into the ground. The cheapest — and most destructive — alternative is flaring, simply setting the gas on fire. Gas flares never go out — there's enough gas from even a modest oil well to burn off for decades, day and night.
Gas flares are everywhere in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. But few are dramatic as the Oshie flare, owned by the Italian oil company Agip. The Oshie flare is almost on top of a village of 1,700 families, the traditional farmers and fishers of Akaraolu. The villagers were promised jobs and money when Agip first erected the flare in 1972. But none of it materialized, leaving Akaraolu with foundering fishing and agriculture and health problems as a result of the 200-hundred-foot high roaring column of flame in their midst. Constant appeals to Agip and the Nigerian federal government for respite have gone unheeded. Most villagers don't even remember a time before what they simply call "The Fire" loomed over their lives.
Dagogo Joel's arm was burned by the Oshie gas flare when he was a child. The flare--lit since early 70s and adjacent to Joel's home village of Akaraolu -- occasionally spews out flaming liquids on the countryside, and burned Joel's arm while he was fishing with his father. |
Thibaut Courtois has been embarrassed on the eve of Euro 2016 – by his granddad who came out as a nudist.
The Chelsea keeper, 24, hoped for a calm build-up to Belgium’s trophy quest in France.
But Courtois became the laughing stock of the Red Devils’ camp earlier this week after grandpa Dieudonne appeared naked in a Belgian newspaper to talk about naturism.
The 77-year-old visited a nudist camp near his home and said: “I’ve been a naturist for 50 years. I’ve done it at the seaside in France and a sauna in Holland, and I wanted to see what it’s like without going abroad.”
He even gave a journalist a tour around the camp, and was apparently surprised by the “physical setting.”
Dieudonne added: “I thought it was smaller. I did not know there were so many locations and well-equipped with pool infrastructure. This summer, if the weather permits, I will come to camp a few days.”
The nudist camp is described on its website as being “land perfectly hidden to allow the practice of naturism.”
It also boasts tennis and volleyball courts, a “field of fauna and flora” as well as “many sites” for tents and caravans.
Belgium begin their Euro campaign with a mouth-watering clash against Italy in Lyon on June 13.
But it is nearer to home that Courtois appears to be having a big impact.
Despite a poor season – in which Chelsea claimed the honor of having the worst ever defense of a Premier League title – the keeper could influence transfer plans.
That is because Courtois and Eden Hazard have urged Roma star (and Belgian countryman) Radja Nainggolan to join Antonio Conte’s Stamford Bridge revolution.
Nainggolan — priced at around $40 million — admitted: “Thibaut Courtois and Eden Hazard have already asked me to come to Chelsea, but a possible transfer is not in my head.” |
Now that The Demographic’s new video for “The Headliner” is finally done, I’ll briefly review some of the technical aspects of the production. I’ve had this project floating around unfinished in the background of my to-do lists since… oh Christ, May, I think? So though I am extremely proud of it, I’m also quite prepared to archive it and stop thinking about it for forever.
This is by far the most ambitious video project we’ve undertaken (not to say the previous two videos weren’t serious undertakings: “Reducer” was a daunting set-making and tiring shooting challenge, and “This Broken Place” was a massive organizing/film-capturing/editing project). “The Headliner” is a pretty successful (well, I think) marriage of my commercial skills with one of my personal projects, two worlds that don’t often rub shoulders. Anyway, I figured I’d post some junk.
First, here’s the video: (or the Vimeo link)
This After Effects screencap shows a clip from the foundation of the video, Sturgis and I playing in the loft over my garage (flammably decorated with Daily Hampshire Gazettes and New York Timeses). We shot multiple, multiple angles and takes (with my Canon HV30) and then I chucked most of ’em out. I pioneered some innovative camera techniques involving string which could revolutionize the filmmaking industry, if only I would reveal them. Ho-ho. Please note my grandfather’s Encore guitar – a Japanese piece of junk that sounds terrible but looks super-cool.
An AE screengrab from the original bridge section idea, which was supposed to be boring, but proved to be so boring we ended up chucking it in favor of the time-lapse clip of us at The Roost. Note Frownie Brownie t-shirt.
Back in September, I posted some process screen caps of drawing & animating the guy who appears at the beginning/end of the video. Here’s one of ’em. Click on the graphic to see the others.
For the big “HEY!” in the middle of the song, I drew, sliced up, and animated another drawing of the guy (the idea being that the sudden yell would scare him out of his chair)…
…but something about the way it came out made me not like it. So he got demoted to the pile of outtakes at at the end of the video and was replaced by a far superior idea, this Rodchenko rip-off (which I recently recycled for a joke):
Green screen test. I’m not a very meticulous color-keyer.
The NewsCenter split-screen template from Illustrator, before I imported it into After Effects and jazzed it up. This whole concept was based off of a promo photo I made a year or so ago.
Left: A fake popup ad. Right: I originally played the angry blogger, but then we re-shot it with Sturgis. We have such an eye for detail, we even used an authentic Crappy Old Webcam! I had a mustache for approximately 40 minutes. Sadly, I used to wear those glasses all the time.
.
Here’s some lazy asset recycling. This is a layout for “The Pioneer Observer,” a fake newspaper template I use for random Optimist comics. This is a fine example of scaling back one’s ambition. I originally envisioned a sequence like this: Sturgis walking down a street reading a magazine with me on the cover… camera zooms in to me on magazine cover reading a newspaper… camera zooms in to newspaper with a photo of Sturgis on it looking at a computer screen… camera zooms in, etc. The prep and prop work seemed overwhelming, and I couldn’t find a cheap way to print a single newspaper-sized sheet of newsprint. I kept hacking down the idea until all that was left was a 3D camera pan across a graphic mock-up. It’s still good, just not GRAND.
This is some crazy shit that I can’t fully explain. It’s like the Holodeck broke. That’s Conan O’Brien’s desk. |
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Advice to a Beginning Graduate Student
or
What is Research?
or
The 4 R's of Graduate School:
Reading, Rithmetic, Research, and Writing 29-AUG-01. Updated 28-AUG-02.
Manuel Blum
Outline of the talk: READING, STUDYING, THINKING,
STARTING OFF on the PhD,
DEEP in the MIDDLE of the PhD,
WRITING it all up.
YOU
READING:
Books are not scrolls.
Scrolls must be read like the Torah from one end to the other.
Books are random access -- a great innovation over scrolls.
Make use of this innovation! Do NOT feel obliged to read a book from beginning to end.
Permit yourself to open a book and start reading from anywhere.
In the case of mathematics or physics or anything especially hard, try to find something anything that you can understand.
Read what you can.
Write in the margins. (You know how useful that can be.)
Next time you come back to that book, you'll be able to read more.
You can gradually learn extraordinarily hard things this way. Consider writing what you read as you read it.
This is especially true if you're intent on reading something hard. I remember a professor of Mathematics at MIT,
name of BERTRAM KOSTANT,
who would keep his door open whenever he was in his office, and he would always be at his desk writing.
Writing. Always writing.
Was he writing up his research? Maybe.
Writing up his ideas? Maybe.
I personally think he was reading, and writing what he was reading.
At least for me, writing what I read is one of the most enjoyable and profitable ways to learn hard material.
STUDYING:
You are all computer scientists.
You know what FINITE AUTOMATA can do.
You know what TURING MACHINES can do.
For example, Finite Automata can add but not multiply.
Turing Machines can compute any computable function.
Turing machines are incredibly more powerful than Finite Automata.
Yet the only difference between a FA and a TM is that
the TM, unlike the FA, has paper and pencil.
Think about it.
It tells you something about the power of writing.
Without writing, you are reduced to a finite automaton.
With writing you have the extraordinary power of a Turing machine. THINKING:
CLAUDE SHANNON once told me that as a kid, he remembered being stuck on a jigsaw puzzle.
His brother, who was passing by, said to him:
"You know: I could tell you something."
That's all his brother said.
Yet that was enough hint to help Claude solve the puzzle.
The great thing about this hint... is that you can always give it to yourself !!!
I advise you, when you're stuck on a hard problem,
to imagine a little birdie or an older version of yourself whispering
"... I could tell you something..." I once asked UMESH VAZIRANI how he was able,
as an undergraduate at MIT,
to take 6 courses each and every semester.
He said that he knew he didn't have the time to work out his answers the hard way.
He had to find a shortcut.
You see, Umesh understood that problems often have short clever solutions.
There will come a time when you work on a problem long and hard but UNsuccessfully :(
And then you learn that someone else found a solution.
See this as the GREAT opportunity it is to learn something important.
Don't let it pass you by.
Ask yourself: "How SHOULD I have been thinking to solve that problem?"
I have found that doing so is a powerful exercise.
Danny Sleator tells me that BOB FLOYD independently recommended exactly this exercise to his students.
He would lead them into asking themselves:
"How COULD I have led myself to that answer?"
Take the time to think it through.
It's worth it. There will come a time when you work on a problem long and hard and SUCCESSFULLY :)
And then you learn that someone else already published. :(
Hard as that may be for you to take, you must view this too as a great opportunity.
Don't turn off. Read what got published. You will be surprised how often the published paper turns out to be different in some significant way. Roughly
50% of the time, it is NOT at all the same as what you did.
25% of the time, it is the same but not as good.
25% of the time it is better. This means that 50% of the time or more, you can still publish. And what about the 25% time that what got published is better than your own?
In that case, you have a great opportunity to learn.
Ask yourself: "How SHOULD I have been thinking to solve the problem in this fine way?" This is how I discovered, as a young engineer, that I should learn something enormously powerful called "Modern Algebra."
It's one reason I switched from Electrical Engineering as an undergraduate major to Mathematics as a Graduate major.
Of course, this was before there existed anything called Computer Science.
Still on THINKING...
The importance of PARADOX and CONTRADICTION.
When you can prove that a statement S is true,
and you can prove that the same statement S is false,
then you KNOW that that you're on to something:
Something is wrong somewhere.
Never underestimate the power of a contradiction.
It is one of our most potent sources of knowledge. Examples include the Liar Paradox "This statement is false." with its applications to Set Theory and our understanding of language.
There are the seeming paradoxes of countability and uncountability,
In CS, there is the apparent paradox that leads to The Halting Problem.
Physics has lots of paradoxical material:
Quantum Theory. The Einstein-Rosen-Podulsky Paradox.
The relativistically speeding Twins.
The wave and particle nature of matter. Here's an ASIDE on my current work, also based on paradox:
I am personally interested in the Paradox of consciousness. Compare the following two views:
1. the view that the human is a MECHANISM, an automaton
with substantial but finite internal memory, programmed like
any computer to do whatever it does, and/or
2. the view that the human is a thoughtful observant
creature with a God-like free will; that it is a CONSCIOUS
ENTITY at the controls of a highly complex highly capable
mechanism, choosing what to do from among options served up
by/from its vast unconscious below. In my view, both these views are correct. How can that be? In his "Life of Johnson," James Boswell quotes Samuel Johnson
as saying:
"All theory is against the freedom of the will; all experience
is for it."
Johnson was 18 years old when Newton (age 85) was buried.
Johnson knew that F=MA implied that humans are mechanisms. "All theory is against the freedom of the will; all experience
is for it." This ends my ASIDE. Make a list for yourself of good ways to pursue a problem.
My own favorite is to try small examples. By comparison,
DAVID GRIES's favorite is to put himself in the middle
of a (presumed) solution. An example is his coffee can problem:
Given a can of black and white coffee beans, do the following: Pull out two beans: if both are the same color, replace them with a white bean. If the two are different, replace them with a black bean. What color is the last bean? Or try out the two methods on the Hershey Bar problem
[Give an optimal algorithm to break an mxn Hershey bar into
1x1 pieces. At each step, you can choose a single rectangle
of chocolate and crack it along one of its vertical or
horizontal lines. A single crack counts one step. You are to
make the fewest number of cracks] Brains are muscles.
They grow strong with exercise.
And even if they're strong, they grow weak without it.
In the months before Kasparov lost to Deep Blue,
his mother came after him.
She was worried that he wasn't spending enough time
exercising himself (on chess).
Her worries proved well-founded. THE PhD: GETTING STARTED
I remember a great summer job I once had at IVIC
(Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Cientificos).
A top neurophysiologist, name of Svaetichin, gave me a splendid problem... one that I unfortunately could not solve.
The problem was to find a way to focus light on a single cell
of a goldfish retina so that the light would not spill over
onto any of the adjacent cells.
Svaetichin had tried making a pinhole in a sheet of black tin,
and shining his light thru the hole. This worked for moderate size holes, but failed for really small holes, which caused the light to diverge, to form diffraction patterns. Since Svaetichin couldn't solve the problem, I decided I couldn't. Or perhaps it's that I thought his problem physically unsolvable. In retrospect, I should have taken out books on physics, especially optics, read as much as I could, talked to others and kept on talking to him.
Svaetichin would have helped me if I had shown him I was reading thinking working. Don't expect your thesis advisor to give you a problem that he or she can answer. Of course, she might.
* She might give you a problem to which she already knows an answer.
* She might give you a problem that she thinks is answerable,
but that she hasn't actually answered.
* She might give you a problem that is deadly hard.
* If the problem she gives you is hard enough,
I suggest you look for a NONSTANDARD answer.
More on this later after I get done cooking the thesis advisor. Your thesis advisor may encourage you to work in an area
that she feels completely comfortable in... in which case you can rely on her for sage advice and sound guidance.
Or she may encourage you to work on something she knows little or nothing about, in which case it will be up to you to inform and teach her.
In the latter case, you will have to learn all you can for yourself...
You will have to learn from other faculty, from courses, from books, from journals. from peers.
Both kinds of advisors can work out for you.
I don't know that one is necessarily better than the other.
But you should know which you got. Whatever you do, you got to like doing it....
You got to like it so much that you're willing to think about it, work on it, long after everyone else has moved on. THE PhD: DEEP IN THE MIDDLE OF IT.
There's a wonderful quote from ANATOLE FRANCE:
"A University Student"
-- and this is especially true for a PhD Student --
"should know something about everything
and everything about something." You know the jokes about PhD's...
A PhD knows more and more about less and less
until he knows everything about nothing. When working on a PhD, you must focus on a topic so narrow that you can understand it completely.
It will seem at first that you're working on the proverbial needle, a tiny fragment of the world, a minute crystal,
beautiful but in the scheme of things, microscopic.
Work with it. And the more you work with it, the more you penetrate it, the more you will come to see that your work, your subject, encompasses the world.
In time, you will come to see the world in your grain of sand. To see a world in a grain of sand
Or a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.
WILLIAM BLAKE (1757-1827) This gorgeous quartet is followed by a large number of sometimes deep sometimes questionable aphorisms, which I see much like the occasionally grinding work of a PhD thesis.
There's all kinds of research you can do.
There's research to prove what you know to be true.
There's research -- maybe better called SEARCH -- to figure out what is true.
Some of the best such search succeeds in DISPROVING
what you initially believed to most certainly be true. For example, Sir Fred Hoyle is said to have coined the phrase "Big Bang" at a time when he was looking to disprove it. For a relatively minor but personal example:
When I was working on the MEDIAN problem,
my goal was to prove that any deterministic algorithm to find the MEDIAN of n integers must necessarily make roughly as many comparisons as it takes to sort n integers, i.e. n log n comparisons.
I was shocked to discover that the median of n integers can be found with just O(n) comparisons. When working on proving some statement S true,
you should spend at least some time trying to prove it false.
Even if it's true, trying to prove it false can give insight.
And in any case, too often, our intuition is dead wrong. There is yet another sense in which, when working on a hard problem, you may find that the answer is NOT what you expected.
You may be looking for a YES or a NO; it may be something else. Some years ago, JOHN HOPCROFT gave one of his PhD students the problem of deciding the Equivalence of Free Boolean Forms.
The specifics don't matter.
The problem appeared as an open problem in Garey and Johnson.
The question was: Is the Equivalence problem NP-complete?
Or is it solvable in poly time?
Chandra, Wegman and I found a randomizing algorithm for this problelm. At the time this seemed to beg the question entirely. Only after writing it up did we really understand that we had given an efficient albeit randomizing algorithm to solve it, This shows, by the way, that the problem is not NP-complete if NP <> RP (Randomizing Poly-time), as seems likely. Of course, this brings up the question whether P = NP.
The question of our time: Are NP-complete problems solvable in poly time?
Could anything I have said today be useful for so hard a problem as that?
Probably not. Nevertheless...
LEONID LEVIN believes as I do that whatever the answer to the P=NP? problem, it won't be like anything you think it should be. And he has given some wonderful examples.
For one, he has given a FACTORING ALGORITHM that is proVably optimal, up to a multiplicative constant.
He proves that if his algorithm is exponential,
then every algorithm for FACTORING is exponential.
Equivalently, if any algorithm for factoring is poly-time,
then his algorithm is poly-time.
But we haven't been able to tell the running time of his algorithm because, in a strong sense, it's running time is unanalyzable.
Maybe as STEVEN RUDICH suggests, the P=NP? problem is undecidable in the standard formalization of Mathematics. The point is that the answer may not lie where you expect it. Here's a poem I wrote when I wondered at the fact that we must sometimes be dragged kicking and screaming in the right direction.
It's a comparison to the blind spot in our eyes,
which isn't really blind but makes things up for us.
It questions whether there might not be other things in this world that our brains, our minds, by their very nature, make up for us: Blind Spots mb 15-MAY-96 All men have Blind Spots in their eyes,
That manufacture visions of their vale.
And shape that void where light's unregistered,
With bold-faced unrepentant tales. What other blind spots shape our minds and thoughts?
What other tales do won'dring minds unfurl
To woo us unbeguiled we would believe
To strange and nonexistent worlds?
ABOUT WRITING:
Here is the one quote that I have found most helpful and wise: "First have something to say,
Second say it,
Third stop when you have said it,
and
Finally give it an accurate title."
JOHN SHAW BILLINGS [1838-1913] MY ADVICE TO YOU:
Don't expect your thesis advisor to read your thesis. Some thesis advisors can and do give good feedback, but not all.
Still, make sure that SOMEBODY reads your thesis...
I especially recommend that you ask your peers. Here's another piece of advice that I have often had to give myself, and I here give you...
When you send a paper off to be published,
and it gets rejected...
Don't be turned off by the mindless cretinous feedback
that you get to your well-thought-out beautifully-written work!
Be a MENSCH. Use the feedback to improve your paper!
Make it better. And send it back.
Finally, it is my most earnest wish that you should know something that is honestly amazingly true of you... That you are each of you UNIQUE and SPECIAL in some glorious way. I wrote a poem to capture this, which I now use to end my sermon. It's called "Fundamentals." FUNDAMENTALS
mb 05-JUN-96 Bird must soar. Skunk must stink.
Cat must prowl. Man must think. What sets man apart from beast is his engine of
thought. His mind. His
BRAIN
makes him unique
and gives him his greatest pleasure. But fundamental as is thought for human beings,
there is stuff more basic still that underlies and
DRIVES
not only man
but all great beasts, And that is nature's call to each of us... to be special.
To be distinguished in some way. To be
UNIQUE.
To BE something, to DO something, BETTER than everyone else. Like the leather nosed chimpanzee,
dragging noisy cans and branches,
frightening peers into submission, One does not have to be brilliant, a genius, to be special.
To do something better than anyone/everyone else. To be
UNMATCHED,
One has only to choose an END
any END
that MATTERS
that INSPIRES
YOU
And then DO IT. |
The Republican lawmaker’s call to ICE will “almost assuredly” be used to show ‘discriminatory intent,’ an attorney said.
A Texas lawmaker’s decision to report protesters to immigration police Monday could come back to haunt the state when it defends the law in court, an attorney involved in the case said Thursday.
On Monday, Representative Matt Rinaldi, R-Irving, called Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) after hundreds of mostly Latino activists filled the House gallery to protest Senate Bill 4, the controversial ‘sanctuary cities’ ban.
Jose Garza, an attorney representing El Paso County in its suit against SB 4, told the Observer that the incident will “almost assuredly” be used to help establish in court that the Texas Legislature passed the law with “discriminatory intent.”
“This was a peaceful protest and many were citizens,” Garza said, “and Rinaldi sicced ICE on them because they were brown.”
Rinaldi, a member of the far-right House Freedom Caucus and an outspoken supporter of SB 4, said in a statement on Monday that he called ICE after seeing signs that read “I am illegal.” After several people, including Democratic lawmakers, said there was no evidence of those signs, Rinaldi clarified in a radio interview Thursday that the signs read “undocumented and unafraid” and “undocumented and here to stay.”
El Paso County and the City of El Cenizo have both sued the state over SB 4, and Austin and San Antonio have announced plans to take legal action as well. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton pre-emptively filed his own lawsuit, which he hopes will lead to a judge declaring the law constitutional, shortly after Governor Greg Abbott signed SB 4 into law.
SB 4 is set to go into effect September 1. Opponents hope a federal injunction will halt the measure before that date. Proving “discriminatory intent” in the lawmaking process is part of their legal strategy.
Thanks to an amendment by Rinaldi’s fellow House Freedom Caucus member Matt Schaefer, SB 4 will allow police to ask people who’ve been detained — not just arrested — about their immigration status. The law also threatens to jail law enforcement officials who limit cooperation with federal immigration agents.
Rinaldi’s call to ICE Monday nearly prompted a fistfight on the House floor. Representative Ramon Romero Jr. said Rinaldi’s call to ICE demonstrates how the law licenses discrimination.
“[Rinaldi] saw a bunch of people who look Latino, and he assumed they were undocumented,” Romero told the Observer on Monday. “So how can he say SB 4 won’t lead to racial profiling?” |
Yesterday Israeli Ambassador Ron Dermer announced that his holiday gift package would include many products from the illegal Israeli settlements. He tweeted: “This year I decided to send a gift for the holiday that would also help combat BDS.” His accompanying letter on the subject says that the gifts are all products of “Judea, Samaria, and the Golan Heights,” and that the package is in defiance of European efforts to label settlement goods, which Dermer says are part of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign.
Notice that Dermer calls BDS the latest effort to “eliminate” Israel and says that the European Union is anti-Semitic for wanting to label settlement goods.
“What kind of country taunts the world with the fruits of its crimes?” Scott Roth wrote last night.
Dermer is flipping the bird at the Obama White House, which treats the settlement project as unhelpful, though it will never outright condemn it out of fear of alienating Israel’s many friends in Washington. John Kerry, the secretary of state, regards “the injustice of settlement building in the West Bank” as a major impediment to any peaceful resolution of the conflict.
This is not the first time that Dermer has flipped the bird at Obama. In fact, he’s done so again and again. It’s a wonder he still has credentials!
Last summer Ron Dermer went up to Capitol Hill to lobby the Congress against the president’s Iran Deal. ” Bolstering the lobbying drive is Israeli Ambassador Ron Dermer, who has met with more than 60 lawmakers to persuade them to vote against the accord,” Newsweek reported.
The Washington Post said that the move angered lawmakers as an over-stepping.
“Having him come and try to influence the members of the Congress and lobby against what the president was working on set the tenor,” Cohen continued. “Netanyahu should not get himself involved in American politics in the future, and AIPAC played a stronger hand than they should have.” Other congressional aides pointed out that Israel’s unprecedented direct lobbying efforts against the deal by Israeli Ambassador Ron Dermer, who once worked for GOP operative Frank Luntz, worsened AIPAC’s position by association.
Dermer worked American Jewish politicians in particular, because of their supposed allegiance to the Jewish state:
“There are a lot of people whose reaction to the Israeli ambassador’s lobbying was not a positive one,” said one Democratic aide to a Jewish lawmaker. “It wasn’t ever a harsh tone or bossy or threatening, but if you are looking at the group of Jewish Democrats, there could have been a better understanding of the nuanced approach those members were taking. Not ‘This is it, take it or leave it, and if you’re on the other side of it, you’re wrong.’ ”
Back in January, of course, Dermer helped arrange Netanyahu’s spectacular speech to a joint House and Senate in defiance of the White House on the Iran Deal. He thumbed his nose at the White House in a tweet then too:
Israel’s ambassador to Washington, Ron Dermer, appeared to mock the White House on Sunday when he tweeted “Breaking Protocol, Choosing Sides: Go Patriots” just before the Super Bowl. White House officials have accused House Speaker John Boehner of committing “a breach of protocol” in arranging for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address Congress without first informing the Obama administration.
The opposition goes way back. TPM:
As it was Dermer who reportedly helped organize Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney’s visit to Israel in the heat of the 2012 campaign, one of the Netanyahu government’s many affronts to the Obama White House
Paul Pillar told TPM that manipulating the US discourse was just par for the course, and the White House was passive in the face of lobbying:
Politico Magazine reported in the days before Dermer became ambassador that the White House and congressional Democrats were already suspicious of him, alleging that he had been undermining the international negotiations with Iran by distributing negative talking points to Capitol Hill offices. According to the New York Times, White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough, among others, had initially resisted the appointment. “The naming of Dermer is a statement that manipulation, with a hard-right twist, of American politics is not just something that arises from time to time in U.S.-Israeli relations but instead is the main aspect of the relationship,” Paul Pillar, a longtime CIA analyst, wrote in the National Interest. “It also is a statement by Netanyahu that he isn’t bothered if the relationship is seen that way.”
That’s the bottom line here. Dermer can do these things without any official rebuke because of the power of the lobby. The White House doesn’t want to alienate Israel’s many friends. As another former Israeli ambassador, Colette Avital, said at the Haaretz NIF conference last week:
[Netanyahu] is really doing what he wishes because he thinks that nobody is going to punish him, because he thinks for instance that in America at the end of the day any politician will need the support of the Jewish community, so there is no real pressure of America on Israel.
The potential to backfire is huge. Americans don’t like the illegal settlements. Even HuffingtonPost says that Dermer is “trolling” the White House. Many are saying that the move simply elevates BDS.
Thank you @AmbDermer for your magnificent efforts in helping to raise awareness of #BDS https://t.co/xDckTZVzGW — Adele (@bruculino) December 23, 2015
Billmon:
.@AmbDermer And all you did was help boost it, you fanatical fuck. #epicfail — Billmon (@billmon1) December 23, 2015
Jim Clancy writes:
Israel @AmbDermer hands out war crimes trinkets as Christmas Gifts. #Apartheid #Occupation are NOT American values.
Dermer’s equation of BDS and the efforts to label settlement goods is something that maddens liberal Zionists because Dermer is erasing the Green Line. They oppose BDS but support the labeling of settlement goods as a means of achieving their holy grail, the two state solution along the Green Line. Matt Duss of the Foundation for Middle East Peace, for instance, has defended the boycott of settlement products:
In the United States, the most prominent examples of concrete boycott-and-divestment-related activism in the Israeli -Palestinian arena have fact been focused unambiguously not on Israel but on the settlements and the occupation. These developments are the product of frustration with the failure of diplomacy to bring an end to the occupation, and a desire to preserve the possibility of a two-state solution.
Duss and other supporters of a Jewish state complain that in going after the BDS movement, Israel supporters like Dermer and all his friends in Congress are also going after the boycott tool employed by advocates of the two-state-solution on only one side of the Green Line. For Dermer and for the BDS movement too, that tactic is a distraction; because the Green Line/two-state solution are widely seen as a charade (after 25 years of false promises), which has only produced “apartheid on steroids,” as the Nation put it; and so the conflict is increasingly polarized between advocates for apartheid and opponents of apartheid, and there is no middle ground politically.
Thanks to Annie Robbins for several contributions to this post. |
Pushing Swift to the Server
Chris Bailey at Swift Summit San Francisco, 2016
Transcript
Chris : Okay, while we get that set up. Yes, I'm Chris Bailey. I'm part of the Swift @ IBM engineering team. We've been working on Swift since its announcement as open source in December last year, looking at how to help Swift come up and running on Linux and other platforms, as well as how to build server side frameworks for Swift. So that's largely what I'm going to talk about today. I'm going to talk about how we've been pushing Swift onto the server, and how in fact, everybody here should be able to build and deploy server side applications in Swift, because you already know Swift from the client and it's very, very similar when you deploy it on the server.
So, why Swift on the server? Now, when we talk about moving Swift to the server, what we often talk about is some of the real basics around things like performance. These are taken from a simple set of benchmarks running on 4 CPU Linux box, by an independent group. We don't run these, we just contribute to them and we see the results. Now, this is a simple computational benchmark, it uses 100% CPU on all four CPUs on the machine. And we can see that Swift completes the task in four seconds. Now, that's actually quite interesting because Java completes it in 4.3 seconds. So, Swift, out of the box actually has very similar performance characteristics to Java. This is actually quite a bit faster than Node.js and quite a lot faster than something like Ruby. So we see that Swift is actually quite a really fast out of the box language to be programming in.
We can also look at its memory footprint. This is the amount of physical RAM that's used when running the same tests. We see that Swift runs the test in 15 megabytes worth of RAM. We see that Java uses almost twice that, Node.js uses about 50% more, and we see that Ruby uses quite a bit more. This allows us to make the statement that Swift is ideal for cloud, because it's both fast and it's relatively small, and most clouds charge you for memory when you're deploying applications, rather than for CPU or physical machines.
Now, whilst that's an interesting story, I guess, unless you actually are paying for the hosting of this yourself or you have a very large hosting bill, right? If you're paying $20 million a year for your hosting, you might be interested in the fact that using Swift on the server will lower your bill. But as developers, what we really care about is, how easy is it for me to build that application? How safe is it going to be and how bug-free is it going to be? So maybe there's some more interesting ways we can actually look at whether Swift is valuable on the server.
That brings me to this: Mars. Now, unfortunately, not Mars 2024, so not SpaceX and the manned mission to Mars. What we're actually going to look at is something that happened 25 years before that date. So, in 1998 there was the launch of the Mars Climate Orbiter, and this was part of a series of missions to Mars that happened just before the millennium. Now, it took off in 1998 and it was part of something like a $280 million project. Now, around about a year or so after the Mars Climate Orbiter left, leaving from Cape Canaveral on December 11th, and with this aim of getting the Mars Orbiter in orbit around Mars to both check its climate and actually work as a guidance mechanism for getting future probes to actually land on the surface of the moon; so this was the entire aim.
Now, about 280 or so days after it left Cape Canaveral, unfortunately what happened was this: in 1999, it's 200 days later, on September 23rd, they lost all radio contact from the Mars Climate Orbiter, and the reason was this; it went a little bit too close to Mars, resulting in unfortunately, complete mission loss. The reason this happened was, we had the Mars Climate Orbiter, and it was on a planned trajectory to intercept Mars, and that trajectory was actually designed to hit Mars, but about a day and a half out from the planet it undertakes trajectory correction maneuver 4, so this is the fourth of the trajectory corrections that it has in its flight path. And the aim of that is to change its path so that it sets out 226 kilometers over the surface of Mars. This was the mission plan.
Now, what actually happened was, it came in on a completely different trajectory. It still went through the trajectory correction that it was supposed to, and having followed that, it came into orbit only 57 kilometers above Mars, and this led to it being far closer than it was supposed to, and leading to our mission failure. This is what happens when you get too close to a planet. How did this happen? Well, it's all about the fact that a lot of the work was done by two locations, one was Lockheed Martin, who did the ground software, and they were based in Bethesda. The second team were the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab, based in Pasadena, California. So these two teams were working on collaborative software, one that's ground software, the other one that's in the Mars Climate Orbiter, and what they were doing was creating software that works together.
So those two teams, what they did was they created what was called a Software Interface Specification. Now, you can think of that as an API of the way the two parts talk to each other. And inside that software specification, one of the bits of information that they passed was called total impulse, and this determined how long to fire the rockets for when they were doing correction maneuvers. Now, the source of the problem is, Lockheed Martin were using pounds-seconds, which is part of the United States Customary Unit. NASA, on the other hand, used Newton-seconds, part of the standard units. The reason this is so critical is, one pound second is the equivalent of 4.45 Newton seconds. So this meant we were actually burning the thrusters far longer than they were supposed to. So we ended up with a catastrophic failure, costing a $280 million project, because whilst we had a very well defined API between two bits of software, those two bits of software were actually working in completely different ways, because they were completely different implementations.
So, what this tells us is that software interop is actually really hard, at least according to rocket scientists who were capable of doing the equivalent of hitting ... What you do when you land a rocket is the equivalent of hitting a hole in one with a golf ball from something like 5,000 miles away. They can do that, they can get it there, but they can't do software interop. The reason of it is the whole design process. So they had two teams and they, between them, agreed on this API spec, and then they go off into their own silos, and they do their own implementations of the two sides of that API specification and they deploy them into their own pieces, and there's the API specification between the two. But they're completely siloed pieces of development.
So, we can do this better if we use collaborative development, where the two sides still have to agree on an API, but they do this by collaborating on one project. That one project then gets deployed with the pieces going to the ground software and the Climate Orbiter, and then you can actually generate that API that sits in the middle. So when you've got your end to end project, the API is just the way the two parts talk to each other. Now, in Swift terms this is collaborating on a Swift project, and in terms of client server, where our client is going to be iOS devices and our server is going to be something like the Kitura server in Swift running with a database in the cloud. Then that API specification becomes something called Swagger, which is a formal definition language for REST APIs.
So, taking this model, we can actually work in the same language on the same piece of code, and make sure that we're not using pound-seconds and Newton-seconds, because our getters and our setters for our data model are identical on both sides, and we're just transmitting that data from one side to the other, using exactly the same code, and we avoid this entire problem space. So, how do we get to the point that we can collaboratively build applications in Swift? Well, it all started off with Swift everywhere, and that's a side effect of the open sourcing of Swift on December the 3rd last year. So, the fact that Swift became open source, and it became open source under an Apache 2.0 license, meant that there was a lot of freedom for hardware vendors and independent open source collaborators to get involved and start bringing Swift to other platforms.
Now, on the day it was open sourced, Swift was actually available on two sets of platforms. They were available on the Mac OS and iOS platforms and on Linux Intel. Now, since then it's actually been brought to a number of other places. Now, some of them are still well in development, rather than actually released. But we've now got to the point that Swift is available on LinuxONE, which is Linus on main frames. It's available on Raspberry Pi, due to Linux on ARM. There's some work being tried out to get Linux running on Android, and there's actually some work as well to have Swift running on Cygwin inside Windows.
So now we've got this ability to run Swift in many, many different places, and that makes it possible for us to have client server and interoperability of our software with Swift on both sides. Once you have that and then you start to have a Swift server as well, then we have the ability to start to do this. On our client side, on our iOS side, we have Swift, we have the Standard Library, we have Foundation, we have Grand Central Dispatch. On the server we now have the same components, we have the Standard Library, we have Foundation, we have Dispatch. Which means, any application or any package that uses those standard components can run in both places.
Now, in order to run a server we do actually need some extra components. We need server sockets, so for Kitura we added a networking library. We need to do HTTPS, so we need SSL capabilities, so we added a security library. And we need to do HTTP parsing as well, so we added one of those. Now, with those added, we can then have our Kitura framework and we can have various frameworks on the client side and we can have our application libraries on the client, shared with the server. Because, all of that standard code that you wanted to use is available.
This is actually one of the reasons why in Kitura, for our server framework we were so keen on using Foundation and we were so keen on using Dispatch. Because, other third party packages use those, and if you're writing concurrency code, you don't want to have conflicts of concurrency model. If you're parsing a HTTP request that we give you, we want to give you data objects that you can pass on to other code. So we are using standard types quite deliberately to make it easier for you to share your application code on both sides of the connection.
Now, the one problem with this picture is these three gray boxes on the right, where we, for our server framework, had to build some proprietary code. What we've been doing is we've been working with Apple and the community to try and extend Swift across those components and add some server APIs as a standard part of the language. That's an announcement that you probably saw two or three weeks ago if you've been following the Swift.org blogs or you've been following any of the mailing lists. So we're now trying to remove those non-standard components and make them a standard part of the language, to make interop even easier.
Okay, so that means that between Swift 3.0, which brought support to Linux, and Kitura 1.0, both of which went out in Linux, you now have this ability to run Swift on the server, and you can actually run real applications to have Swift on the server side as well as having Swift on the client side. So, how do you actually build one? Let's take a very, very quick tour of building your first application. To create an application, the first thing you need to do is create a directory in which to put it, then you can use Swift Package Manager. So you go into that directory, you use swift package init, ask it for an executable as well, and that builds the scaffolding for your project. Then there's really only two bits of things you have to do. You go into your Package.swift file and you say you'd like to have a dependency on Kitura, which is our web framework, major version 1, because we now have 1.0 available. So that's one piece, that's saying you need your dependency.
The next piece is then to actually add the meat of the code for your server application, and here it is, it's less than 10 lines to code to get a server up and running. The first thing you do is you import Kitura, then you say you need a router. A router is just how we take incoming HTTP requests on a given URL and send it to code, so it routes the incoming URL request to some code. Now, in this case, router.get, this is a get request on (“/“). What we do inside is, here we're just sending a response back of "Hello, World". So, any request that comes in on (“/“), we send back "Hello, World." Then finally we have to say, we want to add a HTTP server, we give it the port and we tell it- that’s the router for it. So any request coming in on port 8090 goes to that router, prints, "Hello, World." And then we just tell it to run, which starts a run loop in the background. That's it. It's something like eight lines of code and it will stand up and run a web server in Swift.
Again, that's interesting. You know, it's interesting that you can do that, that you can then run it, go to your local host, and you get your splash screen, you go to (“/“) and you get "Hello, World". But, "Hello, World" isn't really an application. We do provide a lot of tutorials on how to build full REST APIs, how to set out a whole load of routes with GET and PUT and CREATE and so on, in order to build a full REST API. But what we're trying to do is make it easy for people to build applications. That's why "Hello, World" is less than 10 lines of code. So what we also want to do is make it easy for you to build a REST API. That's what we've been doing over the last couple of months, which I'm now going to try and go through in a demo, assuming this lets me switch properly, okay.
So, what we released on Friday via GitHub, so it's open source, is a utility called Swift Server Generator. So all I've done is, I've already got a demo directory and inside that I can run my tool swiftservergenerator, and because I'm in a demo directory it will choose to use that. Let's see if I can actually make this a little bit bigger. Yeah. Okay, so it will create the application, call it Demo, because I'm in a demo directory. I can give it another name if I want to. Okay. Then it creates a bunch of files for me and it actually then runs swift build. So it's, at this point actually built a full Kitura application for me. Now I just have to tell it what is the data that I want to be able to send to and from the server, what is the rest API that I want. I do this using swiftservergenerator --model, to create the data model that it's going to be working with. And this gives me a builder for that data model, so I have to give it a name.
Let's say we're going to build a to do list, and that to do list is just going to have a very simple set of data types in it, which have a name of the task and whether or not I've completed it. So, my model name can be called todo, multiple to dos are called a todos. Okay, so property names, let's say I'm going to have title. Title is a string and I'm going to say that yes, that is required, it must have a title, I'm not going to set a default. Okay, next property, let's have completed, and completed is a boolean, I'm not going to require it, but I am going to set a default, and I'm going to say by default, tasks which are created are not completed. Okay, and yep, let's update that package.Swift file, and that's it; it's now built a full REST API for that model.
Now, there's a couple of things it does at the same time. It creates a config file. This config file gives it a name, it tells it which port to run on, and it also tells it a “store”. Now, in this case, any models that I create are stored in “memory”. You can currently switch that to be a Cloudant or CouchDB database, but we're also building out the set of data stores that you can use over time. For this demo, I'm just going to use the in memory one, and that's the sort of thing that you might want to use for testing. So, let's say you actually have an existing back end that your server team have created, but you want to be able to do localized testing against a back end without actually running the full back end server. You could use this to create a back end, and use the in memory data store so you can populate it with data and then retrieve it again afterwards. So, that's one asset, which is the configuration.
The other is, we also provide you with something called a demo.yaml file, and that's that Swagger definition that I mentioned. This is a formal definition of the REST API. So if we look in that file, this actually defines a REST API, and at the end of it, it defines our model. So, that we said, we created a model called “todo”, with a type of string for the title, a type of boolean for completed, and you'll notice it already adds a number and id filled in for you. Now, if we go to the top, there's just one more thing I'm going to do. Now, REST APIs don't actually really define where they're hosted. You're supposed to add where that REST API is. For convenience for the tool we're about to use, I'm just going to put a host in so it automatically picks up the host for me. So, if I say it's localhost 8090, and save that. Right, so now all I have to do is run my server. Okay, and that's starting my demo server.
Now, the next thing I'm going to do is I'm going to start a utility called “Postman”. Now, what Postman does is, Postman's a utility for making REST requests. Because I have this yaml file, this Swagger definition, what that allows me to do is import that Swagger file. Once I've imported it, because it's a formal definition of my REST API, on the left-hand side it actually knows about the post requests. So it allows me to make those requests very easily because they've got a formal definition of the specification of the application. This means I can actually run a GET to find out what data that I've got. And it returns an empty array, because I haven't actually put any data into my server yet. Now, I can do that by using a post. So, I want to do a post to create a new entry, and I can do that by sending a JSON object and that JSON object needs to have a title, which is going to be say, “Create Demo”.
Audience member : You forgot the L.
Chris : No, there's an L in title.
Audience : [inaudible - audience informs Chris that he forgot to include the “L” in “title” earlier.]
Oh, okay. When I send that it's created my entry of a “tite” of “create demo” and it completed a false. Now, because it has an id value of 1, if I want to update it, I can go to PUT, set the id of 1, and tell it that for this item I want to set my completed value to true, and when I send that, if there's no extra typos, it tells me I've now said it’s true. If I go and get all of my data models, it's now updated it. So, this has actually built a fully running Swift server, and I didn't actually write a single line of code at any point.
Now, if I wanted to then go and do something more significant, I could go back and do that. I built my application. If I wanted to do anything more than just a basic API, I can do that. We provide modules that do authentication against things like Facebook, in Google, in GitHub. We've got services you can use, so, MQTT for messaging, IBM Watson for cognitive analytics. There's stores for various databases like MySQL, Cassandra, PostgreSQL, CouchDB, Redis, and so on. Most of the things you might want to plug into a server are already available. We've also got some utilities for deploying to the cloud. So, if you deploy to Docker there's a Docker image to allow you to do that. If you use Cloud Foundry you can deploy to Cloud Foundry in IBM Bluemix. And we provide some UI tools to actually enable you to do that more easily than having to understand all the command lines required.
There's also a whole bunch of tutorials, so there is the builder, but in addition to that, if you for example, want to know how you add authentication in manually, there's a tutorial that helps you do that. On top of that, there's a couple of full, complete, end to end demos. So, we've got one called Bluepic and we've got another one, which is called Blitter, which is an example of a social network with a similar name. So, that's largely what we've been doing at Swift @ IBM. We've got a Catalog, we've got a Sandbox, we've got Kitura, we've got the Cloud Tools.
So, together, you've got the ability to actually really start to build these collaborative applications where you have Swift on the client, Swift on the server. You can have the same engineers working on both parts, or at least, you can have the both parts being looked at and viewed by two separate teams who can comment on each other's code and you can share data models. All of this should mean that Swift is now there to build safer missions to Mars. So, thank you. |
BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — Romania’s constitutional court said Tuesday it would consult with a European court regarding the case of a same-sex couple who want their marriage abroad to be legally recognized in Romania.
Court president Valer Dorneanu said he was seeking information from the European Court of Justice to see how other EU countries where same-sex marriages are not legal handled similar cases. The court set the next hearing for March 30
Adrian Coman, a Romanian gay rights activist, wants the court to rule that his 2010 marriage in Belgium to U.S. citizen Claibourn Robert Hamilton, is legal in the way it would be if they were a heterosexual couple. The way it stands, Hamilton would not benefit from legal protection as Coman’s spouse if they settled in Romania. The couple live in New York.
Lawyer for the two men Iustina Ionescu told The Associated Press: “This is encouraging. … The court is giving the message that Romania is a member of the European countries that share common values, such as the free movement of people together with their families.”
She said she was confident that the European court would consider free movement “a fundamental right” and recognize a husband regardless of the sex of his partner.
Opposition to same-sex relationships is often fierce in Romania, where homosexuality was only decriminalized in 2002.
Religious groups want the constitution amended to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Nearly 3 million people have signed a petition demanding a referendum to change the constitution, which currently states that marriage is a consensual act between spouses.
© 2016, Associated Press, All Rights Reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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In December 2013 Senator John McCain met in Kiev with the now-Prime-Minister of Ukraine, Arseniy Yatsenyuk of the Batkivshchnya Party, and Oleh Tyahnybok, leader of the Svoboda (Freedom) Party. Svoboda is reportedly the fourth largest political party in the coalition government which has now joined with Batkivshchnya. Svoboda is widely considered to be ultra-nationalist with more than a tad of Neo-Nazi-Skinhead-leanings. Take a look at Tyahnybok giving the ‘heil’ salute on the occasion of his re-election as Svoboda leader. This is the man McCain met with, whose party is said to be supported by the U.S. and the E.U. In the meantime, Ukranian Jewish leaders are warning Jews, some 300,000 mostly living in Kiev, to get out of the city, and the country, if possible.
Fair to say, Tyahnybok just might be anti-Semitic.
Reuters identifies the following photo as:
Activists of the Svoboda (Freedom) Ukrainian nationalist party shout slogans as they take part in a rally marking the 71st anniversary of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), which fought both Nazi and Soviet forces in World War Two, and the feast of the Protecting Veil of the Mother of God in central Kiev, October 14, 2013. (REUTERS/ Gleb Garanich) Source: Russia Today
Gates of Vienna, December 23, 2013:
Western media started writing about the skeletons rattling in the closet of Ukraine’s “democratic opposition” mainly in the last couple of days, after Senator John McCain took his usual traveling Neocon circus to the Ukraine and was photographed with some individuals of questionable connections. … “Do you know what is the “right wing” of the “Euro-Square” in Kiev?” — asks “Polish Ukraine” activist Wiesław Tokarczuk (name is Polish, surname Ukrainian) in a December 9 article in Kresy.pl, entitled “Racism and anti-Semitism in the Kiev Pro-European Union Demonstration Square”. “I have not heard anything in the Polish media about that, but there are troglodyte weirdos there from hell — from the world of Hitler, [Ukrainian fascist leader] Bandera, and Mussolini.”
In the photo above, you see a poster of Stepan Bandera, the Ukranian WWII leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN). He is seen by some as a martyred freedom fighter, whom the Soviets assassinated, and by others as a WWII Nazi collaborator. Ousted Ukraine President Viktor Yuschenko recently honored Bandera as a “Hero of Ukraine” to the outrage of the European Parliament, Russia, and the Simon Wiesenthal Center:
In a letter to Oleh Shamshur, Ukraine’s Ambassador to the United States, Mark Weitzman, the Wiesenthal Center’s Director of Government Affairs, expressed “deepest revulsion at the recent honor awarded to Stepan Bandera, who collaborated with the Nazis in the early stages of World War II, and whose followers were linked to the murders of thousands of Jews and others. It is surely a travesty when such an honor is granted right at the period when the world pauses to remember the victims of the Holocaust on January 27.” Read more.
Russia Today has a column quoting a journalist-photographer saying Oleh Tyahnybok, a “neo-Nazi,” is a man ready to seize power from whomever is in power and has both the intelligence and charisma to make it happen.
With growing popularity of neo-Nazi Oleg Tyahnybok, leader of the Ukrainian far-right Svoboda party, Ukraine is falling into an extremely dangerous situation, journalist and blogger Graham Phillips told RT. “We are looking at a tinder box which might go up and we are looking at a man [Tyahnybok] who’s standing there and waiting for that to happen,” Phillips said, describing the current situation in Ukraine… “Tyahnybok is waiting for the other leaders to knock themselves out and then he’s going to step over them to seize control. It’s a very big likelihood. He is just staying behind, observing the situation and he’s quite prepared to let his enemies rip out each other’s throats. He’s in a very powerful position and has a dominating role in Ukrainian politics. He’s taking a back seat but he is waiting and playing a waiting game, waiting for the right time to make his move. Believe me, he has something up his sleeve, and this is something intrinsic in terms of the future of Ukraine,” he said. Source: Russia Today, December 19, 2013
Svoboda is one of four major parties of the coalition Ukrainian government. As with all things concerning the history of these countries which have been lead by many, and split and spliced together in new designs for centuries, the Ukraine is complicated and I am not capable of finding all the links or chinks in the Ukraine-Russia chain, but I see numerous sites reporting that the U.S. and the EU support Svoboda, which this site says has now coalesced with other parties, creating a dangerous mix, and this mix, which includes Arseniy Yatsenyuk, controls the Armed Forces, National security, Justice and Education. I’ve also read that Svoboda ‘kicked the Nazis out of the party,’ but again, take a look at the party leader’s ‘heil’ salute.
A photo breaking today (see below) around the InterTubes shows alleged Ukranian nationalists wearing t-shirts saying “Beat the Yids,” “Yids” being a hostile term for Jews.
Notice the flag in the above photo:
Tokarczuk relays that Web-posted photographs show Eurosquare’s protesters with the Wolf’s Claw emblem: the contemporary equivalent of the swastika. “They are members of the paramilitary organization “Ukrainian Patriot” and of the nationalist Svoboda [“Freedom”] Party. They are waving flags of the fascist troops of UPA and OUN, symbols of a sick ideology and of genocide.” He relays that none of the leaders or prominent foreign supporters of the pro-European Union demonstrations have distanced themselves from their strong Nazizoid element. Source: Gates of Vienna
Ukraine’s Chief Rabbi, Moshe Reuben Asman, has warned the Jews in Ukraine, mostly residing in the Kiev area, to get out of the city, and out of Ukraine, if possible:
“I told my community to get out of the city and if possible out of the state…there are many warnings about planned attacks against Jewish institutions,” Asman said, adding, “We have been told by the Israeli Embassy to not go outside.” Many members of Kiev’s Jewish community live within walking distance of the main square in the city that has recently become the focus of anti-government riots. In recent days, chaos has gripped the area following the escalation of violence between government security forces and members of the opposition, with institutions around the city closing and subways no longer operating. While Chief Rabbi Asman has been forced to close down the city’s Jewish schools, he continues to conduct three prayer services daily in his synagogue. “The situation here is dire,” said Yossi Asman, a Chabad yeshiva student and son of the chief rabbi. “We have been gathering up families and shuttling them out to safer neighborhoods.” Yesterday a synagogue in eastern Ukraine sustained damage from firebombs hurled at it. The firebombs hit the Giymat Rosa Synagogue in Zaporizhia, located 250 miles southeast of Kiev. Edward Dolinsky, head of the umbrella organization responsible for Ukraine’s Jews, said the city’s dwindling food supply has provoked a state of panic among Kiev’s inhabitants. “We have appealed to [Israeli] Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman to please help us protect our community,” Dolinsky added. Ukraine has a Jewish population of 360,000 – 400,000 people, with roughly a quarter of all the country’s Jews residing in Kiev, according to the European Jewish Congress. Read more here.
Above is Senator John McCain (R-AZ) standing with Oleh Tyahnybok, and you have to wonder if he has a clue what he is doing. He didn’t, and still does not today, as he stood with and supported the under-funded Free Syrian Army, led by now deposed General Salim Idriss. At the time McCain and Senator Bob Corker (R-TN) met with Idriss, who has said publicly that Israel is his enemy, there was the real fear that his leadership was leaving a vacuum for al-Qaeda or al-Qaeda-connected networks to be welcomed-in with cash and manpower.
Linked at Iowa Dawg’s Blawg, read the Inevitablility of ObamaCare here.
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Damascus, SANA – A Swedish parliamentary delegation and the members of the Committee of Arab and Foreign Relations at the People’s Assembly on Tuesday discussed ways to mobilize the efforts of all countries and governments to counter extremist ideology and terrorism, which has become a threat to the whole world.
The visiting Swedish Parliament members noted that their visit to Syria is to get acquainted with the situation in it and convey the true picture of events to the Swedish people, referring to the scale of damage caused to the infrastructure due to the terrorist war in the country.
On the coercive economic measures imposed by the West against the Syrian people,the Swedish MPs affirmed that they are not part of the US system, pointing out that there are countries that have an interest in destabilizing the region through mobilizing media outlets and providing support to the terrorists.
They expressed their hope that the Swedish government would take a neutral stance towards what is going on in Syria as the extremis thinking is spreading in Europe in an accelerated manner.
H. Said |
Kieran Foran and Shaun Johnson have struck up a promising partnership - but for how long with the NZ Warriors?
OPINION: Like that between a couple of eager teenagers, the Kieran Foran-Shaun Johnson relationship has blossomed in recent weeks.
The two have fallen over themselves in describing their respect for each other as they develop a potent attacking formula and also a close bond off the field.
For Foran, Johnson has supposedly provided the ideal off-field example as he has gone about lifting himself out of some dark times.
PHOTOSPORT Shaun Johnson and Kieran Foran have developed a strong bond on and off the field.
For Johnson, in sparkling bright lights, Foran has provided an example of what a strong leader and established halves partner can do for his own game.
READ MORE:
* Road trip Warriors' big test
* Storm favourites for Foran
* Kiwis could avoid Thurston
But like a teenage love interest, it has the potential to get messy. How will this all end?
The player market speculation is rife at the moment with people attempting to join the dots to work out where each off-contract players are going.
Everything is pointing to Foran's time with the Warriors being a one-year stint.
The Warriors got Foran at a bargain price this year given his personal situation and the fact Auckland was viewed as the best place to sort himself out.
Sydney-based clubs with room under the salary cap are now circling one of the most sought-after off-contract players.
So where does this leave the off-contact Johnson, and the Warriors in general, if Foran is gone at the end of the year?
Foran has just delivered the Warriors and Johnson a large dose of reality with what he has done in the space of just two games.
The smart money is on Johnson remaining at the Warriors but he has quickly become aware that for him to get the best out of himself he needs more help in the halves.
A player that will run the show and get into the grind, while he waits to pounce.
Johnson has said publicly that until he was provided the chance to link with Foran over the past two weeks in the NRL, he never realised what he had been missing.
For the first time in Johnson's career, a move away from the Warriors has at least become a serious possibility.
The temptation to follow Foran must be there, and given the demand for Foran, if he wants his new best bud alongside him at a Sydney club he could have plenty of sway.
On the flip side, if Johnson stays, the Warriors management must now be aware that to get to the holy grail - a premiership - they need a strong leader in the halves alongside Johnson.
If they can't go deep into the NRL competition in 2017 with Foran, they won't be a chance to do it without him in 2018.
Tuimalola Lolohea seems to have plenty of experts lining up to shower him with praise, but he hasn't shown enough to suggest he is the right man for the job.
Ata Hingano was used in the No 6 jersey before Foran was able to play - he too has shown potential but does not have the attributes required for a premiership-winning combination with Johnson.
Foran's introduction to the Warriors has provided hope for the 2017 season, but it may well have just sparked more questions than answers in regard to the club's future. |
MERCED (CBS13) — Animal lovers are questioning a policy where Merced Police officers take injured animals out to the police shooting range to kill them.
The penal code has been on the books for decades. Some officers say it’s the most humane thing you can do, while others call it barbaric.
Officers use deadly force to save the lives of others, but what about shooting severely injured dogs or cats found on the street?
According to a California penal code, it’s an officer’s discretion, saying in part:
“…any officer… may, with the approval of his or her immediate superior, humanely destroy any abandoned animal in the field in any case where the animal is too severely injured to move or where a veterinarian is not available and it would be more humane to dispose of the animal.”
“No one wants to see an animal lose its life, but if death is inevitable, and it’s just being prolonged,” said Sacramento County Sgt. Jason Ramos.
He says the sheriff’s department doesn’t have a specific policy for shooting injured animals, but his agency understands why an officer may be forced to.
“Sometimes in the middle of the night you don’t have a vet available, you might be in an extremely rural area. Quite honestly, taking an animal’s life might be the most humane thing to do under those circumstances.”
Policies vary across the state. In Sacramento, officers aren’t allowed to shoot animals.
Oakland changed its policy after the controversial shooting of a deer in someone’s backyard.
And the Merced Bee reports Merced Police take injured animals to the range and kill them there.
“That sounds so archaic to me,” said veterinarian Dr. Jyl Rubin. “What a crazy way of thinking, especially with all these rescue organizations.”
She believes law enforcement agencies that still shoot injured animals should consider creating an alliance with rescue groups.
“All those organizations need to really come together. There needs to be something finite that way if an animal is injured you don’t take it out on a range and shoot it.”
Most vets we spoke to say if you find a severely injured animal on the street, it’s best to call animal control or law enforcement.
Many police agencies call animal control to evaluate severely injured animals. |
I live, part of the time, in a village in Dorset (deep in the west of England) where no one owns their own home: an estate village, where every house is tenanted. The entire place consists of about 30 cottages and farmhouses. The smaller cottages are thatched, the larger houses are pure Regency; there is a beautiful lake by our landlord’s splendid Gothic-revival country pile, and a magical walled garden. The whole place could have been conceived by the artist Rex Whistler: it is a dream world.
Ben Pentreath at home in London
Normally, when dreams are made of this, house prices are staggeringly high; and in a “normal” west Dorset village, whether you live in the grand house or the little cottage, you will be the founder of an eponymous clothing label, or a merchant banker, or a top commercial lawyer, or a bossy retiree escaping from Surrey. My neighbours are largely agricultural; there is a furniture maker and his wife, a renowned food writer; a mechanic, an upholsterer, and several young families who work in the local towns. Many families have stayed here for decades and there is a deep sense of unity about the place, I think perhaps because we are all bound together by a common thread, a shared lack-of-ownership, that is remarkably refreshing in the house-price-obsessed West Country.
In London, I rent as well; the upper floor of a handsome, rambling 1720s Georgian townhouse that is the Bloomsbury headquarters of a venerable arts institution. There is a jumble of flats and an architectural office in the building, alongside the institution’s fine rooms. It is probably true that our rents keep the organisation alive. It, too, is a wonderful place to live, overlooking a leafy square in the heart of London. When I moved here a year or so ago I signed a long lease that allowed me the confidence to spend some money doing things up and getting things how I wanted them without going mad.
I am a five-minute walk from the British Museum; a five-minute walk from my office, on Lambs Conduit Street – all of a sudden one of London’s hottest destinations for menswear and other fashion and itself owned by the Rugby School Estate, another long-term landlord with a large portfolio of commercial units and flats. It is a part of central London that is not dead at night: the lights are on, the flats lived in by young professional couples just starting out in life – some of whom might arrive for a year and stay for a decade. The cafés and restaurants are simple and they work. The People’s Supermarket, a food co-operative, is our corner shop: its slightly sketchy charms and erratic supplies far outweighing the grim fluorescent lighting of the ubiquitous chain supermarkets and coffee stores that clutter the rest of our capital (Starbucks closed on Lambs Conduit Street last year). Why is this neighbourhood alive and kicking? Because normal people can afford to live here; because the Rugby estate takes an intelligent view of long-term rents, and securing good tenancies, and nurturing a community rather than maximising immediate returns.
Exterior of his London flat
I’m often asked why I don’t own a house. In a world where our only hope of economic recovery seems to be yet another property price boom (which simultaneously chokes the life out of places, and the young out of chances, and causes all the other woes of the UK’s “boomerang generation”, ie: the 26 per cent of young adults now living with their parents) it is a question perhaps worth asking more often.
My first problem has always been that I don’t really love saving money for a deposit. I would sooner own a good painting or a Fornasetti cabinet, or a Ravilious coronation mug (which these days seem to accelerate in price faster than a good flat in Mayfair, and are probably rarer).
In truth, I am perfectly happy to save for the long term: I think, honestly, that I am the only single person I know of my age who is bothering with a realistic pension. I am just not very good at saving a deposit in order to take out a huge mortgage. I am no expert (and I realise I am writing therefore in the wrong newspaper) but it appears to me that giant mortgages are merely a form of renting money, very expensively. And I am not quite sure what happens when interest rates rise above 0.5 per cent, but I suspect that one or two people I know are not planning for that. Does the housing recovery feel a little fragile to you?
The exterior of the house in Dorset
These days many of my friends seem saddled with enormous debts taken to purchase bad houses in very strange localities, miles from anywhere you would choose to live if you had a choice. An awful lot of “making do” goes on, of cheerfully deciding that a decaying neighbourhood with poor services and pathetic transport links, bad schools and dismal local markets is “up-and-coming”. It had better be.
Into these neighbourhoods come the young couples clinging to the abstract hope that their three-bedroom Victorian house is now worth £1.6m because apparently that is what the one round the corner sold for. On this basis they add expensive glass-roofed kitchen extensions (which mean the slow diminution of London’s back gardens), Farrow & Ball colours and giant stainless-steel house numbers, which proclaim from every door: “We are the pioneers, and we hope that things are going to come up around here.”
The Dorset home’s dining area
The funny thing is, from time to time, I revisit some of these streets in Ealing or Shepherds Bush or Hackney; and, save for the daftly inflating house prices fuelled by the trickle effect of foreign investment, the neighbourhood itself is as shabby as it was 10 or 20 years ago. My contention is this: the real era of pioneers – when neighbourhoods were worth colonising, when the young couples restored Islington, or Notting Hill, or the squares of Kennington, or the shadier streets of west Chelsea – passed in 1979. That was the last time that a normal person of sensible means with a bit of an eye could buy a house in a place worth living.
I love the simultaneous freedoms and fortune that renting can bring. I am deeply conscious, of course, of the benefits of long-term institutions as landlord, as opposed to get-rich-quick buy-to-let. I wish this were an area that housing policy makers might focus on. But consider: I am free to step away if I wish, never trapped by debt or my situation; yet I am fortunate to live in two beautiful houses in two beautiful places, each of which I could never afford to own (certainly not at this stage of life). Each is exactly where I want to be. I cannot tell you the pleasure I derive from having a five-minute walk to work, instead of an hour-long commute on London’s dreadful rush-hour transport. Walking to work is to live close to heaven.
Inside Ben’s flat in London
I’m often asked about when I’m old. When I am very old, I definitely want to rent, with no responsibilities for maintenance at all (the bane of my Dad’s life, aged in his eighties, is looking after the windows). I desire the tiniest one-room flat in the centre of the city, close to all amenities, from where I will take my godchildren and perhaps some very handsome young admirers out to dinner. The last thing I will want is a large house with a garden in the country. That is something to enjoy now, while I’m young enough to have fun with it (but not rich enough to own it).
When the boiler blows up, or the roof leaks, it’s not my problem. A simple call, and no cost, is all it takes to have these things fixed. It is my problem, of course, to care for and look after the places I rent; and I love pouring my heart and soul, and a bit of cash, into my houses and gardens, to which people sometimes tell me, “you’re mad, you’re throwing good money away on someone else’s house”, but which I would otherwise spend, I guess, on holidays or booze.
And I wistfully look at their ridiculous designer kitchen, or immodest extensions, on which insane sums were spent, generally financed on borrowed money, in which no more than 500 hot dinners will be cooked before it is all in the next owner’s skip, and I think to myself: who is the mad one, and who is happier?
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Letter in response to this article:
A bit excessive in a housing shortage? / From Mr Michael Duggan |
GAINESVILLE, Fla. -- Florida forward Dorian Finney-Smith has a hairline fracture in his left, non-shooting hand.
A Florida official said Sunday that Finney-Smith is cleared to play Monday against Miami (7 p.m. ESPNU) with a brace on his fractured left hand. But to what extent he will be able to contribute will depend on his pain tolerance and ability to handle the basketball.
Finney-Smith led the seventh-ranked Gators (1-0) with 15 points in their 68-45 victory against William & Mary on Friday. He injured his hand in the first half, got it wrapped and finished the game.
Trainers initially diagnosed it as a sprain, but tests later revealed the fracture.
Florida is counting on Finney-Smith, the Southeastern Conference's Sixth Man of the Year last season, to take on a more prominent role this year.
Playing without him could create problems since the Gators already are down two frontcourt players. Chris Walker is suspended another game, and fellow forward Alex Murphy has to sit out nine more games under NCAA transfer rules.
ESPN.com's Andy Katz and The Associated Press contributed to this report. |
Country crooner and pop icon Dolly Parton recently reiterated her love for the gay community in an interview on “Larry King Now,” where she chastised judgmental Christians.
She told King that she sometimes gets pushback from Christian fans about her support of LGBTQ people. But, rather than dance around the issue, she calls them out on their un-Christian attitudes and behaviors.
“I keep saying, ‘If you’re the fine Christian that you think you are, why are you judging people?’ That’s God’s job,” she explained. “We’re not God, we’re not judges, we’re supposed to love one another, we’re supposed to not judge.”
Also not in humanity’s job description: vengeance. Parton said that God’s job, too. And while some people may just have too much time on their hands, she doesn’t have time for that.
“I’ve got too much work to do in my own to try to do God’s work too,” she explained.
The moral of the story: compassion wins.
“I just think that we should be more loving, more caring. We are who we are,” Parton said. “If you’re gay, you’re gay. If you’re straight, you’re straight. And you should be allowed to be how you are and who you are.”
Watch the full interview below.
This Story Filed Under |
Members of the insurance and credit comparison website market have welcomed an announcement from the corporate regulator that it will be keeping a close eye on the growing sector to make sure it complies with all relevant financial laws.
The news also comes as reports suggest price comparison site iSelect is inching closer to a float, months after the company first reported the possibility of trading on the ASX.
The Australian Securities and Investment Commission has identified a number of concerns with comparison sites and in a statement released yesterday it says while the sites can provide a valuable role they can also offer misleading or inaccurate information.
Some of the regulator’s concerns include sites that only offer a limited number of brands or products, which sometimes aren’t clearly disclosed, sites that use ratings and rankings without properly explaining what those are, and sites that refer to special offers and featured products without explaining the process behind choosing them.
ASIC’s statement pointed out that websites which allow consumers to obtain and compare insurance quotes are by definition providing a financial service, and therefore must hold a license.
“For credit comparison websites that advertise loan products, it is important that comparison rates are disclosed as required under the National Credit Code,” it said.
Fred Schebesta, the chief executive and founder of Finder.com.au, told SmartCompany this morning he believes the warning is a good thing – especially for those businesses that are already complying with the relevant laws.
“There are comparison sites not actually revealing whether they are owned by an insurance company, and I’ve got a problem with that,” he said.
“I don’t think it’s doing Australia a service, I think it’s actually doing it a disservice.”
Rohan Gamble, the managing director of Mozo, says the aggregator industry is filled with so-called affiliates, who simply create an aggregator product that only compares their products.
Stamping that out, he says, would be a good move on ASIC’s part.
“This type of announcement makes sure that we do the best we can. We’ve been waiting for this type of thing, and we take the view that we do this seriously, and that everyone else should as well.”
The financial comparison industry has been enjoying several years of growth. As the financial crisis hit, more customers opted to check whether they were getting the best deals on credit cards, or insurance products – the internet makes that type of comparison possible.
Aggregator products have also extended into retail goods, although ASIC is primarily concerned with sites that offer finance and insurance-related comparisons.
iSelect has perhaps been the most successful and well-known of the sites in the financial aggregator market. Earlier this year, the company raised as much as $25 million ahead of a float – which it is expected to announce today.
Even as recently as 2011, valuations of price comparison sites started to rise after iSelect received an investment valuing the company at $300 million.
ASIC commissioner Peter Kell said in a statement that the regulator recognises the benefit of such sites, but that operators “must take care to ensure they accurately portray the features and limitations of the products compared”.
Schebesta says it’s important the regulator stamp out dodgy operators – especially from financial institutions that only offer to compare their own product.
“The intention of what ASIC is doing here is very important, because there are some key challenges out there right now that I don’t think are getting enough attention.” |
KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- A Kansas City man is charged in the shooting deaths of two men and is a suspect in three other killings that occurred along or near south Kansas City hiking and biking trails, prosecutors announced Tuesday.
Fredrick Demond Scott, 22, is jailed on two counts of first-degree murder and two counts of armed criminal action in the deaths of Steven Gibbons, 57, and John Palmer, 54. Prosecutors said DNA evidence connected him to the victims.
Prosecutors said Gibbons was shot in the back of the head as he walked along a south Kansas City street. His death had not been mentioned previously as related to four homicides along trails that were being investigated as possibly linked.
A probable cause statement says surveillance video showed Scott following Gibbons off a Kansas City bus and down a south Kansas City street on Aug. 13. He was later seen running from the scene of Gibbons' shooting and detectives linked him to the case through DNA taken from an iced tea bottle and a cigarette butt, prosecutors said.
Palmer was killed Aug. 19, 2016, in a wooded area near the Indian Creek trail, one of four deaths that police connected in May because they were all near trails and the victims were middle-aged, white men.
"At this moment there remains insufficient evidence to charge Scott" in the other cases, Baker said. "We expect today's charges will ease some of the concerns (in the deaths of) men walking on the trail, but we are only charging in two. We need the public's help in solving all five of these homicides."
Baker said a motive wasn't clear in the five killings, The Kansas City Star reported.
Scott told investigators he was upset about the 2015 stabbing death of his brother, according to police. Scott said he shot the two victims, investigators said.
The other victims are Mike Darby, 61, who was found dead May 18 along Indian Creek Trail; David Lenox, 67, found killed Feb. 27 a few feet from his front door while walking one of his dogs; and Timothy S. Rice, 57, who was found dead April 4 inside a shelter at Minor Park.
"Anyone who shoots innocent people walking on a trail should be prosecuted as heavily as possible," Shaton Duncan, who lives near the trail, told CBS affiliate KCTV.
The slayings terrorized the community for months.
"I was in the Army overseas but I didn't want to walk on the trail by myself, that's how dangerous it felt," area resident Chuck Loomis told the station.
Scott was in custody Tuesday at the Jackson County jail. A phone call to a public defender listed in online court documents was not immediately returned. |
Image caption Sir Ian said changes were necessary to "better support MPs" in their jobs
More MPs will be able to claim extra expenses for children and accommodation under relaxed rules launched on Friday.
Changes to the scheme, introduced last year, follow MPs' complaints that it was too bureaucratic and "anti-family".
An extra 31 "commuter belt" MPs will be able to claim for hotels or rent, and those with children up to 18 will be able to claim extra for travel.
It could add "a few million" to the bill but expenses boss Sir Ian Kennedy said £18m had been saved already.
Sir Ian, chairman of the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (Ipsa), also said the new system had also come in £30m under its projected budget and had "put an end to the expenses scandal that shocked us so much in 2009".
But he said there had always been an intention to review the scheme.
"We didn't get everything right the first time," he said, and some changes were needed to "better support MPs in doing their job".
It was not in the public interest for "family life" to be disrupted or for people with young families to be put off from becoming MPs, he said.
'Sleeping in office'
One of the main changes reduces the number of MPs who are not allowed to claim towards accommodation, because they represent "commuter belt" constituencies, from 128 to 97. Before 2010, only 25 London MPs were not entitled to the full second homes allowance.
It means an extra 31 MPs, representing seats in Guildford, Milton Keynes, among others, will be able to request the allowance - up to a maximum of £19,900 a year for those claiming London rent.
Sir Ian said: "It is not in the public interest if they (MPs) are concerned where they are going to spend the night if the House is sitting late, or feel they are going to have to sleep in their office."
MPs with children would be able to claim more for travel and accommodation and would see a "modest uplift" in their staffing budget, Sir Ian said.
Currently MPs with children up to the age of five can claim an extra £2,425 per child for accommodation - and could claim for up to 30 journeys they make between London and the constituency.
Under the revised scheme, they will be able to make the same claims for children aged up to 16 - or 18 if they are in full time education - and for journeys by spouses or partners accompanying the child.
MPs' staffing budget will increase from a maximum of £109,548 to £115,000.
And Sir Ian said the scheme would be simplified - two office-related allowances will be rolled into one.
MPs will be able to use "payment cards", with a £4,000 monthly limit, to pay for stationery, hotels and constituency office costs - they are already used to cover travel, utility bills and council tax.
But a senior official said if MPs did not then supply the required evidence to back up money spent, they would be told to repay it.
'Toxic'
Sir Ian would not give a figure for the amount the new scheme would cost - and said ultimately it would depend on "take-up" of the newly available expenses.
But he said a figure would be given to the MPs' committee which signs off Ipsa's budget when it meets on 4 April and would then be publicly available.
An Ipsa official said it would cost a "very few million" more pounds at most - and put it into context of the £18m the new system had already saved in claims in the scheme's first ten months.
Sir Ian said calls for changes to the rules on mortgage interest payments had been resisted because that particular expense was such a "toxic" issue: "The sooner we close that chapter, the better."
Mortgage interest is now only payable to MPs who had bought second homes under the pre-2010 expenses scheme, and only up until 31 August 2012.
'Welcome steps'
Ipsa has been heavily criticised by many MPs, including Prime Minister David Cameron, who has said its rules are "anti-family" and causing "a lot of pain and difficulty".
Clearly the system remains under review by Ipsa and there is more that can be done No 10
Sir Ian denied the body was fighting for its survival: "Regulators are very rarely at the top of the Christmas card list of those they regulate - it comes with the territory."
He also said Ipsa was "actively going to consider" calls for an MPs' allowance in the future - there have been suggestions MPs should get a flat-rate allowance - but Sir Ian there would be no going back to the old, discredited system.
A spokesman said Ipsa had not yet started to look into an MPs' allowance so it was impossible to say what it could involve.
No 10 said the prime minister welcomed what it said was a "significant step" towards a "more family-friendly" system.
"He agrees that the system established by Ipsa was not perfect and welcomes the steps they have taken towards addressing some of the problems of the current scheme," a Downing Street spokeswoman said.
"But clearly the system remains under review by Ipsa and there is more that can be done. The bottom line, as far as the PM is concerned, is that expenses should be transparent, cost-effective and acceptable to the public." |
The current work presents a computational pipeline to simulate transcranial direct current stimulation from image based models of the head with SCIRun [ 15 ]. The pipeline contains all the steps necessary to carry out the simulations and is supported by a complete suite of open source software tools: image visualization, segmentation, mesh generation, tDCS electrode generation and efficient tDCS forward simulation.
I. INTRODUCTION
Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) aims to stimulate certain brain regions by sending constant low direct currents non-invasively through electrodes that are usually attached to the scalp. It has been known for over 100 years but has just recently become popular as a tool in brain research ([1], [16], [4]) as well as in therapy to support treatments of psychological disorders ([4]). While the focus of the results reported here work is tDCS, there are other non-invasive techniques that are widely used for neuronal stimulation such as transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) in which elctrical current are magnetically induced. During the application of both TMS and tDCS other unwanted regions are stimulated at the same time and there has been some research to minimize the unwanted activity in those brain regions ([7]). The goal of the present study was develop and validate a computational pipeline capable of optimize electrode configurations and current injection patterns to stimulate only specific desired brain regions.
In tDCS simulations, the tDCS forward problem that has to be solved requires a geometric model of the head, typically from medical image data, as a volume conductor for a realistic modeling of electrical field propagation. In general, this electrical field propagation (volume conduction) depends mainly on tissue conductivities which are only roughly known in-vivo for many of the involved tissues (e.g. skull, skin, grey and white matter of the brain, cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), etc.). As the volume conductor consists of a discrete approximation of the actual head, the resolution of the model and the configuration of the interfaces between the surfaces play important roles in numerical accuracy of the solutions. Certainly, one of the most important tissues in electrical head modeling is the poorly conducting skull tissue which forms an electrical barrier between the brain and the surface electrodes. Skull modeling is important since the conductivity profile depends very much on the local presence of differently conducting skull tissues which are inhomogeneously distributed within the skull ([6]). In order to integrate those different skull tissues (soft and hard bone) in the model they first have to be identified from the medical images. One way to differentiate them is to decide wheater or not a voxel belongs to one or another material based on thresholding the grey values from computed tomography (CT) images. Once the material of a voxel is properly identified a more or less accurate conductivity value is assigned to it (see section below on conductivities) as well as to the associated elements in the model mesh. For a fully realistic tDCS forward solution tissue inhomogeneity in the skull and anisotropic conductivity in the white matter of the brain should be considered ([18]) and be part of the computational pipeline and the final model.
With the volume conductor model in place, there are common ways to solve the tDCS forward problem numerically, for example the Finite Difference Method, as well as the Finite Element Method (FEM, e.g. [19]). FEM is very flexible in dealing with tissue inhomogeneities, irregular tissue boundaries, and conductivity anisotropy and was therefore the numerical method of choice for this study.
In tDCS, the location and shape of the electrodes ([13]) as well as details of the applied current injection (e.g. contact impedance, [9]) play an important role for electrical field propagation and the accuracy of the simulation. There are several electrode models in the literature (e.g. shunt, complete, [5], [13], [2]) in which different electrical boundary conditions are applied together with certain assumptions about the electrode-surface interaction. In realistic settings, and in this study, the complete electrode model is often used since it also includes realistic contact impedances ([5]).
We present a pipeline to compute tDCS simulations for realistic volume conductor models using a combination of open source software tools that includes ImageVis3D, Seg3D, BioMesh3D and SCIRun, all products of the NIH Center for Integration Biomedical Computing (www.sci.utah.edu/cibc). For exhaustive tDCS simulations, e.g. for the optimization of electrode configurations and injection current patterns, a technique called transfer matrix approach ([17]) can be used to reduce the computational effort. |
American actress
Sarah Michelle Prinze[2][3] (née Gellar; born April 14, 1977)[4] is an American actress, producer and entrepreneur. After being spotted by an agent at the age of four in New York City, she made her acting debut in the made-for-television film An Invasion of Privacy (1983). Her television breakthrough came in 1993, when she originated the role of Kendall Hart on the ABC daytime soap opera All My Children, winning the 1995 Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Younger Actress in a Drama Series.
Gellar received widespread recognition for her portrayal of Buffy Summers on the WB series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997–2003), which earned her five Teen Choice Awards and a Golden Globe Award nomination, and became recognized as one of the greatest female characters in U.S. television.[5][6] Her most successful films, in terms of box office receipts, are I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997), Scream 2 (1997), Cruel Intentions (1999), Scooby-Doo (2002), Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed (2004) and The Grudge (2004).[7] Other film roles include Harvard Man (2001), Southland Tales (2007) and The Air I Breathe (2008). She headlined the television series Ringer (2011–2012) and The Crazy Ones (2013–2014).
In 2015, Gellar, along with Galit Laibow and Greg Fleishman, founded Foodstirs, a food crafting brand and e-commerce startup selling baking kits,[8] and in 2017, she released her cookbook Stirring Up Fun with Food.
Early life [ edit ]
Gellar was born in Long Island. She is the only child of Rosellen (née Greenfield), a nursery school teacher, and Arthur Gellar, a garment worker.[9] Both of her parents were Jewish, though Gellar's family also had a Christmas tree during her childhood.[10][11] In 1984, when she was seven, her parents divorced and she was raised by her mother on the city's Upper East Side.[12] While growing up with her mother, she lost contact with her father, from whom she remained estranged until his death in 2001;[13][14][15] she once described him as "non-existent",[16] and in the early 2000s, she stated: "My father, you can just say, is not in the picture. I'm not being deliberately evasive about him, it's just that there's so little to say."[15][17][18] Besides being a working child at the time, Gellar was a competitive figure skater to which she finished in third place at a New York State regional competition,[3] as well as a black belt in taekwondo.[3]
Gellar was given a partial scholarship to study at the Columbia Grammar & Preparatory School,[3][19] as her mother was not able to pay full tuition, for which she was constantly bullied.[20] She said in an interview with The Independent: "I was different and that's the one thing you can't be at school, because you're ostracised. I didn't have the money these kids had".[21] Gellar was not present in class for most of the time at the school as she had to work in several acting projects simultaneously, recalling that she "had more absences in the first month than you're supposed to have for an entire year. I was telling them that I had back problems and had to go to the doctor the whole time".[3] Gellar then briefly attended the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, but dropped out due to acting obligations; the teachers threatened to fail her because of her constant absence from classes as she was busy going to auditions, despite earning good grades.[3] Gellar graduated from the Professional Children's School,[3][22][23] in 1994 as a "straight A" student with a 4.0 grade average.[24][25][26] As Gellar spent significant time working on All My Children while "trying to graduate",[27] the majority of her senior year was completed through guided study.[28]
Career [ edit ]
Early credits and prominence (1981–1996) [ edit ]
At the age of four, she was spotted by an agent in a restaurant in Upper Manhattan.[29] Two weeks later, she auditioned for a part in the television film An Invasion of Privacy, with Valerie Harper, Carol Kane and Jeff Daniels. At the audition, Gellar read both her own lines and those of Harper, impressing the directors enough to cast her in the role.[3] The film aired on CBS in January 1983.[30] She subsequently appeared in a controversial television commercial for Burger King, in which her character criticized McDonald's and claimed to eat only at Burger King.[31] The ad led to a lawsuit by McDonald's, naming Gellar and banning her from eating at the food chain;[32][33] she recalled in a 2004 interview: "I wasn't allowed to eat there. It was tough because, when you're a little kid, McDonald's is where all your friends have their birthday parties, so I missed out on a lot of apple pies."[34][35] While growing up, Gellar also worked as a model for Wilhemina and acted in numerous television commercials.[3][36]
During the 1980s, Gellar played minor roles in the films Over the Brooklyn Bridge (1984), Funny Farm (1988) and High Stakes (1989),[37][38][39] and also guest starred in various television series, such as Spenser: For Hire and Crossbow. At the age of nine, she appeared alongside Matthew Broderick and Eric Stoltz in the Broadway production The Widow Claire.[3][40][41] She served briefly as a co-host of the teen girl talk show Girl Talk, which aired in 1989.[42] In 1991, she was cast as a young Jacqueline Bouvier in A Woman Named Jackie, starring Roma Downey. The miniseries won the Emmy Award for Outstanding Limited Series.
Gellar next took on the leading role in the 1992 syndicated teen serial Swans Crossing, which chronicled the lives of a group of wealthy teenagers. The series ran for one season and earned Gellar two Young Artist Award nominations, for Best Young Actress in a New Television Series and for Best Young Actress in an Off-Primetime Series.[43] She made her debut in the soap opera All My Children in 1993, playing Kendall Hart, the long-lost daughter of character Erica Kane (Susan Lucci). As she got the role, Gellar was complimented as having the acting talent and the "forceful personality" needed to go up against Lucci's experience; Kendall was supposed to be like a younger version of Erica.[44] Her stint on the show was successful as "longtime fans of the soap saw her as the second coming of Erica".[45] Writers showcased her more after her initial reception and she became a household name to the soap opera medium.[45] In 1995, at the age of eighteen, she won a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Younger Actress in a Drama Series for the role.[46] The same year, Gellar left the show to pursue other acting opportunities.[47][48]
Worldwide recognition (1997–2003) [ edit ]
Gellar moved to Los Angeles following her departure from All My Children, and in 1996, she read the script for Joss Whedon's television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which follows Buffy Summers, a teenager burdened with the responsibility of fighting occult foes and supernatural occurrences. She screen tested several times originally for the role of Cordelia Chase,[49] but after approaching Whedon and producers about playing Buffy Summers, she auditioned again and was eventually cast in the title role.[3][50] The show premiered in March 1997, to widespread critical and popular acclaim,[51] and Gellar's Buffy, created to subvert the stereotypical female horror movie victim,[52] went on to become recognized as one of the 100 greatest female characters in U.S. television.[5][6] Buffy ran for seven seasons (144 episodes),[53][54] and during its broadcast, earned Gellar five Teen Choice Awards, the Saturn Award for Best Genre Television Actress and a Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Actress – Television Series Drama.[55] She sang during the series' musical episode "Once More, with Feeling", which spawned an original cast album, released in 2002.[56][57]
During the early airing of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Gellar made her first major film appeareances in two successful slasher films. In I Know What You Did Last Summer, opposite Jennifer Love Hewitt, Ryan Phillippe and Freddie Prinze, Jr, she took on the role of an ill-fated aspiring beauty actress.[58] Budgeted at US$17 million, the movie made US$125 million globally.[59][60][61] Washington Post found the cast to be "solid",[62] in what San Francisco Chronicle described as a "competent but uninspired" film.[63] For her part, Gellar earned a Blockbuster Entertainment Award for Favorite Supporting Actress – Horror and a MTV Movie Award nomination for Best Breakthrough Performance.[64][65] In Scream 2 (also 1997),[66] Gellar played a likewise ill-fated vain character, this time that of a Sorority sister. She filmed her scenes in-between shots of Buffy and had only recently finished work on I Know What You Did Last Summer. Despite the hectic scheduling, she agreed to perform in Scream 2 without having read the script, on the basis of the success of the first film.[67] Scream 2 grossed over US$172 million worldwide.[68][69]
In 1998, Gellar hosted for the first time Saturday Night Live,[70][71] and provided the voice of the Gwendy Doll in Small Soldiers, a moderate commercial success.[72][73] Gellar also had her first appearance on the 'Most Beautiful' list by People magazine, which cemented her "It girl" status at the time.[27] In 1999, she had a cameo appearance in the sleeper hit She's All That,[74] and took on the lead role of a struggling restaurant owner in the critically panned romantic comedy Simply Irresistible.[75][76] Gellar once called it "bad choice",[77] but Roger Ebert, on the other hand, found her to be "lovely" in what he described as an "old-fashioned" comedy.[78] In Cruel Intentions (1999), a modern-day retelling of Les Liaisons dangereuses, Gellar played Kathryn Merteuil, a brunette cocaine addict with an appetite for manipulating people.[79] The US$10 million film was a hit at the box office, grossing USUS$75 million worldwide.[80][81][82][83][84][85] Roger Ebert felt that she is "effective as a bright girl who knows exactly how to use her act as a tramp",[86] and in an interview with Chicago Tribune, director Roger Kumble, describing her work in the movie, said: "She unquestionably is the most professional actor I ever worked with".[3] Gellar and co-star Selma Blair obtained the "Best Kiss" award at the 2000 MTV Movie Awards.[87][88][89] Around that time, she guest starred in three episodes of Angel and appeared as Debbie in the HBO series Sex and the City episode "Escape from New York".
Gellar played the daughter of a mobster in James Toback's independent drama Harvard Man,[90] which premiered at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival.[91] While the film found a limited release in theaters,[92] Gellar's performance in it, along with Cruel Intentions, helped her shed her good girl image.[93] Gellar portrayed Daphne Blake in the live action–comedy Scooby-Doo, directed by Raja Gosnell and alongside Freddie Prinze, Jr., Linda Cardellini and Matthew Lillard. Scooby-Doo made over US$275 million,[94] and became Gellar's most widely seen film to date.[7][95] She won the Teen Choice Award in the category of Choice Movie Actress – Comedy for her part in the picture.[96] Alongside Jack Black, she hosted the 2002 MTV Movie Awards, which attracted 7.1 million viewers on its June 6 broadcast, achieving the show's highest rating ever at the time.[97][98]
During her growing film career, Gellar continued work on the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but she left the show after the seventh season. When asked why, she explained, "This isn't about leaving for a career in movies, or in theater – it's more of a personal decision. I need a rest."[99][100][101][102] In her feature in Esquire magazine Gellar expressed her pride for her work on Buffy, "I truly believe that it is one of the greatest shows of all time and it will go down in history as that. And I don't feel that that is a cocky statement. We changed the way that people looked at television."[103]
Continued film roles (2004–2010) [ edit ]
After the end of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Gellar provided her voice for the character Gina Vendetti in The Simpsons episode "The Wandering Juvie", which aired in March 2004. Her next film was Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed (2004), reprising the role of Daphne.[104] While IGN felt that both Gellar and Prinze "exhibit marked improvements over their work in [2002's Scooby-Doo]",[105] the film was a commercial success, grossing US$181.4 million around the globe.[106] In the horror remake The Grudge (also 2004), Gellar portrayed Karen Davis, an exchange student living and working in Tokyo who becomes exposed to a mysterious supernatural curse. Critic Rob Blackwelder wrote that she "played her part well, and her fear and disorientation are terrifically enhanced by the decision to keep the [original] setting in this remake".[107] The film was a major box office hit,[108][109] grossing more than US$110 million in the US, and US$187 million worldwide.[110][111][112] She received a MTV Movie Award nomination for Best Frightened Performance as well as a nomination for the Teen Choice Award for Choice Movie Actress – Thriller for her role.[113][114] Since 2005, she has voiced several characters in 13 episodes of the animated television series Robot Chicken, as of 2018.
Gellar starred opposite Dwayne Johnson, Seann William Scott, and Justin Timberlake in Richard Kelly's Southland Tales (2006), as an adult film star working on creating a reality television show. Gellar had met with Kelly and was drawn to the original ideas for the movie, accepting the role before she even read the script.[115][116][117][118] The film found a limited audience in theaters,[119] but J. Hoberman for Village Voice remarked that the director "contrives two memorable comic performances" by Gellar and Johnson. In 2006, Gellar also briefly reprised her role of Karen in the critically panned sequel The Grudge 2,[120][121][122] and starred in the psychological thriller The Return, as a businesswoman haunted by memories of her childhood and the mysterious death of a young woman.[123] The film was a critical and commercial failure, grossing only US$11 million.[124][125] The New York Times called it a "career stagnation".[126]
In 2007, Gellar voiced Ella in the poorly received animated film Happily N'Ever After,[127] and also April O'Neil in TMNT, which made US$95 million.[128][129] She starred in the romantic comedy Suburban Girl and the drama The Air I Breathe, both of which were screened at the 2007 Tribeca Film Festival.[130] In Suburban Girl, alongside Alec Baldwin, she took the role of a New York City editor and the love interest of a much older influential man (Baldwin). The film was released for DVD in January 2008.[131] In the likewise little-seen film The Air I Breathe, Gellar appeared with Forest Whitaker, Brendan Fraser and Kevin Bacon, portraying an up-and-coming pop singer.[132][133] The New York Times called it a "gangster movie with delusions of grandeur",[134] while DVD Talk noted that "her character here has the deepest emotional arc, and she hits all the right notes."[135]
Possession, a psycological thriller Gellar filmed in 2006, saw her play a lawyer whose life is thrown into chaos after a car accident sends her husband (Michael Landes) and brother-in-law (Lee Pace) into comas. Due to financial problems at Yari Film Group,[136][137][138] the film went to DVD in March 2010.[139] In the film adaptation Veronika Decides to Die,[140][141] Gellar starred as a young depressed woman who rediscovers the joy in life when she finds out that she only has days to live following a suicide attempt. Like Possession, the film failed to find a proper release in North American theaters, and was released for VOD in 2015.[142][143][144][145] Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter found the actress to be "reasonably compelling" in what he called a "ponderous and silly misfire".[146]
Return to television (2011–present) [ edit ]
Gellar took a two-year hiatus from acting following the birth of her daughter in 2009, and in 2011, she signed to star and work as executive producer for a new drama titled Ringer, in which she played the dual role of twin sisters, one of whom is on the run and manages to hide by assuming the wealthy life of the other. Gellar has stated that part of her decision to return to a television series was because it allowed her to both work and raise her child.[147][148][149] The series received positive reviews from critics;[150] E! Online found her to be "awesome" and "fantastic",[151] while TV Line felt she "does a fine job" as both characters.[152] Ringer went on to have a large fan base,[153][154] but it was canceled after the first season.[155] For her portrayal, she received several award nominations, including one for the Teen Choice Award for Choice Television Actress – Drama.[156][157]
In September 2011, Gellar returned as a guest star on the ABC soap opera All My Children before the show's ending but not as Kendall Hart;[158] she portrayed a patient at Pine Valley Hospital who tells Maria Santos that she is "Erica Kane's daughter", and states that she saw vampires before they became trendy—a reference to Buffy the Vampire Slayer. She voiced a character in the American Dad! episode "Virtual In-Stanity",[159][160] and again for the December 6, 2012 episode ("Adventures in Hayleysitting").[161] On September 30, 2012, she reprised her role of Gina Vendetti in the premiere episode of The Simpsons' season 24.[162][163]
A fan of Robin Williams for years, once Gellar learned that he was making the single-camera television series The Crazy Ones, she contacted her friend Sarah de Sa Rego, the wife of Williams' best friend, Bobcat Goldthwait, in order to lobby for a co-starring role.[164] She obtained the part of an advertising director who runs an agency with her father.[165][166] Digital Spy felt that Williams "shares a warm, genuine chemistry with his on-screen offspring Gellar,"[167] as part of a mixed critical response.[168] Like Ringer, the series was canceled after one season,[169][170] but earned Gellar the People's Choice Award for Favorite Actress in a New Television Series.[171]
In March 2015, Gellar guest-starred as Cinderella in Whitney Avalon's official YouTube channel video short Princess Rap Battle,[172] and joined the cast of Star Wars Rebels for season two,[173] playing a recurring character known as the Seventh Sister.[174] In early 2016, Gellar filmed for NBC a pilot presentation for a potential television series based on the cult-classic film, Cruel Intentions, reprising her role of Kathryn Merteuil. The pilot was ultimately not picked up to series.[175][176]
On January 10, 2019, it was announced Gellar will appear in the limited series Sometimes I Lie based on the best-selling book of the same name. The series is being produced by Gellar, as well as Ellen DeGeneres, in association with Warner Bros. Television.[177]
Public image [ edit ]
Wax statue of Sarah Michelle Gellar at Madame Tussauds in London
Gellar has appeared on the covers and photo sessions of numerous magazines during her career. In February 1998, she appeared in Seventeen,[178] and in subsequent years the list has grown to include Nylon, Marie Claire, Vogue, Glamour, Esquire, Allure, Cosmopolitan, FHM, Rolling Stone and Elle among others.[179][180][181][182] In 1999, Gellar signed on to be the face of Maybelline – becoming the company's first celebrity spokeswoman since Lynda Carter in the late 1970s.[183][184] She was honored with a Woman of The Year Award by Glamour magazine in October 2002,[185] and in the same year, her wax figure by Madame Tussauds, was unveiled as part of the "Trail of Vampires" exhibition.[186]
With her work in Buffy and mainstream movies such as Cruel Intentions, Gellar became a household name and a sex symbol across the globe, status she cemented with being a feature several times in the annual Maxim "Hot 100" list between 2002 and 2008.[187][188][189][190] Wearing a black lace bra, she was on the cover of the December 2007 issue of Maxim and was named the 2009 Woman of the Year by the magazine.[191] She was voted number 1 in FHM's edition of "100 Sexiest Women" of 1999, and was featured in its 2005 list.[192] She had also been in the magazine's German, Dutch, South African, Danish and Romanian editions of the 100 Sexiest Women list every year from 1998 onwards.[193] Topsocialite.com listed her as the 8th Sexiest woman of the 90s along with Alicia Silverstone, Gillian Anderson and Shannen Doherty.[194]
She was featured in Google's Top 10 Women Searches of 2002 and 2003, coming in at No. 8,[195] and was included in UK Channel 4's 100 Greatest Sex Symbols in 2007, ranking at No. 16.[196] Other appearances and listings include: Entertainment Weekly ranked her in its Top 100 TV Icons in 2007, and placed her No. 3 in its Top 12 Entertainers of the Year in 1998, and Glamour ranked her in its 50 Best Dressed Women in the World 2004 and 2005 at Nos. 17 and 24, respectively.[193] BuddyTV ranked her No. 27 on TV's 100 Sexiest Women of 2011 list, as well.[197]
She has appeared in "Got Milk?" ads as well as in the Stone Temple Pilots music video "Sour Girl" and Marcy Playground's "Comin' Up From Behind".[198][199][200] Gellar was featured on the cover of Gotham and their main story in the March 2008 issue, in which she spoke about how her style has evolved since she passed 30. Gellar said: "It sounds clichéd, but when women turn 30, they find themselves. You become more comfortable in your own skin. Last night on Letterman, I wore this skintight Herve Leger dress. Two years ago, three years ago? I would never have worn it."[201]
Other endeavors [ edit ]
Charitable activities [ edit ]
Gellar is an active advocate for various charities, including breast cancer research, Project Angel Food, Habitat for Humanity and CARE. Of her charitable pursuits, she says, "I started because my mother taught me a long time ago that even when you have nothing, there's ways to give back. And what you get in return for that is tenfold. But it was always hard because I couldn't do a lot. I couldn't do much more than just donate money when I was on [Buffy] because there wasn't time. And now that I have the time, it's amazing."[202]
In 1999, she went to the Dominican Republic to help Habitat for Humanity's project of building homes for the residents;[3] Gellar recalled in an interview she had worked with the cause a lot, explaining: "You actually get to physically do something, where you get to go and build these houses. I like working with things where you can directly affect someone in particular".[202] With Project Angel Food, she delivered healthy meals to people infected with AIDS, and through the Make-A-Wish Foundation, she granted sick children's wishes of meeting her while working on Buffy.[202] In 2007, Gellar was featured in Vaseline's "Skin Is Amazing" campaign, with other actors such as Hilary Duff, Amanda Bynes and John Leguizamo.[203] She agreed to auction nude-posed photos of herself on eBay, to raise money for the Coalition of Skin Diseases, an organization which supports clinical research, fosters physician and patient education.[204][205]
In May 2011, Gellar joined "The Nestlé Share the Joy of Reading Program", which promotes reading to young children to encourage them to read during the summer break.[206][207] The following year, she was presented with the Tom Mankiewicz Leadership Award during the Beastly Ball at the Los Angeles Zoo.[208] The honor recognizes members of the entertainment community who have excelled in establishing meaningful and lasting programs that contribute to the welfare of the world's natural and civic environment.[209] In 2014 and 2015, Gellar hosted two fundraisers for Mattel Children's Hospital UCLA.[210][211][212]
Foodstirs [ edit ]
In October 2015, Gellar co-founded Foodstirs with entrepreneurs Galit Laibow and Greg Fleishman. Foodstirs is a startup food crafting brand selling via e-commerce and retail easy to make organic baking mixes and kits for families.[8] By the beginning of 2017, Foodstirs products were available in about 400 stores; by the end of the year a surge of interest from retailers increased its distribution to 8,000 stores. In 2018, the brand entered into a deal with Starbucks to carry Foodstirs mug cake mixes across 8,000 of its stores.[213]
Cook book [ edit ]
Gellar released a cook book titled Stirring up Fun with Food on April 18, 2017. The book was co-authored by Gia Russo, and features numerous food crafting ideas.[214]
Personal life [ edit ]
Gellar met her future husband Freddie Prinze Jr., while they were filming the 1997 teen horror film I Know What You Did Last Summer,[215] but the two did not begin dating until 2000. They were engaged in April 2001 and married in Mexico on September 1, 2002,[216] in a ceremony officiated by Adam Shankman, a director and choreographer with whom Gellar had worked on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Prinze and Gellar have worked together several times; they played each other's respective love interests as Fred and Daphne in the 2002 film Scooby-Doo and its sequel, Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed, and both provided their voices for the animated feature Happily N'Ever After (2007) and the animated series Star Wars Rebels.[217] In 2007, in honor of their fifth year of marriage, Gellar legally changed her name to Sarah Michelle Prinze.[2][3]
Together, Gellar and Prinze have two children, a daughter born September 2009 and a son born September 2012.[218][219] The family lives in Los Angeles.[220]
Filmography [ edit ]
Film [ edit ]
Television [ edit ]
Other works [ edit ]
Awards and nominations [ edit ] |
WASHINGTON — The joke about social media is that Twitter is where we tell the truth to strangers and Facebook is where we lie to our friends.
This week, though, Facebook came through as a forum for truth as women across the country unspooled their tales of sexual harassment and abuse under the #MeToo hashtag — and the movement is already having real-world consequences.
It was popularized by a post on Twitter from Alyssa Milano, but then it spread — and spread and spread — as women considered their own lives. They talked to their sisters and their mothers and their roommates and their friends. They saw the words of acquaintances and professional heroes and the whole vast network of thin relationships and mustered up their courage and decided, yes, this time I will speak up, even if only to cut and paste the #MeToo language that was going viral, without any details.
Me too.
If all the women who have been sexually harassed or assaulted wrote “Me too.” as a status, we might give people a sense of the magnitude of the problem.
Please copy/paste.
Within the first 24 hours of the hashtag, there were more than 12 million posts, comments and reactions from 4.7 million people, according to Facebook — and more than 45 percent of Facebook users in the U.S. were friends with someone who had posted, “Me Too.” Though the company said it does not have more recent data, there’s not question the ultimate reach of the hashtag was even larger, as fresh posts continued to appear well into Thursday.
Alyssa Milano at a pre-Emmys party in September. (Photo: Neilson Barnard/Getty Images for Entertainment Weekly) More
And with #MeToo, a company under siege for its missteps on undisclosed Russian campaign advertising and content-neutral help for controversial social activists emerged as the platform for the latest twist in a women’s uprising that went mainstream with the marches in January.
Call it the ultimate Lean In Circle. “Women accomplish amazing things when we support each other,” reads the tagline for the small peer groups envisioned by Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg that are a cross between 1960s consciousness-raising gatherings and 1720s mutual improvement clubs.
Now that supportive consciousness-raising has moved back online, validated with hearts and angry and sad face emoticons, in a textbook example of what Facebook can be used for when it’s working right.
While Twitter reported more than 1.2 million tweets using the hashtag #MeToo between Sunday at noon and Wednesday at noon — and that’s not even counting retweets or non-hashtag mentions of “me too”— the Facebook conversation is what has made this moment so powerful.
And while some have criticized it as just another blip in the viral outrage factory, of sparking acts of performative allyship from men wanting to be seen as supportive and coercive confessions from women who might otherwise prefer to be silent, it has begun to have real consequences offline.
For the first time ever, there is a real solidarity around these questions. Not a performative solidarity — thought that certainly exists — but the real solidarity that comes from hearing the stories of your real-life friends. Men are chiming in in shock, wondering what to do. And women are learning things about their female friends, their colleagues, even their relatives, they did not know before.
Slideshow: Women’s March on Washington D.C. >>> |
LA take Cali Clasico Cup
Gyasi Zardes connected with forward partner Robbie Keane to score his first preseason goal in the 27th minute as the LA Galaxy beat the San Jose Earthquakes in a preseason edition of the California Clasico in Las Vegas.
Quakes goalkeeper David Bingham played the entire match and made two big saves in the match, one in each half.
LA Galaxy (4-4-2): Dan Kennedy -- Robbie Rogers (Oscar Sorto 76'), Daniel Steres (Dan Gargan 81'), Jelle Van Damme (David Romney 46'), Ashley Cole (Josh Turnley 71') -- Giovani Dos Santos (Jose Villarreal 76'), Nigel de Jong (Baggio Husidic 54'), Steven Gerrard (Rafa Garcia 81'), Emmanuel Boateng (Sebastian Lletget 61') -- Robbie Keane (Ariel Lassiter 81'), Gyasi Zardes (Mike Magee 64')
San Jose Earthquakes (4-4-2): David Bingham -- Marvell Wynne (Kip Colvey 62'), Victor Bernardez (Matheus Silva 62'), Clarence Goodson (JJ Koval 62'), Shaun Francis (Andres Imperiale 62') -- Shea Salinas (Innocent Emeghara 62'), Anibal Godoy (Adam Jahn 70'), Simon Dawkins (Matias Perez Garcia 62'), Cordell Cato (Tommy Thompson 62') -- Quincy Amarikwa (Mark Sherrod 62'), Chris Wondolowski (Chad Barrett 62') |
USA: Police State
PrisonPlanet
Loss of basic freedoms has spurred a mass awakening, next decade will be defined by restoration of liberties
During the first nine years of the new millennium we have been witness to a rapid erosion of freedom. Our basic liberties have been systematically denigrated and diluted by a vast expansion of coordinated global tyranny.
The decade is not over yet, there is still another year to go, however, given that the mainstream media is obsessively compiling it’s own decade lists, we felt it necessary to draw up our own to highlight the major events that have shaped the world we now live in and the future we face.
It is important to stress the fact that while we have indeed experienced a decade of tyranny, we have also seen a mass awakening, an expansion of knowledge and an exponential increase in opposition to the agenda we have come to know as the new world order.
Here in chronological order, follow’s Prisonplanet.com’s defining moments of the decade.
2001 – 9/11
9/11 was the precursor for everything that followed during the decade of tyranny. The immediate invasion of Afghanistan saw the U.S. go to war without a formal declaration.
The passage of the USA PATRIOT Act overnight, with members of Congress not even being afforded time to read it, paved the way for a decade of freedom stripping government legislation.
The expansion of the phony war on terror as justification for big government, a domestic police state and an interventionist foreign policy also stemmed directly from 9/11.
Over the past decade we have ceaselessly exposed the lies behind 9/11. We have seen the 9/11 truth movement blossom from the efforts of a select few individuals to encompass the work of thousands.
While there is no doubt 9/11 is the decade of tyranny’s defining moment, exposing the truth behind it has also led to to an equally influential awakening that is still ongoing.
2002 – Creation Of The Department of Homeland Security
The fallout of 9/11 led to a re-alignment of power in the U.S., with the shadow government stepping out into the open and implementing elements of a long term agenda to subvert Constitutional freedom.
After the passage of the PATRIOT Act in late 2001, the next major step toward tyranny came with the expansion of the federal government through the creation of the DHS.
The DHS has played the role of the domestic police state enforcer agency, encompassing every major law enforcement agency in the nation under one single office.
With multiple subsequent reports and video productions fingering the American people as potential terrorists, the Orwellian titled agency has proven it has nothing to do with security and everything to do with limiting the freedoms of people all over the country.
2003 – Invasion Of Iraq
The March 2003 invasion of Iraq was a war based on a mountain of lies and deceit, and yet at the time the public swallowed the propaganda with wanton bloodlust. The constant invocation of a link between 9/11 and Saddam Hussein was repeatedly debunked both before and after the invasion, but the course for war was set.
The invasion was an illegal attack based on a wholly contrived pretext and the war was not approved by Congress. This set the precedent for unconstitutional global pre-emptive strikes in the name of the war on terror. Conservative estimates put the death told as a result of the invasion at around 655,000, but this number is far higher when the previous years sanctions are taken into account. Upon U.S. occupation of the country, Iraq was turned into one giant gulag, with hundreds of thousands detained and held in internment camps for the most menial offenses.
The occupation of Iraq provided the opportunity to build hundreds of military bases to be used as launch pads for future pre-emptive wars in the key geopolitical region of the Middle East.
2004 – The Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal
The Abu Ghraib torture scandal was shocking for two primary reasons. The first being the treatment of the prisoners themselves, the vast majority of whom were innocents caught up in random sweeps who had nothing to do with insurgents or terrorism whatsoever. However, the photographs that were broadcast around the world only scratched the surface of the the true horror of what happened not just at Abu Ghraib, but what happened and continues to occur at dozens of U.S. torture camps around the world where suspects are illegally kidnapped and imprisoned on a whim via a process euphemistically labeled “rendition”.
The second most disturbing aspect to the story was how the media covered it and how the public’s reaction was carefully manipulated. By only showing the most mild examples of torture, which in reality were disgusting but to a public immersed in violent movies and television were seen as tame, the true depth of the scandal, as revealed in the Taguba military report, was disguised. Abu Ghraib was also about inoculating the public against the idea that torture was something only history’s despotic regimes engaged in. To many who have been completely brainwashed by this tyranny – torture is now as American as Mom and apple pie.
Low-level culprits in the scandal were burned while their superiors who ordered them to torture in complete violation of both the U.S. constitution and the Geneva Conventions were protected by the Bush administration and continue to be protected by Obama who has failed to fulfil his election promise that they would be prosecuted and that similar detention sites like Guantanamo Bay would be closed.
2005 – Hurricane Katrina Fallout
The disaster in New Orleans provided the federal government with the perfect opportunity to wargame a martial law takeover.
Emergency preparedness legislation and FEMA executive orders that have been in effect for decades, were suddenly put into use at the expense of basic freedoms.
The Posse Comitatus Act was overturned as active duty military paraded the streets and aided police in confiscating firearms and implementing mandatory evacuation orders.
The precedent has now been set for natural disasters to constitute broad sweeping changes to ancient laws and rights, overturning and replacing basic liberties with repressive mechanisms of government control.
2006 – Liquid Bombing Scam
The biggest story of 2006 was undoubtedly the staged liquid bomb plot, which led to tighter restrictions on carrying fluids aboard airliners and heralded a new wave of invasive technologies to be implemented in airports and eventually introduced on a day-to-day basis.
Despite the fact that the alleged terrorists involved in the plot to explode multiple airliners were closely tracked for months beforehand, added to the fact that they didn’t have flight tickets or even passports, it was announced on August 10th that authorities had busted the plot amidst a wave of propaganda about continuing the war on terror, similar to what we are hearing in the aftermath of the Christmas Day bombing attempt.
According to news reports the British government and MI5 wanted to wait at least a week before busting the liquid terror cell that their agents had fully infiltrated, including planting a mole within the bomb squad. From the acknowledged timeline and admission that the real attack was scheduled for August 16th – little else can be deduced but the shocking fact that MI5 wanted the bombings to go forward – arresting the perpetrators only after the attack.
A deluge of fearmongering and paranoia ensued, with ridiculous measures hastily enforced in airports which remain with us to this day, such as mothers being forced to drink their own bottled breast milk to prove it is not an explosive liquid.
2007 – Ron Paul Revolution, The Rise Of The Resistance
After years of endless war, economic decline and suppression of basic freedoms, 2007 saw a mobilization of resistance amid a clamor for change.
With a presidential election looming, Congressman Ron Paul, a public representative with an immaculate record, emerged as an icon of counteraction against the growth of big government and the erosion of liberty.
Beginning as an underground phenomenon driven by grassroots activists, the Ron Paul Revolution soon became a mainstream talking point and the Congressman was propelled to the forefront of the debate over America’s future.
Of course, big money and the monopoly of power eventually won out, so the 2008 election saw a new new world order puppet installed in the shape of Barack Obama.
However, Ron Paul’s incredible efforts throughout 2007 and 2008 during his presidential campaign provided a platform for the restoration of liberty and proved that the electoral process has not been completely usurped by those who have shown they have no allegiance to we the people.
2008 – The Bailout Heist
In October 2008, the central banks that own the U.S. government set the course for the most egregious looting of the American public in history with the passage of the TARP “bailout” legislation.
The bailout merely increased the severity of the financial downturn and allowed the same elite to exploit the crisis as a pretext for centralizing control of the world economic system and creating a new world order and a single global currency.
Henry Paulson, one of the chief architects of the bailout and the man who committed financial terrorism by threatening the Congress with martial law and food riots if they didn’t pass the initial TARP package, brazenly pocketed $200 million in Goldman Sachs profits tax free while handing out billions in ill-gotten gains to his bankster buddies, all this after he pulled a bait and switch by changing the entire focus of the bailout from buying up toxic debt to giving money directly to financial institutions.
Following the election of Barack Obama in November 2008, the new President’s actions made it abundantly clear that he would pick up where the Bush administration left off, increasing the looting exponentially to a figure well over $24 trillion by the latest estimates, which don’t even account for the last 6 months.
2009 – Acceleration of World Government
2009 represents the year that the agenda for a world government was both openly announced and the acceleration of its implementation reached breakneck speed as globalists exploited both the engineered financial crisis and the contrived global warming scam to move to finalize total dictatorial control over the planet.
In an October New York Times editorial entitled “We Can Do It,” Ki-moon wrote that efforts to impose restrictions on CO2 emissions “Must include an equitable global governance structure.”
New EU President Herman Van Rompuy said in a December press conference that the Copenhagen conference was, “The first step towards the global management of our planet.”
Similarly, Al Gore said in a speech earlier this year that attempts to regulate CO2 emissions would be driven through “global governance and global agreements.”
Although it failed to ram through a large portion of the global government agenda, the Copenhagen agreement laid the foundation for the introduction of a global transaction tax which would be paid to the World Bank, representing a massive transfer of wealth to the new world government now being primed for total takeover.
Ten years ago, people who warned about a coming new world order bossed by a global government were called paranoid conspiracy theorists. Is the march towards a one world government still a conspiracy theory, even as its architects openly announce its implementation?
The Decade of Freedom?
The battle between tyranny and freedom is a long term game of brinkmanship, however, as we move into 2010, we are reaching a crucial time in modern history. Humanity must decide whether to engage in a battle for freedom or accept a future under the rule of tyranny. |
News in Science
Fast-flowing gas curtails black hole growth
Galaxy sheild Astronomers have discovered a powerful gas stream that limits how big a black hole can grow, preventing it from growing faster than the galaxy around it.
The discovery, reported today in Science, is the first direct evidence of a high-speed gas stream that blocks X-rays.
Scientists have hypothesised that the growth of a black hole could be limited by some kind of wind from the black hole itself, which would blow material away before it can fall into the black hole.
But the wind can only be generated if it is shielded from X-ray radiation coming from the black hole itself.
"This observation identifies one of the mechanisms that you need to develop these high velocity winds that expel the gas," says one of the study's authors, Associate Professor Jerry Kriss of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore Maryland.
"This is good evidence for a mechanism that regulates the growth of a black hole and the growth of its host galaxy."
Self regulation
As matter spirals into a black hole, the in-falling material forms an accretion disk where it's crushed and ripped apart, releasing huge amounts of radiation including ultraviolet light and X-rays, which signal that the black hole has become active.
The ultraviolet radiation can generate powerful winds exceeding 1000 kilometres per second, which can blow away in-falling material, slowing down or even cutting off the black hole's food supply.
These winds can be strong enough to blow gas out of the galaxy, preventing the formation of new stars and limiting the galaxy's size.
While studying the spiral galaxy NGC-5548, located 245 million light years away in the northern sky constellation Bootes, Kriss and colleagues noticed a prolonged dimming of the galaxy's nucleus, with soft X-ray emissions becoming 25 times weaker than previously observed.
The authors discovered the dimming was caused by a large clumpy stream of gas travelling at 5000 kilometres per second, acting like a shield to absorb 90 per cent of X-rays.
"The cloud must be fairly large because it's still going on now and we first had inklings of this last June," says Kriss.
"There's archival data that something's been going on there since at least 2011."
The stream's location, only a few light days away from the galaxy's nucleus, implies it may come from the disk surrounding the black hole.
This finding could also provide clues about the workings of quasars, powerful energy beams produced by supermassive black holes, and which are among the most distant objects in the visible universe. |
In the spirit of NaNoWriMo, this week's post is a short story. PDF available.
Transmission
Nate Soares
6h41 before transmission
First officer Selena Howell fought her way through thick layers of mute confusion. She couldn't form coherent thoughts, but already something in her registered the pounding of the alarms. She struggled towards consciousness.
Her heart shuddered in her chest, twitching in wake of the shock that had spurred it back to life. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears, faster than the wailing of the sirens. Every limb spasmed, the deep chill receding as blood flowed through her veins for the first time in a hundred years.
Wake up.
The memory of her final briefing unspooled in her mind. As soon as you awaken, begin your relaxation routine. The calmer you are, the easier it will be to reintigrate. Sympathetic nervous system arousal can interfere with the process and prolong the symptoms of waking sickness. Try not to panic; everything's going to be fine. A few subjective minutes ago, she'd gone to sleep believing those platitudes. Now she awoke to a disaster.
Selena focused on her breathing and tried to slow her frantic pulse. It was no use. The sirens beat against the inside of her skull, filling her mind with nightmare scenarios. A hull breach, vital atmosphere hissing out into the soundless velvet night. A gravitational slingshot gone wrong, the Front Line tumbling into a blazing star. A power failure in the cargo hold and a thousand frozen people slowly thawing, dying. The alarms pulsed, promising catastrophe, revealing nothing. She needed more information.
She chewed on a tongue that felt like leather, letting the saliva gather in her mouth. She tried to spit and failed, uncooperative lips producing only a dribble of drool. It went right, drawn across her cheek by a soft but steady pull.
Deceleration. They must be close.
The wailing went on, and she strained against the bonds that held her wrists, her ankles, and her newly reconstructed head. At long last, her eyelids fluttered open, and the image of frosted glass registered in her sluggish brain. She forced herself to hold still as the cryotube plodded through its routine checks, unconcerned with the emergency unfolding beyond. No one had seen fit to program in a sense of urgency, and if the machine cared about the sirens, it was only through the increase in her blood pressure.
The minutes stretched out like decades until finally the pane cracked open with a hiss, the restraints pulling back into their compartments. She was out of the cryotube in seconds, ignoring the calm, recorded voice suggesting she relax and rise slowly.
Her feet slipped on the rungs of the ladder, and her knees buckled as she hit the ground with a thump, surprised by the strength of the gravity caused by the ship's deceleration. Pins and needles screamed across her whole body as she forced herself into a run, bare feet slapping against cold metal. At least the metal wasn't hot—they weren't tumbling into a star or burning through an atmosphere.
She stumbled and slammed into the bulkhead, a wave of nausea washing through her and culminating in an empty retch. Dizzy, she slid along the wall, using it to keep herself upright as she made her way to the nearest console.
…disequilibrium, loss of fine motor control, weakness or fever symptoms, reduced reaction time…
She mashed her uncooperative fingers against the keyboard a dozen times before the numbness began to recede, and even then it took her four tries to enter the correct password. One desperate minute later, she had the system fully online and was able to silence the alarms, filling the hallway with blessed silence.
Still shaky, but growing steadier with every step, Selena descended to the bridge and checked the ship's vitals.
No hull breach. No battery leak. All cryobanks stable.
She sagged with relief. The Front Line was still on course, if a few months behind schedule. The logs showed that the ship had been forced to avoid a stellar storm during the gravitational slingshot around Luyten 726-8. The diversion had left them on a slower approach.
After completing her overview, she opened the alert itself. There was nothing to see except a message, addressed to Captain Robins, sender unspecified. She didn't know whether to laugh or cry. They woke her up early from cyrosleep just to read an email.
Selena entered her password—first try, this time—and accessed the contents of the message. Whatever this was, it had been coded to set off the ship's alarms, wake her and the captain from cryosleep, and demand priority attention. Protocol suggested that she wait for the captain, but didn't require it.
She began reading. Halfway through, her heart began to race again.
Captain Emily Robins drifted in and out of consciousness, dreams of klaxons brushing up against a warm voice that told her to relax and rise slowly. She felt a tingling in her arms and legs, and when her eyes opened, all was quiet.
After a few leisurely minutes she sat up, still in a daze as her thoughts picked up momentum. It took a while for her legs to feel they belonged to her again, and she waited another handful of heartbeats to be sure before she tried mounting the ladder.
The descent left Emily feeling slightly queasy, and she paused at the bottom, focusing on her breathing and soothing her ruffled nerves. Taking a step, she realized that she was standing on the ceiling. She shook her head, disoriented.
They must be decelerating, she realized, after a moment's thought. She looked up at her cryotube, mounted horizontally on the wall, a second ladder stretching away to what had been the floor when she'd gone to sleep what felt like ten minutes ago. Another blush of nausea bloomed in her midsection, and she sat down. Something wasn't right—she wasn't supposed to be woken up until after the landing.
Thoughts still fuzzy, she rose and pulled her uniform, upside down, from a sealed sliding chamber behind the ladder. She shook her head, as if to clear the lingering frost, and donned the ancient clothing. Catching a glimpse of herself in the polished steel of the bulkhead, she paused again, the reality of the situation finally sinking in.
It had worked. Her face broke into a broad grin, and she laughed, giddy. It had worked! The risks, the tests, the endless nights of studying, the competition, —it had all paid off, or would soon. One hundred years ago, they had suspended her. Now here she stood, alive again, in the depths of space, leading humanity into its next adventure.
The Front Line was humanity's first and only colony ship, but she held within her the capability to build a hundred more. Beneath the humming deck plates at Emily's feet, the cargo holds were stuffed to bursting with machinery—not just computers and scanned minds and cryobanks, but also ore extractors, refineries, and automated factories. They had everything necessary to begin humanity's journey across the galaxy.
She turned her eyes to her reanimated hands and flexed her fingers, tears of pride and wonder pooling in the corners of her eyes as she reveled in the potential of her species, who took their first steps towards the stars, and had no more need for disease and death.
We're almost there, Aiden, she thought. Just a few more—
She frowned, eyes on the chronometer mounted on the wall. Ten minutes ago, when she'd gone to sleep, the numbers had been steady and green, counting down from an impossibly high starting point of 35,192 days. Now they were red, flashing, and counting up. 51.2371 days, and then, after a few seconds, 51.2372, then 51.2373.
She hadn't been woken up early. She'd been woken up late.
A flutter ran through her stomach as she remembered the sirens in her dream. Her mind churned out a string of possible explanations, all terrible. Shaking her head, she straightened her shoulders, composing herself. She was the captain, after all.
First Officer Howell's cryotube was already vacant—Selena must be awake. It was just like Selena to charge straight ahead before she finished fully waking. She was a fast thinker and a good first officer, but she was reckless. She made mistakes, and mistakes were not something they could afford this far from home.
Emily strode through the corridors and onto the cold metal bridge to find the other woman already at the controls. Selena had not even taken the time to don her uniform. The naked woman sat upright in the pilot's seat, tall and dark, hands flashing on the keyboard, her expression razor-sharp and laser focused. The commander had, no doubt, fired up the control system while still half asleep. Irresponsible, even in an emergency.
"Status?", Emily asked, her voice clear and commanding.
Selena gave no answer. Her eyes flickered over the screen. She flipped a switch and pushed the keyboard aside, grabbing the control column and easing it forward. The deck shuddered beneath Emily's feet and then lurched, throwing Emily to her knees as the direction of gravity shifted. She stood and frowned, suddenly lighter than she had been seconds ago. "Commander, I requested a status update and you will give one to me right now."
The other woman continued to stare down her instruments as she spoke. "Message for you," Selena said, her voice breaking as she pointed at the comm terminal.
"From Earth?" Emily asked, stepping over to the console, cautious. The break in Selena's voice had sent a shiver down her spine.
"No," Selena whispered.
FEDCOM COLONY T1 >>> FRONTLINE CPT ROBINS, EMILY OVERRIDE FLP1 EXISTENTIAL Solar system compromised. Earth destroyed, along with colonies L1, M1, and M2. Ark protocol autoengaged. 203,891,554,520 minds preserved via standard upload. Transmission scheduled pending compression, estimated +7h12 (σ=16min). Software patches for your receiver array already transmitting via EX override; install immediately or you will not have bandwidth to receive. If you have not yet alighted, or if you have not yet deployed your receiver arrays, do so now. We do not anticipate enough time to send this transmission twice.
6h16 before transmission
Emily looked up from the screen. Her mind refused to process the scale of the disaster, which was good—once it really sank in, there would be trouble. "What happened?" she asked.
Selena's hands were on the keyboard again, blurring, making adjustments, crunching numbers. "No idea," she answered. "No anomalous messages in the logs. We got a congratulatory message a few months ago, on the day we were supposed to land, then silence." Selena shot Emily a quick glance, looking almost fearful. "Until this."
Emily's heart raced. A hundred years' worth of messages from Earth—surely, medical science had advanced enough by now to restore even the least healthy of their passengers. Almost there, Aiden. But she couldn't think about that right now. "No news since?"
"Just upgrades for our receiver, streaming in nonstop."
"How far out are we?"
Selena paused, grimacing, squeezing her eyes shut as if to dispel a headache. "Nineteen hours by the original course."
Emily blinked. "That's too long," she said reflexively, knowing it wouldn't help.
"No shit it's too long, Captain," Selena snapped. "Now if you'll shut up and let me focus, I might be able to do something about it."
Emily bristled, but Selena was already continuing, the shudder in the deck plates shifting again as the apparent gravity suddenly died. Emily's stomach lurched as she grabbed onto a handrail, to stop from flying towards the ceiling. The stars outside the viewport shifted as the cockpit swiveled. "The slingshot around L-seven-whatever went wrong," Selena muttered. Her hands shook on the keyboard, and she took a moment to clench and unclench them. "We hit a stellar storm. The Front Line diverted, ended up on a safer but slower approach. We're weeks behind schedule and low on fuel."
"They think we're already on the ground," Emily whispered, her stomach sinking. "How much longer before the minds arrive?"
"Six hours. Seven at best." Her thumb hovered over another button on the control column. "Get ready," she said, pressing it. A dull roar shuddered through the ship, and apparent gravity was restored as the Front Line lurched under foot. Emily barely had time to get her feet under her.
"What are you doing?" she demanded, stepping back to the center of the bridge, where she could look over the first officer's shoulder. Trajectory lines crisscrossed the pilot station's main screen, with calculations and simulations running on all of the ancillary displays.
"I can get us down," Selena said.
Emily's jaw dropped. "You're accelerating us?" she spluttered. "We should be three quarters of the way through decel by now."
"We just began a hard burn. If we sustain it for the next forty-eight minutes, we'll reach orbit in a little over four hours."
"At interstellar speeds, and with no fuel left for a decel. You'll turn us all into a smoking crater!"
"If I hit the planet's gravity well just right —"
"You're going to slam us directly into the planet, and if you don't, then you're going to slingshot us back into space without a drop of fuel left in the tank!"
"I'm telling you, I can do it," Selena snapped. "If we reverse thrust right at the perigee, we can cut our relative velocity enough to make a controlled descent."
Hope sparked in Emily's chest. If there's anybody who can pull off a stunt like that… "Show me," she said.
Selena nodded, directing Emily's attention to the monitors. They tabbed through hasty estimations and crude simulations, Emily struggling to keep up. Selena's notation was unorthodox, her assumptions difficult to pin down. It took nearly ten minutes before she understood what Selena meant to try.
"Selena…," she began, speaking the first officer's name like an apology.
"It's possible!"
"Commander," Emily said, this time with less warmth. She put her hand on the woman's shoulder. Selena brushed it off and turned in the pilot's seat.
"I can do this, Emily."
That's Captain Robins, Emily thought, but she didn't press the point. "Best case, you're looking at twenty gees of force at the perigee, followed by a minimum descent speed of seventy meters per second. Worst case, you're off by an order of magnitude. You will die."
"Thirteen gees for barely more than a second," Selena retorted. "I will pass out, briefly, and then I will wake up, and then I will land this ship."
"You will die," Emily repeated, "and the ship won't do much better. And that's if your calculations are perfect and your piloting is flawless."
Selena unclipped her pilot's straps and stood, turning, jaw set, eyes blazing. "I can do this."
Emily held her gaze for a long moment. "No, Selena, you can't."
"Two hundred billion lives. Run the numbers, captain. You can't possibly think my odds are that low."
"In order for this to work" Emily said gently, pointing at one of the screens, "your first pass around the planet would have to take us within five kilometers of the average estimated surface. If you didn't slam us directly into the face of a mountain, you'd roast us both alive if the atmosphere is even slightly denser than anticipated."
"The aerobraking is part of the solution," Selena insisted. "There are two hundred billion human lives at stake, captain. Two hundred billion!"
"No, Selena," Emily said sadly. "We're twelve light years out. Those people died over a decade ago, when earth was destroyed." She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "The three thousand people on this ship are still alive, and our duty lies with them."
"They're not any more dead than you were half an hour ago," Selena shot back, her voice escalating. "We have the receivers. We have the storage capacity. With the specs that Earth has been beaming us over the last century, we can build the bodies from scratch if we have to. But first we need to save them."
"We also have the only functioning starship," Emily said, keeping her voice as cool and calm as possible, "and the only machinery capable of restoring uploaded minds. We can't risk the final remnant of humanity on a foolish gamble."
In a flash, Selena was out from behind the chair, her hand around Emily's throat as she drove the captain against the bulkhead. "We are not," the first officer growled, "a remnant."
There were tears in Selena's eyes as she relaxed her grip fractionally, speaking through gritted teeth. "My mother is in that transmission. My father. My brother and his children. Everyone we know is in that message, Emily. They're worth saving."
Emily's eyes bored into Selena's as she struggled for air. Somehow, she managed to pour authority into her clipped, breathless words. "Put. Me. Down, commander."
Selena dropped her. Emily straightened, rubbing at her throat as the other woman backed away, naked chest heaving with emotion.
"My son is on this ship," she said, "along with three thousand other people who put their hopes and dreams into our hands. They gave up everything because we promised to bring them to a place of safety, to a fresh start, to a new beginning. We are not going to break that promise." She took a deep breath and straightened out her uniform. "And you, Commander," she said, her voice going cold. "You are not going to touch me again."
"Half of your colonists are sick or senile," Selena spat. She stalked from the captain to the center of the bridge and looked up through the viewport, where a pale red dot hung in the center, flanked by a thousand shining stars. "We were depending upon communication with earth to help us heal them. To upgrade our molecular synthesizers. To give us templates for generating vaccines and antibiotics and retroviral cures. What good is our promise if we've lost the knowledge of humanity?"
"We'll have to hope that some of that knowledge was transmitted over the last century," Emily said. "As for the rest…" she shook her head. "What is lost is lost." She shrugged, voice suddenly weary. "We'll find a way. Many people on this ship will die, yes. But enough will live. Humanity will survive." Stepping up to the pilot's console, Emily keyed in the commands that would shut down the hard burn. Selena made no move to stop her. A few seconds later, the pressure beneath their feet halved, then halved again, until a gentle push from their toes was enough to send them floating a dozen centimeters into the air. "Where there's life, there's hope."
"You're dooming them all," Selena whispered, still staring up through the viewport, floating listlessly.
Emily steeled herself.
"Two hundred billion," Selena said sadly. "Ninety nine point nine nine nine nine nine nine percent mortality rate, when we've had the technology to cheat death for over a century."
Emily said nothing.
"No. My odds aren't that low, captain. One in a hundred. Maybe one in a thousand. But not one in a million." She took a deep breath, centering herself. "I have to take this shot."
The captain rubbed her temples, feeling the weight of impossible responsibility on her shoulders. "It's not about the odds of saving lives, officer. It's about the odds of saving our species."
Selena was shaking her head.
"It's about the odds of there being anyone at all left tomorrow. Right now, we can all but guarantee that three thousand human beings will wake up on Durre Menthor V in a bit over twenty hours."
"At the cost of every other human being born in the past one hundred and twenty years."
"It's my call, Commander. You are hereby ordered to return us to our original flight path, or plot a new one with a similar approach and landing solution."
Selena pushed herself back towards the pilot seat. "No. I'm sorry, Emily."
"I am the captain of this ship," Emily reminded her.
"Emily," Selena said, her voice the softest it had been since they woke. "You are my friend. You are my teacher. If we make it to the surface, there is no better person to make this colony work. But your captaincy is political. You were never meant to be awake during flight. You don't know how to fly the Front Line, and you have no one to enforce your orders." She strapped herself into the pilot's seat. "Even if you did, there is no rank high enough to grant you the power of life or death over our entire species."
She turned back to the control panel and reignited the burn. The deck plates began to shudder as gravity was restored. Emily collected herself and strode to the pilot's seat, jaw set, eyes blazing. "Selena," she demanded, with all the authority she could muster, "it is not worth the risk."
Selena focused on the controls. Emily turned to one of the ancillary terminals and began keying in an override. Selena unclipped herself slowly and stood, drawing herself to her full height. She put one hand on the captain's shoulder and spun the woman around.
Emily turned, staring up, and brushed the hand off her shoulder. "I outrank you, commander. I'll shut this ship down if I have to. Return us to our original flight plan."
Selena held the captain's gaze for a long time, eyes cold and hard. "Get off the bridge, captain. I relieve you of command."
Emily dove for the control column. Selena caught her by the upper arm and yanked, tossing the captain to the floor. Her eyes blazed. Emily tried to stand, but Selena put a bare foot on her chest, pinning her to the deck.
The larger woman bent down, locking gaze. When she spoke, her voice was frigid, but calm. "Your thinking is clouded, captain. Your son is on this ship, and it's influencing your judgement. This colony was not intended to survive without assistance from Earth. And even if it could, would you have us face whatever it was that they faced alone? Have us walk blind into whatever it was that they couldn't handle?"
She took her foot off the captain's chest, letting her stand, and placed a finger on the center of her chest in warning, eyes still cold. "They need us, and we need them. I'm going to try to save them, captain. If you try to stop me by shutting this ship down, then I am going to break your wrists and land anyway, and the only thing you will achieve is lowering the odds." With that she turned back to the pilot's seat, uncompromising.
Emily shivered, feeling very small.
Clearly, there was no reasoning with her. "There's got to be another way," she muttered.
"There's got to be another way," she said louder, as Selena strapped herself in, barely listening. Emily's mind whirled, searching for a path they hadn't seen yet, as Selena added thrust to the burn. The apparent gravity increased, as the commander prepared to dash humanity's final hope.
"Wait!" she cried, a half-formed idea surging to the front of her thoughts. Selena spared her a glance, and Emily scrambled to find the right words. "We can set up the receiver arrays now. Catch the minds in-flight."
"Front Line's cargo doors don't open in space." Selena turned back to the controls.
"We'll deploy them inside."
"No room. We're packed to the brim."
"No we're not," Emily said, mind scrambling to find a way to make the words true, and finding one against all odds. "No, we aren't. The fuel is mostly spent! The fuel tanks were designed to be repurposed as planetside shelter. We can deploy the receiver arrays there."
Selena looked over her shoulder again, and paused. "Too small."
"The fuel tanks are enormous. And if they can't fit all the arrays, then, well, catching half the transmission is better than slamming ourselves into the side of a planet."
A hint of doubt flashed across Selena's face.
"We'll make it work." Emily pressed her advantage. "Look, I know it's risky, but the odds are better than your suicide run. And if we fail, humanity survives. It will be hard without help from Earth, Selena, but it won't be hopeless."
Selena thought for a long moment. Finally, she canceled the burn. "All right," she said, releasing the control column. "But you get one shot. And if this doesn't work, we're doing things my way."
"It will work," Emily declared as the acceleration died, pouring every scrap of faith and confidence she had into her voice. Everything depended on this working. "It will work."
Selena pushed herself up from the chair and launched herself towards the hallway without a word, heading for the cargo hold. The moment she was out of sight, Emily collapsed in on herself, shivering violently.
We'll make it through this, Aiden. I'll wake you up, I promise. And humanity will go on.
A few moments later, she composed herself and followed, her hands trembling as she took a single, brief detour to pull a knife from the emergency kit and tuck it into the pocket of her uniform.
4h25 before transmission
Servos whirred as the receiver array began the deployment sequence in a dark and empty fuel tank. Selena watched in her pressure suit, standing at ease. They had passed the first three hurdles without trouble. Extracting the folded arrays from the cargo hold had been tedious but not strenuous in the microgravity. Emily had successfully overridden the safety mechanisms that prevented the arrays from deploying inside. Selena had disabled the massive pylons that would have shot their way through the ship's hull, thinking to anchor the array in extraterrestrial soil. Selena had even grudgingly agreed to use a deceleration instead of an acceleration in order to provide the artificial gravity necessary to simulate the conditions that the array was engineered to deploy under.
Now the only question was whether they had enough space.
The great central column of the receiver array telescoped upwards with a whine. At the top, the massive core began to open, the shell splitting to reveal the delicate, intricate petals within as they prepared to bloom. Selena glanced up at the hull towering above, held together by steel buttresses. The fuel tanks were larger than Selena remembered, and her optimism was growing.
This just might work.
But the main column just kept rising, too far. Then the petals unfurled with startling speed, larger than life, too close to the ceiling, and the only possible outcome from this folly became starkly clear.
"No no no no no!" Emily's cries of horror rang through the hollow tank in anticipation, as the edges of the unfolding dish shot straight towards the hull. Selena couldn't bring herself to tear her eyes away as the delicate petals slammed against the thick metal and began to crumple, still unfurling, crushing more and more of their fine structure into unrelenting walls, breaking like a wave upon the rocks.
Metal whined, and the array's main column buckled under the strain, listing sideways. Selena tore her eyes away from the screeching destruction and strode back towards the bridge, determination in her step.
Emily pursued. "Wait!" the diminutive woman cried, as the receiver array collapsed, drawing screaming gouges down the ship's hull. "We can partially deploy the next one, we can modify it to—"
Selena spun and found herself shouting. "You already wasted two hours and too much fuel destroying one of our receiver dishes. That's twenty five billion minds you just killed. We have seven receivers left, and less time than we need. So tell me, captain, why should I wait?"
Emily gawked. Selena turned back towards the bridge, increasing her pace, turning her mind to planning the descent, guessing how she'd need to modify the trajectory, preparing herself for the flight of her life. There was no margin for error here.
It really was insane, and she knew it. Even in peak physical condition and a pressure suit, she'd have trouble handling thirteen gees, even for a few hundred milliseconds. And now she might need to handle even more, since they spent so much fuel on Emily's decel. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
But still, she had to try.
She entered the bridge, with Emily in hot pursuit.
"Selena," the captain reasoned, her voice strangely calm, her hand twitching at her side, "You're not gambling our thousands against their billions. Think! You're gambling with the entire future of humanity. If you destroy this ship, we go extinct."
"They have our history, our culture, the entire accumulated knowledge of our people," Selena retorted, voice calm, as if rehearsed. "Do we have any great thinkers, here? Any great philosophers? How far do you think we'll get, without their help?" Even as she spoke, she started clearing her mind. "If we don't die cold and alone under a foreign sun, we'll die the same way they did." She climbed into the pilot's seat, focusing. "If I fail here, there is no future for humanity."
"There can be, Selena." She paced back and forth behind the pilot's chair, practically prowling. The defeat and desperation were gone, but there remained a hint of pleading. "There can be us."
Selena fastened the straps.
"You don't have to do this. They're already dead, Selena."
"Not if I have anything to say about it," some part of Selena replied, while the rest of her concentrated. She reached for the control column.
"You don't have anything to say about it," Emily said, hand straying towards one of her pockets. "I am the captain, and you will obey my orders. And I order you to maintain this decel."
Selena cut the deceleration, not caring to check whether Emily had grabbed onto a handrail first. The stars in the viewport spun as the cockpit swiveled.
"Commander," the smaller woman demanded as she lurched, unphased by the loss of gravity, "I have given you an order."
Selena ignored the captain. The tiny woman's eyes grew sad.
"Selena, please. I won't ask you again."
"You had your chance. You failed. Now it's my turn." She had the ship's computer begin the recalculations. "Now get off the bridge and let me fly." Selena's focus was on the monitors as she fired up the engines. Emily's feet thumped as they hit the deck again. Selena didn't even spare her a glance.
"I have to try, Emily," she apologized.
"No, you don't."
Selena felt a cold sharp pain just below her neck. She was already whirling, before her mind fully processed the feeling, before the pain set in. Her hands clawed at the pilot's straps, releasing them. Her right shoulder screamed as Emily stumbled backwards, clutching a bloody knife, eyes wide.
Selena hardly felt herself move. She only felt the small, pale fingers snapping in her hand and heard the clatter of the knife, felt the wet crunch as she slammed Emily's head into the hard metal bulkhead again and again, until the screaming stopped.
Emily's body slid down the wall, leaving a streak of red, blood still pouring from her split scalp. Selena stumbled dazed back to the pilot's seat, hands still dripping, and increased the burn.
23 minutes into transmission
The Front Line fell, tearing itself apart in the heat of re-entry, shedding white-hot debris as it etched a trail of fire into a virgin sky.
Above, two hundred billion minds streamed forever into oblivion. |
How Far is Too Far?: Fortress USC and the Struggle to Keep Students Safe
*For continued coverage of profiling issues around campus please click here and here.
WHEN I BEGAN MY GRAD PROGRAM at USC in 2001, I lived north of campus a few blocks on Hoover Street. As my daylight hours were generally occupied with classes and teaching responsibilities, I tended to get my long-distance runs in well after dark. Instead of being able to clear my head as I did figure-eights around campus and Exposition Park, however, I was often stopped by police who wanted to know what the hell I thought I was doing.
“Don’t you know bad things happen around here?” I was asked when stopped along King Blvd. one night. “There are drug dealers in that house right there,” an officer said, pointing to one of the houses across the street.
“I’m not in the market for any drugs, officer,” I told him.
“You don’t get it,” he said, exasperated. “It isn’t safe around here. This is a bad area. You shouldn’t be here.”
He was wrong. I did get it.
What I got was that USC and those asked to police the area felt that the best way to keep students safe was to warn them against their neighbors and keep them segregated. The less cross-over, the less chance for problems to arise.
The effort to enforce this segregation was multi-fold. My students reported being warned at orientation to be wary of the community — the long-time inhabitants of the neighborhood. Meanwhile, youth from the area who walked on or near the campus were hassled by the police and on-campus security, asked about who they were, where they were headed, and what business they had being there.
Speaking to local youth participating in a walk on and around campus last year, Dyane Pascall, a young African-American resident of the area and Director of Finance and Administration for Community Services Unlimited, recounted that because he and another staff member had been hassled by police so often when walking near USC — not even on campus — they had both decided to alter their routes to avoid the demoralizing aggravation of being constantly stopped.
For some of my (USC) students, the divide seemed unbridgeable. Many regularly bad-mouthed the community: “It’s such a shitty area;” “There’s nothing around here;” and the oddly self/image-conscious, “People look down on USC because it is in such a ghetto-ass neighborhood.”
That certainly wasn’t true of all students. Many took advantage of the opportunities available to get involved in the numerous efforts USC makes to invest in the community, such as helping out at area schools. But, even then, they weren’t always able to translate lessons learned from those experiences to more harmonious living with long-time residents of the area.
When I suggested that a student looking for a summer program abroad begin by practicing his Spanish with his Guatemalan neighbors (whom I had met while doing a photo project), he scoffed at me: That’s ridiculous.
What was he supposed to do, just knock on the door and introduce himself? He preferred to go some place with real culture and real Spanish, he said. What would he talk to them about, anyways? He was sure they would have nothing to say to each other.
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Now, USC has gone even further in reinforcing that divide between students and residents of the area by doing everything but installing a gator-filled moat around the perimeter.
Between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m., access to the campus has been restricted to students, faculty, staff, and their guests, including guests at university events, seven days a week. The 27 access points have been reduced to 8 at night, including two checkpoints at the entrance at Jefferson Blvd. and Trousdale Pkwy, two at the end of Trousdale and Exposition Blvd., two on Figueroa St., and one at the Vermont Ave. entrance. Fencing along Jefferson (ugly chainlink for now) and Exposition (permanent gates), the installation of 38 on-campus security cameras (adding to the 72 cameras already installed around the perimeter of campus), and the positioning of contracted security ambassadors at strategic locations throughout the campus are intended to ensure these checkpoints are respected.
When I stopped by last night, the checkpoints were each manned by two security ambassadors and at least one member of the Department of Public Safety (DPS), all of whom took their jobs very seriously despite the frigid temperatures.
Want to cross through campus on your way home after you get off the Metro at the Expo/USC station at night? Chill on a quiet bench on campus and chat with a friend after catching an evening event across the street at the Natural History or California African American Museums? Or stroll through campus after a late night coffee at one of the cafes along the perimeter?
Sorry, but if you are not a student (or haven’t gotten a student to register you online at visitor.usc.edu), it looks like you are sh*t out of luck. You might even be out of luck on the weekends, too — day or night — unless you are on a guest list for a specific event or there is a public event, such as the Festival of Books.
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These somewhat drastic measures are largely (although, not completely) in response to calls for greater security in the wake of an on-campus shooting outside a party last Halloween. A third-party promoter had advertised at campuses around the city for a costume party thrown by the Black Student Assembly that was meant to be only open to students. A few of the more than 100 non-USC would-be party-goers that had been turned away at the door got into an altercation. Someone pulled out a gun began firing. Four people were wounded, one critically.
Students and parents alike called for greater security measures around campus. Even those that openly worried about the consequences of closing the campus off to the community did seem to agree that increasing security at night was essential. Although the shooting was the first on campus since 1992, the incident followed the April murders of two Chinese graduate students, shot to death while sitting in a car at Raymond Ave. and 27th St. (about a mile from campus), a horrifically senseless event that put everyone on edge.
Some of the new security measures are merited, no doubt, and can have a real impact on student safety. The prohibition of the use of third-party promoters, for example, is intended to ensure that on-campus events are manageable and do not attract non-students. A fingerprint scanning system implemented at on-campus resident halls has made them more secure (although it is annoying to some), significantly reducing property theft from the typical 25 – 30 incidents in a three-week period last semester to just one, according to DPS Chief Captain Carey Drayton. The security ambassadors stationed at numerous corners between Jefferson and Adams since 2009 have also made students (and their parents) feel safer about walking or riding around the neighborhood at night.
But the measures also raise questions about who USC imagines it is protecting itself from and the cost to that community.
The already heavy-handed policing of the area — as far as local youth were concerned — appears to have become even more intense since the shooting of the Chinese grad students and 30 police officers were added to the Southwest Division. Twenty-year old Fidel Delgado, life-long resident of the area, business administration student at LACC, and subject of a series of articles last year reports that officers now regularly pull up alongside him or his friends when they are walking outside to ask if they are on parole or probation before even bothering to ask their names. Some of the youth report being hassled in their own yards, with police pulling up and, without pretense of any niceties, demanding to know if they live there.
Police have even stopped by family gatherings and parties (when spotting a party-goer or two getting air outside) just to ask about who is there and what they are doing, Fidel says. Maybe they are worried about seeing so many Latinos together, he shrugs with a laugh, not sure if he should say that but unable to find any other explanation for the way he and others from his community are being treated.
It’s getting really bad, he mused from behind the counter of the coffee shop where he works, across the street from campus.
Unsettlingly, he and his friends all live well north of Adams Blvd., more than a mile from campus. Which raises questions about just how much of the surrounding area USC feels it has the right to claim as its territory and whether, as it expands, the members of outerlying communities will be made to feel even more unwelcome in their own neighborhoods.
The December approval of the USC Specific Plan gives USC the green light to replace the University Village shopping area with a 35-acre “Village at USC” that will include a pedestrian-friendly mix of shops, restaurants, a grocery store, a hotel, a movie theater, student housing, and academic offices. According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, the project should result in 8,000 in permanent new jobs at the redeveloped complex, at least 30 percent of which will go to local residents.
Much of the drawn-out negotiations between USC and the community about the plan had been dedicated to ensuring local residents and businesses were not pushed out of the area. The community had wanted USC to view them as a partner and an asset, something they appeared to have achieved with the historic agreement. The likelihood that security will continue to be a paramount concern as that project moves forward, however, raises questions about how the university will balance security with openness. Will the placement of student housing within the new village mean that the site will need to be shut off to the community as well?
What are your thoughts about the new measures? Or about what they mean for the future of relations between USC and the community? Student safety is a genuine concern and USC has a duty to protect its students, but is hunkering down in a fortress the right balance between security and openness? I’d say let loose with your thoughts below, but since USC is also looking for your feedback, that might be the best place to voice your approval or concerns. They have set up an online form that allows students, community members, and interested parties to register their thoughts and suggestions. To add your voice to the mix, please click here.
*Many thanks to grad student Brian Hsu, who, concerned about USC shutting itself off to the community, sent the link to the feedback form to us in an email this morning. And to Eric Bruins and Jonathan Weiss for sending along their photos and concerns this past weekend. |
The extremely small endocranial volume (ECV) of LB1, the type specimen of Homo floresiensis , poses a challenge in our understanding of human brain evolution. Some researchers hypothesize dramatic dwarfing of relative brain size from Homo erectus presumably without significant decrease in intellectual function, whereas others expect a lesser degree of brain diminution from a more primitive, small-brained form of hominin currently undocumented in eastern Asia. However, inconsistency in the published ECVs for LB1 (380–430 cc), unclear human intraspecific brain–body size scaling and other uncertainties have hampered elaborative modelling of its brain size reduction. In this study, we accurately determine the ECV of LB1 using high-resolution micro-CT scan. The ECV of LB1 thus measured, 426 cc, is larger than the commonly cited figure in previous studies (400 cc). Coupled with brain–body size correlation in Homo sapiens calculated based on a sample from 20 worldwide modern human populations, we construct new models of the brain size reduction in the evolution of H. floresiensis . The results show a more significant contribution of scaling effect than previously claimed.
1. Introduction
Homo floresiensis is a diminutive, extinct hominin species from the Late Pleistocene of the Flores Island, eastern Indonesia. Since its initial publication [1,2], the extremely small endocranial volume (ECV) for the type specimen, LB1 (approx. 400 cc), which is comparable to Australopithecus, has been a point of intensive debate [1–14]. Two major explanatory hypotheses discussed are (i) H. floresiensis experienced dramatic brain size reduction from the condition of Homo erectus (approx. 1000 cc) on an isolated insular setting, and (ii) the species was derived directly from a more primitive and smaller-brained form such as Homo habilis (approx. 600 cc) or even Australopithecus (approx. 400 cc). Either possibility has major implication. The former implies that insular brain dwarfing to an unparalleled degree has been a significant factor in the hominin evolution on Flores, whereas the latter demands a revision of the current Out of Africa 1 hypothesis, which supposes H. erectus as the first hominin dispersed deep into Eurasia. Some researchers suspect that the LB1 cranium is from a microcephalic modern human, but so far such claims have failed to show a case of modern human patient with overall skeletal characteristics similar to LB1 (reviewed in [15], but see [16]). Although the possibility that LB1 was an archaic hominin individual with microcephaly may not be entirely rejected at the present stage of the research, the robust limb bones, phalanges with osteophytes and signs of healed trauma on the cranial vault and tibia point to an active life rather than a disabled condition in this individual [17].
In order to investigate the actual amount of brain size reduction in H. floresiensis and its evolutionary causes, we first need to know the ECV and body size in H. floresiensis as well as those of its ancestor candidates. Then, we will be able to evaluate proportions of the brain size decrease explained by intraspecific allometric scaling with body size and other factors such as insular dwarfism of the relative brain size. However, presently, there remain several issues to be resolved to discuss this question: (i) inconsistency in the published ECVs for LB1 (380–430 cc: [1,3,6,18]); (ii) uncertain intraspecific brain–body scaling in the extant Homo species, Homo sapiens [19]; (iii) difficulty in estimating brain and body size in fossil hominins, and (iv) lack of our knowledge about possible degree of brain size reduction in insular primate and hominin species. The purposes of this study are to improve the situations of (i) and (ii) for more accurate modelling of possible brain reduction in the evolution of H. floresiensis. Although not only brain size but also neural arrangement and connectivity are important in understanding brain evolution of this species, we here focus on the former as a palaeontologically measureable element.
2. Background and research design
(a) CT-based endocranial volume measurement
Using traditional seed displacement methods, the ECV of LB1 was initially measured as 380 cc [1], whereas Jacob et al. [6] obtained 430 cc after removing some ‘breccia’ from the endocranial surface. Another report is 417 cc which is based on a virtual endocast from CT data taken by a medical CT scanner, with interpolation of missing areas and adjustment of slight taphonomic distortion [3]. Holloway et al. [18] independently examined the medical CT scan. They also found some distortion in the endocranial form, and suggested that the original undistorted endocast was somewhat smaller than 417 cc.
Advances in X-ray CT and computer imaging technology now allow us more accurate measurement of ECV from a fossil skull than has been possible. Still, a CT-based ECV measurement is affected by various types of error. Some are related to the nature of the cranial specimen (missing parts, damages, distortions, sedimentary matrix or adhesive left in the endocranial cavity, etc.), and others owing to calibration of the CT-scan system, scan resolution, artefacts such as beam hardening and methods of segmentation of the endocranium [20–22]. In this study, we attempt to minimize these errors.
We use a new, high-resolution/quality micro-CT scan of the LB1 cranium [23] to measure its ECV. Fortunately, the LB1 cranium is nearly complete with no substantial post-mortem deformation [1,23]. However, there are numerous cracking and small damages to be filled; small patches of sediments are still attached on the endocranial surfaces and these must be removed. The accuracy of ECV measurement in LB1 rests primarily on the accuracy of locating such damages and sediments, as well as that of reconstructing these damages. In order to facilitate such works, we prepared physical replicas (three-dimensional prints) of the virtually sectioned cranium, which enabled us three-dimensional ‘direct’ observation of the endocranial surface topography (figure 1). Figure 1. Physical replicas (three-dimensional prints) of horizontally sectioned cranium of LB1 (a) before and (b) after cleaning and clay-based reconstruction. (Online version in colour.)
(b) Intraspecific brain–body size scaling for Homo sapiens
Martin et al. [7,8] cited values of 0.03–0.17 as intraspecific scaling exponents for H. sapiens when they claimed that the brain of LB1 is far too small to be attributed to intraspecific dwarfism in H. erectus. These figures are from a study on a modern Danish sample [24], and may not be appropriate for this polymorphic and geographically widely distributed species. Brain–body size correlation is normally weak within each regional group of H. sapiens, but becomes higher among the groups [19]. Because we are here dealing with evolution to a new species, we investigate not within- but between-regional group, species-wide trend of H. sapiens by analysing data from various regional samples.
(c) Evolutionary hypotheses
Researchers are debating whether H. floresiensis originated from H. erectus or more primitive forms of African Homo or even Australopithecus (reviewed in [15]). Some studies support the latter view [25,26], although currently we have no evidence for the presence of such primitive hominins in eastern Asia (see additional discussion about this issue in [23]). Recent craniological studies strongly suggest that H. floresiensis evolved from early Indonesian H. erectus from the Early Pleistocene of Java (ECV: approx. 800–1000 cc) [23,27], not from a generalized condition of H. erectus sensu lato represented by the mean of its global sample (ECV: approx. 991 cc) [7–11]. Importantly, this view is compatible with a recent finding that archaic hominins reached Flores by 1.0 Ma [28]. The early Indonesian H. erectus fossil assemblage can be further divided into stratigraphically upper and lower groups, which show significant morphological differences from each other [29,30]. Because the former likely postdate 1.0 Ma [31], the latter, which currently represents the oldest H. erectus assemblage from Java, is a likely ancestor candidate for H. floresiensis.
In this study, we construct models of brain size decrease from H. habilis and early Indonesian H. erectus. We pay particular attention to the latter not only because we believe it plausible, but also because this, the one supposing a dramatic relative brain size reduction, is the most challenging hypothesis in terms of human brain evolution.
3. Material and methods
(a) Endocranial volume calculation
(i) CT scan and three-dimensional prints
ECV measurement was performed based on the serial CT data reconstructed as a 512 × 512 × 593 matrix of isotropic voxels of 0.260 mm size, which was obtained in 2009 by a microfocal X-ray CT system TX225-ACTIS (Tesco Co.), at the University Museum, University of Tokyo [23]. Prior to the scan of the LB1 cranium, the system was calibrated with known size phantoms; linear measurement error in a horizontal plane was less than 0.1 per cent [20], and the error along the vertical axis, which mostly depends on machine accuracy of the specimen stage, was less than 10 μm.
In order to directly observe the endocranial surfaces, we created three-dimensional prints of horizontally sectioned neurocranium (figure 1a), based on the micro-CT scan and using a three-dimensional printer system (EDEN 260, Objet Geometries, MA, USA). Half maximum height (HMH) thresholding between the CT values of air and bone was used for segmentation. Polygon surface models were extracted from the volume data, using the marching cube routine in Analyze v. 8.1 (Mayo Clinic, MN, USA) to generate the three-dimensional prints.
(ii) Preparation, preservation and pathological alteration
The states of endocranial preservation and morphology were inspected based on the CT imagery, original specimen (from the anatomical foramina and holes caused by damages) and the horizontally sectioned three-dimensional prints (see the electronic supplementary material, figure S1 and text S1). On the endocranial surfaces of LB1, relatively large pieces of the bone are missing at the endobregma, left orbital surface, much of the sphenoid lesser wings including the anterior clinoid processes, right sphenosquamous suture, dorsum sellae, the anterior tip of right petrous and right sigmoid sinus. Otherwise, the endocranial surfaces of LB1 are well preserved, with some regions still covered by minute lumps or thin patches of sediments. The reconstructed alignment of the bones is also good [1,23]. Some parts of the bones are slightly dislocated inward owing to minor cracking inside the bone, but their effects on the ECV appear to be negligible. One small but noticeable distortion lies in the right petrous bone, but we left this distortion uncorrected because it would not significantly affect the ECV (see the electronic supplementary material, figure S1d).
Pathological alteration of endocranial bones, if present, may affect the ECV as a measure of the brain volume. Vannucci et al. [16] suggested that the LB1 brain was pathological showing (i) ‘very prominent gyri recti of the frontal lobes, suggestive of microgyria’, (ii) ‘asymmetry of the temporal lobes, the left appearing abnormally small on the lateral surface’ and (iii) ‘a keel-like dorsal expansion of the lower brain-stem’. Falk et al. [3,5] view the character (i) as a non-pathological, derived feature in H. floresiensis. The character (ii) may be ascribed to deformational plagiocephaly [17,32], and (iii) are not evident in our virtual endocast. In either case, these reflect aspects of the brain substance that should be included in ECV measurement.
Along the sagittal suture and around the vertex of the LB1 cranium, a relatively large area of the inner parietal bone surface (40 mm anteroposteriorly and 25 mm transversely) is depressed approximately 3 mm superiorly (evident in figure 2). No signs of bone fracture are evident, and the three-layer structure of the cranial bone (inner and outer tables, and diploe) appears to remain undisturbed in the CT sections, indicating that the depression was present when this individual was alive. Because depressions similar to this were also observed in a few modern human skulls, we decided to include the space for the endocranial depression (approx. 1.7 cc) in our ECV measurement. Figure 2. Virtual endocast of LB1 showing reconstructed areas. Anterior, posterior, right lateral, left lateral, basal and superior views (clockwise). Grey, intact original bone surface (untreated); light blue, clay reconstruction of relatively simple surfaces; blue, clay reconstruction of relatively complex structures (with minute digital correction when necessary); orange, anatomical foramina, and cracks and other damages treated digitally. See text for methodological details.
(iii) Reconstruction of the endocast and its error estimation
We used Analyze v. 8.1 (Mayo Clinic), Amira v. 5.3 (Visage Imaging, Inc., CA, USA) and Rapidform v. 2006 (INUS Technology, Inc., Seoul) to conduct the following works. By observing the original specimen and the CT sections, we first virtually removed sedimentary matrix attached to the endocranial surfaces (see the electronic supplementary material, figure S2), and we again made horizontally sectioned three-dimensional prints based on this ‘virtually cleaned CT imagery’. Upon these replicas, we reconstructed the missing/damaged endocranial bones by putting and moulding modelling clay with reference to endocranial morphology of modern humans (figure 1b). Fortunately, sufficient endocranial bones remain intact for LB1, and clay reconstructions can be reasonably executed by extending preserved bone surfaces and/or mirror imaging the intact other side (see the electronic supplementary material, text S1). After these clay reconstructions, the upper and lower braincase replicas were physically joined together for another CT scan to create the ‘replica CT imagery with clay reconstructions’.
Then, we digitally superimposed this ‘replica CT imagery with clay reconstructions’ on the ‘virtually cleaned CT imagery’, so that the replica parts of the former are replaced by the original CT scan of the cranial bones in the latter. Small gaps untreated by clay and parts of the clay reconstructions, when found to be inappropriate, were then further corrected in this integrated imagery to ensure smooth continuity of the endocranial surfaces (see the electronic supplementary material, figure S3). Based on this final imagery (virtually cleaned endocranial surface + clay reconstructions of the damaged parts with additional digital corrections), we segmented the endocranial region using the bone–air or clay–air HMH threshold values. Small anatomical foramina and minute cracking untreated by clay were then virtually sealed at the level of the endocranial opening. The foramen magnum was sealed by bridging between its anterior and posterior margins (horizontally most protruding points) in each sagittal section (figure 2). Finally, we calculated the total volume of voxels assigned to the endocranial region.
We also estimated the magnitudes of the following three types of error involved in our ECV measurement. First, in order to examine error related to delimitation of the endocranial cavity, we experimentally changed bone–air threshold value and observe variation in the resultant ECVs. Second, we estimated possible errors stemming from our clay reconstructions of the damaged bones. Reconstruction errors at smoothly curved endocranial surfaces should be negligible, but those parts with complex morphology (figure 2) may significantly affect our ECV measurement. We calculate a total surface area of such complex parts to approximate the effects of their inflation or deflation. Third, we evaluated error in size calibration of our CT scanning. In addition, in order to evaluate the effect from differences in plugging method of the foramen magnum, we tried another method to see associated volume change.
(b) Brain–body size scaling in Homo sapiens
We compared ECV with femoral head diameter (FHD), the most commonly used proxies for brain and body mass, respectively [33–35]. Various equations have been developed to estimate body mass from the FHD, but here, we do not attempt such conversion to avoid complicated effects of the choice of these equations [36]. Vertical head diameter (Martin's no. 18) was preferred as the FHD but transverse (Martin's no. 19) or maximum diameters, both of which are nearly equal to the former, were used when the former was not available.
We collected ECV and FHD data for 20 chrono-regional groups of Holocene H. sapiens worldwide from literature and our own data (table 1). The data and their sources are available from the electronic supplementary material, table S1. These include small- and large-bodied (group means of FHD: 37.7–48.6 mm for males, 35.5–42.5 mm for females) and small- and large-brained (group means of ECV: 1244–1543 cc for males, 1100–1368 cc for females) populations. We excluded ECV estimates based on linear cranial measurements. The samples consist of adult and a small number of adult-equivalent individuals. Although adult brain size is attained by juvenile in modern humans [37], for the sake of safety, we excluded juvenile individuals except for the Egypt sample that may include a small number of juveniles. In some cases, the measurements were taken by different authors based on different samples from the same population, and this is a potential source of (presumably minor) error.
Table 1.Samples of modern humans. Collapse Asia Andamanese, Philippine Negrito, Neolithic Japan (Jomon), Bronze Age Japan (Tanegashima Islanders), modern Japanese, Southern Chinese Australia Australian Aborigines (Murray Valley) Polynesia Easter Island North America Aleut, Alaska Eskimo, Old Zuni (Hawikuh), Pecos Pueblo Europe Sami (Lapp), Neolithic Denmark, England (Spitalfields) Africa Predynastic Egypt, Zulu, Western Pygmies, Eastern Pygmies, Khoisan
Males and females were analysed separately due to the sexual differences in human body and brain sizes. Intraspecific scaling exponents were estimated based on natural logarithms of the sex-specific group mean data and the following four line fitting methods: two types of ordinary least-square regressions (OLSs), ECV on FHD (‘inverse calibration’, OLS-IC) and FHD on ECV (‘classical calibration’, OLS-CC), major axis (MA) and reduced major axis (RMA) [38]. Because we are aiming to predict the condition in a dwarfed hominin, we need to obtain a general slope to extrapolate conditions outside (particularly downside) the range of the reference sample (H. sapiens) distribution. Some researchers suggest that OLS-CC works better for extrapolation [38], but it remains uncertain if this is always the case [39]. In this paper, we mainly focus on MA and RMA as methods best describing the bivariate scatter of X and Y, and produce intermediate (thus ‘conservative’) results between the two OLS regressions [39]. The slopes and their 95% CIs were calculated using R software [40] and its package lmodel2 [41].
The ECV and FHD data were also collected from the following premodern fossil hominin samples (genera Australopithecus and Homo). These data are tabulated in the electronic supplementary material, table S2.
(i) Australopithecus afarensis
The ‘small individual’ is represented by A.L. 288-1 [42,43], whereas the ‘large individual’ is composite data from A.L. 444-2 and KSD-VP-1/1 [43,44]. The group mean is the average of these two datasets.
(ii) Australopithecus africanus
Means were calculated from five cranial (MLD 37/38; Sts 5; Stw 60, 71, 505) and six femoral (Sts 14; Stw 25, 99, 311, 392; 443) specimens [22,33].
(iii) Homo habilis sensu lato
Means calculated from three cranial (KNM-ER 1470, 1805, 1813) and two femoral (KNM-ER 1472, 1481a) specimens [34,43]. Although some researchers suggest that the sample includes multiple species [45], they are lumped together mainly because of uncertain association between the cranial and postcranial specimens.
(iv) Dmanisi Homo
A femur (D4167) from a large adult individual is inferred to be associated with a large mandible (D2600) [46]. Here, the femur is tentatively associated with a relatively robust adult cranium, D2280 which is probably male [47].
(v) H. ergaster (African H. erectus)
Owing to the lack of adult femoral heads, the species is represented here by an estimated adult condition of the large juvenile skeleton, KNM-WT 15000 [34,48].
(vi) Early Indonesian H. erectus (1.2–0.8 Ma)
Two chronological subsamples from the Early Pleistocene of Sangiran, Central Java are included. The ‘Sangiran Upper’ (Bapang-AG) subsample is chronologically younger, and represented by probable male (Sangiran 17) and female (Sangiran IX) crania [49]. The ‘Sangiran Lower’ (Grenzbank/Sangiran) subsample is older and currently represents the earliest Indonesian H. erectus. Relatively gracile (Sangiran 2) and robust (Sangiran 4) crania are available for its ECV [30,31]. The FHD of the earliest Indonesian H. erectus remains unknown. That for Trinil 3 is 45 mm (Y. Kaifu 2007, personal observation), but taxonomic assignment of this specimen to Indonesian H. erectus is questioned [50]. Because their cranial size and shape as well as dento-mandibular morphology are broadly comparable to or slightly more primitive than African H. ergaster [29,30], their mean FHD is expected to have been larger than H. habilis (40–44 mm) or Dmanisi Homo (40 mm), and lesser than the large H. ergaster individual, KNM-WT 15000, whose adult FHD is predicted as 51 mm (95% error range: 46.8–55.2 mm; [34]). In addition, FHDs estimated from pelvic acetabular sizes of African Homo specimens are 46.8 mm for KNM-ER 3228 (approx. 1.9 Ma) and 47.8 mm for OH 28 (0.7 Ma), respectively [34]. In consideration of these, 45–50 mm may be reasonable estimates for the earliest Indonesian H. erectus.
(vii) Homo floresiensis
The FHD for LB1 used here is the mean of vertical and transverse diameters (31 mm; [51]), and is slightly smaller than the FHD reported in ([1]; 31.5 mm).
4. Results
(a) Endocranial volume of LB1
The total amount of the matrix we virtually removed endocranially was approximately 1.5 cc, of which 0.8–1.0 cc was inside the original endocranial cavity (i.e. inside the boundary defined by our reconstruction described earlier). The rest of the removed matrix (0.5–0.7 cc) was distributed outside the original endocranial cavity (mostly within the areas of the damaged bones), and thus irrelevant to the ECV calculation.
For each of the cranial bone (inner table) and air, we measured CT values at arbitrarily selected 132 different voxels taken from three different CT slices to calculate their means. The median of these means was used to differentiate the bone and air. With this HMH thresholding, the volume of the endocranial cavity was 425.7 cc.
If we change the bone/air threshold value ±5 per cent or ±10 per cent of the difference between the average CT values for the bone and air, this ECV shifts by ±0.5 cc or ±1.3 cc, respectively. The total area of the endocranial surface prepared above was approximately 352 cm2, 17 per cent of which (approx. 60 cm2) had been reconstructed either by clay or digital plugging. If we make an unrealistic assumption that all of these parts were erroneously delimited by one pixel (0.26 mm) either inward or outward, then the resultant volume change would be up to ±1.5 cc. Clay-based reconstruction of complex morphology such as the central sphenoid, the medial part of the right petrous bone and the lower part of the right sigmoid sulcus may include some more substantial error (blue portions in figure 2). The total surface area of these parts was 14 cm2, which would result in error of up to ±1.4 cc assuming inflation or deflation of all of these parts by 1 mm either inward or outward. Finally, error owing to size calibration of the CT scanning is no more than ±1 cc [20]. Taken together, given that many of the above error estimates are supposed maxima, we conclude that the original ECV of the LB1 cranium was 426 cc with only a limited degree of error, probably within ±3 cc.
In our definition, the foramen magnum is sealed not by a flat plane but by a folded surface constituted by lines connecting the anterior and posterior margins of the foramen magnum defined separately in each mid/parasagittal CT section. If we change this definition and plug the foramen with a flat, horizontal plane passing through the line connecting endobasion and opisthion, then the ECV decreases by 0.5 cc.
(b) Endocranial volume reduction explained by intraspecific scaling
The log-transformed ECV and FHD are moderately correlated in the male and female H. sapiens samples (r = 0.73 or 0.75, p < 0.001). As seen in table 2, the scaling exponents for male and female H. sapiens calculated by MA (1.05, 1.27) and RMA (1.03, 1.20) are almost identical, whereas those by OLS-IC (0.76, 0.90) and OLS-CC (1.38, 1.60) are lesser and higher, respectively. The slopes are slightly steeper in the female than in the male analyses. Log-transformed ECV and FHD values are plotted in figure 3, together with RMA lines for H. sapiens. Table 2 also shows expected ECV reductions associated with body size (FHD) changes following different scaling models.
Table 2.Slopes for the best-fit lines for H. sapiens (left columns) and expected ECV values after simulated body size reduction from the two hypothetical ancestors to the H. floresiensis conditions (right columns). Collapse model used regression parameters H. habilis (614 cc) earliest Indonesian H. erectus (860 cc) slope 95% CI for the slope intercept expected ECV (cc) decrease to 426 cc (%) expected ECV (cc) decrease to 426 cc (%) OLS-IC male 0.76 0.41–1.10 4.39 488 67 599–649 49–60 OLS-IC female 0.90 0.50–1.29 3.84 468 78 561–616 56–69 MA male 1.05 0.65–1.71 3.29 447 89 522–582 64–78 MA female 1.27 0.82–2.06 2.47 417 105 469–536 75–90 RMA male 1.03 0.74–1.44 3.34 449 88 525–585 63–77 RMA female 1.20 0.87–1.65 2.74 427 100 485–551 71–86 OLS-CC male 1.41 0.97–2.63 1.90 400 114 438–508 81–97 OLS-CC female 1.60 1.11–2.85 1.26 378 126 400–474 89–106
Figure 3. Relationship between the ECV and FHD. Open circle, H. sapiens (male); filled circle, H. sapiens (female); rhombus, mean data for the fossil hominin samples; x, individual data for Australopithecus; +, individual data for premodern Homo. Possible range of the ECV is indicated for the small A. afarensis individual (A.L. 288-1). Estimated ranges of the FHD for the two early Indonesian H. erectus samples (Sangiran Upper and Lower) are indicated by thick broken lines (3.81–3.91 in logarithmic form; see text for more details). The diagonal lines indicate expected brain size reductions from the H. habilis and Sangiran Lower (earliest Indonesian H. erectus) conditions following the scaling relationship for male (dotted lines) and female (solid lines) H. sapiens based on the RMA regressions. (Online version in colour.)
If the body size of LB1 reduced from the average H. habilis condition (ECV = 614 cc, FHD = 42 mm) following the MA or RMA scaling models based on the male data, then the resultant ECV would be 447–449 cc, 11–12% larger than the measured ECV for LB1 (426 cc). If LB1 is female as suggested previously [1,51], such brain size reduction is achieved by the body size scaling alone.
If the earliest Indonesian H. erectus, here represented by the Sangiran Lower sample, experienced body size reduction to the state of LB1, then the MA or RMA male models suggest that their ECV would reduce from 860 to 522–585 cc (63–78% reduction) depending on the ancestral FHD values (45–50 mm). When the female models are used, such expected reduction increases to 71–90%. In other words, 10–29% of the ECV reduction is to be explained by factors other than body size if LB1 was female. More of the ECV reduction is ascribed to body size scaling if we use the OLS-CC models, whereas such proportion becomes less in the OSL-IC models.
5. Discussion and conclusions
Previous studies are in agreement that the brain of H. floresiensis is too small to have been dwarfed from H. erectus following human intraspecific body size scaling [1–14]. Although this view is probably correct, the earlier-mentioned re-examination shows that the proportion of the brain reduction unexplained by body size scaling is smaller (and thus less difficult) than previously claimed. This is because of the following reasons. First, the newly determined ECV of LB1, approximately 426 cc, which is based on high-quality micro-CT scan and elaborate cleaning, reconstruction and error estimations, is slightly larger than the previous estimate (approx. 400 cc). Second, scaling exponents for H. sapiens used previously [7,8] were based on a single regional population and thus considerably underestimated the actual species-wide trend. Although the exponent values cannot be compared directly owing to different scales taken (body weight [7,8] versus FHD (this study)), between-group analyses presented earlier and elsewhere [19] clearly indicate a relatively high level of correlation between body and brain sizes in our species. Several population samples used in this study are small (n = 3–5: electronic supplementary material, table S1), but broadly similar slopes derived from the male and female analyses (table 2) suggest that these reflect actual scaling exponent for H. sapiens. Finally, there are reasons to suppose early Indonesian H. erectus (mean ECV: approx. 860 cc), rather than generalized H. erectus (mean ECV: 991 cc), as an ancestor candidate for H. floresiensis.
In the model of Martin et al. [8], decreased body size from 60 (estimated average for generalized H. erectus) to 16 kg (smallest estimate for LB1 [1]) results in only moderate reduction of ECV from 991 to 794 cc. In our model of ancestor (early Indonesian H. erectus) and descendant (LB1) relationships, and RMA or MA scaling, the estimated body size decrease (changes in the FHD from 45–50 to 31 mm) would reduce the ECV from 860 to 469–585 cc (63–90% reduction) by body size scaling alone (table 2). Even if we use the OLS-IC models that are probably inappropriate for extrapolation [38], 49–69% of the brain size reduction could be explained by body size. The OLS-CC models, recommended by some researchers for extrapolation [38], predict even greater proportion, 81–100%. We cannot exactly determine which of these figures are more correct owing to unresolvable limitations such as small fossil samples, extrapolation and ultimately unknown scaling exponent for extinct Homo. Still, the earlier-mentioned results, based on the best available data and various regression methods, suggest that at least 50 per cent, probably much more, of the brain size reduction in H. floresiensis could occur as scaling effect if this little hominin derived from early Indonesian H. erectus. This means that 0–50% of its brain size decrease needs to be explained by other factors.
There are a few reports about relative brain size reduction in island mammals. Weston & Lister [10] suggested that approximately 30 per cent of brain size decrease occurred in an extinct dwarf species of Malagasy hippopotamus (Hippopotamus lemerlei), in addition to normal intraspecific scaling effect associated with body size decrease. Köhler & Moyà-Solà [52] examined ECV of Myotragus, an extinct, dwarfed caprine genus endemic to the Mediterranean island Majorca [53]. Although its Miocene continental ancestor is presently unknown, these authors found that (i) their continental bovid sample composed of a variety of extant and fossil taxa, including seven caprine species from three tribes (Rupicaprini, Caprini and Ovini) show a fairly consistent brain–body allometric scaling relationship, and (ii) the relative brain size of Myotragus was distinctly (approx. 50%) smaller than expected from this general trend for the mainland bovids.
Therefore, it is ‘mechanistically’ possible [10] that H. floresiensis evolved from early H. erectus, and 0–50% of the total brain size reduction occurred independently from the scaling effect. However, such marked relative brain size reduction in insular mammals is generally considered to have occurred to reduce energetic demand. Because metabolic cost of the brain tissue is expensive, in an insular environment with limited food resources and increased intraspecific competition under the absence of predators, it is advantageous to reduce brain size at the cost of some neural functions such as sensory, motor, social and/or intellectual activities [50]. If one applies a similar energetic explanation for the brain size evolution in H. floresiensis, then we need to answer what aspects of central nervous system were sacrificed in this little hominin [13,14] who show no sign of retrogression at least in stone tool technology compared with earlier hominins on Flores or elsewhere in island Southeast Asia [54,55]. The absence of mammalian carnivores in the Pleistocene of Flores [28,56,57] may explain the situation, despite the presence of a giant lizard (Varanus komodoensis) and a giant marabou stork (Leptoptilos robustus); the close relative brain sizes between H. habilis and H. floresiensis documented above may imply that intellectual capacity comparable to the former was enough for the latter. Otherwise, H. floresiensis may have experienced ‘neurological reorganization’ where brain functions are largely maintained in spite of its overall size change [5], but such proposal is unacceptable for other researchers [9].
We conclude that evolution from early Javanese H. erectus to H. floresiensis was possible in terms of brain size. Still, in this scenario, some amount of the brain size reduction remains to be explained by factors other than body size scaling, posing a challenge to our current knowledge about human brain size evolution. If H. floresiensis descended from H. habilis-like ancestor, the need for such relative brain size reduction is less significant, but we stress currently we have no convincing fossil evidence to support this hypothesis except for the brain size issue discussed here. Then which hypothesis is more correct? The question will be answered most effectively by future discoveries of skeletal evidence for the first hominins to colonize Flores [58].
Acknowledgements We thank E. Wahyu Saptomo, Thomas Sutikna, Jatmiko, Mike J. Morwood, other Liang Bua research team members and Hisao Baba for support, John de Vos, Shozo Iwanaga and Kyoko Funahashi for access to the materials under their care, Tsuyoshi Kaneko, Nobuhito Morota and anonymous reviewers for comments, and Gen Suwa for CT scanning. This work was supported by grants from the JSPS (no. 24247044) and MEXT, Japan (no. 22101006).
Footnotes |
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Shop Talk Live 24: Wicked Weapon for Terrific Tenons
On this week’s edition of Shop Talk Live, editor Asa Christiana and senior web producer Ed Pirnik are down a man, as the 2013 cold and flu season hits Fine Woodworking hard. No worries though, Asa and Ed take a selection of questions on thickness planer technology, building a traditional workbench with minimal tools, and much more. Plus, Ed sings the praises of his new favorite tool for tenoning.
Links from this Week’s Show
Segmented Cutterheads Change the Game
A Slick Tenoning Jig
Ed’s Tenoning Jig
Strengthen Cope and Stick Joints with Dowels
Easy Finish Ages Classic Cherry Piece
Is it a Waterstone or an Oil Stone
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Share. Bringing the retail cost in line with the digital. Bringing the retail cost in line with the digital.
Konami has announced that Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes will now cost less at retail for PS4 and Xbox One.
The next-gen versions of the upcoming title will now cost £29.99 rather than £39.99, so they'll match the cost of the digital editions, as well as the retail price for the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions.
Exit Theatre Mode
The digital version of the game on both PS3 and Xbox 360 remains unchanged at £19.99.
Last week, Konami revealed the resolutions and frame-rates for all versions of the upcoming stealth adventure. The PS4 version runs at 1080p and 60fps, while the Xbox One version runs natively at 720p and 60fps. On the older consoles, Ground Zeroes runs at an upscaled 720p and 30fps.
Following this, the studio confirmed that a limited edition PS4 console would be released to coincide with the release of Ground Zeroes. It looks pretty snazzy. If you're still unsure which platform you fancy getting the game on, a handy comparison video has also been released showing all the versions running at once.
Luke Karmali is IGN's UK Junior Editor. You too can revel in mediocrity by following him on Twitter. |
WEST MONROE, La., Nov. 17 (UPI) — After five years and 11 seasons, A&E’s longest-running reality show, Duck Dynasty, is ending following its current season.
The series follows the Robertson family and their business in Louisiana manufacturing products for duck hunters.
The Robertson family announced in a video Wednesday that the current 11th season would be their last.
“We decided as a family for this to be the final chapter of the Duck Dynasty series,” Jase Robertson said.
The reality show premiered in 2012 and in 2013 became the most-watched reality series in cable history. The series was temporarily banned from the airwaves that same year after family patriarch Phil’s anti-gay remarks went viral.
The current and final season is set to air its last episode on April 12. |
Just in time for the opening of Parliament, a new book entitled A Plague of Prisons has landed in Canada. It tells the story of the “mass incarceration” of Americans over the past 30 years, showing how it has torn families apart, exacerbated racial tensions, drained state treasuries and fostered a culture of violence and vengeance. The author, Ernest Drucker, an epidemiologist at The City University of New York, begins his tale with the passage of tough new state sentencing laws in 1973. Nelson Rockefeller, the governor of the day, was determined to get drug dealers off New York’s streets. He persuaded the legislature to enact mandatory prison sentences, requiring judges to send lawbreakers convicted of selling two ounces of “narcotic drugs” to jail for at least 15 years and stripping them of any discretion to take into account extenuating circumstances. Over the next 25 years, New York’s prison population increased fivefold. Other states quickly jumped on the wagon, imposing evermore onerous sentences on non-violent criminals. The hunger to punish reached its apex in 1994, when California enacted its Three Strikes and You’re Out law, requiring sentences of 25 years to life for three-time offenders. Individuals caught shoplifting or stiffing a contractor became old men behind bars.
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These policies were popular among angry, anxious voters. But they did not produce any reduction in the drug trade, nor did they prevent crime. Between 1980 and 2009, America’s prison population quintupled. It now has the highest rate of incarceration in the world (715 inmates per 100,000 people). What makes all this relevant to Canadians in September of 2011 is that Prime Minister Stephen Harper is poised to embark on the same path the U.S. took a generation ago. Shortly after the opening of Parliament, his government will introduce a package of 12 tough crime bills. They’re guaranteed to become law; the Conservatives now have a majority in both the House of Commons and Senate.
Harper’s legislation is not as draconian as Rockefeller’s. It would require Canadian judges to impose a mandatory one-year sentence for possession of heroin, cocaine or methamphetamine with the intention of trafficking (two years if a weapon or threat of violence is involved) and a six-month to three-year sentence for selling recreational marijuana. But it springs from the same crackdown mentality and taps into the same belief that harsh punishment reduces crime. What makes Drucker’s book compelling is not the statistics he presents; most of them are well known. It is the way he traces the explosion of America’s prison population back to one politician’s gut-driven policies and the way he uses his skills as a clinical psychologist to track the consequences on the streets of Harlem and the South Bronx. Drucker wrote his analysis as a wake-up call to his fellow Americans, not as a warning to Canada. But it offers readers on this side of the border a foretaste of what lies ahead if Harper ignores the advice of everyone from health-care professionals to toppled media magnate Conrad Black, who has seen the American justice system from the inside. Assuming the Prime Minister goes ahead, here is what Canadians can expect:
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• An exponential growth in prisons. The Conservatives have refused to provide taxpayers with a credible estimate of how much they plan to spend on penitentiaries. It won’t be as costly as the American crackdown, which threatens to bankrupt several states, but the bills will keep mounting long after Harper’s departure. • A deterioration of the social structures that communities need to prevent crime. • A disproportionate increase in the number of poor, non-white people behind bars. • A belated recognition that there was never any evidence tougher sentences improve public safety. • And over time, a made-in-Ottawa “plague of prisons.” Is this the legacy we want for our children? Is it the future we want for Canada? Carol Goar’s column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
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by David Stockman
From David Stockman’s Contra Corner. Remarks to the Committee For The Republic, Washington DC, February 2014 (Part 4 in a 6-Part Series) Go to Part 1.
The Great Depression thus did not represent the failure of capitalism or some inherent suicidal tendency of the free market to plunge into cyclical depression—absent the constant ministrations of the state through monetary, fiscal, tax and regulatory interventions. Instead, the Great Depression was a unique historical occurrence—the delayed consequence of the monumental folly of the Great War, abetted by the financial deformations spawned by modern central banking.
But ironically, the “failure of capitalism” explanation of the Great Depression is exactly what enabled the Warfare State to thrive and dominate the rest of the 20th century because it gave birth to what have become its twin handmaidens—-Keynesian economics and monetary central planning. Together, these two doctrines eroded and eventually destroyed the great policy barrier—-that is, the old-time religion of balanced budgets— that had kept America a relatively peaceful Republic until 1914.
To be sure, under Mellon’s tutelage, Harding, Coolidge and Hoover strove mightily, and on paper successfully, to restore the pre-1914 status quo ante on the fiscal front. But it was a pyrrhic victory—since Mellon’s surpluses rested on an artificially booming, bubbling economy that was destined to hit the wall.
The Hoover Recovery of 1932
Worse still, Hoover’s bitter-end fidelity to fiscal orthodoxy, as embodied in his infamous balanced budget of June 1932, got blamed for prolonging the depression. Yet, as I have demonstrated in the chapter of my book called “New Deal Myths of Recovery”, the Great Depression was already over by early summer 1932.
At that point, powerful natural forces of capitalist regeneration had come to the fore. Thus, during the six month leading up to the November 1932 election, freight loadings rose by 20 percent, industrial production by 21 percent, construction contract awards gained 30 percent, unemployment dropped by nearly one million, wholesale prices rebounded by 20 percent and the battered stock market was up by 40 percent.
So Hoover’s fiscal policies were blackened not by the facts of the day, but by the subsequent ukase of the Keynesian professoriat. Indeed, the “Hoover recovery” would be celebrated in the history books even today if it had not been interrupted in the winter of 1932-1933 by a faux “banking crisis” which was entirely the doing of President-elect Roosevelt and the loose-talking economic statist at the core of his transition team, especially Columbia professors Moley and Tugwell.
The Pre-1933 Banking Failures Were Caused By Insolvency
The truth of the so-called banking crisis is that the artificial economic boom of 1914-1929 had generated a drastic proliferation of banks in the farm country and in the booming new industrial centers like Chicago, Detroit, Youngtown and Toledo, along with vast amounts of poorly underwritten debt on real estate and businesses.
When the bubble burst in 1929, the financial system experienced the time-honored capitalist cure—-a sweeping liquidation of bad debts and under-capitalized banks. Not only was this an unavoidable and healthy purge of economic rot, but also reflected the fact that the legions of banks which failed were flat-out insolvent and should have been closed.
Indeed, 10,000 of the 12,000 banks shuttered during the years before 1933 were tiny rural banks located in communities of less than 2,500. Most had been chartered with trivial amounts of capital under lax state banking laws, and amounted to get-rich-quick schemes which proliferated during the export boom.
Indeed, a single startling statistic puts paid to the whole New Deal mythology that FDR rescued the banking system after a veritable heart attack: to wit, losses at failed US banks during the entire 12-year period ending in 1932 amounted to only 2-3 percent of deposits. There never was a sweeping contagion of failure in the banking system.
Milton Friedman’s Huge Error: The Fed Did Not Cause the Bank Runs of 1930-1933
Nor did the Fed’s alleged failure to undertake a massive bond-buying program in 1930-1932 to pump cash into the banking system constitute the monumental monetary policy error that Milton Friedman so dogmatically claimed, and which has become the raison d’etre of contemporary central banking.
In fact, fifty years after the fact, Bubbles Ben 2.0 essentially zeroxed the errors in Friedman’s treatise and got awarded a PhD for this tommyrot by Professor Stanley Fischer of MIT, who Obama has now seen fit to make Vice-Chairman of the Fed. Bernanke then passed himself off as a scholar of the Great Depression and a Friedman disciple, thereby bamboozling the ever gullible Bush White House into appointing a rank money-printer and Keynesian to head the Fed.
Bernanke then proceeded to follow Friedman’s bad advice about 1932 and flooded the banking system with money during the so-called financial crisis, and thereby bailed out the rot on Wall Street instead of purging it as the Board of Governors had the good sense to do in the early 1930s.
But…I digress—slightly!
In fact, it is important to refute the scary bedtime stories that have been handed down about the pre-New Deal banking crisis because they are the predicate for the Fed’s current lunacy of QE, ZIRP and massive monetization of the public debt, which, in turn, enables the perpetual deficit finance on which the Warfare State vitally depends.
The Unnecessary February 1933 Bank Panic: FDR’s 10-Day Fumble
In truth, the banking liquidation was over by Election Day, failures and losses had virtually disappeared, and as late as the first week of February 1933, according the Fed’s daily currency reports, there were no unusual demands for cash.
The legendary “bank runs” occurred almost entirely during the last two weeks before FDR’s inauguration. The trigger was Henry Ford’s vicious spat with his former partner and then Michigan Senator, James Couzens, over responsibility for the failure of a go-go banking group in Detroit that had been started by his son Edsel and Goldman Sachs. Always Goldman!
The hapless Herbert Hoover secretly wrote FDR begging him to cooperate in resolving the Michigan banking crisis. Instead, Roosevelt failed to answer the President’s letter for two weeks; lost Carter Glass as his Treasury Secretary because the President-elect refused to affirm his commitment to the sound money platform on which he had campaigned; and allowed Tugwell to leak to the press a radical plan to reflate the economy by reneging on the dollar’s 100-year old linkage to one-twentieth ounce of gold.
Within days there was a massive run on gold at the New York Fed and a scramble for cash at teller windows across the land. Unlike historians today, citizens back then knew that the Fed could not legally issue more currency unless it had 40 percent gold-backing—hence the sudden outbreak of currency hoarding.
In this context, the daily figures for currency outstanding give ringing evidence of FDR’s culpability for the midnight-hour run on the banks. After rising by a trivial $8 million per day in early in the month, cash outstanding rose by $200 million per day by late February and by a staggering half billion dollars on the day before the FDR’s inauguration. All told, 80 percent of the increase in currency outstanding—from $5.6 billion to $7.5 billion—occurred in the last ten days before FDR took office.
Then, even more fantastically, nearly all of the hoarded cash flowed back into the banking system on its own when 95 percent of the banks were re-opened in an “as is, where is” condition during the three weeks after FDR’s inauguration. Moreover, the mass re-opening scheme was actually drafted and executed by Hoover hold-overs at the Treasury, and had been completely accomplished before the heralded banking reforms of the New Deal and deposit insurance had even had Congressional hearings.
In short, the banking system never did really collapse and the true problem was bad debt and insolvency—not Fed errors or an existential crisis of capitalism.
New Deal: Political Gong Show
Beyond that, the New Deal was a political gong show that amounted to a grab-bag of statist gimcrack. The mild fascism of the NRA and AAA caused the economy to further contract, not recover. The legendary WPA cycled violently between 1 million make-work jobs in the off-years and 3 million make-vote jobs in the election years—-before even a Democratic Congress was compelled to shut it down in a torrent of corruption in 1939.
Likewise, the TVA was a senseless boondoggle and environmental curse; the Wagner Act paved the way for the kind of coercive, monopolistic industrial unionism that resulted in “Rust Bucket America” five decades later; and the legacy of New Deal housing stimulants like Fannie Mae speaks for itself.
Finally, universal social insurance enacted in 1935 was actually a fiscal doomsday machine. When in the context of modern political democracy the state offers universal transfer payments to its citizenry without proof of need it thereby offers to bankrupt itself—eventually.
To be sure, during the middle 1930s, the natural rebound of the nation’s capitalist economy continued where the Hoover Recovery left off— notwithstanding the New Deal headwinds. Yet the evidence that FDR’s policies retarded recovery screams out of the last year of pre-war data for 1939: GDP at $90 billion was still 12 percent below 1929, while manufacturing value added was off by 20 percent and business investment by 40 percent.
Most telling of all was private non-farm man-hours worked: the 1939 level was still 15 percent lower than what the BLS recorded in 1929.
How FDR Torpedoed Recovery and Sowed the Seeds of Autarky, Rearmament, Revanchism and War
So the New Deal did nothing to help the domestic economy. But FDR did personally torpedo world recovery and paved the way toward WWII with his so-called “bombshell” message to the London Economic Conference in July 1933. The latter had been the world’s last best hope for rescue of the failed task of post-war resumption. Specifically, the conferees had shaped a plan for restoring convertibility by means of pegging the pound sterling at a lower exchange rate to the dollar and gold, thereby alleviating the beggar-thy-neighbor pressure on the remaining gold standard countries like France, the Netherlands and Sweden.
In turn, monetary stabilization would pave the way for reduction of Smoot-Hawley instigated tariff barriers and the restoration of global trade and capital flows.
The American delegation led by the magnificent statesman, Cordell Hall, had molded a tentative agreement among the British and French, and thereby had attained a crucial inflection point in the post-war struggle for resumption of the old international order. Yet FDR defied his advisors to the very last man, including the nationalistic and protectionist-minded Raymond Moley, who the President had sent to London as his personal emissary.
Roosevelt’s message, penned by moonlight on the luxurious yacht of his chum, Vincent Astor, was undoubtedly the most intemperate, incoherent and bombastic communique ever publicly issued by a US President. It not only stunned the assembled world leaders gathered in London and killed the monetary stabilization agreement on the spot, but it also locked in a destructive worldwide regime of economic nationalism and autarky.
Accordingly, high tariffs and trade subsidies, state-dominated recovery and rearmament programs and manipulated currencies became universal after the London Conference failed, leaving international financial markets demoralized and chaotic.
The irony was that the Great Depression was the step-child of the Great War. American entry had unnecessarily extended it; had greatly amplified its destructive impact on the liberal international order; and had contributed a witch’s brew of Wilsonian nostrums to a Carthaginian peace that laid the planking for a new world war. FDR then delivered the coup de grace, extinguishing the last hope for resumption and insuring that autarky, revanchism and rearmament would hurtle the world to an even greater eruption of carnage, and an even more debilitating rendition of the Warfare State.
Go to Part 5. |
Boone, Ia. — Michele Bachmann read this statement but took no questions this evening in response to her Iowa campaign chairman’s defection tonight to the Ron Paul campaign:
“It’s clear that this was a deliberate move by the Ron Paul campaign to discredit our campaign and our growing momentum. Ron Paul is in trouble in Iowa and his campaign is worried about people learning about his dangerous stance on foreign policy and how he will make America less safe.
“Kent Sorenson personally told me he was offered a large sum of money to go to work for the Paul campaign. Kent campaigned with us earlier this afternoon and went immediately afterward to a Ron Paul event and announced he is changing teams. Kent said to me yesterday that ‘everyone sells out in Iowa, why shouldn’t I,’ then he told me he would stay with our campaign. The Ron Paul campaign has to answer for its actions.
“We are almost through with our 99 county tour and have seen overwhelming support all across Iowa. This is clearly an effort on the part of the Paul campaign to throw cold water on our growing momentum.
“We are thrilled to announce that State Senator Brad Zaun is now Iowa Chairman of our campaign. He has tremendous respect across the state and he has worked tirelessly for our campaign. I am proud to have him as our State Chairman.”
Recommended Photos |
Facebook has released a library of C++ software components used to help run its site, the social networking company announced Saturday.
By releasing this library, called Folly, Facebook will be able to release more of its internal programs as open source, because they rely on different components in this library.
"One clear bottleneck to releasing more work has been that any open sourced project needed to break dependencies on unreleased internal library code," wrote Facebook software engineer Jordan DeLong, who posted an entry on Facebook announcing the release.
Facebook engineers also announced the release at a C++ conference the company is holding Saturday at its campus at Menlo Park, California.
Facebook has relied on open-source software, such as MySQL, PHP and memcached, to run its sites. And so the company has made a point of releasing its own internal programs as open-source software as well, such as the HipHop PHP compiler and the Thrift service sharing framework.
For many of its open source releases though, Facebook developers have had to rewrite some of the functionality that was borrowed from this library. By releasing the library itself, Facebook will be able to "continue open sourcing parts of [its] stack without resorting to reinventing ... internal wheels," DeLong wrote.
Even if developers don't plan on using Facebook developed applications, they should still take a look at this library, as it includes many utilities of possible to use in other environments, DeLong said. Many of the components available in Folly run more quickly than their equivalents available elsewhere, he boasted. "Our motivation was to build components that were faster and more efficient than what we previously used," he wrote. These utilities were designed to be used in heavy production environments, across thousands of servers.
The components cover a range of functionality. One component was designed to use memory more efficiently. Another reduces contention. The AtomicHashMap utility cuts the amount of time a piece of data in memory is locked by an operation, which can slow performance and cause bottlenecks in heavily used environments. A set of string manipulation components use fewer CPU cycles than formatters in other C++ libraries, DeLong boasted.
The Folly library is posted on GitHub, and Facebook will add new components as they are written, according to DeLong.
Joab Jackson covers enterprise software and general technology breaking news for The IDG News Service. Follow Joab on Twitter at @Joab_Jackson. Joab's e-mail address is [email protected] |
Being too beautiful has turned out to be a curse for one London woman as she claims that her good looks prevent her from keeping employement.
33-year-old Laura Fernee is no academic slouch, she has an earned doctorate in science, and she is surely qualified for employment in her scientific discipline; however, she says her appearance–slim figure, attractive face and glossy hair made her a target for sleazy advances from male colleagues and bitchiness from jealous females, according to a Daily Mirror report.
“It’s not my fault… I can’t help the way I look”, Fernee defends why she hasn’t worked in two years. “I’m not lazy and I’m no bimbo.”
Apparently, the attention she got from men at her medical research job–being asked out for dates and finding romantic gifts on her desk, was too much for Dr. Fernee.
“Male colleagues were only interested in me for how I looked. I wanted them to recognise my achievements and my professionalism but all they saw was my face and body,” she said.
“Even when I was in a laboratory in scrubs with no make-up they still came on to me because of my natural attractiveness. There was nothing I could do to stop it.”
Fernee also says her fellow female counterparts at work were jealous of her beauty, causing them to hate her.
So now that she doesn’t work and gave up her nearly $50,000 salary in the lab, how does the 33-year-old Ms. Fernee support herself?
You guessed it…Mom and Dad.
According to a Daily Mail report, Miss Fernee’s parents – Catherine, 65, and Alan, 70 – inherited money from Laura’s grandfather, and now pay £2,000 a month in rent and bills for her flat in Notting Hill, London, as well as picking up her credit card payments.
That’s not all. They also shell out £1,500 a month for her designer clothes, shoes and handbags, and £700 on haircuts.
Miss Fernee pays £80 a week to work out at the gym and spends £1,000 a month on socializing.
Lazy, conceited, abused, cursed. What do you think? |
News » New Jersey OK’s MMJ on Preserved Farms
The New Jersey State Agriculture Development Committee says that medical marijuana counts as a farm crop under NJ law and thus can be grown on preserved farms and agricultural land. The clarification comes despite Upper Freehold Township residents who oppose the growing of medical cannabis in their area.
New Jersey’s sole recognized grower, Breakwater Alternative Treatment Center, is looking at five properties in Upper Freehold as sites for growing MMJ and some of those are preserved farms, thus leading to the need for clarification. The only restriction in NJ for growing cannabis is that it cannot be on farms and lands for the federal Farm and Ranchland Protection Program funding, which includes only about 140 preserved farms of a total of 2,000. The federal program would cease funding the lands of medical cannabis were grown there, the SADC says.
Marijuana grow ops would not be protected under the state’s Right to Farm Act, however, which specifically requires compliance with federal law. This means that MMJ growers do not receive the zoning breaks and protections from ordinance restrictions that other farms would.
Opponents, of course, were outraged with the decision and had articulate and thoughtful arguments against medical marijuana to offer. Things like:
“In my mind it still comes down to the bottom line, that it is against the federal law,” says Upper Freehold mayor LoriSue Mount. “Illegal is illegal. It’s plain and clear. If we don’t follow laws then where does that leave us?” (Umm.. free?)
One legitimate argument may be heard from farmers in the area, who say that the grow op will be hydroponic inside greenhouses, which are anathema to the point of the preserved farms initiative. “It’s going to be cement and it is going to be grown hydroponically,” says one farmer. “We as taxpayers and as farmers have put all this land aside for preserved farmland and open space, not so a company can come in and build something..”
That may be considered a valid point. Looking at this from someone who chooses to live rurally, I can say that using land set aside as preserved farms to build something that is exactly opposite of what most of us would think of as a “farm” is disingenuous. I would hope that the Breakwater Alternative Treatment Center would think about that when choosing a site. There are plenty of non-preserved sites available and it would seem best to choose one of those if possible in order to keep community goodwill on your side.
[source Asbury Park Press]
Tags: medical, MMJ, New Jersey |
**Before Proceeding, Please Note There Are Spoilers That Follow
After multiple viewings of Rogue One, it’s fun to take into consideration exterior concepts of the story beyond just characters or plot continuity. Data breaches have become a large-scale concern for many, and before our eyes, we possibly saw the largest data heist ever.
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is praised for an inventive approach and fearless directing. From a Managed Service Provider (MSP) perspective, one thing is clear: The Empire’s lack of faith in backup security is disturbing. Yes, Lord Vader and the Empire could still be at large today if it weren’t for their fallen end points and in-house processes failing.
Storing Data on Physical Hardware
Even though this story takes place “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away” it’s ridiculous to believe the empire does not have a cloud-based superstructure employed for their data. An organization of that scale operating (trillions?) end-points spanning from the Outer-Rim territories to the forest moon of Endor and they’re still using tapes?
The mistake here is relying on physical space and hardware to store backup data instead of utilizing a cloud solution. Offsite redundancy across multiple sites would have made it so the Empire could simply delete their files at the Scarif database.
Their Encryption Was Bad and They Should Feel Bad
Hours and minutes after we see the shuttle leave with the stolen Death Star plans, the Rebel Alliance is already looking through the entire file. In compliant regulatory standards, encryption for this kind of information is mandatory. Even if the data is stolen, encryption could have prevented the Rebellion from extracting anything at all. Putting an end to their new hope.
No Firewall?!?!
After the Alliance discovered they were not leaving the planet Scarif with a physical copy of the data, they audibled to plan B; Send the data through the Empire’s very own wireless transmission system. With a firewall in place, this would have made a wireless send extremely difficult for the Alliance.
Overconfidence
Darth Vader boarding the Corellian Cruiser and Tarkin destroying Scarif can’t undo their death star quandary. Luke Skywalker said it best in the Return of the Jedi “Your overconfidence is your weakness.” If only the Empire hired a virtual CIO to manage data backup and security, this story may have ended differently. |
On Tuesday, International Women’s Day, Wisconsin Representative Tammy Baldwin (D) introduced legislation designed to speed up the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA).
The ERA is designed to explicitly prevent discrimination on the basis of sex. Congress passed the Amendment in 1972. Ratification by 38 states was required for the Amendment to become law, but the legislation fell three states short by the extended deadline of 1982.
However, because the deadline for ratification had already been extended from seven to ten years, this suggests Congress has the power to once again extend the deadline. Furthermore, Baldwin points to the 27th Amendment which deals with matters of congressional pay. It was ratified in 1992, 203 years after its initial submission.
The legislation that Baldwin has now introduced would specifically remove the deadline for ERA ratification and would state that upon ratification by three further states, the Amendment would be added to the Constitution.
More from Windy City Times:
“The ERA is intended to ensure equality for women and men in all areas of society,” said Baldwin. “It is an immediate and decisive remedy to end sex discrimination in federal and state laws and provides a clear benchmark for judicial interpretation. Achieving equality and justice for all in the United States is fundamental to our democratic principles, economic recovery, and continued leadership around the world. The intent of my resolution is simple: a path to equality for all Americans,” Baldwin said.
[...]
“With women comprising more than 50% of the workforce and serving this country on the fronts of two wars, it is time to end the discrimination based on sex that women still face in the United States,” said Jean Landweber, Wisconsin ERA Chair, United 4Equality. “I am proud of my Representative, Tammy Baldwin, for introducing this legislation to remove the arbitrary time limit that was imposed in1972 for ratification of the ERA. The time is right to achieve equality of rights by finishing what the brave women of the ’70s started,” Landweber said.
The 15 states still to ratify the bill include: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah, Virginia.
Notable of those is perhaps Virginia. The Virginia state Senate passed a resolution (SJ357) to ratify the ERA in February of 2011 but the House of Delegates companion bill (HJ640) was twice tabled in subcommittee.
The need for the ERA is perhaps best expressed by Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s recent statement saying that the 14th Amendment to the Constitution does not prevent sex discrimination and that a belief otherwise is a “modern invention.” While many would disagree with Scalia, this statement does “serve as an important reminder about the Court’s bitter divide on the issue of the scope of the 14th Amendment” as fellow blogger Jessica Pieklo wrote while commenting on Scalia’s argument.
For the latest on the ERA check equalrightsamendment.org
For more Care2 coverage of International Women’s Day, click here.
Photo adapted under the Creative Commons Attribution License, with thanks to Jay Inslee. |
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It’s seriously hard to keep track of which sites have the best content and resources. So to help make things easier, we’ve compiled this comprehensive list of over 100 of the best sites on the internet.
The websites on this list are those that we consider to be genuinely useful, top-of-the-line sites (not apps) where you’ll find what you need. We update this list regularly, so check back occasionally, and be sure to tell your friends!
Jump Ahead: Books | Browsing | Files | Finance | Learning | Local | Movies | Music | News | Online Privacy | Productivity | Search | Shopping | Social | Software
Books
Own an e-reader but hate paying for e-books The 7 Best Free Ebook Download Sites The 7 Best Free Ebook Download Sites Why spend money buying ebooks when you can download free ebooks instead? Here are some nifty sites where you can do that. Read More ? Luckily, a huge number of great classic books 35 Classic Novels You Can Read for Free on Your Kindle 35 Classic Novels You Can Read for Free on Your Kindle There's a treasure trove of free, out-of-copyright books available on Amazon.com to download to your Kindle right now. Here are our recommendations for classic novels you should be reading... Read More are no longer under copyright. Project Gutenberg is a massive repository for these texts, in a dazzling array of formats, all available free of charge.
What could be better than large social network for book enthusiasts? Amazon-owned Goodreads is fantastic for keeping track of the books you’ve read, connecting with other readers, finding quality book reviews, and sharing recommendations.
The internet’s home of audio books, Audible has an insanely-sized catalog featuring most classics, many new releases, and a host of quality audio courses to keep you learning for years. These are all perfect for listening to in the car, at the gym, or simply as a way of reading a book while giving your eyes time to rest from the screen.
If you’re anything like me, your list of books to read is literally never ending. However, the insights of some books can be garnered in a few short minutes. And that’s what Blinkist is about. The ideas of over 2500 bestselling non-fiction books have been condensed so you can read or listen to them in just 15 minutes.
You can be a book lover without being pretentious. And that’s exactly what Book Riot is selling. An online publication filled with witty, entertaining news and reviews of all things book-related, this is a literary blog anyone can love.
Invaluable for Kindle owners, Pixel of Ink tracks down great Kindle ebooks available cheaply or for free. Ideal for the bargain-hunting reader looking to expand their horizons.
A quality book recommendation engine which works by taking in information about what you’re looking for, and matching you to hand-classified books in its library.
Browsing
Instapaper allows you to save articles to read later without any distractions. While reading these on your desktop or via the mobile app, you can highlight passages, make notes, and even integrate your account with other apps using IFTTT.
Pocket is another popular read-later app. With a single click, you can save videos, articles to read on any of your devices (including in your browser).
Available as a browser extension, Translate leverages Google’s machine learning to convert seamlessly between languages. The results are surprisingly accurate (and getting better with every update).
A simple service for hosting samples of formatted text, at unique URLs, to be shared freely on the internet. Lightweight, useful, and clean.
Need to sign up for a service but don’t want to submit your real email to an endless torrent of spam? Mailinator lets you create unique, disposable inboxes which delete themselves after a few days.
Want to test a service but don’t want to give them your data or set up an account? BugMeMot lets users create shared profiles for accessing websites and then disposed, without revealing personal information.
Files
Mega is currently one of the best file hosts on the internet, with local file encryption, fast downloads, and an impressive 50 GB of free storage space when you sign up.
Dropbox is a leading solution for cloud storage because of its ease of use. Using a “drop box” is exactly like using any other folder on your computer, only the files you save to your drop box are synced online and to any other computers or mobile devices linked to your account.
Microsoft’s answer to Dropbox, OneDrive lets you host, share, and edit your files and images from your browser, across multiple machines. If you’re in Microsoft’s online ecosystem, it’s a great resource.
A virtual hard drive for hosting your files, you can access them from any internet-enabled machine, and edit them from your browser.
When you do get stuck emailing documents to your team, HighTail is a great way to get around arbitrary file size caps on email clients, allowing you to email documents and folders up to two gigs in size.
A great general file converter, allowing the conversion between many different image, audio, document, and video formats. Great for any application that supports only specific file types.
Finance and Accounting
An entirely automatic spending tracker and budgeting tool, Mint is great for people trying to build financial responsibility who have trouble keeping track of the specifics of their finances.
When it comes to sending and receiving money online, PayPal is a major player. A huge (and growing) number of online retailers and service providers now accept payments via PayPal. And you can even send international transfers (for a fee).
TransferWise is a quick and easy way to send and receive money in various currencies. Their fees are usually far lower than your bank would charge (including PayPal), and they use the real exchange rate, so you can calculate exactly how much money you’re sending.
Money Saving Expert is an absolutely huge resource covering everything you could possible need to save money. Whether you’re trying to find coupons, or looking for credit card deals you’ll find the advice you need. The site also has an incredibly active forum if you have more specific questions to ask.
Rather than relying on just one financial news site, Google brings together stories from the many of the best. Whether that’s Reuters, Bloomberg, or the Financial Times, the main headlines will show up in Google Finance. You’ll also have easy access to all the market and portfolio data you need.
Need to track your spending to find out where your money is going? Expensify lets you track your spending in many ways and generates expense reports and analyses for you to look over later.
This is a much-loved, easy to use platform for preparing and filing your taxes at the end of the fiscal year. Free for simple returns.
Learning
Whatever you want to learn, no matter how obscure, it’s likely there will be a quality video tutorial on YouTube ready to teach you. Whether it’s programming, plumbing, gymnastics, or learning a language, everything is covered.
A wonderful platform for short video lectures, TED is a great place for inspirational talks 10+ Alternatives to TED Talks You May Not Have Seen Yet 10+ Alternatives to TED Talks You May Not Have Seen Yet Exhausted watching TED Talks? TED isn't the only game in town. Here are more than ten alternatives to the popular event that should help you gather more ideas and expand your brain. Read More and educational lessons 5 TED Talk Alternatives to Grow as a Person or Professional 5 TED Talk Alternatives to Grow as a Person or Professional Has your interest in TED talks been waning recently? Then, check out these fantastic alternatives to TED. These interviews, speeches, presentations, and even animated talks will help you grow as a person and professional. Read More . Ted Talks provide fantastic insight into the projects and ambitions of engineers, scientists, artists, explorers, and philosophers.
Kialo is a relatively new site where you can join in depth debates and discussions about a variety of deep, and interesting topics. What makes Kialo different however, is the way that discussions are structured (see above). Debate points are ordered into pros and cons. You can then click on any of those points to explore (and contribute) the pros and cons of that specific point. This helps you to really garner an in-depth understanding of the topic in question.
Blooming from a simple series of math tutorials into the largest school on planet Earth, Khan Academy is a powerful tool for teaching yourself anything from Python to linear algebra.
Arguably the web’s best question and answer site, Quora is that place to “share knowledge and better understand the world”. Questions can be submitted and answered by anyone. The site is often frequented by influencers from many industries, with answers to questions being famously high quality.
Coursera lets you take online classes from more than eighty universities and educational organizations, all in one place. Courses are structured like interactive textbooks, including lectures, quizzes, and projects to ensure you’re learning the content thoroughly.
Lynda is kind of like the Spotify of education. For a reasonable monthly fee, you can access the entire catalog of video courses on offer. These are all incredibly easy to follow, covering both the basics and more advanced areas of many technical subjects. These range from 3D animation and CAD, to photography and coding.
Hands down the best free tool for learning another language, Duolingo makes it fun, and helps keep you engaged for the long haul.
If you’d rather learn something more in the humanities, Open Culture has a massive number of free online courses and educational media for you to choose from. These range from complete lecture series, to free-to-access audio books.
Udemy mostly offers paid video courses (80,000 at the time of writing, making this the largest selection of courses online), on every topic imaginable. The prices aren’t bad, either. And some courses are even free The 10 Best Free Udemy Courses The 10 Best Free Udemy Courses Udemy offers 80,000 classes to choose from. We've done the work and rounded up the best free Udemy courses for you. Read More !
At the often-surreal intersection of shop class and Pinterest lies Instructables, a massive repository of guides for making everything from mood lamps to robots to chandeliers. If you want to make it, someone will show you how. If you’ve been looking to get into DIY culture, Instructables is a great place to start.
Like Instructables, MAKE is a great introduction to maker/DIY culture, and great source for tutorials if you want to delve deeper into the maker scene.
Probably the best data visualization site out there, Information is Beautiful distils complex sets of data into ingenious, visually stunning infographics, that’ll definitely teach you a thing or two.
Learning to program? Trying to program? Stuck, or not understanding a concept? Ask StackOverflow! Between the searchable archive (use those first) and an active community of experts, StackOverflow is a fantastic resource for beginning and established programmers alike.
Local
The best free mapping tool, Google Maps is fantastic 10 Lesser-Known Features in Google Maps for Android 10 Lesser-Known Features in Google Maps for Android Google Maps has some amazing features that most people don't know about. Read More for planning trips, and finding your way around. Over the past couple of years, it’s also become an invaluable way to find local restaurants, gas stations, coffee shops, and attractions, making this your perfect local guide!
A local review site, Yelp lets you check what’s good in your area, and leave reviews if you have a good (or bad) experience. This covers everything from restaurants to local electricians and architects.
Whether you’re at home, or traveling to a new place, be sure to check out Like a Local. This is a site that’s packed full of insider tips to help you avoid the tourist traps, and find the hidden treasures, wherever you find yourself!
A great resource for finding huge bargains at restaurants, shops, and for goods in your area.
Like Living Social, Groupon offers a selection of local offers. These can often save you a hefty chunk on the original price of a meal, vacation, or tickets to a local show.
Even if you’ve been living somewhere for years, finding something to do on your days off can sometimes be a struggle. In these cases, TripAdvisor can serve as more than a hotel and flights directory. It also has an extensive database of local attractions that’ll keep you occupied for some time to come.
A foodie’s resource for local restaurant reviews, Zomato is awesome for discovering hidden gems in your neighborhood — and finding out which expensive restaurants aren’t worth your time.
One of the best weather sites out there, Weather Underground is a great resource, especially if you’re the outdoorsy type and need to know whether or not you’re going to freeze your jorts off.
Movies
With an astonishing number of movies, TV shows, and documentaries available to watch on demand, Netflix is a worthwhile investment. Their catalog of shows just keeps on growing, and their original productions such as Orange is The New Black and Stranger Things are as good as you’ll find anywhere else.
Amazon’s video streaming service may not be as elegant as Netflix’s, but if you have Amazon Prime, it comes as part of your package. You’ll find a ton of great stuff in their catalog including many critically acclaimed original shows. Amazon’s deep pockets are also seeing the company signing exclusivity deals with companies like HBO and the BBC, meaning their library of shows is just getting stronger and stronger.
Want to know if a movie is good before you watch it? Rotten Tomatoes aggregates reviews, categorizes them as positive or negative, and then averages them. The result is a simple, unbiased appraisal of the odds that you’ll like the movie.
Literally one of the oldest websites on the internet (it predates the web browser), IMDb is one of those exhaustive, meticulous collections of movie ratings, facts, and trivia that would take decades to replicate. Like Rotten Tomatoes, it’s a go-to place for movie ratings to help you discover your next movie to watch. If you want to dig deeper, we’ve written before about how these movie rating sites differ IMDb vs. Rotten Tomatoes vs. Metacritic: Which Is Best? IMDb vs. Rotten Tomatoes vs. Metacritic: Which Is Best? IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, and Metacritic are the three most popular ratings sites for movies, but they aren't all equal. Read More .
There’s more to YouTube than meets the eye. In fact, it probably belongs in nearly every category on this list. One of the best (and less known) features is the ability to rent movies and TV shows. There’s also a decent selection of free movies to watch on the site, too. Basically, if it’s not on Netflix, it’s probably on YouTube.
As a self-respecting movie buff, ScreenRant should be one of the sites you visit religiously. Packed with the latest movie and TV news, this is an insightful, well-edited publication that keeps you in the know for anything Hollywood related.
Each week, a new, independent, hand-picked short movie is added to Short of The Week for you to watch for free. These can be on any topic under the sun, from love, to killer zombies. Every short manages to incorporate incredible storytelling finesse into 5-20 minute movies. It’s a fantastic way to while a few minutes each week.
Many people see Vimeo as little more than YouTube’s smaller competitor. But the site has managed to capture a segment of the movie industry that’s hard to find anywhere else. Home to a vast number of indie filmmakers, Vimeo is the place to find refreshing, art-house movies to stream on demand. We’re talking about the kind of films you’ll see played at festivals like Tribeca, Sundance, or SXSW.
Music
Spotify continues to be the leading service on PC or mobile for streaming any music (and plenty of podcasts), whenever you want. The free service is a good introduction, but it’s worth picking up Spotify Premium. You don’t realize how annoying the ads are until they’re gone. Plus, the offline access is a god-send.
TuneIn is a free internet radio service, that allows you to stream over 100,000 real radio stations from around the world, and over 5.5 million podcasts direct from the TuneIn website, or the service’s free apps.
Without a doubt, SoundCloud is God’s gift to indie music. It’s a simple, bare-bones service that allows anyone to upload and download music under a variety of licenses, and embed uploaded tracks across the web. SoundCloud is great, and if you want to hear the next big thing before the labels do, SoundCloud is where to look.
Connect your SongKick account to your Spotify, Facebook, and Last.fm accounts, and you’ll be kept up to date about when your favorite artists will be playing nearby (and the price of tickets). This is a simple, yet powerful way to ensure you never miss another live gig.
iTunes has grown to dominate the music industry, comprising a huge portion of music sales across the planet. If you want to buy music (or movies, or audiobooks), iTunes probably has what you’re looking for. It’s also heavily intertwined with Apple Music, Apple’s direct competitor with Spotify, where for a reasonable monthly fee, you’ll have unlimited access to the entire music library, ad-free.
Last.fm eavesdrops in on your listening habits, and uses statistical analysis to predict what you might like. By installing Last.fm’s “toggler” onto, say, your Spotify account, the service offers accurate recommendations for other artist’s you’re likely to enjoy.
Pandora (US users only), is a great tool for finding new music. It’s a “free personalized internet radio”. Simply add a few of your favorite artists and the station will start playing related music that you’ve probably never heard before. Pandora is a great tool, and hopefully it’ll stay that way for years to come.
Genius is a gigantic community of music lovers. This is where people turn when they want to discuss and deconstruct a song, or a specific lyric. It’s where artists come to explain their music to the world. It’s certainly worth checking out.
No matter what kind of music you’re into, MixCloud has you covered. This is a fresh approach to radio in the 21st Century, where anyone can be the radio host. Simply search for the radio station, DJ Mix, or podcast that’s for you, and start listening for free. If you fancy yourself on the other side of the mic, no problem. Just start uploading your own shows!
News
For in-depth analysis on a huge range of topics, you’ll find it hard to beat The Conversation. The site only accepts commentary and editorials from professional academics. What I love about the site though, is that it will often publish several articles on a single subject to offer different perspectives.
Reuters is the world’s leading multimedia news agency, and has received multiple Pulitzer Prizes on international reporting. More importantly, however, according to Media Bias Fact Check Reuters is one of the the least biased news sources Top 5 Unbiased World News Websites Free From Censorship Top 5 Unbiased World News Websites Free From Censorship Is there no place for the reader to turn for unbiased news? These popular news websites are free from censorship. Read More out there, offering objective reporting, while using very few loaded words.
Reddit is one of the most diverse media sites on the web, with content ranging from the serious to the absurd. It’s also a great source of news, both locally and internationally, on whatever topic you like.
Google News is a news aggregator, pulling in the top stories from around the web. The site also uses Google’s secret sauce of machine learning to turn up articles you’re likely to enjoy, based on Google’s statistical models of you.
Quartz is home to some of the most intelligent and thought-provoking journalism you can find. Its global-centric approach offers stories you’re unlikely to find anywhere else. And its understanding of the online world makes Quartz a beautiful site to visit, knowing you’ll always come away more informed than when you arrived.
On the surface, Hacker News is a standard tech news aggregator. However, its technologically literate and involved community offers a unique and insightful perspective that’s not available from the more broadly-aimed tech news sites.
538 is the product of statistician Nate Silver, who is known for almost perfectly predicting the outcome of the 2012 political election via some combination of sober statistical modelling and old-fashioned witchcraft. The site provides news blogging from a data-centric perspective, and often offers an interesting and perhaps soberer take compared to traditional twenty-four hour news networks.
Online Privacy
Tor is not technically a site, but rather a “browser [that] contains everything you need to safely browse the Internet.” Tor makes it very difficult for attackers to figure out who’s talking to who, much less what they’re saying by using computers as a massive obfuscation network to bounce encrypted messages. Want to learn more? Check out our TOR User Guide Really Private Browsing: An Unofficial User’s Guide to Tor Really Private Browsing: An Unofficial User’s Guide to Tor Tor provides truly anonymous and untraceable browsing and messaging, as well as access to the so called “Deep Web”. Tor can’t plausibly be broken by any organization on the planet. Read More !
Keeping on top of all your passwords is tough. That’s why so many people use the same password for most of their services. Rather than do this, LastPass remembers all your passwords, and keeps them safe under lock and key. Whenever you visit a site, so long as you’re logged into your LastPass account, you can also log-in to your other accounts, without needing to remember your password.
This site allows you to find out if any of your account information has been leaked. Just search the site for your email address, and you’ll be shown which of the leaks your data appears in so you can take necessary action to secure those accounts.
Think your computer has been infected with a virus or malware? Visit BleepingComputer.com. This is a huge resource not just of security news, but also virus, ransomware, adware and malware removal guides.
A search engine that scrapes a variety of other search engine to provide its muscle, DuckDuckGo helps to anonymize your searches, making it harder for search engines to build up information about you from your search history. It also keeps no logs of its own users.
Terms of service are dry, bland, unreadable screeds of legalese not intended for human consumption. TOS;DR takes terms of service and digests them into something succinct and meaningful. Great for people who want to take a more active role in the services they use, and how those services use their data.
An easy repository of links for purging various social media accounts from the internet with a minimum of fuss.
Productivity
Gmail is arguably the best email client out there. Integrating seamlessly with all of Google’s other productivity apps, using Gmail is a no-brainer for most people. And with a steady stream of new third-party app integrations and productivity features being released, it’s only getting better.
Google Drive (and its associated suite of web document editors) might just be the best cloud document service out there, especially if you’re already in the ecosystem (via Android or Gmail).
Microsoft Office is now offering a free version of many of its popular apps. Among others, these include Excel, Word, Outlook, PowerPoint, and OneDrive. These free versions are naturally less feature-rich than the paid version, but are a fantastic way to access and edit files from within your browser, even if you don’t pay for the full Office suite.
IFTTT (If this, then that) is a powerful automations platform. From your free account, you can connect hundreds of services and apps that you rely on. Once connected, you can create “applets” that automate certain tasks, so you no longer have to do them manually. For example, you could have IFTTT automatically save email attachments to Google Drive. You could automatically publish your Instagram posts as a Tweet. You can even get an SMS alert to remind you when an event is due to start on Google Calendar.
Arguably the best to-do list manager To-Do List App Showdown: Any.do vs Todoist vs Wunderlist To-Do List App Showdown: Any.do vs Todoist vs Wunderlist Some to-do list apps stand head and shoulders above the rest. But how do they compare and which one is best for you? We'll help you find out. Read More out there, Todoist has both a free and paid version. Being able to add, schedule, and search for tasks with natural language is a huge plus. As are the many integrations that the app has with the automation engine IFTTT. With its cross-platform availability, quick syncing, and mass of useful features, Todoist will surely help you get more one.
Evernote is one of the world’s leading, multi-platform note-taking apps, that’s also available in your browser. It’s a tool designed to help you capture anything, at any time. You can save your favorite articles, photos, Pinterest pins, recipes, notes, scanned receipts etc., to your account, and easily find these at a later date, even if you have thousands of them! The Best Way to Organize Evernote: Use Tags The Best Way to Organize Evernote: Use Tags Is your Evernote a huge mess? We show you a simple tweak that'll help you organize your notes like never before. Read More
Microsoft’s free note-taking app is, according to some, even better than Evernote. Its standout feature is the ability to customize the layout of your notes however you want. Each element within a single note can be dragged and dropped to any location. This means you can insert all sorts of media into a single note. Before you know it, you’ll be running your entire life from this web app.
Google Keep is a simple, much loved note taking app 7 Google Keep Features for Perfect Lists 7 Google Keep Features for Perfect Lists Google Keep has a few features that make it perfect for list keeping. Not only can you create a checklist and sync the app across platforms, Google Keep also offers location-based reminders and more. Read More that’s far more lightweight than Evernote and OneNote. You can easily create and store notes, lists, images, and audio in your account. Share these with friends and family, and use Google’s famous search capabilities to find your notes again when you need them. The app is available on your browser, or on iOS and Android.
RescueTime is a browser plugin with an accompanying site that could save you a huge amount of time. By keeping track of the time you spend on certain sites, you can see an overview of how you’re spending your time online. This insight can help you see where you’re losing too much time, and adjust your browsing habits for a better work-life balance.
Google’s free, browser-based answer to Skype is a great application and one you’ll find yourself using to keep in touch with friends and family all over the world.
A great, easy screen-sharing application powered by LogMeIn, Join.me is great for remote collaboration for small businesses and creative ventures if you need to host an online audio or video call (with screen sharing), from your browser or smartphone, this is the tool for you!
If you’re trying to get more hours out of your day Squeeze an Extra Hour out of Each Day with These 10 Quick Tips Squeeze an Extra Hour out of Each Day with These 10 Quick Tips A few simple habits can help us shed some inefficient ways and increase our reservoir of time doing the things that matter. These ideas can get you one extra productive hour every single day. Read More , outsourcing some of your tasks could be the best decision you’ll ever make. UpWork is the largest freelance jobs site online. Post a job description letting people know the kinds of tasks you’d like them to do (making reservations, data input, etc.), and you’ll receive a huge number of affordable proposals. Then pick the person you think is right for the job.
If you work best with ambient background noise, you’re going to love this site! Simply play around with the sliders to create your very own background noise to channel you straight into that flow state.
Search
You know what Google is. It is to search what the pyramids are to wonders of the world (more specifically, nobody remembers the other six). Google will find what you need, quickly and accurately. They’re the best in the business.
Want to know where a photo came from? TinEye uses “reverse image search technology” to trawl the web for images similar to the one you submit. Perfect for finding other parts of an image series, finding higher-res or uncropped version of a low-quality image, and even finding where else an image has been published.
Wikipedia is one of the greatest repositories of human knowledge Everything You Need To Know About Wikipedia And More Everything You Need To Know About Wikipedia And More Wikipedia is one of the most famous sites on the Internet. It's informative, as well as controversial, and having a page on there is highly sought after. Let's get to know it better. Read More ever constructed. Want to know about anything, from dogs to advanced mathematics? Wikipedia can oblige.
Want to know what a function looks like? Done. Want to see how to solve an equation, step by step? Can do. Want to know the nutrition facts of a cubic parsec of fried chicken? Not a problem. Wolfram Alpha has a bizarrely broad and sophisticated 10 Surprising Things You Didn't Know Wolfram Alpha Could Do 10 Surprising Things You Didn't Know Wolfram Alpha Could Do I continue to be amazed by Wolfram Alpha and the way it crunches numbers around openly available data. The result – it shows us the world in a far more inter-connected and interesting way. It... Read More suite of features, and is the student’s best friend.
When it comes to searching for international and domestic flights, SkyScanner is where you need to be. The free service allows you to search a huge number of airlines simultaneously, to find the cheapest option. You can search for flights on specific days, or you can see an overview of prices across an entire month.
Shopping
Everybody knows Amazon: If you want it, they’ve got it, and can get it to you for a very reasonable price, and quickly. Amazon is fantastic.
If eBay is the world’s garage sale, Etsy is its crafts fair. Thousands of artists and makers turn to the site to create their own online store from which to sell their wares. A bit of searching can bring up some genuinely beautiful, unique items here. It’s a fantastic way to customize your home.
eBay has been called the world’s garage sale, and the comparison isn’t unfair. Less of a player than once it was, the site (especially its ‘motors’ section) remains a viable avenue for bargain-hunters all over the world.
A first glance at Craigslist, with its early nineties web design, would not cause it to jump out at you as a website relevant today. That’s where you’d be wrong. The minimalist website and its classified ads remain a great way to buy and sell cars, computer equipment, and anything else you can imagine.
Overstock, Amazon’s iconoclastic little brother, remains a major online retail outlet: they have great deals, good service, ship internationally—and they accept Bitcoin. What’s not to like?
Years after its formation, ThinkGeek remains an internet staple. The stuff they sell is rarely practical, but it’s often seriously cool: the site delights in nerd tchotchkes and swag, and their stuff makes for great gifts and desk toys for the unrepentant dorks among us.
Newegg is a retailer dedicated to inexpensive consumer electronics, and they do a good job of underbidding the big, non-specialized stores. Their refurbished items are often seriously good deals.
For shoppers outside the US thwarted by region-specific deals and stores, ViaBox lets them permanently register their own US address that they can have parcels shipped to. ViaBox collects the parcels together and ships them anywhere in the world!
Canopy is Amazon, curated. Sometimes finding what you’re looking for on Amazon can be daunting. So, if you’re particularly keen on beautifully designed products, Canopy might be able to help. The site’s hand-curated products are each stunning, and all available on Amazon. This is a fantastic site to browse and find boutique interior products to help your home to stand out.
Social
We all know Facebook. It’s the most used social network on Earth and by now it’s hard to get along without it (despite the bad publicity recently). Facebook is invaluable for organizing events, keeping in touch with old friends, and sharing bad political memes.
Twitter seems facile on the surface. However, it turns out that forcing succinctness eliminates a lot of the cruft that pops up on traditional social networks, and the platform has proved a great way to keep up with businesses, friends, and celebrities. Without allowing them to monopolize too much of your time.
LinkedIn, a website you may know from those emails it keeps sending you, is a professional social network. Want a job? Need to hire somebody? LinkedIn is your friend.
Instagram is a great way to communicate visually with your friends and followers, whether you want to share behind-the-scenes images and videos of your life, or more polished pics to show off your photography skills, this is the platform for you.
Pinterest is a great platform for collecting and sharing eclectic albums of visual content (much of it tutorials, recipes, decor ideas, and art).
Previously just a mobile messaging app, WhatsApp also has a web and desktop client. This hugely popular app has become one of the primary ways for over a billion people per month to stay in touch. And with end-to-end encryption, it’s more secure than many alternative messaging clients.
As an adult, meeting like-minded people outside of work can be tough. Meetup puts an end to this struggle. Acting as a directory of thousands of meetups around the world on a bewildering array of topics, it’s never been easier to make new friends, in real life.
Think of Imgur as a slimmed-down Pinterest. Originally developed as a photo-host for Reddit, Imgur has since bloomed into a great image-sharing platform in its own right.
Tumblr remains one of the leading blogging platforms. It’s a great place to connect with original content, put your own creations out there, or simply curate the awesome stuff you’re finding. The political side of the site can be scary, the creative side of the platform is phenomenal.
For a few years now, Buffer (free and premium), and its accompanying browser extensions, has been making scheduling posts to your social accounts easier than ever. Simply connect your social profiles to your Buffer account, and you can quickly schedule your posts in advance.
Software
MakeUseOf maintains a list of the best free software for Windows, MacOS, Linux, Android, and iOS, and more. We also publish in-depth resources to help you get the most out of any tech you own.
If an app you previously used has started charging, or isn’t quite offering what you need, check out AlternativeTo. Type in which application or website you want to replace, and the site will churn out plenty of decent alternatives for you to try.
GitHub, currently the most popular platform for hosting and contributing to open software projects, is fantastic. It gives access to downloads, version history, commit logs, and contributor statistics.
Similar to GitHub, SourceForge is another open-source coding repository to help you “find, create and publish open source software for free”.
Which Awesome Websites Did We Miss?
We’re sure you’ll agree that these sites are awesome, but they’re still just a drop in the bucket. Which among these are your favorite picks? Did your favorite not make the cut? Let us know! Your contributions will help us keep this list updated.
Image Credit: Rawpixel.com/Shutterstock |
Detroit Lions’ Defensive End Khyri Thornton Was Suspended Six Games By The NFL.
The NFL, more than any business you or I are likely to ever work for, is all up in their employee’s business.
From the number of hip thrusts they are allowed after a touchdown, to what substances that have nothing to do with their jobs they are allowed to ingest, NFL players have to put up with some ridiculous constraints on their lives. Do other celebrities have such regulations? No, they do not.
There was a time when the NFL had a massive image problem. In the 1980s, media outlets were full of stories regarding legendarily wild parties. On order to curb the rising tide of negative publicity, the NFL brought in an intense drug testing program. It really was the beginning of the league office’s role as the fun police.
The result has been the opposite of what was intended, as it always seems to be with the league office initiatives. Now, rather than just getting publicity when a player gets a DUI, the league also gets publicity when a player has a glass of wine on a plane six months later. Then the league gets more publicity when a year later, that player smokes some weed at a party and catches a cab home. Then the league gets more publicity when that player gains 45 lbs after not playing the game for 36 months.
I can already hear people making excuses for why the league needs to be assholes about this. “These players are role models for children. The league needs to set an example.” No; they don’t. Are they more of a role model for children than baseball, hockey, or basketball players?
MLB has not suspended a player for non-PED drugs since 2004. The largest penalty for marijuana use is a $35,000 fine in MLB. No games missed, and nobody cares. The NHL doesn’t even test for it. The NBA couldn’t play a game if its players got suspended for marijuana tests, they also fine players, and publish nothing.
By any measure, the NFL’s drug policy is ludicrous overkill. This article by Brad Townsend runs through the various league’s policies in a bit more detail. That’s the end of my rant on the subject.
What Is Next For Khyri Thornton
Here is how offseason suspensions for periods shorter than a full season affect the daily lives of players during the offseason. They don’t. Thornton can practice with the team. He will play in all of the preseason games, and battle for a spot on the 53-man roster. The suspension doesn’t actually hurt Thornton’s chance of making the cut oddly enough. If anything, it incentivizes keeping him.
How this will likely play out is that the Lions will keep Khyri Thornton. Thornton will begin his suspension shortly after the Lions set their 53-man roster. That will immediately open a roster spot. The effect will be that the Lions get to stash Thornton as a midseason depth option. This is not as good as having Thornton for the first six games of the season unless he wasn’t going to make the cut. Thornton was likely on the roster bubble in 2017. He is still facing competition from additions Jordan Hill and Jeremiah Ledbetter to make the roster.
By no means does this increase Thornton’s chances of collecting the last ten weeks of his salary this season, but neither has it torpedoed them to the depths of the Marianas trench. Unless they cut him tomorrow of course. |
RECHIZITORIU MINERIADA 13 – 15 IUNIE 1990
Anul 2017 luna 06 ziua 12
Extras: formă anonimizată-
(…), procurori militari la Secţia Parchetelor Militare din cadrul Parchetului de pe lângă Înalta Curte de Casaţie şi Justiţie;
Examinând actele de urmărire penală efectuate în dosarul penal (…), privind pe inculpaţii:
Iliescu Ion, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. a, g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
Roman Petre, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. a, g și j din Codul penal, cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
Voiculescu Gelu Voican, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. a, g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.; (…)
Dumitru S. Nicolae, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. a, g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
Măgureanu Virgil, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii,prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. a, g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
General maior (rez.) Florescu Mugurel Cristian, având la data faptelor gradul de colonel, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. a, g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
Amiral (rez.) Dumitrescu Emil, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
Ionescu Cazemir Benedict, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
Sârbu Adrian, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
Cozma Miron, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
Drella Matei, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
Burlec Plăieș Cornel, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
General (rez.) Dobrinoiu Vasile, având la data faptelor gradul de colonel, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.;
Colonel (rez.) Peter Petre, având la data faptelor gradul de maior, (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracţiuni contra umanităţii, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. g și j din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.,
Ghinescu Alexandru – (…), cercetat, în stare de libertate, sub aspectul săvârşirii de infracțiuni contra umanității, prev. de art. 439 alin. 1 lit. g din Codul penal,cu aplic. art. 5 C.p.
EXPUNEM URMĂTOARELE:
I . OBIECTUL CAUZEI
Faptele ce fac obiectul prezentei cauze penale au fost comise în luna iunie 1990 (zilele de 13-15), într-o perioadă de profunde transformări ale vieţii sociale, dar mai ales ale vieţii politice. Evenimentul a rămas în conştiinţa publicului sub denumirea „Mineriada din 13-15 iunie 1990”.
Limba română este singura limbă din lume în care a fost creat substantivul mineriadă care, ulterior, a fost tradus în toate limbile pământului.
În dimineaţa zilei de 13 iunie 1990, autorităţile statului au declanşat un atac violent al forţelor de ordine, în Piaţa Universităţii din Bucureşti, împotriva opozanţilor politici care contestau rezultatul alegerilor din data de 20 mai 1990. Urmare acţiunii, peste două sute de persoane au fost ridicate şi transportate la U.M.(…) Măgurele, unde au fost reţinute până în după amiaza aceleiaşi zile, când au fost lăsate să plece, fără a se efectua vreun act de cercetare faţă de aceştia.
Concomitent, s-a pătruns în forţă, fără drept, în sediul Institutului de Arhitectură, fiind percheziţionate mai multe birourile, iar persoanele aflate în incintă au fost evacuate prin acte de violenţă din clădire, trei dintre ele fiind transportate în afara mun. Bucureşti, la U.M. (…) Măgurele, unitate ce aparţinea Ministerului de Interne motivul fiind că „au pactizat cu manifestanţii”.
Conform hotărârii luate de către preşedintele Consiliului Provizoriu de Uniune Naţională, prim viceprim – ministru, viceprim-ministrul ai Guvernului României, conducători ai instituţiilor de forţă, precum şi de către persoane din conducerea Frontului Salvării Naţionale, în Piaţa Universităţii au fost aduşi muncitori de la Intreprinderea Maşini Grele Bucureşti, avându-l în frunte pe directorul acesteia.
Aceştia din urmă s-au manifestat violent agresând fizic persoanele întâlnite în zona Institutului de Arhitectură, după care au încercat să ocupe Piaţa Universităţii, pentru a împiedica revenirea manifestanţilor.
Acţiunile întreprinse de autorităţi statului au generat o ripostă violentă din partea opozanţilor, astfel că au fost incendiate sediile Poliţiei Capitalei, Ministerului de Interne, Televiziunii Române şi Serviciului Român de Informaţii.
S-a făcut uz de armă cu muniţie de război de către forţele de ordine, în aceste împrejurări fiind împuşcaţi mortal numiții (…), iar numiţii (…) au fost răniţi, de asemenea, prin împuşcare.
Represiunea autorităţilor a continuat, în zilele de 14 şi 15 iunie 1990, printr-un atac sistematic desfășurat împreună cu minerii şi muncitorii din mai multe judeţe ale ţării, care deveniseră o adevărată forţă de ordine paralelă cu cele recunoscute şi organizate potrivit legii.
Acţiunea acestei forţe a fost menită de a menține în funcție puterea politică instaurată în decembrie 1989 şi care câştigase alegerile din 20 mai 1990, căzându-i victime toți cei care erau considerați ,,elemente extremiste, reacționare” și care ar fi organizat o ,,rebeliune legionară”.
Obiectul prezentului dosar îl constituie stabilirea răspunderii penale a persoanelor vinovate de:
– uciderea numiţilor (…), în contextul evenimentelor din 13-15 iunie 1990;
– vătămarea integrităţii fizice şi psihice a unui număr de 1388 de persoane, care au fost agresate fizic sau lipsite ilegal de libertate;
– lipsirea de libertate a unui număr de 1250 de persoane.
Faptele vizate privesc intervalul de timp în care aceste persoane s-au aflat sub puterea autorităţilor sau a celor chemaţi să sprijine acţiunea acestora şi a încetat, odată cu punerea în libertate a ultimei persoane reţinute nelegal.
Prezenta cauză penală nu va analiza:
– stabilirea responsabilităţilor fiecărui participant în parte, respectiv numai a persoanelor care au iniţiat acest plan menit a înlătura orice formă de opoziţie sau care au sprijinit, sub orice formă, aceste acţiuni, cunoscând că, în acest fel, le asigură realizarea scopului urmărit;
– distrugerile provocate la sediilor unor instituţii publice, asociaţii, redacţii de ziare ori a altor pagube materiale, produse în patrimoniul unor persoane fizice sau juridice;
– legalitatea măsurilor de arestare luate de organele de urmărire penală faţă de persoanele reţinute, în lipsa oricăror indicii privind săvârşirea vreunei infracţiuni, întrucât aceste situaţii au făcut obiectul unui dosar de urmărire penală separat, întocmit de Secţia de Urmărire Penală şi Criminalistică din cadrul Parchetului de pe lângă Înalta Curte de Casaţie şi Justiţie şi înregistrat sub nr. (…), în care, la data de 31.05.2006, s-a dispus neînceperea urmăririi penale.
Soluţia a fost confirmată prin încheierea (…) din 03.11.2015, pronunţată în dosarul nr (…) al Înaltei Curţi de Casaţie şi Justiţie – Secţia Penală.
Evenimentele petrecute în Bucureşti sau în ţară, în perioada 01 ianuarie -13 iunie 1990, care sunt descrise în capitolul privind contextul general al cauzei.
Aceste aspecte nu fac obiectul cauzei, întrucât, redeschiderea urmăririi penale, confirmată de către Înalta Curte de Casaţie şi Justiţie, prin încheierea (…) din 09 martie 2015, în dosarul (…), priveşte doar infracţiunile contra păcii şi omenirii şi infracţiunile de omor prevăzute de Codul penal anterior.
II. DATE PRIVIND CONTEXTUL GENERAL AL CAUZEI
În cele ce urmează vor fi punctate momentele istorice, pe care le considerăm importante pentru a putea contextualiza starea de fapt, care formează obiectul acestui dosar.
Odată cu dizolvarea fostelor structuri de conducere ale statului român, puterea a fost preluată de nou înființatul Consiliul Frontului Salvării Naționale (C.F.S.N.), formațiune înființată la 22 decembrie 1989. Înființarea acestuia a fost anunțată, în aceeaşi zi, în jurul orelor 23.30, la posturile naționale de radio şi televiziune de către inc. Ion Iliescu, la acea dată director al Editurii Tehnice, devenit ulterior preşedinte de facto al ţării.
Acesta a fost cel care a dat citire Comunicatului către ţară al Consiliului Frontului Salvării Naționale. Prin acest comunicat Consiliul Frontului Salvării Naționale şi-a definit şi asumat rolul de „organism al puterii de stat din România”.
Comunicatul a avut conţinutul pe care îl prezentăm în cele ce urmează:
„Cetăţeni şi cetăţene, Trăim un moment istoric. Clanul Ceauşescu, care a dus ţara la dezastru, a fost eliminat de la putere. Cu toţii ştim şi recunoaştem că victoria de care se bucură întreaga ţară este rodul spiritului de sacrificiu al maselor populare de toate naţionalităţile şi, în primul rând, al admirabilului nostru tineret, care ne-a restituit, cu preţul sângelui, sentimentul demnităţii naţionale. Un merit deosebit îl au cei care, ani de zile, şi-au pus în pericol şi viaţa, protestând împotriva tiraniei. Se deschide o pagină nouă în viaţa politică si economică a României. În acest moment de răscruce am hotărât sa ne constituim în Frontul Salvării Naţionale, care se sprijină pe armata română şi care grupează toate forţele sănătoase ale ţării, fără deosebire de naţionalitate, toate organizaţiile si grupările care s-au ridicat, cu curaj, în apărarea libertăţii si demnităţii, în anii tiraniei totalitare. Scopul Frontului Salvării Naţionale este instaurarea democraţiei, libertăţii si demnităţii poporului român. Din acest moment se dizolvă toate structurile de putere ale clanului Ceauşescu. Guvernul se demite, Consiliul de Stat si instituţiile sale îşi încetează activitatea, întreaga putere în stat este preluată de Consiliul Frontului Salvării Naţionale. Lui i se vor subordona Consiliul Militar Superior, care coordonează întreaga activitate a armatei şi a unităţilor Ministerului de Interne. Toate ministerele şi organele centrale, în actuala lor structură, îşi vor continua activitatea normală, subordonându-se Frontului Salvării Naţionale, pentru a asigura desfăşurarea normală a întregii vieţi economice si sociale. În teritoriu se vor constitui consilii judeţene, municipale,orăşeneşti şi comunale ale Frontului Salvării Naţionale ca organe ale puterii locale. Miliţia este chemată ca, împreună cu comitetele cetăţeneşti, să asigure ordinea publică. Aceste organe vor lua toate măsurile necesare pentru asigurarea aprovizionării populaţiei cu alimente, cu energie electrică, cu căldură şi apă, pentru asigurarea transportului, a asistenţei medicale şi a întregii reţele comerciale. Ca program, frontul propune următoarele: 1. Abandonarea rolului conducător al unui singur partid şi statornicirea unui sistem democratic pluralist de guvernământ. 2. Organizarea de alegeri libere, în cursul lunii aprilie. 3. Separarea puterilor legislativă, executivă şi judecătorească în stat şi alegerea tuturor conducătorilor politici pentru unul sau, cel mult, două mandate. Nimeni nu mai poate pretinde puterea pe viaţă.Consiliul Frontului Salvării Naţionale propune ca ţara să se numească, în viitor, România.Un comitet de redactare a noii Constituţii va începe să funcţioneze imediat. 4. Restructurarea întregii economii naţionale pe baza criteriilor rentabilităţii si eficienţei. Eliminarea metodelor administrativ-birocratice de conducere economică centralizată si promovarea liberei iniţiative şi a competenţei în conducerea tuturor sectoarelor economice. 5. Restructurarea agriculturii şi sprijinirea micii producţii ţărăneşti. Oprirea distrugerii satelor. 6. Reorganizarea învăţământului românesc potrivit cerinţelor contemporane. Reaşezarea structurilor învăţământului pe baze democrate si umaniste. Eliminarea dogmelor ideologice care au provocat atâtea daune poporului român şi promovarea adevăratelor valori ale umanităţii. Eliminarea minciunii şi a imposturii şi statuarea unor criterii de competenţă şi justiţie în toate domeniile de activitate.Aşezarea pe baze noi a dezvoltării culturii naţionale.Trecerea presei, radioului, televiziunii din mâinile unei familii despotice în mâinile poporului. 7. Respectarea drepturilor si libertăţilor minorităţilor naţionale şi asigurarea deplinei lor egalităţi în drepturi cu românii. 8. Organizarea întregului comerţ al ţării, pornind de la cerinţele satisfacerii, cu prioritate, a tuturor nevoilor cotidiene ale populaţiei României. În acest scop, vom pune capăt exportului de produse agroalimentare, vom reduce exportul de produse petroliere, acordând prioritate satisfacerii nevoilor de căldurăşi lumină ale oamenilor. 9. Întreaga politică externă a ţării să servească promovării bunei vecinatăţi, prieteniei şi păcii în lume, integrându-se în procesul de construire a unei Europe unite, casa comună a tuturor popoarelor continentului. Vom respecta angajamentele internaţionale ale României şi, în primul rând, cele privitoare la Tratatul de la Varşovia. 10. Promovarea unei politici interne şi externe subordonate nevoilor şi intereselor dezvoltării fiinţei umane, respectului deplin al drepturilor şi libertăţilor omului, inclusiv al dreptului de deplasare liberă. Constituindu-ne în acest front, suntem ferm hotărâţi sa facem tot ce depinde de noi pentru a reinstaura societatea civilă în România, garantând triumful democraţiei, libertăţii si demnităţii tuturor locuitorilor ţării. În mod provizoriu, în componenţa consiliului intră următorii: Doina Cornea, Ana Blandiana, Mircea Dinescu, László Tőkés, Dumitru Mazilu, Dan Deșliu, general Ștefan Gușă, general Victor Atanasie Stănculescu, Aurel Dragoș Munteanu, Corneliu Mănescu, Alexandru Bârlădeanu, (…), Petre Roman, Ion Caramitru, Sergiu Nicolaescu, Mihai Montanu, Mihai Ispas, Gelu Voican Voiculescu, Dan Marțian, Mihail Lupoi, Gheorghe Voinea (general), căpitan de rangul I. Emil Dumitrescu, Vasile Neacșa, Cristina Ciontu, Marian Baciu, Bogdan Teodoriu, Eugenia Iorga, Paul Negrițiu, Gheorghe Manole, Vladimir Ionescu, Neculae Radu, Adrian Sârbu, Constantin Cîrjan, Géza Domokos, Magdalena Ionescu, Marian Mierlă, Constantin Ivanovici, Ovidiu Vlad, Valeriu Bucurescu, Ion Iliescu”.
Comunicatul către ţară al Consiliului Frontului Salvării Naționale a fost publicat în Monitorul Oficial Partea I nr.1 din 22 decembrie 1989.
După ce a citit Comunicatul către ţară al Consiliului Frontului Salvării Naționale, Ion Iliescu a mai precizat, referitor la acest organ al puterii de stat:
Deocamdată, este o structură provizorie, gândită într-un mod foarte operativ. Lista rămâne deschisă. Nu aceasta va fi componenţa completă a consiliului. Am menţionat doar câteva nume de oameni care sunt legate de transformările pe care le cunoaşte ţara, oameni care au demonstrat spirit de sacrificiu în anii tiraniei, tineri care în aceste zile au fost pe baricade, care şi-au pus viaţa în pericol, reprezentanţi ai muncitorilor, ai studenţilor, ai intelectualităţii, ai armatei, acele forţe care au fost active, prezente în procesul de instaurare a noului regim al puterii. Lista rămâne deci deschisă. Pentru a putea completa componenţa consiliului aşteptăm propuneri din partea tuturor categoriilor şi forţelor sociale care au luptat şi au învins. Acest comunicat este o primă formă de platforma-program a noului organism al puterii de stat din România”.
Persoanele din componenţa Consiliului Frontului Salvării Naționale, aşa cum a fost anunţată în seara zilei de 22 decembrie 1989, pot fi împărţite în trei categorii.
Prima categorie şi cea mai numeroasă era formată din persoane al căror trecut a fost legat, în mod strâns, de U.R.S.S. şi pot fi enumeraţi aici Ion Iliescu, Nicolae Militaru, Silviu Brucan, Alexandru Bârlădeanu, Károly Király, capitanul de rangul I Emil „Cico” Dumitrescu.
Acestora li s-au ataşat, în ziua de 22 decembrie 1989, Sergiu Nicolaescu, Gelu Voican Voiculescu, Mihail Montanu, Petre Roman, Cazemir Ionescu, Dan Marţian, Constantin Ivanovici.
A doua categorie o reprezintă intelectualii, cunoscuţi pentru poziţia lor anticomunistă manifestată încă din timpul dictaturii comuniste şi care, în acea perioadă,reuşiseră să intre în contact cu cancelariile europene şi enumerăm aici pe Doina Cornea, Ana Blandiana, Mircea Dinescu, Ion Caramitru, Dan Desliu, Aurel Dragoş Munteanu, Domokos Géza, Dumitru Mazilu.
A treia categorie era formată din revoluţionari, care se făcuseră remarcaţi în zilele anterioare datei de 22 decembrie 1989.
Consiliul Frontului Salvării Naționale s-a întrunit oficial la 27 decembrie 1989, dată la care au fost anunțate organizarea și modul de funcționare a acestui organism.
Membrilor iniţiali li s-au adăugat alţii, astfel că numărul lor a ajuns la 141, după ce a fost completat cu reprezentanți ai tuturor județelor din România.
La aceeaşi dată a fost constituit Biroul Executiv al Consiliului Frontului Salvării Naţionale format din: preşedinte – Ion Iliescu, prim-vicepreşedinte – Dumitru Mazilu, vicepreşedinţi – Cazemir Ionescu şi Károly Király, secretar – Dan Marţian, membrii: Bogdan Teodoriu, Vasile Neacşa, Silviu Brucan, Gheorghe Manole, Ion Caramitru şi Neculae Radu.
Pe lângă Biroul Executiv funcționa și un „colectiv pentru relațiile cu publicul și mijloacele informației de masă”, precum şi comisii de specialitate.
Dintre acestea amintim Comisia constituţională, juridică si pentru drepturile omului coordonată de – Dumitru Mazilu, care a redactat proiectul Decretului nr. 92/1990 privind alegeria Parlamentului şi a Preşedintelui României (Monitorul oficial nr. 35 din 18.03.1990).
Prin Decretul nr.1 din 26 decembrie 1989 al C.F.S.N, semnat de Ion Iliescu, în vigoare de la 27 decembrie 1989, Petre Roman a fost numit prim – ministru al Guvernului provizoriu.
Prin Decretul C.F.S.N. nr.2 din 26 decembrie 1989, generalul colonel în rezervă Nicolae Militaru, a fost rechemat în cadrele active ale armatei. Prin Decretul nr.3 din aceeaşi dată, Nicolae Militaru a fost numit în funcţia de ministru al apărării.
Prin Decretul-Lege nr.5 al C.F.S.N. din 28 decembrie 1989, în vigoare din 29 decembrie 1989, au fost numiţi, în funcţia de viceprim-ministru al guvernului, Mihai Drăgănescu şi Gelu Voican Voiculescu.
Prin Decretul-Lege nr.22 al C.F.S.N. din 28 decembrie 1989, în vigoare din 29 decembrie 1989, generalul locotenent Mihai Chiţac a fost numit în funcţia de ministru de interne. Prin Decretul nr.24 din 28 decembrie 1989 al C.F.S.N., Mihai Chiţac a fost înaintat în gradul de general – colonel, iar prin Decretul nr.242 din 14 iunie 1990 al C.P.U.N. a fost eliberat din funcţia de ministru de interne.
Prin Decretul Lege nr.10 din 31 decembrie 1989 al C.F.S.N., publicat în Monitorul Oficial nr.9 din 31 decembrie 1989, s-a constituit Guvernul României, ca organ suprem al administraţiei de stat, care avea obligaţia de a îndeplinii obiectivele cuprinse în programul C.F.S.N. asigurând executarea măsurilor stabilite prin decretele adoptate de acesta. În art. 3 se specifică că C.F.S.N. aproba componenţa Guvernului României la propunerea prim-ministrului.
Din componenţa Guvernului Provizoriu Petre Roman au făcut parte, printre alţii: Prim viceprim-ministru – Gelu Voican VOICULESCU, Ministrul de Interne – Mihai CHIŢAC,Ministrul Justiţiei- Teofil POP,Ministrul Apărării Naţionale- Nicolae MILITARU,Ministrul Economiei Naţionale – Atanase-Victor STĂNCULESCU,Ministrul Petrolului – Victor MUREA,Ministrul Minelor – Nicolae DICU, Ministrul Poştelor şi Telecomunicaţiilor – Stelian PINTILIE, Ministrul Transporturilor – Corneliu BURADA.
Aceste persoane vor fi regăsite cu diferite acte de participare în evenimentele din 13-15 iunie 1990.
La 25 decembrie 1989 a avut loc, la Târgovişte, procesul soţilor Nicolae şi Elena Ceauşescu urmat, în aceeaşi zi, de execuţia acestora. La procesul şi execuţia soţilor Ceauşescu au participat, ca delegaţi, din partea C.F.S.N., Gelu Voican Voiculescu, general Victor Atanase Stănculescu și Virgil Măgureanu.
De asemenea, au mai fost prezenţi maiorul Mugurel Cristian Florescu şi locotenentul-major Trifan Matenciuc.
În data de 28 decembrie 1989, prin Decretul-Lege nr.20/1989, în vigoare de la 29 decembrie 1989, a fost eliberat din funcţia de şef al Marelui Stat Major din cadrul Ministerului Apărării Naţionale şi adjunct al ministrului apărării naţionale, generalul-maior Ştefan Guşă.
În aceeaşi zi, prin Decretul C.F.S.N. nr.17, publicat în Monitorul Oficial în 29 decembrie 1989, a fost rechemat în activitate generalul-colonel (…) şi numit, prin Decretul C.F.S.N. nr.20/1989, semnat de Ion Iliescu, în funcţia de șef al Marelui Stat Major al Armatei Române, funcţie pe care a îndeplinit-o până la 30 aprilie 1991.
În această calitate, (…) a cumulat și funcțiile de prim-adjunct al ministrului apărării (28 decembrie 1989 – iunie 1990) și secretar de stat al M.Ap.N. (iunie 1990 – mai 1991).
Inculpatul Ion Iliescu l-a numit, apoi, pe g-ral.col. (…), consilier prezindenţial şef al Administraţiei Prezidenţiale, la 01.05.1991, funcţie pe care a deţinut-o până la 01.09.1994 când, tot Ion Iliescu, l-a numit consilier prezidenţial pentru apărare şi siguranţă naţională în cadrul Administraţiei Prezidenţiale, funcţie în virtutea căreia a fost şi membru al C.S.A.T., până la 21.11.1996. La data de 21.10.1994, (…) a fost avansat la gradul de general de armată, iar după trecerea sa în retragere, a fost numit, la 27.02.2004, administrator al Uzinei de Armament M.F.A. Mizil. A decedat în anul 2015.
Generalul-colonel (…) care, în perioada 1949 – 1954, a urmat cursurile Academiei Militare de Artilerie şi Rachete din U.R.S.S., a fost trecut în rezervă de Nicolae Ceuşescu, în cadrul procesului de îndepărtare din armată a generalilor care îşi efectuaseră studiile în Uniunea Sovietică.
În ziua de 31 decembrie 1989, a fost arestat generalul-colonel Iulian Vlad, în biroul său de la Ministerul Apărării Naţionale, prezent la arestare fiind şi Gelu Voican Voiculescu. Generalul Iulian Vlad era şeful Direcţiei Securităţii Statului care, încă din 27 decembrie 1989, prin Decretul nr.4/1989 al C.F.S.N., trecuse în subordinea Ministerului Apărării Naţionale. Prin acelaşi Decret nr.4/1989, au mai trecut în subordinea Ministerului Apărării Naţionale, Comandamentul Trupelor de Securitate împreună cu organele şi unităţile din subordinea acestora.
Consiliul Frontului Salvării Naţionale, ca organ al puterii de stat, trebuia să fie unul neutru politic.
Subsumat acestui scop, prin Decretul- Lege nr. 8/31 decembrie 1989, publicat în Monitorul Oficial nr.9 din 31 decembrie 1989, a fost reglementată înregistrarea și funcționarea partidelor politice, trecându-se de la sistemul partidului unic la sistemul pluripartid.
În art. 1 se preciza că:
„În România este liberă constituirea partidelor politice, cu execepţia partidelor fasciste sau care propagă concepţii contrare ordinii de stat şi de drept, în România. Nici o altă îngrădire, pe motiv de rasă, naţionalitate, religie, grad de cultură, sex sau convingeri politice nu poate împiedica constituirea şi funcţionarea partidelor politice”.
Tot la 31 decembrie 1989, s-a constituit Grupul pentru Dialog Social (G.D.S.),
„Ca un grup de sine stătător, care acţionează legal, începând de astăzi, 31 decembrie 1989. El aspiră să reprezinte conştiinţa lucidă a acestei societăţi care a fost umilită şi destructurată. Vrem să contribuim la ieşirea din dezastru şi la regenerare. Grupul pentru Dialog Social este un grup independent, strict informal, care nu se subordonează niciunei grupări politice şi care refuză orice colaborare cu cei care au susţinut vechiul regim. Declarăm explicit: Nu vrem să fim un centru de putere ci un centru de influenţă.Pe cont propriu fiecare membru al grupului are dreptul la propriile sale opţiuni şi orientări politice, care nu afectează însă,în niciun fel, statutul şi orientarea Grupului. Grupul pentru Dialog Social este o instanţă de reflexie critică asupra problemelor fundamentale care frământă societatea civilă română, asupra inserării ei in contextul european: civilizaţie – cultură – politică – societate civilă – ecologie. Este un club de dezbateri între intelectuali de diferite profesii, care îşi propun să prospecteze căile de evoluţie şi organizare ale acestei societăţi, o evoluţie bazată pe valorile umane şi pe drepturile omului. Grupul pentru Dialog Social îşi propune să fie un laborator în care economişti, sociologi, politologi, istorici, filozofi, urbanişti, scriitori, teologi, etc. să găsească (să caute) împreună strategiile şi soluţiile de care societatea română va avea nevoie în viitorul imediat”,
se arăta, printre altele, în declaraţia de constituire a acestei organizaţii neguvernamentale.
Începând din 2 ianuarie 1990, ministrul apărării Nicolae Militaru, împreună cu Gelu Voican Voiculescu, prim-viceprim-ministru, au coordonat preluarea de către M.Ap.N. a structurilor fostei securității. La conducerea fostelor Direcţii Judeţene de Securitate au fost desemnaţi ofiţeri din cadrul M.Ap.N.
Ofiţerii din cadrul Securităţii Municipiului Bucureşti au fost trecuţi în rezervă, considerându-se că aceştia au făcut poliţie politică în favoarea regimului Ceauşescu însă, după puţină vreme, aşa cum vom arăta în continuare, unii dintre ei au fost încorporaţi într-o nouă structură informativă, U.M. (…), sub ordinele lui GeluVoican Voiculescu în cadrul Ministerului de Interne.
La 03.01.1990, Consiliul Frontului Salvării Naționale a anunțat că nu este și nu se va constitui în partid politic însă, la 23.01.1990, cu 128 de voturi pentru, 8 contra și 5 abțineri, Consiliul Frontului Salvării Naționale a hotărât transformarea Frontului Salvării Naționale (F.S.N.) în partid politic, cu intenția de a participa la viitoarele alegeri, hotărâre materializată la 06.02.1990, când F.S.N. a fost înscris în Registrul Partidelor Politice. Primul preşedinte al F.S.N. a fost inculpatul Ion Iliescu.
Silviu Brucan a fost acela care a lansat şi susţinut transformarea F.S.N. într-un partid politic. Pentru a fi convingător, Silviu Brucan a trecut în revistă ceea ce s-a întâmplat în ţările foste comuniste din Europa, unde au apărut partide noi formate din cei care au participat la schimbarea de regim politic. De asemenea, acesta a mai spus că ar fi absurd să părăsească sfera puterii cei care au decis schimbarea României pentru ca, în final, Silviu Brucan să facă o previziune:
„Va fi un urlet de fiară înjunghiată din partea opoziţiei, dar noi vom aduce observatori străini şi le vom închide gura”
(declaraţie martor Caramitru Ion-Horia-Leonida din 01.02.2017, vol.397, filele 8-17).
Referitor la transformarea F.S.N. în partid politic, la data de 25 ianuarie 1990, Ion Iliescu a mers la Televiziunea Română şi a spus:
„Niciodată conducerea F.S.N. nu a afirmat că nu va participa la alegeri. Am întârziat să dezbatem în Consiliu această problemă întrucât nu problemele campaniei electorale ne-au preocupat în această perioadă ci probleme mult mai presante ale vieţii noastre economice şi sociale”.
Unii membrii ai C.F.S.N., ca Dumitru Mazilu, Mircea Dinescu, Ion Caramitru, Andrei Pleșu, Dan Hăulică, Gabriel Liiceanu și Doina Cornea au demisionat înainte ca F.S.N. să se transforme în partid politic.
La data de 05 ianuarie 1990, s-a depus, la Tribunalul Bucureşti, dosarul pentru constituirea (de fapt, reînfiinţarea) Partidului Naţional Ţărănesc – Creştin Democrat.
Un rol deosebit de important în viaţa acestui partid l-a avut Corneliu Coposu care, de altfel, de la reînfiinţarea partidului şi până la data de 11 noiembrie 1995, când a decedat, a îndeplinit funcţia de preşedinte al partidului. Corneliu Coposu a fost, în perioada respectivă, un adevărat lider al opoziţiei politice.
În zilele de 5 şi 6 ianuarie 1990, acesta a avut două întâlniri cu Dumitru Mazilu. La 10 ianuarie 1990, la Palatul Victoria, a avut loc o întâlnire între Corneliu Coposu şi Ion Iliescu, întâlnire la care au mai participat aproximativ 25 de persoane, printre care Petre Roman, Dumitru Mazilu, Cazemir Ionescu, Nicolae S. Dumitru, Dan Iosif, Liviu Petrina, Ion Diaconescu, ultimii doi membri marcanţi ai P.N.Ţ.-C.D. La această întrunire s-a discutat despre pluripartitism.
Pentru prima dată, Corneliu Coposu a lansat ideea ca cei prezenţi să se înscrie într-unul din partidele istorice, Partidului Naţional Ţărănesc – Creştin Democrat(P.N.Ţ.-C.D.), Partidul Naţional Liberal (P.N.L.) sau Partidul Social Democrat Român (P.S.D.R.).
La 15 ianuarie 1990, prin Decizia Civilă nr. 4 a Tribunalului Municipiului București, a fost reînfiinţat Partidul Naţional Liberal (P.N.L.), continuatorul Partidului Național Liberal constituit în 1875. Decizia reînfiinţări acestui partid a fost luată încă din după – amiaza zilei de 22 decembrie 1989.
Din grupul de inițiativă pentru reînfiinţarea P.N.L. au făcut parte, printre alţii, Dan Amedeo Lăzărescu, Radu Câmpeanu, I. V. Săndulescu, Nicu Enescu, Dinu Zamfirescu.
În ianuarie 1990 Sergiu Cunescu, împreună cu Adrian Dimitriu, fost secretar general al Partidului Social Democrat Independent condus de Constantin Titel Petrescu, Mira Moscovici, Constantin Avramescu, Mircea Iscru Stanescu, au înscris, la instanţă, noul Partid Social Democrat din România, continuator legitim și unic al Partidului Social Democrat Independent.
Partidul Naţional Ţărănesc – Creştin Democrat, Partidul Național Liberal şi Partidul Social Democrat Român au constituit, în 1990, opoziţia politică la Frontul Salvării Naţionale.
Prin Decretul nr. 41 din 09.01.1990 al preşedintelui C.F.S.N., Ion Iliescu, procurorul Gheorghe Robu a fost numit în funcţia de procuror general al României.
Prin Decretul nr.11 din 19.07.1990 al preşedintelui României, procurorul Gheorghe Robu a fost reinvestit în funcţia de procuror general al României.
În ziua de 12 ianuarie 1990, cetăţenii din Bucureşti, Timişoara, Braşov, Cluj şi din alte localităţi s-au adunat să cinstească amintirea victimelor Revoluţiei din decembrie 1989.
Mulţimea strânsă în faţa sediului Consiliului Frontului Salvării Naţionale şi Guvernului au cerut celor două instituţii să-şi precizeze poziţia referitor la:
asigurarea de alegeri libere sub egida ONU; să anunţe numărul victimelor represiunii;
să informeze corect opinia publică cu privire la teroriştii despre a căror existenţă s-a vorbit intens în timpul revoluţiei;
să judece, în procese publice,apropiaţii lui Ceauşescu şi teroriştii;
să scoată partidul comunist în afara legii şi
să asigure distribuirea bunurilor şi fondurilor acestui partid tuturor partidelor politice din România;
să facă precizări cu privire la opţiunile politice, atât ale membrilor Consiliului Frontului Salvării Naţionale cât şi ale guvernului provizoriu.
Seara târziu, s-a desfăşurat, la Palatul Victoria, un dialog între membri ai conducerii Consiliului Frontului Salvării Naţionale şi reprezentanţii participanţilor la mitingul din Piaţa Victoriei, în urma căruia s-a anunţat adoptarea a trei decrete-lege privind:
– declararea în afara legii a Partidului Comunist Român;
– organizarea,la 28 ianuarie 1990, a unui referendum pentru reintroducerea în Codul Penal a pedepsei cu moartea;
– instituirea unei Comisii naţionale pentru rezolvarea sesizărilor şi doleanţelor tuturor cetăţenilor ţării.
De asemenea, au fost făcute o serie de clarificări privind participarea egală la alegeri a partidelor politice, repartizarea unor fonduri egale pentru organizarea campaniilor electorale, cu şanse egale pentru fiecare.
În aceeaşi seară, Gheorghe Robu, procurorul general al României, a acordat un interviu, Televiziunii Române, în care a precizat că, toate persoanele cu funcţii importante în conducerea Partidului Comunist Român au fost arestate şi procesul lor urmează să înceapă în următoarele 10 zile. Totodată, procurorul general al României a mai afirmat că sunt arestaţi şi anchetaţi câteva sute de terorişti.
Aceste aspecte au fost relatate în ziarul „Adevărul”, apărut în data de 13 ianuarie 1990.
La data de 17 ianuarie 1990, prin Decretul nr.61, colonelul dr. inginer Gheorghe Andriță din Ministerul de Interne, a fost înaintat la gradul de general-maior (cu 1 stea), iar prin Decretul nr.64, din aceeaşi dată, a fost numit în funcția de adjunct al ministrului de interne, șef al Comandamentului Serviciilor și Înzestrării.
În perioada 17 ianuarie 1990 – 16 iulie 1992, gen. dr. ing. Gheorghe Andriță a îndeplinit funcția de secretar de stat în Ministerul de Interne.
Tot prin Decretul nr.64 din 17 ianuarie 1990 al C.F.S.N., (…)iu a fost numit în funcţia de adjunct al ministrului de interne şi şef al Statului Major din Ministerul de Interne iar, la data de 25 aprilie 1990, a fost numit prim adjunct al ministrului de interne şi şef al Inspectoratului General al Poliţiei Române.
Prin Decretul nr.69 din 19 ianuarie 1990 al C.F.S.N. lui (…) i s-a acordat gradul de general – maior. Acesta fusese trecut în rezervă de Nicolae Ceauşescu, la data de 05 octombrie 1984, cu gradul de colonel, interzicându-i-se accesul în unităţile M.I. În perioada 1971-1984, (…) a fost şef de Stat Major al Trupelor de Securitate. De remarcat este faptul că, între 1956-1960, (…) a absolvit, în U..R.S.S., Academia „Felix Dzerzhinsky”.
Prin Decretul nr.145 din 28 februarie 1990 al C.P.U.N., (…) a fost rechemat în activitate, la Ministerul de Interne, unde a fost numit comandantul Trupelor de Pază şi Ordine. În aprilie 1990, a fost numit adjunct al ministrului de interne şi şef al Statului Major al Ministerului de Interne.
În ianuarie 1991, (…) a fost avansat la gradul de general – locotenent cu două stele, iar în decembrie 1991, a fost trecut în rezervă, la 66 ani. Prin Decretul Prezidenţial nr. 243 din 28 noiembrie 1994 al preşedintelui Ion Iliescu, a fost avansat, în rezervă, la gradul de general – colonel cu trei stele, iar prin Decretul Prezidenţial nr.277 din 09 mai 2003, acelaşi preşedinte l-a avansat la gradul de general de armată cu patru stele, în retragere.
În ziua de 19.01.1990, reprezentanții sindicali ai minerilor din Valea Jiului au avut întâlniri cu Iliescu Ion – președintele C.F.S.N., Roman Petre – prim-ministru și Dicu Nicolae – ministrul minelor, iar în urma discuțiilor au fost satisfăcute toate revendicările minerilor, printre care:
-stabilirea săptămânii de lucru de 5 zile; -posturi de câte 6 ore; -salariu dublu pentru zilele de sărbători legale; -36 de zile de concediu de odihnă, față de 30 de zile câte erau anterior, pentru muncitorii din subteran; -creșterea sporurilor pentru munca de noapte de la 15% la 20%; -plata integrală a salariului pentru zilele de spitalizare cauzate de accidente de muncă; -pensie de urmaș pentru soțiile celor decedați în accidente de muncă.
Fără a pune în discuție oportunitatea satisfacerii acestor revendicări, care ține de politica adoptată în domeniu, de către reprezentanții puterii politice, trebuie remarcat că acest fapt i-a determinat pe mineri să devină fideli celor care exercitau, la acel moment, puterea politică în stat, având credința că alți reprezentanți ai puterii nu au aceeași deschidere față de satisfacerea revendicărilor lor.
Așa cum se va dovedi ulterior, li s-a creat minerilor credința că apărarea revendicărilor obținute îi obligă să-i apere pe cei care le-au satisfăcut aceste revendicări, iar simpla punere la îndoială a concepțiilor politice ale acestora reprezintă o amenințare pentru însăși clasa socială din care minerii făceau parte.
Autorităţile statului român, constituite în 1990, au acordat o atenţie deosebită minerilor din Valea Jiului care, întotdeauna, au lucrat în condiţii foarte grele şi care, indiferent de orânduirea socială, nu au ezitat să aibă şi să îşi susţină revendicările.
În acest context se înscrie şi numirea, la începutul lunii martie 1990, a lui Burlec Plăieş Cornel,inginer minier, în funcţia de ministru adjunct al minelor, în guvernul provizoriu Petre Roman.
În mod succint, vom prezenta câteva repere istorice referitoare la acţiunile revendicative ale minerilor şi modul cum au înţeles a fi rezolvate de structurile de putere, în decursul timpului.
În afara grevei minerilor de la Lupeni din 1929, mai puţin cunoscută,dar de aceeaşi importanţă socială, politică, economică şi istorică este şi greva începută,tot la Lupeni, în data de 1 august 1977.
La 30 iunie 1977, a fost adoptată Legea nr.3/1977 privind asigurările sociale de stat şi asistenţă socială, conform căreia minerii pensionaţi nu mai aveau dreptul să obţină câştiguri mai mari decât cele obţinute anterior pensionării, fiind afectaţi minerii pensionaţi în urma invalidităţiide gradul III, caracterizată prin pierderea parţială a capacităţii de muncă care, pe lângă pensie, mai obţineau şi salarii în situaţia în care erau încadraţi pentru munci mai uşoare sau½ din normă.
La data de 1 august 1977, minerii de la Mina Aninoasa au refuzat să intre în subteran solicitând, ca la faţa locului, să vină un activist al Partidului Comunist Român (P.C.R.) şi cu persoane din conducerea Centralei Cărbunelui Petroşani.
Acestora li s-au alăturat câteva sute de pensionari cu grupa III de muncă, din Lupeni pentru ca, împreună, să hotărască să se deplaseze la Bucureşti, pentru a cere lămuriri în privinţa legii asigurărilor sociale de stat şi asistenţă socială.
În ziua de 2 august 1977, organele locale de partid au încercat să-i oprească pe mineri pentru a pleca la Bucureşti, însă revolta minerilor luase amploare. A fost înştiinţat, despre aceste evenimente, Manea Mănescu, prim-ministrul Consiliului de Stat al României, care a trimis la faţa locului o echipă formată din Ilie Verdeţ, prim viceprim-ministru, Gheorghe Pană şi Constantin Băbălău.
Minerii nu au avut încredere în această echipă din conducerea superioară a P.C.R., astfel că, în ziua de 3 august, s-a deplasat în Valea Jiului, Nicolae Ceauşescu, care a luat act de revendicările minerilor, printre acestea regăsindu-se:
reducerea programului de lucru la timpul de 6 ore pe zi,
pensionarea minerilor pentru limită de vârstă la 50 de ani,
să nu se adopte lucruri în acord global,
să se menţină deciziile de pensionare privind gradul de invaliditate III,
reducerea planului de producţie proporţional cu forţa de muncă productivă.
Aceste revendicări au fost acceptate însă, după încetarea grevei, au început şi represaliile împotriva minerilor.
Liderii grevei au fost condamnaţi pentru infracţiuni de drept comun dar, ca măsuri de prevedere, cadrele securităţii au fost angajate ca muncitori în minele din Valea Jiului, cu scopul de a culege informaţii, de a-i supraveghea şi chiar de a-i intimida fizic pe mineri. De asemenea, au mai fost angajaţi, în minele din Valea Jiului, foşti delicvenţi de drept comun iar, pentru suplimentarea forţei de muncă, au fost trimişi să lucreze în exploatările miniere, militari în termen din unităţile Ministerului Apărării Naţionale.
Revenind la evenimentele din 1990 menţionăm că, imediat după ce s-a anunţat intenţia de constituire a F.S.N. în partid politic, Corneliu Coposu l-a contactat telefonic pe Ion Iliescu şi i-a cerut să respecte pluripartitismul şi l-a anunţat că, faţă de decizia F.S.N., P.N.Ţ.-C.D. va organiza, în ziua de duminică 28 ianuarie 1990, un miting împreună cu celelalte două partide politice P.N.L. şi P.S.D.R.
În ziua de 28 ianuarie 1990, în jurul orei 11:00, participanţii la miting au pornit de la sediul P.N.Ţ.-C.D., către sediul guvernului din Piaţa Victoriei, pe traseul Piaţa Rosetti – Piaţa Universităţii – B-dul Magheru.
La acest miting au participat, alături de lideri ai P.N.Ţ.-C.D. şi domnii Călin Popescu Tăriceanu şi Dinu Patriciu, din partea P.N.L. şi Sergiu Cunescu, din partea P.S.D.R.
În jurul orei 12:30 – 13:00, în faţa guvernului, care era apărat de armată, s-au strâns în jur de 100.000 de oameni, care au răspuns apelului partidelor istorice de a participa la miting. La câteva minute după ce liderii partidelor politice au ajuns în faţa guvernului, Cazemir Ionescu i-a invitat în sediul guvernului, la discuţii, cu persoanele din conducerea ţării.
Astfel, la aceste discuţii au fost prezenţi Corneliu Coposu, Ion Diaconescu, Liviu Petrina, Iftene Pop, Ion Raţiu, Gavrilă Copil, Dudu Ionescu şi Ion Gherasim, din partea P.N.Ţ.-C.D., Călin Popescu Tăriceanu şi Dinu Patriciu, din partea P.N.L., iar din partea P.S.D.R. au participat Sergiu Cunescu şi Constantin Avramescu.
Din partea C.F.S.N. au fost prezenţi Ion Iliescu, Petre Roman, Cazemir Ionescu, Nicolae S. Dumitru, Claudiu Iordache şi Dan Iosif.
Cu prilejul acestei întâlniri, Corneliu Coposu le-a spus interlocutorilor că, partipanţii la miting protestează în mod democratic, că nu au intenţia să dea jos conducerea ţării şi solicită pluripartitismul.
Cu acest prilej, Corneliu Coposu, l-a invitat pe Ion Iliescu să facă parte din P.N.Ţ.-C.D., oferindu-i chiar şi funcţia de preşedinte al acestui partid.
În toată după-amiaza zilei de 28 ianuarie 1990, în sediul guvernului, a fost o forfotă continuă şi se vehiculau tot felul de informaţii.
La un moment dat, în spatele unei uşi întredeschise, a fost observat Silviu Brucan, care era foarte atent la dialogul dintre putere şi opoziţie.
Deoarece oamenii din stradă începuseră să-şi piardă calmul, Corneliu Coposu şi Ion Iliescu, însoţiţi de alte persoane, au ieşit la balcon pentru a se adresa mulţimii.
În cursul după-amiezii, (…) i-a transmis lui Ion Iliescu că„începe să fie umplută piaţa de oamenii noştri”, după care, Ion Iliescu a devenit mult mai sigur pe sine în discuţiile care aveau loc.
Adunarea „oamenilor noştri” nu a fost întâmplătoare, de această acţiune ocupându-se, în mod deosebit, Dan Iosif şi cu Gelu Voican Voiculescu, acesta din urmă a afirmat chiar, la un moment dat, că „forţele legionare au fost anihilate” (…).
Cei doi nu au fost singurii care au mobilizat simpatizanţii F.S.N., pentru a veni în Piaţa Victoriei, chiar Ion Iliescu a contactat telefonic întreprinderi din Bucureşti şi pe unii reprezentanţi ai consiliilor judeţene F.S.N., pentru a mobiliza oamenii să vină în sprijinul guvernului. Din judeţele limitrofe capitalei, oamenii au venit la Bucureşti, fie cu mijloace proprii de transport sau mijloace de transport în comun dar, în marea lor majoritate, au venit cu autobuze puse la dispoziţie de către autorităţile locale (…).
În jurul orelor 22:00 din seara zilei de 28 ianuarie 1990, reprezentanţii opoziţiei au părăsit sediul guvernului, punându-li-se la dispoziţie, în acest scop, autoturisme ARO.
În dimineaţa zilei de 29 ianuarie 1990, au ajuns în Bucureşti şi aproximativ 5.000 de mineri din Valea Jiului, înarmaţi cu bâte, mobilizaţi de către sindicate. Aceştia au făcut deplasarea în capitală, cu o garnitură de tren ce le-a fost pusă la dispoziţie, în mod expres, de către C.F.R.
Tot în dimineaţa aceleiaşi zile, în jurul orei 08.30, s-a umplut Piaţa Rosetti cu contestatari ai P.N.Ţ.-C.D.
Aceştia s-au manifestat violent spărgând unele geamuri de la sediul partidului şi strigând lozinci „Moarte lui Coposu!”, „Coposu roade osu!”. După ceva timp, căpitanul Mihai Lupoi a trimis militari pentru a asigura paza sediului P.N.Ţ.-C.D. şi securitatea celor care se aflau înăuntru, printre aceştia aflându-se Corneliu Coposu, Liviu Petrina, Ion Lupu, Ion Diaconescu, Ion Gherasim.
În jurul orelor 12.00, la sediul P.N.Ţ.-C.D., au apărut Petre Roman şi Cazemir Ionescu, pentru a-i scoate pe liderii P.N.Ţ.-C.D. din clădire.
Corneliu Coposu a fost de acord să părăsească sediul partidului, numai după ce Ion Iliescu a fost de acord ca Televiziunea Română să-i transmită un mesaj în direct.
Deşi tancheta cu care liderii partidului istoric au fost scoşi din sediul P.N.Ţ.-C.D. i-a dus direct la Televiziunea Română, unde Corneliu Coposu a înregistrat, timp de 45 de minute, un protest cu ce se întâmpla în acele vremuri în ţară, acest protest nu a fost niciodată difuzat pe postul naţional de televiziune.
De la sediul Televiziunii, delegaţia P.N.Ţ – C.D. a fost dusă la Ministerul Apărării Naţionale unde, numai lui Corneliu Coposu i s-a permis să aibă o discuţie cu ministrul apărării, gl. Nicolae Militaru. La ieşirea de la această discuţie, Corneliu Coposu a afirmat către unul dintre apropiaţii săi: „Interesul ruşilor ca lucrurile să degenereze în România şi să fie haos este important”.
Ca urmare a prezenţei minerilor la Bucureşti, în ziua de 29 ianuarie 1990, s-a semnalat unele incidente între aceştia şi populaţia capitalei.
Pe străzile Bucureştiului s-au auzit lozincile:
„Nu ne vindem ţara!”, „Moarte intelectualilor!”, „Noi muncim nu gândim!”.
Venirea minerilor la Bucureşti, în ziua de 29 ianuarie 1990, pentru sprijinirea reprezentanţilor F.S.N. şi ai guvernului, a constituit ceea ce opinia publică cunoaşte sub denumirea de „Prima mineriadă”.
Toate acestea au fost tolerate de către autorități, care nu au întreprins nimic pentru a arăta că violența fizică nu poate fi un mod de exprimare într-o societate care pretinde că funcționează pe principii democratice, iar acest fapt a creat, în mentalul colectiv, convingerea că acest mod de acțiune este unul potrivit și eficient, mai ales că ecourile răsturnării, prin forță, a regimului comunist nu se stinseseră încă, iar chemările adresate muncitorilor, chiar prin vocea președintelui Iliescu Ion, îndemnau la „restabilirea ordinii și apărarea democrației”.
După evenimentele din 28-29.01.1990, au avut loc discuții între reprezentanții C.F.S.N. și cei ai partidelor devenite de opoziție, discuții în cadrul cărora s-a stabilit ca puterea legislativă să fie exercitată, în continuare, de un alt organism ce a fost denumit Consiliul Provizoriu de Uniune Națională (C.P.U.N.), din care să facă parte reprezentanți ai tuturor partidelor politice. Astfel, configurația noului organ legislativ provizoriu a fost următoarea: 50% reprezentanți ai F.S.N. și 50% reprezentanți ai celorlalte partide politice, adică din reprezentanţii partidelor istorice şi a partidelor politice nou înfiinţate.
Constituirea C.P.U.N. s-a consfinţit, prin Decretul Lege nr. 81 din 9 februarie 1990, publicat în Monitorul Oficial nr. 27 din 10 februarie 1990.
După modelul central s-au înfiinţat Consilii Provizorii de Uniune Naţională în fiecare județ, în componenţa lor fiind incluşi reprezentanți ai tuturor partidelor politice.
La 13.02.1990, a fost stabilită componența C.P.U.N., a Biroului Executiv al acestuia cât și a comisiilor de specialitate. C.P.U.N. era format din 255 de membri, dintre care 112 aparțineau F.S.N., 112 se distribuiau între diferitele partide politice, 27 erau reprezentanți ai minorităților naționale și 3 ai Asociației Foștilor Deținuți Politici. Un vot era rezervat președintelui.
Biroul Executiv al C.P.U.N. a avut următoarea componență:
președinte-Iliescu Ion; vicepreședinți-Ionescu Cazemir Benedict, Câmpeanu Radu, Mânzatu Ion, Király Károly și Ion Caramitru; secretar-Marțian Dan; 14 membri: Nicolae S. Dumitru, Serghei Mesaroş, Virgil Andrei Vâţă, Gheorghe Manole, Corneliu Mănescu, Radu Ciuceanu, Alexandru Bârlădeanu, János Vincze, Constantin Gurilă, Toma George Maiorescu, Mircea Dinescu, Dan Hăulică, Ion Diaconescu, Nicolae Radu.
La 1 februarie 1990, a fost înfiinţată U.M. (…), structură aflată în subordinea Ministerului de Interne şi care avea ca obiectiv asigurarea protecţiei informative a personalului Ministerului de Interne. Această structură era în subordinea prim-ministrului Petre Roman şi controlată direct de Gelu Voican Voiculescu, cel care, de altfel, a şi avut intiţiativa constituiri acestei unităţi militare.
În componenţa U.M. (…) au intrat fostele cadre ale Securităţii Municipiului Bucureşti care, aşa cum am arătat, după decembrie 1989, fuseseră trecute în rezervă, precum şi cadre din fosta Direcţie a IV a Contrainformaţii Militare.
Nu s-a făcut nicio selecţie riguroasă cu privire la trecutul ofiţerilor încadraţi în U.M. (…). Primul şef al acestei structuri a fost colonelul Florin Calapod, (…).
Prin Decretul C.F.S.N. nr.111 din 08.02.1990, a fost înfiinţat Centrul de Informaţii Externe, ca instituţie a statului român, iar pentru ca prin Legea nr.39 din 13.12.1990 să se acorde identitate Serviciului de Informaţii Externe. Primul director al Serviciului de Informaţii Externe (S.I.E.) a fost Mihai Caraman. În perioada 08.02.1990 – 13.12.1990, acesta a fost comandant al Centrului de Informaţii Externe, având rang de adjunct al ministrului apărării naţionale. Din 13.12.1990 şi până în 09.04.1992, Mihai Caraman a fost director al S.I.E.
Prin Decretul nr.113 din 09 februarie 1990 al C.F.S.N., publicat în Monitorul Oficial nr.27 din 10 februarie 1990, Aurel Dragoş Munteanu a fost eliberat, la cererea sa, din funcţia de preşedinte al Radioteleviziunii Române şi a fost numit în această funcţie Răzvan Theodorescu.
Încă din decembrie 1990, au existat ofiţeri ai armatei care au început să protesteze pentru faptul că, în conducerea Ministerului Apărării Naţionale, au reapărut comandanţi, în frunte cu generalul Militaru Nicolae, ministrul apărării naţionale, despre care se ştia că fuseseră colaboratori sau chiar agenţi ai Serviciului de Spionaj Sovietic.
Aceşti ofiţeri au format Grupul de Iniţiativă pentru Democratizarea Armatei (G.I.D.A.).
La manifestaţia din 12 ianuarie 1990, ofiţerii din cadrul G.I.D.A. au refuzat să execute ordinul generalului Militaru, pentru a ieşi cu subunităţile de intervenţie în Piaţa Victoriei. Pentru acest motiv au fost arestaţi 10 ofiţeri, sub acuzaţia de insubordonare însă, pe data de 13 ianuarie 1990, au fost eliberaţi.
În data de 12 februarie 1990, a avut loc, în Piaţa Victoriei, un protest al cadrelor militare la care au participat cadre militare din Bucureşti, Timişoara, Boteni şi din alte unităţi militare.
Reprezentanţii militarilor protestatari au avut o întâlnire cu Gelu Voican Voiculescu, ca reprezentant al guvernului, căruia i s-au transmis cerinţele cadrelor militare.
Printre cele mai importante au fost:
stabilirea adevărului privind rolul armatei în Revoluţia din decembrie 1989;
înlăturarea din armată a cadrelor militare care s-au compromis în timpul dictaturii ceauşiste;
trecerea în rezervă a ministrului apărării Nicolae Militaru;
trecerea în rezervă a ministrului de interne Mihai Chiţac care participase, în mod direct, la reprimarea manifestaţiilor de la Timişoara, din decembrie 1989.
Consecinţa imediată a acestei acţiuni a fost că, la 16 februarie 1990, generalul Nicolae Militaru şi-a dat demisia, din funcţia de ministru al apărării, în locul său fiind numit generalul Victor Atanase Stănculescu.
Data de 12 februarie 1990 consfinţeşte înfiinţarea Comitetul de Acţiune pentru Democratizarea Armatei (C.A.D.A.), a cărei desfiinţare a fost solicitată de Ion Iliescu,în data de 14 iunie 1990, considerând-o responsabilă pentru neintervenţia în evenimentele din 13 iunie 1990, în Bucureşti.
În continuare, viața politică a fost una foarte zbuciumată, marcată de manifestații și contramanifestații organizate sau spontane, iar la 18.02.1990 a avut loc o astfel de manifestație, în Piața Victoriei din capitală.
Inițial, aceasta a debutat ca o manifestație anticomunistă, fiind scandate lozinci împotriva comunismului și asecurității, însă nemulțumirile manifestanților au început să se îndrepte spre cei care preluaseră puterea, după revoluția din 1989 și care erau percepuți, de către manifestanți, ca făcând parte din „nomenclatura” comunistă.
În acest sens au fost afișate pancarte cu inscripții ca:„F.S.N.=P.C.R.” iar, în scurt timp, manifestația a devenit una violentă, manifestanții pătrunzând în sediul guvernului, unde au fost comise acte de violenţă sau au fost sparte geamurile, au fost distruse documente şi mobilierul din birouri.
Persoanele care au pătruns în sediul guvernului l-au găsit pe prim viceprim-ministrul Gelu Voican Voiculescu, pe care au vrut să-l arunce peste balcon.
Ulterior, o parte dintre aceștia au fost reținuți și au fost prezentați pe postul național de televiziune ca fiind contrarevoluționari, plătiți de partidele istorice pentru a răsturna, prin forță, conducerea politică recent instalată, cu toate că reprezentanţii partidelor de opoziţie declaraseră, la unison, că nu sunt implicaţi în organizarea acelei manifestaţii.
Au fost reţinute 106 persoane care au fost duse la U.M. (…) Măgurele, unde comandant era maiorul inculpat Peter Petre.
În Ordinul de zi pe unitate nr. (…)/19.02.1990, emis de maiorul Peter Petre se menţionează, la rubrica Diverse:
„Ca urmare a unor manifestări care au avut loc în piaţa palatului de către unele persoane intrând în sediul consiliului de uniune naţională (spărgând gemuri, distrugând imobile, etc.). Conform ordinului ministrului apărării naţionale transmis prin ordinul scris cu nr.(…) din 18.02.1990 de către comandantul Trupelor de Apărare Teritorială în ziua de 19.02.1990, orele 00.00 un număr de 106 persoane au fost reţinute de către unităţi ale Ministerului de Apărare Teritorială fiind cazaţi şi hrăniţi în B31 apărare teritorială. Anexăm alăturat tabelul cu persoanele reţinute”.
U.M. (…) Măgurele era o unitate militară a Trupelor de Securitate şi care, aşa cum s-a specificat mai sus, fusese trecută în subordinea Ministerului Apărării Naţionale, având ca eşalon superior Comandamentul Trupelor de Apărare Teritorială, care era continuatorul Comandamentului Trupelor de Securitate.
În luna martie 1990, Comandamentul Trupelor de Apărare Teritorială a trecut în subordinea Ministerului de Interne, sub denumirea de Comandamentul Trupelor de Pază şi Ordine, pentru ca, în urma Hotărârii de Guvern nr.0749 din 5 iulie 1990 cu privire la creşterea capacităţii de acţiune şi îmbunătăţirea structurii organizatorice a Ministerului de Interne, Comandamentul Trupelor de Pază şi Ordine să fie transformat în Comandamentul Trupelor de Jandarmi. Prin Legea nr.40 din 18 decembrie 1990, s- au legiferat structura şi atribuţiile Jandarmeriei Române.
Revenind la evenimentele din 18-19 februarie 1990, cu ajutorul liderilor sindicali, au fost aduși, în Bucureşti, în sprijinul puterii politice, aproximativ 4.000 de mineri din Valea Jiului, iar reprezentanții F.S.N. și ai guvernului le-au cerut acestora să restabilească ordinea deși, la sosirea minerilor în Piața Victoriei, nu mai existau manifestanți întrucât fuseseră deja împrăștiați de forțele de ordine.
Pentru aducerea minerilor la București, Voiculescu Gelu Voican și Ionescu Cazemir Benedict, împreună cu alte patru persoane, s-au deplasat la Petroșani, cu elicopterul, în scopul de a organiza deplasarea acestora.
Aceasta a fost considerată „a doua mineriadă” care, alături de mineriada din ianuarie 1990, a constituit precedentul pentru aducerea minerilor în Bucureşti, în iunie 1990 și a devenit un mod de acțiune pentru conducerea politică a țării din acea perioadă, acela de a pune față-n față, într-o confruntare, diferitele categorii sociale, iar această confruntare nu putea fi decât una cu consecințe ce nu mai puteau fi controlate și care poate fi asimilată ușor unui război civil.
În acest context, deosebit de relevantă este afirmația pe care a făcut-o suspectul Cozma Miron care, interpelându-l pe ministrul de interne Mihai Chiţac, i-a spus acestuia că, dacă instituțiile statului nu sunt capabile să-l apere pe președintele Ion Iliescu, atunci îl vor apăra minerii. De asemenea, minerii au promis că vor reveni în Bucureşti ori de câte ori vor mai avea loc astfel de evenimente.
Tot în seara zilei de 18 februarie 1990 au fost chemaţi, în sprijinul guvernului, muncitori din judeţele limitrofe (…).
În februarie 1990, (…) cofondator, alături de (…), al Sindicatului Şoferilor din România, împreună cu (…), preşedintele Sindicatului Liber Independent Policolor, au fondat Confederaţia Sindicală Frăţia, căreia i-a fost atribuit sediul fostului Consiliu Municipal al Sindicatelor, situat în Bucureşti, str. Anghel Saligny nr.8 din sector 5.
În urma celei de-a doua mineriade, în data de 22 februarie 1990, a avut loc la Timişoara un miting de protest la care, George Şerban a propus redactarea unei Proclamaţii a Timişoarei către ţară.
La 27 februarie 1990 membrii Societăţii Timişoara au aprobat textul Proclamaţiei propus de George Şerban. La această Proclamaţie a aderat, în data de 09 martie 1990, C.P.U.N. Municipal Timişoara. În ziua de 11 martie 1990, s-a organizat o adunare populară, în Piaţa Operei din Timişoara, la care au participat peste 15.000 de oameni şi în cadrul căreia George Şerban a lansat Proclamaţia de la Timişoara.
Proclamaţia de la Timişoara a avut 14 puncte. Făcând o sinteză a acestor puncte, cu excepţia punctului 8, ideile desprinse au fost:
Idealul Revoluţiei din Decembrie 1989 a fost şi a rămas reîntoarcerea la valorile autentice ale democraţiei şi civilizaţiei europene; Toate categoriile sociale au fost oprimate de regimul comunist şi niciuna nu doreşte răul celorlalte; Oameni de toate vârstele s-au bătut cu aceeaşi dârzenie pentru cauza revoluţiei; Timişoara este un oraş românesc şi european în care naţionalităţile au refuzat şi refuză naţionalismul; S-a susţinut ideea pluripartitismului, toate partidele politice având dreptul la existenţă, cu excepţia celor de extrema stângă şi extrema dreaptă; Rescrierea corectă a istoriei ţării din perioada 1944-1950; A fost acuzată laşitatea membrilor P.C.R. care, la Congresul al XII-lea al P.C.R., au intenţionat să-l înlăture de la putere pe Nicolae Ceauşescu, însă nu au făcut acest lucru; Orientarea cheltuielilor ţării pentru realizarea unui nivel minim de civilizaţie; Privatizarea, prin împroprietărirea lucrătorilor din intreprinderi, prin acordarea unui număr egal de acţiuni, urmând ca statul să păstreze un procent de fonduri care să îi asigure controlul asupra activităţii; S-a lansat principiul descentralizării economice şi administrative; Rechemarea în ţară a celor plecaţi în exil pentru reconstrucţia ţării;
Desemnarea ca zi naţională a României, ziua de 16 decembrie, adică ziua în care românii au avut curajul să se ridice la luptă împotriva totalitarismului.
Cel mai important punct al Proclamaţiei de la Timişoara a fost punctul 8, al cărui conţinut este următorul:
„Ca o consecinţă a punctului anterior, propunem ca legea electorală să interzică pentru primele trei legislaturi consecutive dreptul la candidatură, pe orice listă, al foştilor activişti comunişti şi al foştilor ofiţeri de Securitate. Prezenţa lor în viaţa politică a ţării este principala sursă a tensiunilor şi suspiciunilor care frământă astăzi societatea românească. Până la stabilizarea situaţiei şi reconcilierea naţională, absenţa lor din viaţa publică este absolut necesa¬ră. Cerem, de asemenea, ca în legea electorală să se treacă un paragraf special care să in¬terzică foştilor activişti comunişti, candidatura la funcţia de preşedinte al ţării. Preşedintele României trebuie să fie unul dintre simbolurile despărţirii noastre de comunism. A fi fost membru de partid nu este o vină. Ştim cu toţii în ce măsură era condiţionată viaţa individului, de la realizarea profesională până la primirea unei locuinţe, de carnetul roşu şi ce consecinţe grave atrăgea predarea lui. Activiştii au fost însă acei oameni care şi-au abandonat profesiile pentru a sluji partidul comunist şi a beneficia de privilegiile deosebite oferite de acesta. Un om care a făcut o asemenea alegere nu prezintă garanţiile morale pe care trebuie să le ofere un Preşedinte. Propunem reducerea prerogativelor acestei funcţii, după modelul multor ţări civilizate ale lumii. Astfel, pentru demnitatea de Preşedinte al României ar putea candida şi personalităţi marcante ale vieţii culturale şi ştiinţifice, fără o experienţă politică deosebită. Tot în acest context, propunem ca prima legislatură să fie de numai doi ani, timp necesar întăririi instituţiilor democratice şi clarificării poziţiei ideologice a fiecăruia dintre multele partide apărute. De-abia atunci am putea face o alegere în cunoştinţa de cauză, cu cărţile pe faţă”.
După lansarea Proclamaţiei, au început să se strângă semnături pentru susţinerea ei, dar în acelaşi timp apar şi primele reacţii ostile, în special cu privire la controversatul punct 8.
La 19 martie 1990, Ion Iliescu s-a întâlnit cu o delegaţie a Societăţii Timişoara, formată din George Şerban, Vasile Popovici, Daniel Vighi şi Dorel Mihiţ şi au discutat pe tema Proclamaţiei.
La 20 martie 1990, textul Proclamaţiei de la Timişoara a fost citit integral la Televiziune Română, dar fără a se face comentarii pe marginea acestuia.
În urma difuzării textului, au avut loc mai multe mitinguri la Cluj, Lugoj, Bucureşti, de solidaritate şi de adeziune la Proclamaţia de la Timişoara. La 11 aprilie 1990 s-a organizat, la Timişoara, un miting de protest împotriva refuzului C.P.U.N. de a adopta punctul 8 al Proclamaţiei din 11 martie 1990. Acelaşi lucru l-au facut şi bucureştenii, la 22 aprilie 1990, într-un miting de protest, în faţa Televiziunii, care s-a transformat într-un marş către Piaţa Universităţii.
La data de 14 martie 1990, Consiliul Provizoriu de Uniune Naţională a adoptat Decretul-Lege nr.92 pentru alegerea Parlamentului și a Președintelui României, publicat în Monitorul Oficial nr.35 din 18.03.1990.
Proiectul legii electorale a fost elaborat de către de Comisia Constituțională, Juridică și pentru Drepturile Omului a Consiliului Frontului Salvării Naționale, în urma unor dezbateri, care au început la 27 ianuarie 1990 şi la care au participat reprezentanți ai tuturor partidelor legal înființate după decembrie 1989, precum şi în calitate de observatori, reprezentanți ai altor formațiuni politice, aflate în acel moment în proces de constituire și înregistrare legală.
Discuţiile au continuat şi în luna februarie 1990 şi s-a ajuns la un acord asupra proiectului legii electorale supus apoi dezbaterii și aprobării Consiliului Provizoriu de Uniune Națională (C.P.U.N.).
După sesiunile C.P.U.N. din 9 și 13 martie 1990, la 14 martie 1990, cu un singur vot împotrivă și două abțineri, Consiliul a adoptat Decretul-Lege nr. 92 din 14 martie 1990 pentru alegerea Parlamentului și a Președintelui României, primele alegeri libere parlamentare și prezidențiale fiind stabilite pentru ziua de 20 mai 1990.
În art. 2 din Decretul-Lege nr.92/1990 se prevedea că guvernarea României se realizează pe baza sistemului democratic pluralist, precum şi pe separaţia puterilor legislativă, executivă şi judecătorească, iar în art. 3 se menţiona că Parlamentul este alcătuit din două camere, Adunarea Deputaţilor şi Senatul şi este ales prin vot universal, egal, direct, secret şi liber exprimat.
Tot în art. 3 se mai statua că şi preşedintele României se alege tot prin vot universal, egal, direct, secret şi liber exprimat.
Membrii Parlamentului urmau să fie aleși pe liste de partid, prin vot proporțional, fără a fi impus un prag electoral.
Decretul-Lege nr.92/1990 mai prevedea că Adunarea Deputaţilor şi Senatul, în şedinţă comună, se constituiau în Adunare Constituantă, care avea ca şi scop adoptarea Constituţiei României.
După intrarea în vigoare a noii Constituţii, Parlamentul trebuia să mai hotărască organizarea de alegeri în termen de cel mult un an.
Candidații pentru Adunarea Deputaților și cei pentru Senat urmau să fie aleși pe liste separate, depuse de partide, de formațiuni politice sau pe care erau înscrise persoane independente.
Decretul-Lege nr.92/1990 a reglementat şi modul de constituire a Parlamentului, precum şi validarea alegerii preşedintelui României şi atribuţiile acestuia.
Conform art.79, Adunarea Deputaţilor şi Senatul urmau a fi convocate în prima şedinţă, în a douăzecea zi de la data alegerilor şi, separat, sub preşedinţia celui mai în vârstă deputat sau senator urmau să fie aleşi, dintre membrii fiecărei camere, o Comisie de Validare care trebuia să verifice dosarele şi legalitatea legilor, după care propuneau Adunării Deputaţilor şi Senatului validarea şi invalidarea mandatului fiecărui deputat şi senator.
Validarea alegerii preşedintelui se făcea de Curtea Supremă de Justiţie, în termen de 20 de zile de la data alegerilor. Hotărârea Curţii Supreme de Justiţie se prezenta în şedinţa comună a Adunării Deputaţilor şi Senatului, iar de la acea dată, cel ales era declarat Preşedintele României.
La 18 martie 1990, în conformitate cu prevederile legii electorale, a fost declanșată, în întreaga țară, campania electorală.
În timpul campaniei electorale, unii lideri de sindicat ai minerilor s-au implicat activ în campania electorală a lui Ion Iliescu şi F.S.N.
(…)
În luna martie 1990 au avut loc incidente în mun. Târgu Mureş, care s-au soldat cu victime. Cercetarea acestor fapte s-a realizat de către unităţile de procuratură care au şi dat soluţii.
La 24 martie 1990, a avut loc conferinţa de constituire a Ligii Sindicatelor Miniere din Valea Jiului, la care au participat 193 de delegaţi, care reprezentau următoarele sindicate: I.M. Lonea, I.M. Petrila, I.M. Dâlja, I.M. Livezeni, I.M. Vulcan, I.C.I.T.P.M.H., I.M. Lupeni, Preparaţia Livezeni, I.M. Paroşeni, I.M. Bărbăteni, I.M. Aninoasa, I.M. Petrila Sud, I.M. Câmpu lui Neag.
Scopul constituirii Ligii este de a asigura unitatea de acţiune a sindicatelor afiliate, care cuprind 25.000 de membri şi de a asigura un cadru organizat de luptă sindicală, pentru rezolvarea problemelor profesionale, economice, sociale şi culturale de interes general ale membrilor săi.
Activitatea sindicală din domeniul minier s-a organizat, la nivel naţional, începând cu 11.04.1990 la Petroşani, prin înfiinţarea Federaţiei Sindicatelor Miniere din România, care cuprinde activitatea de exploatare a carbunelui, minereurilor feroase si neferoase, a uraniului si a sării.
La 27 aprilie 1990, la Judecătoria Petroşani, s-a hotărât înregistrarea Ligii Sindicatelor Miniere Libere „Valea Jiului”.
Primul birou executiv a fost alcătuit din:
preşedinte – Miron Cozma,
vicepreşedinte – Torsan Ilie,
vicepreşedinte – Napău Ion,
secretar – Croitoru Nicolae.
Ca urmare a acestui fapt, interesele minerilor din Valea Jiului erau reprezentante, pe linie sindicală, de Liga Sindicatelor Miniere Libere Valea Jiului, iar interesele celorlalţi mineri din ţară, atât din exploatările carbonifere cât şi din exploatările minereurilor ferose şi neferoase, din exploatările de uranium şi sare, erau reprezentante de Federaţia Sindicatelor Miniere din România.
În luna martie 1990, a fost înfiinţată Confederaţia Naţională a Sindicatelor Libere din România (C.N.S.L.R.) care, de fapt, a fost continuatoarea Uniunii Generale a Sindicatelor din România (U.G.S.R.), preluând întregul patrimoniu şi fondurile băneşti ale Uniunii. Primul preşedinte al C.N.S.L.R. a fost Victor Ciorbea.
La 26 martie 1990, prin Decretul nr.181/1990, a fost înfiinţat Serviciul Român de Informaţii (S.R.I.), având ca scop obţinerea de date şi informaţii referitoare la activitatea serviciilor de spionaj, a organizaţiilor extremist teroriste îndreptate împotriva României, a elementelor cu intenţii de a organiza şi desfăşura acţiuni de diversiune şi atentat, de subminarea economiei naţionale, de destabilizarea ordinii de drept.
În îndeplinirea atribuţiilor, S.R.I. colabora cu Ministerul Apărării Naţionale, Ministerul de Interne, organele procuraturii, Direcţia Vămilor şi celelelate organe ale administraţiei de stat, în funcţie de competenţele, atribuţiile şi sarcinile specifice ale acestora (a se vedea art. 1 şi 6 din decretul privind înfiinţarea Serviciului Român de Informaţii).
S.R.I. s-a constituit ca organ central al administraţiei de stat şi funcţiona în subordinea directă a preşedintelui C.P.U.N., iar după alegerile din 20 mai 1990, în subordinea preşedintelui României.
S.R.I., conform prevederilor art. 4 din Decretul nr.181/1990, era condus de un director numit prin decret, având rang de ministru. Primul director al S.R.I. a fost inculpatul Virgil Măgureanu, funcţie pe care a deţinut-o în perioada 26.03.1990 – 25.04.1997.
La înfiinţare s-a estimat că S.R.I. avea aproximativ 8.000 de angajaţi, iar aproximativ 3.000 proveneau atât din fosta Securitate cât şi din diverse structuri ale armatei.
La data de 7 mai 1990, prin Decretul nr.204 al C.P.U.N., s-a înfiinţat Unitatea Specială de Pază şi Protocol (U.S.P.P.), în componenţa Brigăzii de Gardă, în subordinea Ministerului Apărării Naţionale, cu misiunea de a asigura protecţia şi paza demnitarilor români şi a celor străini care vizitau România.
Prin Legea nr.51/26 iulie 1991 privind siguranța națională a României, U.S.P.P. a căpătat denumirea de Serviciul de Protecție şi Pază (S.P.P.), devenind un organ de stat, cu atribuții în domeniul siguranței naționale. Activitatea s-a desfășurat pe baza prevederilor unui Regulament aprobat de Consiliul Suprem de Apărare a Țării, la 15.11 1991.
Bazele S.P.P. au fost puse, încă din data de 26 decembrie 1990, când ofiţerii, (…), toţi din cadrul U.M.(…) şi, din cadrul U.M.(…), au primit misiunea să asigure paza şi protecţia preşedintelui C.F.S.N. Ion Iliescu.
În primele trei luni ale anului 1990, s-au fost înfiinţate mai multe ligi şi asociaţii, printre cele mai importante fiind Liga Studenţilor din Universitatea Bucureşti – preşedinte Marian Teofan Munteanu, Asociaţia 21 Decembrie 1989 – preşedinte Alexandru Nancu şi Asociaţia 16-21 Decembrie 1989 – preşedinte Ion Nemţiu, Asociaţia Foştilor Deţinuţi Politici,Grupul Independent pentru Democraţie, Alianţa Poporului.
La 05 aprilie 1990 a avut loc, în zona Universităţii, în Bucureşti, o manifestaţie a tinerilor care au iniţiat Revoluţia în Bucureşti, în ziua de 21 decembrie 1989.
Manifestaţia a început la orele 12:00 şi a durat până în jurul orelor 24:00 şi la ea au participat circa 2.000 de persoane. În această zi o delegaţie a Asociaţiei 21 Decembrie 1989, condusă de Alexandru Nancu a avut o întâlnire, la Palatul Victoria, cu Petre Roman în urma căreia prim–ministrul le-a atribuit, ca şi sediu, fostul Hotel „Luca” al P.C.R., clădire situată pe str. Batiştei.
În jurul orei 23:00, membrii delegaţiei au revenit la miting, însoţiţi de Cazemir Ionescu Benedict şi, fiind mulţumiţi de sediul primit, au hotărât să părăsească zona Universităţii. Cei prezenţi la respectivul miting au scris pe clădirile din zonă inscripţii cum ar fi: „Jos comunismul şi foştii activişti!”, „F.S.N. = P.C.R.!”, „Revoluţia continuă!”, „Jos Iliescu, Roman, Brucan, Voican, C.Ionescu, Chiţac şi restul vânzătorilor!”, „Niciun activist deputat!”.
În zilele de 13 şi 14 aprilie 1990, au avut loc, în Bucureşti, două manifestaţii pentru apărarea drepturilor omului.
La 23 aprilie 1990, preşedintele C.P.U.N. Ion Iliescu l-a numit pe inculpatul Florescu Mugurel Cristian, adjunct al procuroului general şi şef al Direcţiei Procuraturii Militare, funcţie pe care a deţinut-o până la 14.04.1993.
Între 1970-1972, Florescu Mugurel Cristian, a fost procuror civil la Procuratura Locală Medgidia, între 1972-1983 a fost procuror militar la Procuratura Militară Bucureşti.
În perioada 1983 – decembrie 1989, acesta a fost consilier juridic la Direcţia de Comerţ Exterior a Armatei şi apoi la Departamentul pentru Producţie şi Înzestrare al Armatei din subordinea gen. Victor Atanase Stănculescu. Aşa cum s-a mai specificat, inculpatul a fost prezent şi la procesul, de la Târgovişte, al soţilor Ceauşescu.
Din decembrie 1989 şi până la numirea sa în funcţia de adjunct al procurorului general şi şef al Direcţiei Procuraturii Militare, inculpatul a fost consilier al prim viceprim-ministrului Gelu Voican Voiculescu, funcţie în virtutea căreia avea acces la discuţiile care se purtau între membrii guvernului (vol. 159, fila 201).
În cele aproximativ 4 luni de zile în care a fost consilier al lui Gelu Voican Voiculescu, inculpatul Florescu Mugurel Cristian a reuşit să obţină nu numai o promovare pe o funcţie înaltă, în cadrul statului roman ci şi o promovare în grad, pe linie militară, de la gradul de maior la cel de colonel.
III. MANIFESTAŢIA DIN PIAŢA UNIVERSITĂŢII
Pe 22 aprilie 1990, la ora 11:30, a început, în Piaţa Unirii din Bucureşti, un miting electoral al „Grupării Democratice de Centru”, cartel format din 10 partide, a cărui deviză era „Uniţi pentru Victorie, Prosperitate, Naţiune, Democraţie”.
În aceeaşi zi, Asociaţia 16-21 Decembrie şi Alianţa Poporului, au organizat un marş, la Cimitirul Eroilor, unde s-au depus coroane de flori în memoria celor căzuţi în Revoluţia de decembrie 1989 după care, participanţii la marş s-au îndreptat, ca de obicei, spre Televiziune, pe traseul Piaţa Unirii – Piaţa Universităţii – Piaţa Victoriei – Televiziune.
Mitingul „Grupării Democratice de Centru” s-a terminat la ora 12.30, iar participanţii la acest miting s-au alăturat marşului tradiţional către Televiziune al Asociaţiei 16-21 Decembrie şi al Alianţei Poporului.
Oamenii strigau lozinci:
„Cine stă de-o parte nu vrea libertate”, „Viză pentru rege”, „Apel din Timişoara, trezeşte, Doamne, ţara”, „Jos Chiţac”, „Iliescu s-a aflat, lovitura ta de stat”, „Iliescu nu uita, tineretul nu te vrea”, „Iliescu pentru noi este Ceauşescu II”, „Iliescu nu fi trist, Iliescu e comunist”, „Iliescu şi ai lui trădătorii neamului”, „Nu vrem vilă la Şosea, noi îţi vrem demisia”, „Iliescu nu uita, te votăm la Moscova”
Manifestanții purtau pancarte pe care scria:
„PROCLAMAŢIA DE LA TIMIŞOARA, LEGE PENTRU TOATĂ ŢARA”, „JOS ILIESCU ŞI GUVERNUL COMUNIST”, „JOS COMUNISMUL, JOS DECRETELE CEAUŞISTE”, „F.S.N. = P.C.R.!”, „MINISTERUL DE INTERNE = MAN = KGB?”.
Pe 22 aprilie 1990, P.N.Ţ.-C.D.a organizat un miting, în Piața Aviatorilor. Mitingul a a durat aproximativ 2 ore, în intervalul de timp 12:30-14:30. La acest miting au participat fruntaşi ai P.N.Ţ.-C.D., respectiv preşedinte partidului Corneliu Coposu, Ion Raţiu, Ion Puiu şi alţii, precum și invitați din Franța, Grecia și Anglia care au transmis mesaje, dar şi membrii ai altor partide şi asociaţii.
În Piaţa Aviatorilor au sosit timişorenii (…), cu un steag tricolor şi pancarte pe care era scris: „Proclamaţia de la Timişoara” şi „Timişoara-Bucureşti”. Timişorenii parcurseseră distanţa Timişoara-Bucureşti pe jos, purtau drapele tricolore şi adunau semnături pentru susţinerea punctului 8 din Proclamaţia de la Timişoara.
În cadrul discursurilor ţinute, mulţi dintre vorbitori au scos în evidenţă importanţa Proclamaţiei de la Timişoara, insistându-se, în mod deosebit, pe conţinutul punctului 8 din această proclamaţie.
În discursul său, Ion Raţiu, a spus, printre altele:
„Voi v-aţi sacrificat, voi aţi vărsat sângele vostru sfânt, voi trebuie să faceţi acuma România de care se va bucura poporul, generaţie după generaţie”,
(Ziarul „România Liberă” din 24 aprilie 1990).
În încheierea mitingului, Corneliu Coposu a înmânat o medalie reprezentantului Franţei, care a susţinut o scurtă alocuţiune încheiată cu cuvintele: „Nu vă fie frică, comunismul pică”, cuvinte rostite în limba română, (Ziarul „România Liberă” din 24 aprilie 1990).
Participanţii la mitingul P.N.Ţ.-C.D. s-au alăturat manifestanţilor care venea, în marş, dinspre Piaţa Victoriei şi, cu toţii, au mers la Televiziunea Română pentru a cere schimbarea conducerii acesteia şi abrogarea Decretului nr.473/1977, conform căruia televiziunea era subordonată direct preşedintelui ţării.
S-a redactat un comunicat al participanţilor la acest marş pentru a fi înmânat, spre difuzare, la singurul post de televiziune existent, în ţară, la acea vreme. Răzvan Teodorescu a refuzat dialogul cu demonstranţii, care au părăsit zona.
În timp ce coloana formată din circa 1.000 de oameni se deplasa pe Calea Dorobanţi, din blocul „Sofia” s-a aruncat cu un ghiveci de flori care a rănit-o pe d-na Sanda Lugoj, în vârstă de 59 de ani, participantă la marş, provocându-i acesteia o fractură craniană. Victima a fost dusă la Spitalul de Urgenţă, unde medicii au apreciat ca fiind gravă starea în care se afla.
În jurul orelor 19:00, o parte dintre participanţii de la marşul organizat la Televiziunea Română au ajuns în Piaţa Universităţii, unde au blocat circulaţia, pe toate sensurile şi au hotărât să rămână în piaţă, peste noapte, în semn de solidaritate cu d-na (…), dar şi cu victimele Revoluţiei din decembrie 1989, susţinând, totodată, introducerea în Decretul-Lege nr. 92 din 14 martie 1990 pentru alegerea parlamentului și a președintelui României, a unui amendament conform celor stipulate în punctul 8 al Proclamaţiei de la Timişoara. S-a mai solicitat, de către cei rămaşi în Piaţa Universităţii, abrogarea Decretului nr.473/1977.
Numărul celor care au rămas în Piaţa Universităţii a fost de circa 100 de tineri.
În jurul orei 21:00, au apărut două autobuze cu soldaţi din cadrul M.I., înarmaţi cu bastoane de cauciuc. Mulţimea din piaţă a început să scandeze: „Voi aţi tras în noi 16-22!”. După circa 15 de minute, în zona blocului Dunărea,au apărut „scutierii”,care au trezit o puternică emoţie în rândul manifestanţilor, deoarece au amintit de intervenţia acestora din 21-22 decembrie 1989, fapt ce a generat altercaţii între forţele de ordine şi demonstranţi, în urma cărora scutierii s-au retras.
Manifestanţii din Piaţa Universităţii au oprit circulaţia folosind nişte panouri metalice găsite în zona Spitalului Colţea.
Televiziunea Română, a cărei independenţa era cerută de către manifestanţi, nu a transmis imagini sau informaţii despre aceste evenimente. Demonstranţii rămaşi în piaţă, peste noapte, au marcat cu o bandă tricoloră spaţiul în care, în 21 decembrie 1989, au căzut, în Bucureşti, primele victime ale revoluţiei.
În dimineaţa zilei de 23 aprilie 1990,cei rămaşi în piaţă s-au retras spre gura metroului din apropierea Hotelului Intercontinental.
În cursul zilei de 23 aprilie 1990, celor rămaşi li se mai adaugă şi alte persoane care au ocupat trotuarul din faţa Teatrului Naţional. O parte dintre ei au rămas aici şi peste noapte.
În dimineaţa zilei de 24 aprilie 1990, în jurul orelor 05.00, au apărut poliţişti care au cerut să fie desfiinţate baricadele, respectiv banda tricoloră despre care s-a făcut vorbire mai sus. Cei circa 100 de tineri au refuzat, în semn de protest la adresa guvernului, care nu doreşte să ia act de solicitările lor. La ora 05:30 poliţia a desfăşurat o acţiune de împrăştiere în forţă a demonstranţilor, folosind bastoane de cauciuc. Pe străzile laterale zonei Pieţei Universităţii au fost aduşi poliţişti, pentru a-i putea prinde pe demonstranţii care fugeau.
La ora 07.00, la postul naţional de radio, se anunţa că, în Piaţa Universităţii, se manifestează încă, solicitându-se demisia guvernului.
Despre manifestaţiile care au avut loc, în perioada 12-24 aprilie 1990, în Bucureşti, au scris pe larg şi agenţiile străine de presă.
Agenţia de presă REUTER transmitea că „demonstranţi antiguvernamentali au ocupat un bulevard central din Bucureşti, într-o confruntare tensionată cu poliţia. Geamul unui autobuz al poliţiei a fost spart în timp ce sute de manifestanţi cereau demisia preşedintelui interimar Ion Iliescu şi a guvernului Frontului Salvării Naţionale, etichetat drept neocomunist. Poliţiştii s-au îndreptat de mai multe ori spre demonstranţii care strigau «TERORIŞTI» şi «JOS cu ILIESCU», dar s-au retras fără să ia măsuri împotriva acestora, în timp ce mulţimea se extindea în Piaţa Universităţii.
Cei mai tineri manifestanţi au înconjurat un grup de aproximativ 100 de elevi poliţişti înarmaţi cu bastoane, strigând:«F.S.N. este o agenţie a K.G.B.» şi «F.S.N. = P.C.R. »”.
Agenţia FRANCE-PRESSE a făcut, la vremea respectivă, comentarii despre mitingul Partidului Naţional Ţărănesc, despre acţiunea celor 8 timişoreni plecaţi pe jos, de la Timişoara la Bucureşti, precum şi despre marşul Asociaţiei 16-21 Decembrie şi Alianţa Poporului.
Agenţia de Presă TASS a scris, printre altele, „După cum s-a aflat ulterior, participanţilor la acest miting din capitală, organizat de către P.N.Ţ., de grupul democratic al partidelor de centru, precum şi de Uniunile 16-21 Decembrie şi Alianţa Poporului, li s-au raliat participanţii la marşul pornit pe jos de la Timişoara.
După încheierea mitingului au ocupat Piaţa Universităţii. Acolo se aflau câteva sute de persoane. Multe dintre acestea fluturau steaguri tricolore, pe asfalt erau scrise cu creta lozinci ca: «F.S.N. ÎNSEAMNĂ PARTIDUL COMUNIST», «JOS COMUNISMUL»,«NU-L VREM PE ILIESCU». O persoană cu un megafon în mână cerea oamenilor să rămână pe loc, să menţină acest bastion al luptei împotriva F.S.N. şi împotriva comunismului”.
Tot Agenţia TASS mai menţiona, „În centrul capitalei României, în Piaţa Universităţii, încă din primele ore ale dimineţii zilei de 23 aprilie a fost blocată circulaţia rutieră. De-a lungul străzilor care dau în Piaţă au fost desfăşurate panglici în culorile steagului naţional românesc, au fost ridicate baricade improvizate. Grupuri de tineri cu banderole tricolore pe mâneci nu permit maşinilor să intre în Piaţă, dirijându-le spre străzile din preajmă unde apar numeroase baricade”.
În ziua de 24 aprilie 1990, în şedinţa C.P.U.N., s-a discutat şi despre situaţia persoanelor care protestau în Piaţa Universităţii. Referindu-se la aceştia, Ion Iliescu a spus:
Uneori se face aceasta cu intenţie bine elaborată: pentru a provoca acte de dezordine, pentru a discredita organele de ordine că nu sînt capabile săîntreţină ordinea, pentru a arunca acuzaţii de partea cealaltă, nemotivate, că nu ar putea să se asigure condiţiile necesare derulării alegerilor libere în mod corespunzător. Eu cred că fără o colaborare activă, responsabilă din partea tuturor, nu vom putea într-adevăr asigura aceste condiţii. Dar este datoria noastră, responsabilitatea politică a tuturor, să asigurăm asemenea condiţii. Trebuie să dăm creditul necesar poporului nostru, alegătorilor, cetăţenilor și alegerile să fie cele care să se pronunţe asupra mandatelor care să fie acordate cu acest prilej. Aceasta ar fi în legătură cu ceea ce s-a spus, că dimineaţă organele de ordine au venit cu forţe numeroase în Piaţa Universităţii pentru a degaja circulaţia. Și sînt unii care le plîng de milă câtorva golani care provoacă dezordine în centrul orașului. A face ordine, asta nu înseamnă încălcarea drepturilor oamenilor. Democraţia nu se confundă cu anarhia. Trebuie să fim înţeleși. A ocupa o zi întreagă circulaţia în artera centrală a orașului, este bine, este civilizat? Este ordine?”.
Ion Lupu a protestat împotriva etichetării cetăţenilor care sunt prezenţi în Piaţa Universităţii ca fiind „golani”.
În şedinţa C.P.U.N., care a avut loc în după-amiaza zilei de 24 aprilie 1990, s-a discutat despre intervenţia forţelor de ordine asupra protestatarilor din Piaţa Universităţii. (…)
Din aceste discuţii reiese că, încă din data de 24 aprilie 1990, inculpatul Ion Iliescu, nu excludea posibilitatea ca minerii să vină în Bucureşti, să facă ordine, aşa cum aceştia veniseră şi în 28-29 ianuarie 1990, precum şi în 18-19 februarie 1990, atunci când Miron Cozma se oferise să vină în Bucureşti cu minerii, ori de câte ori era necesar, pentru a-l apăra pe preşedintele C.P.U.N.
După ce la postul de radio s-a aflat că preşedintele C.P.U.N., Ion Iliescu, a afirmat despre protestatarii din Piaţa Universităţii că sunt „golani”, tinerii din Piaţă şi-au pus în piept cartonaşe pe care era scris „GOLAN”, cuvânt pe care manifestanţii din Piaţa Universităţii l-au transformat într-un simbol al luptătorilor împotriva neocomunismului.
Tot pe 24 aprilie 1990, pe Institutul de Arhitectură a fost afişată o bucata de pânză pe care scria „FACULTATEA DE GOLANI”, iar deasupra acesteia a fost pus portretul poetului naţional, Mihai Eminescu.
Tot pe Institutul de Arhitectură a mai fost pusă, mai jos, o altă bucată de pânză pe care scris: „APEL DIN TIMIŞOARA, TREZEŞTE, DOAMNE, ŢARA”.
În aceeaşi zi, şi-au anunţat participarea la demonstraţiile din Piaţa Universităţii, Liga Studenţilor din Universitatea Bucureşti, Grupul Independent pentru Democraţie, Frontul Antitotalitar Român, Asociaţia 16-21 Decembrie, Alianţa Poporului. S-a anunţat că participanţii la manifestaţie nu fac parte din niciun partid politic şi nu reprezintă interesele niciunui partid.
Manifestanţii au ocupat perimetrul cuprins între clădirea Universităţii, Institutul de Arhitectură, locul unde în seara de 21 decembrie 1989 s-au ridicat baricadele împotriva tancurilor regimului Ceauşescu, Hotelul Intercontinental, Teatrul Naţional şi intersecţia de la Universitate, fiind blocată, în totalitate, circulaţia autovehiculelor pe bulevardul Magheru, de la Universitate până în spatele Hotelului Intercontinental.
În jurul orelor 17:00, Marian Munteanu, preşedintele Ligii Studenţilor din Universitatea Bucureşti, a deschis balconul de la Facultatea de Geologie, care a intrat în istorie ca fiind locul de unde au fost lansate, de numeroşi participanţi la demonstraţie, ideile anticomuniste şi calea de urmat a poporului român, după revoluţia din decembrie 1989.
Deasupra balconului a fost pusă icoana Fecioarei Maria cu pruncul Isus Hristos,iar ceva mai sus, un banner pe care scris „Unitate, Libertate, Victorie”. Pe cele două coloane a fost pus portretul lui Mihai Eminescu.
În noaptea de 24 spre 25 aprilie 1990, au manifestat, în Piaţa Universităţii, studenţi, elevi, muncitori, oameni cu condiţii sociale sau educaţie diferită, s-au scandat: „LIBERTATE!”, „TIMIŞOARA!”, „JOS NOMENCLATURA!”, „JOS COMUNISMUL!”, „JOS ILIESCU!”, „JOS CHIŢAC!”, s-au cântat cântece despre Avram Iancu şi au fost auzite acordurile Simfoniei nr.9 – Oda Bucuriei.
De asemenea, s-a cântat „NOI DE-AICEA NU PLECĂM, NU PLECĂM ACASĂ, PÂNĂ NU VOM CÂŞTIGA, LIBERATEA NOASTRĂ!”.
În zilele următoare numărul manifestanţilor a sporit, ajungând, ca după orele 17:00, în Piaţa Universităţii, să fie în jur de 30.000 de oameni. La balconul Universităţii au apărut personalităţi ale vieţii culturale, artistice, profesori universitari, teologi, dar şi oameni cu nivel mediu de pregătire care, în discursurile lor, au afirmat că sprijină ideea continuării revoluţiei pentru ca la conducerea ţării să nu ajungă persoane din eşalonul 2 şi 3 al nomenclaturii comuniste.
De asemenea, s-a susţinut ca Televiziunea Română să fie independentă şi să nu mai răspundă la comenzile politice ale puterii provizorii, să înceteze manipularea conştiinţei publice al cărui efect este pregnant în provincie, unde nu se cunoştea mai nimic din ceea ce se întâmpla în Bucureşti.
Figura centrală a Pieţei Universităţii a fost Marian Teofan Munteanu, liderul Ligii Studenţilor din Universitatea Bucureşti.
În Piaţa Universităţii s-au întocmit revendicări pe care organizatorii mitingului doreau să le înainteze guvernului. Printre acestea, cea mai importantă revendicare se referea la introducerea punctului 8 din Proclamaţia de la Timişoara, ca amendament la Decretul-Lege nr.92 din 14 martie 1990 pentru alegerea parlamentului şi a preşedintelui.
Încă din primele zile ale manifestaţiei din Piaţa Universităţii, au luat cuvântul, de la balcon, reprezentanţi ai Grupului pentru Dialog Social.
Radu Filipescu, cunoscut dizident din timpul regimului Ceauşescu, a spus:
„Sînt golan! Este cea mai frumoasă manifestaţie şi extraordinar ce frumos se vede de aici de sus. E atît dedătătoare de speranţă după atîtea dezamăgiri!”.
Stelian Tănase, membru G.D.S. şi fondator al Revistei „22”, a afirmat, de la acelaşi balcon:
„Este o onoare pentru noi să fim calificaţi drept golani, huligani, atîta timp cît la Timişoara tot nişte golani au pornit Revoluţia!”.
De asemenea, în Piaţa Universităţii şi-a făcut apariţia, de la bun început, Gabriel Liiceanu, Florin Gabriel Mărculescu, Octavian Paler, ultimul afirmând, într-un articol publicat în ziarul „România Liberă” din 28 aprilie 1990:
Spiritul democratic e străin în egală măsura de negaţia sumbră şi de aderenţa necondiţionată, care vede în orice obiecţie o libertate nepermisă. Dincolo de aceasta paranteză teoretică, nu cred că ignorarea şi cu atît mai puţin dispreţuirea tinerilor de la Universitate ar fi o idee înţeleaptă, indiferent cum sînt văzute cererile lor. Şi ar fi de rău augur refuzul autorităţilor de a intra în dialog cu ei. Măcar pentru a sterge ofensa pe care le-au adus-o într-un moment de iritare, pe care firesc ar fi să-l regrete, domnul Iliescu s-ar cuveni să-l asculte…”, „ …se vor găsi oare şi acum români care, din motive egoiste, să acţioneze de fapt împotriva intereselor României? E posibil oare ca oamenii care au doborît un dictator prin coborîrea disperării în stradă să nu spere la înlăturarea dictaturii din ei? Să fie la mijloc, oare, un blestem istoric reînnoit, cauza patimilor mărunte care ne orbesc, împiedicându-ne să vedem interesul general, de a înlătura orice urmă a coşmarului totalitar? Sau sîntem victimele unor lupte sălbatice pentru putere cărora puţin le pasă de fericirea sau nefericirea ţării? Şi dacă da, care e preţul? Zădărnicirea miracolului din decembrie, cînd cei din stradă eram toţi solidari? E un timp, acum, cînd vinile vechi pot fi sporite sau răscumpărate. Fiecare poate şi trebuie să aleagă”.
În data de 27 aprilie 1990, la orele 19:00, a avut loc o conferinţă de presă, la Palatul Victoria, a preşedintelui C.P.U.N., Ion Iliescu şi a primului-ministru interimar Petre Roman, conferinţă la care au participat, atât ziarişti români, cât şi ziarişti străini.
În timpul acestei conferinţe de presă, unul dintre ziarişti, făcând referire la manifestanţii din Piaţa Universităţii, a afirmat că aceştia sunt decişi să rămână în piaţă până la 20 mai 1990 – data alegerilor parlamentare şi pentru preşedintele ţării.
La această remarcă, inculpatul Ion Iliescu a răspuns:
„Nu au decît să stea, să fiarbă în sucul propriu, cît îi va duce răbdarea”.
De asemenea,preşedintele C.P.U.N., de la acea dată, a mai susţinut că manifestanţii din Piaţa Universităţii urmăresc să obţină un statut de victimă, în caz că ar fi atacaţi de muncitori.
Tot în această zi, Grupul de Dialog Social, au prezentat un comunicat prin care se cerea inculpaţilor Ion Iliescu şi Petre Roman să vină la tratative cu reprezentanţii manifestanţilor. Chiar dacă obiectivele demonstraţiei au fost, exclusiv morale şi de înlăturare totală a comunismului din România, reprezentanţii puterii au văzut în manifestaţia din Piaţa Universităţii doar o chestiune de circulaţie rutieră.
În aceste împrejurări, unii manifestanţi au declanşat greva foamei, scopul acestora fiind susţinerea punctului 8 al Proclamaţiei de la Timişoara, libertatea de expresie a Televiziunii, aflarea adevărului despre Revoluţia din decembrie 1989 şi abolirea structurilor comuniste.
Ulterior, în greva foamei au intrat şi alţi manifestanţi, situaţia în parte a fiecăruia urmează a fi prezentată, pe larg, în prezentul rechizitoriu. Această formă extremă de protest se desfăşura pe peluza din faţa Teatrului Naţional, unde s-au instalat nişte corturi pentru persoanele aflate în greva foamei.
(…)
În primele zile ale manifestaţiilor din Piaţa Universităţii, Cristian Paţurcă a scris „Imnul Golanilor”, în care se regăsesc principalele revendicări ale protestatarilor:
„A fost o dată ca-n poveşti,
A fost în România,
O gaşcă mare de «golani»,
Ce-au alungat sclavia.
Noi nu ne-am confundat nicicînd
Cu «oamenii de bine»,
Numiţi şi neocomunişti
Şi fără de ruşine. Refren: Mai bine haimana,
Decît trădător,
Mai bine huligan,
Decît dictator,
Mai bine «golan»,
Decît activist,
Mai bine mort,
Decît comunist. Vrem libertate
Nu comunism
Şi nici schimbări de formă
Şi de aceea, securişti,
Să nu ne puteţi normă.
Noi nu vrem neocomunism,
Nici neolibertate,
«Democraţii» orginale
Şi nici minciuni sfruntate. Ne-aţi întrebat ce vrem aici
Dar ştie toată ţara,
Noi susţinem punctul 8
De la Timişoara.
A căzut patru-şapte-trei
Ce ţinea TVR,
Legată în lanţurile ei,
Dar tot degeaba e! Alegeri fără comunişti,
Fără nomenclatură,
Şi nu vă temeţi de «golani»
Fără coloratură.
Din cei care au murit aici
Ne-am reîntors năluci
Să nu mai fie cum a fost
Măcelul de atunci”
Aceste versuri au fost puse pe muzică, de către Vali Sterian şi, seară de seară, „Imnul Golanilor” era cântat de toţi cei prezenţi în Piaţa Universităţii.
Printre personalităţile prezente în Piaţa Universităţii a fost şi Rusan Otilia-Valeria, cunoscută sub pseudonimul Ana Blandiana. (…) În Piaţa Universităţii au fost prezenţi ziarişti, reporteri şi corespondenţi ai agenţiilor de presă, care transmiteau evenimentele din Piaţa Universităţii în aproape toate colţurile lumii, cu precădere însă, în Europa şi S.U.A. Marea majoritate ai acestor ziarişti şi reporteri îşi aveau centrul de presă în Hotelul Intercontinental.
Manifestaţiile din Piaţa Universităţii au fost urmărite la faţa locului şi de mulţi străini, unii dintre ei fiind chiar membrii ai ambasadelor acreditate la Bucureşti.
Important de subliniat că printre manifestanţii din Piaţa Universităţii au existat, în permanenţă, şi cadre militare din instituţiile cu rol de apărare a ordinii publice şi din domeniul securităţii statului, care urmăreau atent desfăşurarea demonstraţiilor, precum şi persoanele care erau prezente în piaţă şi îşi expuneau opiniile.
Notele informative pe care cadrele militare din M.I. le întocmeau şi, în special, cele întocmite de U.M. (…), ajungeau la preşedintele C.P.U.N. Ion Iliescu şi la primul-ministru Petre Roman. Tot la aceştia ajungeau şi informările transmise de Serviciul Român de Informaţii prin directorul său, Virgil Măgureanu.
Beneficiar al informaţiilor din zona Pieţei Universităţii era şi inculpatul Gelu Voican Voiculescu, (…).
La data de 09.05.1990, primul-ministru a fost informat de către structurile de informaţii că numitul (…), deşi nu poseda permis de conducere, se deplasa zilnic, cu autoturismul cu numărul de înmatriculare, 15-B-8744, aparţinând tatălui său, în Piaţa Universităţii, pentru a aproviziona cu alimente manifestanţii.
La 27 aprilie 1990, U.M. (…) informa că, Petre Mihai Băcanu împreună cu Octavian Paler, l-au folosit pe conducătorul auto (…), pentru a aproviziona cu pâine şi produse alimentare manifestanţii din Piaţa Universităţii, folosind în acest scop autotirul cu numărul 24-B-4265, al Autobazei 4 Militari.
În perioada manifestaţiilor din Piaţa Universităţii, comanda U.M. (…) a hotărât ca un grup de ofiţeri să filmeze, permanent, dintr-o cameră a Hotelului Intercontinental, ce se întâmpla în Piaţa Universităţii.
Trebuie specificat că această unitate militară beneficia şi de un serviciu în care îşi desfăşurau activitatea ofiţeri acoperiţi, despre existenţa lor ştiind numai cei care aveau acces la asemenea informaţii: (…).
Exemplele pot continua în acest sens, cele menţionate fiind doar câteva dintre ele.
Televiziunea Română a prezentat manifestaţiile din Piaţa Universităţii, într-un mod cu totul şi cu totul deformat, manipulator, cu scopul de a prezenta opiniei publice că această demonstraţie este de mică amploare şi că ideile vehiculate sunt contrare intereselor ţării şi poporului.
În acest scop, Televiziunea Română transmitea imagini din Piaţa Universităţii filmate în cursul dimineţilor, când numărul manifestanţilor era mai redus, iar atunci când prezenta imagini şi din cursul după-amiezii, filmările erau făcute din unghiuri care să creeze iluzia optică a unui număr mai mic de oameni prezenţi în Piaţă.
De asemenea, se prezentau reportaje despre oameni care se alipiseră zonei Pieţei Universităţii şi ale căror preocupări contraveneau legii, oameni a căror prezenţă, putem spune că era cel puţin tolerată de către autorităţi, pentru a-i compromite pe manifestanţii care solicitau înlăturarea neocomunismului şi înscrierea ţării în rândul statelor democratice din occident. Tot Televiziunea Română prezenta date nereale referitoare la persoanele care luau cuvântul de la balconul Universităţii, dar şi cu privire la organizatori şi, în special, cu privire la Marian Munteanu. (…)
Aceeaşi tactică a dezinformării o aplicau şi instituţiile de apărare a ordinii publice şi cu rol de securitate cu scopul ca populaţia ţării să dezaprobe manifestaţiile din Piaţa Universităţii.
Era evident faptul că demonstraţiile din Piaţă iritau puterea politică instituită în decembrie 1989 şi, în special, partidul Frontul Salvării Naţionale, cu atât mai mult cu cât, în perioada respectivă, toate partidele se aflau în plină campanie electorală pentru alegerile parlamentare şi prezidenţiale a căror dată fusese stabilită la 20 mai 1990.
Inculpatul Adrian Sârbu, consilier al inculpatului Petre Roman a fost în stare să gândească atacuri teroriste asupra manifestanţilor din Piaţa Universităţii, solicitând ministrului apărării să-i pună la dispoziţie 20 kg. de trotilpentru a-i arunca în aer pe protestatari.
(…).
La alegerile din 20 mai 1990 s-au prezentat la vot 86,19% din numărul alegătorilor înscrişi pe listele electorale. Alegerile au fost câştigate, în mod detaşat, de către F.S.N., care la Senat a obţinut 67.02% din voturile valabil exprimate, ceea ce a însemnat un număr de 91 locuri din totalul de 119 locurile.
Pentru Camera Deputaţilor, F.S.N. a obţinut 66,41% din numărul voturilor valabil exprimate, respectiv 263 de locuri în Cameră din totalul de 383 locuri. Pentru alegerile prezidenţiale au votat 86,19% din totalul alegătorilor înscrişi pe listele electorale. Ion Iliescu, candidatul F.S.N., a obţinut 85.07% din numărul voturilor valabil exprimate, Radu Câmpeanu, candidatul P.N.L., 10,64% şi Ion Raţiu, candidatul P.N.Ţ, 4,29%.
Aceste cifre arată scorul zdrobitor cu care F.S.N. a câştigat alegerile a căror corectitudine şi legalitate nu au fost puse la îndoială.
Trebuie subliniat faptul că, în urma acestor alegeri, inculpaţii Petre Roman, Gelu Voican Voiculescu şi Cazemir Benedict Ionescu, au devenit membrii ai Parlamentului, candidând ca independenţi, dar pe liste electorale ale F.S.N.
Dacă structura politică a F.S.N. nu ar fi acceptat candidatura celor trei inculpaţi, pe locuri iligibile, ei nu s-ar mai fi putut bucura de privilegiile conferite de puterea politică. Exemplul contrar, în acest sens, îl reprezintă modul în care au participat, la alegerile din 20 mai 1990, (…), care au candidat pe lista candidaţilor independenţi şi nu au obţinut numărul de voturi necesar accederii în Parlament.
După alegerile din 20 mai 1990, Liga Studenţilor din Universitatea Bucureşti, Liga Studenţilor de la Institutul de Arhitectură, Grupul Independent pentru Democrație şi Asociaţia 21 Decembrie au considerat că votul reprezintă voinţa poporului şi au hotărât să se retragă din Piaţa Universităţii, dând totuşi posibilitatea membrilor lor de a participa la manifestaţii ca simple persoane, fără vreo apartenenţă civică. A fost închis balconul de la Universitate.
În aceste împrejurări, manifestaţiile din Piaţa Universităţii, treptat, au început să scadă în intensitate. S-a încercat o întâlnire între manifestanţii din Piaţa Universităţii şi preşedintele Ion Iliescu pentru a negocia o evacuare a zonei. (…).
(…)
După retragerea din Piaţa Universităţii a Ligii Studenţilor din Universitatea Bucureşti, a Ligii Studenţilor de la Institutul de Arhitectură, a Grupului Independent pentru Democraţie şi a Asociaţiei 21 Decembrie, singura asociaţie care a continuat manifestaţiile a fost Alianţa Poporului, (…).
După alegerile din 20 mai 1990, numărul participanţilor la manifestaţiile din Piaţa Universităţii a scăzut la câteva sute, iar pe timpul nopţii, uneori, mai rămâneau în Piaţa Universităţii chiar şi sub 100 de persoane. Cu toate acestea, cei care au declarat greva foamei şi-au continuat această formă de protest.
IV. |
President Trump on Thursday blamed Congress for the current "very dangerous" relationship with Russia.
"Our relationship with Russia is at an all-time & very dangerous low," Trump tweeted one day after signing into law a bill overwhelmingly approved by Congress that imposes new sanctions on Russia and curbs the president's authority to lift them.
Trump also took a shot at the inability of the Senate to pass an ObamaCare repeal law.
"You can thank Congress, the same people that can't even give us [healthcare]!" he wrote.
Our relationship with Russia is at an all-time & very dangerous low. You can thank Congress, the same people that can't even give us HCare! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 3, 2017
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The comments are a shot at Republican and Democratic members of the House and Senate given the broad support in Congress for the Russian sanctions bill.
Besides imposing new sanctions on Russia in addition to Iran and North Korea, it would limit the president's ability to return diplomatic compounds seized by the Obama administration in retaliation for Russian election meddling.
Russia has overshadowed Trump's administration from the start.
The sanctions are related in part to findings by the intelligence community that Russia interfered in the U.S. presidential election through a coordinated effort that included hacks of political organizations and a promulgation of "fake news" stories intended to hurt Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham ClintonSanders: 'I fully expect' fair treatment by DNC in 2020 after 'not quite even handed' 2016 primary Sanders: 'Damn right' I'll make the large corporations pay 'fair share of taxes' Former Sanders campaign spokesman: Clinton staff are 'biggest a--holes in American politics' MORE and undermine faith in the U.S. democracy.
Justice Department special counsel Robert Mueller is investigating Russia's meddling, including possible ties to Trump's campaign. The investigation has been an annoyance to the president, who fired FBI Director James Comey over it.
Trump and his campaign aides have repeatedly denied collusion with Russia. Trump has decried the Russia probe as a "witch hunt" and as an excuse by Democrats for losing the election.
Russia's government responded to the sanctions by ordering the U.S. embassy and missions in Russia to reduce its diplomatic staff.
Trump has yet to respond to that action.
Trump signed the bill Wednesday and issued two statements labeling parts of the bill an unconstitutional infringement upon executive authority and his ability to negotiate with Moscow.
“By limiting the executive’s flexibility, this bill makes it harder for the United States to strike good deals for the American people, and will drive China, Russia, and North Korea much closer together,” Trump said in a sharply worded statement.
Trump said he signed the legislation for the sake of "national unity." He also blasted Congress for its inability to pass healthcare reform in Wednesday's statement.
“The bill ... encroaches on the executive branch’s authority to negotiate,” he said in the statement. “Congress could not even negotiate a healthcare bill after seven years of talking.”
Trump last month met with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Group of 20 summit in Germany. During the meeting, Trump reportedly pressed Putin about Moscow's effort to meddle in the 2016 presidential election, which Putin denied.
After the meeting, Trump tweeted that it was "time to move forward in working constructively with Russia." |
Aaron Hiler / Flickr
An open letter reads: “To the sensationalists, liars and race-baiters—we are done with you.”
Police unions are not exactly shy about expressing their anger. New York’s police-union chief said Mayor Bill de Blasio had blood on his hands following the fatal shooting of two officers. Baltimore’s police-union chief described #BlackLivesMatter protesters as a “lynch mob.” Cleveland’s police-union chief said “we've given the inmates the keys to the asylum,” referring to recent anti-cop sentiments, and while the subject of that remark wasn’t entirely clear, he was plain about his hostility to “leadership, federal, state and local.” All of that is patty-cake compared to the position taken by the River City Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 614 in Louisville, Kentucky. In an open letter, Louisville police union president Dave Mutchler issued what could be read as a threat to residents of the city. “We know that the vast majority of you see that ninety-nine percent of police officers serve with integrity and courage,” the letter reads. “Although we know in our hearts that you are the silent majority, sadly, that may not be enough. Soon, we may have to ask for you to rise with us against the small, but very vocal group of people in our city who resist everything we all strive to attain—freedom, safety and the ability to live our lives happily and without fear.” (The bold emphasis is ours.)
Press Release-River City FOP Lodge 614 by insiderlouisville The letter is addressed to three parties: “the public we serve”;
“the criminal element in our city”; and
“the self-appointed spokespersons who choose to remain blind to reason, who use misinformation and who sensationalize tragedy at every opportunity to forward their political agendas.” As if to clarify, Mutchler salutes each of these groups separately. “To the sensationalists, liars and race-baiters—we are done with you,” Mutchler writes, addressing that third bloc. “At first it was good enough just to sit back and watch your ridiculous spectacle. No more.” What moved the police union to such anger? Mutchler was most likely discussing the criticism that the Louisville Metro Police fielded after an officer fatally shot Deng Manyuon, a Sudanese refugee, on June 14. Louisville Metro Police chief Steve Conrad released surveillance-video footage of the incident, which shows officer Nathan Blanford shooting Manyuon after he attacked the officer with a flag pole. (Mutchler didn’t return a call for comment.) Mutchler’s dramatic letter drew a fast response from Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer, which he posted via Twitter. Regarding the FOP letter: I appreciate that emotions are high after the tragic event of last week. — Mayor Greg Fischer (@louisvillemayor) June 19, 2015 This letter does not reflect the sentiments of me or the vast majority of Louisville's citizens, who know that we are all on the same page — Mayor Greg Fischer (@louisvillemayor) June 19, 2015 We are in this together, including police who put their lives on the line to keep us safe while building strong relationships of trust — Mayor Greg Fischer (@louisvillemayor) June 19, 2015 Rather than incite distrust between the police and the community, my administration will work to build those critical relationships — Mayor Greg Fischer (@louisvillemayor) June 19, 2015 Police chief Conrad also issued a response, albeit a tepid one.
Here’s the deal: The officer’s decision to shoot Manyuon may have been justified. The video of the fatal encounter is unusually clear. The officer made his decision in a fraction of a moment. That much appears to be beyond doubt. (Critics have said that the officer should have responded with non-lethal force.) Even if the shooting was justifiable, though, it was a fatal incident that should have been avoided. Manyuon, who spoke very little English, had been arrested 16 times since he arrived in Louisville in 2008. He frequently reacted to police with violence, according to the Associated Press. He struggled with alcohol. Manyuon failed himself. But the immigration, social-support, and criminal-justice systems failed him, too. Cities are changing fast. Keep up with the CityLab Daily newsletter. The best way to follow issues you care about. Subscribe Loading... Even as Louisville searches its soul over Manyuon’s death, the city is struggling with a surge in violent gun crime: more than a dozen shootings in one week, with six homicides over two weeks. Residents of West Louisville are asking for more police officers, not fewer. “Consider yourselves on notice”: not the sort of thing people would expect police to say in response to residents asking for greater police presence. Yet the allergy among police to reprisals, indictments, criticism, even just questions following police shootings is so great that police unions are lashing out, proactively, preemptively, against the residents they are sworn to serve. Residents who, in Louisville, are asking for their help. |
Roy Lee has teamed with Scott Bernstein to adapt the Japanese property for the big screen.
Fresh from the record-breaking box-office haul of horror-thriller It, producer Roy Lee is now setting his sights on giant robots and two-legged tanks.
Lee has teamed with Scott Bernstein, the Universal executive turned producer, and Warner Bros., which released It, to adapt Ma.K, an epic sci-fi property out of Japan.
Originating in the early 1980s in Hobby Japan magazine, Ma.K was a monthly comic that also tied into customizable model kits. It was created by artist and sculptor Kow Yokoyama, who worked with the magazine's editors to create an expansive universe inspired by Star Wars, Blade Runner and World Wars I and II. The combination of manga and models took off, gaining a worldwide cult following over time.
The story is set far, far into the future after a nuclear war caused survivors to flee Earth. When the planet is habitable once again, new colonies are set up, but it's not long before a battle over resources begins. When one side wants to make Earth independent, a new revolutionary war begins, this time with mechanized armor and robots.
"Kow is a world creator in the truest sense, and this project finally gives Ma.K a global audience who will experience this epic and rich sci-fi property as fans have for the last 35 years," says Kevin Munroe (TMNT), who will executive produce with Yokoyama, Rick Privman and Yumiko Miyano.
A version of this story first appeared in the Sept. 20 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe. |
| by Greg Lipinski |
This week's Throwback Thursday takes us back to the summer of 2002, north of the entrance to the Steam Whistle Brewery at Roundhouse Park. The landscape of the park is sparse and dry, while in the background, Harbourfront's early condos are rising over the parking garage that looms over the Gardiner Expressway. On the left are the completed One York Quay towers of 1990, while behind the lamppost, Urbancorp's Riviera Condos have reached their structural topping-off at 24 storeys. Opened in 2003, the residential development added over 500 units to Toronto's Central Waterfront, with many more set to join in the coming years. On the left side of the photo in front of One York Quay, two cranes can just be made out. They are for the construction of the first two towers of the three-phased Waterclub Condos, the tallest of which would eventually rise 37 storeys.
Riviera Condos under construction in July 2002, image by Edward Skira
Flash forward 15 years to today, and we see a dramatic change to the cityscape surrounding the park, while the park itself has been greatly improved. The Steam Whistle signage on the water tower now pops out in its green branding, while railcars provide a glimpse into our past at the Toronto Railway Museum now onsite. On the east end of the park, the former Don Station acts as a shop and the start point for the popular children's train ride throughout the park. Intentionally zoomed out to cover more of the park's backdrop, this photo below shows how much has changed. For one, the ugly parking structure is now mostly hidden in this view by growing trees, while many new developments are now home to a thousands of people.
A slightly wider perspective of Roundhouse Park in 2017, image by Greg Lipinski
Starting on the left, we catch a glimpse of architectsAlliance's Ïcë Condominiums standing as the tallest buildings in the neighbourhood, while Infinity Condominiums, the first residential development in South Core, sit in front of Ïce. Nestled behind is Tridel's Ten York, which is climbing ever higher to its final floor count of 65 storeys. In the middle, the three Waterclub Condos towers are complete, as a the two Riviera towers.
We will return next week with another look at the changing face of Toronto! |
More of that Christian love: Atheist mom receives death threats after a public school is forced to remove a Ten Commandments monument.
Some conservative Christians are angry after a Pennsylvania school district agreed to remove a 6-foot tall granite Ten Commandments monument in front of a public high school.
The New Kensington-Arnold School District says it will relocate the monument from outside Valley Junior-Senior High School and pay $164,000 in legal fees to settle a federal lawsuit brought by the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) on behalf of Marie Schaub and her daughter.
The monument at Valley Junior-Senior High School in New Kensington, Pennsylvania, is being removed for the simple and obvious fact that it is an unconstitutional display that violates the separation of church and state.
However, many local conservative Christians are furious that the monument is being forced to relocate, and they are taking their wrath out on Schaub. Local media reports that the mother and concerned citizen has been harassed and has even faced death threats for simply doing the right thing and standing up for the U.S. Constitution.
WPXI reports that the hateful messages include:
You should be dragged in the street and shot.
And:
Leave the country.
After linking to a story concerning the removal of the monument, the Facebook page for the Valley News Dispatch had to plead with with people to refrain from making threats against Schaub and her family:
Commenting on the legal victory, Schaub, who received FFRF’s Atheist in a Foxhole Courage Award at its annual convention last fall in Pittsburgh, said:
It’s unfortunate that many people in my community don’t understand or appreciate the separation of church and state, but I hope this settlement serves as an important lesson. I’d like to thank the FFRF for all of their help and everyone who has supported our cause.
Schaub is a hero for standing up for what is right, despite the consequences. As for the death threats – anger and ignorance from conservative Christians is all too common, and but another sad reality in Trump’s America.
Bottom line: Nothing says “Christian love” like an angry death threat. |
This is what a painting made from blood looks like.
The portrait of Alan Turing, the pioneering computer scientist and British war hero, was made from hundreds of vials of blood, all donated by gay men.
The painting was commissioned by campaign group Freedom to Donate, who unveiled it at an event at a reception at the Houses of Parliament on Monday.
Artist Conor Collins told BuzzFeed News that almost all the blood is from medical professionals who are unable donate blood, because of their sexuality.
"With the exception of one person, all the blood in the painting is from GPs, surgeons, nurses. They're all medical professionals who, because of who they are, can't donate blood," he said.
"One of them was a heart surgeon and you literally trust him to open you up and hold your heart in his hands and yet we apparently, according to the law, don't trust him to donate blood.
"It was surprisingly easy to get the blood. Once I started telling people about the piece and the protest we were making, they were instantly eager to help."
Men who have had sex with another man in the last 12 months can't give blood, according to NHS guidelines. |
Depending on the weather, wind turbines can face whispering breezes or gale-force gusts. Such variable conditions make extracting the maximum power from the turbines a tricky control problem, but a collaboration of Chinese researchers may have found a novel solution in human-inspired learning models.
Most turbines are designed to produce maximum allowable power once winds reach a certain speed, called the rated speed. In winds above or below the rated speed, control systems can make changes to the turbine system, such as modifying the angle of the blades or the electromagnetic torque of the generator.
These changes help keep the power efficiency high in low winds and protect the turbine from damage in high winds. Many control systems rely on complex and computationally expensive models of the turbine's behavior, but the Chinese group decided to experiment with a different approach.
The researchers developed a biologically inspired control system, described in the American Institute of Physics' Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy, that used memory of past control experiences and their outcomes to generate new actions. In simulations, the controller showed initially poor results, but quickly learned how to improve, matching the performance of a more traditional control system overall. The memory-based system is attractive because of its simplicity, the researchers write, concluding that "the human-memory-based method holds great promise for enhancing the efficiency of wind power conversion." |
Hi there!
We hope, everyone does fine!
Last week, our Publisher Eurovideo sent out a press release with a sample track from Giana Sisters: Dream Runners. The track presented you with a new variation of the well know Giana Sisters main theme.
Today we like to give you a new track from Giana Sisters: Dream Runners. As you'd expect, there is a Punk, as well as a Cute version available.
It's one of our favorite tracks from the game score. Simply because it's catchy, it's fast and it adds to the fast gameplay on the screen. And we're sharing it first with you!
Unfortunately, we cannot embed sound files here. To listen to both tracks, we have to ask you to visit our official blog.
What we would like to know from you, is this: Do you like the tracks, too?
One more thing,
before we let you go. It would mean very much to us if you’d check out the Das Tal kickstarter. Fairytale Distillery is a fellow indie developer from Munich and is working on a really tight budget. They have only seven days left in their campaign and still lack half the amount to reach their goal. Das Tal looks extremely promising and deserves a chance. So if you cannot pledge, please consider sharing their Kickstarter page in your social media channels.
Thanks! |
Fitchburg City Councilor Dean Tran on Tuesday won the north central Massachusetts Senate seat vacated earlier this year by Jennifer Flanagan, helping Republicans to a rare feat by flipping a Senate seat that had been held by Democrats.
Dean Tran (Courtesy State House News Service)
With Tran coming to Beacon Hill, where Senate Democrats are in the midst of their own leadership upheaval, Republicans will hold seven of the 40 seats in the chamber and the party gains some momentum heading into 2018 which features legislative and statewide elections, including a U.S. Senate contest.
After a campaign in which he called for keeping taxes low, creating jobs and supporting education, Tran on Tuesday night declared victory over Leominster City Councilor Sue Chalifoux Zephir, who had won a three-person special election primary in September and racked up interest group endorsements.
The Sentinel & Enterprise of Fitchburg reported that Tran defeated Chalifoux Zephir by about 600 votes in a race where more than 15,600 votes were cast and more than 1,500 votes went to an unenrolled candidate, Leominster Councilor Claire Freda.
Nationally, Tran is the fourth Republican this year to seize a state legislative seat held by a Democrat, according to the Republican State Leadership Committee, a national caucus of Republican state leaders that said Tran will become the first Vietnamese-American elected to the Massachusetts Legislature.
"Dean Tran’s victory tonight again shows that Republican candidates can be successful in traditionally blue states when they run on common-sense, fiscally-sound legislative solutions," RSLC President Matt Walter said in a statement. "With popular Governors like Charlie Baker, Republicans can continue to win tough races and flip legislative seats in states throughout the country."
The Worcester and Middlesex Senate District covers Fitchburg, Gardner, Leominster, Berlin, Bolton, Lancaster, Lunenburg, Sterling, Townsend, Westminster and two precincts in Clinton. The seat opened up when Flanagan accepted Gov. Charlie Baker's offer to serve on the new Cannabis Control Commission.
A Leominster city councilor since 2009, Chalifoux Zephir is director of the food pantry Ginny's Helping Hand and a former public TV production manager.
"I was proud to run a campaign focused on the major issues facing the families of North Central Massachusetts, from fixing our roads and fully funding our schools to making healthcare more affordable, from creating jobs to fighting the opioid epidemic. I congratulate Councilor Tran on his victory," Chalifoux Zephir said in a statement Tuesday night.
Tran was a young child when his family left their possessions behind in Saigon, Vietnam, and fled communism, according to his campaign website. His family lived for two years in a refugee camp in Thailand before a Catholic priest in Clinton sponsored their entry to America. They eventually settled in Fitchburg.
During the campaign, Democrats criticized Tran for saying the transgender protection law signed by Baker did not do enough to protect children from sexual predators and for saying he would prefer to see public dollars go to local women's health clinics over Planned Parenthood. Tran also knocked Senate Democrats for passing legislation loosening mandatory minimum sentences associated with drug crimes.
Baker stuck with Tran, amid calls from Democrats for him to withdraw his support, saying he disagreed with the candidate on some issues but valued his local government experience and felt that he was "the right guy for that job."
Gardner Mayor Mark Hawke backed Tran during the campaign.
"As a legal immigrant, spending two years in a refugee camp before coming to the United States, Dean knows the importance of hard work, commitment and honesty. As a city councilor Dean knows the significance of bringing back more local aid to cities and towns and will fight to ensure the Chair City receive its fair share," Hawke said.
In a statement Tuesday night, MassGOP Chairman Kirsten Hughes said, "Senator-elect Dean Tran will be a terrific advocate for the people of the Worcester & Middlesex district, and a champion for taxpayers and small businesses on Beacon Hill. The MassGOP is proud to congratulate him on his victory, which is a testament to the fact that voters stand with Governor Baker's vision of fiscal discipline and commonsense reform."
The special election unfolded the day after Senate Democrats elected Sen. Harriette Chandler of Worcester to serve as acting president, accepting Sen. Stan Rosenberg's offer to take a leave of absence from the presidency and opening up an Ethics Committee investigation into Rosenberg in connection with reports in the Boston Globe that his husband, Bryon Hefner, sexually assaulted or harassed men, some of whom had business pending before the Senate.
In 2016, Tran came up just short in his campaign for a House seat, losing to Democrat Stephan Hay by 125 votes.
Before Flanagan, Democrat Robert Antonioni held the Worcester and Middlesex Senate seat. Republican Mary Padula of Lunenburg represented the Second Worcester and Middlesex District throughout the 1980s. |
Valhalla Knights 3 Gold Will Bring Players To Heaven And Hell
By Spencer . December 13, 2013 . 3:08am
Marvelous AQL added a new storyline to Valhalla Knights 3 Gold that involves and angel and a demon. The Rain of Blood falls, an omen said to bring destruction to the world. This also caused a Dimension Distortion which opened rifts into the Saint Place and Evil Abyss.
Saint Palace is a garden for the gods far away on a floating continent. Angels fled to this place to avoid an ancient natural disaster. Adventurers can prepare for their fight against demons in mock battles at Saint Palace. An evil god fittingly resides in the Evil Abyss. This demonic deity has people fight for its entertainment in an arena of demons. Winners can face the demon lord in battle.
Going along with the storyline, Valhalla Knights 3 Gold adds new angel and demon races. Players can also master Saint and Dark Lord jobs. Valhalla Knights 3 Gold will come out on February 27, 2014 for PlayStation Vita. |
Video: Space anomaly gets extraterrestrial intelligence experts' attention Copyright by KRON - All rights reserved Video
John Newsome, CNN - OAKLAND (CNN) -- The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Institute has its eyes -- and soon possibly one of the United States' premier telescopes -- focused on an anomaly that some astronomers can't quite explain.
Users on the online astronomy crowdsourcing interfacePlanet Hunters discovered a peculiar light pattern between the Cygnus and Lyra constellations a few years ago. The group uses publicly available data gathered by NASA's Kepler Telescope, which has been tasked with finding Earth-like planets by searching for the periodic dimming of stars that might suggest such a planet is passing by.
After a number of users noticed the peculiarity, it was sent to the group's advisory science team, which includes Yale postdoctoral astronomy fellow Tabetha Boyajian.
"It did definitely spark some lively discussions on the talk boards. We scrolled through the discussion boards and superusers, and they let us know that there's something we should be watching out for," Boyajian says.
"What was unusual about that was the depth of the light dips, up to 20% decrease in light, and the timescales (of light variation) -- a week to a couple of months."
So what's the explanation? Could it be from a swarm of comets? Some sort of intergalactic phenomenon that Earthbound scientists haven't discovered? Or an effect of planet-sized structures built by some sort of alien civilization?
Jason Wright, a Penn State astronomy professor, saw Boyajian's data and can't quite explain it. But in a post Thursday to his website, he cautioned against jumping to conclusions -- as some apparently have -- that intelligent beings far away are behind this oddity. "My philosophy of SETI," Wright wrote, referring to the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, "is that you should reserve your alien hypothesis as a last resort." He also cited "Cochran's Commandment to planet hunters ... : Thou shalt not embarrass thyself and they colleagues by claiming false planets. "It would be such a big deal if true, it's important that you be absolutely sure before claiming you've detected something, lest everybody lose credibility," the astronomer added. "Much more so for SETI." Comet swarm or sign of alien intelligence? The star, identified by researchers as KIC 8462852 -- though Wright calls it "Tabby's star" and his team labels it the "WTF star" after the subtitle to Boyajian's paper, "Where's the flux?" -- is roughly 1,465 light-years from Earth, or about 8.6 quadrillion miles. Along with a group of colleagues, Boyajian published an academic paper last month about the star and concluded that the light peculiarities could have been the result of comet fragments. This is "a plausible but contrived natural explanation," according to Wright. "I would put low odds on that being the right answer," the Penn State astronomer said. "But it's by far the best one I've seen so far (and much more likely than aliens, I'd say)." Boyajian herself stressed "the necessity of future observations to help interpret the system," which is why she and her cohorts took the paper to Andrew Siemion, the head of the University of California-Berkeley's SETI Group. They wanted answers, and they said top-notch telescopes were needed to get them. "At first I thought they were absolutely nuts; it wasn't until they told me their data had been vetted by the Kepler team at NASA," Siemion said. The California-based astronomer, who's been working on the search for extraterrestrial intelligence for about 10 years, called the findings "very atypical." "This is one of maybe only two or three times we've been contacted by an astronomer who says there's something we don't understand," he said. "It is a very strange object." The search for ET has been going on for years. What do we know? Request put in to use radio telescope Siemion submitted a series of proposals to use telescopes -- including the Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia, which the National Radio Astronomy Observatory calls the premier single-dish radio telescope -- to look deeper into the anomaly. |
Apple sold more iPads than HP sold PCs in Q1 2012
Apple reported record fiscal Q1 2012 earnings today with sales of its iPads and Macs well exceeding rivals’ sales of PCs. Specifically, the 15.4 million units sold of iPads alone already surpass HP’s worldwide PC sales of 14.7 million as well as Lenovo’s 12.9 million and Dell’s 11.6 million units.
For the first time, Apple has surpassed HP in both computer unit sales and revenues, making it the largest computer maker. Apple also isn’t fazed by the onslaught of cheaper tablets, such as the Amazon Kindle Fire. Instead, Apple said it would continue to “innovate like crazy” on the iPad, which will continue to threaten PCs.
Apple CEO Tim Cook reiterated the company’s belief that tablets will one day overtake PCs, citing IDC’s recent study that showed strong momentum with tablet sales already surpassing PC sales last quarter. Cook also emphasized that although iPad sales were having negative impact on PCs, it has not affected Mac sales.
[via AppleInsider] |
The Kansas State AFL-CIO executive board has endorsed two Democrats, Paul Davis for governor and Jean Schodorf for secretary of state, in the 2014 election.
Davis, the House minority leader from Lawrence, is the presumptive Democratic nominee to take on Gov. Sam Brownback, a Republican.
Schodorf, a former Republican state senator from Wichita who switched to the Democratic Party, has announced she will seek the Democratic nomination to face Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, a Republican. Mission Hills businessman Randy Rolston, a Democrat, has already filed to run in the race.
“Union members are looking ahead to new leadership for a stronger Kansas,” said Bruce Tunnell, executive vice president of the Kansas State AFL-CIO. “We are proud to support Paul Davis for Governor and Jean Schodorf for Secretary of State. We are confident that Davis and Schodorf are the right candidates for the job at hand,” he said. |
Now why would voters think Republicans are unethical, extreme, and unconcerned with the needs of regular people?
Now why would voters think Republicans are unethical, extreme, and unconcerned with the needs of regular people?
If you were taking a look at Pew's latest health care-related poll, you'd certainly be struck by the big number Jed pulled out earlier today: that voters trust the Democratic Party on health care over the GOP by a 45-38 margin, despite the botched Obamacare rollout. Given Republicans are running their entire 2014 campaign on taking away people's Obamacare insurance and abortion, this can't make them too happy.
But that's not the only interesting data in the poll.
Third Way and their friends will weep at this:
Overall, 63% say reducing the budget deficit should be a top priority for Congress and the president this year, down from 72% a year ago. Most of the decline has come among Democrats: Only about half of Democrats – 49% – view deficit reduction as a top priority, down 18 points since last January.
[A]nother policy objective – dealing with the problems of the poor and needy – has declined as a top priority among Republicans. Just 32% of Republicans say dealing with the problems of poor and needy people should be a top priority for Obama and Congress, down 14 points since 2013 (46%).
Remember that stuff about Republicans coming up with a poverty agenda ? Never mind that nonsense.The public really thinks Republicans are assholes:Heck, Republicans should be humiliated that the public sees the parties tied on the issue of handling taxes, 41-41. That's supposed to be their issue. But conservatives can console themselves with their 45-36 lead on handling the federal budget deficit and a narrow 42-38 lead on the economy.
Given that the economy is the number one issue for voters, that's not an insignificant consolation. But Republicans will have to stop coming across as such creeps in order to capitalize on that. And so far, they're doing a pretty poor job of it. |
TORONTO, ONTARIO--(Marketwired - Dec. 18, 2017) -
The common shares of Pivot Pharmaceuticals Inc. have been approved for listing on the CSE.
Listing and disclosure documents will be available at www.thecse.com on the trading date.
Pivot Pharmaceuticals Inc. is an emerging biopharmaceutical company engaged in the development and commercialization of therapeutic pharmaceuticals and nutraceuticals using innovative drug delivery platform technologies. Pivot's wholly-owned medical cannabis products division, Pivot Green Stream Health Solutions Inc. ("PGS" or "Pivot Green Stream"), conducts research, development and commercialization of cannabinoid-based nutraceuticals and pharmaceuticals.
L'inscription à la cote de CSE des actions ordinaires de Pivot Pharmaceuticals Inc. a été approuvée.
Les documents d'inscription et de divulgation seront disponibles sur www.thecse.com à la date de négociation.
Pivot Pharmaceuticals Inc. est une société biopharmaceutique émergente qui se consacre au développement et à la commercialisation de produits pharmaceutiques thérapeutiques et de produits nutraceutiques faisant appel à des technologies novatrices de plateformes de délivrance de médicaments. La division des produits de cannabis médical à propriété exclusive de Pivot, Pivot Green Stream Health Solutions Inc. («PGS» ou «Pivot Green Stream»), mène des activités de recherche, de développement et de commercialisation de nutraceutiques et de produits pharmaceutiques à base de cannabinoïdes. |
In Heir to the Fathers, author Gary V. Wood examines the ideas that guided John Quincy Adams throughout his political career. For Wood, it is Adams' understanding of The Constitution of the United States that foregrounds a crucial link between the principles laid-forth in The Declaration of Independence and the original intent of the Framers of The Constitution. Heir to the Fathers traces this link through an examination of Adams' celebrated essay, Jubilee of the Constitution and, most significantly, through his defense of a group of Africans who mutinied aboard the slave ship Amistad. The contradictory relationship between what is stated The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution and the treatment of African slaves has been a persistent problem in any attempt to understand the legacy of freedom in the United States. Adams' argument before the Supreme Court, based on his interpretation of constitutional law, is an example of how this unique political mind comes to terms with this contradiction without abandoning the spirit of America's founding principles. Wood's discussion of Adams' political and intellectual life invites readers to reexamination the principles upon which the United States of America was founded. Heir to the Fathers is a salient addition to the study of constitutional law and history and American political thought. |
When I wrote about The Golden Age of x86 Gaming, I implied that, in the future, it might be an interesting, albeit expensive, idea to upgrade your video card via an external Thunderbolt 3 enclosure.
I'm here to report that the future is now.
Yes, that's right, I paid $500 for an external Thunderbolt 3 enclosure to fit a $600 video card, all to enable a plug-in upgrade of a GPU on a Skull Canyon NUC that itself cost around $1000 fully built. I know, it sounds crazy, and … OK fine, I won't argue with you. It's crazy.
This matters mostly because of 4k, aka 2160p, aka 3840 × 2160, aka Ultra HD.
Plain old regular HD, aka 1080p, aka 1920 × 1080, is one quarter the size of 4k, and ¼ the work. By today's GPU standards HD is pretty much easy mode these days. It's not even interesting. No offense to console fans, or anything.
Late in 2016, I got a 4k OLED display and it … kind of blew my mind. I have never seen blacks so black, colors so vivid, on a display so thin. It made my previous 2008 era Panasonic plasma set look lame. It's so good that I'm now a little angry that every display that my eyes touch isn't OLED already. I even got into nerd fights over it, and to be honest, I'd still throw down for OLED. It is legitimately that good. Come at me, bro.
Don't believe me? Well, guess which display in the below picture is OLED? Go on, guess:
@andrewbstiles if it was physically possible to have sex with this TV I.. uh.. I'd take it on long, romantic walks — Jeff Atwood (@codinghorror) August 13, 2016
There's a reason every site that reviews TVs had to recalibrate their results when they reviewed the 2016 OLED sets.
In my extended review at Reference Home Theater, I call it “the best looking TV I’ve ever reviewed.” But we aren’t alone in loving the E6. Vincent Teoh at HDTVtest writes, “We’re not even going to qualify the following endorsement: if you can afford it, this is the TV to buy.” Rtings.com gave the E6 OLED the highest score of any TV the site has ever tested. Reviewed.com awarded it a 9.9 out of 10, with only the LG G6 OLED (which offers the same image but better styling and sound for $2,000 more) coming out ahead.
But I digress.
Playing games at 1080p in my living room was already possible. But now that I have an incredible 4k display in the living room, it's a whole other level of difficulty. Not just twice as hard – and remember current consoles barely manage to eke out 1080p at 30fps in most games – but four times as hard. That's where external GPU power comes in.
The cool technology underpinning all of this is Thunderbolt 3. The thunderbolt cable bundled with the Razer Core is rather … diminutive. There's a reason for this.
Is there a maximum cable length for Thunderbolt 3 technology? Thunderbolt 3 passive cables have maximum lengths. 0.5m TB 3 (40Gbps)
1.0m TB 3 (20Gbps)
2.0m TB 3 (20Gbps) In the future we will offer active cables which will provide 40Gbps of bandwidth at longer lengths.
40Gbps is, for the record, an insane amount of bandwidth. Let's use our rule of thumb based on ultra common gigabit ethernet, that 1 gigabit = 120 megabytes/second, and we arrive at 4.8 gigabytes/second. Zow.
That's more than enough bandwidth to run even the highest of high end video cards, but it is not without overhead. There's a mild performance hit for running the card externally, on the order of 15%. There's also a further performance hit of 10% if you are in "loopback" mode on a laptop where you don't have an external display, so the video frames have to be shuttled back from the GPU to the internal laptop display.
This may look like a gamer-only thing, but surprisingly, it isn't. What you get is the general purpose ability to attach any PCI express card to any computer with a Thunderbolt 3 port and, for the most part, it just works!
Linus breaks it down and answers all your most difficult questions:
Please watch the above video closely if you're actually interested in this stuff; it is essential. I'll add some caveats of my own after working with the Razer Core for a while:
Make sure the video card you plan to put into the Razer Core is not too tall, or too wide. You can tell if a card is going to be too tall by looking at pictures of the mounting rear bracket. If the card extends significantly above the standard rear mounting bracket, it won't fit. If the card takes more than 2 slots in width, it also won't fit, but this is more rare. Depth (length) is rarely an issue.
There are four fans in the Razer Core and although it is reasonably quiet, it's not super silent or anything. You may want to mod the fans. The Razer Core is a remarkably simple device, internally, it's really just a power supply, some Thunderbolt 3 bridge logic, and a PCI express slot. I agree with Linus that the #1 area Razer could improve in the future, beyond generally getting the price down, is to use fewer and larger fans that run quieter.
If you're putting a heavy hitter GPU in the Razer Core, I'd try to avoid blower style cards (the ones that exhaust heat from the rear) in favor of those that cool with large fans blowing down and around the card. Dissipating 150w+ is no mean feat and you'll definitely need to keep the enclosure in open air … and of course within 0.5 meters of the computer it's connected to.
There is no visible external power switch on the Razer Core. It doesn't power on until you connect a TB3 cable to it. I was totally not expecting that. But once connected, it powers up and the Windows 10 Thunderbolt 3 drivers kick in and ask you to authorize the device, which I did (always authorize). Then it spun a bit, detected the new GPU, and suddenly I had multiple graphics card active on the same computer. I also installed the latest Nvidia drivers just to make sure everything was ship shape.
It's kinda ... weird having multiple GPUs simultaneously active. I wanted to make the Razer Core display the only display, but you can't really turn off the built in GPU – you can select "only use display 2", that's all. I got into several weird states where windows were opening on the other display and I had to mess around a fair bit to get things locked down to just one display. You may want to consider whether you have both "displays" connected for troubleshooting, or not.
And then, there I am, playing Lego Marvel in splitscreen co-op at glorious 3840 × 2160 UltraHD resolution on an amazing OLED display with my son. It is incredible.
Beyond the technical "because I could", I am wildly optimistic about the future of external Thunderbolt 3 expansion boxes, and here's why:
The main expense and bottleneck in any stonking gaming rig is, by far, the GPU. It's also the item you are most likely to need to replace a year or two from now.
The CPU and memory speeds available today are so comically fast that any device with a low-end i3-7100 for $120 will make zero difference in real world gaming at 1080p or higher … if you're OK with 30fps minimum. If you bump up to $200, you can get a quad-core i5-7500 that guarantees you 60fps minimum everywhere.
If you prefer a small system or a laptop, an external GPU makes it so much more flexible. Because CPU and memory speeds are already so fast, 99.9% of the time your bottleneck is the GPU, and almost any small device you can buy with a Thunderbolt 3 port can now magically transform into a potent gaming rig with a single plug . Thunderbolt 3 may be a bit cutting edge today, but more and more devices are shipping with Thunderbolt 3. Within a few years, I predict TB3 ports will be as common as USB3 ports.
A general purpose external PCI express enclosure will be usable for a very long time. My last seven video card upgrades were plug and play PCI Express cards that would have worked fine in any computer I've built in the last ten years.
External GPUs are not meaningfully bottlenecked by Thunderbolt 3 bandwidth; the impact is 15% to 25%, and perhaps even less over time as drivers and implementations mature. While Thunderbolt 3 has "only" PCI Express x4 bandwidth, many benchmarkers have noted that GPUs moving from PCI Express x16 to x8 has almost no effect on performance. And there's always Thunderbolt 4 on the horizon.
The future, as they say, is already here – it's just not evenly distributed.
I am painfully aware that costs need to come down. Way, way down. The $499 Razer Core is well made, on the vanguard of what's possible, a harbinger of the future, and fantastically enough, it does even more than what it says on the tin. But it's not exactly affordable.
I would absolutely love to see a modest, dedicated $200 external Thunderbolt 3 box that included an inexpensive current-gen GPU. This would clobber any onboard GPU on the planet. Let's compare my Skull Canyon NUC, which has Intel's fastest ever, PS4 class embedded GPU, with the modest $150 GeForce GTX 1050 Ti:
1920 × 1080 high detail Bioshock Infinite 15 → 79 fps Rise of the Tomb Raider 12 → 49 fps Overwatch 43 → 114 fps
As predicted, that's a 3x-5x stompdown. Mac users lamenting their general lack of upgradeability, hear me: this sort of box is exactly what you want and need. Imagine if Apple was to embrace upgrading their laptops and all-in-one systems via Thunderbolt 3.
I know, I know. It's a stretch. But a man can dream … of externally upgradeable GPUs. That are too expensive, sure, but they are here, right now, today. They'll only get cheaper over time. |
Update: Baroni, Kelly guilty on all counts
NEWARK--Defense attorneys Thursday asked for the declaration of a mistrial in the Bridgegate saga in the wake of a furtive, day-long battle that took place behind-the-scenes on Wednesday over whether jurors had been incorrectly instructed.
The request was made in a redacted application that gave no reason for the mistrial request.
At the same time, assistant U.S. Attorney David Feder filed a separate motion asking the court to seal the record.
"Because the filing refers to a matter that was addressed in a sealed courtroom on Nov. 2, 2016, and because its disclosure would complicate the court's efforts to ensure a fair trial, the government submits that, in an abundance of caution, the filing should be maintained under seal," the motion said.
As of 11:20 a.m., defense attorneys were in the courtroom awaiting the judge.
The request for a mistrial comes seven weeks after the trial began and three years after the politically motivated lane closures at the George Washington Bridge that led to indictments against two former Christie administration insiders.
Defense asks judge to reverse order
It was not known whether the issue involved the jury itself, or another legal matter.
But it came following a heated dispute on Wednesday involving the judge's answer to a question by the jury a day earlier, when U.S. District Court Judge Susan Wigenton told jurors they need not consider the politically inspired motive in the George Washington Bridge scandal in determining the the guilt or innocence of the defendants.
Jurors had questioned whether Bridget Anne Kelly and Bill Baroni, the two former Christie administration insiders charged with illegally shutting down toll lanes at the George Washington Bridge to cause traffic problems in Fort Lee, could be found guilty of conspiracy if their intent had not been to punish Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich, as prosecutors have alleged.
Baroni, the former deputy executive director of the Port Authority, and Kelly, who served as a deputy chief of staff to the governor, are charged with conspiracy and fraud in connection with the 2013 lane closures at the bridge, which federal prosecutors said was planned with the intention of causing traffic havoc in Fort Lee to send a message to Sokolich over his refusal to endorse Gov. Chris Christie for re-election.
David Wildstein, the key figure in Bridgegate and key witness against Baroni and Kelly, previously pleaded guilty to the scheme and was the main witness against the two.
But in the initial instructions to the jury before the start of deliberations, prosecutors had argued the indictment charged the two with illegally misapplying the resources of the Port Authority, not with a scheme of retribution. Wigenton agreed that motive was not an issue in the case and in her answer to jurors, she told them the defendants could indeed be found guilty of conspiracy without a finding of intent.
However, defense attorney Michael Critchley, who represents Kelly, angrily told the judge that the response would "direct a verdict of guilty." On Wednesday, he filed a motion with the court seeking reconsideration.
In that motion, Critchley said the indictment charged a conspiracy to accomplish a specific unlawful purpose--in this case retribution--and that the government needed to prove an unlawful purpose.
"While it is true that motive is not an essential element of every conspiracy, it is an essential element when the grand jury charges a defendant with conspiring to do so, and in fact, doing something he is authorized to do, but doing it for an improper purpose," Critchley wrote in his motion.
He called it an error to instruct the jury otherwise, and that the court should correct it with re-instructions to the jury.
In the wake of the filing, both the defense teams and federal prosecutors cycled in and out of the courtroom throughout the day Wednesday before retreating--the defense attorneys to a conference room down the hall and the assistant U.S. attorneys to their offices in the Peter Rodino Building next to the courthouse in downtown Newark.
While the two sides were in the courtroom, no one else was allowed inside. When one reporter attempted to go in, a U.S. Marshal threatened to remove him from the courthouse. A record of the proceedings on Wednesday was placed under seal.
Late this morning, the U.S. Attorney's office filed a response to the defendant's motion for new jury instructions.
They said the indictment alleged that "the defendants conspired to and did obtain by fraud, knowingly convert, and intentionally misapply Port Authority resources to facilitate and conceal the causing of traffic problems in Fort Lee, all without any legitimate justification."
The government said the arguments made by the defense would be relevant if they had been charged with misusing some Port Authority resource unrelated to alleged scheme.
"The remainder of defendants' arguments are restatements of what they previously argued in support of their desire for motive to be part of the Court's instructions," they wrote.
Shortly after lunch, the judge ruled on that motion, denying a request to change the instruction to the jury. However, she did not move on the mistrial.
She said the defense "failed to set forth any dispositive factual matters or controlling decisions of law that have been overlooked or newly discovered information."
Matt Arco may be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @MatthewArco or on Facebook. Follow NJ.com Politics on Facebook.
Ted Sherman may be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @TedShermanSL. Facebook: @TedSherman.reporter. |
We are pleased to be offering private individuals the opportunity to purchase a limited number of casks of Ardnahoe new spirit in the inaugural year of the distillery’s production.
Private Cask Owners will then truly become a part of the story of Ardnahoe, and will join us on our journey as together we watch the spirit mature into Islay’s newest Malt Whisky. Ultimately, owners of Private Casks will have their own unique bottling of Ardnahoe Single Malt Whisky.
We are now accepting orders for these inaugural year casks. Once we have your order we will confirm it to you and then contact you again for payment at time of your cask filling. We anticipate beginning fillings of private casks in June 2018.
Please see below to download the brochure, terms and conditions, and order form. Order forms should be printed out, signed and scanned, and returned to us at [email protected]
Alternatively, you may post it to us at:
Ardnahoe Distillery Cask Offer
16 Park Circus
Glasgow
G3 6AX
UK |
Check out the Vaughn Gittin Jr Signature 1969 Ford Mustang RTR-X Sprint 2 Sport Kit!
World Champion Drifter Vaughn Gittin Jr. and the Need for Speed crew teamed up to build this one-of-a-kind, fully-functional Street, Track and Drift machine, and this is the official, authorized RC replica, only from HPI! Balancing 5.0 liters of tire-shredding American horsepower with vintage American, Japanese, European and Drift culture inspired design influences, Vaughn has incorporated state-of-the-art technology while retaining a nostalgic feel into his vision for the 1969 Ford Mustang's timeless body. The RTR-X was designed and built from the ground up to be driven hard; the RTR-X is NOT a trailer queen. While Vaughn will be the only one behind the wheel thrashing it, the entire world will be able to enjoy driving the HPI 1/10th scale RTR-X. The RTR Sprint 2 Sport is a fun, easy to drive and simple to maintain street car, featuring a completely pre-assembled race car chassis for amazing fun and loads of action! We've packed in all the latest features like 2.4GHz control and complete waterproof protection! The chassis is factory assembled right out of the box, making the Sprint 2 Sport a quick and easy way to get straight into driving, racing and honing your skills! This is a complete racing machine that looks and drives just like the real thing!
Note: optional wheels and tyres shown in some pictures
The RTR Sprint 2 Sport is ready to tackle wet conditions! The waterproof 2.4GHz receiver is fitted inside an enclosed receiver box and the SS-20WR water-resistant steering servo and SC-3SWP2 waterproof electronic speed controller complete the package, allowing you to enjoy the action on the road no matter what the weather is like!
All of the latest HPI kits are now fitted with a comfortable and feature-packed HPI 2.4GHz radio system for supreme control and confidence! The radio features a pistol-grip design with steering wheel for ease of use and realistic control, compact size, servo reversing and a light weight due to it requiring only four AA batteries. You won't have to worry about radio crystals or what channel other RC racers are using with our 2.4GHz technology - the radio does all that work for you! The radio prevents frequency conflicts automatically and changes channels if there is any interference. Finally, if you ever lose radio signal or battery power, an electronic failsafe will bring it to a safe and controlled stop. You'll have professional-level control in one easy RTR package!
The RTR Sprint 2 Sport features a pre-painted 1969 Ford Mustang RTR-X muscle car body with authentic detailing and decals. The body comes completely trimmed and mounted for the ultimate in ease, and a functional racing wing is fitted for supreme control at all speeds. You'll have concours quality appearance, and you can always customize your car with any of the clear or pre-painted polycarbonate body shells from the huge assortment of HPI bodies and other manufacturers as well! This kit is supplied with a set of awesome wheels fitted with HPI X-Pattern tyres, AND you get another complete set of wheels fitted with HPI drift tyres, too! You can enjoy grip and drift driving with one kit!
The RTR Sprint 2 Sport chassis features a host of racing and durability features, as well as the capability for race tuning, should you want to hit the track! This car also has the exact same drivetrain as our Sprint 2 Flux, so it can handle some serious power - this means that it's durable enough to handle just about anything you can throw into it. Read on for more details!
Dual Belt Drive Dual Belt Drive
The drivetrain of the Sprint 2 features dual drive belts and rubber-shielded ball bearings for the ultimate in durability and efficiency. From the mid-mounted motor and spur gear, the layshaft and center pulleys gets the power to gear diffs front and rear through sturdy drive belts which are made from urethane for extreme durability and wear resistance.
Fully Independent Suspension Fully Independent Suspension
The suspension built into the Sprint 2 allows for complete flexibility and easy, neutral driving characteristics through the use of four-wheel independent suspension with dual-wishbone design, just like modern full-size supercars. Real oil-filled racing shocks provide consistent damping action for fantastic grip and control.
Race Car Tuning Race Car Tuning
Built into the Sprint 2 design is the capability to completely custom-tune the handling to suit your particular driving style, or emulate the type of driving you're into, whether it's road course, gymkhana, drift and more. Use camber link and shock mount locations, widen the track of the car, change the camber and caster, alter the Ackerman and even adjust droop and ride height!
Just like all HPI cars and trucks, you get a full, in-depth instruction manual with step-by-step instructions that allow you to easily disassemble and reassemble your car for maintenance and easy servicing. The manual also includes a handy parts list and full-scale drawings of the parts and hardware.
From the authentic sports car looks to full adjustability of the suspension geometry, the RTR Sprint 2 Sport is the complete package. 2.4GHz radio, full ball bearings, water-resistant electronics, silicone oil-filled shocks - it's all there on the RTR Sprint 2 Sport, precision built from the factory!
Feature Summary: Officially licensed 1969 Ford Mustang RTR-X muscle car body
Officially licensed by Ford and Vaughn Gittin
Two complete sets of custom green wheels with one set of drift tyres and one set of grip tyres
2.4 GHz radio system for crystal-free, comfortable control
Waterproof SC-3SWP2 3S-ready electronic speed control with LiPo safety cut-off
Water-resistant SS-20WR steering servo
Waterproof receiver fitted in enclosed receiver box
Orange anodized aluminium chassis parts
Two sets of wheels and tyres provided for grip and drift fun
Foam bumper protects the car from potentially damaging impacts
Adjustable body posts allow you to mount a variety of different bodies without trimming or replacing the posts
Adjustable turnbuckles to fine tune your suspension
Complete set of ball bearings for a smooth and efficient drivetrain
Oil-filled coil-over shock absorbers
2 degree and 3 degree rear hubs for additional tuning choices
Durable injected moulded nylon main chassis
Front and rear shock towers with optimized shock absorber and camber link positions for ideal suspension geometry
Optional low profile front shock tower is included in the kit which allows the use of the full range of HPI 190mm to 210mm wide bodies
Droop screws allow you to "race tune" your suspension settings
Precise bellcrank steering
#109299 RTR SPRINT 2 SPORT w/ 2.4GHz Radio System 1/10th Scale Pre-Assembled 4WD Touring Car with 2.4GHz Radio System and Painted 1969 Ford Mustang RTR-X Body
SPECIFICATIONS: Length: 431mm (17") Height: 127mm (5") Width: 200mm (7.9") Wheelbase: 254mm (10") Includes: 4 AA batteries, 7.2v 2000 mAh NiMH battery with standard plug and battery charger |
Note: the interactive content on this page only works in Chrome and Safari (desktop/mobile) for now. Firefox sorta works but is janky. Sorry.
I was inspired reading Jordan Ferguson's book about Donuts, J. Dilla's classic album of hip hop beats. (My brief review: it's a great book, technical while remaining accessible. Read it.) The book got me listening to Donuts again, and in particular I picked up on "Don't Cry". "Don't Cry" does one of my favorite things in hip hop production: it lays bare its own materials. It opens with 40 seconds of seamlessly mixed portions of the song it samples from, then perfectly segues into a beat that flips the original track into something fractured and gorgeous.
Each button below plays a half-second sample from "I Can't Stand (To See You Cry)" by The Escorts (1974), itself a cover of The Whatnauts' "I Can't Stand to See You Cry" (1973). The Escorts cover is the main (I believe only) sample source in "Don't Cry".
baby guit_hi guit_lo string_bass_1 string_bass_2 string_snare harp_bass
Press this to play a very short beat from J. Dilla's "Don't Cry", which I've reconstructed by picking the above samples (this took me ~6 hours of careful listening to both songs and I only managed to reconstruct 2.6 seconds of Dilla's work). You can press the buttons below and listen to the different samples.
play beat (click again to stop)
add kick/snare
For this particular loop, Dilla took miniscule bits of sound from a three-minute-long song, usually grabbing little kick and snare hits at the end of vocal phrases where the instruments were isolated in the mix, but also sometimes picking hits where there was a remnant of vocals. He was also more meticulous than I would have guessed. If you imagine a beat as "One and two and three and four and" (repeating), most producers will snip out "one and", "two and", "three and", "four and" from their sample sources. They'll grab those from different parts of a song (a "one and" from the first verse, a "two and" from the bridge). Dilla chopped things up like, "one", "and", "two", "and", "three", "and", "four", "and". This is really meticulous reconstruction work, and it allowed him to take a "one and" where the "and" half might have had a vocal coming in to mess it up, and instead stitch in an "and" from somewhere else. The result is like a record skipping all around the platter, a half second at a time. Check out this image that shows where the seven samples come from, and how short they are compared to the length of the song:
People like to talk about how Dilla had the best "ear" in hip hop, and they're totally right. Listen to full beat again and listen to just the bass part: it's a legitimate, brand-new bassline that wasn't in the original song. Listen to that transition between guit_lo and string_bass_1: there's a syncopated bass note right at the end of guit_lo and then bam, it segues right into that higher note (maybe a fifth interval? I suck at music theory). And you can't get that just by chopping things up randomly, even if you select good samples. Here's a button you can press that will play the samples in random order:
play random (click again to stop)
It still sounds pretty interesting, but it doesn't have the cohesion of Dilla's beat. Let's take it another step, this time retaining the bass/snare hits in their position on the ones and twos, but randomizing the order. This is how you might chop up a sample on an SP-303 sampler (which Dilla famously used for at least a portion of Donuts production), playing around with jumping between ones, twos, threes, and fours from different parts of a song:
play random, keep ones/twos (click again to stop)
So anyway, I hope this little essay/app helps illustrate why Dilla's as good as people say he is.
RIP J. Dilla / Jay Dee
(Psst... there's an expanded version of my beat maker here, just for fun.) |
You may know that Amy Schumer, the actress-producer-writer-comedian, is both hilariously brilliant and superbly outspoken on women's issues - but did you know that she's also a certified kickboxing instructor?
Yep, she is pretty bad ass.
Plus she's also used her qualification to teach classes in yoga, Pilates, spin, step, and dance.
Schumer had to get into even better shape for her role in Trainwreck. And to do this she roped in the famous celebrity trainer, Harley Pasternak. And Schumer isn't the only super-fit star that Pasternak has helped stay in shape.
His past A-list clientele has stretched from Lady Gaga to Halle Berry and Jessica Simpson. And Pasternak has also had a hand in how pop princess Ariana Grande keeps trim.
Pasternak spoke to us exclusively about the diet and exercises that he uses to keep both Schumer and Grande in tip-top shape.
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Staying fit: Personal trainer Harley Pasternak works out celebrities such as Amy Schumer (left) and Ariana Grande. He says his favorite workout for Schumer to do is spinning while he has Fitbit 'competitions' with Grande
The Canadian-born trainer and nutritionist has a Masters of Science in Exercise Physiology and Nutritional Sciences.
As well as training Hollywood's elite, he has also spent time in the past serving as an exercise and nutrition scientist for Canada's Department of National Defence.
We asked him exactly what his tips and tricks are for keeping celebs in shape. The good news? He says a celebrity body is attainable for anybody.
Q: What kinds of exercises do you do with Amy Schumer?
Amy is super athletic and stays active all the time. Recently she's incorporated some spinning into a routine, but mainly she does a great resistance circuit called the Sinful Seven, where I combine seven different strength movements and to continue a circuit
Q: And how about Ariana Grande?
Ariana is my Fitbit nemesis - somehow she manages to just outstep me each day. She's always dancing on tour, and staying active, and we incorporate very simple resistance move supersets into her weekly routine.
Q: What are their favourite workouts?
I'm not sure they have favourite workouts but both of them have a really high pain threshold, which is great. While they exercise I also keep telling them fascinating stories to keep them distracted from the intensity of our workouts.
Pasternak said anyone can get a A-list body because: 'To get a celebrity body just means you work as hard as they do and eat as clean as they do'
Q. How many times do they train per week?
It completely changes depending on their schedule, but they stay active every single day.
Q: How long are their sessions?
Their sessions last between 30 and 45 minutes.
Q: How hard do you push them?
Just hard enough, they should still be able to carry on a conversation, though.
Q: What kind of diets do they both follow?
I try and get them to eat three meals and two snacks a day. I incorporate some Body Reset Diet smoothies into their routines (straight from Pasternak's book, this diet is packed with metabolism boosting smoothies).
Each meal has a protein the mass of their hand, unlimited vegetables, water soluble fibre that fits in the palm, and at least the mass of the thumb of healthy fats.
Q: What is your number one tip for dieting?
You need to make sure you have protein, fibre, and healthy fat at each meal.
Q: Are there any foods you limit or eat more of?
I tell my clients they have two 'free meals' a week where they can eat whatever they like, otherwise we focus on the nutrients I mentioned.
Q: If you have a cheat meal, what is it and how often do you eat it?
Chocolate chip cookies! But I'm not telling you how often.
Q: Can we all have celebrity bodies?
Celebrities are just normal people with interesting jobs, they don't have any physiological differences than anyone else.
To get a celebrity body just means you work as hard as they do and eat as clean as they do.
Comedienne Amy Schumer is a certified kickboxing instructor - a skill she used when training with Pasternak to get in shape for her movie Trainwreck
Q: What is your most reliable type of go-to exercise?
Walking. You can do it anywhere and anytime, with friends or with co-workers or by yourself, and it requires no special equipment.
Although I do strongly recommend you get yourself a Fitbit to see how many steps you take (it should be at least 10,000).
Q: What is your favourite type of fat busting exercise?
Still walking. Because you can do lots of it, throughout the day, you don't need any equipment to do it, and the leanest people in the world also walk the most.
Q: What is your favourite strength exercise?
I love the walking lunge. I like that you're travelling from one point to another, and using a lot of your lower body.
Pasternak posted this photo of Grande last week showing off her slim body
Q: What ratio of cardio – weights do you advise?
I don't think of it in terms of ratio. You need to hit at least 10,000 steps every day of your life. That's aerobic. Resistance-wise, it depends on who you are and your goals, but I suggest doing 10 to 30 minutes three to five days a week.
Q: What is your number one way of keeping your clients motivated to continue a workout?
I don't believe you can meaningfully motivate anybody. I believe we are already motivated, and just need the simplest and most comfortable ways to achieve our goals.
Q: What do most of us get wrong when we aren't seeing results?
You're either not moving enough throughout the day, not eating clean enough, or maybe not sleeping well enough.
This article was originally published by Healthista |
It was almost exactly one year ago that Facebook launched Places, their location-based offering. Reading the press at the time, you would have thought it was going to be the Foursquare-killer, the Gowalla-strangler, the Loopt-beheader, etc. Nevermind that Facebook partnered with all of them for the launch — those guys were done.
Fast forward to today: Foursquare recently raised a large round of funding valuing them at $600 million. And Facebook is killing off Places.
To be clear, Facebook is not ducking out of the location game itself. In fact, you could say that they’re doubling-down on it. But they are moving away from the game that the “check-in” services have been playing. And a result of that is Places being killed off and being replaced by new “Nearby” area, as Jason outlined along with the bigger privacy changes today.
Reading over Facebook’s own post on the location changes, it wasn’t entirely clear what these changes meant for the concept of the check-in itself. But this page appears to make it a little more clear. As I read it, check-ins will remain as a part of the product, but they’ll no longer be emphasized. It seems that the hope is that people will move away from thinking of location in terms of “checking in” and instead think about it in terms of tagging your location to what ever it is you’re doing — sharing a thought, posting a picture, etc.
As the new location page makes clear, Facebook now views location usage in three main ways:
Share where you’ve been
Share where you are now
Share where you’re going
Past. Present. Future.
This is smart, as it’s something none of the other location services have really nailed yet. And now that location is being emphasized on every Facebook action (though it can easily be turned off) — and not just on mobile — a lot of people are going to use it. Location as a layer of context is about to get a big upgrade.
All of this is also smart from a location-based advertising strategy. It’s more data and more strong signals. What I’m not yet clear on is what this means for Facebook’s location-based deals service. Launched alongside Places last year, it would seem that this never really took off. And Facebook doesn’t mention it today. I’ve reached out to them to clarify.
The video on the location info page details how location tagging will work. The default on facebook.com appears to be city-level, and there’s a secondary location button to add an actual venue (which is then inserted into your status message). You can also add location to photos you’ve already posted.
The video also points out that on mobile devices there will still be a check-in button, but the functionality will be different. It apparently will only exist as a part of a status update and there will be no more big blue “Check In” button that inserts your check-in into a stream of other check-ins (and again, no more Places area itself). Instead, once you select a place, it will simply be tacked on to the end of your status message.
Location sharing will also be tied to the more direct and simplified privacy changes Facebook outlined today.
Update: Here’s what Facebook has to say on the check-in deals:
Once someone tags where they are on Facebook, they will be directed to the News Feed. If the Place is offering a Check-in Deal, the title of the deal will appear below the News Feed story. You’ll then be able to click on the deal title and will then be taken to the claim flow.
Below, find the flow diagram of how it will now work. |
On Sunday morning, Arab media outlets reported that Israeli forces launched a missile strike that killed Samir Kuntar, a senior Hezbollah leader, and several others in Syria.
Following the reports, Hezbollah released a characteristically bellicose statement confirming his death:
At 10:15 p.m. on Saturday December 19, Zionist warplanes struck a residential building in Jaramana city in Damascus countryside. The dean of liberated detainees from Israeli prisons, brother Mujahid Samir Kuntar was martyred along with several Syrian citizens in the strike.
While Israel did not take responsibility for the strikes, several Israeli government officials and former military officers let it be known they were not sad to learn of Kuntar’s untimely demise. “It is good that people like Samir Kuntar will not be part of our world,” one member of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet told Israel Radio.
Hours after the episode, Israeli media reported that at least three missiles fired from Lebanon landed in northern Israel, causing no damages or injuries. The projectiles landed near the Israeli city of Nahariya, which is meaningful in the context of Kuntar’s violent legacy.
In 1979, Kuntar led a raid in which he and a group of attackers infiltrated Israel from Lebanon, killed an Israeli police officer, and then kidnapped Danny Haran and his four-year-old daughter from their Nahariya home. As Israeli troops bore down on them, Kuntar executed the two on a beach. Haran’s two-year-old daughter also died when his wife, Smadar, accidentally smothered her while trying to stifle her cries from the crawlspace where they were hiding. (On Sunday, more than 45 years later, Smadar Haran called Kuntar’s death “historic justice.”) |
Microsoft Corp. could finally unleash Windows apps on the Xbox One. The company is bringing the core of Windows 10 to the Xbox One, allowing developers to bring apps and games from Windows Phone and PCs to Microsoft's latest console.
The update for the Xbox One will arrive sometime in 2015, the company said Tuesday. Microsoft said "Windows 10 will run across an incredibly broad set of devices,” some with 4-inch screens, others with 80-inch screens, as well as those without a screen that "primarily use [a] controller/gesture" interface.
Windows 10 on Xbox One could finally make good on Microsoft's promise to bring Windows apps to the console. Dell originally boasted that "every" Windows app would come to the console before its release, but Microsoft clarified that only "some" would make it. In reality, practically no Windows apps have made it to the console, so far, but Microsoft says that will change next year.
Photo: Microsoft.com
Not every Windows or Windows Phone app will be available for the Xbox One, developers will now be able to make apps that can work -- with a few caveats -- on any Microsoft device. Microsoft said it was “delivering one application platform for our developers. Whether you’re building a game or a line of business application, there will be one way to write a universal app that targets the entire family" with more details on Windows 10 coming “early in 2015.”
The way the apps will be able to work on different devices with several different hardware configurations is that Microsoft structured Windows 10 with a common core of services capable of running underneath any device, from Xbox One, Windows phones, tablets to PCs. On top of those services is a user-interface that will vary on the device’s form factor.
The apps that will be able to run on Xbox are made to run on multiple devices, said Steve Kleynhans, vice president and research analyst at Gartner. Those so-called "universal Windows" apps are the ones Microsoft previously called "metro," and while PCs will still be able to run "legacy," or traditional Windows programs like Adobe Photoshop and Excel, which won't come to the Xbox.
A number of new apps in the Windows Store are “universal” apps -- ones with a small icon indicating their cross-device support, that will eventually run on the Xbox One. Developers will still have to deal with the user interface issues that would come from porting an app made for a 5-inch touchscreen smartphone to the Xbox One, but the concept is that Microsoft will allow users to play any game on any platform: the company’s long-term goal. Microsoft is also reportedly working on allowing people to play full resolution Xbox One games on lower-powered PCs and tablets through Internet Explorer.
“Strategically, Windows 10 is the right move for Microsoft. It plays on their strengths. They’ve got a lot of talent when it comes to building operating systems, and this move allows them to focus that talent and build one product instead of several,” Kleynhans said. “This allows them to build an excellent operating system all the way through, that runs on any kind of device.”
On PCs and tablets, the new operating system will largely do what many had expected from the Redmond, Washington-based software company: The best features of Windows 8 are coming to a desktop more like Windows 7. |
Crepitus is an alleged Roman god of flatulence . It is unlikely that Crepitus was ever actually worshipped. The only ancient source for the claim that such a god was ever worshipped comes from Christian satire . The name Crepitus standing alone would be an inadequate and unlikely name for such a god in Latin . [ further explanation needed ] The god appears, however, in a number of important works of French literature .
The origin of the myth is somewhat obscure, as it is possible that the existence of this god is an invention by a satirist. No ancient polytheistic source appears for this deity.
The earliest mention of a god of flatulence is as an Egyptian, not a Roman deity. This comes from the hostile pen of the author of the Recognitions dubiously attributed to Pope Clement I, in which it is reported that:
alii ... crepitus ventris pro numinibus habendos esse docuerunt. "others (among the Egyptians) teach that intestinal noise (Latin: crepitus ventris) ought to be regarded as a god."[1]
It is unlikely that Clement I was the author of the extant Recognitiones; these are extant chiefly in a Latin translation, presumably out of the original Greek, made by Tyrannius Rufinus in the late fourth or early fifth century. The passage of Pseudo-Clement stands within a Western Christian tradition of satire against the variety of minor deities worshipped by classical pagans; similar passages exist in The City of God by Saint Augustine of Hippo, and Tertullian's Ad Nationes.[2]
Robert Burton, in The Anatomy of Melancholy, mentions a god Crepitus Ventris among a variety of other deities allegedly worshipped in classical antiquity:
Lilius Giraldus repeats many of her ceremonies: all affections of the mind were heretofore accounted gods, love, and sorrow, virtue, honour, liberty, contumely, impudency, had their temples, tempests, seasons, Crepitus Ventris, dea Vacuna, dea Cloacina, there was a goddess of idleness, a goddess of the draught, or jakes, Prema, Premunda, Priapus, bawdy gods, and gods for all offices.[3]
Burton cites a work called Syntagma de Diis ("A Compendium of the Gods") by Lilius Giraldus as his source for the existence of such a god; by this reference, Burton probably meant Giraldus' Historia de diis gentium ("History of the Pagan Gods"); but because Burton wrote in what he called an "extemporean" style, quicquid in buccam venit ("whatever came into his head"),[4] Burton's quotations and references are not always reliable.[5] Because of Burton's mixed Latin and English style, this passage may not say that there was a god named "Crepitus Ventris", (Latin for "intestinal noise"), but only that there was a god of intestinal noise. The Latin word crepitus, moreover, did not exclusively mean the sound generated by intestinal gas; it referred to squeaks, groans, knocks, and any nondescript noise in general. In The City of God, Augustine elsewhere refers to crepitus cymbalorum, the clang of cymbals.[6] Medical jargon gives the name crepitus to the creaking or popping noises made by the joints. The Latin word for "to fart" is pēdere.[7]
Voltaire, in a passage of his Philosophical Dictionary devoted to changing conceptions of deity, alludes to a number of real or alleged Roman deities of a less exalted status:
La déesse des tétons, dea Rumilia; la déesse de l’action du mariage, dea Pertunda; le dieu de la chaise percée, deus Stercutius; le dieu Pet, deus Crepitus, ne sont pas assurément bien vénérables. . . Il est sûr que deus Crepitus, le dieu Pet, ne donnait pas la même idée que deus divum et hominum sator, la source des dieux et des hommes. "The goddess of breasts, dea Rumilia; the goddess of the marital act, dea Pertunda; the god of the toilet, deus Stercutius; the god Fart, deus Crepitus, were surely not quite objects of reverence. . . It is certain that deus Crepitus, the god Fart, did not give the same sort of idea as deus divum et hominum sator, the creator of gods and men." — "Polytheism", entry in the Philosophical Dictionary of Voltaire.[8]
Through these passages, the noun Crepitus moves from a common noun to a proper noun. Previous authorities had only claimed that the ancient polytheists, whether Egyptian or Roman, worshipped a god of intestinal noises. Perhaps in Burton's mention, and certainly in Voltaire, Crepitus is the name of a god of flatulence. |
Thousands of bands have made strong debuts, and many of those have made good second and third records — it's harder, but not unusual. It's truly rare to make your 10th album exciting and relevant more than 20 years on. For all that, I'd say Wilco is an American legend.
Though Wilco is basically a conventional rock band in form — guitars, bass, drums, keyboards, one lead songwriter — it defies expectations in so many other ways. In 2001, the group put an entire new album (the instant classic Yankee Hotel Foxtrot) online for all to hear; it's one thing to do that in 2015, as Wilco did with Star Wars, but it was virtually unheard-of in 2001.
This is a deeply imaginative band, with evocative imagery and relatable storytelling; drummer Glenn Kotche is one of the best around, while Nels Cline's crazy, textured guitar layers add adventure to everything he touches. I could go on, but let's just say that breaking my rule of never bringing a band back to the Tiny Desk — Wilco performed here back in 2011 — was easy once I heard Star Wars.
Wilco opened this set with "The Joke Explained" from that album, but then dug deep into its catalog, performing 1996's "Misunderstood" and two songs from the 1999 pop masterpiece Summerteeth. I'm thinking we make a date: When Wilco turns 25 in a few years, let's break more rules and bring back their magic once more.
Star Wars is available now. (iTunes) (Amazon)
Set List
"The Joke Explained"
"Misunderstood"
"I'm Always In Love"
"Shot In The Arm"
Credits
Producers: Bob Boilen, Niki Walker; Audio Engineer: Josh Rogosin; Videographers: Niki Walker, Kara Frame, Becky Lettenberger; Production Assistant: Ben de la Cruz; Photo: Brandon Chew/NPR.
For more Tiny Desk concerts, subscribe to our podcast. |
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Pentagon said Wednesday it has told family members of the four U.S. soldiers killed last month in Niger that its investigation won’t be finished until at least January.
In a brief written statement, the Pentagon said Army officials contacted the families this week to give them an idea of when to expect answers to the many questions that have arisen since the soldiers were killed in an ambush Oct. 4.
Among the unanswered questions is whether the soldiers’ commando unit was carrying out its assigned mission at the time it was ambushed about 200 kilometers (120 miles) north of Niamey, by what officials believe was a relatively new offshoot of the Islamic State group that calls itself Islamic State in the Sahel. Some reports have indicated the commando unit, which was operating with a larger team of Nigerien soldiers, might have been retasked at some point.
Also unclear is why one of the four Americans killed became separated from the others and why his body was not found until two days later. Others have raised questions about the adequacy of intelligence information available to the soldiers prior to the start of their mission.
The families were told the investigation is expected to be finished in January but could go longer.
An Army investigation team will travel to numerous locations in the U.S., Africa and Europe to gather information. The team is led by Army Maj. Gen. Roger Cloutier, the chief of staff at U.S. Africa Command.
The four killed were Staff Sgt. Bryan C. Black, Staff Sgt. Jeremiah W. Johnson, Staff Sgt. Dustin M. Wright and Sgt. La David T. Johnson. |
49ers beat writer Matt Barrows put together a post today indicating that cornerback Phillip Adams is ahead of schedule in rehab as he looks to rebound from his brutal ankle injury last season. Adams broke his left ankle and appeared doomed to miss a sizable chunk of offseason training. As Barrows points out, a seventh round pick cannot afford to miss much practice or he quickly becomes "out of sight, out of mind."
Before the injury, Phillip Adams had shown a fair amount of promise. He spent a sizable chunk of his time on special teams, but from what I can remember he looked rather solid when he received opportunities in the secondary. He's got a lot of work to do to work his way into consistent playing time. However, if he can get as close to 100% healthy as possible by the time the lockout ends, he could be in a position to make a name for himself in the the Vic Fangio defense.
Given the 49ers concerns in the secondary, it will be all hands on deck once training camp actually begins. The 49ers drafted two cornerbacks in this year's draft: Chris Culliver in the third round and Curtis Holcomb in the seventh round. While we wait to see what the 49ers might or might not do in free agency, we can still look at the corners currently in place.
Prior to the draft, the top four corners on the team were Nate Clements, Shawntae Spencer, Tarell Brown, and Will James. When training camp gets going, competition will likely include some of all of those four (pending Clements' contract, and James' free agent status) along with Culliver, Holcomb, Adams, and Tramaine Brock. The question is what kind of playing time the latter four will be competing for as compared to the first four.
Depending on how free agency plays out, I'd imagine the 49ers probably let Will James walk. However, that still leaves an interesting battle for the third and fourth cornerback positions. Holcomb's best roster chance right now would likely be on special teams. If Adams is sufficiently healthy by the start of training camp his one year of playing time will give him a sizable advantage over Holcomb, even with the new Fangio defense.
How do you think the depth chart emerges at the cornerback position? I realize several significant roster changes could very well happen between now and training camp. Nonetheless I'm curious how you at least rank these corners in terms of expected playing time as the roster currently stands. |
This post comes from Allison Miller, an avid birder and raptor technician at the Avian Reconditioning Center in Apopka, FL. Allison was lucky enough to travel to Tokyo recently, and has these bird hotspots to share with us.
I recently found myself in Tokyo for a week, and unlike my previous visits to the city, I spent a lot of time looking at birds. I’m a much bigger bird nerd than I used to be – before, I only really noticed Tokyo birds enough to note that the crows were huge (they still are).
Before arriving, I Googled around for bird watching places in Tokyo, and couldn’t find many sites in English, although there were a lot of helpful forum posts. As it turned out, almost any green space in Tokyo was host to many varieties of birds, and since there’s no shortage of public parks in the city, I saw new birds almost everywhere I went.
I didn’t bring my DSLR on the trip, as I was trying to keep luggage light, so the pictures are a little lacking, but I still have eBird. Even though I was abroad, my OCD habit of list keeping forced me to drag my travel-weary body home and enter a full list of birds seen into my laptop at the end of each day. So I have a good written record of my trip, even if it’s somewhat lacking in visual aids.
So, after a week beating street in Tokyo and surrounds, here are a few of my favorite spots for bird watching.
Ueno Park – Central to Tokyo, and accessible by the Ueno subway station, this is a good option if you only have an hour or two to spare. I stopped here after arriving on the train from Narita, and quickly picked up Japanese White-eye, Japanese Tit, Oriental Turtle-dove, Large-billed Crow (the aforementioned massive corvid), and the Brown-eared Bulbul, which I would soon tire of, as they were in virtually every tree, screaming their fool heads off.
Around Shinobazu Lake, on the south end of the park, I found both Great and Japanese Cormorants, as well as a man feeding a huge mass of Eurasian Tree Sparrows and ducks, mostly Mallards, Northern Pintail, and Eastern Spot-billed Ducks. Hiding in the reeds were some Northern Shovelers, Common Pochards, and Eurasian Coots.
There were also a bunch of Tufted Ducks snoozing in the lake with some Black-headed Gulls, bobbing about like corks in the lake, and a Little Egret hunting on the shore. Not bad for a single afternoon.
Yoyogi Park – near the Harajuku, or Meiji-jingu Mae stations, Yoyogi is a great place to people watch, in addition to the birds, in one visit, I saw a girl group practicing their dance moves, a yoga class, and a bunch of pompadour-clad rock stars jamming out on their boom box.
Despite all the activity, there’s no shortage of birds. The usual suspects are present all over the park – Tree Sparrows, Large-billed Crows, Brown-eared Bulbuls, Rock Doves, and Eurasian Spot-billed Ducks in the pond.
But the real gem of Yoyogi-Koen is the large fenced in Bird Sanctuary on the eastern corner. While people can’t physically enter the sanctuary, you can look over the short fence into the trees, where a myriad of smaller birds live. In one visit, I saw several Japanese White-eyes, both Varied & Japanese Tits, a Dusky Thrush, Grey & White Wagtails, a Pygmy Woodpecker, and several colorful Bramblings.
You probably won’t have the place to yourself though – at any one time, there were roughly 7-10 other birders with their spotting scopes and massive lenses, all good-naturedly jostling for the best views of the avian inhabitants. They also seem to have trained a few Varied Tits to take seeds out of your hands. Some of the more daring birds were darting from person to person, collecting treats.
Shinjuku Park National Garden – I was unfortunate to visit this park in Shinjuku on a day that turned into a rainy mess, but the Japanese Tits and Eurasian Tree Sparrows were out in force – as well as a bunch of Tufted & Eastern Spot-billed Ducks, and a few Common Pochards, among the more common domestic Mallards. I also found a Common Kingfisher hunting in the rain, near the Japanese garden, and a Little Grebe hunting not far away.
Hibiya Park – While this wouldn’t be considered the best birding ever, Hibiya-koen is as central to Tokyo as you can get. A quick walk through this small park near the Imperial Palace and Tokyo Station yielded Mallards, Tufted & Eastern Spot-billed Ducks, White Wagtails, a plethora of Brown-eared Bulbuls, Rock Doves, Large-billed Crows and Tree Sparrows everywhere you look, as well as a pleasant pond to sit and have lunch beside.
Mt. Takao – About 45 minutes outside Tokyo, a short hike up this mountain from the Takao-san Guchi train station makes a good day trip, if you’re itching to get out of the city and into some real woods. I say hike, but it’s really a stroll up an inclined paved path, and you can even take a tram half-way up, so it’s not exactly strenuous. It did snow at the top though, so dress warmly in the winter, even if it’s mild at the bottom.
My noisy friends, the Brown-eared Bulbuls were everywhere here too, apparently undaunted by the cold, as well as Japanese White-eyes, and Large-billed Crows. Best of all, I found four kinds of Tits here – Japanese, Varied, Coal and two Long-Tailed Tits. I also found four Pygmy Woodpeckers here, and I’m sure there were many more.
Also, Varied Tits are apparently fearless – I set my Onigiri (rice ball) lunch down on a wooden bench and one of the little devils was perched on top, digging rice out of it before I could blink.
Kasai Rinkai Park – Across the bay from Tokyo Disney, this park – half grassy woods, and half wetlands – was probably the best birding I found in Tokyo, and the one spot I really wish I could have spent more time in.
It’s easily accessible from central Tokyo, Kasai-Rinkai Koen is just a few stops away from Tokyo Station on the JR Keiyo line. I heard some people talking about how they got there at the crack of dawn (I admire their stamina) and saw a slew of raptors, none of which I managed to spot while I was there. Although you can’t enter the wetlands area, which is left as natural habitat, you can walk out on a long spit of rocky land nearby, and look over with binoculars or a spotting scope.
This was the best place I’d found for the Japanese Cormorant, and the Great Cormorant was there too. There were probably 300 Greater Scaup rafting in the bay in early December – I thought they were debris at first, there were so many.
Closer to hand, there were Eastern Spot-billed Ducks, Common Pochards, and Eurasian Wigeons. Around the wetlands there were Little, Eared, and Great-crested Grebes, Little Egrets, and a Grey Heron. There were also peeps along the rocky shore, including Dunlin and Common Sandpipers. I also found White-cheeked Starlings here, and a mess of Black-headed Gulls. In addition to the usual suspects – Tree Sparrows and Brown-eared Bulbuls – the Japanese Wagtails seemed to be everywhere, as well as their White Wagtail buddies.
There’s no shortage of good birding in Tokyo – most of the parks are centrally located, and easily accessible by public transportation. Mt. Takao and Kasai-Rinkai Koen would be better done has half-day or full day trips, but wherever you end up, you should be able to find some birds to keep you busy. |
Following a previous Dutch court ruling that Apple cannot provide refurbished products as warranty replacements, a new ruling has outlawed ‘remanufactured’ units also. Apple must, the court found, supply brand new models exactly as it would to a paying customer …
NordVPN
Following the ban on issuing refurbished products in the country, Apple switched to what it called ‘remanufactured’ units. The company said that these used the same manufacturing and inspection standards as brand new ones, and therefore were different to refurbished products.
A woman offered a remanufactured iPad as a warranty replacement rejected this argument and took the company to court, reports Tweakers.
In 2015, the woman bought an iPad Air 2 and took extra warranty through Apple Care. After four months, the tablet experienced Wi-Fi problems, a problem Apple could not fix. The manufacturer provided a remanufactured model, but the woman did not like it.
The judge ruled that the woman was entitled to a brand new replacement, and that Apple would be fined €100 for each day that the woman was left without that replacement.
Apple’s refurbished products are ones which have been sold and later returned to the company. They are returned to as-new standard, and given the same warranty as brand new devices. In addition to being used for warranty replacements, they are also made available for sale at a typical discount of around 14-15%.
Remanufactured products are newly-manufactured but may include used parts harvested from broken models. These are not made available for sale, says the company, but used only as warranty replacements.
Photo: iFixit |
The Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) is a 3,000-mile (4,800 km) inland waterway along the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico coasts of the United States, running from Boston, Massachusetts, southward along the Atlantic Seaboard and around the southern tip of Florida, then following the Gulf Coast to Brownsville, Texas. Some sections of the waterway consist of natural inlets, saltwater rivers, bays, and sounds, while others are artificial canals. It provides a navigable route along its length without many of the hazards of travel on the open sea.
Context and early history [ edit ]
The shipping hazards and safe havens of the Atlantic coast have been well known and appreciated since colonial times, and considered of great commercial, communication, and military importance to both the colonial power and the newly established, independent United States. The physical features of the eastern coast were advantageous for intracoastal development, resulting from erosion and deposition of sediment over its geologic history, but also enhanced and redistributed by the action of the Atlantic Ocean currents along it.
Since the coastline represented the national border and commerce of the time was chiefly by water, the fledgling US government established a degree of national control over it. Inland transportation to supply the coasting trade at the time was less known and virtually undeveloped, but when new lands and their favorable river systems were added in 1787, a radically new and free national policy was established for their development and transportation use.[1]
Over time, internal improvements of natural coastal and inland waterways would develop into the Great Loop, which allows for waterborne circumnavigation of the eastern continental United States, using minimal ocean travel, with the Intracoastal Waterway providing its eastern end.
Initial suggestions [ edit ]
The improvement of the country's natural transportation routes was a major concern for all geographic regions and from a national perspective of building and binding the nation. These improvements were also a source of political division about where and how improvements should be developed, who should pay, and who should perform the work.
In 1808, the first federal government report on existing, possible, and likely avenues of transportation improvement was presented; it included much of the distance where the ICW now traverses the Atlantic coast. In 1802, at the request of the Senate, Treasury Secretary Albert Gallatin presented an overall plan for future transportation developments of national importance and scope.
Along with inland east–west improvements, Gallatin's north–south improvements included the following:[2]
While Gallatin discussed the details of engineering, construction, and costs, including the national benefits to accrue from lowered transportation costs between domestic and international markets, his full $20 million, 10-year plan was never approved. That is not to say his plan was never implemented, however, for with experience in the War of 1812 shortly thereafter and the attendant British blockade, the continued need for such facility was soon highlighted.
Since Gallatin had based his proposals on the known advantageous natural geographic features of the country, many of his proposals became the locations of navigation improvements that were surveyed, authorized, and constructed starting with the 1824 General Survey Act and the first of many pieces of rivers and harbors legislation,[3] as well by individual state-built improvements.
Since these 1824 acts, the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) has responsibility for navigation waterway improvements and maintenance. All four proposed sections of Gallatin's intracoastal plan were eventually built; the Delaware and Raritan Canal was later abandoned for a better alternative, but the Cape Cod Canal remains in operation, and the Delaware and the Dismal Swamp portions still form part of the larger present-day Intracoastal Waterway.
19th-century growth [ edit ]
Starting in 1826, Congress authorized the first survey for an inland canal between the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico, and during early developments, the growth of steam power to propel water, land, and sea transportation. Over time, additional portions of other coastal improvements were authorized for development, including the Houston Ship Channel and the Delaware River in 1872.[4] Following the Civil War, developments to the waterway system suffered as government funding moved increasingly from navigation to railroads; over time this resulted in anti-competitive pricing and acquisition practices by railroads over water transportation, but also in insufficient haulage capacity to move the required freight to the coasts. These conditions were investigated, accompanied by considered conclusions and recommendations, as early 1873 by the Report of Windom Select Committee from the Senate's Select Committee on Transportation Routes to the Seaboard,[2] but their plans and recommendations "received less attention than was anticipated, of course by reason of the rapid growth of interest in railways."[2] While some policy corrections were implemented over the ensuing 30 years, continued insufficient capacity of railroad transportation became apparent following the harvest of 1906.[2]
In the River and Harbors Appropriations Acts of 1882 and 1884, Congress signaled its intent to improve waterways to benefit the nation by promoting competition among transportation modes. The 1882 act was the first act of Congress to combine appropriations for development of the nation's waterways with a reaffirmation of the policy of freedom from tolls and other user charges,[4] first stated in 1787; it was passed over President Chester Arthur's veto, who considered it wasteful spending for the government's growing federal surplus.[5] In 1887, the Interstate Commerce Act established federal regulation of railroads; Congress continued to promote freedom from tolls or special taxes on waterways.[4] In 1890, Congress passed the Sherman Antitrust Act, the first federal statute to limit cartels and monopolies, but the federal government used it minimally until Theodore Roosevelt's presidency more than 10 years later.
20th-century developments [ edit ]
The invention of the diesel engine in 1892 eventually led to the conversion of fuels for transportation from coal and steam to diesel and the internal combustion engine. This was greatly enhanced by World War I military uses and the beginning of a new age of fuel usage and consumption. The Rivers and Harbors Act of 1909 set national policy for an intracoastal waterway from Boston to the Rio Grande,[4] and the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1910 authorized a 9-by-100-foot (2.7 m × 30.5 m) channel on the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway between the Apalachicola River and St. Andrews Bay, Florida, as well as a study of the most efficient means to move cargo. Between 1910 and 1914, navigation channels were deepened, and the screw propeller proved efficient for improved steering and flanking qualities.[4] Also during this period the Panama Canal Act was passed, in 1911; it proved key to the revival of waterway transportation in the United States, because the opening of Panama Canal in 1914 allowed coastal shipping to extend to the US west coast for the first time. The law also prohibited railroads from owning, controlling, or operating a water carrier through the canal and led to succeeding legislation that eliminated monopoly of transportation modes by railroads. The country's World War I experience demonstrated the need for bulk cargo transportation, with Congress establishing the Federal Barge Lines and spurring development of cheaper ways to transport farm commodities, including the first use of standardized freight barges.[4]
In 1924, Congress incorporated the Inland Waterways Corporation, generally regarded as the beginning of modern water carrier operations, and in 1925 it authorized construction of the Louisiana and Texas Intracoastal Waterway, as well as surveys east of New Orleans to Apalachicola Bay; this was the first legislation to treat the ICW as a continuous whole.[4] The River and Harbor Act of January 21, 1927, passed by Congress, authorized the portion of the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, using the route planned out by the Jacksonville District of the Corps of Engineers.[6] In 1936 the continuous 9 ft × 100 ft (2.7 m × 30.5 m) channel was completed between the Apalachicola River and New Orleans. During World War II, the need for efficient transportation of bulk materials within the continental United States was well demonstrated after German submarines sank numerous merchant ships off the East Coast. By 1942, the 9 ft × 100 ft (2.7 m × 30.5 m) ICW channel was completed between New Orleans and Corpus Christi.
Today, federal law provides for the waterway to be maintained at a minimum depth of 12 feet (3.7 m) for most of its length, but inadequate funding has prevented that.[citation needed] Consequently, for larger ships, shoaling or shallow waters are encountered along several sections of the waterway, with these having 7-foot (2.1 m) or 9-foot (2.7 m) minimum depths from earlier improvements. While no tolls are charged for waterway usage, commercial users have been charged a fuel tax since 1978, which is used to maintain and improve facilities. That year, the Inland Waterways Revenue Act imposed a barge fuel tax; originally set at 4 cents per gallon in 1980,[7] it was gradually raised to 10 cents per gallon by 1986.[4] To hold these funds, the act also created the Inland Waterways Trust Fund under the US Treasury, which are used to cover half the cost of new construction and major rehabilitation of the inland waterways infrastructure (33 U.S.C. ch.32).[8] The Water Resources Development Act of 1986 was a wide-ranging bill regarding all water resources utilization nationally. Concerning transportation on waterways, this law established the Inland Waterways Users Board to make recommendations regarding construction and rehabilitation priorities and spending levels for the inland waterways, and also gradually increased the incremental fuel tax to 20 cents per gallon by 1995.[4]
Current route [ edit ]
Navigation on the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway, where it intersects with Bayou Perot, in the vicinity of New Orleans
Aerial photo of the Cape Cod Canal and Scusset Beach State Reservation in southeastern Massachusetts
The Intracoastal Waterway runs for most of the length of the Eastern Seaboard, from its unofficial northern terminus at the Manasquan River in New Jersey, where it connects with the Atlantic Ocean at the Manasquan Inlet, then around the Gulf of Mexico to Brownsville, Texas. The official terminus point is the Annisquam River,[9] a U.S. Army Corps maintained channel 26 miles northeast of Boston, Massachusetts, connecting Annisquam and Gloucester, Massachusetts.
The waterway consists of three non-contiguous segments: the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway (AIWW), extending from Portsmouth, Virginia (milepost 0.0) to Key West, Florida; a section of the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway beginning at Tarpon Springs, Florida, and extending south to Fort Myers;[10] and a second section of the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway extending from Brownsville, Texas, east to Carrabelle, Florida. These segments were intended to be connected via a dredged waterway from St. Marks to Tarpon Springs and the Cross Florida Barge Canal across northern Florida, but these projects were never completed due to environmental concerns. Additional canals and bays extend a navigable waterway to Boston, Massachusetts.
The Intracoastal Waterway has a good deal of commercial activity; barges haul petroleum, petroleum products, foodstuffs, building materials, and manufactured goods. It is also used extensively by recreational boaters. On the east coast, some of the traffic in fall and spring is by snowbirds who regularly move south in winter and north in summer. The waterway is also used when the ocean is too rough for travel. Numerous inlets connect the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico with the Intracoastal Waterway.
The Intracoastal Waterway connects to several navigable rivers where shipping traffic can travel to inland ports, including the Mississippi, Alabama, Savannah, James, Susquehanna, Delaware, Hudson, and Connecticut rivers.
Natural bodies of water [ edit ]
The following natural bodies of water are included in the Intracoastal Waterway system:[citation needed] Albemarle Sound, Apalachicola Bay, Aransas Bay, Barnegat Bay, Biscayne Bay, Boca Ciega Bay, Bogue Sound, Buzzards Bay, Cape Cod Bay, Cape Fear River, Casco Bay, Charleston Harbor, Charlotte Harbor, Chesapeake Bay, Choctawhatchee Bay, Connecticut River, Corpus Christi Bay, Delaware Bay, East River, Elizabeth River, Galveston Bay, Halifax River, Hampton Roads, Indian River Lagoon, Laguna Madre, Lake Worth Lagoon, Little River, Long Island Sound, Waccamaw River, Winyah Bay.
Canals [ edit ]
Major freight canals [ edit ]
Other canals [ edit ]
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
KML is from Wikidata |
# hilda # hey tao if you feel the urge to write a treatise on what qualities of scandinavian folklore hilda gets right that other media doesn’t # I would absolutely read it # I want to know # what is the flavor (via @uovoc)
hhhhhhhhHHHH YOU ACTIVATED MY TRAP CARD
I realize that a lot of the references I’ll make won’t track for you if you don’t live in scandinavia/the nordics area or aren’t familiar with our folklore but w/e. Read some of these books, they’re really good.
For me, watching Hilda is kind of like what I imagine it might be to watch Over the Garden Wall in terms of local folklore, except for like spooky Americana. At least that’s what i’ve gathered from my american pals who have seen it. I love OtGW, it’s spooky and comfortable and captivating as hell. But it doesn’t play right into all of my cultural familiarities the way Hilda does. Not to be danish or anything, but this show has some mad hygge going on. It also goes off script a lot, it doesn’t follow any “canon” completely (any folklorist will tell you there is no ‘true’/’original’ version of any story, every version is as valid as the next one). But despite borrowing what it likes and changing the rest, it. Well, it feels true. .
Let me explain.
This is particularly interesting because it’s being written and produced by anglophones of various descriptions. A current trend in a lot of english language urban fantasy is to describe everything under the sun as “fae” or “fairies”. Now this can be a pretty fluid term but i think we can recognize that after a while the word becomes completely inappropriate and loses all meaning in the context. It definitely did when i saw someone write about japanese Kappa as ‘fae’. Now, I’ve read a lot of great books of the fae/fairy description. But the popularity of them in urban fantasy has also inspired a great many tepid hastily-written knock-offs, who sometimes try to apply one kind of understanding of folklore to traditions from different places that work in totally different ways.
Hilda reminds me of a lot of the stuff I grew up with - not just folk tales, although it employs a lot of them, such as stories of the lindorm, the nisse, the trolls, the hidden people, draugar and so on. But in tone it also reminds me a lot of Tove Jansson’s work, particularly the Moomin books, and of Astrid Lindgren’s books - particularly Ronja and Pippi Longstocking. There’s also an icelandic children’s book EVERYONE reads when they’re kids that’s just a very simple love story between two trolls, that also really fits this tone. I could go on, but what they have in common is an appreciation of the magic of every day things, and a certain disregard for that terrible tendency of childrens’ book authors to moralize at kids. Something that put me off once I started to read books translated from english as a kid was that it felt like every story was trying to Teach You Something. You often had the feeling that the author was pulling you out of the story to ask you in a saccharine sort of way, “And what did we learn today, kids?” One thing you’ll notice about Hilda is that she often helps people and tries to do right by them, but doesn’t get rewarded for it. In fact, it often gets her into way more trouble than if she’d left them alone. But unless people wrong her, she help them out anyway (and sometimes even then). It’s not about Being Good, it’s just that people need help, and you’d want someone to reach out a hand if it was you.
It’s also that most of the people or creatures she gets into conflict with aren’t actually evil or morally corrupt. Usually they’re just inconsiderate or have a different view of the world or a totally different set of priorities. It’s true, sometimes they’re absolutely terrible, but it’s usually not because they are the Bad Guys and our heroes are the Good Guys. The Mara being a bunch of insecure teenage girls trying to make themselves feel better by making other people feel worse totally tracks for me, for example. Creatures who seem antagonistic may behave in very strange ways but their reasons may be quite everyday. For example, even though there’s no stories about the hidden people being obsessed with bureaucracy, it feels true when the show adapts them in such a way - one of the things you’ll learn as a kid reading scandinavian childrens’ books is to be cynical re: the reliability of local politicians. Characters like the Wood Man, meanwhile, may be anti-social in a very particular way (he reminds me of Little My and Snufkin from the Moomins in equal parts) but aren’t actually bad. They ever actually stop acting like that, you just come to a better understanding of them over time and realize they’re pretty great - even though they’re thoroughly strange and do very questionable stuff sometimes. Adults, instead of being completely incompetent or antagonistic, are also just people doing their best and occasionally make mistakes like everyone else (shout-out to Johanna for being maybe the only cartoon mom i’ve encountered in a While who isn’t a totally incompetent person who pays no attention to her kid)
What english-language stuff building off’f scandinavian folklore (i actually just gave away half my YA books so i can’t recall any specific titles, but there were several on that theme) tends to do is that it makes these creatures/people all ~ethereal~ and ~mysterious~ which, you know, is fine and something I quite enjoy. It’s just that a lot of scandinavian/nordic folklore is so thoroughly everyday. Yeah, trolls eat people, but you can scare them away by ringing the church bells, kind of like you’d get rid of a big angry dog. Yeah, sometimes you raise ghosts but if you beat them in a wrestling match they gotta go back into the grave. Yeah, there’s a giant taller than a mountain who comes and stares at your house in the night - because he’s waiting for his friend to show up and you just happen to live there.
Early folklorists liked to pretend that every single myth/folktale/story was in some way Symbolic of something greater, like natural phenomena or social problems or Great Cosmic Questions. They can be that, but this is the flip side. The hidden people living next door are a metaphor for your fussy neighbor who complains when you turn the TV up. Your house being wrecked by a giant is symbolic of the indifferent government re-zoning your neighborhood. There’s a hairy guy sitting on the sidewalk begging? Might be a nisse or a homeless person - or both.
But really nothing has to be symbolic of anything at all for these stories to work out - they’re just stories about people living their lives, it’s just that a lot of these people are trolls or giants or tiny elves or forest spirits. What gives it that feeling of magic and mystery is seeing something that you don’t understand and that lives such a different life from yours. And then slowly gaining a better understanding of them. The first two episodes do a great job of this, contrasting the hidden people to Hilda to Jörgen the giant - their experiences of the world are very different simply because of something as simple as size. But in the end Hilda starts to understand that she plays a similar role to the elves as Jörgen plays to her and her mom. Folkloric people aren’t totally incomprehensible; they’re really not that much unlike us, even if we don’t always see eye to eye. |
A Regina-trained artist says her Facebook page has been deleted by the company over images of women breastfeeding children taken from her works of art.
Kate Hansen — a visual artist in Courtenay, B.C. — says the problem began in April when the social networking site repeatedly removed breastfeeding art pictures from her page and sent her notes saying the images were not allowed.
"You uploaded a photo that violates our terms of use, and this photo has been removed," one message from Facebook sent to Hansen, said. "Facebook does not allow photos that attack an individual or group, or that contain nudity, drug use, violence, or other violations of the terms of use."
Hansen says the pictures she posted included images of her artwork of women breastfeeding.
She says she tried to contact the company about the matter, without success.
Hansen told CBC News that on Thursday, a few hours after she posted a photograph depicting her breastfeeding her child, her entire page was deleted.
"We're treading a thin line when we say art is obscene," Hansen told CBC News on Friday. "I think it is a dangerous line to cross when we start deleting art and we start saying art is obscene in our culture."
When word about what happened spread, a new Facebook group sprung up to support Hansen.
Bring Kate Hansen Back was still available on the Facebook site as of Friday afternoon, and had more than 1,000 members.
CBC News sought comment from the company on Friday but there was no immediate response.
Hansen is from Regina and studied art at the University of Regina. |
Microsoft is giving Salesforce a real run for its money 12:49 PM ET Tue, 21 March 2017 | 00:35
Microsoft just took a direct swipe at Salesforce with a new enterprise-ready version of LinkedIn's product for sales professionals, Sales Navigator.
"Today's announcements take Sales Navigator to the next level," Doug Camplejohn, LinkedIn sales solutions head of product, said in a blog.
The new product steps up competition with arch rival Salesforce.
Microsoft beat out Salesforce to acquire Linkedin for $26.2 billion — by far the company's largest acquisition to date — in June.
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff was so concerned, he accused the company of "anti-competitive behavior" and urged regulators to investigate.
Flash-forward less than a year and Microsoft's new Sales Navigator Enterprise Edition incorporates many features aimed at turning LinkedIn into a must-have tool for sales teams at big companies.
Among other features, the new enterprise version increases the number of LinkedIn messages users can send to 50 per month, makes it easier for large companies to manage the product by adding single sign-on and allows sales teams to draw on LinkedIn connections from anyone within their organization with a new feature called TeamLink Extend.
The Sales Navigator tool does integrate with Salesforce's CRM system, as well as Microsoft's competing Dynamics CRM. But it's also a clear indication of the synergies between LinkedIn, which has a massive database of information about professionals and their business relationships, and Microsoft's ambitions to target company sales forces with its products. |
Analog Audio & Reel to Reel
The 2010’s have been a decade of analog audio revival. Following in footsteps of the Vinyl revolution that has presses putting out millions of new records a year, Reel to Reel machines have seen a wicked resurgence among audiphiles, hipsters, & boomers alike. As the Factory Service group for TEAC & TASCAM, we have been absolutely shocked by the volume of units coming to us for repair. Models like the X1000 and 38 are among the many coming to us from the corners of the US including New York, Los Angeles, & even Alaska. These units require precision calibration& biasing, but when correctly calibrated, some say the warm analog sound is unparalleled by digital and other analogue mediums.
New Reel to Reel Machines
At this time, there are no new manufacturers of reel to reel machines, but a group from the UK hopes to change that. Horch House, a last man standing in the analog space, hopes to change that with the introduction of Project R2R. Horch House intends to manufacture new Reel to Reel machines, and we salute them for their dedication to an almost lost form of media.
A Favorite Among Audiophiles
For those surprised by the resurgence of Analog, look no further than an old reel to reel. As the publication The Absolute Sound reported:
In 2013, The Absolute Sound shocked readers by concluding that a reel-to-reel deck absolutely crushed the highest-rated turntable-based system ever reviewed by the magazine. “I have never heard rock and roll reproduced more powerfully and realistically in my home or at a show in my entire life,” concluded reviewer Jonathan Valin. The deck in question was billed as ‘new’, but was in fact a highly modified TASCAM Pro deck.
Try it for yourself some time. |
VANCOUVER -- A controversial proposal by the Beedie Development Group to build a 13-storey condo building on an empty lot in Chinatown has ignited opposition from a fresh set of organizers and volunteers.
“We wanted to flip the script of ‘Chinatown is dead or dying’ …. and focus on the positive things being done by youth in and for Chinatown,” says June Chow.
They are not only talking up their case against Beedie’s plans, but spurred by it to connect different voices in the streets and spaces of Chinatown.
Chow and her sister, Doris, for example, co-founded the Youth Collaborative for Chinatown and have been holding monthly mah-jong social events that bring together senior citizens with hipsters over a poker-like game. It’s a cultural activity that isn’t based on eating or buying, says Doris. She feels it’s part of keeping alive “the history of Chinatown and the contributions made by many Chinese-Canadians to this city and country.”
In some ways, they are also motivated by “fights for Chinatown” of the past, going all the way back to the strikes against racism in 1907 to the protests of the 1970s against a freeway, says Kathryn Lennon, another organizer. “We also want to broaden the discussion — it’s not just about one site — to say ‘what more can we do for this neighbourhood?’”
Their mah-jong sessions initially set out to “activate” public spaces in the area; the first few involved just a few tables set outside near Columbia and Keefer Streets on summer evenings.
Word spread and, at the last session in a Chinatown food court atrium on a rainy December afternoon, the organizers were greeted by a larger-than-expected turnout. With some participants arriving half an hour early to play, they hardly had enough tables. Eventually the place was filled with veteran players hovering behind newbies, shouting handy tips over the sounds of shuffling tiles.
“There is need to invest in the crisis of belonging in Vancouver,” says urban planner Andy Yan, who was at the event along with his boss, architect Bing Thom. “June and Doris pulled this off with a shoestring budget.”
The deadline for the public to submit feedback to the city on Beedie’s rezoning application is next week on Jan. 4 and this sparked other Chinatown youth efforts in December.
Over at the Carnegie Community Centre, Chanel Ly, a downtown eastside outreach worker who mainly serves low-income Cantonese and Mandarin-speaking seniors, this week debuted a short film she and her partner, Eliot Galan, made.
Called Hot Earth, it focuses on how elderly residents in the area feel about the plans for 105 Keefer. Their voices are otherwise “quite hidden,” Ly says, but the discussion is changing.
“We talk a lot about the impact of development, but it’s usually abstract. (This) has been a lot more concrete,” Ly says. “This is one site to fight for and the condo (building) has not been built yet, so it is a perfect critical moment to mobilize people with the site being in the heart of Chinatown.”
The Chows’ youth group, along with Kevin Huang at the Hua Foundation, which represents Chinese-Canadian youth, set out to talk directly with Chinatown businesses in order to compare their own findings with Beedie’s conclusion that only eight per cent of 144 businesses canvassed within a 300-metre radius of the site were opposed to the plans for 105 Keefer.
After four days visiting about 50 businesses along Keefer and Pender Streets, they found a much higher level of opposition, at 50 per cent. Some 40 per cent also told them they had no recollection of being approached by Beedie, which concerned the group enough to write a letter to the company and the City on Dec. 15.
Beedie executive Houtan Rafii was not available to speak with The Vancouver Sun on short notice ahead of Christmas and is out of the country now with limited access to email.
The company’s proposal follows condo projects on nearby Main Street in Chinatown being built by other companies, Solterra and Westbank, which the city allowed based on a 2011 neighbourhood plan for taller buildings.
Beedie bought its site at 105 Keefer in 2013 for $16.2 million. After its first proposal generated a mini-uproar last year, it revised it in October, designating 25 of the 127 units as seniors housing. It has also tried to minimize the bulk of its original design, adding details such as recessed balconies inspired by traditional buildings in Chinatown.
Despite this, some prominent voices have joined the brewing opposition in recent weeks. They include former premier Mike Harcourt, the city’s advisory Urban Design Panel, the Chinese Benevolent Association, which includes over 100 societies and clan groups in the area, and the Chinatown Historic Area Planning Committee (CHAPC).
[email protected] |
At long last, production will soon begin on a feature film adaptation of Stephen King’s The Dark Tower, which has been on again, off again more times than we can count over the years. Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey will star in the main roles, and a genre fave has just been added to the cast.
Per THR, Fran Kranz (The Cabin in the Woods) has signed on to play Pimli, the right-hand man of the Man in Black.
Based on the King-penned fantasy series, the film will follow a wandering knight (Elba) who is the last hope of the fallen land of Mid-World. He is charged with finding the Dark Tower while battling his nemesis the Man in Black (McConaughey).
Nikolaj Arcei is set to direct, with Ron Howard and Brian Grazer set to produce under their Imagine Entertainment banner. King and Erica Huggins also will produce.
Expect more soon! |
Category: History || By
© 2013 Tube City Community Media Inc., except where noted. Please do not reprint without permission. To comment on this story, or any other story, email tubecitytiger at gmail dot com, or write to Tube City Online, P.O. Box 94, McKeesport, PA 15134.
When Liberace came to the Mon-Yough area to play at Monroeville's Holiday House, he knocked out the standing-room-only crowd.
On opening night, Nov. 23, 1963, the flamboyant pianist led a sing-a-long of old-time tunes and played variations on "Mack the Knife" ... after first making a costume change, saying "excuse me for a moment while I slip into something more spectacular."
He joked about the rumors surrounding his personal life: "Someone told me I wouldn't smile so much if I could hear some of the stories going around about me. So you know what I told him? I heard 'em."
Rave reviews followed the show. "A magnificent case of showmanship," The Pittsburgh Press reported. The Post-Gazette was equally lavish in its praise: "To leave an audience smiling, wanting more, is all that a performer could want."
The Press reported that Liberace's final number received "an ovation the likes of which is seldom heard in supper clubs."
It was damned near the last ovation Liberace would ever hear, because he nearly died there, just a few miles up the road from McKeesport. His recovery took three agonizing weeks at Pittsburgh's St. Francis General Hospital --- and helped popularize dialysis as a treatment for kidney disease.
. . .
Steven Soderbergh's celebrated new movie about Liberace, "Behind the Candelabra," tells the story of the flamboyant pianist's deeply closeted personal life, and his troubled 1970s love affair with a personal assistant.
But although it mentions Liberace's brush with death, it doesn't (for obvious reasons) go into detail about the incident.
It happened at the Holiday House --- Monroeville's gone, but not forgotten supper club on Route 22 --- a half-century ago, on the night after President Kennedy's assassination.
Years later, in response to a question from East McKeesport-based writer Carol Peticca, Liberace, who died in 1987, recalled the incident in Monroeville as a turning point: "You begin to cherish and treasure life so much more once you have almost lost it," he said.
. . .
Liberace was born in West Allis, Wis., in 1919, but with his mixed Polish and Italian heritage, he could have easily been a native of the Mon Valley. His parents raised him Roman Catholic and his hard-working father was a factory laborer and part-time musician who encouraged his son to pursue piano lessons.
Liberace's first audiences were at Mass when he played the organ, but soon he was becoming known as a keyboard prodigy, performing in short films and with symphony orchestras. Though purists often criticized his piano playing as sloppy or overly dramatic, his sense of humor --- and his wardrobe --- endeared him to audiences.
By the late 1940s, he was a Hollywood celebrity, and in 1950, he performed at the White House for President Truman. In 1953, Liberace became one of the earliest stars of syndicated TV with a weekly half-hour series, and was spoofed by everyone from Jack Benny to Bugs Bunny.
. . .
to do three benefit shows for polio research at Oakland's Syria Mosque, 4,000 people turned out every night for concerts that began at 8 p.m. and didn't finish until well after midnight. "Such is the craftsmanship of this super-showman," reported Henry Ward of the. "Liberace is first, last and always an entertainer.""The staid walls of the Mosque have seldom looked down on a more responsive audience and the cheering, as far as we were concerned, was genuine," Ward wrote. "Audience reaction to the Liberace charms reached its high water mark when he switched (from classical music) to boogie and had everyone from the child of eight to sweet old ladies of 80 yelling 'Hey!'"In 1955, a Las Vegas casino paid Liberace $50,000 to headline its main room --- a price that wasn't topped until the mid-1960s. He performed for Queen Elizabeth II at the London Palladium with Nat King Cole and Sammy Davis Jr. and was granted an audience with Pope Pius XII.. . ., Liberace was a sex symbol for women --- not for nothing did the Chordettes, in their 1954 hit " Mr. Sandman ," wish for a boy with "lots of wavy hair like Liberace."Newspaper and magazine stories (no doubt planted by publicists) several times reported that Liberace had been "linked romantically" to various women, but that he remained "a confirmed bachelor."Liberace's early success, however, began to fade after the syndicated show went off the air. Rock and roll unquestionably hurt the appeal of Liberace's sentimental and schmaltzy takes on classical music and old pop tunes.. . .by female fans, rumors began to leak that the campy, flamboyant performer with the feathers and furs was (not surprisingly) gay.If the rumors had been confirmed, Liberace's career would have come to a swift end. Homosexuality was classified as a mental illness until 1973, and consenting sexual activity between adults of the same gender was illegal in many states through the 1950s.There were attempts to out him., a gossip and scandal magazine, reported in a cover story that Liberace's theme song should be "Mad About the Boy!" and claimed he had tried to sexually assault a male press agent. London'scalled him "mincing" and "fruit-flavoured."Liberace sued both publications, successfully, for libel, but the damage to his image from such stories was lasting.In the early 1960s, without his regular TV show, Liberace became what would today be considered a "lounge act." No longer playing large venues such as the Syria Mosque, he toured hotels, ballrooms and supper clubs --- including the Holiday House.. . .
, the Holiday House was the Pittsburgh area's number one spot for exclusive and intimate performances by entertainers of all types --- comedians, musicians, singers, dancers.It was created by John, James and Mario Bertera, former owners of the famous Vogue Terrace, just north of McKeesport in North Versailles. The Vogue Terrace had been the McKeesport area's leading nightclub, but in 1954, the big action moved to the glitzy new Holiday House.Initially constructed at a cost of $203,000 as a supper club with 18 motel rooms, the Holiday House quickly grew, taking over a neighboring motel and other properties. Soon, its lounges, restaurants, swimming club and 200 motel rooms sprawled over 11 acres near the intersection of Northern Pike, Monroeville Boulevard and William Penn Highway --- a little bit of the Las Vegas strip transported to the Turtle Creek Valley.(And like Vegas, rumors also abound of shady doings --- involving top U.S. organized crime figures --- in the Holiday House's many corridors. Which of those rumors are true, and which are romantic fantasies, is lost to the ages.)By the 1960s, if a nationally known performer was doing a show in Pittsburgh --- The Temptations, Phyllis Diller, The Chi-Lites, Andy Williams, Billy Eckstine, Tony Bennett, Neil Sedaka, Foster Brooks, David Brenner, Sophie Tucker, Sister Sledge, Dinah Washington, Ray Charles, Louis Prima --- chances are they were playing at the Holiday House.The glitz and glamour of the Holiday House was the natural setting for Liberace, who was touring the U.S. in 1963.. . .noted that Liberace was no longer the star he had been in the 1950s."In as much as Liberace has been ducking Vegas and hasn't been much in evidence on television, the question arises, just what has he been doing? The answer: He has been been making a fortune in one-night stands."Liberace, Scott reported, had just completed a nine-month tour of cities large (New York) and small (Jackson, Miss.) and was spending four weeks in Las Vegas at the Riviera Hotel. When that engagement ended, Liberace would be headed back out onto the road, visiting 70 cities, including Pittsburgh."At $5 per admission ticket, Liberace can afford to forget television --- and Vegas, too," Scott wrote.. . .was booked into the Holiday House for 16 days. His first show was scheduled for Nov. 22, 1963.Other shows in the Mon Valley that night included the New Christy Minstrels at the Twin Coaches in Rostraver --- their first Pittsburgh area appearance --- and "new jazz sensations" the Ron Leibfreid Trio at Paule's Look Out in West Mifflin. The New Christy Minstrels would spawn the career of folk singer Barry McGuire, but Leibfreid was never more than a Pittsburgh-area "sensation."That afternoon, in Dallas, Texas, an assassin later identified as Lee Harvey Oswald killed President Kennedy and seriously wounded Texas Gov. John Connally.Across Pittsburgh, nightclubs, theaters and lounges closed out of respect for the dead president.. . .. Liberace gave his assistants the night off, and spent the evening cleaning his colorful costumes.It's unknown what brand of cleaning fluid Liberace used, but if it contained carbon tetrachloride, then it seems likely that he used a bottle of Carbona Cleaning Fluid , which was popular, nationally advertised and widely used.The main ingredient in Carbona, which was introduced in 1908, was carbon tetrachloride. Developed in the 19th century, "carbon tet" was available in a variety of products Radio and TV repairers used carbon tet to fix dirty control knobs in customers' sets, and because it wouldn't burn, carbon tet also was deployed in fire extinguishers to put out grease and electrical fires. It could also be used as a refrigerant.. . .also could cause people to get light-headed and pass out. (The Ramones' song " Carbona Not Glue " --- about huffing cleaning fluid to get high --- demonstrates that people knew carbon tet was powerful stuff.) In some cases , users of carbon tet working in enclosed spaces went into comas. Prolonged exposure at low levels could cause cancer. Short-term exposure at high levels caused kidney and liver damage within 24 hours.As early as 1956, an article inwas warning consumers about the hazards of carbon tetrachloride, calling it "a poison so vicious it should be banned from every home." Carbon tetrachloride was eventually removed from consumer products in the U.S. in 1970, and Carbona Cleaning Fluid no longer includes carbon tet.But in 1963, carbon tetrachloride was still widely sold in supermarkets and hardware and variety stores. (There was an S.S. Kresge five-and-10 only a block or two away from the Holiday House in Miracle Mile Shopping Center . It's fun to imagine Liberace, clad in jewelry and furs, sweeping into Kresge's to buy a bottle of Carbona, though there's no evidence that's what happened.)"I suppose I should have had the window open in the room, but it was a cool day," Liberace said later. "One of my staff came into the room and said, 'How can you stand the smell of that stuff?' It didn't seem that bad to me. I'd gotten used to it.". . .was postponed until Saturday, Nov. 23. The show was standing-room-only. People unable to get tickets waited in the lobby to hear and see whatever they could, according to theAccompanied by coloratura soprano and Springdale native Claire Alexander , Liberace played a medley of tunes from "West Side Story," then pounded out a raucous rendition of "The Birth of the Blues."In its review, thenoted that the label "Mr. Showmanship" is attached to many entertainers, but that Liberace had earned the right to the title."Liberace is a very assured, likable and gifted performer who disarms his audience by good-humored, if shrewd, candor," wrote the's Lee McInerney. "He has a happily diversified program of tunes, and he does them all with a flourish.". . ., Liberace was smiling and joking only with great difficulty. After his first number, he remembered later, the room began spinning. Halfway through the performance, he was seriously nauseated.In fact, the show that the newspapers raved about wasn't Liberace's usual lengthy nightclub performance. As his condition deteriorated, Liberace re-arranged the list of songs to make the show shorter."It was clear that I was finished for the night," he said later. "In fact, I was almost finished forever."To the thunderous applause and whistles of the packed Holiday House auditorium, Liberace took his bows and walked off of the stage.Then, just before collapsing to the floor, he threw up at the feet of Marvin Ackerman, the Holiday House's general manager. As Liberace's skin drained of color, he slipped into unconsciousness.. . .in 1963. East Suburban General Hospital --- now known as Forbes Regional --- wouldn't open until 1978.So Liberace was rushed by ambulance to the nearest emergency room at Columbia Hospital in Wilkinsburg. By 11:10 p.m., he was transferred to the larger, better-equipped St. Francis General in Pittsburgh's nearby Lawrenceville neighborhood.His remaining shows at the Holiday House were cancelled and reporters were told that Liberace was suffering from "a recurrence of an ear infection" that would sideline him for a week.. . .was a blatant lie, probably intended to keep other venues from canceling Liberace's shows. A team of nine doctors at St. Francis quickly agreed that Liberace was suffering from what was then called uremic poisoning --- kidney failure.His prognosis was grim. They gave him a 20 percent chance of survival. Liberace noted sardonically that his hospital room overlooked St. Mary's Cemetery on the other side of Pittsburgh's 45th Street. His lawyer arrived from Hollywood with a new copy of his will, and a priest gave Liberace the "Anointing of the Sick" --- better known as last rites."Doctors are lousy liars," Liberace wrote in his 1973 self-titled autobiography . "The ones in the hospital would tell me I was improving while glancing at my chart and shaking their heads."It took Liberace's personal physician, Dr. Frank Taylor, to give him the plain truth. "Put your house in order," he said.. . .as a lover of jewelry, furs and other gaudy trappings, Liberace used what he thought were his final hours to go on a shopping spree. He opened charge accounts at New York's finest stores --- including Saks and Tiffany's --- and ordered lavish gifts for friends and families."If you think a drunken sailor spends money carelessly, you should get a load of a rich piano player when he thinks he's dying," Liberace wrote in his autobiography.Liberace later credited a mysterious nun's prayers to St. Anthony of Padua --- a Franciscan monk, and traditionally the patron saint of lost articles --- with his recovery.* "I began to pray, and almost immediately, I began to feel better," he remembered.. . .the mysterious nun was clad all in white. St. Francis' nuns supposedly wore dark-colored habits, and when he asked about his visitor, no one could explain who she was.But a visit to the website maintained by the Sisters in Healthcare History Project shows that the nuns of St. Francis General Hospital certainlywear white in the 1960s.So, was Liberace's visitor a divine messenger? An illness-induced hallucination? Or was it just a little bit of showbiz B.S. made up by Mr. Showmanship to make the story better?. . ., Pittsburgh had something else --- what was then called an "artificial kidney," about the size of a small refrigerator.In nature, the kidneys remove poisons from the blood and drain them to the bladder, where they're eliminated in urine. In patients whose kidneys are failing, the poisons continue to collect in the bloodstream until the other organs begin to shut down.The process of "hemodialysis" --- artificially filtering the blood to remove poisons --- was first proposed in the 1850s by a Scottish doctor, and the first attempt to use the process on a human being came in 1924.A working dialysis device was created by a Dutch doctor, Willem Kolff, during World War II, and when he emigrated to America in 1950, he brought his research with him. His "dialyzers" were successfully used to treat wounded Allied soldiers during the Korean War.. . .to be treated with dialysis was Barbara Porr of Pittsburgh's North Side, who in March 1951 went into acute kidney failure after accidentally swallowing several tablets of disinfectant. Her life was saved with a dialyzer built by Allis-Chalmers --- a company better known for building farm equipment, and (ironically enough) based in Liberace's home town of West Allis, Wis.At the time, Westinghouse Electric Corp. and doctors from the University of Pittsburgh were collaborating on development of their own improved "artificial kidney." One of the doctors on the research team was 1944 Pitt med school graduate Frank Mateer By 1954, Mateer had successfully dialyzed 150 people in Pittsburgh, mostly at Bloomfield's West Penn Hospital, not far from St. Francis. But the equipment was crude. Mateer later told stories about repairing the early dialysis machines with "tape and gum bands.". . ., combined with news stories reporting that some dialysis devices included washing machine parts and sausage casings as blood filters, surely led many to conclude that dialysis was an unreliable quack science.On the other hand, Liberace was near death. What did he have to lose? In the early 1960s, there were only a handful of dialysis machines in Pennsylvania. Pittsburgh had at least two --- at Shadyside Hospital and West Penn Hospital. St. Francis sent for Mateer and his "artificial kidney."Mateer, an inveterate tinkerer who repaired cars, built models and designed his own house in Wilkinsburg's Blackridge neighborhood, was not one to be put off by a balky dialysis machine, or a challenge.After a few days on Mateer's dialysis machine, Liberace's vital signs improved and his kidneys slowly regained their function. He was moved from the Intensive Care Unit to a room on the seventh floor of the south wing of the hospital.. . .
Artis, Bryant, "Liberace Still Single, Available," The Pittsburgh Press , May 11, 1954
, May 11, 1954
Bishop, Pete, "How used car lot turned into district's premier nightclub," The Pittsburgh Press , Oct. 11, 1983
, Oct. 11, 1983
Brellis, Matthew, "Holiday House future in doubt as debts mount, owners bicker," The Pittsburgh Press , Oct. 11, 1983
, Oct. 11, 1983
---, "Holiday House makes bid to survive," The Pittsburgh Press , March 10, 1984
, March 10, 1984
Kalina, Mike, "Holiday House is Sold," Pittsburgh Post-Gazette , March 25, 1982
, March 25, 1982
Lewando, Ralph, "Liberace Unique, Ace Entertainer," The Pittsburgh Press , May 12, 1954
, May 12, 1954
Liberace, Liberace: An Autobiography (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons), 1973
(New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons), 1973
McInerney, Lee, "Liberace Wins Audiences," Pittsburgh Post-Gazette , Nov. 25, 1963
, Nov. 25, 1963
Murphy, William P., et al, "Use of an Artificial Kidney," The Journal of Laboratory and Clinical Medicine , Sept. 1952
, Sept. 1952
Potts, Kimberly, "Behind the Candelabra, The Book: The 12 Best Revelations from Liberace's Former Lover," Yahoo! News , May 13, 2013
, May 13, 2013
Scott, Vernon, "Liberace still has grin," United Press International, July 5, 1963
Sloan, Leslie Joan, "Fond memories: Service for patron Liberace held at St. Francis," Pittsburgh Post-Gazette , Feb. 7, 1987
, Feb. 7, 1987
Srikameswaran, Anita, "Obituary: Dr. Frank M. Mateer/Performed some of the first kidney dialysis procedures in Pittsburgh," Pittsburgh Post-Gazette , Nov. 12, 2006
, Nov. 12, 2006
Snowbeck, Christopher, "Saying goodbye to St. Francis Medical Center," Pittsburgh Post-Gazette , Oct. 20, 2002
, Oct. 20, 2002
Troan, John, "'Washer' Rinses Poison Out of Woman, Saves Life," The Pittsburgh Press , March 19, 1951
, March 19, 1951
Ward, Henry, "4,000 Dig Liberace at Mosque," The Pittsburgh Press , May 13, 1954
, May 13, 1954
---, "A Case of Showmanship," The Pittsburgh Press , Nov. 26, 1963
, Nov. 26, 1963
"American Sausage Skin Used to Make Artificial Kidney," Associated Press, Oct. 17, 1947
"Artificial Kidney Built From Washing Machine," Associated Press, Jan. 4, 1969
"Artificial Kidney Saves Wounded," Associated Press, Nov. 12, 1952
Artificial Organ History: A Selective Timeline , George Mason University, retrieved from http://echo.gmu.edu/bionics/exhibits.html
, George Mason University, retrieved from http://echo.gmu.edu/bionics/exhibits.html
"Class Notes," PittMed , Feb. 2004
, Feb. 2004
"Ear Trouble Sends Liberace to Hospital," Associated Press, Nov. 26, 1963
"Liberace Has Kidney Ailment," United Press International, Nov. 29, 1963
"Liberace Talks of Near-Fatal Illness," Associated Press, Feb. 2, 1964
"Monroeville shopping center hinted," The Pittsburgh Press , Sept. 9, 1987
, Sept. 9, 1987
"Pianist Files Suit for $25 Million," United Press, May 15, 1957
"Work is Started on Holiday House," Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Dec. 25, 1954
--- who was preparing to die at the end of November --- was discharged from St. Francis. He boarded a plane at Greater Pittsburgh Airport and flew home to Hollywood to continue recuperating."As I lay in the hospital, I thought about a lot of things," Liberace told a reporter in early 1964, explaining that he was re-thinking his punishing touring schedule. "I also got my faith back when death was near. I was brought up a Catholic, but I wasn't a very good one. I'm trying to do better now. Serious illness can make you see things a lot differently."He began staying closer to the West Coast, making guest appearances on TV with The Monkees, Lucille Ball and Johnny Carson. He played a campy villainous version of himself on theTV show.. . .Although the hospital had hoped that Liberace would donate a substantial amount of money --- there is no evidence that he ever did --- Liberace did make personal appearances on behalf of St. Francis, and he supported its fundraisers and supplied its nuns with free tickets to his shows.In 1986, when St. Francis remodeled the main lobby of its hospital, it was named for Liberace. He attended the dedication on June 26, 1986.Less than a year later, on Feb. 4, 1987, Liberace would be dead at age 67 of complications from AIDS.. . .highly publicized illness and recovery, dialysis became more widely accepted. Outpatient dialysis centers began opening for patients with chronic kidney diseases, and unattended overnight dialysis was begun in Seattle in 1964.With fewer national acts willing to play supper clubs, places such as the Holiday House went into decline. The Turtle Creek Valley was further hurt in the early 1980s by the rapid collapse of the U.S. steel industry, which sent unemployment into double-digits in places such as McKeesport, Duquesne and Braddock --- communities that provided the nucleus of the Holiday House's audiences.The Holiday House tried, unsuccessfully, to transform itself into a convention center, headed downmarket with attractions such as women's mud wrestling, and finally went bankrupt in September 1983. It was sold for just $5,000 the following year. By 1988, it was for sale again. It was demolished that year to make way for Holiday Center, a strip shopping mall.. . .went onto a highly successful career as a specialist in diseases of the kidneys, thyroid and endocrine system, and became well-known in medical circles throughout the United States before retiring in 1999. He died in 2006 at age 85.Badly bruised by declining Medicaid reimbursements and further wounded in the long-running battle between UPMC Health System and West Penn Allegheny, St. Francis Medical Center closed in October 2002.The hospital campus in Lawrenceville was sold to UPMC, and much of it was demolished to make way for a new Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh. The contents of the Liberace Lobby were sold at auction.. . ., there's still interest in the flamboyant, eccentric performer who became a camp icon.And although neither St. Francis nor the Holiday House still exists, as long as Liberace's legend is alive, the Mon-Yough area will remain an important footnote to his career, as the place where Liberace nearly joined the "choir invisible," 50 years ago this fall.. . .This article was inspired by Mark Evanier's May 25, 2013 article on hiswebsite entitled " My Liberace Story ."This article would have been much more difficult to write without the trail blazed by Carole Peticca's June 27, 1986 article for the"Weekend Magazine" entitled, "Revisiting a 'turning point.'" Peticca's story provided many details not available elsewhere, including quotes from St. Francis Medical Center personnel and Liberace himself. It's available from Lexis-Nexis and on Google News.St. Anthony is the patron saint of lost articles. This story originally said he was the patron saint of lost causes. Thank you to Alert Reader Meghan for pointing out the mistake! |
But nearly all of these vehicles are built on shared platforms, and that incurs compromises. Crossovers are typically based on front-drive cars with limited towing and off-road abilities. Body-on-frame S.U.V.’s are based on pickups, and they (including the original Durango) drive and swill fuel like trucks.
The latest Durango, though, is based on neither a car nor a pickup. Thanks to Chrysler’s bygone hookup with Mercedes-Benz, the Durango (as well as the Jeep Grand Cherokee) shares DNA with the Mercedes GL, a classier fancier relative than a Taurus or a Silverado.
Like the $60,000-plus GL, the Durango uses a rear-drive unibody platform with independent suspensions front and rear. This seems the best of both worlds. You get S.U.V. prowess for off-roading and towing without paying a significant penalty in on-road drivability or fuel economy. In fact, a rear-drive V-6 Durango can tow slightly more than a Chevy Tahoe Hybrid while matching its highway mileage rating.
The Durango’s new V-6 puts out a healthy 290 horsepower, but Dodge also offers a 360-horsepower Hemi V-8 that uses a cylinder-deactivation system to run on 4 cylinders under light loads. Most of these deactivation systems seem to work if you’re only heading downhill with a tailwind under a waning moon, but it’s easy to coax the Durango into fuel-miser mode at moderate speeds. On a highway trip during an earlier test of the V-8 Durango, I got 22 m.p.g., which equaled the rating for the V-6 with all-wheel drive.
In corners, the Durango feels more like a crossover than a truck. Its front-to-rear weight distribution is 50-50, with some trim levels even tipping toward a slight rear weight bias. BMW makes a big deal of its cars’ 50-50 balance, so it’s impressive to see a Dodge S.U.V. achieve that handling-friendly balance.
In stark contrast to its rude predecessor, the new Durango looks like a member of a higher price bracket. The interior, in particular, is emblematic of Chrysler’s newfound willingness (and for that matter, ability) to invest money where you can see it. You might expect heated leather rear seats and adaptive cruise control in a Lexus, but their availability in a Dodge is a nice surprise.
Regardless of its upscale intentions, this is still a beast of burden, and Chrysler says the Durango can carry enough 10-foot 2-by-4s to build a treehouse. This seems like a strange metric for cargo capacity — I mean, how big is the treehouse? — but I like it. If I owned a Durango, I would often boast of its treehouse capacity (one).
And, in contrast to the herd of crossovers, the Durango is still a real S.U.V. During my test drive, a huge storm struck my neighborhood, flooding the main road. The scene was straight out of an S.U.V. commercial: a line of cars trapped at water’s edge while a tow truck on the opposite side winched out a Cadillac SRX that didn’t make it across. I pulled to the front of the line, gauged the depth and plunged in. No problem.
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While the Durango starts around $30,000, options can hoist the price beyond $47,000. Even at that level, the Durango strikes me as a reasonable value. Don’t think of it as an expensive Dodge; think of it as an inexpensive Mercedes. |
Two Edmonton police officers were sent to hospital this week after dealing with a fentanyl seizure, Edmonton's deputy police chief said Monday.
During a presentation to the Rotary Club of Edmonton, Deputy Chief Kevin Brezinski mentioned the incident while speaking about the risks fentanyl investigations pose for police officers.
"They were both drug investigations where the members had handled a container and shortly after the side effects, such as being nauseous and elevated heart rate, came to our attention," Brezinski said.
"So they were taken to the hospital and shortly thereafter were released. But it just kind of tells that fentanyl, as we know, is a dangerous drug and it's affecting our membership, as well," he added.
"It's not frequent. These are the first two, to my knowledge, that were exposed to fentanyl."
Deputy chief Kevin Brezinski spoke to the Rotary Club of Edmonton on Monday to discuss how the city has changed over the past 10 years. (Scott Neufeld/CBC)
He said both officers were wearing protective gloves and taking "other precautions" when they came in contact with a pill bottle.
"It's definitely concerning," he said.
"I know it's happening across the world but we do have precautions and measures in place to ensure that our members are safe. Unfortunately in these circumstances they were exposed to a substance unknowingly and then were later taken to hospital."
In December, Edmonton police Chief Rod Knecht said he was worried about the city's officers coming across fentanyl more frequently.
At the time, EPS officers were being trained to use naloxone, an antidote used during a fentanyl overdose, on overdose victims. Knecht said it was also to protect officers.
Fentanyl is so powerful that a single grain can induce overdose symptoms, Knecht said in December.
He cited an RCMP video about two B.C. police officers who suffered on-the-job fentanyl exposure.
In the video, Const. Dawn Adams said white powder got onto her face after she unfolded a piece of paper she found near a slumped-over man.
According to a September report from the Alberta government, 96 people died of fentanyl-related drug overdoses in Edmonton between January and August. In all of 2016, 118 people died of fentanyl overdoses.
@Travismcewancbc
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Who would have thought I’d have another issue of Pokemon News to cover after E3. Well, I do, and it involves something a lot of us were asking for. So my name is Viger, and let’s get right into it.
This update comes to the hit mobile game “Pokemon GO”. Having sort of slumped in activity as of recent even with the introduction of Generation 2 Pokemon, a new update has breathed life back into the game. This update brings vast changes to Gyms and introduces the long anticipated “Raid Battles”. So first up, let’s talk about the newly revamped Gyms.
Gyms now have even more of a reason to be visited in the first place. Much to GatorMaximus’s delight, since a Gym is located right in range of where he works, Gym now act as Pokestops too. Gyms can now dispense items such as Pokeballs, berries, and healing items just like Pokestops. As an added bonus, if your team owns a Gym, then those team members get bonus items for controlling it. As far as battling goes, Gyms do not function on a “Prestige” system like before. Instead, it works on a “Motivation” system. Each Pokemon in a Gym has a specific Motivation level. Motivation decreases every time a Pokemon in a Gym loses a battle. They also lose a portion of their CP as well, making them easier to beat in the following battles. Once a Pokemon’s motivation hits zero, the Pokemon leaves the Gym. If you have a Pokemon in a Gym, you can raise its Motivation and make it harder to force out of the Gym by feeding it berries, with the newly added Golden Razz Berry boosting your Pokemon’s motivation to the maximum. It should also be noted that feeding Gym Pokemon berries will also reward you 20 Stardust. Five berries gives you a Candy for that Pokemon, and 10 is the max number of berries you can feed to a Gym Pokemon.
Another new thing with Gyms is the inclusion of Gym Badges that players can earn from defeating/controlling a Gym. Each badge has its own level that increases when you battle at that specific Gym, feed berries to Pokemon at that Gym, or spin the item disk at that Gym. The higher the badge’s level, the more items you will receive from that Gym.
Now onto something completely new to Pokemon GO. We finally have the introduction of “Raid Battles”. You know, that thing in the first trailer that had a bunch of trainers in Time Square battling Mewtwo? That is a Raid Battle.
While we don’t have Mewtwo just yet, Raid Battles are still exactly what the game needed to keep players engrossed. Raids occur at Gym locations all around the world. When a Raid begins at a Gym, all Pokemon at that Gym are evicted and a large egg will appear above that Gym. These eggs come in three different colors: Pinke for Normal Pokemon, Yellow for Rare Pokemon, and Silver for Legendary Pokemon. A countdown begins at that Gym as the egg begins to hatch, giving players from every team enough time to get to the Gym. Once the countdown reaches zero, the Pokemon will hatch, and players can battle it together as one team.
The Pokemon that hatches, however, is nothing like anyone has ever fought before and will require teamwork to take down. This is because a Raid Battle Pokemon’s CP usually lands in the 10,000’s and 20,000’s, making it impossible for a single player to defeat. Raid Battles work exactly the same as a Gym Battle, with players teaming up to take down the much much larger Raid Battle Pokemon.
Once the Pokemon is defeated, a number of rewards will be made available to the players that fought. All players that participated will receive a set number of Premier Balls based on their performance. Players can also get a Golden Razz Berry, the brand new Rare Candy (which acts as a candy of any Pokemon), or a TM (Technical Machine) which can teach any of your Pokemon a new move. There are also bonuses based on certain aspects of the Gym that the Raid Battle occurred at as well as player and team performance:
Who owns the gym – You get more if you’re on the same team as the team that runs it
Damage inflicted by team – The team with the most damage inflicted on the boss gets a boost of Premier Balls
Damage inflicted by teams – The more damage your team gives, the higher amount of balls of Premier Balls
Damage inflicted by you – The more damage you give, the higher amount of balls of Premier Balls
These Premier Balls are very important, because once the Raid Battle is finished, the Pokemon that served as the Raid Boss will be available to catch. These Pokemon have significantly higher stats and CP than regular Pokemon, but they can only be caught with Premier Balls. Berries can still be used to make the capture easier, but once you run out of Premier Balls, the Pokemon will flee.
As of right now, Raid Battles are only available to players that are Level 35 or higher, with more players at lower levels being added later down the road. So build up your team, take over Gyms, and get ready for the Raids!
One last thing that came up in the news is a brand new Mystery Gift event involving Mega Stones in Sun and Moon. By entering the code MATSUBUSA, you will recieve Mega Stones for Sceptile, Blaziken, Swampert, Camerupt, and Banette. More of the events will continue, so stay tuned for when the codes drop.
And that’s it for Pokemon News. Again, I didn’t think I’d be doing back-to-back issues given how the previous weeks have been with the news, but I love it when this happens. Either way, I’ll see you guys in the next issue. |
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NewbieActivity: 3Merit: 0 To Hal Finney from a fellow Open Source Software Developer with ALS April 15, 2013, 03:55:00 PM #115
I hope, but do not expect, that you will eventually read this thread, if for no other than the inhuman effort required to create it.
I am familiar with your story, as I read it in the LessWrong forum a year ago or so. I was not familiar with your work on bitcoins, although in retrospect I could have taken a clue from your work in cryptography.
Hats off to you, sir, for you have helped through your continuing work with Open Source to make a better world.
As yourself, I am a member of the Stupid Club, of people diagnosed with ALS. As you do, I am relegated to communicating with the world with my eyes, in the form of a Tobii eye gaze tracker and Dasher. Also like yourself, I have and continue to contribute to Open Source Software, although it is in the form of Drupal, a content management system used to publish websites.
The proud father of two young children, I was surprised to learn just two years ago that my life expectancy had taken a plunge. Unlike many well-intentioned hopes in the thread you started, I understand the harsh prospects that you and I face, which is why I won't point to Stephen Hawking as inspiration; unless you're Stephen Hawking, there's little chance you'll survive the decade, and kudos to you if you do. I also won't urge you to rush out and try an experimental treatment; for you and I are not welcome to try them, as they don't want patients more than two years beyond diagnosis, for they don't want us throwing off their numbers with our likely deaths.
I wonder, though, about your thoughts about cryonics. I posted about my intention to seek cryonic preservation on a private ALS support group on Facebook, and was shocked by the angry responses I received, everything from I should trust in the eternal life promised by my Lord and savior, to I am stealing resources from the future and present generations by seeking immortality.
I have received a more welcome response from the cryonics and Open Source communities, but I did not expect the vitriol that I received from my fellow patients with a terminal illness. In retrospect, I guess that the one is self-selected, where the other is thrust onto us against our wills. It is perhaps, of course, wishful thinking, but I would have hoped for if not something along the lines of me too, where do I sign up, at least something a bit more supportive.
In any case, I do not expect to learn of your plans or even thoughts about cryonics, because I don't suspect you'll chance across this thread. But if you do, and you are planning for it, then I hope we'll meet on the other side. And if you, like me, have instead found yourself blindsided by the life insurance companies' unwillingness to chance on a terminally ill patient, then here is the link to the Society for Venturism
Stay strong,
Aaron Winborn
http://www.aaronwinborn.com/
Hal, I just read your heartwarming post over at https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=155054.msg1643833#msg1643833 , and due to restrictions on this forum, find myself unable to post a response on that thread. Thus, I am posting here on the newbie forum.I hope, but do not expect, that you will eventually read this thread, if for no other than the inhuman effort required to create it.I am familiar with your story, as I read it in the LessWrong forum a year ago or so. I was not familiar with your work on bitcoins, although in retrospect I could have taken a clue from your work in cryptography.Hats off to you, sir, for you have helped through your continuing work with Open Source to make a better world.As yourself, I am a member of the Stupid Club, of people diagnosed with ALS. As you do, I am relegated to communicating with the world with my eyes, in the form of a Tobii eye gaze tracker and Dasher. Also like yourself, I have and continue to contribute to Open Source Software, although it is in the form of Drupal, a content management system used to publish websites.The proud father of two young children, I was surprised to learn just two years ago that my life expectancy had taken a plunge. Unlike many well-intentioned hopes in the thread you started, I understand the harsh prospects that you and I face, which is why I won't point to Stephen Hawking as inspiration; unless you're Stephen Hawking, there's little chance you'll survive the decade, and kudos to you if you do. I also won't urge you to rush out and try an experimental treatment; for you and I are not welcome to try them, as they don't want patients more than two years beyond diagnosis, for they don't want us throwing off their numbers with our likely deaths.I wonder, though, about your thoughts about cryonics. I posted about my intention to seek cryonic preservation on a private ALS support group on Facebook, and was shocked by the angry responses I received, everything from I should trust in the eternal life promised by my Lord and savior, to I am stealing resources from the future and present generations by seeking immortality.I have received a more welcome response from the cryonics and Open Source communities, but I did not expect the vitriol that I received from my fellow patients with a terminal illness. In retrospect, I guess that the one is self-selected, where the other is thrust onto us against our wills. It is perhaps, of course, wishful thinking, but I would have hoped for if not something along the lines of me too, where do I sign up, at least something a bit more supportive.In any case, I do not expect to learn of your plans or even thoughts about cryonics, because I don't suspect you'll chance across this thread. But if you do, and you are planning for it, then I hope we'll meet on the other side. And if you, like me, have instead found yourself blindsided by the life insurance companies' unwillingness to chance on a terminally ill patient, then here is the link to the Society for Venturism http://www.venturist.info/ , the organization responsible for the cryonic preservation of Kim Suozzi, and the charity which has taken up my similar cause.Stay strong,Aaron Winborn |
Date: June 8th
Time: 11:00 AM EST
Description: R Markdown provides an incredibly powerful tool for authoring reports from R. R Markdown is "hands down the easiest and most elegant method to creating rich documents that contain data analysis, figures, mathematical formulas, and text." - Claus Wilke Professor of Integrative Biology at The University of Texas at Austin. Now we would like to introduce you to flexdashboard! Flexdashboard leverages R Markdown to publish data visualizations as a dashboard. Flexdashboard is an easy way to quickly create dashboards, ideal for publishing visualizations with flexible and easy to specify layouts. When you use flexdashboard, charts are intelligently re-sized to fill the browser and adapted for display on mobile devices. In this webinar you'll learn how to create your own flexdashboards with a variety of layouts, including tabset panels, navbars, and multiple pages. You'll also learn about a wide variety of components which can be included in layouts: Interactive JavaScript data visualizations based on htmlwidgets.
R graphical output including base, lattice, and grid graphics.
Tabular data (with optional sorting, filtering, and paging).
Value boxes for highlighting important summary data.
Gauges for displaying values on a meter within a specified range.
Text annotations of various kinds.
Shiny components that allow viewers to change underlying parameters of the visualizations.
Only 1,000 live attendees are allowed in the Webinar on a first come first serve basis. It is typical for many people who register to not attend (which is why registration does not guarantee access.) If for any reason you cannot make the webinar or cannot get in we will provide links to the recording as well as all materials within 48 hours.
Our webinar host, GoToWebinar, Now Supports Linux but ONLY for VIDEO. You must dial in by Telephone to the conference for access to the audio. If for any reason you cannot make the webinar or cannot get in we will provide links to the recording as well as all materials within 48 hours. |
Update: The speaker essentially will not hold a charge anymore and function even when plugged in. The speaker has lasted about 10 months prior to starting to see these symptoms (reached out for support on the 11th month). It will no longer charge after being plugged in for up to 4 days (last time I tried). Will not stay connected to either Bluetooth or analog connections (I suspect due to the power issue). I tried to fix this over the course of a month, draining it entirely, which was easy since it wouldn't hold a charge. Utilized multiple cables and different power sources and other attempts in the hope of isolating any external hardware issues. Unfortunately, I could not get it to power up (and stay on for more than a minute) straight from power cord or charge the internal battery. Good/decent sounding product, but if it cannot last a year, I could no longer recommend it.
I attempted to contact TaoTronics by sending an email to their support team (really no other option offered) from their website and have not received a response from them for a week now. I have had less established names contact me within 8 hours (1 business day) for any issues, but I would suspect at week or 5 business days to even acknowledge it was received would hav been appropriate. This surprises me actually. Anyway, the combination of a faulty unit and slow response on a 1 year warranted product makes me wary to recommend or do business with them if their product fails and support does not reach you in a timely manner.
*** Original Post (Below) ***
After months of use, this is good powered bluetooth speaker. The build and looks is very good. It's built with good quality and looks quite good. The build seems like it'll last for quite some time. It connects well to my BT devices and straight forward connection. Of course the most important feature is the sound. For the price, this is very good, but not THAT MUCH Better than any other than in this price range. (Note: I purchased this at a higher price than what is currently listed on Amazon, so this last comment was based on it's "current" cost, ~$35. Any higher, I would advise to consider higher end alternatives.) Many state it has a great range, but in context for what it is, it's good, but not great on the low end. This is the biggest issue with portable wireless speakers. On an economical standpoint, you can't really lose with this sound quality, but don't expect miracles. Unless you're in the $100+ range, you really won't get the range. Although portable, this unit is not really made to be used outdoors where it would be exposed to the elements. I would argue the design itself doesn't seem like it's intended for outdoor use (more indoor), but you definitely can use it outdoors, just keep it out of the sun (due to it's metallic/aluminum casing, which can heat up the device), and away from moisture. Overall, good product for the price. I would recommend for anyone who needs a wireless speaker for your office, small room, or connecting to an Amazon Echo Dot device. |
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