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A magazine supplement with an image of Adolf Hitler and the title 'The Unreadable Book' is pictured in Berlin. No law bans “Mein Kampf” in Germany, but the government of Bavaria, holds the copyright and guards it ferociously. (Thomas Peter/REUTERS) The city that was the center of Adolf Hitler’s empire is littered with reminders of the Nazi past, from the bullet holes that pit the fronts of many buildings to the hulking Luftwaffe headquarters that now house the Finance Ministry. What it doesn’t have, nor has it since 1945, are copies of Hitler’s autobiography and political manifesto, “Mein Kampf,” in its bookstores. The latest attempt to publish excerpts fizzled this week after the Bavarian government challenged it in court, although an expurgated copy appeared at newspaper kiosks around the country. But in Germany — where keeping a tight lid on Hitler’s writings has become a rich tradition in itself — attitudes toward his book are slowly changing, and fewer people are objecting to its becoming more widely available. No law bans “Mein Kampf” in Germany, but the government of Bavaria, where Hitler officially resided at the time of his 1945 suicide, holds the copyright and guards it ferociously. German-language copies that were printed before 1945 are legal, although they command a premium price, and the book is available in translation elsewhere in the world. But the question of whether to publish it in the country where Hitler plotted his empire has lost some of its edge in the Google era, when a complete German-language copy of the book pops up as the second result on the local version of the search engine. “To say this is a very dangerous book, we must ban it, this is ridiculous,” said Wolfgang Wippermann, a professor of modern history at the Free University of Berlin. “Maybe it was necessary once, but now it’s over, it makes no sense. You can find it so easily.” The publisher of the excerpts, London-based Albertus, has said it will appeal the Bavarian government’s injunction. In 2009, the publisher beat charges of copyright violation and the illegal use of Nazi symbols after the Bavarian government seized reprinted copies of the Nazi Party’s in-house newspaper. The attempt to publish portions of “Mein Kampf” on Thursday was scuttled at the last moment, although the publisher, ready to capitalize on the publicity, had printed two versions of the pamphlet. The version propped on top of a heap of celebrity magazines at a newsstand in Berlin’s central Friedrichstrasse station was a slender, blue, 16-page leaflet that has historical commentary in one column and an image of blurred text stamped with “Unreadable” in the other, accompanied by two reproductions of Nazi-era newspapers. “Mein Kampf” “is an awful book, and the whole thinking is absolutely not ours, but we have another view on it regarding the idea of packing it away. This idea is just naive,” said Alexander Luckow, a spokesman for the publisher. “In a free country, you need to discuss these very bad parts of German history.” Still, he said, there are limits, and using Hitler’s words as inspiration, not as historical artifact, is where it crosses the line. “The danger is allowing right-wing people to sell it in bookshops with their modern commentary,” he said. “This is forbidden and it’s good . . . not only in Germany, this should be equal in other countries in Europe. Anti-Semitism is not confined to Germany. You look and it’s all around Europe, dating back to the Middle Ages.” The debate will soon be over, whether or not the latest excerpts make it to newsstands. German law extends copyright 70 years after the author’s death; after 2015, “Mein Kampf” will be fair game. Some in Bavaria’s government worry that neo-Nazis will publish their own version of the book shortly thereafter, and to counter that, they are encouraging a scholarly edition. A group of historians is preparing it. Germany’s Jewish organizations have approached the publication with mixed emotions, sensitive that their country still has problems with neo-Nazis and anti-Semitism. The German government released a study this week that found that one in five Germans has anti-Semitic attitudes. And a neo-Nazi ring that has been linked to at least nine killings before it was shut down in November shocked Germans who thought they had done a thorough job working through their past. “I do very well without any publishing of ‘Mein Kampf,’ ” said Dieter Graumann, the head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany. “In a few years, it will be free, and I have every trust in the democratic maturity of the German people. . . . But for the moment, I am glad it is not.”

For today’s post, I’d like to take a look at California’s voter initiative to legalize pot. If the measure passes, and the sky doesn’t fall, many other states will probably be looking at similar law changes in the near future. Our drug policy of the last century has simply not worked, and it’s heartening to see a state attempting to legalize marijuana. The statistics on marijuana arrests are really shocking. According to the Drug Policy Alliance, which is in favor of legalization, blacks are arrested for marijuana possession between four and twelve times more than whites in California, even though studies have consistently shown that whites smoke more pot than blacks. In the last ten years, around 500,000 people have been arrested for possession. That’s absurd! Think about how expensive that is for the criminal justice system. California spends $216,000 for each juvenile inmate in its prison system, yet it spends only $8,000 per student in the Oakland school system. It seems to me that if you really want to limit drug use, it’d make more sense to spend more money keeping kids in school, helping them achieve. The economic benefits of legalizing marijuana are mind blowing. If marijuana was legalized and taxed at the same rate of tobacco, the money we would save on law enforcement and gain in tax revenue equals about $17 billion. As Nicholas Kristof notes, that is enough money to send every three and four year old in a poor neighborhood to pre-school. Or we could spend that money improving public school education. Or we could use the money to shore up border defense. Whatever we do, $17 billion is not exactly a trivial amount. For me, the biggest reason to legalize marijuana is to hurt the cartels. Immigration has emerged as a hot button issue recently, with Arizona passing a draconian immigration law and many similar propositions being considered by other states. People are worried about violence, and understandably so. No one wants to have foreign drug dealers operating in their back yard. But no matter how many laws we pass, or how much money we spend, marijuana from Mexico and other Latin American countries will always find a way across the border. Drug importers are smart, and the demand is so high that increased patrols by border agents and harsher prison sentences will not act as an effective deterrent. America will always have a demand for marijuana, and that means as long as the drug stays illegal, violent drug cartels will operate in our borders. But what if the drug that the cartels are pushing is suddenly legal? No one in their right mind would buy pot off the street if they could instead walk into a dispensary and buy high quality marijuana legally, and probably for less money than the cartels are charging. Very few people actually want to have to hide their drug use. If given a choice, marijuana smokers would absolutely buy legal drugs. This would severely weaken the cartels, and decrease deaths related to drug trafficking. I’m not advocating drug use here. I know people who have ruined their lives from excess drug use. But it’s not true that marijuana is the gateway drug that people have been demonizing for years. Just because someone smokes pot every once in a while doesn’t mean that person will turn around and become a heroin addict. Yes, marijuana intoxicates you, but so do legal drugs like alcohol. As long as sensible restrictions are built into the law, such as making it illegal to drive under the influence, then there is no reason that marijuana should not be legalized.

Anarchists in solidarity with the purged immigrants of Agios Panteleimonas ventured once again to open the public playground which is kept locked by fascists in favor of segregation, leading to battle with riot police and five arrests. On Tuesday 9/06 anarchists in solidarity to immigrants who are being daily terrorised by fascist thugs of the Golden Dawn neonazi party and their local allies in the area of Agios Panteleimonas, moved to unblock the entrance of the local children playground which the fascists want to keep locked in an effort to impose segregation between greeks and immigrants, and "to preserve the blood purity of the white race"...While unblocking the playground the anarchists were attacked by fascists who were soon routed before the arrival of riot police forces who engaged the anarchists in battle with the aim of protecting the fascists. During the clashes one policeman was injured and five protesters were arrested on criminal charges. After the end of the clashes, a local greek father, Mr Tasoulas, defying the reign of terror in the area, took his son to play in the coveted playground. Soon they were surrounded by fascists who blocked the exit of the playground and threatened to linch the father calling him a traitor. After he managed to handle the child to a sympathetic neighbor, the fascists beat the father in full presence of the chief of the local police station. The strong police forces present at the scene then arrested the father and took him to the local police station, where his solicitor, a leading figure of the legal world and human rights activist, was piled with eggs by fascists who threatened her life. The new tension in the area comes after the euroelection ascent of LAOS, the fascist Popular Orthodox Alarm Party, to the 4th position with 7% of the vote. This in combination with the governing party's landslide defeat, has led the government to endorse the core of the extreme-right wing policies of LAOS, and pledge a mass sweeping operation against illegal immigrants and their greek supporters within the summer. As the concentration camp planned to be built in the old NATO airbase of Aspropyrgos is now deemed impractical, the government has committed several old military camps of disgraceful humanitarian standards around the capital for the purpose of "cleaning the city of foreigners". The measures and discourse comes as little surprise as it comes from a political party famous for wanting to displace homosexuals in desert islands in the late 1970s. Furthermore the "Law and Order" operation of the coming summer is said to also include a mass attack against anarchist squats, and solidarity actions to immigrants by the movement as a whole. This the government hopes to achieve via a virtual military occupation of the center of Athens for the summer months modeled on Olympics 2004, as well as the introduction of a disputed legislation that would eventually render protest marches illegal. Due to the lack of a legislative majority by one MP, the government has resorted to yet another legal trick by increasing the total number of MPs by one, non-elected member of its own liking for the summer session of the Parliament. The dictatorial rule of the right-wing and the ruthless employment of its parastate agents is increasing the tension across the country. Last week one police station in Athens was attacked and a central tax office was bombed by a Marxist guerrilla group, while a series of luxury brothels frequented by the ruling class were destroyed. At the same time, the movement is on its guard in expectation of next Saturday's Gay Pride parade which last year was attacked by parastate fascist thugs, as well as in expectation of an evacuation of the old courts in down-town Athens which are occupied by immigrants and are a constant target by the bourgeois media who waste no time in supporting the fascists in a most unambiguous manner.

The 45-year-old “highway shooter” who engaged in a 12-minute shootout with California Highway Patrol officers earlier this year now says Fox News host Glenn Beck has been an inspiration for his activity. In a several thousand word expose for MediaMatters, Pacifica journalist John Hamilton interviewed the so-called highway shooter, Byron Williams, from prison. In the interview, Williams details what he saw as an elaborate global conspiracy and tells the journalist — whom he sees as his “media advocate” — to look to specific broadcasts of Beck’s show for information on the conspiracy he describes. (MediaMatters says Beck’s show provided “information on the conspiracy theory that drove him over the edge: an intricate plot involving Barack Obama, philanthropist George Soros, a Brazilian oil company, and the BP disaster.”) The release on Hamilton’s story explains that “Williams also points to other media figures — right-wing propagandist David Horowitz, and Internet conspiracist and repeated Fox News guest Alex Jones — as key sources of information to inspire his ‘revolution.'” Williams is quoted as saying that “Beck would never say anything about a conspiracy, would never advocate violence. He’ll never do anything … of this nature. But he’ll give you every ounce of evidence that you could possibly need.” “I collect information on corruption,” Williams says, “I’ve been at it for some time.” Beck, in particular, he says, is “like a schoolteacher on TV.” Williams reportedly told Hamilton, “You need to go back to June — June of this year, 2010 — and look at all his programs from June, and you’ll see he’s been breaking open some of the most hideous corruption.” Hamilton notes that extremism linked to anti-progressive propaganda is nothing new: Conspiracy theory-fueled extremism has long been a reaction to progressive government in the United States. Half a century ago, historian Richard Hofstadter wrote that right-wing thought had come to be dominated by the belief that Communist agents had infiltrated all levels of American government and society. The right, he explained, had identified a “sustained conspiracy, running over more than a generation, and reaching its climax in Roosevelt’s New Deal, to undermine free capitalism, to bring the economy under the direction of the federal government, and to pave the way for socialism or communism.” In a 2009 report, the Southern Poverty Law Center found that the anti-government militia movement — which had risen to prominence during the Clinton administration and faded away during the Bush years — has returned. According to the SPLC, the anti-government resurgence has been buttressed by paranoid rhetoric from public officials like Republican Congresswoman Michele Bachmann and media figures like Fox News’ Glenn Beck. Just last month, Gregory Giusti pleaded guilty to repeatedly threatening House Speaker Nancy Pelosi — including threatening to destroy her California home — because he was “upset with her passing the health care law.” His mother told a local news station that he “frequently gets in with a group of people that have really radical ideas,” adding, “I’d say Fox News or all of those that are really radical, and he — that’s where he comes from.” After the 2008 election, Fox News personalities filled the airwaves with increasingly violent rhetoric and apocalyptic language. On his Fox News show, Beck talked about “put[ting] poison” in Pelosi’s wine. Observers of this most recent act were mystified by one of Byron Williams’ reported targets: the Tides Foundation, a low-profile charitable organization known for funding environmentalists, community groups, and other organizations. Beck, it turned out, had attacked Tides 29 times on his Fox News show in the year-and-a-half leading up to the shooting. In their writeup, The Huffington Post provided a video that detailed Williams’ attack, as posted on YouTube. It follows.

New drunk-driving law cracks down on 3rd DUI LEGISLATURE Drivers who are repeatedly caught drunk behind the wheel could lose their license for up to a decade under legislation signed by the governor Monday. The measure by Assemblyman Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo, allows judges to revoke a person's driver's license for up to 10 years if they have three or more convictions for driving under the influence within the prior decade. Currently, courts may only take away a repeat offender's driver's license for three years. The law will take effect on Jan. 1, 2012. Hill estimated that the measure could help take more than 10,000 repeat DUI offenders off the road each year. Nearly 188,000 DUI convictions were handed down around the state in 2008, he noted, with 9,164 of those drivers on their third conviction and 3,200 with four or more DUI offenses, Hill said. "I urge judges across the state to use this new authority and take repeat DUI offenders off the road," Hill said in a statement. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, there are 1.5 million DUI arrests in California each year, and one-third of those arrested are repeat offenders. In total, more than 310,000 Californians have three or more DUI convictions, according to the agency. "This legislation is an important step toward making California's roads safer," Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said in a statement. "Those who have multiple DUI convictions should not be on the road threatening lives."

While it’s good to see that number of obese and overweight children has (slightly) fallen for those starting school, one in 10 children is still entering reception obese or overweight, rising to one in five at the start of secondary school. More startlingly, the figures from the Health & Social Care Information Centre show that 25% of children in poorer areas are obese, compared to about 11% in more affluent areas. Let’s absorb that disturbing fact – right now, Britain’s poor children are more than twice as likely to be obese or overweight. Responses to these statistics have included calls for a ban on junk food advertising before the 9pm watershed, but is this really the most productive way forward? What if it’s not so much about “junk food”, as we define it, but, rather, that all too often these days the junk is the food and the food is the junk – and that sometimes, for people on tight budgets, this is all that’s reasonably achievable? Once poverty enters the equation, it’s simply not about junk food as we understand it anymore. Say junk food and an image springs to mind of people allowing their children to scarf down crisps, sweets, and the now notorious fizzy drinks, or burgers, pizzas and fried chicken from overflowing buckets. The implication is that the problem lies with the treats and extras, consumed on top of real meals and that children are being overindulged, to the detriment of their health. However, this image of feckless, uncaring, underprivileged Britons encouraging their fat children to over-snack simply doesn’t ring true, especially considering that these are households where, by definition, money is tight. On the contrary, it seems obvious that the actual meals are contributing hugely to the problem – and that this is where austerity is having a terrifying and sustained impact. While healthy food is often prohibitively expensive, less healthy options are relatively as cheap as, well, chips. When parents have to find the cheapest food available for their family, it’s nearly always going to be less likely to be fresh; more likely to be highly calorific (therefore “filling”), as well as packed with additives whose addictive and metabolism-skewing properties should not be discounted. You also have to factor in how exhausting poverty is. Often the last thing that stressed, skint parents need at the end of the day is to start a meal from scratch. This is why, however well meant, the “why not buy some veg from the local market and make a lovely stew?” rationale so often takes on the shrill ring of Marie Antoinette’s fabled suggestion about the poor eating cake. That’s the cruel thing about cooking. It’s not all about “lazy proles” and their lost culinary skills. Something that’s a hobby, a stress release, in an affluent household, too easily becomes an extra source of tension in an impoverished one. Moreover, “real” cooking can be expensive – from the ingredients, and the herbs and spices, to the equipment, even the gas or electricity. Hence the microwave, the ripping open of the packet, the easier solution. Who’s to judge? Plenty of people do. Perhaps it could be acknowledged that the very concept of junk food has become absurdly dated and misleading. That shifts in fundamental food culture (the creep of junk into normal meals) appear to be a much more profound problem than merely overindulging in signposted treats. Kids eating rubbish has always been with us but it is only now that the staples, the dietary cornerstones, are also unhealthy, that their weight problems are escalating. Nor is the problem confined to junk food advertising – if only it were that simple. Like with most things that become uncontrollable in life, money lies at the core. Poverty isn’t only exhausting and limiting, it’s also highly fattening. Coe did the right thing. But why did it take so long? Facebook Twitter Pinterest Better late than never. Sebastian Coe has walked away from his Nike contract. Photograph: Lionel Cironneau/AP Even though Sebastian Coe has finally resigned from his £100,000-a-year role as Nike ambassador, he still insists that there was no conflict of interest with his position as president of the IAAF. Is he on another planet or am I? Coe’s resignation doesn’t prove that there was any wrongdoing, even with the email that surfaced relating to Eugene (birthplace of Nike) winning the right to stage the 2012 World Athletics Championships without others being allowed to bid. As things stand, Coe’s conduct appears to have been above board. Nevertheless he has to stop this ludicrous sulking as if a big fuss is being made about nothing. This is a prime example of a big fuss being made about… something. Obviously, it is not feasible for the president of IAAF simultaneously to be signed up as an ambassador to a major international sportswear company. Likewise, Coe’s main argument concerning the longevity of his association with Nike (38 years) is resentful, entitled nonsense. It’s time for Coe to be philosophical. This was a blatant conflict of interest and the only mystery is how it wasn’t dealt with when he became president earlier this year. Let Katie Hopkins damn herself Facebook Twitter Pinterest Katie Hopkins: the face of unreason. Photograph: Dan Kennedy/Discovery Communications/Dan Ken It seems as though every week now there is a terrible darkening of the skies as a giant candlesnuffer slams down over the flickering wick of free speech. This time, it happened at Brunel University, where Katie Hopkins was spouting her usual informed, enlightened views on welfare. (Oh sorry, I went a bit funny there.) Hopkins wasn’t banned from speaking. Instead, just as she began to talk, a large bunch of students stood up, turned their backs on her and walked out of the hall. It was an action that was widely billed as a wonderful compromise protest, but it wasn’t really. Of course it was better than banning – but only because anything is better than banning. It wasn’t spontaneous, and therefore looked staged and just a little pompous. Nor, crucially, did it respect one of the foremost principles of free speech. Free speech is not just about someone being allowed to talk, it is also about them being properly heard and debated, and this holds true, even when that someone is as idiotic and offensive as Hopkins. Especially then. For free speech to work, you have to let people speak first, and then challenge them via debate, which means no bans or, indeed, back-turnings and walk-outs. Otherwise, all that happens is that people such as Hopkins remain wedded to the delusion that they’re fearless speakers of truth. Ideally, they should have their arguments brusquely shredded in a public forum. The Brunel University walk-out was not a compromise protest, it was just a way of banning without actually banning. Everyone has to stop panicking and just allow people to be annoying bigots. Last time that I checked, the good people of Britain could cope.

The Reds announced that they signed free agent outfielder Ryan Ludwick to a two-year deal with a mutual option for 2015 (Twitter link). The BHSC client obtains a $15MM guarantee following his best offensive season since he was a member of the Cardinals. The Reds made the free agent outfielder a two-year two-year offer earlier in the week, but John Fay of the Cincinnati Enquirer reported that at least one other club was being more aggressive on Ludwick. The 34-year-old posted a .275/.346/.531 batting line with 26 home runs in 472 plate appearances for the Reds this past season, a marked improvement from 2010-11 when he didn't hit more than 17 home runs or post an OPS above .750. Ludwick ranked 26th on MLBTR's list of top 50 free agents with MLBTR's Tim Dierkes correctly predicting that he would re-sign with the Reds. Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com first reported the agreement and the dollar amount. Fay first reported the option year and that the Reds were making progress toward a deal. Photo courtesy of US Presswire.

What if I want to build everything in ClojureScript JiyinYiyong Blocked Unblock Follow Following May 31, 2017 Many things have changed since I wrote this post, check out updates on shadow-cljs. That’s might be promising. JavaScript is becoming more and more mature. For front-end, React/Anguar/Vue are capable of building middle-size or even large apps, with help of all kinds of components and libraries. Deploying webapps is never easier, Webpack has almost all the features we need. For backend, Node.js ecosystem has been evolving since 2009, we have Express and Koa, with all kinds of middlewares. No mention how many developers are participating in “rewriting everything in JavaScript”. JavaScript is a messy world. Mixed language paradigms, inconsistent languages features, lots of innovations toward different and sometimes opposite directions. It’s hard to get well with such an inconsistent programming language. However, it turned out people like to use it thanks to its successful ecosystem. ClojureScript is in a different situation. We have faith in functional programming but there’s not a large community to support it. Here’s the problem in me. I want to build websites with only ClojureScript. How can I achieve that? For front-end, ClojureScript libraries and components are relatively rare(or at least hard to find many of them on Google). Yes we can use use JavaScript libraries and components. However it’s not always true. Take an example from React and Vue, which are both in JavaScript, but it’s impractical to share components from each other. I saw people using React components in Reagent or Rum many times. I was convinced it’s possible. But I don’t think it’s easy since we may need so many components. For backend it’s worse. People are using Clojure to build web servers. Being a JavaScript developer there are lots of barriers if I want to pick up the whole Java ecosystem. Developing and debugging Clojure is a lot different from ClojureScript. And for web servers, the JavaScript community is throwing away expressing and going toward Koa with async/await support, while in ClojureScript it’s core.async , a lot different. We can still Google and find blogs and projects on using React components in ClojureScript, but it’s fewer results for Node.js, besides, how about the framework and libraries? And I’m not sure about the database part either. It’s not easy to believe in ClojureScript. To see JavaScript developers using create-react-app, using Koa, although slowly but most aspects of developing are covered by people who went ahead. In using ClojureScript, I have to take every step very carefully, sometimes in debugging without SourceMaps on variables, sometimes worried about where to find guides and docs, sometimes anxious about people misunderstanding my work. I will still pick ClojureScript as the primary language for my personal projects. Also I’m fully aware that it adds limits to me so someday I still need to pick up some other languages to finish my work. It will be my big problem in the near future. I already see it and it made me feel sad that I can only write fast in ClojureScript. ClojureScript has some unique features that help me finished Stack Editor and Cumulo, but also trapped me here. I do hope that I learnt ClojureScript I can program all things I need, it’s always not true for any language. Now I have to consider what to do next. In the past years I built many toy apps, none of them reached the complexity of real-world products. I have to learn such ability. Bet on ClojureScript or another?

Ben White writing in the Independent: This is Israel in 2012 according to a top UN body. Using unprecedented strong language, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) criticised Israeli policies in terms of “apartheid”, as part of their published observations following a regular review. Affirming the kind of analysis that Israel’s advocates try to dismiss as lies or rhetorical excess, the Committee slammed Israel for violating the right to equality in numerous policy areas. CERD described “segregation between Jewish and non-Jewish communities”, a lack of “equal access to land and property”, and “the ongoing policy of home demolitions and forced displacement of the indigenous Bedouin communities” in the Negev. The lack of a “prohibition of racial discrimination” in Israel’s Basic Law was highlighted, and more recent developments, such as the restrictions on family unification affecting Palestinian citizens were also part of CERD’s wide-ranging criticisms. The Committee’s observations also covered Israel’s policies in the Occupied Territories, showing how the same discriminatory patterns are found on both sides of the Green Line. Israeli settlements in the West Bank form part of a regime of “de facto segregation” severe enough to cause the Committee to remind Israel of the “prohibition” of policies of “apartheid”. According to Dr David Keane, senior lecturer in law at Middlesex University and author of ‘Caste-based Discrimination in International Human Rights Law’, this is “the most cutting CERD recognition and condemnation of a legal system of segregation since apartheid South Africa”.

RCMP Commissioner Bob Paulson says the OPP's much-anticipated report into the RCMP's response to the Parliament Hill shootings will be released this week or next. Paulson told the Senate's national security committee Monday his force are on the verge of releasing the report. The report was commissioned by House Speaker Andrew Scheer after he asked for an independent police investigation following the Parliament Hill shootings. The OPP led the investigation and submitted the report to the House of Commons in early April. When it was delivered, there were initial concerns whether the report would be made public or not. Paulson told senators the report examines the RCMP's response to the Oct. 22, 2014 shooting, both outside Parliament Hill and inside Centre Block. That's where shooter Michael Zehaf-Bibeau was finally shot and killed. Paulson also told senators the Mounties will release the remaining 18 seconds of the Zehaf-Bibeau cellphone video in the coming weeks. Zehaf-Bibeau recorded the video immediately before the fatal shooting. The RCMP already released 55 seconds of the video at a Commons public safety committee meeting in March. "This is in retaliation for Afghanistan and because [Prime Minister Stephen Harper] wants to send his troops to Iraq," Zehaf-Bibeau, says in the video. "Canada's officially become one of our enemies by fighting and bombing us and creating a lot of terror in our countries and killing us and killing our innocents. So, just aiming to hit some soldiers just to show that you're not even safe in your own land, and you gotta be careful.​" In March, Paulson told reporters the remaining 18 seconds was edited for "sound operational" reasons. Thirteen seconds were cut from the beginning of the video and five seconds were edited from the end.

The way forward for autoworkers: An online interview with Jerry White 15 October 2015 This Sunday, October 18, at 3:00 PM Eastern Daylight Time (conversions here), the World Socialist Web Site will host an online interview with WSWS Autoworker Newsletter editor Jerry White to review the political lessons of the contract fight. White will be joined by WSWS reporter Eric London, who will conduct the interview and field questions from autoworkers across the country. The interview will be broadcast at wsws.org/autoworkers/interview. The battle by autoworkers in the United States has reached a critical juncture. After Fiat Chrysler workers overwhelmingly defeated the contract pushed by the United Auto Workers earlier this month, the UAW has brought back another deal crafted to meet the strategic aims of the auto corporations and Wall Street. No matter what the spin the UAW’s PR firm puts on it, the new deal, like the first, would accelerate the descent of autoworkers—once among the highest-paid industrial workers in the world—into the ranks of the working poor. The challenges autoworkers face are immense, but the forces they can mobilize among workers and youth in the US and around the world are more powerful. To carry out a successful struggle, however, autoworkers who are leading this fight have to have a clear understanding of the economic and political forces that they confront. To submit a question in advance of the interview, please register below. We urge our readers to make a donation to help the WSWS broaden the campaign amongst US autoworkers.

Don’t raise your voice here. Angela Kabari Blocked Unblock Follow Following Jul 20, 2017 My name is Angela. I am the woman in the centre of the current Ushahidi sexual harassment scandal. The past six months have been some of the most bizarre in my life and, on the balance, I think there is benefit in sharing my experience with the world so that lessons may be learned from it. It is my hope that, my story shall prompt a change in company policies, both in the Kenyan tech space and in other fields. I joined Ushahidi in September 2015 as a Capacity Development Officer for Making All Voices Count. My time there was mostly enjoyable: the work was challenging, the team was great, and the environment was liberal and progressive. All in all, a good place to be. Of course, everything was not perfect, but what organisation does not have issues and day-to-day frictions? This changed on the morning of January 19th 2017, when Daudi Were, the Executive Director at Ushahidi asked me to have sex with a colleague, presumably for his own titillation. The events of that night left me troubled and confused. I knew that what had happened to me was not right, but I thought it was an isolated incident and decided to forget it and attempted to move on. (For details of this, see here my statement on the events of the night as well as a transcript of the audio. Some of the names in the transcript have been altered to protect the identities of my former colleagues. Aside from this, no other alterations have been made to it). I managed to do this for precisely one week after which I began to lose focus on my work. Over the next two weeks, I started to experience migraines whenever I went to the office. I did not want to leave my bed, yet I was sleeping poorly. I had experienced some periodic stomach upsets prior to and during the team retreat. However, after the retreat, these became worse and more frequent. At first, I thought that this was due to the upheaval that the Making All Voices Count programme was experiencing at the time due to international politics (it was negatively impacted by Brexit and changes in US presidency). I also thought that I might be physically ill so I sought professional advice from my doctor. I was diagnosed with a bacterial infection of the gut, but my doctor could not account for all my other symptoms. Upon his advice, I went to see a therapist who suggested some exercises to help me figure out what was wrong. I also took 3 weeks off from work from late February to mid-March as I thought I might be suffering from ordinary stress and burnout. It was during this time off that I did the exercises prescribed by the therapist and I realised that my problem was psychosomatic. The distress from the incident in January had caught up with me, almost a month later. I had tried to pass off Daudi’s remarks as drunkenness or joking but my body wasn’t buying it. It was at this point that I decided to quietly resign; I still wasn’t convinced that it was something I could or should raise with my employers. Once I had made this decision in early March, I separately confided in two close friends that I was looking for a new job because I was uncomfortable with continuing to work at Ushahidi. When they asked why I was leaving, I shared with them some details of what had happened with Daudi. In the course of our conversations, I was stunned to learn that Daudi’s comments were not the isolated incident I had assumed but rather that he had a years’ long, widely-known reputation for sexually inappropriate conduct, socially and at work. After my leave was over, I began predominantly working from home, which thankfully was possible as Ushahidi allows remote working. I was going to the office only thrice a month on average and I timed my visits to the office to ensure that I would not have to run into Daudi. It was in early April, after a month of soul searching and conversations with three other women who had been on the receiving end of unwelcome attention from Daudi, that I came to the conclusion that something needed to be done. Unfortunately, I seemed to be the only person with both tangible evidence of his misconduct, as well as an employer-employee relationship. It is then that I sought legal advice and learned that, based on the provisions of Ushahidi’s HR Manual, as well as Kenyan and Florida Law, Daudi’s comments qualified as sexual harassment by creating a hostile environment. I was advised that I could file a court case but that it would be prudent to first give the company an opportunity to address the issue internally as the court should be a last resort. With this in mind, I began to reach out to some of the women I had spoken to earlier. At this stage, I had been able to identify over five women who had also had inappropriate encounters with Daudi. Only one woman was willing to come forward if the Board could guarantee that she would remain anonymous. Some of the other women had no evidence of their allegations and thus did not expect to be believed. Others did not want to be associated with something so potentially scandalous or to rehash past traumatic events. It therefore took about three more weeks to get my ducks in a row and submit the complaint to the board; I did that on 4th May 2017. See this timeline for what transpired since. Since then, I have heard terrible stories from a total of eleven women who have told me about having similar unpleasant encounters with Daudi, in addition to another ten or so stories that I’ve been unable to verify. The behaviour told of in these stories varies from inappropriate and/or suggestive text messages to sending of pictures of male genitalia and pornography. In one incident Daudi allegedly exposed his genitals to a woman in the middle of a conversation about her work. Viewed against this grim picture, I feel as if I got off lightly. And, in the larger spectrum of harassment that encompasses physical assault and even sexual assault, it is easy to dismiss what happened to me as trivial. Except that it is not. I’ve actually had people tell me “It was only words so it’s not a big deal — at least he didn’t rape you.” However, in my view, verbal harassment is not inconsequential; in addition to being traumatic, it is often the gateway to more grievous offences and thus should not be treated lightly or ignored. The reason I did not come forward with my story earlier is because, under Kenyan law, it is not permitted to comment on matters currently before a court. In this case, I was advised that as a show of good faith I should uphold this convention and extend its application to the internal Ushahidi process, even though the convention does not apply because the internal process was not judicial. But now that the Ushahidi Board has suspended Daudi after finding him guilty of gross misconduct, and will issue him with a notice to show cause why his employment should not be terminated, I am of the view that I am finally free to speak and comment on this entire debacle. I have two main bones of contention. The first is Daudi’s behaviour. Based on the additional allegations made via tweets and offline discussions that have occurred since the news of my complaint came to light on 9th July, it would not be a stretch to call Daudi’s alleged behaviour predatory. Such predation is enabled by a culture of silence and secrecy that encourages victims of harassment to “not make a fuss” or “persevere” or “just ignore him until he gets tired or bored and goes away.” This culture leads many, many victims to not call out predatory behaviour and report it as the violence it actually is. This culture feeds into the victims’ fears that there is no point in speaking out against the harassment they face and leads them to feel like they have no option but to suffer in silence. This must stop! We cannot expect victims of harassment to speak up if they are (rightly) afraid that public opprobrium will follow. My second bone of contention is the Board’s response. I have been deeply let down by the actions and inaction of David Kobia, Erik Hersman, Juliana Rotich and Jenny Stefanotti. Ever since I lodged my complaint on 4th May, I have been subjected to all the negative repercussions that make victims of harassment afraid to speak out: Lack of support: Over the 74 days of this ordeal, not a single board member has reached out to inquire about my well being in any way, shape or form. Not a phone call, not an email, not through a third party. I shall repeat this again: nobody from Ushahidi leadership or the board has at any point bothered to ask if I’m okay or sought to alleviate the adverse impact this has had on my work and health. The only person in management who displayed any concern is my supervisor who, even though he is my direct line manager, only found out about this when I informed him of my intention to leave Ushahidi on 19th June. The Board have claimed on several occasions that they refrained from enquiring about my well-being because they feared incurring legal liability. To the best of my knowledge, no laws prohibit a person from asking “how are you?” Anyone possessing some basic human decency should know — and do — better. Victim shaming: All through this process, I have been subtly censured by the Board for seeking and retaining legal counsel. The rationale is that I “made this legal and complicated” by involving a lawyer which forced everyone else to lawyer up and thus led to the delays in handling the matter. This has been said to me personally by Erik Hersman and is a sentiment that has been repeated several times by other Board members, and their counsel in both private and public conversations. Slander: I have been reliably informed of more than one instance where Daudi has made comments to the effect that I am the one who pursued him for the purposes of establishing a sexual relationship and that I only filed a complaint when he rejected me. These comments were made to both colleagues and at project meetings with Ushahidi partners. I have tried to bring this up at least twice: once in the 24th May letter to the Board and subsequently at the internal hearing on 5th July. In the first instance, I received no response while in the second I was not even allowed to complete my question and was told that “my question is not relevant” as these events occurred after my complaint was made and thus were not covered by the inquiry. Delays: It took 74 days to get a decision from the Board. Nothing except enthusiastic letter writing was done for the first 60 days. And even the letters from the Board’s counsel seemed to be sent by literal snail mail — there was always a delay of 1 to 4 working days, and unlike the other lawyers they did not send advance copies of their letters via e-mail. The Board only seemed to act once the matter became public — first with Making All Voices Count followed then in various Kenyan WhatsApp groups, blogs and media. More happened in days 60–74 (15 days) than in the initial 60 days combined. An opaque process: Throughout the 74 days, and until now, I have had no clarity on how the board would handle this issue, save for the letter issued by the Board’s advocates after the meeting of 20 June 2017 where the terms of engagement of the hearing were set out. At no point did the Board provide me with the timelines within which they intended to conclude this matter. They could have chosen to do this any way they wanted as the Ushahidi whistleblower policy is vague and only states “The Ushahidi’s Compliance Officer will notify the person who submitted a complaint and acknowledge receipt of the reported violation or suspected violation. All reports will be promptly investigated and appropriate corrective action will be taken if warranted by the investigation.” And even when a process was outlined, it was not as advertised. For instance, the inquiry that the board held was framed as a “conversation to try and establish what happened and seek clarification” but in my view, the “conversation” quickly degenerated to my being subjected to over 2.5 hours of brutal questioning designed not to get at the truth but to create an alternative narrative where the perpetrator became the victim. Even the 27-page Inquiry Report on this process ends with a Notice To Show Cause that once again has no timelines or clarity on when the process will end. Character attacks: During the inquiry, I had several harmless and not so harmless personality flaws used against me. Because I have a potty mouth and used the word “fuck” during the incident, it was suggested that I am the one who turned the conversation to sex and thus invited Daudi’s sexual overtures. This was despite the fact that I did not use the word in a sexual context (see this video for various uses of the word “fuck”). It was also implied that I actively welcomed Daudi’s sexual proposition because I did not vociferously voice my protest at his inappropriate remarks but instead tried to change the subject. The refusal to listen to, let alone address my concerns: Throughout this process, I have been provided with no opportunity to openly air my concerns to the board or receive a response to them. The issues I raised in my letters, such as Erik asking Ushahidi staff to report any sexual harassment to management, including Daudi, were not addressed. Even at the hearing, I was not permitted to ask any questions — I was not even allowed to explain why I resigned! The blame for what is arguably the mismanagement of this entire issue lies squarely with the Board. David Kobia, Erik Hersman, Juliana Rotich and Jenny Stefanotti need to jointly and severally take responsibility for this. Their failure to properly manage my complaint is the sole reason I resigned from a job I was very fond of and was very good at. Their failure to set out crystal clear parameters for the hearing allowed Daudi’s counsel to turn it from an inquiry to a ‘courtroom’ with him as the prosecutor and the judge. Their failure to speak up or intervene as I was harangued for over 2.5 hours — even when my counsel objected — indicates that they found this acceptable. They also lacked the independence to properly investigate and take action in this matter. This is evidenced by the following: Previous knowledge of similar allegations: Daudi has a long history of allegations of sexually harassing women from his days in the Kenya Blogger Webring (KBW), which was active in the mid to late 2000s. What is even more horrifying is that at least three of the Board members have known about Daudi’s alleged penchant for harassing women for a significant period of time. Juliana was an administrator at Kenya Unlimited as this was going on, while David Kobia was a co-founder and forum administrator at Mashada. Erik was also active online during this period and presumably was aware of these accusations. Even if he might not have heard of these allegations in the aughts, Erik Hersman was explicitly informed about allegations of sexual harassment against Daudi in late 2015 when a prominent Kenyan tech entrepreneur told him about them in November 2015. The allegations this time included sending unsolicited “dick pics” to women via DM on Twitter and making unwanted sexual advances to women within the Bishop Magua building (where Ushahidi, BRCK, GearBox and iHub were then located) and in the wider tech ecosystem. At this time Daudi was the acting Executive Director of Ushahidi Kenya. Despite all this knowledge, the Ushahidi Board made Daudi’s Executive Director position permanent in January 2016. Furthermore, even when presented with unequivocal proof of gross misconduct, as I did when I made my complaint on May 4th 2017, the board had to be subjected to intense public pressure before they did anything meaningful. For over nine weeks after I lodged this complaint, Daudi continued to act in his capacity as Executive Director: he participated in project meetings, strategy sessions and even international travel as the face of the organisation, including attending the 2017 Advancing Good Governance seminar and the 6th Annual Luxembourg Peace Prize Awards. He was only sent on compulsory leave on the same day that Quartz Africa ran a story (12th July). All through this ‘investigation’, the Board has bent over backwards to accommodate the requests of Daudi and his lawyer. Initially, they asked for the same level of procedure as a criminal court (e.g. witness lists and sworn statements) without having the authority to do so. Later, they turned around and insisted that it was an internal investigation and thus should exclude evidence from sources outside the company. The Board acceded to Daudi’s lawyer’s demands, apparently because they were afraid of a wrongful termination suit being filed by Daudi. This is at best disingenuous and at worst malicious. A company with the ethos Ushahidi purports to have should not shy away from doing what is right for fear of a lawsuit. Besides, had Daudi sued Ushahidi, he’d have effectively turned a private matter public as he would have had to declare why he was terminated. Court documents in Kenya are public documents: having my complaint and particularly that audio recording in the public domain logically went directly against his own best interests. Daudi’s explanation for the events of the evening was that he lost an earpiece of his hearing aid and Erik, as well as the Aberdare staff, were helping him look for it. I then allegedly joined them without invitation and refused to leave him so all his statements were made in an effort to get rid of me. However, at the time of our conversation, Erik had already retired to bed for the night. This can be attested to by any of the Ushahidi Team Members who were still at the bonfire. During the hearing, Erik did not correct Daudi on this point and in so doing, indirectly corroborated that untruth. Even if Erik had been awake, the fact that he was called upon as part of Daudi’s “alibi” should have clearly demonstrated his lack of independence. Erik should not have been a part of the panel that the Board constituted to investigate and make a decision. One cannot be a witness and judge in the same case! To date, Daudi still has his job: From the board’s latest update, Daudi has only been suspended. It is entirely possible that he may be reinstated in the company. This is despite the Board possessing audio evidence of him sexually harassing his junior as well as allegations from a plurality of victims which relate to multiple occurrences. Even with this, it still took public pressure for the Board to first send him on leave then suspend him. This is unacceptable. How are victims supposed to come forward if this is how a company with the reputation of Ushahidi handles these incidences? I’ve received several explanations for the delay: The Board claims that this was a complex matter because Ushahidi is domiciled in the US, yet the employees are Kenyan and the incident occurred in Kenya. It really wasn’t that complicated. Florida and Kenyan law are in sync when it comes to sexual harassment laws: we checked this before we submitted my complaint and even attached excerpts from both countries’ laws. The Board has also claimed that they were not able to action my complaint as quickly as they would have liked because they were trying to avoid a wrongful termination suit. As explained above this is insincere. Based on the speed of events from the 3rd of July, this could have been handled in 2 weeks. So why did it take 74 days? It seems clear that the board was looking for reasons not to act despite their verbal and written assurances to the contrary. In such a case, the will to act is all that matters. Not assumed best intentions. And based on their findings, Daudi is guilty of misconduct on several fronts. None of that was news and was obvious even before the 5th July Inquiry was held. This should not have taken as long as it did. As detailed extensively above, for some mysterious reason the Ushahidi board and leadership has been reluctant to take action even when presented with clear evidence about Daudi’s misconduct. This completely boggles the mind because this scandal poses an existential risk to Ushahidi as an organisation. The Nairobi grapevine was already buzzing with rumours of this complaint after it was made on 4th May. The board just seems to have gone out of its way to avoid dealing with my complaint. The board has also been less than forthright in the following ways: Clay Shirky left the Board of Ushahidi in October 2015. This was not announced internally nor externally. Up until 15th July, Clay was still listed on the website as a Board Member. The summary of the proceedings at the inquiry is dubiously interpreted, contains some outright misrepresentations as well as the omission of relevant sections. This can be borne out by the recording of said proceedings which the Board possesses and I invite them to share this recording in its entirety with the public. Internally, Ushahidi has an open door policy. However, it seems that this openness exists in spite of, and not because of the Board. Erik has invited the staff to report any incident of harassment assuring them that the Board will handle it swiftly. This assurance is solidly contradicted by how the Board has thus far treated the two staff members who were sexually propositioned on 19th January 2017, one of whom had evidence (myself) and one who did not. The Chronology of Events provided by the Board on 17th July is economical with the truth. Specific examples that demonstrate this are: The failure to mention that I was travelling for work when I was unavailable on 31st May. This is information the Board had easy access to and should have taken into consideration when they proposed a date for the hearing. The inaccurate description of the process of the giving of the evidence (5th to 15th June). See the timeline for what actually transpired, with an explanation for the delays. The inaccurate description of the process of agreeing upon the terms of engagement to be used at the inquiry (20th and 27th June) 5th July: At the hearing, the Board stated they needed a week to make their decision. This has now been revised to “7 working days to communicate its decision” “5th July: The Board communicates its decision to send the Respondent on leave until a decision is made.” It is not clear who they communicated that with. It certainly was not to me in the course of the hearing nor to the staff as I had access to e-mails until 10th July and this had definitely not been communicated to the team by then. Daudi was first sent on leave on 12th July after significant community and public pressure. All in all, this complaint has been completely and utterly mismanaged from Day 1. Both the tech community and Kenyan society at large need to reject the terrible precedent that the Board of Ushahidi has set. Their process has been deeply flawed and this should not be ignored just because they have ostensibly come to the correct conclusion. In cases such as these, the means matter just as much as the end. Having been on the wrong end of a poorly managed process, I would suggest that all organisations revisit their sexual harassment procedures and evaluate them in light of best practices. Specifically, they need to ensure that the following issues have been addressed: A well-articulated process should be described that covers: Timelines: The time taken for the entire process should be as short as possible. A maximum of 14 calendar days seems to be an acceptable global standard. The process to be followed: In what form and way should employees submit complaints or raise concerns? Are there alternate persons to whom employees can submit such complaints when the complaints are against the very person they are normally supposed to submit them to? Is evidence of a claim required? If yes, what kind? What each stage of the process will do, when it will be done and why. What form communication during the process will take and what each party should expect to hear / receive at each stage. Notification of other staff: Be explicit on what staff will be notified, when and in what form. Channel to raise concerns: A means should be created to allow all parties to raise any issues they have as the process is ongoing. Appeal process: if the outcome is not satisfactory to the parties, what if any avenues for recourse do they have? Support to the parties: what, if any, psychological support are the victim and perpetrator entitled to? When and where is this support available, and for how long? Leave of absence during the investigation: If and for how long the victim and perpetrator should be sent on compulsory (paid) leave as the investigation process is undertaken. Communication with the rest of the company and the outside world: A policy should exist on what is revealed, when and how to other staff as well as to parties outside the organisation. It should go without saying it seems that it must be said: Sexual harassment is not a harmless or victimless crime. Because of it, I’ve had to resign from a job I liked and was very good at. This has been detrimental to both the Programme, and the organisation as a whole. I know of people who have been forced to resign due to harassment and are subsequently unable to find new jobs and new sources of income. This is because at its core sexual harassment is about an abuse of power. The person in a position of power leaves the victim in a position where they either remain silent or lose their livelihood. We cannot be speaking of building inclusive workplaces for women (who bear the brunt of the majority of sexual harassment cases) when we are still contending with such rudimentary issues as ensuring that offices are free of harassment. Based on how effectively my complaint was bungled, Ushahidi’s reputation has taken a massive hit. This need never have happened and is completely unfair to the majority of the staff of the organisation who have played absolutely no part in this series of unfortunate events, and to this day remain mostly in the dark about exactly what transpired. It breaks my heart that the good people who work at Ushahidi have been damaged by the actions of David Kobia, Erik Hersman, Juliana Rotich and Jenny Stefanotti. The good work that Ushahidi has done over the past 10 years, and continues to do should not be tarnished by the actions and lack thereof of this Board. In order to begin the healing process within the company, and for the world to begin to regain confidence in Ushahidi, the Board should resign in its entirety. Only new management can begin to repair the damage done. There is a Swahili saying: “Mwenzako akinyolewa, na wewe tia maji”. Current employees who have witnessed first hand how poorly I have been treated have very real fears about how their issues and concerns will be handled in the future. Only a fresh and independent Board and Executive Director can provide the assurances that the staff, the Kenyan tech community and the world at large need, as we all move on from here. A good first step would be to set up a Kenya HarassMap deployment and put aside some resources to pay for any legal and counselling support services to other victims of Daudi and other sexual predators. Ushahidi is a great company with a valuable product. I hope the Board can put their egos aside and do what’s best for the company, which is stepping aside to give Ushahidi a chance to rebuild its reputation. Update: Timeline updated on 21 July to correct typos and add a missing link

The decision Monday, the Roberts court’s first direct look at public campaign financing, concerned only systems that use matching funds, as opposed to lump-sum grants. About a third of the states have some form of public financing, as does the federal government for presidential elections. “We do not today call into question the wisdom of public financing as a means of funding political candidacy,” Chief Justice Roberts wrote. “That is not our business.” Supporters of the law said the decision could have been worse. “Chief Justice Roberts at least recognized that public financing is a valid constitutional option,” said Monica Youn, a lawyer with the Brennan Center for Justice, which represented one of the defendants in the case. As a consequence of the decision, states and municipalities are now blocked from using a method of public financing that is simultaneously likely to attract candidates fearful that they will be vastly outspent and sensitive to avoiding needless government expense. “The government can still use taxpayer funds to subsidize political campaigns, but it can only do that in a manner that provides an alternative to private financing” said William R. Maurer, a lawyer with the Institute for Justice, which represented several challengers of the law. “It cannot create disincentives.” Chief Justice Roberts said that all escalating matching funds placed an unconstitutional burden on politicians who chose not to participate. But he added that Arizona’s system also created problematic asymmetries and anomalies. Candidates with several opponents could generate multiple subsidies every time they spent money, and spending from unaffiliated supporters could do the same. Justice Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr. joined the majority opinion. Advertisement Continue reading the main story Three years ago, in Davis v. Federal Election Commission, another 5-to-4 decision with the same justices in the majority, the court struck down a superficially similar federal law known as the “millionaire’s amendment.” That law allowed candidates to raise amounts over the usual contribution limits when rich opponents spent more than a given amount of their own money. Justice Alito, writing for the majority, said the law imposed “an unprecedented penalty on any candidate who robustly exercises” free speech rights guaranteed by the First Amendment. Chief Justice Roberts said the logic of the Davis decision required the court to strike down the Arizona law. Indeed, he said, it is one thing for the government to allow candidates to seek additional contributions and another for the government to send a check. Newsletter Sign Up Continue reading the main story Please verify you're not a robot by clicking the box. Invalid email address. Please re-enter. You must select a newsletter to subscribe to. Sign Up You will receive emails containing news content , updates and promotions from The New York Times. You may opt-out at any time. You agree to receive occasional updates and special offers for The New York Times's products and services. Thank you for subscribing. An error has occurred. Please try again later. View all New York Times newsletters. “The cash subsidy, conferred in response to political speech, penalizes speech to a greater extent and more directly than the millionaire’s amendment in Davis,” Chief Justice Roberts wrote. The decision concerned two consolidated cases, Arizona Free Enterprise Club v. Bennett, No. 10-238, and McComish v. Bennett, No. 10-239. It was the fifth ruling from the Roberts court cutting back on the government’s ability to regulate campaign finance. In a dissent summarized from the bench, Justice Elena Kagan said the Arizona law advanced First Amendment values. “What the law does — all the law does — is fund more speech,” she wrote. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor joined the dissent. “Arizona, remember, offers to support any person running for state office,” Justice Kagan wrote. The candidates who challenged the law declined to accept that help, she said. “So they are making a novel argument: that Arizona violated their First Amendment rights by disbursing funds to other speakers even though they could have received (but chose to spurn) the same financial assistance,” Justice Kagan wrote. “Some people might call that chutzpah.” Advertisement Continue reading the main story The Davis decision, Justice Kagan wrote, involved a different issue, as it concerned a law that raised contribution limits disproportionately. The majority and dissent disagreed about whether the Arizona law was supported by a permissible government rationale. Chief Justice Roberts wrote that its main purpose was to level the playing field for political speech, which several earlier decisions have said is an improper goal. “It is not legitimate for the government to attempt to equalize electoral opportunities in this manner,” he wrote. “And such basic intrusion by the government into the debate over who should govern goes to the heart of First Amendment values.” “ ‘Leveling the playing field,’ ” Chief Justice Roberts wrote, “can sound like a good thing. But in a democracy, campaigning for office is not a game.” Justice Kagan countered that the main purpose of the law was to root out corruption and the appearance of corruption by encouraging candidates to participate in public financing systems, a goal the Supreme Court has endorsed. “Like citizens across this country, Arizonans deserve a government that represents and serves them all,” she wrote. “And no less, Arizonans deserve the chance to reform their electoral system so as to attain that most American of goals. Truly, democracy is not a game.”

FILE- In this Friday, May 18, 2012, file photo, a child looks at a laptop displaying Facebook logos in Hyderabad, India. Facebook said Monday, June 4, 2012, it is testing out ways to allow younger kids on its site without needing to lie. (AP Photo/Mahesh Kumar A., File) Facebook has finally forgotten about that drunken night in college when you vomited on that one friend who never talked to you again. Any deleted photo from that episode, or any photo deleted by users for whatever reason, has finally been removed from the social network's servers, it appears. (Now if only your friend could permanently forget about the incidence too.) Since 2009, Ars Technica's Jacqui Cheng has doggedly tracked how long it takes big photo-sharing sites to permanently delete photos after a user hits "Delete." Her method was simple: save a photo's URL, delete the photo and wait to see how long it takes for the link to die. For Twitter and Flickr, it took seconds. For MySpace (remember that?), it took months. But for Facebook, Cheng found it could take years. In some cases, photos deleted in 2009 were still on Facebook servers in 2012. In February, Facebook explained to Cheng "[w]e have been working hard to move our photo storage to newer systems which do ensure photos are fully deleted." Now, Cheng is happy to report that she has "tested this with two photos while saving their direct URLs, and both photos became inaccessible within two days of deletion." Her readers got similar results. First, let us say, Good job, Facebook. Like how we train a dog, we ought to reward good behavior as well as punish bad. The media, rolling up its newspaper, has knocked Facebook on the nose for many no-nos: swapping users' listed email addresses for Facebook addresses, accidentally showing people's private chats to the public, to name a few snafus. We're glad to finally give Facebook a treat. But why did this take so long to implement? "The systems we used for photo storage a few years ago did not always delete images from content delivery networks in a reasonable period of time even though they were immediately removed from the site," Facebook told Ars Technica on Thursday. During its period of massive growth, Facebook apparently found it difficult to expand its servers and delete photos in a timely fashion. But now that new photo storage, installed in February, apparently deletes photos within 30 days, according to Facebook. Perhaps what this tells us several months later is that Facebook wanted to get serious about privacy -- including making sure that unwanted photos weren't being stored after users tried to delete them -- as it hurtled toward its initial public offering in May. As a publicly traded company, it's reasonable to expect Facebook to be more sensitive to privacy concerns.

Several states voted to legalize marijuana this past Election Day but the pot business still has a gripe—regulations. Though decriminalized on some level in 19 states and the District of Columbia (it remains illegal under federal law), marijuana is still subject to regulations that strike some in the industry as micromanagement. One company that tracks regulations is Cannabiz Media, which publishes the “Marijuana Licensing Reference Guide.” It recently posted a list of what it describes as the “10 weirdest marijuana laws.” For example, in Nevada and Oregon, signage for businesses that sell pot is regulated down to the font size and even font style. Connecticut bans the uses of illuminated signs while Washington, DC, makes it a point to outlaw the sale of pot at gasoline stations or auto repair shops. Ed Keating, the person who compiled the list, sees such regulations as more than just a nuisance, particularly for medical marijuana dispensaries. “It’s really hard to comply with these regulations because they are so particular and, in some cases, they just don’t seem to make a lot of sense,” he said. “If you’re a business trying to get medicine to your patients… some of these regulations are very expensive to comply with.” However, Keating isn’t entirely against regulations and argues that some control would be in the industry’s best interests. “In a lot of states now, they’re starting to put what an appropriate dosage or amount is to consume,” he said, noting that Maureen Dowd’s 2014 New York Times piece on her overdose of marijuana-infused chocolates showed the dangers of no labeling. “That makes a lot of sense for safety.” “The other area that has seen a lot of regulatory scrutiny is testing because they want to make sure that if people are consuming this as medicine—or even recreationally—they’re given a safe product,” he continued. “Where it gets dangerous is when people concentrate that product into a liquid, an oil. You’re raising the concentration of everything. So if there are bad chemicals in there, they get much more concentrated and it could be a danger to people. So I think we’ll be seeing even more regulations there.”

The movement is not going away — most Republicans in the House have more to fear from primary challengers on their right than from Democratic challengers. An unpopular budget deal could reignite the Tea Party, as the antitax crusader Grover Norquist predicts. But surveys of voters leaving the polls last month showed that support for the Tea Party had dropped precipitously from 2010, when a wave of recession-fueled anger over bailouts, federal spending and the health care overhaul won the Republicans a majority in the House. The House members elected with Tea Party backing in 2010 forced onto the national agenda their goals of deep cuts to spending and changes to entitlement programs, embodied by the budget blueprints of Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, who became Mitt Romney’s running mate. And some of those lawmakers led the revolt last week that prompted Speaker John A. Boehner to cancel a House vote on a plan to avert a year-end fiscal crisis by raising tax rates on household income above $1 million. “The Tea Party put a lot of steel in the spine of the Republican Party,” said Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma. But the Tea Party activists have not been front and center in the fiscal fight. And Mr. Cole added that Tea Party leaders now excoriating Mr. Boehner for offering higher taxes in a budget deal did not recognize political reality. “These guys want instant success,” said Mr. Cole, a member of the House Republican leadership. “If they want to see a better result, they’ve got to help us win the United States Senate. We’ve thrown away some seats out of political immaturity.” But a number of Republican leaders said the Tea Party seemed headed toward becoming just another political faction, not a broad movement. It may rally purists, but it will continue to alienate realists and centrists, they said. Advertisement Continue reading the main story “I think the Tea Party movement is to the Republicans in 2013 what the McGovernites were to the Democrats in 1971 and 1972,” said Don Gaetz, a Republican who is the president of the Florida Senate. “They will cost Republicans seats in Congress and in state legislatures. But they will also help Republicans win seats.” Photo Because the Tea Party comprises thousands of local groups, it is impossible to determine whether its ranks shrank after the many electoral defeats last month, which activists said caused grief and deep frustration. Greg Cummings, the leader of the We the People Tea Party in rural Decatur County, Iowa, said his group had picked up 12 members since the election, for a total of about 50. “If you were in a fight and someone gave you a good left hook, it doesn’t mean the fight is over,” he said. But Everett Wilkinson, the chairman of the Florida Tea Party in Palm Beach County, said the number of active Tea Party groups statewide “has diminished significantly in the last year or so, certainly in the last couple of months,” with only a third of what there once was. Newsletter Sign Up Continue reading the main story Please verify you're not a robot by clicking the box. Invalid email address. Please re-enter. You must select a newsletter to subscribe to. Sign Up You will receive emails containing news content , updates and promotions from The New York Times. You may opt-out at any time. You agree to receive occasional updates and special offers for The New York Times's products and services. Thank you for subscribing. An error has occurred. Please try again later. View all New York Times newsletters. “A lot of people gave their heart and soul to trying to get Obama out; they’re frustrated,” he added. “They don’t know what to do. They got involved with the electoral process, and that didn’t work out.” FreedomWorks, a national group that has played a crucial role in organizing Tea Party activists and backing insurgent candidates, has been riven by turmoil, leading to the departure last month of its chairman, Dick Armey, a former Republican majority leader in the House. Mr. Armey said in news accounts that he questioned the ethical behavior of senior officials in the group, though others told of a power struggle. He was eased out with an $8 million consulting contract, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press. FreedomWorks spent nearly $40 million on the 2012 elections but backed a string of losing Senate candidates, including Richard E. Mourdock of Indiana, Josh Mandel of Ohio and Connie Mack of Florida. Some Tea Party firebrands lost their House seats, including Allen B. West of Florida and Joe Walsh of Illinois. One notable success for the Tea Party was the Senate victory by Ted Cruz of Texas. Mr. Cummings, who is the Midwest coordinator for Tea Party Patriots, a national group, said a major issue he would be focusing on now was Agenda 21, a United Nations resolution that encourages sustainable development. It has no force of law in the United States, but a passionate element of the Tea Party sees it as a plot against American property rights. Advertisement Continue reading the main story Billie Tucker, an activist with the First Coast Tea Party in Florida, said she and others suspected that corruption on local election boards had led to Mr. Obama’s victory in the state. Activists want to investigate. “Some people say it’s just a conspiracy theory, but there’s rumbling all around,” she said. “There’s all kinds of data, and no one’s talking about it, including, hello, the mainstream media.” Another issue boiling is the “nullification” of the Affordable Care Act. Angry that Mr. Obama’s re-election means that the health care law will not be repealed, some activists claim that states can deny the authority of the federal government and refuse to carry it out. At a Florida State Senate meeting this month, two dozen Tea Party activists called the law “tyrannical” and said the state had the right to nullify it. Mr. Gaetz, the Senate president, a conservative Republican, said in an interview that he, too, disagreed with the Supreme Court ruling that upheld the law. But he called nullification “kooky.” “We’re not a banana republic,” he said. It is “dangerous to the foundation of the republic when we pick and choose which laws we will obey.”

Former Bush administration official Stephen Hadley, a forceful advocate for a military strike against Syria, owns about $875,000 worth of stock in Raytheon, which manufactures Tomahawk cruise missiles . (Alex Brandon/ASSOCIATED PRESS) Military analysts who made frequent media appearances during the recent debate over a possible U.S. strike on Syria have ties to defense contractors and other firms with stakes in the outcome, according to a new study, but those links were rarely disclosed. The report by the Public Accountability Initiative, a nonprofit watchdog, details appearances by 22 commentators who spoke out during this summer’s Syria debate in large media outlets and currently have industry connections that the group says can pose conflicts of interest. In some cases, the potential conflicts were clear-cut — such as board positions and shares in companies that make weapons that probably would have been used in any U.S. action. In other instances, including work for private investment and consulting firms whose clients are not disclosed, it was not possible to know whether those speaking had an interest in the debate. The report also notes the prominent role of seven think tanks during the debate and their close links to defense companies. “We found lots of industry ties. Some of them are stronger than others. Some really rise to the level of clear conflicts of interest,” said Kevin Connor, the group’s director and a co-author of the report. “These networks and these commentators should err on the side of disclosure.” In several media appearances in September, Stephen Hadley, a former national security adviser to President George W. Bush, was a forceful advocate for strikes. He told Bloomberg TV that Republicans should back the president’s use-of-force resolution and argued in a Washington Post op-ed that failure to punish Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for using chemical weapons against his own people would damage U.S. credibility if military action were threatened over Iran’s nuclear program. While Hadley’s role in the Bush administration was always noted, there was no mention of his ties to Raytheon, manufacturer of Tomahawk cruise missiles, which likely would have been fired from Navy destroyers stationed in the eastern Mediterranean in strikes against Syria. Hadley has been on the board of directors of Raytheon since 2009 and, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing from June included in the new report, owned 11,477 shares of Raytheon stock, now worth about $875,000. Hadley was also paid $128,500 in cash compensation by the company last year, according to a filing with the SEC. In one appearance, CNN noted that Hadley is a principal at RiceHadleyGates, an international strategic consulting firm based in Silicon Valley and Washington. Fred Hiatt, editorial page editor at The Post, said Hadley’s opinions in the newspaper’s op-ed commentary were not colored by his association with Raytheon. “More disclosure is generally better than less, but I’m confident that Hadley’s opinion piece, which was consistent with the worldview he has espoused for many years, was not influenced by any hypothetical, certainly marginal, impact to Raytheon’s bottom line,” Hiatt said in a statement. A spokesperson said Hadley was traveling in China and unavailable for comment. Retired Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni, a former commander of the U.S. Central Command, also made several media appearances to discuss the Syrian situation and cautioned that the kind of limited intervention that was being proposed has in the past been difficult to accomplish. But in the five appearances covered by the study, his ties to the defense industry were not disclosed. Zinni has been on the board of directors of BAE Systems, a top defense contractor, since 2002 and was board chairman from 2009 to 2012. The company specializes in cybersecurity, intelligence analysis and several weapons systems. Zinni, in addition, sits on the board of advisers of DC Capital Partners, a private equity firm that focuses on investments in intelligence, homeland security and other sectors. Reached by e-mail, Zinni said his board memberships are public. “The media who contact me for comment should post any relevant info re my background including my board positions if they desire,” he wrote. Retired Gen. Jack Keane, a former Army vice chief of staff, made frequent appearances as well, including as a Fox News military analyst, during which he supported U.S. action against Syria. His military career and his affiliation with the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington think tank where he is board chairman, were regularly cited. But there was no disclosure of Keane’s ties to General Dynamics, where he has been on the board since 2004, and to SCP Partners, a venture capital firm focused in part on investments in defense and security, where he is a venture partner. General Dynamics’ Bath Iron Works is the lead designer and builder of the destroyers from which the Tomahawk missiles would have been launched. Keane’s office said he was not available to comment. Asked about the report’s findings, Michael Clemente, executive vice president of news at Fox News, said in a statement, “We generally disclose contacts when our judgment is that it’s journalistically germane to the story.” Two other networks where analysts covered by the report made frequent appearances, CNN and NBC, did not respond to requests for comment.

Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain was our game of the year in 2015, however the foundations for it were laid by standalone introductory chapter Ground Zeroes. Today, Konami has announced Metal Gear Solid V: The Definitive Experience which gathers both games and a bunch of DLC under one banner. Due to launch via Steam on October 13, players can expect “additional Mother Base currency”, as well as a slew of items, including Rasp Short-Barrelled Shotguns, the Adam-ska Special handgun, a range of Personal Ballistic Shields, and a number of costumes for The Phantom Pain. Previously console-exclusive Ground Zeroes missions—Déjà Vu and Jamais Vu—are also included, as are a number of DLC packs and weapons for Metal Gear Online. “Metal Gear Solid V has received collectively over 60 industry accolades and awards thus far,” says Konami president Tomotada Tashiro in a statement. “The Definitive Experience will give players an opportunity to play the complete MGSV experience, without interruption. Additionally, with Metal Gear Online, players also get access to a completely unique multi-player setting that is designed for a truly engrossing gaming experience as well.” Metal Gear Solid V: The Definitive Experience is due October 13. Console versions will cost £34.99/$39.99, however Steam pricing is yet to be confirmed. Read Sam’s review of The Phantom Pain over here.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s campaign said on Monday a McCain opinion article about Iraq offered to The New York Times as a rebuttal to Democrat Barack Obama had been rejected. Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain (R-AZ) speaks at a campaign picnic outside the Maine Military Museum in South Portland, Maine July 21, 2008. REUTERS/Brian Snyder The McCain camp had submitted the article to The Times as a response to a piece by Obama published by the newspaper last week. “My Plan for Iraq” had detailed Obama’s goal of withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq in 16 months if he is elected on November 4. The McCain article was largely a critique of Obama’s position, arguing against establishing a set timetable for pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq. McCain is attempting to make sure his voice is heard while Obama picks up headlines with a visit this week to Afghanistan and Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East and Europe. “During the course of eight visits to Iraq, I have heard many times from our troops what Major General Jeffrey Hammond, commander of coalition forces in Baghdad, recently said: that leaving based on a timetable would be ‘very dangerous,’” McCain wrote. An e-mail sent to the McCain staff by a Times editor said it would be terrific to have an article from McCain but that the one sent in was not acceptable as currently written and that a new draft should articulate how McCain defines victory in Iraq. The McCain campaign, which does not feel McCain gets equal treatment in the U.S. news media, expressed dismay at the Times’ decision and suspected it was because the Times did not agree with McCain’s policy. “John McCain believes that victory in Iraq must be based on conditions on the ground, not arbitrary timetables. Unlike Barack Obama, that position will not change based on politics or the demands of The New York Times,” said McCain campaign spokesman Tucker Bounds. The New York Times said it was standard procedure to have a “back and forth with an author about his or her submission” and looked forward to publishing McCain’s views. “We have published at least seven Op-ed pieces by Senator McCain since 1996. The New York Times endorsed Senator McCain as the Republican candidate in the presidential primaries. We take his views very seriously,” said the statement from Times spokeswoman Catherine Mathis.

North Korea has detained another U.S. citizen, a Korean American professor, bringing to three the number of Americans being held in Pyongyang. The Swedish Embassy in Pyongyang, which represents U.S. interests there because the United States does not have diplomatic relations with North Korea, confirmed to The Washington Post that a U.S. national had been detained. In Washington, the State Department said it was aware of the report. Media in South Korea identified the man as Kim Sang-duk, a former professor at the Yanbian University of Science and Technology (YUST) in the northeastern Chinese city of Yanji, near the border with North Korea. Kim was arrested at Pyongyang’s international airport Friday as he was waiting to board a flight, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency reported. Kim had been teaching a class in international finance and management at the Pyongyang University of Science and Technology, a sister institution, for a month and was leaving the country with his wife when he was arrested, the specialist website NK News quoted the chancellor of PUST, Park Chan-mo, as saying. [What it’s like to be an American held in North Korea] North Korea has taken a slew of Americans hostage in recent years and used them as bargaining chips in negotiations with the United States. It is holding two other Americans. Otto Warmbier, a University of Virginia student who went on a tour in North Korea while on his way to a study-abroad program in Hong Kong, was detained for allegedly trying to steal a propaganda sign from a Pyongyang hotel on New Year’s Day last year. He was convicted of subversion in March after a court found that he had committed a crime “pursuant to the U.S. government’s hostile policy” toward North Korea and was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor. [North Korea sentences college student to 15 years of hard labor] He has not been seen since March 2016, when he was convicted, and when Swedish diplomats were last allowed to meet with him. Another American, former Virginia man Kim Dong-chul, was charged with spying last April and was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Kim, who is in his early 60s, was born in South Korea but became a U.S. citizen in 1987, although he is thought to have been living in northeastern China in recent years. Previous American detainees have been released after a few months following visits from high-profile Americans, including former presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter. But so far, the North Korean regime has not used Warmbier and Kim as leverage. Read more: North Korea sentences former Va. man to 10 years of hard labor North Korea sentences U-Va. student to 15 years of hard labor in prison U-Va. student held in North Korea ‘confesses’ to ‘severe’ crime Today’s coverage from Post correspondents around the world Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news

Animals are dying in unnecessary agony because of a lack of understanding over how stunning stops them feeling pain when their throats are cut, research shows. In conventional slaughterhouses, cows, sheep and chicken are stunned, usually with an electric shock, to ensure they are unconscious before their throats are cut. This minimises suffering but in a number of Muslim abattoirs the animals are not stunned over fears it is not permissible, or 'halal'. In a number of Muslim abattoirs animals are not stunned before slaughter over fears it is not permissible, or 'halal' but research suggests this is due to ignorance of the process (file image) A study by researchers at the University of Bristol suggests some Islamic scholars are ignorant about the humaneness of stunning, leading to animals dying in pain,The Times reported. Widespread research shows the welfare benefits of pre-slaughter stunning. The electric shocks lessen the pain felt by animals when their throats are cut. A number of industry bodies have spoken out against the slaughtering of animals without pre-stunning, with the British Veterinary Association saying there is an 'unacceptable time lapse between slaughter and the onset of permanent insensibility [loss of feeling] when animals are not stunned'. Animals must also be stunned before slaughter under EU regulations. However Britain allows an exemption for those who oppose because of religious beliefs and the number of animals killed without stunning appears to be on the rise. RITUAL KILLING OF ANIMALS FOR RELIGIOUS REASONS HALAL Halal slaughtering involves cutting through the large arteries in the neck with one swipe of a blade, while a Muslim butcher recites a religious verse. All blood is then drained away since the consumption of blood is forbidden under Islamic law. Under Islamic law, an animal must be slaughtered by having its throat cut while it is conscious. KOSHER According to the laws, in order for a meat to kosher it must come from an animal that meets the kosher rules. These are the animal must be ruminant and have split hooves. Ruminant animals chew food once and swallow, before regurgitating it and chewing again. Animals that Jews can eat include cows, sheep, goats and deer. They cannot eat pigs despite the fact it has split hooves because it is not a ruminant animal. Before slaughtering, the animal must be healthy and uninjured and a sharp knife is used to slice through the main arteries and windpipe, causing a drop in blood pressure that causes the animal to lose consciousness. Jews believe this is a way of killing that shows 'respect and compassion' as set out in Jewish law. Some 2.4 million sheep and goats were put to death using the religious method in halal and kosher abattoirs in 2013 – a rise of 60 per cent on 2011. According to analysis by the Food Standards Agency, some 37 per cent of sheep and goats, 25 per cent of cattle and 16 per cent of poultry were killed in this way in halal premises. Researchers from the University of Bristol School of Veterinary Science questioned Islamic scholars and Halal consumers on the use of pre-slaughter stunning. The study is published in the journal Meat Science. Some 69 per cent of scholars said they did not agree that stunning prior to slaughter had been showed to reduce the pain felt by animals, according to The Times. However more than 95 per cent of the scholars and 53 per cent of consumers agreed that if stunning did not result in death, cause physical injury or obstruct bleed-out, the meat would be considered Halal. The study said: ' The lack of understanding of stunning among some scholars has resulted in the issuance of confusing fatwas on the suitability of stunned meat for consumption by Muslims. 'There is an urgent need for these scholars to be given theoretical and practical education on stunning and other modern slaughter techniques such as mechanical slaughter. 'This will help them make informed decisions about the suitability of these techniques for Halal production.' Gudrun Ravetz, president of the British Veterinary Association said: 'Our view is that all animals should be stunned before slaughter, based on peer reviewed evidence that indicates an unacceptable time lapse between slaughter and the onset of permanent insensibility when animals are not stunned. Britain allows an exemption for those who oppose because of religious beliefs and the number of animals killed without stunning appears to be on the rise. File image 'A number of notable bodies including the Farm Animal Welfare Committee and the EU Food Safety Authority all agree that there is a high probability that the cutting of sensitive tissues at the neck will trigger a significant pain response in a conscious animal. 'Given the barrage of evidence about the humaneness of stunning before slaughter the veterinary profession is persuaded that animals must be stunned.

Photo Fifteen years ago, bemoaning the high cost of higher education, the governors of 19 Western states decided to start a nonprofit online institution to help meet their need for a trained work force. The result, Western Governors University, offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in education, business, the health professions and information technology. Everything is online except for student teaching and some nursing requirements. Most of its 25,000 students are over 25, and have previously earned some college credits. Instead of being required to spend a certain number of hours to earn a certain sequence of credits, students at Western Governors must show “competency” through assignments and proctored exams. Marie Hermetz, who paid Western Governors about $9,000 to earn her master’s degree in health care management, said she heard about the program on the news and switched from one that would have cost up to $40,000. “Doing it one class at a time, I would have graduated maybe never,” said Ms. Hermetz, 43, who had a bachelor’s degree in math. “This way, it took just under 18 months. And whenever I ran into trouble, my professors would make arrangements, whether it was through a webinar or a phone call or an e-mail, to help me.” Advertisement Continue reading the main story Actually, Western Governors does not have “professors” in the usual sense: the online curriculum is not developed by the university, but chosen by outside experts, and students have “course mentors” with graduate degrees.

The BBC has been ordered to disclose the names and details of 150 senior managers who received severance payouts after MPs invoked a rare parliamentary custom. The Commons public accounts committee is to invoke the power of a standing order to force the broadcaster to release information about 150 redundancy payments to senior managers between 2010 and 2012. Citing data protection issues, the BBC has previously fought attempts to divulge the names, but has now written to the former managers alerting them that the nature of their severance arrangements may now be made public. The development came on Friday amid further fallout in the BBC payoffs controversy, with a statement challenging former director general Mark Thompson's claim that the BBC Trust was fully informed about a £1m severence settlement with a senior executive in 2010 issued by five trustees. One ex-senior BBC manager, who received the letter warning that details of his severance arrangement may be published, told MediaGuardian: "I am not prepared to have details of what was meant to be a confidential matter released into the public domain without any kind of assurance of how it will be presented. "My redundancy was totally in order, but there is no guidance from the BBC as to how the information will be presented. The concern I would have is that a senior manager such as myself – whose redundancy settlement was perfectly in order – will be lumped together with the very small number of senior managers whose deals seem to have been rather more generous. I cannot see myself giving consent for my name and details to be released." In the letter sent to all 150 former bosses to give them the opportunity to raise any concerns, the corporation said: "PAC has recently confirmed in writing to the BBC that it is applying its Standing Order power to call for the 150 names and details of the 150 recipients of severance payments cited in the [National Audit Office] report, which includes you. "PAC has informed us that on receipt of this information, it will then decide whether or not to make this information public taking into account the public interest in doing so. PAC further states that it will consider any representations concerning individual cases, that it takes the needs of confidentiality seriously and has chosen not to publish information regarding individuals on previous occasions." On Friday the BBC Trust issued a statement from five trustees who were in post when the payoff for former deputy director general Mark Byford was being discussed in late 2010 – Richard Ayre, Diane Coyle, Anthony Fry, Alison Hastings and David Liddiment. "We were not asked for approval of the financial package – formally or informally – nor did we give it. The Trust was assured that the package was within contractual terms and that the chairman of the BBC's executive remuneration committee had agreed to it being approved," they said. Thompson, in his PAC evidence submission published on Friday, said he took "all reasonable steps to ensure that the BBC Trust was properly informed in advance" about the proposed redundancy settlements with Byford and Sharon Baylay, the former director of marketing who left with a £390,000 payoff. "The timetable and the urgency of the email traffic between the Trust and various BBC managers supports the view that the Trust wanted to be able to express its view about the proposed settlements before the [executive remuneration committee] was asked to formally approve them," he added. "The only non-automatic part of the proposed settlement with Mark Byford was the intention to delay the issuing of formal notice and to make a payment in lieu of notice: there is clear evidence that the trust was aware of both those points." Earlier on Friday, it emerged that Lucy Adams, the BBC's HR director, has written to MPs to correct her evidence to parliament about her involvement in agreeing the £1m severance payment for a former senior executive. Adams admitted in fresh evidence released by the PAC on Friday that she was involved in drafting a key memo to the BBC Trust that detailed the controversial £1m severance payment to Byford. Thompson described Adams in evidence also published by the committee on Friday as "one of the main authors" of the memo – dubbed the 7 October note – which she claimed not to have seen when she appeared before MPs on the PAC on 10 July. In a letter made public on Friday, Adams said it was not clear which document the committee was referring to at the time. The 7 October note, drafted in 2010, has become central to the BBC payoffs saga because it was drawn up to inform the BBC Trust of two controversial payoffs – to Byford and Baylay. The BBC Trust has since claimed not to have been fully briefed on these redundancy deals. • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email [email protected] or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication". • To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook

SHARE THIS ARTICLE Share Tweet Post Email Austrians elected a Green Party-backed economics professor as their next president, spurning the appeal of an anti-immigration nationalist who campaigned to weaken ties to the European Union. With all regular votes counted, Alexander Van der Bellen defeated Norbert Hofer of the Freedom Party by 51.7 percent to 48.3 percent after Sunday’s repeat run-off election to the mainly ceremonial presidency. While mail-in ballots will only be counted on Monday, Van der Bellen’s margin of victory was too great to change the outcome, and Hofer conceded defeat. Van der Bellen, 72, said that he stood for the “old values” of freedom, equality and solidarity. He also signaled that he wanted to preside over a more active presidency, urging a focus on policies such as efforts to tackle unemployment. Austria sent a “good signal” today “to the capitals of the European Union,” Van der Bellen, who ran as an independent, said in an interview with public broadcaster ORF. “You can actually win elections with a pro-European position.” Together with a referendum in Italy also being held on Sunday, the Austrian vote was seen as a bellwether for populist sentiment in Europe after the U.K.’s Brexit vote and Donald Trump’s election to the U.S. presidency. Geert Wilders, the anti-Islam Dutch politician, offered Hofer his commiserations on Twitter, as did French National Front leader Marine Le Pen. Nigel Farage, the former head of the U.K. Independence Party, had cited Hofer’s EU-skeptic stance as further evidence of the pressures buffeting the EU “construction.” German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel, who heads the Social Democratic Party, hailed Van der Bellen’s win as a “victory of reason against right-wing populism,” according to an interview with Bild newspaper. EU President Donald Tusk extended his “wholehearted congratulations” to Van der Bellen in an e-mailed statement. Year of Acrimony The result defied projections of a razor-tight finish and ends an acrimonious year of campaign politics that polarized Austria. Van der Bellen, who pledged to prevent anti-EU forces from forming a government, now has to heal the rifts exposed over immigration and economic inequality. It’s the first time in 70 years the country has elected a presidential candidate outside the Social Democratic or Austrian People’s Party, after both the established parties were eliminated in earlier rounds of voting. It’s also the first time that a Green Party leader has won a popular election in Europe to become head of state since the global environmental movement began. Van der Bellen narrowly squeezed out Hofer in the first presidential runoff on May 22, but the result was overturned by the Constitutional Court because of irregularities in counting mail-in ballots. Austria’s Interior Ministry showed Van der Bellen won more rural support in Sunday’s repeat vote, and also took key regions in the industrial heartland of Upper Austria as well as in the mountains of Tirol. Opening Doors The result is a rebuff to some analysts who predicted Hofer would benefit from the same nationalist forces that propelled Trump to the presidency last month. Hofer campaigned on his ability to court favor inside a Trump White House as well as with Russian President Vladimir Putin. “I’m asking my voters to accept that in a democracy, the voter is always right,” said Hofer. He added that he’s looking forward to the next round of national elections where he’ll stand by Freedom Party leader Heinz-Christian Strache, who accused Van der Bellen of orchestrating Sunday’s victory with a “massive campaign of fear.” Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern, a Social Democrat who warned last week that the EU must reform or slip into the abyss, struck a more conciliatory tone. “Alexander Van der Bellen will be a good partner for an open-minded, future-oriented policy of chances and hopes,” Kern said. “To the voters of Norbert Hofer, I say nobody should feel like a loser today. We’re all Austria.” — With assistance by Rainer Buergin, and Matthias Wabl

The views may be pleasantly apocalyptic, and the second act may feature a motorbike duel with a robot B52, but it's the little things that really sell me on Gears of War 4 - the surprisingly delicate way it both harkens back to and departs from Epic's original cover-shooters. The fact that Swarm footsoldiers rush you when they're close to death, for example, where their Locust predecessors would often dig in till the bitter end. The presence of branching path sections that ask teams of two to support one another across a gulf, a classic Gears device enlivened by the addition of flying enemies and eccentric new flavours of sniper rifle. And then there's the Overkill shotgun, which perhaps encapsulates how well the Coalition understands the series it has inherited. On the surface it's a quad-barrelled monster worthy of Painkiller, but in practice the Overkill is a flexible instrument that, much like the famous Active Reload mechanic, challenges you to keep a cool head under pressure. Simply pull the trigger and you'll fire all four barrels at once to shattering effect. But if you hold the trigger, pause and release, you'll fire each pair of barrels separately for a tighter spread, allowing you to dent targets at range and really make the most of your ammo. Shotguns have always been Gears of War's principal skill weapons, the roaring Sphinxes that gate access to the upper echelons of competitive multiplayer. With the Overkill, the Coalition has crafted both an elegant tool for returning Gnasher pros and a bloodthirsty treat for the rest of us. Everywhere you look in Gears of War 4, you'll find a studio engaged in careful dialogue with the past. This is literally the case in the story, which takes place a few decades after the destruction of the Locust, and sees two generations of the Fenix clan fighting side by side. In a bid to shore up what remains of civilisation, the Coalition of Organised Governments has herded Sera's surviving humans into gigantic walled cities, defended by robots, but not everybody is content to trade their freedom for security. Amongst the rag-tag Outsiders who scrape a living in the wilderness is the one and only Marcus Fenix, he of the thousand yard scowl. As the game's second act begins, the COG is holding the Outsiders responsible for a spate of abductions, and new leading man JD Fenix has returned to his father's estate in hopes of guidance and a little covering fire, if not a hug. What follows is essentially a license handover reimagined as a family squabble, a clash between epochs in video game characterisation. JD is a blond and blue-eyed graduate of Nathan Drake High, accompanied by glib sidekick Delmont Walker and token ladybro Kait Diaz, whose parents are among the missing. Marcus remains a potty-mouthed crank, cut from the rock of the WW2 shooter and pickled to perfection by years of isolation. The script isn't exactly captivating so far - in opting for a more presentable college age cast, the Coalition has sacrificed a certain vivacity - but the reinvention of Marcus as a grouchy hermit, bellowing about his greenhouse in the midst of a COG bombing run, is worth a few laughs. I'm looking forward to finding out who else is back from Gears 3. With any luck, the Cole Train still operates somewhere deep in the wilds. The art direction is also something of a generational mash-up. The Coalition has come up with its own spin on the original's "destroyed beauty" aesthetic - "reclaimed beauty", an admittedly clunky buzzword which pays into an unexpected riff on fossil fuel politics. By the time of Gears 4, Sera's reserves of underground immulsion are long gone, Mother Nature has taken back much of the surface, and the population now depends on a hodgepodge of renewable energy resources. The game's plunging rural fastness is littered with the vestiges of the old world and ramshackle stabs at revival - windmills idling against a baleful sunset, enormous flywheels canted against cliff-faces, hydroelectric dams torn open by the "windflares" that now rake the planet's crust. In the course of the campaign's five acts (an estimated 10 hours) you'll take a ride in a deteriorating funicular and do battle inside a memorial to the Pendulum Wars, Sera's darkest hour prior to the emergence of the Locust. A hint: some of the antique weapons on display are functional. Inspired by the landscape of north Italy, the game's palette is quietly enchanting - wiry underbrush and purple leafpile, mildew-spotted signage and ground-down masonry, flowing together in a way that makes the cover layouts less obvious to the eye, if no less tangible under the thumb. Gears of War's world has always been uniquely textured, and the Coalition has done a fine job of weaving its own vision into the tapestry, aided no end by some fancy bells and whistles - screen-space reflections on puddles, physically based shaders for a more tactile look, and a persistent dynamic weather system which, at its most severe, actually affects how you play. When the winds are raging, movement becomes a chore, certain terrain fixtures can be shot loose to create tumbling hazards, and slower projectiles such as the Boomshot's rounds may be blown off course, allowing you to sneak the odd shot around cover. If all this sounds transformative, however, the wind was seldom this much of a presence during my few hours with the campaign. For the most part, Gears of War 4's cover combat follows on from that of Gears 3, its AI behaviours, animations and even exploits painstakingly rebuilt to take advantage of Unreal Engine 4. The basic rhythms are much as in any Gears game: you'll enter an area, slam your back against a pillar and work your way gradually around to flanking positions, overlooks and weapon drops, relying on AI comrades to revive you as and when you overreach yourself. The Coalition has added a few new tricks - you can reach across cover to haul a foe onto your combat knife, which adds an extra element of risk and reward to close-quarters gunplay - but any longtime Gears detractors hoping for a change of tune will come away disappointed. There are, of course, new weapons to spice up the familiar double act of rifles versus shotguns. The Embar rifle handles like a mix of Torque Bow and Longshot - you must hold the trigger to charge up a slug, but if you hold it a second too long the weapon will vent, a blunder that's sure to rouse the scorn of Twitch chatboxes. The Buzzkill and Dropshot, meanwhile, are ways of cheating the game's cover logic. The former coughs up sawblades that ricochet around objects, while the latter spits out a flying drillhead that slams to earth explosively when you release the trigger. More important than the new firearms, though, are the creatures you'll wield them against. Gears of War 4 introduces two new factions, the crusty Swarm and the COG's army of automatons or "Dee Bees". They share a number of familiar combat archetypes - units that pin you down, skirmishers that flush you out, and the odd towering bullet sponge equipped with a power weapon. But each faction boasts a few oddballs that may throw veteran players off-balance. The Dee Bees occasionally field Guardians, slippery UAVs that sport a chaingun or a rocket launcher (detachable, once you've shot the vehicle down) plus a recharging energy shield. Their rolling Tracker units are Kamikaze terrain denial weapons, exploding at your feet to create a brief but deadly puddle of static electricity. The Swarm feel indistinguishable from the Locust at first, their rank and file emerging from sinkholes that can be sealed with a frag grenade, but just wait till you meet the Juvies - Swarm infants caught mid-gestation, fatty tissues dripping from their muscles as they hop and flail towards you. The original game's Wretches are the obvious comparison, but Juvies are much nimbler around objects and harder to hit - I was reminded a little of the Doom reboot's fidgety reinvention of the Imp, which is an encouraging parallel indeed. They also represent something of a terrain variable: you'll encounter Juvie egg sacks that can be used as cover, or shot down from the ceiling to squish anything beneath, but woe betide the player who rouses the occupant in the process. Weirder and deadlier still are the Swarm elites, especially the prancing Snatchers - they'll actually ingest you if they get the chance, carrying the hapless victim around in their bellies till blasted into submission. Carriers are the Swarm's artillery, their enormous torsos cracking open to release a cloud of toxic spores as they stomp slowly into melee range, and then there are the Pouncers, catlike, dart-tossing fiends with soft pink bellies that hop from surface to surface. As the name implies, Pouncers may try to pin you, but if you're alert to the warning signs you can usually catch the descending beast on the blade of a Lancer. Beyond the campaign, Gears 4 offers up a brace of familiar modes - Warzone, TDM, King of the Hill, and Guardian - plus the already discussed Dodgeball, a co-op bots mode and Arms Race, a team-based version of the Gun Game mod for Counter-Strike. In the latter, all team members get a different weapon after every third kill, which good news in that a struggling player won't be left behind, and less good news in that allies may accidentally sabotage each other. Finding that your Gnasher has become a Longshot after cornering an opponent is every bit as exhilarating as you'd imagine. There's also Escalation, a three ring objective capture mode with a metagame element that is aimed squarely at the eSports community. The idea is to win seven rounds, the twist being that losing teams can activate a weapon spawn between rounds, whether to give themselves an edge or bait the other team into taking a risk. Backed up by LAN support and a robust suite of commentator options, it seems a good pitch for the tournament crowd. But the star attraction in multiplayer is, of course, the new take on Horde, Gears of War's influential wave survival mode, which again follows on from Gears 3 but retains a few ideas from the underrated Gears of War: Judgment. The battle now revolves around a movable fabricator, where you'll construct fortifications such as turrets, fences and decoys using globs of power that must be manually collected from the bodies of the slain. This creates more of a frantic, push-pull rhythm, as players scurry out to gather energy at the risk of being caught trousers-down when the next round begins. It accompanies a set of loose player classes - Heavy, Soldier, Engineer, Scout and Sniper - which determine your starting layout and are geared towards certain roles, but flexible enough that you can change tactics on the fly. Each class has a selection of abilities, largely passive, that can be levelled up - the Scout can equip a skill that awards bonus Power when harvesting under fire, for instance, while the Soldier might plump for the ability to plant up to five grenade mines at once. The class system doesn't quite feel essential yet, and there's the suspicion that it exists to justify the sale of ability cards, though all abilities can be earned and upgraded in-game. But having to factor in the fabricator's location and resource gathering on top of the usual Horde strategies is a fun complication, and you needn't give those cards a second thought once you've left the lobby screen behind. The truly disarming thing about Gears of War's return is that it no longer has an obvious rival. The original's mechanics have been imitated by every blockbuster under the sun, from Killzone through Tomb Raider to the Tom Clancy franchise, but most of its disciples have either died off or evolved beyond recognition. If the Coalition's debut is a fairly conservative work at heart, one that is content to tinker ingeniously within sturdy parameters, it nonetheless feels strangely exotic. There is no game out there right now that plays like this one, that uses quite these variables in quite this way, and while the revisions aren't mind-blowing individually, they're gripping as a whole. Marcus Fenix may have aged disgracefully, but Gears of War 4 has the wind in its sails. This article is based on a press trip to The Coalition's headquarters. Microsoft paid for travel and accommodation.

(1) Existing law generally prohibits the possession or transfer of assault weapons, except for the sale, purchase, importation, or possession of assault weapons by specified individuals, including law enforcement officers. Under existing law, “assault weapon” means, among other things, a semiautomatic centerfire rifle or a semiautomatic pistol that has the capacity to accept a detachable magazine and has any one of specified attributes, including, for rifles, a thumbhole stock, and for pistols, a second handgrip. This bill would revise this definition of “assault weapon” to mean a semiautomatic centerfire rifle, or a semiautomatic pistol that does not have a fixed magazine but has any one of those specified attributes. The bill would also define “fixed magazine” to mean an ammunition feeding device contained in, or permanently attached to, a firearm in such a manner that the device cannot be removed without disassembly of the firearm action. By expanding the definition of an existing crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. (2) Existing law requires that any person who, within this state, possesses an assault weapon, except as otherwise provided, be punished as a felony or for a period not to exceed one year in a county jail. This bill would exempt from punishment under that provision a person who possessed an assault weapon prior to January 1, 2017, if specified requirements are met. (3) Existing law requires that, with specified exceptions, any person who, prior to January 1, 2001, lawfully possessed an assault weapon prior to the date it was defined as an assault weapon, and which was not specified as an assault weapon at the time of lawful possession, register the firearm with the Department of Justice. Existing law permits the Department of Justice to charge a fee for registration of up to $20 per person but not to exceed the actual processing costs of the department. Existing law, after the department establishes fees sufficient to reimburse the department for processing costs, requires fees charged to increase at a rate not to exceed the legislatively approved annual cost-of-living adjustment for the department’s budget or as otherwise increased through the Budget Act. Existing law requires those fees to be deposited into the Dealers’ Record of Sale Special Account. Existing law, the Administrative Procedure Act, establishes the requirements for the adoption, publication, review, and implementation of regulations by state agencies. This bill would require that any person who, from January 1, 2001, to December 31, 2016, inclusive, lawfully possessed an assault weapon that does not have a fixed magazine, as defined, and including those weapons with an ammunition feeding device that can be removed readily from the firearm with the use of a tool, register the firearm with the Department of Justice before January 1, 2018, but not before the effective date of specified regulations. The bill would permit the department to increase the $20 registration fee as long as it does not exceed the reasonable processing costs of the department. The bill would also require registrations to be submitted electronically via the Internet utilizing a public-facing application made available by the department. The bill would require the registration to contain specified information, including, but not limited to, a description of the firearm that identifies it uniquely and specified information about the registrant. The bill would permit the department to charge a fee of up to $15 per person for registration through the Internet, not to exceed the reasonable processing costs of the department to be paid and deposited, as specified, for purposes of the registration program. The bill would require the department to adopt regulations for the purpose of implementing those provisions and would exempt those regulations from the Administrative Procedure Act. The bill would also make technical and conforming changes. (4) The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.

The Marijuana Policy Project, a grassroots organization supportive of marijuana legalization, has named Colorado Senate President John Morse as the worst state legislator with a stance on marijuana issues in the country. Morse was included on the list primarily due to his role in attempting to repeal Amendment 64 in the last few days of the 2013 legislative session. Amendment 64 was authorized via a statewide people’s ballot last year with a majority vote in all CO counties, and in May the Colorado legislature moved forward with a regulatory framework to support recreational sales. Morse has received considerable push-back from voters due to his stance on marijuana and other issues since the 2013 legislative session. Currently, over 10,000 petition signatures have been collected to support the recall, nearly 50% more than the required amount to initiate a recall. Next Tuesday, September 10th, voters will be given the opportunity to decide whether or not Morse and fellow anti-legalization legislator Senator Angel Giron will be allowed to maintain their office. Sen. Giron, of Pueblo County, was responsible for a separate anti-legalization bill, which would had criminalized marijuana if voters do not pass new taxes to support regulation.

Noah McCall (Albany Police Department Facebook page) Noah McCall (Albany Police Department Facebook page) Image 1 of / 3 Caption Close Partygoer accused of urinating on police officer 1 / 3 Back to Gallery Albany City police officers who went to the site of a loud party early Sunday said one of the partygoers urinated from a staircase onto an officer. At 3:20 a.m., officers went to 470 Hudson Ave., where they say several people inside and out were drinking alcohol and causing a disturbance. Noah McCall, 19, urinated on an officer, police said. McCall was charged with reckless assault, police said. A resident was found with metal knuckles, police said. Luca Quinn, a 19-year-old State University at Albany student, was charged with criminal possession of a weapon. Both men were arraigned in Albany City Court and released. Police also requested a building and codes inspection of the house. The inspection found the building to be unsafe and uninhabitable. Police were called to the home at least two other times in the last 15 months. At about 12:15 a.m. on Aug. 30, police received a report of a loud party and found a group of people drinking alcohol. Police noted safety hazards on that visit and requested a building and codes inspection. The site was deemed uninhabitable. On 1:15 a.m. Nov. 9, 2012, police found 14 people in the basement for what appeared to be an initiation for membership in a group or fraternity. Officers said they saw several people face down on the basement floor with their faces submerged in water. They were being struck with wooden paddles and rubber hoses while being told to "beg for mercy" and having cold water from a garden hose sprayed on their heads. Nine people were arrested on charges of hazing, criminal nuisance, unlawful assembly, obstruction of governmental administration and resisting arrest.

To many parents, it may be confirmation of something they have long suspected. A new study suggests that children pose a greater distraction to drivers than using a mobile telephone at the wheel. The research involved an analysis of 12 families over a period of three weeks, in which all their car journeys were monitored by four cameras installed in their vehicle. The families taking part had an average of two children, between 1-8 years of age. In total, 92 trips were analysed by the researchers, looking for any evidence of potentially distracting activity undertaken by the driver, such as looking away from the road for more than two seconds. In 90 of the 92 trips studied, the team detected distracting activity on the part of the motorist, with the average parent taking their eyes off the road for three minutes and 22 seconds, during a 16 minute trip. The video recordings showed that children travelling in the rear seats accounted for 12 per cent of all potentially distracting activity, compared to mobile phones, which were responsible for one per cent. Fathers were more likely to engage in distracting activities with their children and were distracted for longer periods than their mothers. The most frequent types of distractions included turning to look at the child in the rear seat or watching them in a rear-view mirror (76.4 per cent), engaging in conversation with the child (16 per cent), assisting the child in some way, such as handing them food or drinks, (seven per cent) or playing with the child (1 per cent). The study found that the presence of a front seat passenger did not significantly affect the way in which drivers engaged in potentially distracting child-related activities. The research was conducted by the Monash University Accident Research Centre, in Melbourne, Australia, where rules regarding the use of mobile phones while driving are similar to those in the UK, with hands free phones permitted. The team say the results suggest that children are 12 times more distracting to motorists than talking on a mobile phone. Dr Judith Charlton, an associate director of the centre, said: “The costs of distracted driving are undeniable. One major and previously unrecognised distraction is kids in the back seat.” The research comes just days after Brake, the road safety campaigners, supported by the Association of Chief Police Officers, called for tougher rules on mobile phones in cars, with a ban on hands-free devices, as well as hand-held ones. The charity also called for the penalty for calling or texting behind the wheel to be increased from £100 to somewhere between £500 and £1,000. But Dr Charlton suggested that while the risks of distraction during driving are becoming increasingly well known, motorists often overlooked children as a source of the problem. She added that her research indicated there was a need for more education on the issue. Her team have now launched a larger study, involving 50 families. The research comes just months after Norland College, the British nanny school, was involved in the launch of Nanny Drive iQ, a specialist driving school to teach childcare professionals techniques about driving with children. Sarah Rowley, from the driving school, said: “Parents expect those who care for their children to have relevant qualifications, but often let a carer or nanny drive off with their children without knowing how skilled and confident they are behind the wheel.”

Hannity: GOP's Failure 'Pushed Trump Into Arms of Chuck & Nancy' Tucker: Trump Signing Dems' DACA Deal Would Be 'Massive Amnesty,' 'Collapse' of GOP President Donald Trump has been criticized by some on the right for striking a deal with Democrats on raising the debt ceiling and then meeting with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) to discuss a plan to preserve the DACA program while increasing border security. On "Fox & Friends," former White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said Trump made it clear during the campaign that he's a deal-maker and he's going to do what's in the best interests of the U.S. "I think Washington needs to wake up and understand that this is a guy who is going to make the best deal for the country when he can," Spicer said. "If that's with Republicans, it's going to be with Republicans. If that's with Democrats, it's going to be with Democrats. If that's with a bipartisan group of individuals, it'll be them." He said that Trump has a big heart and wants to find a way to protect so-called "Dreamers" from deportation, but he also knows the importance of border security and is committed to building a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. "So like it or not, I don't see how you get a deal done that doesn't include the wall, because that's been a major priority of this president," Spicer said. "When you see what the final product is, I guarantee it's going to be on Donald Trump's terms." Watch more above. Coulter: 'If We're Not Getting a Wall, I'd Prefer President Pence' Tomi Lahren: 'ESPN Values Diversity, But Maybe Not Diversity of Opinion' Gorka: Trump Won on 'Make America Great Again,' Not 'Make the GOP Great Again'

Doug, Mr. Hennigan & Chaille discuss starting a Bisbee gossip column, Bingo's new book, Doug's dad on tour and a couple of travel tips. Hey, they all can't be gems. Recorded Oct 10th, 2017 at the FunHouse in Bisbee, AZ with Doug Stanhope (@DougStanhope), Brian Hennigan (@MrHennigan), & Ggreg Chaille (@gregchaille). Produced & Edited by Chaille. Pre-Order a SIGNED copy of Doug's NEW book, " This Is Not Fame: A "From What I Re-Memoir"" at - http://bit.ly/2z4dmBg This episode is sponsored by BlueApron.com - Get $30 OFF YOUR FIRST MEAL - WITH FREE SHIPPING - by going to BlueApron.com/STANHOPE DRAFT.com – New players get a FREE entry into a draft when you make your first deposit! Use promo code DOUG and play a real money game for FREE! ALL THINGS COMEDY Comedy Festival (OCT 26-29) presents The Doug Stanhope Podcast LIVE with Doug Stanhope, Chad Shank, Greg Chaille and Special Guests @ The Orpheum Theater Thu - 10/26 8:00pm in Phoenix, AZ. Tickets at https://phoenix.ticketforce.com/eventperformances.asp?evt=371 More Stanhope 2017 Tour Dates at http://www.dougstanhope.com/tour-dates/. Get on the Mailing List. LINKS: Amy Dresner's book,“My Fair Junkie” - http://amzn.to/2gBVaZ9 Justin's Peanut Butter Packs - http://amzn.to/2zk0fNr Chad Shank Voice Over info at AudioShank.com Support the Innocence Project - http://www.innocenceproject.org/ The comedy clip is from Todd Barry's DVD “From Heaven” (2008 Comedy Central Records) and is available on Amazon.com - http://amzn.to/2xBXb1Y

Oh, space. You're so hard to explore. Sometimes you bombard spacecrafts with hurtling rocks and deadly cosmic rays, and other times you're so empty you don't give astronauts a darn thing to hold on to. But while scientists haven't quite figured out how to keep radiation at bay, the scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory—specifically, its Planetary Robotics Laboratory—are building machines that can get a grip on the most difficult surfaces astronauts will find out there. Adhesion-wise, space presents a couple problems. First, robots typically struggle with uneven surfaces, let alone the kind of cliffs and crags you see on Mars. Second, space is kind of gravity challenged. "Out in zero gravity, even pushing tape against surfaces is difficult," say Jaakko Karras, a robotics electrical engineer at JPL. Without gravity to anchor your feet to the ground, it's easy to run afoul of Newton's third law. (For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. So you'll be pushed away from the wall with the same amount of force you applied to it. Physics!) And that's not just a problem in microgravity. Low gravity environments, like asteroids or comets, can be uncooperative too. (Just ask the European Space Agency's Philae lander.) "If you got out there and wanted to do some sort of sampling and just started drilling, you’re more likely to spin about the drill bit than the drill bit into the surface," Karras says. So what's a robot to do? "Nature solves the problems around us all the time," says Karras. "A fairly common path for us is the biomimicry approach." When Karras and his team would test climbing robots out on vertical rock walls, lizards would blaze right past them. But rather than getting annoyed at the speedy little reptiles, Karras decided to take his cues from evolution instead. His team's adhesive makes use of van der Waals forces, which geckos use to climb smooth surfaces. For bumpy ones, his team built claw-inspired microspine grippers that can bend and flex. (You can see them in action in the video up top.) Both gecko adhesive and microspine grippers are well on their way to scoring a ticket to deep space. Gecko adhesive is already being tested on the International Space Station. Right now, astronauts are using it to anchor things to interior panels, but NASA is considering using it as a replacement for Velcro, which kicks off a lot of dust and bristles—particulates aren't all that welcome in the fragile environment of the ISS. And microspines are a crucial part of NASA's asteroid redirect mission: The little spikes will cover robotic arms used to snatch up an asteroid's boulder and deposit it in orbit around our moon. Karras also hopes that future missions will use microspines' vertical climbing skills to explore Mars' caves and lava tubes. "They haven't been explored yet because they're difficult from a mobility standpoint," Karras says. "But they may once have been collection points for liquid water, and they're sheltered, low-radiation areas. They're of interest for investigating the possibility of past and present life." So if we find any Martians in the next couple of decades, you have lizards to thank.

HANOI (Reuters) - Abuses by Vietnam’s powerful police force are occurring at an alarming rate, a rights group said on Tuesday, and it urged the government to rein in offenders and create agencies to investigate complaints of beatings, torture and killings. Tracking four years of alleged abuse of suspects in custody, the New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Vietnam’s Communist government needed to recognize the scale of the problem and urgently initiate police reforms. “What we have uncovered is a human rights crisis in the daily operations of the Vietnam police,” Phil Robertson, HRW’s deputy Asia director, told a news conference in Bangkok. “We’re convinced that what we’re presenting today is the tip of a much larger iceberg,” Robertson said, according to a transcript provided by HRW. The group said many victims of police brutality were accused only of minor crimes like speeding or petty theft. It cited 14 deaths in custody - four unexplained, six alleged suicides and four from illness - and documented 31 cases of police beatings, among whose victims were eight children. Robertson said the report was far from a quantitative survey and “more a snapshot of a serious situation”. The rights group did not interview witnesses or suspects itself for fear it could put them in danger. It drew largely on what it described as patchy coverage of the issue in by Vietnam’s state-controlled media and from bloggers keen to document cases of police brutality. Reforming the police force could, however, be a tall order in Vietnam. The force is overseen by the Ministry of Public Security, which has a big stake in politics and numerous areas of society and administration. Several ministers, current and former, are politburo members and the remit of the ministry is far-reaching. “STRONG COMMITMENT” The rights group recommended that the government establish an independent police complaints commission, local-level internal affairs units, a tracking system to address allegations of abuse and ensure interrogations of suspects were videotaped. Vietnam’s government rejected what it said were “false allegations” in the report, citing its signing of the U.N. treaty against torture and inhumane acts as evidence of strong commitment to preventing abuses of suspects in police custody. “Every act of torture and corporal punishment during investigation and trial processes will be strictly handled in accordance with Vietnamese law,” deputy Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Tran Thi Bich, said in a statement. Minister of Public Security Tran Dai Quang last week said during a hearing of the justice committee of Vietnam’s parliament that action was being taken against policemen accused of abuses and cases had risen from 2011 to the end of last year. Quang said that of the 828 police accused of “infringing upon judicial activities”, 23 were charged with using corporal punishment. Quang did not disclose if any had been jailed. Robertson described the hearing as remarkable but said far more needed to be done. “For now, it’s clear that the Vietnam police are mostly getting away with these abuses,” he said.

Germany coach Joachim Low will explore his options against Azerbaijan as he attempts to identify a pecking order behind injured goalkeeper Manuel Neuer. The world champions secured their place at Russia 2018 with a 3-1 win away to Northern Ireland on Thursday, extending their 100 per cent record in qualifying to nine matches. But their preparations suffered a setback with news that Neuer could be sidelined for a further six months due to a metatarsal injury. Barcelona shot-stopper Marc-Andre ter Stegen is the current replacement, but Bayer Leverkusen's Bernd Leno will be given another chance to impress on Sunday after an underwhelming display against Australia at the Confederations Cup. "When Neuer is fit, he starts. We must see how [his injury] develops," Low said at his pre-match press conference. "Marc-Andre has shown himself to be very capable. He has developed well with us. "If you can speak of a goalkeeper behind Manuel Neuer, it is Marc-Andre ter Stegen. We also have confidence in him, just as in Bernd Leno and Kevin Trapp." Low also confirmed the in-form Leroy Sane will earn his eighth international cap at the Fritz-Walter Stadion and will be joined in the starting XI by Liverpool midfielder Emre Can. Manchester City attacker Sane, a member of Germany's Euro 2016 squad, pulled out of the Confederations Cup to undergo nasal surgery.

Tricks of the trade: The world's best make-up artists reveal their secrets From primer to eyeshadow, these are the products we use every day - but do we know how to use them? We asked international make-up artists Laura Mercier, Jackie Tyson and Gucci Westman to give us their inside tips. Laura is known for her successful make-up range - her primer is a beauty icon. Gucci is a New York-based celebrity make-up artist who works with all the stars, including Demi Moore and Jennifer Garner. And Jackie is the make-up artist on The X Factor and Britain's Got Talent. Here, they select the products we really need and give their differing views on how to use them... Debating the truth: Make-up artists Laura Mercier (left), Gucci Westman (centre), and Jackie Tyson (right) Should you apply primer on top of freshly cleansed skin or on top of moisturiser? LAURA: Primer is a protective layer that seals in moisturiser and provides a smooth surface for foundation. If you have an oily complexion, you may feel that the primer without moisturiser is enough. GUCCI: My routine is more about colour- correcting, treating and highlighting the skin. A product that gives you an immaculate canvas is a pore minimiser, which would be my equivalent to a primer. I use it only around the T-zone, where pores need to be made to look smooth and match the rest of the skin. Apply after moisturiser, and before you apply your foundation. JACKIE: A primer provides a base for your foundation, which will ensure it will stay put longer, but will also help give the illusion of flawless, radiant skin. Try Avon MagiX Face Perfector, £7 (avonshop. co.uk) or Beauty Flash Balm by Clarins, £26.50 (from Boots), which is a cult classic. The X Factor: Jackie Tyson cannot live without her eyelash curlers and disposable mascara wands Which make-up tools can’t you live without? LAURA: My camouflage brush to apply concealer - it allows me to pinpoint areas where I need more coverage. GUCCI: My sponges - they are amazingly soft. JACKIE: My Shu Uemura Eyelash Curlers, £19.50 (020 240 7635). I also get through lots of disposable mascara wands - £6.25 for a set of nine (thepromakeupshop.com). Professional tools: Invest in a set of brushes to get that flawless finish What’s the best way to apply foundation to get a smooth, even coverage? LAURA: Fingers for a cream foundation, a sponge for liquids and a brush for mineral powder. GUCCI: Using a brush, start from under the eyes working out and up. Then apply highlighter to cheekbones, bridge of the nose and cupid's bow, pat it in with your fingers, and smooth out with a brush. Revlon brushes from £6.99 (Superdrug). JACKIE: Use foundation only where you need it: around the eyes, nose and mouth. Blend well with a brush or fingers. How can you get a lovely, healthy glow using bronzer without looking unnatural? LAURA: Never overload your brush, and match texture to texture. A cream or gel is perfect over liquid foundation, for example. If you don't want a powdery look, use a blusher with a hint of pearl to lift the texture and add a glow. GUCCI: For mature skin, the more cream textures you can use, the better. Avoid powders as much as possible. It's easy to get a natural look with blusher - it's all in the blending. After applying cream or powder blush, simply dust over the area with a clean powder brush. JACKIE: Avoid powder bronzers for a more mature skin. POP Beauty has a fabulously easy-to-apply cheek stain called Apples Of The Cheeks, £12 (popbeauty.co.uk), that looks great on any skin tone and can be applied with fingertips. Break out of your eyeshadow rut: Bellapierre has a good range of shimmer powders How can you break out of a colour rut with eye shadow? LAURA: Seek the advice of an in-store make-up artist - they'll give an objective opinion. When applying eye shadow, use a little at a time; it's easier to add more than take some off. GUCCI: Go for a eye make-up palette that combines a few of your safer, familiar tones with a range of new colours. JACKIE: Try to complement your outfit with make-up rather than match it. Bella Pierre has a good range of shimmer powders - individual pots cost £12.99 or a stack of nine is £59.99 (bellapierre.co.uk). Can you define your mouth and get long-lasting colour that doesn't look too fake? LAURA: Apply lipstick by dabbing with your finger to create the shape. The colour will look far more natural, and the pressing action will grind its pigment onto your lips. GUCCI: Apply lip colour using your fingers, pat it on and clean up the edges with a small concealer brush. Revlon's new Colorburst lipstick, £7.99 (Superdrug and Boots) has a great lip balm feeling and provides a huge amount of colour. JACKIE: Colour is best applied sparingly over the top of a good lip primer to fill in fine lines around the lip line. Blend gently with the ring finger. When buying lipstick, get exactly the same colour lip liner. After applying a primer, such as Elizabeth Arden Advanced Lip-Fix Cream, £18 (Boots and department stores; 020 7574 2714 for stockists), apply the liner all over the lips to provide a colour base and give the lipstick something to cling to. Blot with a tissue and repeat two to three times for extralasting power. Bobbi Brown's Lip Liner pencils, £14 (bobbibrown. co.uk), are long-lasting and the shades are all wearable. After applying, blend gently with the fingertips to remove any excess colour. Nearly here: Yes To Tomatoes Totally Tranquil Facial Hydrating Lotion, £11.99, victoriahealth.com COMING SOON… Tomatoes in your face cream The Yes To Tomatoes range is rich in vitamin C and lypocene. Totally Tranquil Facial Hydrating Lotion, £11.99 (victoriahealth.com) combines 26 minerals from the Dead Sea with tomatoes, rosemary and red pepper. Nivea's Protect & Bronze, £12.55 (nivea.co.uk) is a dual-purpose suncream that protects the skin and enhances tanning. It uses a plant extract called GA that helps increase the skin's melanin production. Benefit Confessions Of A Concealaholic, £28.50 (benefitcosmetics. co.uk) has everything to hide blemishes in one handy kit, including eyelid brightener, primer and concealer brushes. WE LOVE... For anyone who's ever had a disastrous home hair colour, Colour B4, £9.99, Boots, is a must. Britain's first home hair colour remover erases blunders with one application. Launched in association with hair, image and style expert Scott Cornwall, Colour B4 is available in regular (to reverse an undesirable hair colour) and extra strength (for hair with multiple colour applications). Pedicure perfect: Comfys have been designed to stretch, flex and rejuvenate your feet HEAD TO THE BEECH! These sandals may look scary, but are as comfy as slippers. There are four toe separators that flex and rejuvenate your feet. Beauty addicts have discovered that they're the perfect footwear for polished toes after pedicures. Available in leather or velour. Beech Sandals, £29 (victoriahealth.com). WHERE CAN I FIND... ULTRAGLOW? Created in the Seventies, Ultraglow was a must-have, along with shaggy perms and Sun-In hair lightener. But the product was wise before its time because it contained minerals long before the rest of the cosmetics world had realised their benefits. Wise before its time: Ultraglow Mineral Shimmer Powders, £4.21 (ultraglowshop.co.uk) The original formula hasn't changed, but it now comes with a Kabuki brush for application, and is available in loose or pressed textured. Complexsun is a matte version with a four-star UV rating. The famous Ultraglow Magic Lips, £20.42, are also still around (remember the lip stains that came in black, red and green and changed to your personal shade of pink when applied?) and sell like hot cakes on the internet. And there's also a great range of Ultraglow Mineral Shimmer Powders, £4.21, and a Magic Mascara, £9.95, which gives impressive coverage. Ultraglow Original Pressed Bronzing Powder, £15.99 (ultra glowshop.co.uk).

Okay, are y’all ready for the longest sex question I’ve ever answered? Because this one’s a doozy. Normally we edit the questions down to a nice size, but there’s a lot going on here and I think all of it’s valuable. So we’re publishing most of this question, almost intact: I have been in a relationship with a bisexual girl for more than 10 months. We have a pretty okay relationship, we have our strong differences but there are things about her that I do adore. However, we are having some bedroom issues. In February 2013, she went for an operation to remove a couple of cysts in her womb and she has been put on the mini-pill ever since. And since after that, our sex life has gone from hero to zero. We have had many chats (both peaceful and heated) about the lack thereof and she has said on many occasions that she will decide when we have sex. She said it’s her body and she has a right to decide what someone else can do with it. I definitely have a higher libido than she does and here, I’m not sure if it is because she has had sex with men or women (I’m not her first girl) who have been demanding and have forced themselves on her. But all this is making me afraid to initiate sex in fear of rejection and yet I feel that it’s unfair that sex should solely be on her terms. She sees penetration as an “invasion” of her body and it is getting increasingly frustrating for me. I do not want to jeopardize the relationship—I know sex isn’t everything but I don’t feel the intimacy with her. She says that I always want instant gratification that I get from sex and I always want it when I want it, which is not true. It seems that she only wants sex when she’s drunk or when she feels like it. Please help. I don’t know what else to do. Alrighty, dear reader. This is going to be a multipart opus, because you’ve actually asked a lot of questions here, not just one. I want to start, though, by commending you for not calling this lesbian bed death. I feel like that term gets bandied about a lot and it implies that a difference in libido is somehow a lesbian-specific phenomenon. It’s not. Any couple, no matter how they identify, can face this issue. So now let’s start by picking apart these questions, one by one, and see if we can’t unwind this tangled ball of string into a more manageable spool. Medications Make A Difference You’ve acknowledged that there might be an external cause for the gap between your libidos. Medication, hormones, stress—these are all things that can make a difference in one’s desire to have sex. So it could be that this is a storm that you can weather—is she on this medication temporarily? Or it could be that she’s on the wrong medication for her. I don’t know enough about her medical condition (or about medical conditions in general) to tell you if that’s the case, but it’s something about which she can certainly talk to her doctor. However, some medications are long-term and have unavoidable libido side-effects—which might mean that this is the new normal. So what could that mean for you? Her Body Is, In Fact, Hers She says that her body is hers and she can decide who does what with it when, and that’s 100% correct. Even in your horniest state, it would be super ultra mega no-good to pressure her into having sex. Remember that consent counts only when it’s enthusiastic. You have the right to pursue a sexually fulfilling relationship, but that doesn’t mean that your girlfriend is personally obligated to sexually fulfill you even when she doesn’t want to. But there is another side to that equation—your body is yours, and you are allowed to want things done to it. And you’re allowed to seek out those things. It’s normal and wonderful to want sex and to seek it out. So let’s talk about the ways you can do that within the parameters you’ve described. The Price Of Admission Before everyone gets on my case for using an idea that Dan Savage popularized, let me be clear. Dan Savage has said some VERY problematic things in his career, as many have. But he has helped normalize talking about sex and has contributed to the culture of being open and honest about our wants and needs. And this particular idea of his, despite so many problems with his other ideas, is a real winner. Basically, think of your partner as a ride (while still thinking of them as a person! I’m not suggesting you objectify your partner!). There is a price you pay to ride the ride, and that price is often a compromise. I’ll give you an example from my own life: my girlfriend is wicked smart. Like, the kind of smart you cannot even believe exists. But she does have this weakness. And that weakness is Say Yes To The Dress. Sure, most of the time we’re watching thought-provoking documentaries or really excellent foreign films or any number of other things that are WAY MORE INTELLIGENT than Say Yes To The Dress. But the price of admission for my girlfriend is that sometimes we are gonna marathon this show and there’s nothing I can do about it. If there is a Say Yes To The F*cking Dress marathon, that is what we are watching. Instead of fighting against it, I go with it and we have fun critiquing the wedding industrial complex together. I’ve even come to grudgingly love it and find my inner Monte. (My girlfriend’s note here: YOU DID NOT SPECIFY SAY YES TO THE DRESS ATLANTA! SAY ATLANTA! I HAVE MY STANDARDS.) You can apply this idea to sex as well. I’ll give you another example from my own life: I cannot keep my mouth shut during sex. I dunno, I just let forth a torrent of filthy talk every time I get naked. That’s the price of admission for me—I don’t necessarily need someone to reciprocate it, I just need someone who’s okay with me doing that. Because I like it and I really don’t want to not do it. Sometimes price of admission can change — it sounds like her boundaries about sex and penetration might be more recent, and may not have been there when you began this relationship, but that doesn’t make them less valid. In your case, it sounds like you both have different prices of admission when it comes to having sex at all. Your price of admission is frequent sex. Her price of admission is no penetration, or only when she’s completely into it. Thus the apparent libido gap. Which brings me to my next point: Sex Can Be More Than Penetration… In your question, you state “she sees penetration as an ‘invasion’ of her body.” But if penetration is your criterion for sex, I’d challenge you to broaden your definition. Sex is a huge category that covers a bunch of different acts. Here are a few suggestions for things that could be considered sex that are not you penetrating her. Using a vibrator on her. Her using a vibrator on you. Mutual masturbation! Non-mutual masturbation/watching each other masturbate! Her penetrating you (fingers, dildo, back door or front door if ya catch my drift). Oral sex! BDSM acts without penetration. (Yes, you can just flog someone and leave it there! Totally a thing!) And much much more! Whenever someone, a couple of someones, or multiple someones talk to me about a perceived libido gap, I always have to check and make sure they’re on the same page when it comes to defining sex for themselves as an individual, couple or group. Everyone has certain things they’re into, and when you’re having sex with someone else, you’re going to do the things that you’re both into, the acts where your interests intersect. Think of it as a Venn diagram. It could be you’re both thinking you’ve got a huge libido gap because you’re both defining sex as acts totally on the opposite sides of your circles, but actually there are certain things you’re both into doing together that fall smack in the middle and are totally still sex acts. The only way to find out about that is to talk about it. For a more complete list of sex acts to peruse, I recommend this list on Scarleteen (yes, yes, I know, I am always talking about it, but that’s because the yes/no/maybe list is so good!) or this (admittedly a bit cheesy) interactive sex questionnaire. Your libido gap may not be as large as you think, you might just be looking in the wrong place on the diagram. Or you discover that no, in fact, your libido gap (the difference between your respective prices of sexytime admission) is exactly as large as you think it is and it is truly a difference in how often you want to be having the sex in the intersection. You still have other options. …And Relationships Can Be More Than Monogamous Another valid way of addressing a libido gap is to consider sleeping with other people. If you’re both into it and you want to keep the non-sexual parts of your relationship going, you can always negotiate a less traditional relationship structure. You know, one that allows you to take your yayas outside the two of you and get your rocks off with someone else. Or many someone elses. Now there’s a bit of a misconception I hear often—a non-monogamous relationship doesn’t mean you both have to be sleeping with other people to make it equal. It sounds like that wouldn’t be really happening for her if you all decide to go this route. No, what makes this kind of relationship egalitarian is that both partners’ needs are being met and both of you are happy. That means that, if you both agree on it, you could sleep with other people and she could sleep only with you, when she feels like it. Totally cool. Or perhaps she really likes her nonsexual relationship with you, but would like to also have a sexual relationship with someone else. Or! Maybe she finds that her libido increases when she gets her yayas yaya-ed by someone else and you are also bumping hoo-has with another human and then you come together for a sextravaganza. Some couples find that INCREDIBLY SEXY! Or! OR! She might want to watch you fuck someone else. Some couples find THAT incredibly sexy. The point is that there are options for bridging a libido gap. And those options can safely and respectfully include non-monogamy. For more thoughts on this subject, I highly recommend The Ethical Slut by Dossie Easton and Janet W. Hardy and Opening Up: A Guide to Creating and Sustaining Open Relationships by Tristan Taormino. Regardless of what you decide, you should still feel okay talking about sex with your partner and asking for sex from your partner (if you both agree that you still wanna be having sex). So— There Are Ways of Bringing Up Sex Without Pressure I’ve actually written about this before, but let me do a reader’s digest version. Always talk about sex at a time and in a place where you’re not having sex, or intending to immediately have sex after the conversation. Noisy coffee shops are my favorite. Driving in the car is my second favorite, though some have told me that location doesn’t work for them because it distracts them from driving. Regardless, pick a place that your partner won’t feel like you’re pressuring her to have sex right this second. Ask permission to talk about sex and give that other person a chance to reschedule the conversation. If they say they don’t want to talk about it right now, say something along the lines of “that’s totally cool, no pressure. But this is a really important conversation to me. Can we work out another time to talk about it?” Assume positive intent. Assume your girlfriend wants to make you happy. Assume that she is not mismatching y’all’s libidos on purpose. Because unless you’re dating a mustache-twirling cartoon villain, she’s not. If you are dating a mustache- twirling cartoon villain, pics please. Be prepared to compromise on one of those above solutions. Be prepared to make an actual change in the way you’re doing things, and not expecting her to be the only one changing. And I’m going to add another bullet point here, specific to you. Your partner seems to be not super into the way you’ve asked for sex in the past. So make sure to include this question: “How would you prefer me to express my want for sex in the future?” And again, really listen to what she says here, and be prepared to do what she asks. Always Be Masturbating Well, not always. You’ve got to eat, sleep and go to work. But yeah, masturbation is included in every You Need Help I answer because it’s important. And in this case, it can be an important tool for filling the libido gap with some spectacular orgasms. It can also be a sex initiator—many people get turned on when their partner starts touching themselves, and not wanting sex can turn into wanting sex totally organically. However. May I speak frankly? I generally try not to give really specific advice because even though I answer the You Need Helps on Autostraddle sometimes, my relationship isn’t your relationship and the way I have sex isn’t the way you have sex. Things are different for everyone. But I want to point out a few things I read in your question: “I have been in a relationship with a bisexual girl for more than 10 months. We have a pretty okay relationship, we have our strong differences but there are things about her that I do adore.” “I do not want to jeopardize the relationship—I know sex isn’t everything but I don’t feel the intimacy with her.” First off, you’ve only been in a relationship with this woman ballpark ten months. That’s not a very long time and already you’re experiencing problems—I want you to think about spending the next year this way. How about the next five? You also describe the relationship as only “pretty okay” and you don’t say you adore her, but rather you say there are things about her that you do adore. That sounds like a pretty ambivalent way to talk about what should be a fairly new relationship. It sounds like you’re compromising pretty hard here, and not just in the bedroom but outside it as well. You also state that it’s not really about the sex, it’s about the intimacy that you’re not feeling. Which brings up yet another reason for a libido gap: that there are deeper problems with the relationship. Problems like not truly having feelings for each other, or not trusting each other. Or perhaps more personal problems for one or both of you (think depression or anxiety). And it’s these issues that are the problem—the mismatched libido is merely a symptom, not the cause. It’s up to you whether or not you want to work through those problems. But I need to be honest with you—if I were in the relationship that you have described here, I would end the relationship. I would be breaking up with my partner. Which brings me to my last point. Sometimes a libido gap isn’t a libido gap. It’s just a gap, plain and simple. An everything gap. And that gap can be too big to bridge. We need to reframe breaking up in our community—everyone talks about it like the worst thing that could happen to a relationship. It can actually be the best thing. It means both of you get to be honest about what you’re truly feeling, instead of keeping up a charade and wasting time y’all could be out courting people who are fulfilling your needs. It could mean that you remain friends because you haven’t ventured into the place where your relationship (not the romantic kind) is irreparable. It could mean that you never speak to each other again, and that’s okay too! But whatever the case, we don’t have to look at it as a thing that has to get ugly. Or a moment that has to be entirely sad. Endings are beginnings too, and I recommend you end this era and begin something new and different. Good luck, dear reader. I’m rooting for both of you.

A number of the recent improvements made to Dropbox have focused around greater integration with Microsoft Office. The companies announced a partnership last fall, and you can now do things like open Office files in your Dropbox directly in Office Online, with changes being automatically synced back to the original file through Dropbox. Today, yet another new Office-related feature is being announced: the Dropbox app for iOS will soon let you create Office documents right inside it, without having to jump to another app. Presumably, the files are then saved to your Dropbox folder and can be accessed through Office Online or the traditional desktop apps. We haven't had a chance to try it out yet and see if it truly offers the same features you'd find creating files through Microsoft's apps, but it's certainly an intriguing way for Dropbox to take on the Google Drive / Docs combo. Dropbox says the feature will be available "later this month." Office document creation is the standout new feature here Dropbox is also building on the commenting feature added last week. The feature lets users leave remarks on shared files that all other collaborators could see; you can now make and view those comments in the iOS app as well as through the web. Today's update also includes a slight navigation change. Rather than seeing simply an alphabetical list of your files and folders, the default Dropbox app view will instead show your most recently used files — that's anything you've uploaded, viewed, renamed, or edited on any device. While all these features are useful enough, the most intriguing feature here is definitely the upcoming Office document creation — we'll be keeping our eyes peeled to see exactly how that works. Update, May 5th 11:34 AM ET: This article has been updated to reflect that comments are now available on iOS as well as the web.

A Texas woman has filed a lawsuit against three police officers in Victoria, claiming that they brutally beat her and broke her ribs without a good reason. Mary Frances Jones told the Victoria Advocate that the three police officers woke her up early in the morning on Dec. 22, 2013 over reports that a truck that she had purchased the day before had been seen driving in a local creek. Jones said that she had been unaware at the time that her sons borrowed the truck while she was sleeping. After officers claimed that she was lying about owning the truck, Jones said she tried to go back inside her home, and that’s when they forced her to the ground. “One of them had his foot on my arm, and the other kicked me and broke my ribs,” she recalled. “They hurt me. They hurt me bad, and they know they did.” According to Jones, she had to plead no contest to a charge of disorderly conduct-vulgar language so that she could go to the hospital. Her fiance, 50-year-old Mathew Milberger and two sons, William and Danny Wallace, were also arrested and charged with disorderly conduct-vulgar language. A police report filed by Officer D. Stone accused Jones and her family of yelling, “F*ck the police, f*ck yall, and various other profanities.” The report noted that Jones’ son was shocked with a Taser, but it did not mention that she suffered broken ribs, black eyes and other injuries. Jones said the broken ribs eventually resulted in pneumonia, which left her on a ventilator. In all, she had been in the hospital six times because of the beating, she said. Attorney Christopher J. Gale, who filed the lawsuit on behalf of Jones, said that police had made her pay for showing “disrespect.” “I think the police, while they’re trained in the concepts of law enforcement, they are not trained in regards to the application of them,” Gale explained. “When you express your opinion in any form or fashion with any kind of words and walk away from them, that’s a sign of disrespect.” “It’s completely and utterly constitutional to walk away from somebody,” he added. “They’re just going to make you pay the price. That’s concerning. This is not a police state.” The lawsuit accuses the officers of false arrest and imprisonment. And it asserts that Jones’ constitutional rights were violated because officers went beyond the “reasonableness” standard set by the Fourth Amendment. Jones is seeking $1 million in damages. The Texas Rangers recently launched an investigation after another officer with the Victoria Police Department used a Taser on a 76-year-old man while he was already on the ground.

LANSING, MI -- Enbridge directors say there are no areas where bare Line 5 metal is exposed to Great Lakes water but admitted during a Michigan Pipeline Safety Advisory Board meeting the outer coating layer has failed in places and the company doesn't usually repair that kind of protection system. Kurt Baraniecki, Enbridge director of pipeline integrity, told the state board on Monday, March 13 that anticorrosion protections on the controversial pipeline under the Straits of Mackinac are "working as designed," but there are 18 places where there is coating " ." Baraniecki said a federal work plan incorrectly identified the delamination spots along the pipeline as "holidays," where the multi-layered coating has been completely lost and bare pipe metal is exposed. Baraniecki said "the consultants had generalized this" language in a to assess the impact of invasive quagga and zebra mussels on the twin underwater pipeline segment, a required part of a civil Enbridge reached with the U.S. Justice Department last year following the 2010 Kalamazoo River oil spill. "These are locations we've identified that could potentially have coating holidays," he said. Divers "are going to each of those locations to take samples of the biota and visually inspect the coating to see if it is still intact." He said Enbridge is "confident it is still intact" because of constant monitoring. Baraniecki's presentation was the main event at a rowdy pipeline board meeting on Monday that featured several busloads of protestors who packed the hearing room at the Michigan Public Service Commission building on W. Saginaw Highway. Security estimated there were about 260 attending, not including media, board members and state staff. Board co-chair Valerie Brader admonished the hostile audience several times during Baraniecki's presentation, reminding them that shouted questions, jeers and other interruptions only ate time away from the public comment period. At one point, a Petoskey man and his grandson sitting in the front row briefly left the meeting for the bathroom, where they undressed and coated themselves in chocolate cake batter to make a visual statement about the threat of a spill. Man and grandson cover themselves in cake batter at rowdy Line 5 meeting "We wanted show you what the birds will look like... if the line breaks." The packed meeting followed confusion related to Enbridge's biota investigation plan, which pipeline board member Jennifer McKay of the Tip of the Mitt Watershed Council stumbled across on the company website in February. The plan with the pipeline board because it referred to numerous holidays in the pipeline coating that had been identified during a June 2016 inspection of the pipeline. Enbridge called the holidays " ," but agreed to give a detailed presentation. In a March 8 letter, Attorney General Bill Schuette, Department of Natural Resources director Keith Creagh and Department of Environmental Quality director Heidi Grether called Enbridge's characterization of the holidays as merely hypothetical "confusing in light of the terms of the plan itself," which clearly identified them in maps and diagrams. Using a series of slides, Baraniecki said the pipeline has a coal tar enamel coating layer under two layers of outer fiberglass wrap, and cathodic protection inspections show the enamel layer is "still intact," although photographs show the outer wrap layer is missing, or "delaminated," in spots. He said a consultant that created the biota work plan, Gulf Interstate Engineering (GIE), used data from Ballard Marine and identified places where they believed bare pipe was exposed to the water, but Enbridge concluded it was a "mistake." Enbridge director of pipeline integrity Kurt Baraniecki explains why Line 5 has delaminated outer coating during the Michigan Pipeline Safety Advisory Board meeting on March 13. He said in-line inspection tools have not detected any holidays, but the delamination areas were discovered by visual inspection last year. "We're not certain what is causing the delamination" but they hope to figure that out. This year, Enbridge plans to hydrostatic test the original pipeline pressure used in 1953 when the line was installed to demonstrate the lines are as "good as they were when they were brand new." The maximum pressure allowed on the line is 600 pounds-per-square-inch and Baraniecki said the company will test the line at double that level. As part of the biota survey, divers will look at delamination areas and "if there are holidays, we will assess whether we need to do any repairs." Baraniecki said the purpose of the outer layers is to protect the pipe during construction and to prevent abrasion from soil or sediment during the line's lifespan, so it being compromised shouldn't diminish the coating system. "The outer wrap is not something we'd typically repair." That statement got the attention of Michigan State Police Captain Chris Kelenske, the state's emergency management coordinator. "If the outer wrap was necessary when it was put in, why would we not repair it, regardless of whatever the testing is?" he asked. Brad Shamla, Enbridge vice president of U.S. operations, jumped in. "We don't believe that going in and doing a repair is going to change the corrosion protections at all, but it's certainly something to look at," Shamla said, adding that the delamination spots amounted to "less than 0.1 percent of the system." Kelenske replied that, "from where I sit, any percent above zero is not good." Enbridge Line 5 may be 'one peak current event' from failure, says scientist Meanwhile, state officials seek info about 'hypothetical' defects in pipeline coating. After the meeting, McKay said the presentation left her with more questions. "I think Enbridge needs to do a full analysis on the coating and look at the outer wrap, inner wrap, coal tar enamel and determine what is the extent of loss and what does it ultimately mean for the fitness of service for this pipeline," she said. Board member Mike Shriberg, regional director for the National Wildlife Federation, said he had a hard time squaring Baraniecki's assertion that the line was as good as new when there's delamination in the outer wrap. "A pipeline that's in 'like new' condition isn't missing part of its coating,' he said. Shriberg, who represents an organization that is active in opposition to the pipeline in the public realm and in the court system, said Enbridge appears not to really know the depth of coating loss at certain points on its pipeline. "They're assuming it's just the outer wrap -- which is bad in and of itself -- but it could be much deeper," he said. "It left me with more questions than I started with." After the meeting, Enbridge spokesperson Ryan Duffy said the company is satisfied that Baraniecki showed there's no exposed metal on the pipeline. As for the outer wrap delamination, Duffy said it "doesn't play a role in preventing corrosion, necessarily. It's just the outer thin wrap on the line. Bottom line: There's no exposed metal anywhere along the line. There's no holidays."

An ancient Roman merchant vessel has been discovered off the Italian coastline, reportedly in such good condition that much of the food it was carrying might still be intact in its storage jars. 'There are some broken jars around the wreck, but we believe that most of the amphorae inside the ship are still sealed and food-filled," Lt. Col. Francesco Schilardi of the police divers' group told the BBC of the containers. Local fisherman first became aware of the wreck when pieces of pottery began turning up in their nets. They notified police divers who used a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) to locate the 2,000-year-old ship in the sea off the town of Varazze. "We believe it dates to sometime between the 1st Century BC and the 1st Century AD," Schilardi said. Tests on some of the roughly 200 pots, or amphorae, that the ship holds reveal that they contain pickled fish, grain, wine and oil, which were most likely en route to Spain to be traded for other goods when the ship sank. The ship's remarkable state of preservation has been attributed to the layers of mud on the seabed, which covered the wreck and protected it from harm. The vessel will remain on the ocean floor until Italian authorities decide whether to raise it. "Right now, the area of the finding has been secured," Schilardi said, "and no fishing or water traffic is allowed."

Political action committees with silly names are a dime a dozen — "Americans for Real Good Coffee" and "Americans for Crushing It" both actually exist — and most of them never end up with a dime to their name. But the Americans Against Insecure Billionaires With Tiny Hands PAC is standing out from the pack with a political ad demanding that Donald Trump release the exact measurements of his hands. It's a spot-on parody of political ads, from the regular people expressing their dire fears about the future while engaged in everyday activities (setting the table, doing chin-ups, working at a construction site) to the swelling, ominous background music. There are some good hand puns: America, the ad declares, needs "a president who can grasp the complexity of the world and hold off the decline of a great nation." "If the White House phone rings at 3 am, will his little hands even pick up the receiver?" one woman asks worriedly. The video is tapping into a rich vein of criticism that Trump has historically found very difficult to tolerate: Call him a racist or a bully or a xenophobe if you must, but do not, under any circumstances, insult the length of his fingers. During the primaries, Sen. Marco Rubio was the first to pick up on it: "I don't understand why his hands are the size of someone who is 5-foot-2," Rubio said during his brief insult comic phase: "And you know what they say about men with small hands? You can't trust them." (That isn't actually what they say about men with small hands, but we'll get to that in a minute.) Jokes about Trump's small hands — or, in the phrasing more commonly used before 2016, his short fingers — have a long, entertaining, very Trump-like backstory. His sensitivity to the insult dates back decades. Why Trump really hates the insult "short-fingered vulgarian" Accusations of below-average finger size have dogged Trump for nearly 30 years. In 1988, Spy, a satirical magazine based in New York, coined an epithet for Trump that it would gleefully repeat for eight years: "short-fingered vulgarian." Spy, which was published from 1986 to 1998, was busy skewering celebrities and public figures as Trump was building his national profile. Proudly avaricious and braggadocious, Trump embodied the spirit of the '80s. And Spy made him a frequent target of not just insults but also elaborate practical jokes. "Donald Trump was our clickbait," Bruce Feirstein, a contributing editor for Spy, wrote for Vanity Fair in 2015: He brought us word-of-mouth recognition, and more readers—just the same way he is now bringing eyeballs to newscasts, and page views to Web sites… Over the course of our years at Spy, we fact-checked his books and his finances (with predictable results), trolled him by sending miniscule checks — as low as 13 cents —to see if he’d cash them (he did), and wrote up his all-but-forgotten business debacles. (Remember the "Trump Castle World Power Boat Championship"?) "Two-month anniversary of the publication of short-fingered vulgarian Donald Trump's The Art of the Deal," Spy noted in January 1988, its first use of the phrase. "Reader … is rushed to the hospital with hubris shock." (The same issue, presciently, floated the possibility of a Trump presidential bid, citing a survey that found 4 percent of Americans were sad he wasn't in the running.) Spy would call Trump a "short-fingered vulgarian" 12 times in the next eight years, including once reprinting a correction from the Stanford student newspaper, which had written the phrase as "short-fingered Bulgarian" and had to apologize for insulting Bulgarians. Trump, an expert troll, was getting trolled. He rose to the bait, responding in characteristic fashion: scribbling on the article in Sharpie marker and sending it to its writers. ("Face of a dog!" he once wrote over a photo of New York Times columnist Gail Collins, who had committed the other ultimate infraction: downplaying Trump's wealth by calling him a "thousandaire.") What upset Trump wasn't being called a "vulgarian," a rich person with bad manners. It was the slur on his finger length. "To this day, I receive the occasional envelope from Trump," Graydon Carter, a founder of Spy and now the editor of Vanity Fair, wrote in 2015. "There is always a photo of him — generally a tear sheet from a magazine. On all of them he has circled his hand in gold Sharpie in a valiant effort to highlight the length of his fingers. I almost feel sorry for the poor fellow because, to me, the fingers still look abnormally stubby." Rubio's "small hands" joke was probably a slur on Trump's penis size Before we get any further into the saga of Trump's hands, here's one important note: It is not at all clear that Trump's fingers are, in fact, unusually short. But what matters is that Trump himself seems to believe short-fingeredness is a terrible accusation that must be refuted. The Washington Post's Philip Bump conducted a thorough investigation that included, among other things, the photographic concept of foreshortening, a 1902 study of the finger lengths of imprisoned criminals, and a comparison of the size of Trump's hands with the size of a sheet of paper. Bump's conclusion: "Trump is not a 'short-fingered vulgarian,' for the sole reason that he is not short-fingered." Still, Trump seems to take a slur on his fingers as a terrible insult, for reasons that Spy was far too arch to make explicit. Palm readers, for one, have a host of stereotypes about short-fingered people: They're impulsive, stubborn, unconcerned with detail, prone to jumping to conclusions, and interested above all in doing big things. ("They build enormous buildings," the Benham Book of Palmistry even notes.) But while that's a scarily accurate description of Trump, it's unlikely this is what Spy meant. Finger size also could be linked to testosterone, and has been cited as a predictor of everything from athletic prowess to ruthlessness on a trading floor. But that research — which, in any case, was conducted long after Spy first called Trump short-fingered — deals with the ratio of the length of a man's ring finger to the length of his index finger, not how long or short the fingers in question are. Trump was probably drawing a much less obscure conclusion: He thought Spy was implying he had a small penis. "My fingers are long and beautiful, as, it has been well documented, are various other parts of my body," he told the New York Post's Page Six in 2006. "From what I hear, the same cannot be said of editors of the failed Spy." Trump, as Trump does, was making the subtext text. While there are some superstitions linking hand size to strength of character, a far more common association is that small hands are an indication of, um, smallness elsewhere. (Urban Dictionary was on the case in 2008: "If you say someone has small hands it means that they have a small penis.") And Rubio's remark has put the old jokes about Trump's hand size back into circulation, from funny tweets in March to the PAC today. Hastily-Arranged News Conference Just Excuse for Trump to Show Off New Hands pic.twitter.com/CNJxNpLQV0 — Daniel Lin (@DLin71) March 2, 2016 It might set Trump's mind to rest if it were more widely known that the connection between hand size and penis size is spurious at best. The connection has been studied twice, once finding only a weak correlation and once finding no relationship at all. But the feud over whether Trump is a "short-fingered vulgarian" has now lasted nearly 30 years. It would be a shame to stop it now.

This video is no longer available This video was hosted on Vidme, which is no longer in operation. However, you might find this video at one of these links: Video title: A Man Called Gaddafi: (His Life & Death) (Why Gaddafi had to die?) Upload date: April 4 2017 Uploaded by: americanpatriot Video description: Muammar Muhammad Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi (c. 1942 – 20 October 2011), commonly known as Colonel Gaddafi, was a Libyan revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He governed Libya as Revolutionary Chairman of the Libyan Arab Republic from 1969 to 1977 and then as the "Brotherly Leader" of the Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya from 1977 to 2011. Initially ideologically committed to Arab nationalism and Arab socialism, he came to rule according to his own Third International Theory before embracing Pan-Africanism. The son of an impoverished Bedouin goat herder, Gaddafi became involved in politics while at school in Sabha, subsequently enrolling in the Royal Military Academy, Benghazi. Founding a revolutionary cell within the military, in 1969 they seized power from the absolute monarchy of King Idris in a bloodless coup. Becoming Chairman of the governing Revolutionary Command Council (RCC), Gaddafi abolished the monarchy and proclaimed the Republic. Ruling by decree, he implemented measures to remove what he viewed as foreign imperialist influence from Libya, and strengthened ties to Arab nationalist governments. Intent on pushing Libya towards "Islamic socialism", he introduced sharia as the basis for the legal system and nationalized the oil industry, using the increased revenues to bolster the military, implement social programs and fund revolutionary militants across the world. In 1973 he initiated a "Popular Revolution" with the formation of General People's Committees (GPCs), purported to be a system of direct democracy, but retained personal control over major decisions. He outlined his Third International Theory that year, publishing these ideas in The Green Book. In 1977, Gaddafi dissolved the Republic and created a new socialist state, the Jamahiriya ("state of the masses"). Officially adopting a symbolic role in governance, he retained power as military commander-in-chief and head of the Revolutionary Committees responsible for policing and suppressing opponents. Overseeing unsuccessful border conflicts with Egypt and Chad, Gaddafi's support for foreign militants and alleged responsibility for the Lockerbie bombing led to Libya's label of "international pariah". A particularly hostile relationship developed with the United States and United Kingdom, resulting in the 1986 U.S. bombing of Libya and United Nations-imposed economic sanctions. Rejecting his earlier ideological commitments, from 1999 Gaddafi encouraged economic privatization and sought rapprochement with Western nations, also embracing Pan-Africanism and serving as Chairperson of the African Union from 2009–10. Amid the Arab Spring, in 2011 an anti-Gaddafist uprising led by the National Transitional Council (NTC) broke out, resulting in the Libyan Civil War. NATO intervened militarily on the side of the NTC, bringing about the government's downfall. Retreating to Sirte, Gaddafi was captured and killed by NTC militants. Gaddafi was a controversial and highly divisive world figure. Supporters lauded his anti-imperialist stance and his support for Pan-Africanism and Pan-Arabism, and he was decorated with various awards. Conversely, he was internationally condemned as a dictator and autocrat whose authoritarian administration violated the human rights of Libyan citizens, and supported irredentist movements, tribal warfare and terrorism in many other nations. Total views: 408

That is the same thinking that got Europe into such deep trouble—the idea that one must welcome hordes of diversity in order to, what? still have enough people to buy cars or rent apartments, or require teachers—to fuel the economy. And, they pretty much say it in this article at a small town newspaper in Maine, to wipe our old white butts in nursing homes! Watch, I’ll be accused of being a white nationalist (oh wait! I already am labeled as such!) just for writing about this story. But, it isn’t me saying this, it is an immigration lawyer whose livelihood depends on more immigration just as a used car salesman looking for refugees to sell to (not disparaging used car salesmen!) does, or a nursing home owner who is trying to get workers at the cheapest hourly wage he can get! Here is the story from Maine. ‘Lawyer, employer encourage hiring more refugees‘ which reports that refugees are now being spread out further from the normal resettlement sites in Maine (thanks to Catholic Charities). “Why are we so old?” immigration attorney Jennifer Atkinson asked a small crowd gathered Nov. 16 for a talk about her work, hosted by the Camden Conference at Rockport Opera House. “Look around…” she said. “We’re white. We’re so old because we’re so white.” She put the area’s demographics bluntly, calling the Midcoast “a bastion of whiteness” within the oldest and whitest state in the country. [….] While some residents might be content with this, Atkinson said it doesn’t bode well for Maine’s economy or its future. When you read these next lines consider this: I’m white and old enough to remember when the pressure on all of us college grads was to have ONLY two children or risk killing the planet. Guess who didn’t listen to that—the rest of the brown world didn’t listen! Heck we have 9/11 mastermind KSM telling interrogators that they are going to take us over by outbreeding us! Statistically speaking, there is a correlation between whiteness, oldness and slow population growth. [….] Maine’s aging and decreasing population (the state had a net loss of 928 people last year) leads to cascading problems: low school enrollment, pressures on budgets, strains on services — especially health care — and declines in the working-age labor force. [928 doesn’t sound like a lot to me!—ed] [….] “To grow we have to be willing to become more racially diverse,” Atkinson said, “because that’s where the growth is, in non-white communities. “There’s always the option to reach out to refugees and asylum-seekers,” she added, fully disclosing that doing so would be good for her Friendship-based practice, but also would benefit employers and the community as a whole. Who is taking care of the old white people in nursing homes? I don’t have time to discuss the next section, but you should read it, here. It is about a nursing home owner who has figured out that he can hire refugee labor probably much cheaper than a Mainer. When making arguments about why they hire refugees they NEVER admit it is about the hourly wage. They could probably find Americans for this work if they paid a decent wage! But, that would mess up their bottomlines! (Your tax dollars subsidize the family’s needs when wages are too low.) LOL! Big business owners are always pretending they are doing God’s work by hiring refugees! Having had some experience with nursing homes in recent years, any one of you considering finding one for your elderly family member, especially one with some form of dementia, make sure that all those caring for your loved one (no matter their skin color) SPEAK ENGLISH WELL. It is hard enough for the mentally impaired as it is, and they need to be able to communicate well with a nursing aid. Something as benign seeming as a urinary tract infection can kill if not detected in time. Questions I want answered: Why is that Leftwingers are always pushing for more population growth (to fuel the economy) when they must know that growth of that sort will necessarily bring some degradation of the environment—more cars, more roads, more houses, more school construction, less open space, etc? I don’t get it! If there is some Open Borders Leftwinger who would like to explain it to me and our readers, I would very much welcome a guest column. And this too? Why all the yammering at whites to have only 2 kids, I don’t see any of you nagging the Arabs or the Africans to do the same thing. See our Maine archive by clicking here.

Michigan State coach Tom Izzo's Spartans are coming off their most spectacular and dominating win of the season, a 75-52 rout of rival Michigan, the best win Izzo said he's seen from his team in three years. (Photo11: Mike Carter, USA TODAY Sports) Story Highlights Izzo thinks people stopped talking about/thinking about the Spartans after the UConn loss Izzo says going through the Big Ten's top teams might be tougher than the NCAA tournament Izzo says Draymond Green is one of those great players that rarely comes along Each Friday leading up to the NCAA tournament, USA TODAY Sports' Nicole Auerbach catches up with a premier college basketball coach: EAST LANSING, Mich. – This week, Michigan State coach Tom Izzo is happy – or as happy as he can be when he says he still can't tell how good his team is. (Here's my hint: Pretty good.) Izzo's Spartans are coming off their most spectacular and dominating win of the season, a 75-52 rout of rival Michigan, the best win Izzo said he's seen from his team in three years. Once again, Michigan State is being touted as a Big Ten title contender (and is sitting atop the conference standings with Indiana at the moment) and a national championship contender, too. If there's one thing we've learned about college basketball this season, it's we should never count out a coach like Izzo and a balanced, talented team like the Spartans. Sitting in his office Thursday morning, Izzo caught up with USA TODAY Sports about his team flying under the radar for much of the season, the brutal Big Ten schedule and what every great college basketball team needs – a fantastic leader. Izzo on why people haven't been talking much about the Spartans until recently: BUBBLE TRACKER: Who's in and who's out We had some question marks coming in. You have to remember the (Branden) Dawson (torn ACL). He didn't start shooting the ball again until September, so that's seven months. Most people say you aren't any good until the year after. Adrian Peterson kind of screwed up that theory. That was a key thing. Our point guard – would he come into his own? He was a 2 guard playing the point. Would he grow? We had a couple of freshmen we knew we'd have to rely on, especially (Denzel) Valentine and (Gary) Harris. Those are unknowns. That, along with you take Michigan – they had (Trey) Burke and (Tim) Hardaway coming back. They had some things to plug, too, but usually a team is going to have a chance to go far with its guards. It's like if you have a great quarterback, you're going to have a better chance to go somewhere. Usually, most years, we lose a couple of games early and we go from top five, top seven, top 12 to 20th and we're kind of off the radar. Most of the time, we play a schedule that's different than most people. This year, we lose to UConn and lose at Miami before Miami's anything. MAILBAG: Duke-UNC, Izzo and more Izzo on the challenge of Michigan State's upcoming Big Ten schedule: (In a 17-day stretch starting Feb. 19), ours is Indiana here, at Ohio State, at Michigan and Wisconsin here. That's concentrated. If you threw something in there, like Penn State, then you at least have some breathing room. You have to get up for every game. That's harder than the NCAA tournament. In the NCAA tournament, there's more space in between. We just came off three games in six days. When you're traveling and going to school, that's hard. When everybody tries to compare these conferences, there is no comparison. I've been in this 30 years. There's no comparison to what the top teams in our league are going through. Izzo on the importance of great leadership, like he had in recent years with Draymond Green: He is rare. You know what happens with rare guys? You go to Final Fours. … That was another Jud (Heathcote) line when we won the national championship. He calls me four days later, and he always tells me I work too much. … He says, 'Take some time off. You better enjoy this.' I said, 'Yeah, I'll enjoy it.' He says, 'You really better enjoy it.' He says, 'You don't understand, this comes around every 20 years.' I say, 'Oh, I have to wait 20 more years to get to a Final Four, this or that?' Nope, he says, having that kind of leader. It was Magic (Johnson). It was Mateen (Cleaves). ... Thirteen years later, Draymond came around, and he's not far off. That's what's missing at a lot of programs. (Izzo then mentioned Indiana's Victor Oladipo and Michigan's Trey Burke and Tim Hardaway Jr. as guys, like Draymond Green, who weren't really, really hyped or highly rated coming out of high school but have developed into their teams' leaders. He also discussed how programs like Duke, UNC and Kansas have talented upperclassmen who could have gone pro stay, and then they in turn teach underclassmen how to grow into leaders. Interesting stuff about what makes these teams successful.)

Competition to feed humans has grown difficult enough that a Seattle couple, Dawn and Ben Ford, opened a food truck for humanity's best friend. Via Life with Dogs: The popularity of food trucks in the United States has exploded recently, and in almost every major city there are a few that specialize in a particular style or flavor profile. This is great because it gives people options to eat foods that they may not have before. This is great for humans, but what about dogs? Is there a food truck for them somewhere? In Washington, the answer is YES! The Seattle Barkery is a new mobile café for dogs. Everything they make and serve is aimed towards giving dogs a similar freedom of choice like we as humans have. For their furry, four legged customers, they have everything from bacon cupcakes and peanut butter pumpkin pretzels, to chicken feet and duck necks.

Another day, another batch of mostly redundant and anonymously sourced stories about whether Vice President Joe Biden will run for president. Some of those stories, however, are getting ridiculous. So FiveThirtyEight’s politics writers met in Slack to pick over the latest Biden coverage, our own assumptions and the state of the 2016 Democratic primary. This is an edited transcript of the conversation. micah (Micah Cohen, senior editor): So, the will he/won’t he speculation about Joe Biden hasn’t slowed down, but do either of you buy the argument that a Biden run could actually help Hillary Clinton? hjenten-heynawl (Harry Enten, senior political writer): I don’t think it would be particularly helpful to Clinton. Forget about all the BS about whether Clinton runs better when she’s in trouble. Personally, I never got that. If she were so good at running when she was in trouble, then why did she lose in 2008? Rather, why would Biden run? Sure, he’s in his 70s and this is his last shot, but he also has a family to take care of. He’d likely only run if he concludes he has a better than nominal chance of winning. And that conclusion would be quite different from what the current metrics, such as endorsements, suggest. Biden may have an insight on the invisible primary that isn’t visible to the rest of us. natesilver (Nate Silver, editor in chief): The irony is that the media has exaggerated all sorts of threats to Clinton, who remains in good shape for the nomination. But then you have the one thing that would be a tangibly bad sign for her campaign — the vice president of the United States running for the nomination against her! — and there are lots of “smart takes” about how it could help Clinton. hjenten-heynawl: What we’ve argued this entire time is that Sen. Bernie Sanders has a weakness among the party actors (i.e., he doesn’t have any endorsements), and that he has no longtime connections to the Democratic Party (remember, he’s not a Democrat). Biden, on the other hand, has been in major federal office in Washington since 1973. He’s someone who could conceivably reach out to all members of the party. He’s already polling better among African-Americans than Sanders, for instance. micah: Let’s break this down a little: Both of you seem to think Biden entering the race is inherently bad for Clinton — he’d be the most serious competition for the nomination she’s faced. But would there be a couple side benefits, like that by giving the media a horse race to cover, there would be less focus on Clinton’s scandals? natesilver: Well, first of all, it’s not just that Biden would be a more formidable competitor to Clinton than Sanders. I don’t know that Biden would be all that great a candidate, in fact. But Biden running would signal that concern about Clinton among Democratic Party elites had gone from the bedwetting stage to something more serious. micah: Is bedwetting not serious? hjenten-heynawl: I mean, it depends how old you are. natesilver: But the other big problem (as we and others have pointed out before) is that Biden doesn’t have much rationale to run other than if Clinton has “trust”/scandal problems. He might never come out and say it, but that would be the whole basis for his campaign. They don’t really differ in any meaningful way on policy. micah: But your logic seems circular: “Biden will only enter the race if Clinton is in big trouble, and therefore if Biden enters the race it means Clinton is in trouble.” What if all the party actors are telling Biden that he shouldn’t run, that they’re backing Clinton, and Biden just wants to run? It’s his last chance. And he enters the race. natesilver: What I’m saying is that there’s a lot of information we’re not privy to, about what Democratic elites are thinking. Sure, there’s some reporting on it, but a lot of that reporting needs to be looked at skeptically — like because it relies on anonymous sourcing, or cherry-picked information from a media that would like to make the race seem competitive. The one tangible sign we have about what Democratic elites are thinking — endorsements — looks really good for Clinton. But Biden running would be a tangible sign too. Contra Maureen Dowd or whatever, this isn’t necessarily a personal decision for Biden, or at least not entirely one. He’s a party guy. He’s the vice president. He’s not likely to run unless he thinks it’s in Democrats’ best interest. hjenten-heynawl: Endorsements are merely a proxy for intra-party support. And proxies are wrong from time to time. They’re imperfect. And I don’t buy Biden is desperate to run. He reportedly indicated this week in a phone call with Democratic National Committee members that he and his family are grieving. The man lost his best friend and son. He wants to be there for his family. If I lost my father (my best friend), I don’t take off running for president just because I feel like it. I run because I think I can help my party, and because I think I can win. natesilver: Right. It’s possible that Biden assesses the problem and miscalculates. But running for president would be a calculated decision on his behalf. And, by the way, if you read the reporting on Biden carefully, it suggests that the decision is very, very calculated. He’s taking as long as possible to decide whether to enter — and at a time when it’s already pretty darn late to begin a campaign — because he wants to collect more information on whether Clinton’s in trouble or not. hjenten-heynawl: BINGO. He’s meeting with a ton of people who represent different wings of the party, such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Richard Trumka (head of the AFL-CIO). He’s doing that, one would think, because he wants to understand what they are seeing. What are their people, their constituents, telling them. micah: OK, so let’s say Biden gets in. The night before he announces, he’s sitting with his family and some advisers and they’re talking about why they can beat Clinton (based on everything they hear during these weeks of meetings). What are they saying? Does it all come down to email/scandal? Or would they be pointing to something else in the Clinton campaign or electorate? (I want data.) natesilver: If you want data, and Biden’s camp is looking at the same data, then they shouldn’t be running in the first place. Unless they think the scandal will be Clinton’s undoing. Clinton remains extremely popular with Democrats, and that popularity is pretty broad-based. White liberals might not like her as much as white moderates, Hispanics, or African-Americans, but as we’ve argued before, their support for Sanders is more an indication that they like him than that they dislike Clinton. Some of the reporting around what Biden’s coalition would be doesn’t make any sense. See, for example, from Politico: Biden’s circle has identified what they see as their potential voting blocs: Reagan Democrats, Jews, an LGBT base that largely credits him with pushing President Barack Obama into supporting gay marriage, and Rust Belt voters. They believe he’ll benefit from better stump skills than any of the other candidates running. There’s no evidence that any of these groups are weaknesses for Clinton. Nor are they all that large, nor do they have very much in common. micah: What about the Quinnipiac poll out this week showing Biden running better than Clinton against Republicans in general election matchups? And that voters don’t think Clinton is trustworthy or honest? natesilver: I don’t think you can compare a declared candidate in Clinton — who’s been getting a ton of scrutiny from the press, some deserved and some not — against a hypothetical candidate who has a halo around him because the press would love to see a huge fight for the nomination. Over the long run, Clinton’s favorability numbers have been no worse than Biden’s. Often a little better. hjenten-heynawl: General election polls of candidates who aren’t running in the primary are ridiculous. Once he enters, all of Biden’s faults will be put on the table. And there are a lot to play with. If there weren’t, he’d have done better when he ran in past elections. micah: From the WSJ writeup of the Quinnipiac poll: The Quinnipiac poll found that 51% of voters have an unfavorable impression of her, her worst score ever on that measure. The poll also found that 61% of voters say she is not honest and trustworthy, another record low. On the honest and trustworthy question, that is up from 57% in a July Quinnipiac poll. natesilver: Here’s the problem, Micah. Lots of people, political reporters especially, believe in momentum. If something goes from 50 to 45 percent, they assume it will keep going down, until it hits 40, 35, etc. But empirically, the opposite is closer to being true. At least when it comes to polling. If something goes from 50 to 45, it’s more likely to bounce back to 50 than to continue declining. Mean-reversion tends to be stronger than momentum. At least over the long term — the short term is sometimes a different story. But it’s the long term we should be concerned with, given that it’s still only August. The Clinton who has a 42 percent favorability rating today isn’t really all that different than the one who had, I dunno, a 52 percent favorability rating at the start of the campaign, or a 48 percent favorability rating when she was running in 2008, or whatever. She is different than Clinton as secretary of state or first lady, because those are closer to being nonpartisan positions. So she can’t expect to see those numbers again, at least not while she’s a presidential candidate. But the odds are that her favorability ratings would revert to the mean by Election Day next year, which in her case means about 50/50. hjenten-heynawl: Remember when there was talk about whether Chris Christie would get into the 2012 race? Or whether Fred Thompson would get into the 2008 race? Or Wesley Clark into the 2004 race? Those guys were tied or leading in the primary polling at the time. Biden’s best percentage so far has been 18 percent. He’s down nearly 30 percentage points to Clinton. Clinton is still in a ridiculously strong position. natesilver: Yeah, I saw some article that offhandedly asserted Biden was polling exceptionally well given that he wasn’t in the race yet. Polling at 12 percent or 15 percent or 18 percent among members of his own party doesn’t seem that great to me for a guy who is vice president of the United States. hjenten-heynawl: But we don’t have all the information. We believe Clinton is strong based on polling, money and support from party actors. If Biden were to enter, though, it says to us that he has a piece of information that we aren’t privy to. And this information is that Clinton is weak — for whatever reason. If he doesn’t enter, it’s a confirmation that she is strong within the party. natesilver: Part of this is looking for verifiable evidence in an environment where the media has an interest in overrating how competitive the Democratic race is. By most objective measures, Clinton is doing really well in the nomination hunt. About as well as any non-incumbent candidate has been doing up to this point in time. So, on the one hand, we look at that data and it makes us skeptical that Biden will convince himself to run. On the other hand, it means we have more reassessment to do if Biden in fact does run. micah: OK, let’s say Biden gets in. How does he win? Does he come in guns blazing on email and trustworthiness? Does he claim the Obama mantle? natesilver: How does he run or how does he win? I’d guess that his messaging would be rather cryptic at first. Because the way he wins is basically if Democrats decide that Clinton is too much of a liability because of her scandals. But Biden doesn’t want to come right out and say that. Debating Clinton on policy is also awkward, though, given that they have few real differences. And that, to the extent they do, one of them is going to be criticizing the Obama administration’s policy, which is an odd look for an incumbent party trying to win another term in office. hjenten-heynawl: Let’s start with this: Clinton must perform disappointingly in the Iowa caucuses. If Clinton wins in Iowa by a convincing margin, this thing is going to take off. I don’t know how Clinton loses in Iowa, necessarily, but that’s where it needs to begin. Biden cannot wait until later states to take her on. Her money and momentum will be too great. So it’s Iowa or bust. Now, it could be that Sanders comes close in Iowa — it doesn’t have to be Biden, but he’s gotta do reasonably well. natesilver: Yeah, I agree. I mean, one way Biden wins is if there’s some new scandal (or some new wrinkle to the email scandal) that’s so bad Clinton drops out. That’s sort of obvious, I suppose. Short of that, it might come down to the timing. Say there’s some bad news for Clinton that drops a couple of weeks before Iowa. Iowa is taken as a referendum on her campaign, and she fails that referendum. micah: And what happens to #feelthebern if Biden jumps in? hjenten-heynawl: I think he continues on the path it was on. He’ll continue to get white liberals and that’s about it. I guess you could argue one way or another whether this slightly boosts his odds, but I think it doesn’t help him. If anything it could steal attention away from him as the anti-Clinton. natesilver: Yeah, I don’t think Sanders’s support will be affected that much. At the margin, it might make it easier for him to win the plurality in a caucus state here or there. But Bernie will keep on Bernin’. What I don’t think we’re likely to see is a case where the Clinton-Biden fight drags out for months and months, and then we’re all doing a bunch of delegate math, involving Clinton and Biden and Sanders, in May. As Harry said earlier, a Biden candidacy would either gain traction or collapse pretty quickly based on how it did in Iowa and New Hampshire. hjenten-heynawl: Support for an anti-Clinton is either there or not. micah: So on our initial question — “Could a Biden run help Hillary Clinton?” — we think the answer is: “No. And also, it probably wouldn’t affect Sanders much either.” Is that right? natesilver: A Biden run would be the worst news Clinton has had so far in the campaign. She’d still probably be the favorite, however. Read More: Joe Biden Made the Right Call

REGINA — The Saskatchewan government has introduced a climate-change strategy that inches toward a price on carbon emissions, but leaves large parts of its economy untouched. And it doesn't include a carbon tax, which Environment Minister Dustin Duncan was happy to point out Monday. "I believe it will achieve as much, if not more than, a carbon tax ever would," Duncan said after introducing the plan. It calls for performance standards on facilities that emit more than 25,000 tonnes annually of carbon dioxide equivalent. Facilities that exceed their limit will have to pay. I believe it will achieve as much, if not more than, a carbon tax ever would. Dustin Duncan They will be able to buy carbon offsets from farmers or foresters, a carbon credit from another company with emissions under its allotment or pay into a provincial fund. The standards are to be developed next year, Duncan said. "We want to see the economy continue to grow and, for some industries, that means that their emissions will grow. It's not a cap-and-trade program where we're capping absolutely the amount of emissions." Duncan said standards will recognize investments companies have already made to reduce their emissions, something the energy industry has been lobbying for. No goals or targets The document contains no goals or targets and doesn't include estimates of how much greenhouse gas emissions are expected to be reduced. There is an undated pledge to have SaskPower, a Crown-owned utility, generate half its electricity from renewables. "They're going to great pains to say they're not doing carbon pricing and then implementing a policy which, everywhere else it's implemented, is called carbon pricing," said University of Alberta energy economist Andrew Leach. The biggest hole in Saskatchewan's plan is its limited scope, said Leach. "They're not touching their transportation, home heating, commercial and industrial energy use at all with this policy." Alberta, British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec all have more inclusive plans, he said. Leach also noted the government hasn't specified how high the emissions standards will be. Too high, he said, and carbon becomes worthless and few emissions will be cut. Chris Wattie/Reuters Environment Minister Catherine McKenna takes part in a news conference in Ottawa on Dec. 9, 2016. Federal Environment Minister Catherine McKenna said the plan is a good step toward carbon pricing. "Saskatchewan's new plan proposes a performance standard for heavy industry that includes a carbon market. Momentum for carbon pricing is growing." But she said it will have to be wider to satisfy Ottawa. "Based on what's in today's plan, Saskatchewan's price likely wouldn't hit our standard, because it applies only to heavy industry instead of being economy-wide." Brad Herald of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers welcomed Saskatchewan's plan. Based on what's in today's plan, Saskatchewan's price likely wouldn't hit our standard. Catherine McKenna "There's a great range of compliance options for us there." He declined to say whether Saskatchewan's plan is more favourable to industry than Alberta's, which includes a carbon tax. "Both are legitimate," he said. The Agricultural Producers of Saskatchewan also praised the plan. It leaves agriculture, the source of about one-quarter of the province's emissions, largely exempt. "We also strongly reject the imposition of a carbon tax on our sector," said association president Todd Lewis. 'They are last to the party' Erin Flanagan of the Pembina Institute, a clean energy think-tank, said Saskatchewan's plan is an improvement over previous positions. "It's still not a credible approach to climate change," she said. "They are last to the party, but it's good they are moving forward with some pieces of an approach." Flanagan said it's tough to know how much difference the plan will make. "The fact they haven't said what these (carbon) prices will be makes it difficult to know what kind of impact this is going to have. Saskatchewan doesn't have an economy-wide (reduction) target. Saskatchewan has remained opposed to the federal government's insistence that all provinces must have a price on carbon in place by 2018. Duncan said Monday's plan doesn't change that. "We're prepared to defend our position. If that means go to court, so be it." Previously On HuffPost:

I’m still trying to find my place as a pray-er among the residents at the women’s care facility. As an introvert and hermit, and with what little social skills I possess, the challenge is large. I had been given a list of names of the women who are Catholic and ambled to each room to introduce myself. Awkwardly I’d pause to greet those in the corridors and sitting areas. In the first room, the woman sat on the side of her bed, a wheeled oxygen tank between her knees and tubes under her nose. She was confused by my presence but not my purpose, and accepted my offer to pray with her. She’d scurried to the administrator’s office when I left her room. I learned later she had asked if I were real—and convinced that I was—asked if I would come again. My next stop was with a very joyous developmentally-impaired woman. I’m not a touchy-feely kind of person and found her advances to hug and touch off-putting. I struggled to hold my ground against the urge to back away. She could not understand that I was offering prayer, telling me instead of her upcoming birthday and of many other happy things. I knocked on two more doors, shamefully relieved that there were no responses, and headed upstairs. In the stairwell I stopped, overwhelmed. I was ill-prepared for the emotions that flooded my heart. I was upset because of the confusion I felt in the presence of these women, and questioned if I lacked genuine love in my actions. I wanted to feel that my presence gave validation to Jesus’ love, and to feel pleasing to our Lord. I felt none of this. What I felt was the little love I had was barely enough to keep me moving to the next floor, let alone sufficient to be a presence to these ladies. Leaning against the banister I steadied my resolve to follow the promptings of the Holy Spirit felt months ago. I prayed for those I had just encountered and for perseverance and the confidence to move on. Later at home in my oratory I thought about my shortcomings of truly being the hands of Christ. I felt that the spiritual food I had to offer was not enough for the enormity of the summons set before me. As I sat in silence, the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000—more than that counting women and children—came to mind. When I read the Bible passages (Mt 14:13-16, Mk 6:30-37, Jn 6:1-13) something struck me. Consistent in all three, Jesus did not say to the apostles that he would feed them—he said you feed them. The apostles begged Jesus, for the good of all, to quickly send them away. There were too many in need for only a dozen hands to feed. Jesus knew that with what little they possessed there was enough for him to work with. He didn’t change the venue of the challenge; he multiplied the bits and pieces that they had to meet the need at hand. I only have a small amount to share—of confidence, courage, and love. But in the hands of Jesus, what little I have is multiplied enough to feed those standing beside me, and he gives me enough for another day. There’s a miracle in here, somewhere. I’m just too startled to see it.

Italian airport is letting travellers take as much as 500g of the sauce in their carry-on luggage, exempting them from the 100ml rule for liquids The Italian port city of Genoa has taken pride in its famed pesto sauce to new heights by granting special airport waivers for those who can’t get enough of the basil and pine nut pasta sauce. Trevi levy: Rome imposes fines for frolicking at famous fountains Read more Genoa’s airport is letting travellers take as much as 500g of pesto in their carry-on luggage, exempting them from the 100ml rule for liquids in carry-on baggage. The catch: passengers must make a donation of 50 cents or more to a charity that airlifts sick children to hospitals. The airport said this week that €500 had been raised in the first 20 days of the initiative, which was inspired by the anguish of so many foodies having their pesto confiscated when trying to get through security.

The United Nations doesn’t really give a shit that most of the rest of the world suppresses freedom and violates human rights. No, they are more concerned with what’s going on in the most free and most civil country on the planet. In their newest most ridiculous demand, the UN is warning the United States that we must abolish the 1st Amendment right to free speech to combat white supremacy, or else. I think I speak for all Americans on all sides of every issue when I say the UN can go f*ck itself. The UN threw The UN threw this shit out there in response to Charlottesville:  The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) has called on the Government of the United States of America, as well as high-level politicians and public officials, to unequivocally and unconditionally reject and condemn racist hate speech and crimes in Charlottesville and throughout the country. In a decision issued under its ‘early warning and urgent action’ procedure, the Committee — which monitors implementation of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination* — stated “there should be no place in the world for racist white supremacist ideas or any similar ideologies that reject the core human rights principles of human dignity and equality.” Early warning and urgent action procedure? This peculiar wording makes me think that if we don’t comply, the UN is going to issue some kind of sanctions against the US. I double-dog dare them to do this. I’m almost certain President Trump will react by pulling all funding to the UN and as I’m sure they know, we pay most of their bills. “We are alarmed by the racist demonstrations, with overtly racist slogans, chants and salutes by white nationalists, neo-Nazis, and the Ku Klux Klan, promoting white supremacy and inciting racial discrimination and hatred”, said UN nitwit Anastasia Crickley. Gosh, what about the daily radical Islamic acts of terror around the globe? Don’t those cowardly acts of violence that result in the deaths of hundreds of innocent people seem like a bigger concern? Apparently not. The death of one person in an isolated incident in the US is a way bigger deal. “We call on the US Government to investigate thoroughly the phenomenon of racial discrimination targeting, in particular, people of African descent, ethnic or ethno-religious minorities, and migrants,” said Crinkly. In case this isn’t crazy enough for you, check this out:  Acting under its early warning procedure, CERD also called on the US to ensure that the rights to freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly are not exercised with the aim of destroying or denying the rights and freedoms of others. It also asked US to provide the necessary guarantees so that such rights are not misused to promote racist hate speech and racist crimes. The UN wants America to get rid of the 1st Amendment rights of free speech and assembly to address white supremacy, which is only an issue with hysterical liberals. I guess they don’t quite get how freedom works or that unpopular speech is exactly the kind of speech that the 1st Amendment protects. A better idea would be for the UN to condemn 99% of the rest of the world that has some kind of free speech restrictions. In half the countries having a opinion is a jailable offense and in the other half speaking one’s mind is a death sentence. Putting up with a handful of racist knuckleheads is a small price to pay for liberty. America’s freedom is the least pressing issue facing the globe.

Bedrock presented preliminary design and plans for the site of the former J.L. Hudson’s Department Store Wednesday, February 22, 2017, at a meeting of the DDA (Photo: Bedrock Detroit) In an era of a downtown Detroit renaissance, plans for the tallest building in the city were unveiled Wednesday. The building is part of an estimated $775 million development proposed by an entity linked to billionaire Dan Gilbert. The project for the empty Woodward Avenue block where the J.L. Hudson department store once stood is one of the most expensive and ambitious plans introduced in a decade that has seen many blockbuster deals. The shimmering, futuristic 734-foot tower aims to be a centerpiece for the city and state, officials for Gilbert’s Bedrock Detroit said as they rolled out the proposed project to the board of the Downtown Development Authority. That’s one of the city agencies that would need to approve the deal. The tower would have 250 residential units and 700-plus underground parking spaces. A connected nine-story base structure would house retail, office, technology and arts and culture space. The development looks like nothing in Detroit now, with a glass and steel exterior that sweeps upward. Bedrock officials showed images of Smithsonian exhibits and TED Talks as examples of the kind of events that could be held in conference and exhibit space. There were images of a market and hip retailers in the floor beneath street level. The mixed-use development would have 1.2 million square feet of space. “We believe this project is so unique that it can help put Detroit back on the national, and even global, map for world-class architecture, talent attraction, technology innovation and job creation,” Gilbert said in a written statement Wednesday. The DDA board quickly approved a new time frame for the yet-unnamed development. An entity linked to Gilbert has had development rights for the former Hudson’s site since 2010; the DDA has granted extensions for the project several times. Early designs released in 2015 showed a swooping glass-and-metal structure. If things go as intended — and it’s too soon to tell — the new schedule would see construction start in December of this year and be finished by the end of 2020. A spokesman for Mayor Mike Duggan did not respond to an email asking for comment on Wednesday’s announcement. Plans for the project could change because Gilbert is counting on tax breaks that don’t yet exist to make the financing work on the project. Those potential tax incentives are currently in the state Legislature. On Wednesday, the package of bills was approved by the state Senate and the bills now go to the state House of Representatives. Last year, similar legislation died in the House. If the tax incentives are not passed, “It certainly will impact what happens,”said Joe Guziewicz, vice president of construction for Bedrock Detroit. “We would end up coming back to the DDA with revised renderings and a revised timeline,” for the project, he said. Beyond the tax incentives, it’s unknown whether other tax breaks may be sought for the development. Entities linked to Gilbert and Bedrock Detroit are major forces downtown, controlling more than 90 properties, which amounts to a $2 billion-plus investment. The proposed tower would make the structure Detroit’s tallest — by 7 feet. The 70-story center tower of the General Motors Renaissance Center stands 727 feet tall. The development plans were designed by SHoP Architects of New York in conjunction with Detroit-based Hamilton Anderson Associates. For decades, the Hudson’s store was the jewel of a bustling downtown filled with stores, offices and people. The store was demolished in 1998 and the site has been empty ever since, serving as a reminder of Detroit’s decades-long decline. The scope of the Hudson’s development was praised by John Mogk, a Wayne State University law professor who follows downtown development. “Hudson’s was a magical place that was really the catalyst for the downtown. This could be that, too. The Renaissance Center failed to do that.” The estimated $775 million price tag rivals the cost of Little Caesars Arena, the still-under-construction venue that will be the home ice to the Detroit Red Wings. The current estimate for the arena is $732.6 million, but that will increase if the arena also becomes home to the Detroit Pistons, which would result in millions of dollars in modifications to the venue. [email protected] Twitter: @LouisAguilar_DN Higher ground These are the tallest buildings in Detroit. The planned building on the Hudson’s site — at 734 feet and 52 floors— would eclipse them all. 1. The Detroit Marriot at the Renaissance Center: 727 feet tall, 70 floors 2. One Detroit Center: 619 feet tall, 43 floors 3. Penobscot Building: 565 feet tall, 47 floors 4. Renaissance Center Towers 100, 200, 300, 400 (Satellite Towers): 522 feet tall, 39 floors 5. The Guardian Building: 496 feet tall, 40 floors Sources: Emporis, historicdetroit.org Read or Share this story: http://detne.ws/2lwdlQU

FBI Handout Gunman who killed a security agent at LAX was carrying a note expressing 'disappointment in the government', reports claim. In pictures: Shooting at Los Angeles Airport The gunman who opened fire inside Los Angeles International Airport, killing a security agent and injuring several others, was carrying a note describing himself as a "pissed off patriot" who wanted to shoot "pigs", it has been reported. In the hours after Friday's deadly attack, suggestions began to emerge that the shooter - identified as Paul Ciancia, 23 - was motivated by extremist anti-government views as well as emotional problems that had pushed him towards thoughts of suicide. Authorities have declined to address his motivation publicly but a law enforcement official told the Los Angeles Times that a note was found on Ciancia expressing "disappointment in the government" and claiming he had no interest in harming "innocent people". Instead, he wanted to "kill TSA", the note reportedly stated, a reference to the Transport Security Administration created in the wake of the September 11 attacks to increase safety on US transportation. The written rant was said to detail Ciancia's belief that his constitutional rights were being violated by TSA searches and his anger at former Department of Homleand Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. As he embarked on his shooting spree, dressed in fatigues and carrying a high-powered rifle, Ciancia asked several cowering members of the public if they were TSA, witnesses claimed. He found his target, shooting dead 39-year-old agent Gerardo Hernandez, the first TSA officer to be killed in the line of duty since the agency's creation. A number of other agents suffered gunshot wounds. The deadly attack threw one of the world's busiest airports into chaos as terrified passengers fled Terminal 3, some gathering on the airside tarmac under the wings of waiting planes. Others locked themselves in bathrooms as security officers sought to fell the shooter, ultimately engaging him in gunfire which resulted in shots to his mouth and leg, and taking him into custody. Ciancia, originally from New Jersey, reportedly began his assault at a check-in counter where he pulled an assault rifle out of a bag and opened fire. Witnesses heard several "popping" sounds before the gunman moved up an escalator, and through a security screening area to where passengers were waiting for their flights outside boarding gates. He was then shot and wounded by police, reportedly near a Burger King stand. Up to a dozen shots were heard by passengers as they scrambled away. Ciancia had at least five full 30-round magazines with him, police said. He was shot in the mouth and leg by two airport police officers. Ciancia had earlier that day sent a text message to his brother saying that he intended to take his own life. This led his father to contact police in the family's home state of New Jersey expressing concern for his state of mind and asking for help in locating him. They in turn contacted police in Los Angeles who sent a patrol car to Ciancia's apartment in the city. There, his two roommates said they had seen him the previous day and that he appeared to be fine. A former classmate of Ciancia's told the LA Times that the suspected shooter was a loner and suffered bullying at their private school. "In four years, I never heard a word out of his mouth," said David Hamilton, who graduated with Ciancia from Salesianum School in Wilmington, Delaware, in 2008. "He kept to himself and ate lunch alone a lot. I really don't remember any one person who was close to him." Witnesses said Ciancia appeared calm and composed as he picked his way through the terminal seeking targets. But passengers, who included a number of TV and film celebrities, told of their terror during the ordeal. Emmy-nominated actor Tim Daly, who appeared in The Sopranos, was in the Virgin first class lounge on the other side of a wall from the shooting. "Less than a minute after the shots the LAPD burst into the lounge with weapons drawn to make sure there were no bad guys in the lounge," he said. "That was pretty frightening." Daly said when he was evacuated he saw a gun that looked like an AR-15 assault rifle with three clips on the floor outside Gates 35 and 36. He said: "It was right in the middle of where everyone waits to get on their planes. We were told not to step on any blood or bags because it was evidence." TV presenter Tory Belleci, from the show Mythbusters, tweeted: Twitter: Tory Belleci - Heard gun shots then everyone starting running for the door. Not sure if anyone was hurt. #LAX The airport, known as LAX, serves about 64 million people a year, with more than 1,500 flights taking off and landing every day. Terminal 3 is home to Virgin America and other airlines. All flights were grounded and President Barack Obama was being kept informed. Passenger Sarah Richardson said: "We heard a lot of loud gunshots. My colleague threw me to the ground and we were scrambling. Somebody told us to make a run for it. We got into a room and they pulled a coffee machine in front of the door. We could hear gunshots outside. "The sound was so loud we thought a bomb had gone off. Some people hid in a bathroom. It was pure and utter mayhem, people tripping over each other crying and screaming, bags everywhere." Eyewitness Brian Adamick, 43, told the Los Angeles Times he saw a wounded TSA agent with a bloody leg on the tarmac. "It looked like it was straight out of the movies," he said. The agent told him "I got shot, I'm fine," adding that he had been shot before. Los Angeles chef Vernon Cardenas, who was en route to Philadelphia to audition for the MasterChef TV programme, said the gunman looked at him but didn't shoot. He described a white man in his 20s with "dirty blonde hair". Mr Cardenas said: "He was dressed in navy blue clothes, he almost looked like an employee of the airport. He was walking around in sort of a daze." The television channel AMC confirmed that scenes for its award-winning drama Mad Men were being filmed at the airport at the time of the shooting. Production on Mad Men was taking place at nearby Terminal 4 and a member of the crew said on Twitter: "We are filming at LAX. Gun fire. Locked down. Evacuating. Terminal 4. Forced back inside for safety." It was not clear which members of the cast were present at the airport at the time. Mythbusters presenter Tory Belleci told CNN: "People were running towards me screaming 'There's a shooter, there's a shooter.' I heard the shots. Everybody was jumping over each other and trying to stay low. It was blowing my mind how he could get a weapon that far into the airport." Fellow Mythbusters star Grant Imahara said: "To be there was surreal and you went into survival mode. It was like the whole airport was holding its breath for an hour." Passenger Leon Saryan, who was walking from the security check carrying his shoes and belt, told ABC News: "I was cowering in a corner. He (the gunman) looked at me and he said, 'TSA?' I shook my head no, and he kept on going. I just prayed to God. That's all I did. I just prayed."

Despite years of painful austerity, the UK’s level of public spending is today no lower as a share of national income than it was after 11 years of a Labour government in 2008, according to a report by the Institute for Fiscal Studies. The major report from the UK’s leading economic think tank shows that deep cuts have left the NHS, schools and prisons in a “fragile state”, and have merely returned public spending to pre-financial crisis levels. The document presents a challenge to claims that Conservative-driven austerity saved the public finances following years of Labour overspending. We’ll tell you what’s true. You can form your own view. From 15p €0.18 $0.18 $0.27 a day, more exclusives, analysis and extras. The think tank’s report goes on to conclude that in the light of the data, Chancellor Philip Hammond’s plan to abolish the UK’s deficit by the mid-2020s is “no longer sensible”. With his critical Budget approaching in November, it challenges him to admit the target looks “increasingly unlikely” in the light of a worsening economic outlook, exacerbated by Britain’s “terrible” productivity and uncertainty over Brexit. The IFS analysis of public spending levels appears in its pre-Budget look at the Chancellor’s options published on Monday. It found public spending as a share of national income was at a similar level both now and shortly before the financial crash, an event David Cameron and George Osborne claimed Labour overspending left the country ill-prepared for. In 2007-08, public spending as a share of GDP was 39 per cent, it peaked in 2009-10 at 45.1 per cent and is forecast to be 39.6 per cent this year, according to the IFS. The main justification for austerity has been the need to reduce and eventually abolish the deficit, a target that the IFS refers to as “ever-receding”. The IFS argues Mr Hammond’s critical budget speech next month, will be given against a backdrop of a worsening economic outlook that demands austerity goals are rethought. The key to the “significantly worsened” fiscal forecasts expected in November, leaving the Government less money to play with, is the UK’s “lower productivity growth” coming off the back of seven years of “terrible” growth. The report argues Mr Hammond will also find it difficult to raise new money from taxes given the “political arithmetic” that exists following an election which left the Tories without a solid Commons majority. The Chancellor also faces huge pressure to ease the Treasury’s purse strings, including demands to boost universal credit welfare payments, increase public sector pay and spend more on defence. The IFS report said: “It looks like [Mr Hammond] will face a substantial deterioration in the projected state of the public finances. “He will know that seven years of ‘austerity’ have left many public services in a fragile state. And, in the known unknowns surrounding both the shape and impact of Brexit, he faces even greater than usual levels of economic uncertainty.” It goes on: “Given all the current pressures and uncertainties – and the policy action that these might require – it is perhaps time to admit that a firm commitment to running a budget surplus from the mid-2020s onwards is no longer sensible.” The body sets out areas where continuing austerity is having its greatest impact on services, citing “clear signs of strain” in the NHS. It adds: “Both the four-hour A&E target and the 18-week waiting period target are being missed nationally. “The indicators paint a worrying picture for prisons, which, unlike the NHS, have seen large real-terms cuts (over 20 per cent) since 2009-10. “Statistics compiled by the Institute for Government show that while the prison population is at roughly its 2009 level, staffing is down and violence (both against fellow prisoners and prison staff) and prisoner self-harm rates are on an alarmingly steep upwards trajectory.” The report goes on to note how the Chancellor has already abandoned the blanket public sector pay cap and may decide to give more people a pay rise. The Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell said: “The IFS have today confirmed seven years of Tory austerity policies have failed to drive up investment and productivity, with serious potential consequences for the public finances. “Tory economic failure means wages and salaries are lower today than when they came to power, and still falling, whilst their mishandling of Brexit is now also adding to the uncertainty around future borrowing plans.” The Independent contacted the Treasury for comment. We’ll tell you what’s true. You can form your own view. At The Independent, no one tells us what to write. That’s why, in an era of political lies and Brexit bias, more readers are turning to an independent source. Subscribe from just 15p a day for extra exclusives, events and ebooks – all with no ads. Subscribe now.

Michael Garb/Gravity Glue (Facebook) Michael Grab, a Boulder artist who goes by the name Gravity Glue, said that police threatened to ticket or jail him for creating stacked river rock sculptures that the community has been enjoying for years. In a Monday Facebook post, Grab explained that a Boulder police officer had informed him that there would be stiff penalties for continuing his art. “For the past 7 years i have been creating this art in and around Boulder, Colorado, USA. nearly every day!” he wrote. “[J]ust this weekend, one police officer has decided that balancing rocks in Boulder, Colorado is now illegal, obscurely referencing two city codes [5-4-8 and 5-4-2] about ‘destruction of public property’ in relation to rocks.” “So now the police have belligerently taken it upon themselves to write tickets and/or arrest ANYONE balancing rocks in Boulder, CO. and specifically threatened to ticket me and/or arrest me if they catch me in the future,” the artist lamented. “[I] encourage as many people as possible (especially locals) to contact the city council here in Boulder and voice your support for this long standing tradition in Boulder. [I]t is something that an overwhelming portion of the community supports.” Grab said that he would be forced to leave Boulder if the city council did not step in to clarify the city ordinances. Rooster Magazine wondered why Boulder police felt the need to focus on “Draconian rock art witch hunt” instead of higher-than-average rates of rape and theft. “Why is any of this important? Because if we ban every bizzaro Boulder character that causes a stir (see: nude gardening woman), we’re left with nothing more than a college town with a Target that’s about to become Google’s new headquarters,” the magazine noted. “At a time like this, we need less kid gloves in the form of overzealous legislation, and more attention paid to retaining the city’s core personality. And if you don’t like that, f*cking move to Westminster.” “Keep Boulder weird, and keep Gravity Glue making weird ass rock art.” In the end, the call to action worked. Grab said that the city attorney personally called to let him know that rock stacking was not illegal in Boulder. “UPDATE: holy shit! maybe the support was more than i anticipated!!” he exclaimed. “[J]ust got a call from the city attorney personally here in Boulder telling me that he has ordered the police to NOT cite rock balancing under the city codes [I] mentioned below!!!” “THANK YOU everyone for the overwhelming support!!!! [T]hey must have gotten lots of calls!! haha :))” Watch a video below of Gravity Glue doing his thing.

Kirsten Dunst earns millions for a film. But what about the actor who dubs her into Spanish? The world's top voice artists tell all - in their own words Mexico's Kirsten Dunst: Claudia Motta I began dreaming of acting as a little girl, watching Japanese cartoons. I fell in love with the voices. Later I got into radio and then into dubbing - and I love it. After I spoke Kirsten Dunst's lines in Spider-Man, they asked me to do Mona Lisa Smile, Wimbledon, and others. She's a favourite in my stable of characters now, and I'm so pleased things are going well for her in Hollywood. I don't imitate the actor, I get into the personality of the role. I focus on the gestures and reflect that in my voice, even if there was no sound in the original. I add to the drama because to dub well you have to be as good an actor, or better. They paid me 10,000 pesos (£500) for Mary Jane in Spider-Man. The problem is that distributors don't put us in the credits. Suppose Kirsten Dunst thought, "Gosh, how nice I sound in Spanish." She wouldn't have known who the voice belonged to. Much of my work is for television. I'm best known for playing Bart Simpson for 10 years. When different actors were brought in because of a contract dispute, the public demanded we be brought back. Mexican dubbers mostly use a kind of neutral Spanish without accents or regional expressions so all Latin America can understand. We have the best dubbing industry, and the competition in Argentina and Venezuela just doesn't have our finesse or tradition. Top Cat in Spanish has a personality and feeling that is missing in English - and I take my hat off to the woman who voiced the witch in Snow White. France's Angelina Jolie: Françoise Cadol Sometimes my home phone will ring and when I say "hello" there will be a sharp intake of breath at the other end. I know immediately it's a dubbing fan who has got hold of my number. Once a woman rang me and started gasping. Then after a silence, she said: "Sorry, I'm just so emotional at hearing you, I can't speak, I'll have to call back." There are people in Paris who keep scrapbooks on dubbing, who collect signed photos, who know what you've dubbed despite your name rarely appearing on the credits. I respect people's reasons for wanting to contact me, but I don't send out photos. People feel they know the voice and they want to know you. A voice is a very moving thing. Dubbing is taken seriously in France, and people get very upset if an actor who has dubbed a star for a long time suddenly changes. Audiences want continuity. I get invited on to TV shows to discuss dubbing - people are interested in the process. I have been Angelina Jolie since Tomb Raider because I was the voice of Lara Croft in the video games. I thought Jolie was very good in Mr and Mrs Smith - you could tell she and Brad Pitt were having a good time making that film. I don't seek out information on her in the celebrity mags, or follow her life at all, but I get on very well with the French actor who dubs Brad Pitt - a well-known actor in his own right. I'm also Gong Li, Sandra Bullock, Patricia Arquette and the voice of Mary Alice in Desperate Housewives. I dub films because I enjoy it, it's artistic - and it is a skill that teaches you a lot about acting. I'm currently writing my fourth play for my theatre company and dubbing allows me to keep on doing the work for theatre. I've acted in theatres all over Paris, I've been on the TV, but the greatest irony is that I've never actually appeared on the cinema screen. Italy's Renée Zellweger: Giuppy Izzo I was born into the business. My teacher was my father. He had four daughters and most evenings at dinner he would try to teach us something about intonation. He had a saying: "Your voice is the soundtrack of your life." One of my sisters also entered the business and is now a dubbing director as well as a dubbing artist. It was a bit like growing up as a circus child, really. My first job was as the 10-year-old daughter in The Goodbye Girl. I've no idea how many other films I've dubbed since then. I've voiced Renée Zellweger in both her Bridget Jones movies and several others. I've studied her diction, her movements and her breathing so much that I feel I know her. We've not met, though - the only actor I've both dubbed and met is Ellen Pompeo, the star of Grey's Anatomy. She came up and hugged me at a conference in Milan in the summer. The key to this profession is obsession with detail. To get the same effects as in the original, I try, as far as I can, to imitate the actor's movements as I say her lines. Anyone who saw me working would think I was nuts. I lay down on the floor for the bedroom scenes in the Bridget Jones films. At the end of one of them, there's a scene in which Bridget is badly out of breath. I ran twice around the block before we recorded it. China's Tom Cruise: Ren Wei Tom Cruise was my latest voice acting role, but I have played hundreds of parts since I joined the Shanghai Film Dubbing Studio in 1986. I was Ewan McGregor in Moulin Rouge, John Travolta in Broken Arrow, Joseph Fiennes in Enemy at the Gates, Hugh Jackman in Kate and Leopold and Vincent Perez in Fanfan la Tulipe. But my real dream is to become a tenor. Luciano Pavarotti is my idol and I haven't given up trying to get a role in a musical. I have a good voice, dancing skills, and acting experience. I just need a chance. I guess I was chosen to voice the Tom Cruise role in Mission: Impossible III because my age and physique are similar to his. Some people say I even look like him from a certain angle. It was a tough job. While Atang [the Cantonese nickname for Tom Cruise] had months to make the film, I had to do the whole thing - from learning the script to dubbing all the lines - in four days. We always have to rush because of the piracy problem in China. If we don't get the translation and dubbing done quickly, an unauthorised version will be out on the streets before ours. Every day I worked for at least 12 hours. I studied Atang's voice and tried to imitate his style of talking. It was an action movie, so there was lots of running about and shouting, which was hard to emulate in a studio. It was very intense and I had to cover a big range of emotions. In the fighting scenes, it was all "Get down, get down! Go, go!" Then there were romantic moments when his voice breaks up as he tells his wife how much he loves her. I had to watch the original English version time and time again to get the feeling right. When it was all over I was so hoarse that the director told me to go home and take a rest. The crew cracked jokes: "Tom Cruise runs so fast he breaks his legs, Ren Wei shouts so loud he breaks his voice." I have never used the fact that I am Atang's voice actor to chat up women, but I have received letters from fans who say they really like my delivery. But that is not what is most important. My main aim is to satisfy the original actor as much as the audience. Germany's Julia Roberts: Daniella Hoffmann It all started out with the casting for Pretty Woman back in 1990. Back then I didn't expect it to be a big deal - more like a B-movie. I was among the finalists and I think it was my laugh that clinched it. I can do a good, really filthy laugh just like Julia Roberts -I love it when she laughs. Since Pretty Woman I've played her in every film. My vocal range is very like hers, so it all comes pretty naturally. With Ally McBeal, whom I also dub, I put on a very different voice, much higher. I don't often get recognised as being the voice of Julia Roberts. I think women's voices are much harder to identify than men's. But being Julia has definitely brought work my way. Some adverts want the sound of "Julia Roberts" and I have also done Charlotte's Web because it was originally Julia who did the voiceover. When I come in to record I generally haven't seen the film I'm going to dub. It used to be different: we used to get the videos to take home beforehand. But these days they are amazingly strict about new releases. When I did a voice for Star Wars, I wasn't even told in advance what film we were doing - just to turn up. But when I play Julia Roberts I don't need to prepare or anything. I follow her lead. I mean, the woman is a great actress, an Oscar-winning actress - why should I change anything about her work? India's Arnold : Schwarzenegger: Pawan Kalra I've done most of the big names: I was Arnold in The Terminator and True Lies; I voiced Owen Wilson in Shanghai Noon and Shanghai Knights; and Hugh Jackman in Van Helsing. A number of people say I look like Bruce Willis and I did Bruce as the cop in Sin City. I think Brad Pitt is one of the finest. I have just done him in Spy Games - a great film. Pitt is a very fine actor who can both overplay and underplay a role. You really have to watch how he speaks, it is fantastic. Dubbing is an art requiring a voice of many textures and tones. Not everybody can do it just because they have a good voice. Voiceover artists are cast and we have writers who make the scripts fit the lip movements of the actors on screen so that it runs as smoothly as possible. There are sometimes arguments over how to translate a single phrase. It is hardest with black actors like Eddie Murphy and Will Smith. They are not only very funny but they speak very, very fast. Trying to street talk quickly in Hindi is extremely tough. After two days your mouth gets really tired. My brother was in the film business. I was running my father's transport company in Bihar, out there in the sticks. But I had done some performances, so my brother said: come out and try. So I did. And here I am, eight years later. A film for TV takes two days. I will make 20,000 rupees (£250). For theatre release it is more like 50,000 rupees (£625). It's really exploding. I do films, commercials and TV shows now. There are a lot more people saying "I heard you on television" these days. But it's a really competitive industry. When I started there were just a few people - now everybody thinks they can voice movies. · Interviews by Jo Tuckman, Angelique Chrisafis, John Hooper, Jonathan Watts, Jess Smee and Randeep Ramesh

ALLEN PARK -- There was some fear that Ndamukong Suh had opened himself to possible retaliation hits following his latest questionable football act. Seems he had to wait only one week for the first blow, after Arizona right guard Paul Fanaika dove at Suh's knees behind a play during Sunday's game. But there's been little media coverage of the hit, and no public backlash. Ndamukong Suh was on the other side of a questionable block Sunday against Arizona, but isn't making a big deal about it. And the Detroit Lions defensive tackle isn't angry at the possible double-standard. "(That kind of hit) happens all the time," Suh said during a news conference Wednesday "It's not going to stop. Look forward to it -- look forward to keep making plays down the field. That's my job. "To me, it's just gnats that are in the air that keep going after you. You swat at 'em, and sometimes you hit 'em, sometimes you don't. Sometimes they run away, sometimes they come back again. But ultimately, I'm just that bee going to find that honey hole. That's what I do." Suh was excoriated by various players, past and present, as well as coaches and some media for blocking Minnesota center John Sullivan in the knees in the opener. He drew a record $100,000 fine. Fanaika, conversely, wasn't whistled for a penalty -- in fact, the block was legal because Fanaika's an offensive lineman -- and the country hasn't rallied to Suh's defense. Suh said he "doesn't care" about being treated differently in the media. "That's not my job," he said. Coach Jim Schwartz shrugged off the play as well, and wouldn't disclose whether Detroit has or plans to file a grievance with the league. "That whole turning plays in and saying the league called and said this, I honestly think that's a little unbecoming," Schwartz said. "We try to keep our conversations with the league just to that. If they tell us they blew a call ... I mean, how many times have I come up here and said that? "Probably never, because we don't make excuses. We don't want to make excuses for stuff like that." Schwartz did seem to have some issue with the rule itself though, which allows for offensive lineman to block below the waist as long as it's from the front. "Is it less of an injury risk (than if a defensive lineman does it)? No, but it's a legal play as opposed to a play that's penalized, so it is what it is," he said. Suh also denied a Fox Sports report that he's stomped on teammates in practice, deferring to previous statements from Schwartz and center Dominic Raiola that it never happened.

Humanoid robots are a vanity project: an attempt to create artificial life in our own image – essentially trying to play God. The problem is, we’re not very good at it. Ask someone on the street to name a robot and you might hear “Terminator”, “the Cybermen” or “that gold one from Star Wars”. What you’re not going to be given are names like Tesla Model X, Cassini or DJI Inspire 2. These are all robots, but they don’t follow the sci-fi narrative of what robots should be like. The fact is, the robots of the near future won’t be going about on two legs like the shuffling C3PO. And they’ll be much more efficient than us bipeds. Our impression of what a robot is has been tainted by science fiction and popular culture. The term “robot” was first used in 1920 by Karel and Josef Čapek in a play called R.U.R. to describe an artificial automaton. Since then, our narcissistic desires have seen the word become synonymous with humanoid robots, or androids. We like to think that we’re the dominant creatures on the planet, so mobile robots should look like us. But the fact is, they shouldn’t. We can’t fly, we’re not very good swimmers, we can’t live in a vacuum and if we want to travel more than a mile, most of us will get on some type of wheeled vehicles. Bipedal locomotion has served us well but it is limited and requires a huge amount of brain power and years of learning to perfect. The computer versions of our brain are nowhere near our level and are unlikely to be so for decades to come. After nearly 100 years of development, our most advanced humanoid robots can only just open a door without falling over (too often). Is a plane a robot? So what is the future of robotics? Well, it comes down to what you define a robot as. Unfortunately there isn’t a unified definition of what a robot is, but the general consensus is that it’s a physical device which can sense its surroundings and interact with the environment with limited human intervention. This could either be automation, where tasks are pre-programmed, or autonomy, where the robot makes decisions on its own. Let’s say that I build a little four-wheeled robot that can move from point A to point B without crashing into anything. I can give it a map and tell it where to go and it will do so without any further instructions. This sounds quite nifty, but what’s the point of it? Well now let’s scale it up so you can sit in it. Now suddenly it’s not a robot, it’s a driverless car. But all that’s changed is the size. I now want to fly off on my holidays. I quite happily get on the plane and see the two pilots in the cockpit. When I land, they’re still there and I think what a great job they did. More than likely though, the pilots didn’t actually fly the plane. They will have inputted commands to the autopilot and the computer will have flown the plane. The plane, for all intents and purposes, is a robot with human supervisors to take over if anything goes drastically wrong, just like a driverless car. Planes, trains automobiles … and robots The future of nearly all transport is mobile robots. We’re already there with robotic aircraft and within the next decade, we’ll have robot cars. Robots already fly through space and scour the bottom of the ocean. It won’t be too long before we have driverless trains and trams too. Drones will become a bigger part of society. All these things are robots, but they’ve had to be called something else due to societal impression of what a robot is. What this highlights is that we adapt the technology to fit the environment. Rather than building robots that look like us so that they can be a direct replacement, you’ll start to see things being built to suit a problem. Why do you need a robot with complex hands to pick up a pair of scissors or a hammer, when it can be built into their arms? Why build a robot to climb over debris in an earthquake on two legs, when four or six legs – or a wheeled track – would be much more stable? There is no doubt that eventually androids will be walking around and talking with us. You’ll pass them wandering down the street or hold a conversation with one as you do your shopping. But for now, the robots of the near future won’t walk like us. Instead they’ll drive, they’ll fly, they’ll swim or they’ll walk on any number of legs – except two.

Russia today announced the beginning of a significant military drawdown in Syria, with the nation’s lone aircraft carrier group being withdrawn from the Syrian coast, and a number of troops apparently set to follow as the ceasefire in the country continues to hold. Exact details of the drawdown are unclear, but reports suggest a drawdown of some sort was actually always meant to be part of the deal which led to the ceasefire, which began a week ago and continues to mostly hold. There is considerable skepticism, however. That’s because Russia already announced a drawdown back in 2016, shortly after the February ceasefire began, only to eventually send a number of reinforcements when that collapsed. Until a peace deal is negotiated, these drawdowns are always going to be seen as temporary. Peace talks are coming though, with plans for negotiations in Kazakhstan some time later in January. Exact dates are not set, and the rebels have largely not committed to take part in the negotiations. Last 5 posts by Jason Ditz

Emma Mærsk is the first container ship in the E-class of eight owned by the A. P. Moller-Maersk Group. When launched in 2006 she was the largest container ship ever built, and in 2010 she and her seven sister ships were among the longest container ships. Officially, she is able to carry around 11,000 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU) or 14,770 TEU depending on definition. In May 2010, her sister ship Ebba Mærsk set a record of 15,011 TEU in Tanger-Med, Tangiers.[3] History [ edit ] Emma Mærsk was built at the Odense Steel Shipyard in Denmark. In June 2006, during construction, welding work caused a fire within the superstructure.[4] It spread rapidly through the accommodation section and bridge, which delayed her completion by six to seven weeks. She was named in a ceremony on 12 August 2006, after Mærsk Mc-Kinney Møller's late wife, Emma. She set sail on her maiden voyage on 8 September 2006 at 02:00 hours from Aarhus, calling at Gothenburg, Bremerhaven, Rotterdam, Algeciras, the Suez Canal, and arrived in Singapore on 1 October 2006 at 20:05 hours. She sailed the next day for Yantian in Shenzhen, then Kobe, Nagoya, arriving at Yokohama on 10 October 2006, and returning via Shenzhen, Hong Kong, Tanjung Pelepas, the Suez Canal, Felixstowe, Rotterdam, Bremerhaven, Gothenburg to Aarhus, arriving on 11 November 2006 at 16:00 hours.[5] She appeared in headlines prior to Christmas 2006, when she was dubbed SS Santa because she was bound for the United Kingdom from China loaded with Christmas goods. The return journey to southern China was loaded with UK waste for recycling.[6] Her appearance in the news prompted the State Environmental Protection Administration in China to promise to "closely watch the progress of investigation into the dumping of garbage in south China by Britain". Ministry officials added that no official approval had been given to any company in the area to import waste.[7] In 2008, the ship was featured on an episode of the television documentary series Mighty Ships, during a voyage between Malaysia and Spain.[8] In 2011, the National Bank of Denmark issued a 20 DKK commemorative coin for her.[9] Going eastwards on 1 February 2013, she suffered a damaged stern thruster and took on so much water in the Suez Canal that she became unmaneuvrable. Tugs, anchors and the wind[10] took her to Port Said to offload 13,500 containers, drain her and be investigated by divers. She had not been in danger of sinking.[11][12][13][14][15] On 15 February 2013, Maersk Line confirmed that she was about to leave Port Said under tow to a yard for further assessment and repair.[16] On 25 February she reached the yard of Palermo, Sicily, where she was scheduled to stay for four months.[17] In August 2013, she was in service again[18] after a DKK 250 million (roughly US$44.5m) repair.[19] Capacity [ edit ] Originally Maersk reported a capacity of 11,000 TEU (twenty-foot equivalent units) as the maximum capacity of fully loaded 14 ton containers, according to Maersk company's then method of calculating capacity,[20] which, at her introduction into service, was about 1,400 more containers than any other ship.[21] However, Maersk also acknowledges the standard method of defining capacity, stating 14,770 TEU.[22] By normal calculations, she has a capacity significantly greater than reported—between 13,500 and 15,200 TEU.[23][24] The difference between the official and estimated numbers is because Maersk calculates the capacity of a container ship by weight (in this case, 14 tons/container), i.e. 11,000+ containers,[25] of which 1,000 can be refrigerated containers.[26] Other companies calculate capacity according to the maximum number of containers that can be carried irrespective of weight, always greater than the number calculated by the Maersk method.[citation needed] As of 2012, the E-class is still the largest by full-weight 14-tonne capacity. The Marco Polo can carry 10,000 14-t containers, 16,020 if not fully loaded.[27][28] On 21 February 2011, Maersk ordered a family of ten even larger ships from Daewoo, the Maersk Triple E class, with a capacity of 18,000 containers. A further ten ships were ordered in June 2011. The first was delivered in 2013.[29][30] Engine and hull [ edit ] She is powered by a Wärtsilä-Sulzer 14RTFLEX96-C engine, the world's largest single diesel unit, weighing 2,300 tonnes and capable of 81 MW (109,000 hp) when burning 14,000 litres (3,600 US gal)[31] of heavy fuel oil per hour. At economical speed, fuel consumption is 0.260 bs/hp·hour (1,660 gal/hour).[32] She has features to lower environmental damage, including exhaust heat recovery and cogeneration.[33] Some of the exhaust gases are returned to the engine to improve economy and lower emissions,[34] and some are passed through a steam generator which then powers a Peter Brotherhood steam turbine and electrical generators. This creates an electrical output of 8.5 MW,[35] equivalent to about 12% of the main engine power output. Some of this steam is used directly as shipboard heat.[36] Five diesel generators together produce 20.8 MW,[35] giving a total electric output of 29 MW.[26] Two 9 MW electric motors augment the power on the main propeller shaft.[35] Two bow and two stern thrusters provide port manoeuvrability, and two pairs of stabilizer fins reduce rolling.[35] A special silicone-based paint, instead of biocides used by much of the industry, keeps barnacles off of the hull.[21] This increases her efficiency by reducing drag while also protecting the ocean from biocides that may leak. The paint is credited with lowering the water drag enough to save 1,200 tonnes of fuel per year.[37] The ship has a bulbous bow, a standard feature for cargo ships. The turning diameter at 44 km/h (24 knots) is 1.50 km (0.81 nmi). The engine is near midship to make best use of the rigidity of the hull and to maximize capacity. When banking 20 degrees, the bridge sways 35 metres.[38] Sailing schedules [ edit ] Her regular round trip is between northern Europe and the far east via the English Channel, the Strait of Gibraltar and the Suez Canal, calling at Ningbo, Xiamen, Hong Kong (westbound), Yantian (westbound), Algeciras (westbound), Rotterdam, Bremerhaven, Algeciras (eastbound), Yantian (eastbound), Hong Kong (eastbound), and Ningbo.[5][39][40] As of April 2011 , the schedule included Gdańsk, Aarhus, and Gothenburg.[41] Criticism [ edit ] She and similar ships have been criticised for burning bunker fuel, which has a high sulphur content,[42] 2.5 to 4.5%, over 2,000 times more than allowed in automotive fuel.[42] In Europe, new rules regarding the operation of marine shipping will require ships to burn cleaner fuel. MARPOL Regulation 14 will limit global sulphur content to 0.5% in 2020. However, a review of global fuel availability due to conclude in 2018 may delay the new regulations by five years, until 2025.[43] See also [ edit ]

Now in its 11th year, the annual Race to Wrigley will feature a new course this year, giving participants their first chance to experiencing running through the new bleacher concourse that opened last year. The race, which starts at Addison and Racine, takes runners through the Wrigleyville and Lakeview areas, heading west to Ravenswood and east on Irving Park. This year, runners will continue on Irving Park all the way to Sheridan, which will eventually lead them to the center outfield of Wrigley Field for a final stretch through the field’s concourse before ending at Clark and Addison. “It’s always been a race that reflects the fact that we are in a neighborhood and yet a major league ballpark,” Mike Lufrano, executive vice president of community affairs and chief legal officer for the Chicago Cubs, says. “It’s the third largest tourist attraction in Illinois. We started a race that would combine the two, [allowing runners] to see a bit of the neighborhood and community and reflect the fact that we are part of the community as well.” The 5K race, which will start at 8 a.m. on April 23, also serves as a crucial fundraiser for Cubs Charities. Runners can also choose to individually raise money for Advocate Children’s Hospital, with the first 100 who raise $500 receiving an autographed baseball from a current Cubs player. “[The money raised] all goes back into the community here,” Lufrano says. “It supports youth sports, building baseball fields, health and fitness programs for kids, provides scholarships for kids to go to college. Last year, we donated about $3.4 million total and the race is part of that.” Registration for the race will remain open online through April 22. To sign up, visit either cubscharities.org or racetowrigley.com.

Mid Canterbury's mysterious big black cat is back. Ange Montgomery reckons she spotted it prowling down an Eiffelton hedge line 150 metres away from where she was sitting having a coffee early one frosty August morning. She knows some people might think she is crazy, but she knows she's not. She knows what she saw, and that other people have seen it too. Erin Tasker/FairfaxNZ Angela Montgomery, with two-year-old daughter Isabel Purton, believes she saw Mid Canterbury's mysterious black panther walking along the hedge in the background. It's been about three years since the last reported sighting of the cat, which some people believe is a black panther or puma. Its story dates to 2001 when it was first spotted near Alford Forest. In 2003, Ashburton truck driver Chad Stewart saw a large black animal sitting at the foot of a hill near stockyards on the Mayfield farm of Blair and Sarah Gallagher. READ MORE: * High-country trap for mystery black panther * Editorial: Mystery of the panther Erin Tasker/FairfaxNZ Angela Montgomery, with two-year-old daughter Isabel Purton, believes she saw Mid Canterbury's mysterious black panther walking along the hedge in the background. Extensive searching from air and on land found no trace of the mysterious animal. In the years that followed numerous people reported seeing a similar creature lurking on Mid Canterbury farm land. Montgomery admits that before she saw it for herself she would have been skeptical. Montgomery – who moved from Christchurch to an Eiffelton dairy farm with her partner and two-year-old daughter Isabel only a couple of months ago – knows what she saw was a big cat. It walked along the hedge and then disappeared into it. It was the way it walked that convinced her it was a big cat. She has been keeping her eyes peeled since, but has not seen it again. "It was exciting for me, I know what I saw and it wasn't anything explainable," she said. "It wasn't a cow, or a dog, or anything like that." She called out to her partner, but he was not quick enough to see it. When he told her it might have been a black panther, she thought he was kidding, until she remembered seeing something on the news a few years ago about a panther sighting in the area. Now, she is a believer, but she held off going public until she had researched the other sightings and the habits of big cats. "I've told a few people about it and they kind of think I'm nuts and it was probably something else, but I know what I saw," Montgomery said. It was bigger than a labrador dog and smaller than a cow, but was not a feral cat, she said. "I know my animals and I know what they look like, and it wasn't that far away." There have been rumours in the past that it is a black panther that escaped from a private zoo, or possibly from a boat, but no physical trace has been found. In 2005, Timaru man Mark Brosnahan reported seeing a large black feline in the Mid Canterbury high country. He got two pictures of it from a distance. If it was the same big black cat first seen in 2001, it was getting on in years now. Black panthers have an average life expectancy of 12 to 17 years. * Comments have been closed.

The warnings on Europe sound extra-apocalyptic this week. “The eurozone really only has days to avoid collapse,” blares the headline on Wolfgang Münchau’s column. And, while European leaders are frantically thrashing out plans for further fiscal union to save the euro, German Chancellor Angela Merkel is still resisting sweeping reform measures. As my colleagues Michael Birnbaum and Anthony Faiola report, “investors and world leaders alike hang on Merkel’s every word, searching for a hint that her resistance is simply a bluff to scare countries into behaving more like hers.” Not so easy, going it alone. (Michael Sohn/AP) These sorts of scenarios are no longer unthinkable. But a recent report suggests that either move would be far more painful than most people seem to realize. Indeed, a crack-up could prove far more costly to Germany than a bailout of its neighbors. In September, economists at UBS Investment Research tried to tally up the costs of seceding from the euro. If a “weak” country like Greece tried to leave the euro, it would almost certainly have to default on its national debt, watch its domestic banking system collapse — every halfway-sentient depositor would rush to withdraw euros before they got converted to new, less-valuable drachmas — and the country would get rocked by big trade disruptions and unrest. UBS estimates that a “weak” country like Greece or Ireland leaving the euro would take a hit of up to 50 percent of its GDP in the first year alone, and then a 15 percent hit per year for the next few years. That’s a crushing blow. Now, what would happen if a financially sound country like Germany decided to leave the euro, in order to maintain its own currency? Even that would hurt. A lot. Germany wouldn’t default on its national debt — in fact, its new currency would likely be worth more than the old euro — but its banks would suddenly have assets in the old, devalued currency. Balance sheets would be thrown out of whack, and Germany would have to pour an enormous amount of money into bailing out its banks. What’s more, the country’s exports would likely collapse. All told, UBS estimates, the cost of secession to a country like Germany would likely reach 20 percent to 25 percent of GDP, and remain at about half that for a few years thereafter. One thing UBS notes is that it would be much, much cheaper for Germany to simply bail out Greece, Ireland, and Portugal outright (that would cost about 1,000 euros for every German man, woman and child in one swoop) than it would be for Germany to exit the euro zone (which would cost the average German 8,000 euros the first year and 4,500 euros thereafter). Bailouts are deeply unpopular in Germany, and for good reason, but they look like the cheaper path. Even Bernard Connolly’s estimate that it would cost Germany 7 percent of its GDP for several years to bail out all troubled euro zone countries, up to and including France, looks like a less-painful option at this point. Indeed, that’s why the UBS report suggests that it would be insane for Germany to let the euro fracture, and argues that there’s “an overwhelming probability” that the euro zone moves toward some sort of fiscal integration — which partly means German taxpayers bailing out the Mediterranean neighbors it deems irresponsible. Of course, even if that’s the more rational approach, that doesn’t mean that will be the end result.

Arabic is the fastest-growing language in American households — and that’s leading the US Census Bureau to explore the tricky task of adjusting its questionnaires to ­accommodate the language’s right-to-left script. The bureau is using focus groups to explore possible changes to the 2020 census questionnaires for Arabic speakers who are not English-proficient, the Pew Research Center reported Friday. Arabic is now the seventh-most commonly spoken non-English language in US households. An estimated 1.1 million people ages 5 and older speak Arabic at home, an increase of 29 percent between 2010 and 2014. The number who speak Spanish at home has grown only 6 percent during the same period. Of those who speak Arabic at home, 38 percent are not proficient in English, according to census estimates. That’s just below the 42 percent English proficiency rate among the 39.3 million US residents who speak Spanish at home. The growth in Arabic is linked to continued immigration from Middle Eastern and North African countries, according to the Pew Research Center. Possible changes to the census questionnaire include replacing the blocks for individual printed letters with a single open-field rectangle, so that answers can be written in connected Arabic script, the center said. One major challenge facing census officials is whether to require a response in English and when to allow an Arabic response. A focus-group study recommended that the address fields require people to use English, because an American address might not be accurately translated into Arabic, according to the Pew Research Center. Arabic names present another complication — as they can be transliterated into English in different ways because the letters of the Arabic ­alphabet don’t necessarily have direct English equivalents. For example, the Arabic name Hussein can be transliterated into English at least five additional ways: Hussain, Husein, Husain, Houssain and Houssein.

Img Project Descripton Backers Pledge / Goal / % +1 Button CoMo Booster Board for Rpi Module with: wifi, oled screen, digital audio, RTC, 6-36v power input. 55 $6,834 / $40,000 / %17 ZIR EL-200 "ZIR EL-200 is connected to your computer, smartphone or tablet using Wi-Fi wireless network, and from there we set or directly assign instructions using the browser. However, one of its most interesting features is the ability to also be controlled by voice, using for that purpose applications on iOS and Android." 60 $5,012 / $90,000 / %5.6 1080Pi 10" 1080p Screen that mounts to the Rpi GPIO with 16 extra GPIO, 4 with 3A sinking current. 189 £20,451 / £100,000 / 20% RFberryPi A 433Mhz Radio Shield used to communication with several peripherals such as relays & sensors. 14 £321 / £4,850 / 6.6% SerialPi5 Board giving the Rpi the ability to have 5 RS-232 serial ports. 5 £261 / £11,000 / 2% Jilia Iot Dev Kit "Add ZigBee, Z-Wave, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi to your Raspberry Pi with on-board sensors and an easy cloud API." 119 $6,256 / $50,000 / 12.5% RF Breakout Kit Breakout kit to build your own radio using the Rpi's built in clock generator. Frequencies up to 250Mhz 126 £1,330 / £1,800 / 72% Bridge Shield Bridge an Arduino with: RTC, Motor drivers, Temp Sensor, IR Sensor, USB-UART converter, 5V 3A Reg, header for ESP8266, header for HC-05, level shifting between Rpi and Arduino, 8 Servo Motor Driver (I2C) 45 $2,696 / $4,100 / 65.8% Pi UpTime "GPIO connections, analog ports, UPS, RTC & battery power enabling Raspberry Pi to be mobile." 17 hours of uptime on full battery, 2 analog input, RTC, and 25 $4,020 / $15,000 / 26.8% Hatlogico "Open-source 16 PWMs, 8 ADCs and dual-voltage communications to sit on your Raspberry Pi to drive your quadcopter, robot, 3D printer etc" 42 £1,352 / £4,800 / 48.3% BattPi "BattPi is a Case for Raspberry Pi with integrated Battery and Real Time Clock. Built in UPS offering up to 8 hours of battery life." 34 £1,973 / £20,000 / 9.9% ProtoPLC Industrial add-on board. 6 inputs, 6 outputs, 1 analog input, 1 analog output, programmable leds. 28 $3,653 / $20,000 / 18.3% Raspitab Hackable tablet built from the Rpi Module with 3400mah battery, 7" screen, wifi usb, 5MP camera module. 87 £9,981 / £125,000 / 8% Pi-Home Add-on board with the ability to control: Zwave, Infra-red devices (TV/DVD..), RF Device (315/433 Mhz Plugs), and Zigbee devices. 80 $10,001 / $15,000 / 66.7% TX-1 GSM Cellular phone w/GPS add-on module. 5 $641 / $14,000 / 4.6% HDMI Input Module "Add an HDMI input interface to your Raspberry Pi and record or stream high quality video from your HD camcorder with clean HDMI output." 63 $6,907 / $15,000 / 34.5% easyPio GPIO breakout module for prototyping. 45 £329 / £1,200 / 27% RasPoE Raspberry Pi PoE Shield. 28 €3,310 / €12,500 / 26.5% If you're looking to crowdfund your Raspberry Pi project maybe you can learn what didn't go right for these projects. Here is a list of hardware projects that didn't get funded. This list was pulled from the two top crowdfunding sites Indiegogo and Kickstarter . This isn't all of the projects that I had found but some of the more interesting ones.*Note items in the list may have been re-listed later and funded. Some projects may have been ahead of their time as the Pi wasn't popular enough.

This article is about the motion picture of a fictional story of a character whose name is a homonym of a famous American automobile. For the article on the automobile, see Ford Fairlane (Americas) The Adventures of Ford Fairlane is a 1990 American action comedy mystery film directed by Renny Harlin and written by David Arnott, James Cappe, and Daniel Waters based on a story by Arnott and Cappe. The film stars comedian Andrew Dice Clay as the title character, Ford Fairlane, a "Rock n' Roll Detective", whose beat is the music industry in Los Angeles. True to his name, Ford drives a 1957 Ford Fairlane 500 Skyliner in the film. The film's main character was created by writer Rex Weiner in a series of stories that were published as weekly serials in 1979–80 by the New York Rocker and the LA Weekly. The stories were published as a book by Rare Bird Books in July 2018.[3] The film was both a commercial and critical failure, grossing a little more than half its budget and being awarded the Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Picture, tying with Bo Derek's Ghosts Can't Do It. However, it has since developed a cult following. Plot [ edit ] Ford Fairlane (Andrew Dice Clay) is seen sitting on a beach smoking as the film opens. A flashback initiates, showing a roaring crowd at a concert given by fictional popular heavy metal band The Black Plague. Lead singer Bobby Black (Vince Neil) makes an eccentric entrance down a zip-line onto the stage and begins performing. Shortly into one of the band's songs, Bobby Black collapses on stage and dies. After the lead singer of The Black Plague is murdered onstage, shock-jock Johnny Crunch (Gilbert Gottfried), an old friend who came west with Fairlane, hires Ford to track down a mysterious teenage groupie named Zuzu Petals, who may have a connection to Black's death. Soon after hiring Fairlane, Crunch is electrocuted on the air. The world's hippest detective soon finds himself trading insults with ruthless record executive Julian Grendel (Wayne Newton), a clueless cop and former disco star, Lt. Amos (Ed O'Neill), a merciless hit man named Smiley (Robert Englund) and countless ex-girlfriends out for his blood. Aiding and abetting Fairlane is loyal assistant Jazz (Lauren Holly) and a hip record producer (Morris Day) at the head of a bizarre lineup of suspects, victims, beautiful women and a koala as he finds himself hip-deep in the case of his life. The Macguffin of the film is three data CDs which, when read simultaneously, detail the illegal dealings of Julian Grendel, who was getting rich from bootlegging his record company's music and murdered Bobby Black when he found out Black had acquired the CDs with the incriminating evidence. Both of Fairlane's beloved possessions, his house and his car, are blown to bits, courtesy of Grendel. The first disc was with Colleen Sutton, the second with Zuzu Petals, and the third disc was hidden under the star for Art Mooney on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. It is later revealed that Grendel killed Bobby Black and Johnny Crunch, as he considered them both greedy and stupid because they wanted more money for their involvement in pirating CD's to sell to the highest bidder, making the music industry corrupt. However, Fairlane kills Grendel by setting him on fire with a flammable milk shake. Jazz leaves Fairlane, knowing how ungrateful he is for everything that has happened. Smiley shows up and plans to kill Ford, but not before revealing that he killed his young neighbor's [the Kid's] father. Ford distracts him and kills Smiley with a sleeve pistol. Jazz and Ford decide to reconcile, while the Kid decides to join their detective agency. Ford wins a million dollar lottery and buys a yacht, ending the film. Cast [ edit ] Soundtrack [ edit ] Music being central to the plot of a film about a private detective who specializes in cases arising from the music industry, the soundtrack featured a diverse group of artists. The official soundtrack release featured: The film's soundtrack includes Idol's "Cradle of Love", the video for which was shown often on MTV in 1990. The song also appeared on Idol's 1990 album Charmed Life. In the video, a young woman, played by Betsy Lynn George, taunts an uptight neighbor with her advances as she dances to the music. The video also featured footage from the film playing on a television in the neighbor's home, although none of the footage features Clay (at least not his face). This may be due to the infamous ban of Clay from appearing on the music network. Alternate versions of the "Cradle of Love" video eliminates the film footage when the video is usually aired on MTV. Richie Sambora's contribution to the soundtrack was a cover of the Jimi Hendrix song. Yello's "Unbelievable" samples bits of dialogue from the film, with one notable dialog switch - where in the film, a phone number is said as "1-800-Unbelivable" and in the song, the phone number is said as "1-800-Perfect". A number of the musicians featured on the soundtrack also appeared in the film itself, including Morris Day, Sheila E., Tone Loc (as Slam the Rapper), former Ozzy Osbourne bassist Phil Soussan, and drummer Randy Castillo appear playing the Black Plague concert during the flashback at the beginning of the film and Vince Neil, the lead singer of Mötley Crüe (who appeared as Bobby Black, the lead singer of the fictitious band, Black Plague). Black Plague's lead guitarist was played by Quiet Riot's axeman Carlos Cavazzo. Not appearing on the soundtrack is "Booty Time", the song that Ed O'Neill's character performs during the film. Yello is also credited with the film's "music score", and an early cut of their album Baby is used as the film's incidental soundtrack. The film's score was composed and conducted by Cliff Eidelman. Release [ edit ] Billy Idol's recording of "Cradle of Love" was named one of the "Most Performed Songs from Motion Pictures" by the ASCAP.[4] Critical response [ edit ] The film received generally negative reviews upon release. Review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a 29% rating based on 28 reviews.[5] On Metacritic, the film has a 24 out of 100 rating based on 13 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".[6] Critic Roger Ebert gave the film 1 star out of a possible 4, and called the film "loud, ugly and mean-spirited" but he also suggested that Clay had the confidence and screen presence for a successful acting career if he could move beyond his shtick.[7] Box office [ edit ] The film was not a financial success during its original theatrical release, making just over $21 million in the U.S.[2] Clay has claimed in interviews that the film had a successful first week before being pulled from theaters under pressure from the politically correct.[8] In fact, the film played on more screens during its second week than its first, but still suffered a 53.5% drop in box office gross.[9] Accolades [ edit ] The film "won" numerous Razzies at the 1990 Golden Raspberry Awards including Worst Actor (Andrew Dice Clay), Worst Picture (Joel Silver & Steve Perry — tied with Ghosts Can't Do It), and Worst Screenplay (Daniel Waters, James Cappe and David Arnott). It was also nominated for Worst Director and twice for Worst Supporting Actor (for both Gilbert Gottfried and Wayne Newton).[10] International reception [ edit ] Despite negative reviews in the US, the film enjoyed tremendous success in post-communist Hungary, where copies of a pirated, dubbed version were widely circulated in the burgeoning VHS market. The film's popularity in Hungary has been attributed to a high-quality dub starring iconic eccentric musician and actor Feró Nagy, which contains gratuitous use of profanity not found in the original English version of the film. Several lines of dialogue from the film became ingrained in the slang of Hungarian urban youth culture throughout the 90s. In Norway, after its 1992 VHS release, Ford Fairlane soon became a phenomenon. The catchphrases became hugely popular and the movie received cult status during the 90s. After huge demand from Norwegian audiences, the film was released on DVD in the early 2000s. It also became quite popular in Spain, especially due to the dub by the popular singer, actor and comedian Pablo Carbonell. See also [ edit ]

Suspect Antwan James, 27, was last seen wearing a white t-shirt, blue jeans and black boots. He is believed to be armed with a gun and is considered dangerous. (Photo11: Prince George's County Police Dept.) Story Highlights Police: Stepson of a D.C. police officer shot the officer during a dispute over yard work Prince George's County police are searching for 27-year-old Antwan James James is considered armed and dangerous UPPER MARLBORO, Md. (AP) — Police say the stepson of a D.C. police officer shot and killed the officer during a dispute over yard work at their Maryland home. Prince George's County police said Tuesday that they are searching for 27-year-old Antwan James. He's been charged in a warrant with murder in the fatal shooting of his stepfather, 46-year-old Joseph Newell. Police were called to Newell's Upper Marlboro home Monday night and found him shot to death. The officer was off duty at the time of the shooting. Police say Newell and James had been arguing over yard work before the shooting. Newell had been with the Metropolitan Police Department since 1989. Police are searching for James with K-9 units and other specialized officers. He is considered armed and dangerous. Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/ZLEjAh

DO the Republicans owe their current congressional majority to gerrymandering? At first glance, it seems self-evident that they do. In the 2012 election, the Democrats won the popular votes for the presidency, the Senate and the House of Representatives. But somehow in the House — for whose seats Republicans controlled the redistricting process in many crucial states — the Republicans managed to end up with a 16-seat majority despite losing the popular vote. The presumption among many reformers is that the Democrats would control Congress today if the 2012 election had been contested in districts drawn by nonpartisan commissioners rather than politicians. But is this true? Another possibility is that Democrats receive more votes than seats because so many of their voters reside in dense cities that Democratic candidates win with overwhelming majorities, while Republican voters are more evenly distributed across exurbs and the rural periphery. Perhaps even a nonpartisan redistricting process would still have delivered the House to the Republicans. To examine this hypothesis, we adapted a computer algorithm that we recently introduced in the Quarterly Journal of Political Science. It allows us to draw thousands of alternative, nonpartisan redistricting plans and assess the partisan advantage built into each plan. First we created a large number of districting plans (as many as 1,000) for each of 49 states. Then we predicted the probability that a Democrat or Republican would win each simulated district based on the results of the 2008 presidential election and tallied the expected Republican seats associated with each simulated plan.

Image copyright Reg Haslett Image caption Not a great day to be under canvas in Glenarm, County Antrim Northern Ireland was the wettest region of the UK in July with 128mm of rain, according to Met Office figures. That is 57% above average for the summer month, making it also the wettest July on record since 2010. The UK as a whole saw 107mm of rain, or 37% more than normal, with all areas receiving more rain than average. According to the Republic of Ireland's weather service, Met Éireann, most areas across Ireland were also wetter than normal. Image copyright Mervyn Robb Image caption When the clouds parted there was some beautiful weather in Portrush, County Antrim Shannon Airport had its wettest July since 1946 when more than double the average rain fell at the County Clare site. However, it was also the sunniest July in Northern Ireland since 2013 with 170.5 hours of sunshine, or 21% more than normal. Image copyright James Carlisle Image caption Another "soft day" for these hill-dwellers This reflects the fact that we enjoyed some warm and sunny weather during the first 18 days of the month. Image copyright Mervyn Robb Image caption July in Cushendun - not a complete washout The figure for the UK as a whole was 171 hours - which is normal for the time of year. Temperature-wise, July was fairly unremarkable with an average temperature of 14.4 celsius, just 0.2 celsius below normal.

A cop killed a dog and something else happened. Baltimore police officer Alec Taylor was off duty when, via the Baltimore Sun: Taylor's girlfriend told police she received a text from Taylor on February 26 telling her that he killed... [her] seven-month-old dog, named Rocko, after it defecated on the carpet. He then sent her a picture, according to a news release. She told police Taylor said he was tired of cleaning up the dog's mess and that he had beaten it with a mop before throwing its body in a parking lot dumpster. Police said he later told investigators he used a mop to force Rocko from behind the dryer and then used his hands to choke the dog. Who the fuck is in charge of hiring at the Baltimore police department? The arrest was made by the Montgomery County police department, who charged Taylor with animal cruelty and abuse. The Baltimore police department insisted in a statement that it took animal cruelty seriously, although Taylor was merely suspended without pay and not fired right away for being the kind of sociopath who kills a girlfriend’s pet and then sends her a picture (because his job is like a right!). h/t CPA As a sad sign of the times, the Sun’s sidebar included this related story from just a month ago, where a cop in nearby Arundel shot a dog while canvassing a neighborhood and was put on “administrative duty” while the department promised a “thorough” investigation. Our own related stories, below.

Derby County will renew acquaintances with Benfica this summer after final details to take part in the Algarve Football Cup this summer were completed. Nigel Pearson’s side will head to Portugal for a week-long training camp – between Wednesday 13 July and Wednesday 20 July – as part of their 2016/17 preparations and during their stay in the southern part of the country the club will compete in two games. As part of the Rams' week-long training camp, they will face Benfica and fellow Primeira Liga outfit Vitoria Setubal in the Algarve Football Cup. The first fixture will see Derby take on Vitoria Setubal on Friday 15 July, kick-off: 8:30pm. The following day will see Pearson’s side take on Benfica, who reached the Quarter-Finals of the 2015/16 UEFA Champions League competition and lifted the Primeira Liga title, on Saturday 16 July, kick-off also 8:30pm. Both of Derby’s fixtures will be played at the state-of-the-art Estádio Algarve – a purpose built-stadium for the 2004 European Championship Finals. Boasting a capacity of around 30,000, the Estádio Algarve hosted three Euro 2004 fixtures and has since been occupied by the Portugal and Gibraltar national teams. About Vitoria Setubal: Managed by Quim Machado, Vitoria Setubal finished 15th in this season’s Primeira Liga – finishing just a point above the relegation zone. In the history of the club, they have lifted the league title on one occasion as well as the Portuguese Cup three times. Founded in 1910, Vitoria Setubal play their games at the Estádio do Bonfim, which has a capacity of 18,694. About Benfica: Champions of Portugal for a third consecutive year, Benfica are classed as one of the biggest club’s in the European game. During the 2015/16 season, they reached the Quarter-Finals of the Champions League, where they were beaten by Bayern Munich over two-legs. Benfica, however, have the second most participations in the European Cup/ UEFA Champions League – second only to Real Madrid. Historically, Derby defeated the Águias (Eagles) over two legs in the 1972 European Cup – winning the first leg at the Baseball Ground 3-0 courtesy of goals from John McGovern, Kevin Hector and Roy McFarland. JTA are offering an exclusive package for this summer's tour to Portugal. For more information, email JTA at: [email protected] to register for details which they will then contact once the details are confirmed. Derby County 2016/17 pre-season so far… Wednesday 13 July – Portugal training camp Friday 15 July – Vitoria Setubal (Estádio Algarve) 8:30pm KO Saturday 16 July – Benfica (Estádio Algarve) 8:30pm KO Saturday 23 July – Walsall (Banks’s Stadium) 3pm KO Tuesday 26 July – Chesterfield (Proact Stadium) 7:30pm KO Wednesday 27 July – Sheffield United (Bramall Lane) 7:45pm KO Tweets by @ dcfcofficial

* Dept of Homeland Security: Java vulnerable to hackers * Could be used to steal identity, form malicious networks * Applies to browsers on all major operating systems By Jim Finkle Jan 11 (Reuters) - The U.S. Department of Homeland Security urged computer users to disable Oracle Corp’s Java software, amplifying security experts’ prior warnings to the hundreds of millions of consumers and businesses that use it to surf the Web. Hackers have figured out a way to exploit Java to install malicious software enabling them to commit crimes ranging from identity theft to making an infected computer part of an ad-hoc network of computers that can be used to attack websites. “We are currently unaware of a practical solution to this problem,” the Department of Homeland Security’s Computer Emergency Readiness Team said in a posting on its website late on Thursday. “This and previous Java vulnerabilities have been widely targeted by attackers, and new Java vulnerabilities are likely to be discovered,” the agency said. “To defend against this and future Java vulnerabilities, disable Java in Web browsers.” Java is a computer language that enables programmers to write software utilizing just one set of code that will run on virtually any type of computer, including ones that use Microsoft Corp’s Windows, Apple Inc’s OS X and Linux, an operating system widely employed by corporations. Computer users access Java programs through modules, or plug-ins, that run Java software on top of browsers such as Internet Explorer and Firefox. The U.S. government’s warning on Java came after security experts earlier on Thursday warned of the newly discovered flaw. It is relatively rare for government agencies to advise computer users to completely disable software due to a security bug, particularly in the case of widely used programs such as Java. They typically recommend taking steps to mitigate the risk of attack while manufacturers prepare an update, or hold off on publicizing the problem until an update is prepared. In September, the German government advised the public to temporarily stop using Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser to give it time to patch a security vulnerability that opened it to attacks. The Department of Homeland Security said that attackers could trick targets into visiting malicious websites that would infect their PCs with software capable of exploiting the bug in Java. It said that an attacker could also infect a legitimate website by uploading malicious software that would infect machines of computer users who trust that site because they have previously visited it without experiencing any problems. They said developers of several popular tools known as exploit kits, which criminal hackers use to attack PCs, have added software that allows hackers to exploit the newly discovered bug in Java to attack computers. Security experts have been scrutinizing the safety of Java since a similar security scare in August, which prompted some of them to advise using the software only on an as-needed basis. At the time they advised businesses to only allow their workers to use Java browser plug-ins when prompted for permission by trusted programs such as GoToMeeting, a Web-based collaboration tool from Citrix Systems Inc. Adam Gowdiak, a researcher with Polish security firm Security Explorations, subsequently said that he had found other security bugs in Java that continued to make computers vulnerable to attack. Java suffered another setback in October when Apple began removing old versions of the software from Internet browsers of Mac computers when its customers installed new versions of its OS X operating system. Apple did not provide a reason for the change and both companies declined comment at the time.

Japan might have only minutes to prepare for nuclear attacks, said officials in the island nation as they face down threats from demented North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. Tokyo is asking for all its regional governments to sharpen alert plans should Pyongyang’s tubby tyrant press the button and send nukes flying over the Sea of Japan. Officials in Tokyo — Japan’s largest city with 13.5 million citizens — said their residents might have as little as 10 minutes to act. And even more concerning, Osaka Mayor Hirofumi Yoshimura said the 2.6 million residents of Japan’s third-largest city might have as little as four minutes to run for their lives and take shelter. “A missile may not be detected as soon as it leaves the launch pad … and that could take several minutes,” Yoshimura told the Japan Times. “The warning and alarms might only sound four or five minutes before a missile arrives.” As North Korea continues to make nuclear threats, Japanese citizens are becoming increasingly fearful that they — and not Pyongyang’s sworn enemies in Seoul and Washington, DC — could be Kim’s first targets. Japan’s civil defense website received 5.7 million visitors in the first 23 days of this month — a massive hike from its usual monthly traffic of less than 400,000 hits, the Washington Post reported. The prime minister’s office issued new “actions to protect yourself” guidelines this week — which pretty much amount to taking cover inside well-constructed buildings. Under the site’s FAQs, Japanese officials said citizens will have only minutes to act. “When a missile is launched from North Korea, it will not take long to reach Japan,” it answered. “For example, the ballistic missile launched from (North Korea) on February 7 last year took 10 minutes to fly over Okinawa.” US Vice President Mike Pence last week reaffirmed the Trump administration’s alliance with Japan amid the recent provocations from the hermit kingdom.

The Lure of Radicalism Amongst Muslim Youth 10/18/2010 Why is it that a few militant clerics are so popular among some American Muslims? I was asked by an academic at a recent luncheon. After all, besides being so extreme in their message, don’t most of them lack the scholarly credentials of the many mainstream clerics who oppose their militancy? The questioner was a highly educated person, someone who had a deep understanding of Islamic theology. He also understood quite well the existence of significant variations in the interpretation and understanding of religious texts. He was one of those who had no problem looking past the right-wing Islamophobic rhetoric of Fox News and Robert Spencer et al., yet was still confused as to why second-generation American and British Muslims would find a message of extremism and militancy so appealing. He correctly pointed out that the clerics espousing militancy were not only in the minority, but were also not as well-trained in the classical sciences as were clerics belonging to the opposing camp. Why then, were their voices so influential? This academic at the luncheon was not the only one struggling with the question. A recent congressional hearing also tackled this same issue. And of course, this was not the first time that I, myself, had to confront this very question. It was especially driven home after someone with whom I had only briefly interacted Umar Farouk AbdulMutallab, the now infamous “underwear bomber” turned radical and tried to blow up innocent men, women and children. Like this? Get more of our great articles. Get more of our great articles. Umar’s transformation provides an excellent case-study that can and should be studied further to shed light on the question of radicalism, and this short essay makes a first, humble attempt at doing just that. I remember Umar as a shy introvert who attended an intensive retreat, the IlmSummit sponsored by Al-Maghrib Institute in Houston, TX, in the summer of 2008. I was among ten instructors at that retreat. Umar was in fact so quiet and shy that I almost felt obliged to engage him in small talk, asking him mundane questions about where he lived and what he was studying. And that was about the extent of my interaction with him. Never once did he raise his hand in class to ask a question, or seek any advice, or share any concerns, or confront me on any subject. It appears that the lack of communication or socializing was not limited to the two of us. Rather, it seems that other students at the retreat had the same experience; they didn’t remember anything significant about him except his nonchalant, quiet presence. In fact, my encounter with him had been so brief and dull, that when I saw his pictures being paraded on every website and news magazine cover in December of 2009, I didn’t even recognize him until someone alerted me via email that this was the same Umar who had been at the AlMaghrib retreat. Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined that someone as shy and socially introverted as Umar would have attempted to blow up a plane by stuffing his underwear with explosives! So, what happened? From news accounts and our own documentation, we know that the AlMaghrib retreat was his last AlMaghrib course or seminar. We also know that he left England for a Middle Eastern country (where he remained for a few months), and eventually made his way to Yemen, where he interacted with an American-born cleric whose vision of Islam was completely at odds with our own. It was this cleric who apparently inspired him to open a new chapter in his life, and who brainwashed this 19-year old introvert into believing that murdering two hundred innocent people, including many women and children (some of them even fellow Muslims), would somehow bring him closer to his Lord and earn him reward on Judgment Day. Why did Umar AbdulMutallab, a college-educated young man with a bright future ahead of him, reject the authority and guidance of authentic orthodox Islam, and allow himself to be lured into performing such a destructive and naïve act in the process destroying his own life and possibly that of many others? After all, hadn’t he interacted with us (instructors and students of knowledge) and lived with us for two full weeks? Hadn’t he observed our level of scholarship, our academic grasp of the religion, and our emphatic opposition to irrational and counterproductive militancy? Umar might have been a social introvert, but he was clearly not unintelligent. What was it in the message of this Yemeni-American that had caused him to ignore the message and methodology of the many teachers that he interacted with at the AlMaghrib retreat? Some of what you are about to read might not be ground-breaking, but other points that I mention will raise a few eyebrows and perhaps even anger some. That is to be expected, and I do not expect everyone to agree with everything that I write. The point of this article (as is typically my main intention when writing such pieces) is to jump-start the discussion, and to allow for frank dialogue among all parties. Let’s get to the answer then. It is not rocket science, nor does it require expertise in human psychology. Rather, it is quite simple. There is an external factor, and an internal factor, and when these two factors are coupled together, the result is fertile breeding ground for extremist ideas. The external factor is an almost total absence of voices from within mainstream Islam (of all varieties: Sufis, Salafis, Deobandis, etc.) that speak to and address the concerns and issues that resonate with the Muslims most prone to extremism. When the only voices that address issues of concern are the voices of radical militant jihadis, it is only natural that young and impressionable minds will gravitate to these voices. From the perspective of these disaffected youth, since the mainstream clerics aren’t discussing relevant issues, or involved in the discourses that concern them, how then can they be turned to for guidance? The internal factor is a very warped understanding of Islamic texts and doctrines, and a romanticized view of Islamic history. It is only with such a skewed and idealistic vision that a Muslim can allow radical voices to bypass simple common sense and a pure Islamic heart, filtering all the way to his inner psyche. Let us discuss both of these issues in more detail: The External Factor The issues and concerns that are fogging the minds of many Muslims (and all those who turn to radicalism) center around the present state of the Ummah, and in particular the political and social struggles that many Muslims around the world are facing. These struggles are significantly complicated (directly or indirectly) by policies put into place by our own American government (and, to a lesser extent, other Western countries). Before 9/11, most of the grievances were solely linked to the Palestinian question, and it was for this reason that radicalization and militant tendencies during that time-frame amongst Western Muslims were almost non-existent (it is not a coincidence that all those who planned and aided in the 9/11 attacks were foreigners). Post 9/11, our government reacted in ways that has added infinitely more fuel to the fire of extremism (and hence, the rise in radicalism amongst our own Western youth). From the illegal invasion of Iraq to the foolish military endeavors in Afghanistan, from Abu Ghraib to Guantanamo, from Aafia Siddiqui to Ali al-Timimi, from the ‘War on Terror‘ to the ‘Patriot Act’, it became easier to convince an impressionable mind into accepting the West versus Islam paradigm (as if these two entities can be surgically and neatly delineated, separated and defined). And instead of such incidents abating with time, every few days a new headline in some newspaper conveys yet another story proving the false paradigm: an American drone missile strike kills a few dozen anonymous, faceless tribe-members in Pakistan, or ever-expanding Israeli settlements steal more land from Palestinians, or a new torture scandal involving Muslim prisoners is leaked, or another military scandal involving the killing of innocent Muslim civilians is exposed. These incidents are a direct or indirect result of either our own American military operations, or our tax-supported military aid, or our turning a blind eye to specific actions of our allies via the use of our veto power in the UN Security Council. As if such misguided foreign action was not sufficient to enrage a proud young Muslim man, he must also face the constant media onslaught that seeks to portray him and his faith as inherently evil and dangerous. He hears of his friends and families or other Muslims being routinely harassed, humiliated and intimidated at airports and border-crossings, and “randomly” selected for additional screening and questioning. Of course, he too has his own first-hand discriminatory experiences. His faith attacked on national airwaves, his religiosity treated with suspicion, his co-religionists around the world killed, and his activist brothers and sisters in Western lands jailed, it is no surprise that our young and impressionable Muslim teenager struggles to make sense of all of this. He wants someone to defend his faith and speak up on behalf of the oppressed. He wishes to hear fiery and angry rhetoric, charging the “free and democratic”nations with hypocrisy, double standards, and the flouting of human rights. It is obvious to him that his government is primarily concerned with acquisition of oil and the control of natural resources, even if that results in the loss of Muslim blood. He clearly sees our politicians pandering more to the interests of corporate sponsors and special-interest donors than to the interests of their own fellow citizens. So, naturally, as a lay-Muslim, he looks to the scholars of his religion, seeking to find solace in angry tirades and verbal lashings against our politicians, leaders, media pundits, and law enforcement agencies who are, in his view, the root cause of all of this anger and terror in the first place. Instead, all he hears at his local mosque, assuming he is fortunate enough to live in an area where the Imam speaks English, are khutbahs that have no political relevance whatsoever. Finding nothing of significance at a local level, he then looks to more influential scholars: famous national clerics and da`ees, staple invitees to any major Islamic conference. Alas, all he hears them do is to regularly criticize his side: the victims in his eyes. Those who stand up to defend the innocent and fight against the real terrorists “from his perspective” are described as “Muslim terrorists.” Instead of supporting the cause of the weak and oppressed, these clerics side with the oppressors, routinely dissociating themselves from their own, giving spectacle fatwas against violence even as they ignore state-sponsored terrorism and what he perceives as the “greater violence.” Over time, as acts of violence and terror increase in Muslims lands, and as local scholars only increase in their denunciation of “Muslim extremism,” this young man becomes even more disillusioned with these clerics. In his eyes, these Western scholars, no matter how popular among the masses, are nothing more than sell-outs: government-appeasing servile acquiescing cowards who are more concerned about their own safety and popularity than the safety and comfort of their persecuted brothers and sisters around the world. “Enough of criticizing us! Who speaks up to defend them?” he demands. “Where is the condemnation of our own Western nations, our own policies and our own governments, when they engage in acts of violence, drone bombings, mass-killings, torture, secret renditions and sham trials? Why is such activity not described as terroris, is it not also targeting the innocent? Or is ‘terrorism’ only when a Muslim commits such acts?” Alas, the token condemnation against foreign policy that does occasionally come from the mouths of these ‘mainstream’ clerics is too shallow for his liking, too weak to satiate his own anger, too lost in the convoluted language and footnotes of their larger message. He is always reminded of the words of Malcolm X and the distinction that Malcolm drew between the ‘house Negro’ and the ‘field Negro’ and he cannot help but feel that these mainstream scholars are far too entrenched with the powers-that-be to stand up against them. Not hearing anything from his local or national scholars in the physical world around him, he scours the virtual world instead, looking on the net for voices that will speak to his concerns and address his anger. And in this virtual world, he stumbles across chat-rooms and forums where, for the first time, he finds people who see the world his way. These people, aided by the anonymity of the internet and empowered by the false bravado that only a fake alias can give, finally make our young man feel home, and that he was right all along in his assessment. It is on these forums that he finds people who list nothing but the political faults of the Western world. It is on these forums where little children pretend to be brave men who can take on the ‘big bad wolf.’ And it is on these forums that he is introduced to ‘clerics who speak the truth’ and ‘fear none amongst men’, of legendary giants that even America fears and will do anything to silence (even if that means sending squads of assassins to murder one of their own citizens without trial). Whereas previously he had trouble finding anyone who would voice his view of the world, here, all the voices on these forums seem to be echoing the same message, spoken from the mouths of militants and circulated online by their testosterone-filled teenage cheerleaders. And in this worldview espoused by these militants, our young man finds great comfort and solace. According to the militants, every fault in the whole world emanates not from within, but from without. The Muslims are never to blame for anything. It is always the ‘West,’ and in particular ‘Amrika’. Local persecution of scholars in Muslim lands? ‘Amrika,’ because they were the ones who propped up the kings, presidents and emirs in the Muslim world in the first place. Bombings that kill innocent Muslims in the streets of Baghdad, or the mosques of Karachi, or the shrines of Najaf? ‘Amrika,’ through the use of false-flag operations conducted by American agents, or as a result of the wider chaos originally caused by once again, ‘Amrik’. The awful state of the economy in Muslim lands? You guessed it, ‘Amrika’, via the use of loans that the American-controlled IMF gave out and the economic policies that America put in place. It is a comforting vision, especially for a young teenager: a simple and self-serving view that reclaims the honor of his faith while laying blame on the feet of others. “It’s not our fault at all! We are always oppressed, always victimized, it’s all America’s fault,” he says to himself over and over again. And on the forums that he frequents, the constant interactions with twenty other kids from around the world, some writing secretly from their parent’s basement, some from their own ‘Star-Wars’ posters-lined bedrooms, this chatter begins to sound like the representative voice of the entire Muslim world. This young ‘victim’ does not realize that the ‘victim-mentality’ is not a motif of the Quran, nor do we find it ever verbalized in the seerah of our beloved Prophet. It is not a dignified mentality, and even if there are elements of truth in some portions of it, such an attitude does not befit a believer who believes in an All-Mighty Being who Hears and Sees all. Our Prophet suffered more at the hands of his detractors than any Muslim in our time, yet he maintained a moral dignity and an internal courage that would put to shame the entire paradigm of victim-mentality that these radicals espouse. The Internal Factors With regards to the internal factors, it is not likely that a mind well-grounded in authentic texts and traditions will gravitate towards acts of terrorism. Thus, it is no coincidence that one will be hard-pressed to find senior clerics, of any theological persuasion, who justify flying planes into building or strapping bombs onto one’s body in order to blow up innocent civilians. A radical’s mind could only have been exposed to cherry-picked religious texts along with their misinterpretations; typically verses from Surah al-Anfal and Surah al-Tawba (both of which were revealed in specific historic situations very different from our own). Such a mind is only versed in Prophetic traditions of a military nature, sheered of their context and shown in isolation from many other traditions that would help paint a more nuanced view. However, these are not the only verses and ahadith (the Prophetic traditions) pertaining to the topic of jihad. Many other verses, especially those that seem to conflict with their warped understanding of Surah al-Anfal and Tawba, are simply dismissed as belonging to the ‘Makkan’ phase of revelation. Many Prophetic traditions which would show that military action is not the only way to fight for the truth are simply bypassed or ignored. For every evidence that they quote, there is an almost surreal attempt to isolate that one verse or hadith from the entire corpus of Islamic texts and law. For these militants, it is as if each verse they cherry-pick was actually revealed for their immediate benefit. For them, it is as if every hadith that they quote was stated by the Prophet directly to them and in support of their world-view. Only a mind completely bereft from the necessary hermeneutical tools of usul al-fiqh (the procedure of deriving laws) and maqasid al-Shariah (understanding the goals of Islamic Law) can be so shallow. With regards to doctrines, a simplistic, black-and-white understanding of wala wa-l-bara is propagated by the extremists; one that the intellectually-challenged (of the ilk of George W. Bush) would have absolutely no difficulty understanding. “You’re either with us or against us”, both Bush and Awlaki pontificate. Yet, the real world that we live in is not as black and white as these Manichean camps would like it to be. A clear and simple argument can be made that on each and every issue, we should stand with the truth, regardless of which side that truth is on. And it is not uncommon that this truth is not on one side, but somewhere in between. In the context of the very verses that many militants use to justify their black-and-white understandings of wala wa-l-bara, one verse (8:72) specifically mentions that even if Muslims under attack ask for help, and reach out to you based on religious loyalties, you are not obliged to help them if that help will compromise your political alliances. Extrapolating from this, one can state that while American Muslims are with the Palestinians, Iraqis and Kashmiris in wanting freedom, safety and security for them, at the same time we cannot help them militarily if that help will compromise our own safety and the safety of our families and communities, or if such help would contradict our political alliances. We can still help our suffering brethren in many other ways, for example, by educating our fellow countrymen regarding the dismal plight of these people and how our own government has been, many times, complicit in perpetuating or even causing such predicaments. The point that I am stressing here is that a more nuanced and pragmatic reading of the Quran can also just as easily be done “ but it takes more wisdom, foresight and moral courage than many of these testosterone-filled youth are willing to undertake (and for the record, I firmly believe that one of the best ways to de-radicalize these young men is to help them get married early and encourage them to have kids, and I mean this in all seriousness). Muslims need to understand that anyone who approaches the Quran and Sunnah with preconceived notions, wishing to find justification for certain theological or legal opinions, can almost always do so. If one wishes to speak to the texts rather than allow the texts to speak to him, then only his imagination will be a limit to the opinion that he seeks to derive. With regards to our Islamic history and heritage, our overzealous youngster is told of a few romanticized legends of how a woman cried out for the Caliph Mutasim to come rescue her from the clutches of the enemy, or how Umar b. al-Khattab could not rest even if only one Muslim was in trouble, or how Salah al-Din al-Ayyubi almost single-handedly raised up an army to liberate Jerusalem from the clutches of the evil Crusaders. But this youngster never actually reads a book of Muslim history himself. If he did, he would find a very different story, a very human one. Yes, there is no doubt that there were times in our past when noble men achieved gallant feats and ordinary people faced almost impossible challenges, yet came out as heroes in the end. But, as with any human history, these examples are more the exceptions than the rule. Politically speaking, the Muslims suffered from as much intrigue, internal backstabbing, civil wars, bureaucratic inefficiencies, secret dealings, internecine warfare, bribery and corruption as just about any other culture and civilization. Were this youngster to read further, he would discover the almost constant insurrections that the Umayyads had to face from various Muslim insurgents, the political intrigues and the civil wars fought multiple times within the Abbasids, the alliances that the Taifa Rulers of Andalus regularly formed with Christian princes against fellow Muslims in order to retain power, the rivalries and fratricide of the Ottoman Sultans, and many, many, many more such sordid facts facts that are not taught in Islamic Sunday school. Most of the armies that were harnessed and prepared in our fourteen centuries of Islamic history were actually gathered to fight other Muslims for political or material gain, and not to fight the ‘inglorious infidel’. Muslim societies of classical and medieval times struggled with many of the same issues that their modern counterparts do (albeit to different levels), of societal corruption and moral decay and religious indifference. If there were even prostitutes in the holy city of Madinah during the Prophetic era (as our source books clearly mention), does one believe that later societies would somehow be better than our ‘pious predecessors’? What a thorough reading of our history shows us is that our societies and people were not angels, but simply humans. Yes, there was much good as well, and there is no denying that having a Caliphate that ruled according to Islamic law led to a society of greater Islamic accomplishments than what can be obtained in our times. But by the same token, because we live in an age devoid of a Caliphate, the good that does occur in our era is of a different type, and the endeavors and struggles of our times will inevitably form its own legends and heroes for future generations. It is immature and dangerous to over-glorify our past. By painting an imaginary and overly-romanticized picture of an Islamic epoch, it is easier for misguided clerics to convince energetic but naïve youngsters to reclaim and resuscitate such a fantasy, no matter what the cost might be. I have no doubt that Umar AbdulMutallab saw a level of academic excellence at AlMaghrib that he would be hard-pressed to find anywhere else in the Western world. I also have no doubt that he was highly impressed with the scholastic content of our seminars. However, in the end, what was important to him was not what he saw, but what he didn’t see. And what he didn’t see was an exposition and condemnation of the role our own countries play in spreading terror around the world. What he didn’t see were explicit solutions being offered in light of the current situation of the Ummah. In other words, what he didn’t hear was a discourse regarding the current political and social ills that he felt so passionately about, and a frank dialogue about the Islamic method for correcting such ills. And in that vacuüm, where neither AlMaghrib nor other mainstream voices had anything substantive to offer, the voices of radical extremism proved to be the only bait dangling in front of his eyes. For him, there never was a competition between Orthodox Islam and militancy; there never was an ‘either-or‘ choice to be made because these two visions of Islam (from his perspective) were completely independent of one another. Each one discussed different topics and each was active in a different arena. So convinced was he by that message of radicalism that he was willing to give up his life for it, not realizing that living one’s life for the sake of God is far more difficult than committing suicide for His sake (as if the latter can ever truly be for the sake of God!). By allowing radicals to speak on behalf of the voiceless, we who remained silent simply lost the battle for the hearts and minds of people such as Umar. If we truly wish to fight radical ideas amongst our youth; if we wish to persuade them away from rash measures drawn from raw emotions, and to persuade them to act upon wisdom and perform real acts of courage,then the first step that we will have to take is to become more vocal about the grievances that drive young men to acts of desperation. We will need to be frank about the role that our governments play in ruining the freedoms and happiness that specific societies around the world deserve. And after discussing these woes, we will need to educate our youth about the proper way forward in solving them: away from foolish and un-Islamic militancy, and towards education, political activism and other positive channels. Those who choose to take on this task will have much to worry about for themselves. They will have to brave the attention and subsequent fury of a fear-mongering media empire that loves to demonize any who dares disagree with its own romantic notion of a lost American utopia. These individuals will have to put their trust in Allah as they fight legal and political battles against their own governments and law enforcement agencies, as they themselves are wiretapped, monitored, harassed, baited and perhaps even jailed merely because they state the obvious: that it is our own country’s domestic and foreign policies that are the greatest source of the anger and resentment fueling radicalism. It is an awkward position to be in; for some, it appears to be a hopeless battle. How can one simultaneously fight against a powerful government, a pervasive and sensationalist-prone media, and a group of overzealous rash youth who are already predisposed to reject your message because they view you as being a part of the establishment (while, ironically, the ‘establishment’ never ceases to view you as part of the radicals)? But there really is no other alternative. We need to protect our religion for our children after us, and we need to preserve what we can of the freedoms this country still offers us. And while I am skeptical that America will ever revert to its innocent pre-9/11 state of affairs; still, despite all that has occurred to change this country, America remains far better than any European equivalent, and we need to appreciate and cherish this fact even as we struggle to balance our loyalties between the requirements of our faith and those that are increasingly being imposed upon us by our country. The journey ahead of us is long and difficult, and the task is well beyond simply acknowledging the root cause of anger. Real and tangible solutions must be offered, and we must assess the pros and cons of any step that we undertake. This is but one step, and many more arduous miles lie ahead. But even the journey of a thousand miles must begin with one step. To be continued. Image courtesy artcornwall.org

Do Me a Favor, Prince [Monday Meeting Notes] Monday Meeting, News Another fine piece of art from the Prince’s Gambit card set by Mark Kelly. This time, of course, it’s the Sabbat, which makes a lot of sense since part of the game is to figure out who among those playing is the Sabbat infiltrator or infiltrators. There’s more info down below in the BLURBS! section about the Prince’s Gambit Kickstarter, if you want to check it out. Speaking of Kickstarters, somebody asked me what kinds of KSs I have backed and what compels me to back them. Which was a very different sort of question than I usually get asked, so thanks! So, for me, I’ll back if the project is for a property I’m interested in, or if the KS is for something that couldn’t get made any other way. Sometimes those two coincide. So, I just got in the giant, and I mean in dimensions, Judges’ Guild book by Goodman Games that reprints a mess o’ JG material at that “tabloid” size they published in back when I started out with D&D, and I just received my Unknown Armies books, from Atlas Games, that I backed because amazingly I never had a UA book in my game collection. Outside the industry, I absolutely had to back the MST3K revival KS, which might have fit into the next category, but honestly, I never thought it would fail. But, in that second category, I backed MASHed, RPing in the Korean War by Mark Plemmons, which despite it having a perfect jewel of a triage system driving the operating room tension that was key to MASH, is the sort of ultra-focused game that might not have been made without KS. Similarly, but outside RPGs, I backed Chris Moeller’s KS that he ran several years ago to fund the creation of the third graphic novel in his Iron Empires series after the mainstream comic book publishers wouldn’t touch it. And sometimes, if the KS is just so chock full of Stretch Goal stuff then I just have to pledge, even though I don’t “need” more stuff. The sculpts for the Rising Sun game were one of those things that were too cool, and in such quantity, that I couldn’t say no. Our meetings today were mostly about process and getting things done. First Eddy and I went through a lot of the efforts he is going through setting up his schedule and his move to Ireland. Then we had our Onyx staff meeting, and that was also about all the projects we are working on, the differences between our properties and our licensed ones, and whether anyone expects us to respond to every comment Tweeted about us. (The answer is no, we have work to do). Mirthful Mike Chaney asked me to remind everyone that we are still looking for artists, and frankly we always will be! If you are interested, you can email your interest and examples of your best work to him at: [email protected] Now, here’s the important part. We want any of you who are considering sending some samples to Mirthful Mike to know that you have just as good a chance to get work with us, and to continue to work with us, as any other artist, regardless of gender, race, creed, or anything about the person you are. We’re interested in awesome illustrations, and if you can do that, and deliver them on deadline, then that’s what matters to us. And let me stress, because we want you to hear us, if you’ve been unable to break into illustration because of any of those factors, we want you to know that we want you here working with us. Some people will ask why I felt the need to stress that. Well, because it’s important for aspiring artists who’ve had the door slammed in their faces because of who they are to know that the door we have opened isn’t just open, but that we’re waving them in because we want to see what kind of artwork they can do. Then it is up to the artwork to convince us to hire the artist. There are other ways to phrase this, and other ways to try and get more diversity into this thing of ours. This is what we are doing right now, and how we are phrasing it. BLURBS! KICKSTARTER! The Prince’s Gambit casual vampire card game Kickstarter continues to roll with over 1100 backers! We’re almost at the Stretch Goal for adding the Independent Clan Ravnos and then more new art, with more cool rewards yet to come. So please check it out: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/200664283/princes-gambit-casual-vampire-card-game ! Designed by long-time Vampire: the Masquerade tabletop RPG developer Justin Achilli, Prince’s Gambit is a fast-paced social deduction game set within the world of Vampire, but which requires no special knowledge to play. Players must cooperate to gain the favor of the Prince while deducing who among them are secretly the traitorous Sabbat infiltrators. Next, the Monarchies of Mau KS is scheduled come after Gambit. ON SALE! Looking for our Deluxe or Prestige Edition books? Here’s the link to the press release we put out about how Onyx Path is now selling through Indie Press Revolution: http://theonyxpath.com/press-release-onyx-path-limited-editions-now-available-through-indie-press-revolution/ You can now order wave 2 of our Deluxe and Prestige print overrun books, including Deluxe Mage 20th Anniversary, and Deluxe V20 Dark Ages! From the massive Chronicles of Darkness: Dark Eras main book, we have pulled this single chapter, Dark Eras: Beneath the Skin (Demon and Skinchangers 1486-1502 Aztec Empire). Ahuitzotl sits on the throne at the height of the Aztec Empire, overseeing his sorcerer-priests’ sacrifices and the endless flower wars his jaguar and eagle warriors carry out in his name to keep the altars well-supplied with victims. The gears of the Aztec Empire turn smoothly and inexorably, but not everything is what it pretends to be. Skinchangers take the shapes of animals to run the wilds or bring down human prey, the Unchained cobble together identities from stolen lives, and stranger things still lurk in the deserts and jungles beyond the walls of Tenochtitlan. Available Wednesday in PDF and physical copy PoD versions on DTRPG! From the massive Chronicles of Darkness: Dark Eras main book, we have pulled this single chapter, Dark Eras: Into the Cold (Demon: the Descent 1961 Berlin). East Germany erects a wall against its Western counterpart, turning West Berlin into an island within its own country. As the Cold War heats up, demons find themselves the targets of increasing human scrutiny, and begin to realize that the God-Machine’s plans didn’t end with the War. Available Wednesday in PDF and physical copy PoD versions on DTRPG! The splendor and horror of Rio is unwrapped! Cursed Necropolis: Rio for Mummy: the Curse is on sale in PDF and PoD versions: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/205257/Cursed-Necropolis-Rio Beneath the splendor of Rio de Janeiro seethes a hotbed of occult activity. Over a score of mummies keep their tombs in Rio, their presence seeping into the soil and stones and souls of the city. Over all this reigns the infamous Teshra-Gemet, the pretender Pharaoh. The city of Rio births marvels both bright and dark… and you never know which kind you have until it’s too late. Cursed Necropolis: Rio contains: The secrets and schemes of Rio’s Arisen. New Utterances, from the perception usurping Horse and Rider to the cleansing fire of Baal’s Due. “The Serpent’s Tooth,” an all-new adventure to introduce players to the conflicts and power plays of Rio de Janeiro. Beasts are added to Hunter: the Vigil with Hunter: Tooth and Nail, coming atcha in PDF and physical book Pod versions on DriveThruRPG.com! http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/204066/Hunter-Tooth-and-Nail Tooth and Nail is a bonus chapter/companion book to the previous released Hunter: Mortal Remains that explores antagonists inspired by the Beast: the Primordial RPG. Hunter: Tooth and Nail includes: Fiction and story hooks to bring these beasts of legend to your Hunter: The Vigil chronicle. chronicle. New bestial Dread Powers. New Compacts and Conspiracies which hunt the monsters, but also sometimes hunt the zealous heroes that hunt as well. The Secrets of the Covenants for Vampire: the Requiem 2nd REVEALED this Wednesday on DTRPG! Physical copy PoD version coming to DTRPG: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/199280/Secrets-of-the-Covenants Vampires gather under many banners. But five have endured the tumult of Western history better than any other. The Carthian Movement. The Circle of the Crone. The Invictus. The Lancea et Sanctum. The Ordo Dracul. Each has its fierce devotees, its jealous rivals, and its relentless enemies. Now,for the first time, the covenants speak for themselves. This book includes: A variety of stories from each of the covenants, all told in their own words. Never-before revealed secrets, like the fate of the Prince of New Orleans. New blood sorcery, oaths, and other hidden powers of the covenants. From the massive Chronicles of Darkness: Dark Eras main book, we have pulled this single chapter, Dark Eras: Fallen Blossoms (Hunter 1640-1660 Japan). Japan is moving into the Edo Period. New laws and new ways of thinking wash over the land, and with a new order come new threats to humanity. Take a look at the Vigil in a time where samurai transition from warlords to bureaucrats, Japan massively and lethally rejects outside influence, and when Edo rapidly grows into a world power. Continuing our individual Dark Eras chapters, we offer you Dark Eras: Fallen Blossoms on in PDF and physical copy PoD versions on DTRPG! http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/205483/Dark-Eras-Fallen-Blossoms-Hunter-the-Vigil From the massive Chronicles of Darkness: Dark Eras main book, we have pulled this single chapter, Dark Eras: Doubting Souls (Hunter 1690-1695 Salem). Immigrants and tribes struggled to co-exist on the Eastern Seaboard in the ever-expanding Colonies. Violent clashes, supernatural beliefs, and demonic influences spelled disaster for Salem Village and its surrounding towns, while others fought werewolves and vampires on the frontier. With so much at risk, only god-fearing men and women were deemed innocent — and those were few indeed. Available in PDF and physical copy PoD versions on DTRPG: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/204372/Dark-Eras-Doubting-Souls-Hunter-the-Vigil From the massive Chronicles of Darkness: Dark Eras main book, we have pulled this single chapter, Dark Eras: The Bowery Dogs (Werewolf 1969-1979 NYC). New York City in the 1970s. Crime. Drugs. Gang violence. Vast economic disparity. And werewolves. It’s a lean, ugly time to be alive, and the lone wolf doesn’t stand a chance out there. In the end, all you really have is family. Available in PDF and physical copy PoD versions on DTRPG: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/203762/Dark-Eras-The-Bowery-Dogs-Werewolf-the-Forsaken The Locker is open; the Chronicles of Darkness: Hurt Locker, that is! PDF and physical copy PoDs are now available on DTRPG! http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/199275/Chronicles-of-Darkness-Hurt-Locker Hurt Locker features: Treatment of violence in the Chronicles of Darkness . Lasting trauma, scene framing, and other tools for making your stories hurt. . Lasting trauma, scene framing, and other tools for making your stories hurt. Many new player options, including Merits, supernatural knacks, and even new character types like psychic vampires and sleeper cell soldiers. Expanded equipment and equipment rules. Hurt Locker requires the Chronicles of Darkness Rulebook or any other standalone Chronicles of Darkness rulebook such as Vampire: The Requiem, Werewolf: The Forsaken, or Beast: The Primordial to use. From the massive Chronicles of Darkness: Dark Eras main book, we have pulled this single chapter, Dark Eras: Ruins of Empire (Mummy 1893-1924). Perhaps the quintessential era of the mummy in the minds of Westerners, this period saw the decline of the two greatest empires of the age: British and Ottoman. Walk with the Arisen as they bear witness to the death of the Victorian age, to pivotal mortal discoveries in Egypt, and to the horrors of the Great War. Available in PDF and physical copy PoD versions on DTRPG. http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/178801/Dark-Eras-Ruins-of-Empire-Mummy-the-Curse From the massive Chronicles of Darkness: Dark Eras main book, we have pulled this single chapter, Dark Eras: The Sundered World (Werewolf and Mage 5500-5000 BCE). At the birth of civilization, in the shadow of the Fall, the Awakened stand as champions and protectors of the agricultural villages spread across the Balkans. In a world without a Gauntlet, where Shadow and flesh mingle, the steady taming of the world by humanity conflicts with the half-spirit children of Father Wolf. Available in PDF and physical copy PoD versions on DTRPG. http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/202272/Dark-Eras-The-Sundered-World-Werewolf-the-Forsaken-Mage-the-Awakening Night Horrors: Conquering Heroes for Beast: the Primordial is available now as an Advance PDF: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/202615/Night-Horrors-Conquering-Heroes This book includes: An in-depth look at how Heroes hunt and what makes a Hero, with eleven new Heroes to drop into any chronicle. A brief look at why Beasts may antagonize one another, with seven new Beasts to drop into any chronicle. Rules for Insatiables, ancient creatures born of the Primordial Dream intent on hunting down Beasts to fill a hunger without end, featuring six examples ready to use in any chronicle. CONVENTIONS! Discussing GenCon plans. August 17th – 20th, Indianapolis. Every chance the booth will actually be 20? x 30? this year that we’ll be sharing with friends. We’re looking at new displays this year, like a back drop and magazine racks for the brochure(s). In November, we’ll be at Game Hole Con in Madison, WI. More news as we have it, and here’s their website: https://www.gameholecon.com/ And now, the new project status updates! DEVELOPMENT STATUS FROM ROLLICKING ROSE (projects in bold have changed status since last week): First Draft (The first phase of a project that is about the work being done by writers, not dev prep) Exalted 3rd Novel by Matt Forbeck (Exalted 3rd Edition) Trinity Continuum: Aeon Rulebook (The Trinity Continuum) M20 Gods and Monsters (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) M20 Book of the Fallen (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) Ex Novel 2 (Aaron Rosenberg) (Exalted 3rd Edition) C20 Novel (Jackie Cassada) (Changeling: the Dreaming 20th Anniversary Edition) Pugmire Fiction Anthology (Pugmire) Monarchies of Mau Early Access (Pugmire) Hunter: the Vigil 2e core (Hunter: the Vigil 2nd Edition) DtD Night Horrors: Enemy Action (Demon: the Descent) The Realm (Exalted 3rd Edition) Dragon-Blooded (Exalted 3rd Edition) Arms of the Chosen (Exalted 3rd Edition) Redlines

People need to understand exactly what was going on before forming conclusions.The layers of the securization process go very deep. In simple terms: 1. Bank lends you the money 2. They sell the loan into securization 3. The loan is then bundled with many other similar loans 4, Then the whole bundle is divided into dozens if not hundreds of pieces and sold to investors. 5. The investors then hold, sell, trade, whatever is their fancy 6. Pieces of your loan go from party to party. 7. Folks also short the securization, which in effect creates double the amount of long holders on that piece of the loan, offset by those who are short your loan. 8. This process repeats itself and you have 5 times your loan held by investors offset by four times your loan being short. In effect your loan is being paid to five different investment pool parties and four other investment pool parties are also profferring up payments on your loan along with yours to even it all out. (possibly exaggerated) 9. All along, the legal requirements for transferring ownership of the loan are ignored. Thats because there is no true distinct owner of the loan. Since they didn't bother naming the true owner before hypothecating the loans, these loans are truly invalid under contact law. The banks are just acting as agents of the trust when they foreclose. The trust is just a nominee and can't be an owner under the law. These means neither the bank nor the trust are able to truly prove ownership. I said long ago the only solution was for the fed to buy these loans and refinance them at current market values. Banks could have continued servicing them to earn their money. A $100,000 loan modfied down to $70,000 still means a $135,000 total repayment at 5% interest. This could have allowed most people to keep their homes and also would set the ground for newly valid mortgage contracts. And the government could have even made a profit on it and saved the economy in one quick swoop. Proves they are not friends of the people.

Story highlights Phyllis Schlafly, a prominent social conservative leader for decades, has passed away The 1970's-era ERA foe died at 92 Washington (CNN) Phyllis Schlafly, a prominent anti-feminist and early leader of the social conservative movement, died Monday at the age of 92 at her home in St. Louis. Schlafly, an outspoken voice against the liberalism of the 1960's and 1970's, was a towering figure in what emerged as the modern religious right. Her death was confirmed by the Eagle Forum, the Missouri-based advocacy organization she led. "Her focus from her earliest days until her final ones was protecting the family, which she understood as the building block of life. She recognized America as the greatest political embodiment of those values," the statement read. "From military superiority and defense to immigration and trade; from unborn life to the nuclear family and parenthood, Phyllis Schlafly was a courageous and articulate voice for common sense and traditional values." Schlafly was most well-known for her work fighting the Equal Rights Amendment in the 1970's, emerging as one of the leading female critics of the feminist movement. Photos: History of the ERA Photos: History of the ERA The feminist activists of the 1960s, '70s and early '80s weren't the first to push for an Equal Rights Amendment. Suffragist leader Alice Paul, second from right, fought hard to pass the 19th Amendment -- which earned women the right to vote in 1920. She drafted the first ERA and introduced it to Congress in 1923. Hide Caption 1 of 12 Photos: History of the ERA In 1972, the House and Senate passed the ERA by the necessary two-thirds votes before sending it to state legislatures for ratification. Three-quarters of the states needed to ratify it, but the ERA fell three states short by its 1982 deadline. Among those where it failed was Florida, where supporters voiced their disapproval after the state Senate voted 22-16 against the ERA in June 1982. Hide Caption 2 of 12 Photos: History of the ERA Gloria Steinem, arguably the most recognized name and face in feminist activism, was among the key forces behind the ERA effort in the '70s and '80s. Although it wasn't ratified, most men and women were pro-ERA, Steinem says. She recently took a break from writing her latest book to join a gathering in support of the new ERA Coalition and celebrate the release of "Equal Means Equal," written by coalition founder and director Jessica Neuwirth. Hide Caption 3 of 12 Photos: History of the ERA Women's rights activist, poet and writer Robin Morgan -- seen here during a women's liberation conference in New York in 1970 -- was also among the crowd at the fundraiser and book launch at Manhattan's Yale Club. Morgan's 1970 anthology, "Sisterhood Is Powerful," helped galvanize a movement. Hide Caption 4 of 12 Photos: History of the ERA President Richard Nixon endorsed the ERA after it was adopted by both houses of Congress in 1972. Thirty-five of the needed 38 states ratified the ERA by its 1982 deadline. The latest efforts to revive the ERA have included legislation that would lift the deadline or start the ratification process from scratch. Hide Caption 5 of 12 Photos: History of the ERA The face of ERA opposition during the last big go-round was Phyllis Schlafly, the conservative activist who founded the Eagle Forum. Now 90, she says the ERA is "dumb and offensive" and that the new push for it is "a colossal waste of time." Schlafly, seen in this 1975 photo, once warned that the ERA would lead to same-sex marriage and women being drafted into combat. She also said it It would threaten families -- an argument she still makes. Hide Caption 6 of 12 Photos: History of the ERA Schlafly led protests against the ERA, including this one at the White House in 1977. The group, about 200 strong, was protesting then-first lady Rosalyn Carter's campaign for the ERA. Amendment supporters like Eleanor Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority Foundation, say their real enemy was never Schlafly, but big business and insurance companies. Hide Caption 7 of 12 Photos: History of the ERA Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy speaks at an ERA fundraising dinner in Washington in 1980. Kennedy spent more than three decades as a champion for the amendment in Congress. Hide Caption 8 of 12 Photos: History of the ERA Eleanor Smeal, then-president of the National Organization for Women, left, and first lady Betty Ford attend an ERA rally on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in 1981. Hide Caption 9 of 12 Photos: History of the ERA From left, Rep. Gwen Moore, Sen. Bob Menendez and Rep. Carolyn Maloney hold a news conference in 2010 outside the U.S. Capitol to call for passage of the ERA. The amendment has been introduced in nearly every session of Congress since 1923. Hide Caption 10 of 12 Photos: History of the ERA ERA supporters like to quote U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who told California Lawyer in a January 2011 issue: "Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex. The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn't." Hide Caption 11 of 12 Photos: History of the ERA Last April, Scalia appeared at the National Press Club beside his judicial polar opposite -- and friend -- Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The two were asked how they would amend the Constitution, if they could. Ginsburg, seen here at an annual Women's History Month event at the U.S. Capitol in March, didn't hesitate: "If I could choose an amendment to add to this Constitution, it would be the Equal Rights Amendment," she said. Hide Caption 12 of 12 Schlafly, until her death, remained in the political arena and recently made the case for electing Donald Trump president. On Monday night the Republican nominee eulogized Schlafly in a statement. Read More

Dobson's history of perverse and shocking ideas about raising children is well-documented, but has escaped much media scrutiny. From Dobson's book "The Strong Willed Child": "When I told Sigmund [the family dog] to leave his warm seat and go to bed, he flattened his ears and slowly turned his head toward me. He deliberately braced himself by placing one paw on the edge of the furry lid, then hunched his shoulders, raised his lips to reveal the molars on both sides, and uttered his most threatening growl. That was Siggie's way of saying. "Get lost!" "I had seen this defiant mood before, and knew there was only one way to deal with it. The ONLY way to make Siggie obey is to threaten him with destruction. Nothing else works. I turned and went to my closet and got a small belt to help me 'reason' with Mr. Freud." . . . "What developed next is impossible to describe. That tiny dog and I had the most vicious fight ever staged between man and beast. I fought him up one wall and down the other, with both of us scratching and clawing and growling and swinging the belt. I am embarrassed by the memory of the entire scene. Inch by inch I moved him toward the family room and his bed. As a final desperate maneuver, Siggie backed into the corner for one last snarling stand. I eventually got him to bed, only because I outweighed him 200 to 12!" ... "But this is not a book about the discipline of dogs; there is an important moral to my story that is highly relevant to the world of children. JUST AS SURELY AS A DOG WILL OCCASIONALLY CHALLENGE THE AUTHORITY OF HIS LEADERS, SO WILL A LITTLE CHILD -- ONLY MORE SO." "[I]t is possible to create a fussy, demanding baby by rushing to pick him up every time he utters a whimper or sigh. Infants are fully capable of learning to manipulate their parents through a process called reinforcement, whereby any behavior that produces a pleasant result will tend to recur. Thus, a healthy baby can keep his mother hopping around his nursery twelve hours a day (or night) by simply forcing air past his sandpaper larynx." Keep your children far away from Dobson - and anyone who follows his teachings. On p.15 Dobson tells the story of a mother who spanks her 5 year old daughter and locks her in the garage for throwing some stones at cars. On p.18 he tells the story of a mother who slaps her 18 month old 9 separate times for reaching for a candy dish. On p.20 he tells the story of a mother who counts to three "and if the kids had not minded by then, they would have to face the wooden spoon." On p.61 Dobson says to spank a 6 year old for calling his parents "hot dog" or "moose" and on p.63 Dobson says to spank a 7 year old for lying. . . . On p. 135 Dobson is asked this question: "Q: How long do you think a child should be allowed to cry after being punished or spanked? Is there a limit? A: Yes, I believe there should be a limit. As long as the tears represent a genuine release of emotion, they should be permitted to fall. But crying can quickly change from inner sobbing to an expression of protest aimed at punishing the enemy. Real crying usually lasts two minutes or less but may continue for five. After that point, the child is merely complaining, and the change can be recognized in the tone and intensity of his voice. I would require him to stop the protest crying, usually by offering him a little more of whatever caused the original tears." On p.136 Dobson recommends using a switch or paddle to beat children. (link above) On p.137 Dobson says "The spanking may be too gentle. If it doesn't hurt, it doesn't motivate a child to avoid the consequence next time. A slap with the hand on the bottom of a diapered two-year-old is not a deterrent to anything. Be sure the child gets the message." One can only imagine with horror what goes in this man's household. Sick and crazy. More here if you want to be even more throughly repelled. But this will almost - almost- make you feel sorry for the man: A recent profile of Dobson sheds some light on these questions. As it turns out, Dobson’s parents physically and mentally abused him as a child, and he once got beaten up in school by a kid even Dobson admits was widely acknowledged to be a “sissy.” The article in a Denver magazine called “5280″ makes Dobson’s mother, Myrtle, sound like a real piece of work. Notes writer Eileen Welsome: Myrtle [tag]Dobson[/tag] was an amiable and social woman, but she didn’t hesitate to whack her son with a shoe or belt when she felt it was required. Consequently, Dobson writes, he learned at an early age to stay out of striking distance when he back-talked to his mother. One day he made the mistake of mouthing off when she was only four feet away and heard a 16-pound girdle whistling through the air. “The intended blow caught me across the chest, followed by a multitude of straps and buckles wrapping themselves around my midsection.” The girdle incident did not dampen his defiance, however. One evening, after Dobson’s mother forbid him from going to a dance, the recalcitrant teenager told her that he was going anyway; she picked up the telephone and called her husband. “I need you,” she said. The article continues: “‘What happened in the next few days shocked me down to my toes,’ writes Dobson.” His father canceled the next four years’ worth of speaking engagements, put the Oklahoma house up for sale, and took a pastor’s job in San Benito, Texas, a small town near the Mexican border. Dobson had two years of high school left, and when he started classes he found himself the target of a couple of bullies. Rather than turn the other cheek, Dobson wheeled around and threw his schoolbooks in the face of one annoying youth. “By the time he could see me again I was on top of him,” Dobson writes. Dobson also tried a little bullying himself, targeting a boy whom he sized up as a “sissy.” But the boy gave him such a thrashing that Dobson concluded bullying wasn’t for him. Elsewhere the story notes that in the Dobson household there were “a million rules…regulations and prohibitions for almost every imaginable situation.” Dobson recalls being “chewed out for using the expression ‘Hot dog!’ and forbidden from uttering ‘darn,’ ‘geez,’ or ‘dad-gummit’ because they were considered shorthand swear words.” Even more alarming, Dobson admits in one of his books that as a child he arranged a fight between two mismatched dogs. The battle involved a tenacious bulldog and a “sweet, passive Scottie named Baby,” and Dobson provoked it by throwing a tennis ball toward Baby. He writes what happened next: “The bulldog went straight for Baby’s throat and hung on. It was an awful scene. Neighbors came running from everywhere as the Scottie screamed in terror. It took ten minutes and a garden hose for the adults to pry loose the bulldog’s grip. By then Baby was almost dead. He spent two weeks in the animal hospital, and I spent two weeks in the doghouse. I was hated by the entire town.” As any child psychologist will tell you, this type of cruelty toward animals is a sign of a serious psychological disturbance. James Dobson is a sick, sick man. Instead of seeking help for the psychological damage he suffered as a child, he decided instead to inflict evil on others by manipulating them into beating their own children and telling them God wants them to. Talk about dragging Biblical understanding through the gutter. I will never on any day be listening to anything James Dobson has to say about the Bible or any other subject. Why the media gives his man any credence whatsoever is one of the great mysteries of life that will never be adequately explained.

It's not clear how or why two men attacked a man believed to be a British soldier in the London neighborhood of Woolwich, but U.K. officials are already investigating it as a possible act of terrorism. A video broadcast by the U.K. network ITV purports to show one of the two attackers explaining himself to a camera immediately after the attack. His hands are covered in blood, a knife and a machete in his right hand. The victim is clearly visible on the ground with a crowd gathering in the background. Here's what he said: We swear by Almighty Allah we will never stop fighting you. The only reasons we have done this is because Muslims are dying every day. This British soldier is an eye for an eye a tooth for tooth. We apologise that women had to see this today but in our lands our women have to see the same. You people will never be safe. Remove your government. They don't care about you. The Guardian cites eyewitnesses as describing the attack as a "beheading." The BBC talked to an eyewitness who describes what he saw after arriving in the middle of the attack: I saw two people lying over him and I thought they were trying to resuscitate him. I went down to the garage and another bloke come along and told me they were actually stabbing him. Apparently they actually ran the car into him and knocked him down before they did anything. And the next minute a silver car came along and a man got out and shouted he was going to phone the police. The next thing that happened was he actually pulled a handgun out. It was a gun that looked as if it could take about 12, 15 rounds so I definitely know it was handgun because I actually seen it in his hand. The same witness also said that some unarmed police were nearby but did not want to approach the men, who appeared to be armed, until armed "Trojan" police arrived. The two attackers were shot by police and are currently receiving medical treatment. Update: The Washington Post's Anthony Faiola, reporting from London, listened to the ITV video very carefully and came away with a different quote than the one circulating in British media. The first part of the attacker's quote is difficult to hear because the ITV anchor is speaking over him. It's not clear to me where the above version, which is cited in The Guardian and elsewhere, first appeared. Here's the quote as heard by Faiola:

If you take the long view with Chelsea — the view that starts on the day Roman Abramovich first wrote his name on the club in 2003 — the amazing thing isn’t that they won the Champions League but that they won it the way they did — as underdogs, riding on luck and drama. Consider: 1. Chelsea became the champions of Europe while finishing in sixth place in their own country, the worst domestic-league finish of any team since the European Champion Clubs’ Cup became the Champions League in 1992. If they hadn’t won the tournament, they wouldn’t have qualified to play in it next year. 2. In the quarterfinals, Chelsea overturned a 3-1 first-leg deficit against Napoli to win 5-4 after the home leg at Stamford Bridge. This happened after a late Lampard penalty forced extra time, allowing Branislav Ivanovic, who has scored eight goals in 107 appearances for Chelsea, to slot home a Drogba cross in the 105th minute. 3. In the semis, they blew a 1-0 first-leg lead against the hugely favored Barcelona, went down 2-0 in the away leg, saw John Terry sent off in the first half, and somehow, with 10 men, came back to win 3-2 when Fernando Torres — he of the recent 1,541-minute goal drought — scored on a breakaway counter in the 91st minute. 4. In the final, again playing against a favored team at that team’s home stadium, and now missing four key players due to suspension, they again fell behind, needing late Drogba heroics, extra time, a colossal Petr Cech save against Arjen Robben, and a comeback during penalties (including more late Drogba heroics) to win. Bayern had a 43-9 shot advantage and a 20-1 advantage in corner kicks. Chelsea’s one corner led to Drogba’s match-tying goal. You know those scenes in Friday Night Lights when Dillon comes back to win on a four-play, 240-yard drive that ends with a 90-yard Hail Mary with 0.001 seconds left? Chelsea did that in the Champions League against three straight opponents, two of whom (Barcelona and Bayern) finished 1-2 in both possession and pass-completion rate in Europe, one of whom (Barcelona) was an era-defining team that had won two of the last three Champions League titles. If it hadn’t been Chelsea — a massively well-funded English club with global reach and an owner who owns multiple submarines — we would have talked about this as if it were the Cinderella run to end all Cinderella runs. No matter how dire their situation looked, Chelsea just kept surviving, trailing streams of exclamation points, and somehow repeatedly blowing up the clock a split second before the minute hand touched midnight. It’s hard to remember now what a disruptive force Chelsea was in world soccer during the first few years after Abramovich bought the club. Back in 2006 — the year the club won the second of its two straight Premier League titles under Jose Mourinho — the novelist John Lanchester joked that he was now supporting Chelsea “on Maoist grounds,” and his friend responded, “I think that’s more Pol Pot–ist.” That was how Chelsea seemed back then: like a terrifying power that was either going to remake the game or burn it to the ground, if not both. Years before Manchester City batted an eyelash toward Abu Dhabi, it was Abramovich’s takeover at Chelsea that established the archetype of the shady superbillionaire who buys a soccer team to use as his personal plaything. The old, established hierarchy of powerful clubs — the Manchester United/Real Madrid cohort — certainly ran on money, but even the top clubs were shocked by the sums Abramovich could casually throw around — £21 million for Shaun Wright-Phillips, £24 million for Drogba, £31 million for (gulp) Andriy Shevchenko. Not all these players worked out (see previous gulp), but what difference did that make when Chelsea could go back to the well for £30 million whenever they felt like it? European soccer, which had no salary cap, no luxury tax, very little revenue sharing, no draft — almost no parity-fostering features at all — had no defense against this. Chelsea looked upon the dynamics of the sports economy and just luxuriantly did not give a shit. Any player in the world was potentially theirs for the taking. This was also right around the moment when the Premier League stopped being an English sports league with international appeal and became an international sports league that happened to be based in England. Knowingly or not, Abramovich exacerbated all the tensions associated with the league’s rush toward globalization. He was a trembly-lipped, bodyguard-flanked petro-oligarch with close ties to Vladimir Putin. He was the long-distance governor of a remote Russian province. (Chukotka forever!) He collected yachts. He built the club both with global capital and in the model of global capital — ruthless, chaotic, indifferent to local tradition. Arsenal had filled squads with foreign players, but only in the service of Arsene Wenger’s finer principles; they had to buy this Ivorian and this Estonian, because of the harmony and balance that would result from bringing them together. Abramovich, by contrast, bought foreign players the way other people might shop for shoes online. It wasn’t about team chemistry or even tactics. It was about acquisition for its own sake, about taking whatever you wanted. Or anyway, that was how it seemed. Predictably, Chelsea was feared and hated. Abramovich compounded both emotions by hiring Jose Mourinho to manage the club in 2004. The new coach reveled in the panic Chelsea caused and did everything he could to provoke the English soccer establishment, from calling Arsene Wenger a “voyeur” to signing the widely loathed Ashley Cole as the team’s left back. Mourinho created the mother of all siege mentalities around the club, and it worked frighteningly well: In 2004-05, Chelsea demolished the field during the most annihilating championship run since the Football League was founded in 1888: 95 points, 29 wins, 15 goals (15!) conceded all season. They won again in 2005-06. For four and a half years — 86 games, stretching from March 2004 to October 2008 — Chelsea didn’t lose a single home game. It was easy to hate them, but there was also something thrilling about the ease with which they turned English soccer upside-down. Top-level European soccer is essentially a racket that benefits the big clubs at everyone else’s expense. The only thing capable of destabilizing the status quo is a massive amount of money. For around five years, from 2003 to 2008, Abramovich’s billions were the most anarchic force in the sport. Chelsea wasn’t staging a proletarian revolution; that’s not how billionaires operate. But they were doing the next best thing — punching Manchester United in the mouth and swaggering off with both middle fingers up. Their audacity was its own kind of greatness, even if it was founded on an even more rigged game, global capitalism. Naturally, this couldn’t last. Chelsea spent three seasons as the flashpoint of English soccer — the club with the most money, the deepest and most talented squad, the most flamboyant coach, and by far the most controversial headlines. At some point, though, the rest of soccer started to catch up. More billionaires bought into the game. Some of them, like Sheikh Mansour at Manchester City, were even richer than Abramovich. Other clubs got better at exploiting global finance, sponsorship, and the weird pathways of 21st-century commerce (cf. Real Madrid’s plan to build a $1 billion resort island in the United Arab Emirates, which reads like something Jerry Jones dreamed up on a particularly sweaty peyote trip). UEFA passed Financial Fair Play, a set of rules that should/might/could possibly curtail runaway sugar-daddying in European soccer. At the same time, Chelsea itself tore down some of the walls that kept it separate from other big teams. For years, Chelsea was at entertaining odds with the G-14, a supergroup of the biggest clubs in European soccer. After a lot of cloak-and-dagger maneuvering from then-Chelsea executive Peter Kenyon, the G-14 dissolved in January 2008 and was replaced by the European Club Association, a larger group that does include Chelsea. But the typical radicals-to-congressmen rules applied: Every time Chelsea made it a little further into the game’s aristocracy, the club seemed a little less dangerous. More urgently, Abramovich decided that winning the European Cup was his overriding top priority. After firing Mourinho’s successor, the toadlike, thoroughly unqualified, and surprisingly successful Avram Grant — whose run included a 16-match unbeaten streak, a razor-thin loss on penalties in the 2008 Champions League final in Moscow, and a press conference in which he refused to answer any questions — Abramovich cycled through a sequence of far more conventional big-name managers like Phil Scolari, Carlo Ancelotti, and Guus Hiddink. He demanded “entertaining football” in place of Mourinho’s dull but punishingly effective 4-5-1. Where Chelsea had once seemed totally indifferent to the established ways of doing business, now they started to seem like another Juventus or Madrid — a big club answerable to the whims of the fans and the media. They even started sounding serious when they talked about turning a profit. People (including me) still complain about Chelsea and their money, but the truth is that they’ve been pretty normal for a pretty long time. Manchester City has more or less taken over the “crazed and embattled vessel of the super-rich” role at this point, with the difference being that their most provocative antics now feel kind of homespun and familiar, because Chelsea’s already been there. Soccer has a way of assimilating whatever weird new challenges the clubs throw at it, and the aging squad of ex-controversialists at Stamford Bridge is proof that the game will still be there when Carlos Tevez finally calms down. The terror that Chelsea represented in those early years was that with enough money, all the surprise could be taken out of the sport. When you spend a hundred million and then concede 15 goals across a 38-game season, you raise the legitimate fear that you will simply buy all the talent, win all the matches, and conquer European soccer with your unstoppable army of math. The irony, of course, is that by winning the Champions League with a frenzy of improbable, last-second comebacks, Chelsea finally conquered European soccer behind exactly the sort of unpredictability that they once threatened to eradicate. Somehow, winning the biggest tournament in the game was the least fearsome and most accessible thing they’ve done in the Abramovich era. It took frantic adjustments, the way it does for everybody, and a different kind of good fortune. After nearly a decade under soccer’s most iconoclastic rich dude, Chelsea now wins and loses on lucky breaks and heart, the way everyone loses and wins.

Yet the President is fast losing the few friends he did have in the capital, following a wild period in which he offered cover to white supremacists and ignited a war of words with North Korea, leaving GOP allies in the crossfire. Thursday brought rebukes from two prominent Republican senators and a member of the highly influential Murdoch family, staunch supporters of the President. Bob Corker, one of the most respected Senate Republicans, who has tried to keep open channels to the White House and coax Trump toward a more conventional foreign policy, unloaded on him in a spectacular manner. The chairman of the Senate foreign relations committee is not prone to outspoken outbursts and thinks carefully before delivering his analysis. So his critique that the President has not shown sufficient stability, competence or understanding of the character of the country that he leads was devastating. South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott was another Trump ally who had been wrestling with a painful political and moral dilemma. But he also broke ranks Thursday, saying he could not defend the "indefensible" in the wake of Trump's comments about the alt-right rallies in Charlottesville. Scott, the only black Republican senator, suggested that Trump had squandered the moral authority of his office -- a critical commodity vital in binding the nation together in a time of crisis or national tragedy that also helps to sustain the power of any presidency. Another sign of Trump's growing isolation came Thursday night. James Murdoch, the 21st Century Fox CEO and son of Rupert Murdoch, who is one of Trump's close informal advisers, wrote a withering email denouncing the President's reaction to the White Supremacist rally and the violence it sparked. "I can't even believe I have to write this: standing up to Nazis is essential; there are no good Nazis," Murdoch wrote. "Or Klansmen, or terrorists. Democrats, Republicans, and others must all agree on this, and it compromises nothing for them to do so." Their sharp words were a clear indication of the damage that Trump inflicted on himself with his unchained news conference Tuesday, in which he drew an equivalence between racists and counterprotestors in Charlottesville and offered a shocking glimpse of his inner beliefs and temperament. The defections of the two senators followed a stampede away from Trump by CEOs who served on White House advisory councils, amid fears their company brands could be tarnished by association with the President. It all left Trump increasingly alone and even more reliant on his ever-loyal core voters, who sustain him in times of self-inflicted controversy and public outrage, but who may not represent a sufficiently broad base on which to build a successful presidency. Corker and Scott have been slow to join the ranks of Trump's critics. Corker for instance, was on the President's short list to become vice president or secretary of state. And although he warned in May the White House was in a "downward spiral," he has not been a fixture on the chorus of Trump critics that includes Arizona Sens. John McCain and Jeff Flake. Congressional tensions have a political price The rebukes by Corker and Scott also pointed to a looming political problem that Trump has only exacerbated by his recent behavior. The President was already lacking friends in the Senate, a reality that became clear in his narrowly failed push to repeal and replace Obamacare that left little doubt that few senators fear or revere him. If he is to enact his ambitious political agenda that includes items such as tax reform and a massive infrastructure program -- or to influence Senate Republican legislation on these issues -- he will need to mend his toxic relations with top GOP members of the chamber, not least his feud with Senate Majority leader Mitch McConnell. Every lawmaker is acutely conscious of the political pressures that weigh on them in their districts and states. The fact that Corker and Scott felt able to speak out may hint at trouble for Trump's political fortunes. It may also reflect an ebbing of enthusiasm for the President among grassroots GOP voters. While 83% of Republicans approved of the job that the President was doing in the latest CNN poll last week , there were indications that the number of GOP voters who strongly approve of him is beginning to wane. In a way it's not surprising that Republicans feel free to criticize the President. His presidency has been in crisis from almost its first day. His approval ratings are the lowest of any modern president at an equivalent stage, and his campaign is facing a special counsel probe into allegations of collusion with a foreign espionage service. Only the resilient economy that continues to pump out good job numbers may be preventing a complete free-fall. The implications of Corker's remarks Thursday are staggering. Taken to their logical conclusion, the remarks, from the lips of a friend, suggest that the President is simply not fit for office. "The President has not yet been able to demonstrate the stability nor some of the competence that he needs to demonstrate in order to be successful," Corker said, according to a video posted by local news website Nooga.com. The Scott and Corker critiques fit into a trend that is seeing Trump's circle of influence and political relationships shrink as his White House slips further into self-imposed isolation and crisis. The now-disbanded advisory councils on which the CEOs served might have been little more than public relations efforts, but their demise dealt a blow to Trump, who relished gathering corporate titans to talk business and to stage photo-ops in which he starred. In many ways, after a largely unproductive first seven months in office, Trump is again becoming what he has always been — an outsider. His White House inner circle is dwindling, after the ouster of former chief of staff Reince Priebus and press secretary Sean Spicer, creatures of the Washington D.C. Republican establishment. There are rumors that another latecomer to Trump's campaign, his ideological alter ego Steve Bannon, may also be on the way out. This week, Trump, having failed to lure a big hitter to the West Wing, named Hope Hicks, one of his most loyal aides, as interim communications director. In another sign of his insularity, the President -- even when he leaves the White House -- rarely spends time outside his comfort zone in Trump-branded properties. He has spent extended time at his resort at Mar-a-Lago in Florida and Bedminster in New Jersey. If he goes out in Washington, it's usually to the Trump hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue. If he's in the White House at weekends, he usually flees to his golf course on the banks of the Potomac in Virginia. Testing the limits of an unorthodox strategy Trump's narrowing political horizons are also reflected in his political strategy. In many ways, his unrestrained, unpredictable behavior of the last week recalls the persona that made him so popular with disaffected heartland voters. By picking political fights on the status of Confederate monuments amid the fallout of his interventions on Charlottesville, he is raising issues that are important to a certain section of the conservative, Republican base. Next week, the President will return to the embrace of his adoring core voters, at what is expected to be a raucous rally in Arizona. His pitch is sure to position him as the anti-establishment champion of voters who revile Washington. So while the defections by senators like Corker and Scott are damaging to his hopes of getting things done, they actually offer a measure of validation in a different political context. Many accounts of Trump's life and career stress that the President has never been the kind of person who cultivates vast networks of close political friendships. And he gives the impression that the only people who are not expendable to him are those in his family inner circle. Right from the start of his rise as a brash, young, real estate up-and-comer from Queens, Trump was spurned by New York elites and seen as a brazen self-publicist. He was never part of the corporate crowd he courted as President. But his experience of being spurned helps explains the uncanny connection he forged with working-class, heartland voters who felt excluded from the economic boons unleashed by globalization and the economic recovery after the 2008 crisis. His instinctive understanding of his fellow outsiders also helped shape his ferocious assault on the GOP establishment — which made him President. But it left him with a string of political enemies that made the friends he did have in Washington all the more important. That's why the rebukes from Corker and Scott may end up being even more damaging than they first appear.

It's prom season at high schools across the country, a special time that until recently has been reserved for straight student couples. A sign of growing acceptance and change took place in West Virginia on Saturday night. The Mussleman High School senior prom was held at The Heritage Hall in Inwood, West Virginia. Among the couples attending were Michael Martin, a Mussleman senior, and his boyfriend Logan Westrope, who attends Hedgesville High School. Michael was a four-year starter on his school's soccer team, making all-state as a goalie. He is also an all conference swimmer and tennis player. He told his coming out story on Outsports in December, in what was our most-viewed story of 2014. Michael will attend Wilson College in Pennsylvania this fall, major in Environmental Sustainability and play soccer. Logan plays tennis for Hedgesville High School. He will attend Penn State University and major in meteorology. The two have been dating for four months. "We knew this would be a night to remember," Logan told Outsports. "We walked in, checked in with our tickets, and were off to have fun! At first we were both a little hesitant to hold hands, not knowing how the rest of the student body would react. But after a short while, we were always next to each other and danced together the whole night. "Some of the slow songs we danced to were 'Stay With Me' (Sam Smith), 'See You Again' (Wiz Khalifa), and 'All of Me' (John Legend). At the moment when the slow songs played, we would just stare into each other's eyes and would think of how lucky we are to have each other. "We didn't hear any negative comments about Michael and I. A lot of people would come up to us (especially the girls) and say, 'You both are so cute!' or 'You guys look great!' Once we left the prom, I remember Michael saying to me in the car, 'Logan, this is our last prom and I'm so glad I got to spend it with you.' I couldn't have asked for a more perfect night." Michael asked Logan to the prom in March in the parking lot of Chik-fil-A, where Logan works. "I asked Logan to the prom after his work. I gave him a bag with a chicken sandwich inside and asked, 'Are you a chicken or will you go to the prom with me?' " Michael said. "He easily and gladly said yes." "Most everyone knows that I am gay and for the most part everyone that I work with there accepts me for who I am," Logan said. "I was extremely nervous to tell my fellow employees but then realized I wasn't afraid to show the real me." Here are photos from their big prom night. All photos were taken by Logan's mom, Jodi Brotman Westrope: Michael and Logan get ready for the night West Virginia cool Logan's dog, Piper, sees her master and his man off An avid photographer (his Instagram page has 19,000 followers), Michael takes a shot of Logan at Poor House Farm Park in Martinsburg Michael adjusts Logan's corsage Logan returns the favor No prom these days would be complete without a selfie The happy couple at the end of the night Michael Martin can be reached via email ([email protected]), Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Logan can be reached via email ([email protected]), Facebook and Instagram.

In the city that never sleeps, most people could not be bothered to count the sheep that for three minutes every night this month have been filling more than 20 electronic billboards in Times Square. Bales of hay, flocks of sheep and other pastoral scenes that were shot in Wyoming are being beamed onto screens ranging in size from 15,000 square feet down to 32 — small enough to fit on the side of a newsstand. A sheep’s face peered over Broadway between 42nd and 43rd Streets as it appeared more than seven stories tall on the Nasdaq billboard. The glimpses of rural life displayed in the heart of New York are part of “Midnight Moment,” a synchronized digital art exhibition curated by Times Square Arts that lasts from 11:57 p.m. to midnight each night. The footage, from a yet-to-be-released documentary called “Counting Sheep,” was first shown on Dec. 1 and will appear through Dec. 30.

The following is an analysis of a currently (at the time of this writing in early June) unnecessarily embargoed vulnerability in multiple OSes regarding the userland heap/stack gap and how it affects grsecurity (or rather, doesn't affect it and hasn't affected it for many years). It's unnecessarily embargoed because the issue was already publicly discussed fully in Gaël Delalleau's underappreciated 2005 CanSecWest presentation available here. A patch (available here) for this problem even existed prior to that presentation, created by Andrea Arcangeli in 2004 and included in at least SUSE Linux Enterprise 9 and 11 (as mentioned here). I am not a member of the private distros or linux-distros mailing lists, and though this particular issue is leaking through various channels like a sieve, I have no interest in digging out more details or ruining embargoes that I'm not party to. As a matter of principle, we choose not to participate in embargoes (even for issues reported to us) as they distort public perception of security: differences in response time, level of proactive measures, and quality of in-house security talent is obfuscated through the activity and delay happening behind closed doors. Effective security shouldn't depend on hoping the "bad guys" don't have early access to vulnerability information, which is what zero-days are all about. So this article is being written based off my impression of what the "newly" discovered vulnerability is, knowing nothing about whatever particular userland application prompted the sudden intense interest, and will be published immediately after expiration of the embargo. Andrea's patch mentioned above was never included in upstream Linux in 2004, and no improved version appeared in its place in the years following. That changed in 2010 when a highly-publicized instance of the kind of vulnerability Andrea's patch was designed to prevent was published against the X server by Rafal Wojtczuk. Rafal had worked with distributions on the now-shuttered private vendor-sec mailing list to ensure a fix for the issue was created at the kernel level. Seven weeks later, based purely off private discussions, Linus attempted to silently fix the issue via this commit, yet it had to be revised repeatedly later (at least as late as 2013 -- see this commit) as it broke userland applications and oopsed the kernel. But more importantly, Linus' patch didn't address the wider problem, but instead only the particular reported instance of the problem -- attacker-controlled recursion that could be prevented by a single guard page. We mentioned the problems with the patch publicly in comments on an LWN article on Linus' patch, but those comments, technical explanations, and C/assembly examples of issues not covered by Linus' patch fell on deaf ears; the upstream Linux stack/heap guard code saw no improvements in the following years. And now, as they say, the chickens have come home to roost. I imagine the issue is that someone again realized the behavior of GCC and LLVM on non-Windows OSes with regard to the default non-existence of stack probing and found some new instance of a vulnerable and widely-used application/service to exploit. The following is a summary of the main issues which have all been heavily detailed and explained already in Gaël's 2005 presentation from slide 24 onward (under the heading of "Jumping the stack gap"). Calls to alloca() over a page in size, large local variables, variable-length arrays (VLAs), etc can all easily skip over a single guard page and read from/write to an attacker-controlled mmap-based heap allocation and cause further deeper stack frames to do the same, with all the implications on saved instruction pointers, etc. Not only does this problem affect the main process stack, but it's an issue for thread stacks as well. It was part of the motivation for the creation of GRKERNSEC_RAND_THREADSTACK over four years ago in response to this alloca()-based vulnerability/exploit by Exodus Intelligence. Further easing exploitation is that Linux will honor mmap hints, conceivably permitting some rare vulnerable application to allow an attacker to suggest an allocation just below the stack guard page without needing to exhaust virtual address space to accomplish it (which would open up this vulnerability for more 64-bit apps). Under PaX's ASLR, this is infeasible since mmap hints are ignored. MAP_FIXED requests are of course honored as required by the standard, but an attacker controlling those can just as easily blow away any existing allocation and replace it with their own content. Further, much like Andrea's original patch, our heap/stack protection (implemented via an enforced gap instead of Linus' guard page) can be adjusted in size at runtime. Andrea's patch defaulted to a single page gap (for compatibility reasons that aren't a problem for the PaX implementation) whereas the PaX implementation enforces a 64KB gap at minimum by default. Without stack probing in place, any uncontrolled alloca() could be abused, so the chosen size of the enforced gap is a tradeoff between virtual address space wastage and security-based assumptions about reasonable stack allocation ranges an attacker might have control over without being fully unbounded. It should be clear that kernel-only attempts to solve this problem will necessarily always be incomplete, as the real issue lies in the lack of stack probing. Since the alternative real solution depends on rebuilding all userland, this is likely the only feasible solution for the foreseeable future. On grsecurity systems, the size of the heap/stack gap can be adjusted via the /proc/sys/vm/heap_stack_gap sysctl entry. For instance, the following command will enforce a 1MB main stack gap for all new allocations: echo 1048576 > /proc/sys/vm/heap_stack_gap An interesting historical note: looking through the current upstream Linux kernel code, one will find a remnant perhaps of Andrea's never-merged original implementation, a single "int heap_stack_gap = 0;" line unreferenced by anything else in the kernel, but introduced by accident via an unrelated nommu commit by David Howells in 2005. This variable in Andrea's implementation held the number of pages of the variable-sized heap/stack gap, something Linus' later implementation crucially lacked. Despite several public comments and LKML threads about this line, it continues to stand alone as a reminder about the dangers of NIH. One might now be wondering: doesn't this same issue also apply to the kernel stack? Yes, it does. Here too upstream developers failed to note or care about this particular excerpt from our KSTACKOVERFLOW configuration help: This introduces guard pages that in combination with the alloca checking of the STACKLEAK feature and removal of thread_info from the kernel stack prevents all forms of kernel process stack overflow abuse. The PaX STACKLEAK plugin was added to grsecurity prior to my work on KSTACKOVERFLOW, so KSTACKOVERFLOW built upon it. The STACKLEAK plugin importantly instruments all implicit and explicit calls to alloca() by the kernel, ensuring the requests wouldn't step outside expected stack boundaries. One might recall the STACKLEAK plugin from when it was "ported" by a member of the KSPP, making no mention whatsoever in the commit description or Kconfig help of this functionality, and also having failed to even enable the plugin at all due to failing to adjust some copied and pasted lines from the Makefile to actually enable the plugin. This functionality also wasn't mentioned during a subsequent recent "port". This is but one of many examples that seriously raise the question of how security functionality will be properly implemented and maintained upstream if the maintainers don't understand what the code they've copy+pasted from grsecurity does in the first place. The upstream CONFIG_VMAP_STACK has been claimed by many to be equivalent to what's present in grsecurity. Its Kconfig description includes the following: This causes kernel stack overflows to be caught immediately rather than causing difficult-to-diagnose corruption. This claim was repeated by various news outlets reporting on the upstream VMAP_STACK feature. One may recall VMAP_STACK for being responsible for over a dozen kernel CVEs, introducing potential memory corruption and denial of service through its design and resulting in several additional CVEs for memory handling errors in the fixes needed for those CVEs. Defending VMAP_STACK recently against claims by me that the implementation is objectively bad, Kees Cook of the KSPP said "With this implementation in place, now those kernel stack exploit methods are dead." Remember that even though stack overflow vulnerabilities are quite rare in the first place, let alone exploitable ones, at least one of the published exploits for a Linux kernel stack overflow vulnerability (CVE-2010-3848) was exactly for this kind of vulnerability that VMAP_STACK would be unable to protect against. Unless there were at least 99 other exploitable stack overflow vulnerabilities in the kernel, characterizations by another KSPP and linux-hardened contributor that VMAP_STACK fixes 99% of the issue are also patently false. In fact, VMAP_STACK lacking the equivalent functionality in grsecurity not only leaves it possible to exploit certain VLA-based overflows, it may ironically make it even easier to exploit these lingering forms of kernel stack overflows. Vmalloc allocations are less frequent to the point that one could more reliably target an adjacent victim kernel stack or other large allocation, not needing to know its absolute address. As should now be clear, the kinds of kernel stack overflows grsecurity can prevent are not at all dead upstream, or for that matter in the recent linux-hardened project, which in its comparison matrix comparing upstream to grsecurity under the heading of "Prevent kernel stack overflows" suggests that upstream's reimplementation of grsecurity's protection for this class of vulnerabilities is "complete". In our comparison matrix we marked the associated KSPP feature with a orange minus symbol denoting "watered-down features that differ significantly in their implementation and security benefits". We'd been called misleading for this, while I held my tongue knowing the facts of the matter. By now it should be evident how much faith should be put into security claims and comparisons to grsecurity by developers that don't understand the basics of the code they're copying and pasting. It also demonstrates what we've said all along about the synergistic benefits of various grsecurity and PaX features that aren't realized by mindless piecemeal extraction. A careful reader may have noted the title of this article is a tongue-in-cheek reference to the LWN article linked above. This blog is being published as a teachable moment to demonstrate that articles written by non-security experts simply repeating the security claims of other non-security experts about their own code or others' code are to be taken with a large grain of salt. The "ancient kernel hole" LWN grandiosely proclaimed was closed, was in fact not closed at all for the past seven years. The facts destroying the myth have been available there for everyone to see all this time, but when a news site seems to care so little about accuracy in reporting that it doesn't (for instance) contact the subject of an article prior to publication, or correct glaring factual errors in its content that they've been made aware of, instead requiring readers to wade through pages of third-party comments, it's no wonder that the public is fooled by authoritative-sounding articles and don't bother investigating further. Some months ago I stopped publicly commenting on LWN due to its lack of concern for accuracy in reporting and commenters' lack of interest in learning. When the next issue is reported incorrectly, a reader can't assume an expert will chime in with a proper analysis as happened in this case seven years ago. Technical debt always finds a way to be repaid, with interest.

Double Dragon is one of the most iconic games ever made, and while the series is best known as side-scrolling beat ’em up, there was actually a legit Double Dragon fighting game based in the 1994 movie. Released for the Neo Geo CD, the movie-based fighting game was actually a well-developed and fun game that even The Angry Video Game Nerd (James) can’t help but praise. It’s apparently one of his favorite fighters of all time. Now, James is no fighting game aficionado, but he is a gaming enthusiast who knows a thing or two about good and bad video games. Watch him play and critique the obscure Double Dragon fighting game… Are you old enough to remember Double Dragon? Do you have any fond memories of the series? Let us know in the comments below.

Nintendo will release special shiny packaged versions of its upcoming Nintendo 3DS ports of Pokémon Gold and Silver, the company announced today — at least in Europe and Japan. The company’s European division tweeted out the photo below, confirming that the boxes would contain digital download codes for the games; these can also be purchased separately. On 22/09, shiny packaged versions of #Pokemon Gold and Pokémon Silver containing a download code will be released in shops. pic.twitter.com/PpfYtZFzp2 — Nintendo of Europe (@NintendoEurope) August 18, 2017 The Japanese version of the retail release includes additional goods: magnets shaped like the original Game Boy Color cartridges, stickers and a poster featuring the Gold and Silver generation’s Pokémon. Polygon has reached out to Nintendo to ask if the special edition boxes will also be available in North America and will update when we hear back. Maybe don’t get your hopes up, however — similar retail releases for the 3DS Virtual Console ports of Pokémon Red and Green last year didn’t make it stateside. Nintendo announced in June that Pokémon Gold and Silver, originally released in 2000 for the Game Boy Color, would be available to download on the Nintendo 3DS eShop. Nintendo also confirmed that the updated versions of the games would be compatible for the first time with Pokémon Bank, the 3DS service that allows players to deposit, store and manage their pocket monsters in private Boxes online. Pokémon Gold and Silver will be available to download on Sept. 22.

TODAY marks the 22nd anniversary of Xena: Warrior Princess, who first came into our lives in 1995 and has remained a major part of pop culture ever since. For many, Xena was an icon of feminism, female empowerment and strength and became an icon for the LGBT community thanks to her challenging ideas of masculinity and femininity, and her relationship with sidekick Gabrielle. So to celebrate all that Xena’s given us over the years, here are a few facts you may not have known about the show, complete with tributes from around the Twittersphere from fans celebrating this auspicious day. LUCY LAWLESS WAS NOT THE FIRST CHOICE TO PLAY XENA Xena is so ingrained in pop culture now that it’s hard to imagine anyone else playing the part, but she wasn’t actually the first choice for it. The first choice was British actress Vanessa Angel, who starred in the TV adaptation of Weird Science. However Angel fell ill before she was supposed to fly to the set and Tapert eventually decided on giving Lawless the role. RENEE O’CONNOR WASN’T THE FIRST CHOICE FOR GABRIELLE, EITHER Renee O’Connor has similarly become the only face fans could imagine playing Xena’s trusty sidekick and love interest Gabrielle, but she also wasn’t the first choice. Sunny Doench was meant for the role but backed out, reportedly because she didn’t want to leave her partner in the States. Lucky break for us, but not so much for her. XENA’S LOOK WAS MODELLED OFF A TENNIS STAR Xena was originally going to be blonde, but Lucy Lawless died her hair black. Lawless decided that an Amazonian princess should look more like Gabriela Sabatini who was “the big noise in tennis” at the time. In an interview for the Emmys, Lawless said: “I was like, ‘What about being like her? She’s big and bronze and dark-haired.’ Fortunately they went that way, because my hair would have fallen out if we tried to keep it blonde.” THE CREDITS HAD A RUNNING IN-JOKE FOR FANS The credits regularly had a fake disclaimer similar to the Humane Association messages saying “no animals have been harmed”. It started as an occasional joke in season one, but by season two, every single episode had disclaimers like, “Despite Gabrielle’s incessant hurling, Ulysses’ ship was not harmed during the making of this motion picture”, “No harpies were harmed in the making of this episode”, “No oversized Polynesian-style Bamboo Horses were harmed during the production of this motion picture. However many wicker lawn chairs gave their lives,” and in an episode featuring Xena’s death; “Xena was permanently harmed in the making of this motion picture, but kept her spirits up.” Fans caught on and started keeping track of each message via internet forums. Which brings us to the next point. XENA AND GABRIELLE WERE PRACTICALLY MARRIED Speculation has always been rife over the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle and through many interviews over the years, the cast and crew have confirmed that gay subtext was done entirely on purpose. But while the relationship was never made explicitly clear on the show, Lawless told Lesbian News in 2003 that Xena was “Gay. Gay, definitely.” Not bisexual, not pansexual, not even just curious and experimenting — as far as she’s concerned Xena and Gabrielle, “They’re married, man.” XENA WAS ONE OF THE FIRST SHOWS TO HAVE AN ONLINE FANDOM — AND IT’S STILL GOING STRONG While nowadays, we use the internet for pretty much everything all the time, the 90s were a different time. Yet somehow, Xena managed to grow an online fandom. The Xena fandom was one of the first to utilize the net to discuss their favourite show via the Xena Online Community board. The Xena fandom was so strong that it only just had its final convention in 2015, a full 14 years after the show ended, and the online forums are still alive and thriving. XENA WAS ORIGINALLY SUPPOSED TO DIE Xena was originally only brought into Hercules because producer Rob Tapert wanted a dark figure to counterbalance the cheerful and heroic Hercules. She was supposed to be there for three episodes and then die, but Tapert and the other producers liked Xena so much that they remodelled their previously planned Hercules spin-off just for her. Praise the TV Gods. This story originally appeared in the New Zealand Herald.

Please enable Javascript to watch this video Occupy protestors performed a small bit of satirical play acting Wednesday as a form of demonstrating against the influence of corporate money in government. Both Occupiers and supporters of LGBT rights had their say as the lawmakers and lobbyists observed from the balconies inside the Capitol Rotunda. “Today's event is a piece of political theater and it’s is intended to showcase how ALEC, or the American Legislative Exchange Council has an influence and a direct impact on our legislative branch,” said Occupy Salt Lake protestor Michael Wilson. ALEC describes itself as a conservative legislative think-tank that creates model legislation lawmakers can take to their states and use. According to their website, they are the "only" organization to provide that service in the country. Their next annual meeting is in Salt Lake City. “Attending the summit here this summer is $7000 if you're an attendee or $50 if you happen to be a legislator,” said Wilson. FOX 13 tried contacting ALEC via phone and email, but had not received a response back as of Wednesday whether those costs disparities between a private person and a legislator are true. An LGBT protest that also happened earlier Wednesday had protestors expressing a degree of anger in regards to a statewide antidiscrimination bill getting quickly tabled by lawmakers. FOX 13 will have more on this protest tonight during News at Nine.

MADRID — European basketball authorities say they will investigate an alleged assault of former Portland Trail Blazer player Rudy Fernandez while he was boarding the team bus in Lithuania. Fernandez plays for Real Madrid, and the mayhem followed his team's 105-104 overtime win over Zalgiris Kaunas on Thursday. Madrid official Juan Sanchez says two fans hit Fernandez on the shoulder and neck and struck a security guard several times. The Euroleague says it has asked for reports from both teams and the local police. Fernandez was back in his home country of Spain on Friday. He says he is fine and thankful "things did not go further." He stresses that "people should not think that all Lithuanian fans are like that just because of these two people. Not at all." -- The Associated Press

Researchers from the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, part of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, compared Connecticut's homicide rates during the 10 years following the law's implementation to the rates that would have been expected had the law not been implemented. The large drop in homicides was found only in firearm-related killings, not in homicides by other means, as would be expected if the law drove the reduction. Earlier research from Webster found that Missouri’s 2007 repeal of its handgun license law was associated with a 25 percent increase in its firearm homicide rates. For the Connecticut study, Webster and his colleagues used comparison states with homicide trends that most closely matched those in Connecticut before the law went into effect in order to predict what would have happened to homicide trends in Connecticut had the handgun licensing law not been implemented. “Taken together, these studies provide compelling evidence that permit to purchase licensing systems is one of the most effective policies we have to reduce gun violence,” Webster says. In 1995 Connecticut added a law to the state's books requiring licenses (permits) and requiring background checks. Researchers at Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research decided to look into whether or not there were any results as a result. Comparing these results with results of the inverse happening in Missouri after they repealed their handgun law license has led to the shocking conclusion that gun laws help save lives. Cold dead hands and all that.

Story highlights Police: 14-year-old was armed with a pistol, held hostages in a 2nd-floor classroom He released the hostages first, then put down his gun and surrendered to authorities (CNN) A 14-year-old boy held numerous students and a teacher hostage Tuesday inside his West Virginia high school -- a scary episode that ended peacefully with the teen dropping his gun and surrendering, police said. A 911 call placed at about 1:30 p.m. alerted Barbour County authorities that a person with a gun was inside Philip Barbour High School in Philippi, a city of 3,000 people about 40 miles south of Morgantown. According to a West Virginia State Police post on Facebook, responding officers arrived to find a 14-year-old armed with a pistol with other students and the teacher in a second-floor classroom. Everyone else was quickly shuttled to safety, first to the school's football field and then home via bus. No injuries were reported. Read More

Tony Abbott under fire from Cabinet colleagues over decision to grant knighthood to Prince Philip Updated Some of Prime Minister Tony Abbott's most senior colleagues are bewildered, angered and dismayed by his decision to award an Australian knighthood to Prince Philip. Prince Philip and former Defence Force chief Angus Houston were named Australia's newest knights today, under an honours system reinstated by Mr Abbott last year. Cabinet ministers have told the ABC the Prime Minister did not consult any of the leadership group before announcing the move. Mr Abbott agreed it was a "captain's call", saying he consulted only with Governor General Sir Peter Cosgrove and Order of Australia chairman Sir Angus. Ministers said they would have opposed the knighthood, if asked. One described it as a "stupid" decision that would make the Government an object of ridicule. Another said the Prime Minister's colleagues were willing him to succeed, but he had started the year badly and had made the job of trying to lift the Coalition's electoral credibility just that much harder. "There is an old saying that when you are in a hole you should stop digging," one minister said. "Well, we've just punched through the Earth's crust." Another Coalition MP said the move reinforced the left-wing caricature of the Prime Minister: the appointment harked to Australia's past and the opportunity of making a positive statement about the future on the national day had been squandered. The private anger of Coalition MPs and ministers was given public voice by the conservative chief minister of the northern territory, Adam Giles. He said that when he read reports of the Prince's knighthood this morning he wondered if he had woken on April Fools' Day. "It's Australia Day," he said. "We're not a bunch of tossers, let's get it right." The move to award an Australian knighthood to the Queen's husband has also been criticised by republicans, with former Western Australia premier Geoff Gallop calling it a "sad reflection" on Australia. And it drew fire on social media from commentators including Canberra press gallery veteran Laurie Oakes, who tweeted: "Libs must wonder who can help a PM apparently determined to be seen as a joke. #jokeknighthood". Answering questions about the decision at an Australia Day event in Canberra today, Mr Abbott said he was "really pleased" the Queen had accepted his recommendations on the knighthoods and added that whilst the Duke had not called to say thank you for the honour, he did not "expect gratitude". And he said social media criticism of the move was akin to "electronic graffiti" "I think that in the media, you make a big mistake to pay too much attention to social media. You wouldn't report what's sprayed up up on the walls of buildings and look, as I said, social media has its place, but it's anonymous," he told reporters. "It's often very abusive and in a sense, it has about as much authority and credibility as graffiti that happens to be put forward by means of IT." Mr Abbott said he stood by the decision to award the knighthood to 93-year-old Prince Philip because "the monarchy has been an important part of Australia's life since 1788". "Prince Philip has been a great servant of Australia, he's been a great servant of all the countries of the Commonwealth. "Here in this country he's the patron of hundreds of organisations. He's the inspiration and wellspring of the Duke of Edinburgh's Awards which have provided leadership training for tens if not hundreds of thousands of Australians over the years. "I'm just really pleased that in his 90s, towards the end of a life of service and duty, we in this country are able to properly acknowledge what he's done for us." Asked how widely he had consulted before making the decision, Mr Abbott said: "As you would expect, I consulted with the Chairman of the Order of Australia, and I consulted with the Governor-General. That's what you would expect." Asked if Prince Philip was a "captain's pick" for the award, Mr Abbott said "I'm not going to dispute your characterisation" before calling for questions on other topics. Shorten says award for British royal 'a time warp' Opposition Leader Bill Shorten, who yesterday called for a renewed debate on Australia becoming a republic, said giving a knighthood to an English royal on Australia Day was outside the mainstream of Australian thinking. "It's a time warp where we're giving knighthoods to English royalty," Mr Shorten told Fairfax Radio. "On Australia Day, we're talking about Australia, Australian identity, the Government's managed to find a British royal to give a medal to, a knighthood to." He said that if Labor won office it would not continue the tradition of knights or dames. "When we look at Australia in the 21st century, it's about who we're going to be as a people and I just think giving out a top award to a British royal is anachronistic." Prince has 'long relationship with Australia' Earlier the head of Australians for Constitutional Monarchy, Professor David Flint, said the knighthood was an appropriate recognition for Prince Philip's "long relationship with Australia". "He was a sailor in the convoys that protected Australian troops being taken to the Middle East in the Second World War," Professor Flint said. "He was also in the Pacific Fleet and he was actually in Tokyo Bay at the time the Japanese surrendered. "He opened the '56 Olympics, he's got a very long relationship through the Duke of Edinburgh Awards scheme." But Mr Gallop said Mr Abbott's decision to start awarding Australian knighthoods had "heavily polluted" the Australian honours system. "As we try to reflect upon our nation ... one of Australia's highest honours goes to someone who's not part of our community," he said. "In effect this is the eccentricity of Tony Abbott's views on our constitution coming through. "It certainly doesn't reflect the view of the Australian people through a meritocratic process." Famed for his off-the-cuff quips and gaffes, Prince Philip, who married Queen Elizabeth in 1947, is the longest serving royal consort in British history. The Queen once described him as "my strength and stay all these years". But the duke, a constant presence by his wife's side throughout her six decades on the throne, has suffered a series of health scares in recent years. Topics: constitution, government-and-politics, royal-and-imperial-matters, human-interest, abbott-tony, australia, united-kingdom First posted

WE STILL NEED YOUR HELP! HOURS LEFT TO PLEDGE! Even though we have met our goal, we'd love to raise another $3k to help cover the Kickstarter and Amazon fees (8-10%). We still have some great rewards available and even several producer credits left! RECENT PRESS Huffington Post - USA Today - Indiewire - "Project of the Day" Sundance just featured us on their front page! Check it out here. ABOUT THE FILM FIGHT CHURCH is a feature documentary about the confluence of Christianity and Mixed Martial Arts. The film follows several pastors and fighters in a quest to reconcile their faith with a sport that some consider violent and barbaric. Faith is tried and questions are raised. Can you really love your neighbor as yourself and then punch him in the face? WHY WE NEED YOUR HELP The film is still a long ways from being done and we must raise 30k to complete our shooting and post production. Here's where your money will be going: 1) $12,500- We need to return to New York and various other states to film with our main character and additional characters. Without this footage, we won't be able to tell the full story. 2) $17,500- We have another 6-9 months of editing ahead of us. We need to hire an editor and an assistant editor at a bare bones salary to work with us to shape the story. We have about half the film edited, but can't finish without a budget. Please help us tell the stories of these amazing individuals today! We want to finish our passion project and can't do it without your help! ________________________________________________________ THE FILMMAKERS & THEIR FILMS While some of you may already be familiar with our work, others may not. Here are a few of the past projects we've completed. Daniel Junge, Director Saving Face - Oscar Winner for Best Documentary Short. The film follows several Pakistani women who are victims of acid violence. The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner - Oscar Nomination. The documentary follows the assisted suicide ballot initiative in Washington State. They Killed Sister Dorothy - Jury and Audience Award Winner at SXSW, Emmy-nominated, Oscar Short-Listed. Documentary on the killing of 73-year-old Catholic nun and activist Sister Dorothy Stang. Bryan Storkel, Director Holy Rollers: The True Story of Card Counting Christians - Award-winning documentary tells the story of a team of card counting Christians who took millions from Vegas. Eben Kostbar & Joseph McKelheer, Producers (Film Harvest) Free Samples - Narrative Feature starring Jesse Eisenberg, Jason Ritter, & Jess Weixler. Premiered at Tribeca 2012. The Hammer - Award Winning Biopic on UFC fighter, Matt Hamill. __________________________________________________ HOW CAN YOU HELP US FURTHER? Please follow us on Facebook and Twitter, and please tell your friends and family about our Kickstarter campaign. Fight Church on Facebook Fight Church on Twitter Because of how Kickstarter works, if we don't reach our goal of $30k, we won't get to keep any of the money. We can't do this without you! Here's how you can help us... 1) Like us on Facebook, then share the Kickstarter Link with your FB friends, asking them to pledge. 2) Make a small donation to help us finish the film! THANK YOU VERY MUCH! :)

The spotlight cast on the novelist by the Charlie Hebdo attacks should not mislead us – his target here is not Islamism but suggestible modern men News: Houellebecq stops promotion of novel after Charlie Hebdo attack As the aftermath of the Charlie Hebdo murders continues to unfold, French readers are turning to the magazine’s latest cover star, with Michel Houellebecq’s Soumission racing to the top of bestseller lists at Amazon.fr. But is France’s most celebrated controversialist offering a splenetic vision of the Muslim threat to Europe or a spineless “submission” to gradual Islamic takeover? Actually, neither. It’s much more interesting than that. Those riffling impatiently through the opening for controversy will be disappointed, as we are introduced slowly to the narrator, François, a middle-aged literary academic who teaches at the Sorbonne. He is an expert on Huysmans, the cultish 19th-century anatomist of decadence, and he sleeps hungrily with his students. But he is bored. The narration is enjoyably sardonic, a pungent mixture of deadpan jokes about sexual politics and close reading. The novel, due to be published in English later this year, is set seven years hence, in the year 2022. François settles in to enjoy the TV spectacle of the presidential elections, which he considers second only to the World Cup for entertainment value. After the first round of voting, the two candidates left are Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-right Front National, and the head of France’s new Islamic party, Mohammed Ben Abbes. The Socialists do a deal with the “Muslim Fraternity” to defeat Le Pen, and Ben Abbes becomes president. Immediately all women go veiled in the street, state secondary schools adopt an Islamic curriculum, and François is informed that he cannot return to his university work unless he converts to Islam. Some in France have already complained that the novel fans right-wing fears of the Muslim population, but that is to miss Houellebecq’s deeply mischievous point. Islamists and anti-immigration demagogues, the novel gleefully points out, really ought to be on the same side, because they share a suspicion of pluralist liberalism and a desire to return to “traditional” or pre-feminist values, where a woman submits to her husband – just as “Islam” means that a Muslim submits to God. But Soumission is, arguably, not primarily about politics at all. The real target of Houellebecq’s satire – as in his previous novels – is the predictably manipulable venality and lustfulness of the modern metropolitan man, intellectual or otherwise. François himself happily submits to the new order, not for any grand philosophical or religious reasons, but because the new Saudi owners of the Sorbonne pay much better – and, more importantly, he can be polygamous. As he notes, in envious fantasy, of his charismatic new boss, who has adroitly converted already: “One 40-year-old wife for cooking, one 15-year-old wife for other things … no doubt he had one or two others of intermediate ages.” Michel Houellebecq stops promotion of new novel after Charlie Hebdo attack Read more The novel ends in an almost science-fictional conditional mood, with François looking forward dreamily to his own conversion and a future of endless sensual gratification: “I’d have nothing to regret.” But with his publisher under police protection, Houellebecq must surely regret the manner in which his darkly clever and funny book has become another succès de scandale.

Two worlds collide in Mario + Rabbids® Kingdom Battle! This game is available for purchase exclusively on Nintendo eShop for Nintendo Switch. Gold Edition includes game and season pass: 8 new solo challenges + 5 co-op maps 16 new weapons. An exclusive world featuring a new hero, coming in early 2018. The Mushroom Kingdom has been torn apart by a mysterious vortex, transporting the chaotic Rabbids into this once-peaceful land. To restore order, Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach, and Yoshi must team up with a whole new crew: four Rabbids heroes! Together, they will battle with weapons through four worlds filled with combat, puzzles, and unpredictable enemies. Developed exclusively for the Nintendo Switch™ system, Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle is the best of the Mario and Rabbids franchises, combining all that you love about Mario's iconic universe with the side-splitting antics of the Rabbids.

Image caption Harry Redknapp said two men fell on their knees and began pulling at his trouser legs Tottenham Hotspur manager Harry Redknapp has revealed he was mugged while attending a football match in Spain on Thursday. Redknapp, 63, was in Madrid to see the Spanish capital's two main teams, Real and Atletico, play in the Copa del Rey. He said two men fell to their knees in front of him and tugged at his trouser legs to distract him while four others took money and items from his pockets. Redknapp said he did not report the incident to police. He said he was at the match with his assistant manager Kevin Bond and had to borrow money from him to pay for a taxi back to his hotel and for dinner before returning to London. 'Got some sweets' The former Portsmouth and West Ham manager said: "I'm walking round the outside of the stadium, it's a fantastic atmosphere, there's all little stalls there selling sweets. I just probably looked stupid or something Harry Redknapp "I got some sweets, me and Kevin, and it was so packed. The next thing there's two guys on their knees in front of me and I felt someone pull my overcoat. "I thought 'what are you doing?'. The next thing he's got my keys on the floor. "I thought 'is he a blind man or someone having trouble walking properly?' What are they doing, these two blokes? "I'm going 'let go of my trousers', pushing them away. While I'm doing that they're rifling my pockets, there were about six of them. And then they went. Image caption The Spurs manager was in Spain to watch Real Madrid beat Atletico Madrid "I thought 'what are they doing?' I went to put my hand in my pockets and realised what they'd done. "They took everything. All my money, credit cards, everything really." The Spurs manager said he did not believe the muggers knew who he was. "I just probably looked stupid or something, and they thought 'here's one here, he's not Spanish, obviously and we're looking for a foreigner'." Real Madrid won the match at Atletico's Vicente Calderon Stadium 1-0. Redknapp said the incident unsettled him and he left about 15 minutes before the end of the game, which he attended to watch potential transfer target Diego Forlan, the former Manchester United striker.

Image caption Mr Eastwood said if the 90,000 people who voted in the Brexit referendum turn out in March we wouldn't be 'hurtling towards direct rule' The SDLP leader has urged the public to turn out for March's assembly elections in the same numbers as the EU referendum in June. Colum Eastwood said if voter turnout was as high as it was for Brexit it could avoid the collapse of Stormont and a lengthy period of direct rule. The referendum saw 63% of the electorate in Northern Ireland voting. That was eight percentage points higher than the turnout for the Stormont election the previous month. 'Alternative power-sharing government' Mr Eastwood told the BBC he believed that a higher turnout on 2 March would increase the chances of a change to the status quo. Speaking to the Inside Politics programme, he argued that his party and the Ulster Unionists had shown they could work together in a spirit of co-operation, but acknowledged they would need other parties to form an alternative power-sharing government together. Mr Eastwood said that next month's election presented a "major opportunity" to change local politics. Image caption 62.7% of the electorate voted in the referendum, 8% higher than the turnout for the May's Stormont election "If you take the 90,000 people who voted in the Brexit referendum but didn't vote in the May election," he argued, "if those people came out, then you'd have a very different type of politics. "We wouldn't be hurtling towards direct rule that we might not come back from. We'd be able to form a government on day one despite all the differences and all of the challenges." 'Full transparency' The SDLP leader said he wrote some weeks ago to the Secretary of State James Brokenshire asking him to name a date for the publication of party political donations. Previously the SDLP had opposed full transparency over donations, but Mr Eastwood said that in the wake of the Renewable Heat Incentive scandal it is right that the current rules should change. The SDLP leader said it is unfortunate that the DUP has not revealed the identity of an English organisation which helped fund its Brexit referendum campaign. Questioned about the Irish government's opposition to the idea of special designated status for Northern Ireland within the EU, Mr Eastwood said he didn't care about the "semantics" of what any special measures are called, but supports protection for citizens, businesses and communities who will be disadvantaged as a result of Brexit. Image caption On reforming the petition of concern, Mrs Long argued that neither the DUP nor Sinn Féin have been genuine in their approach. 'About policy, not people' Meanwhile, the Alliance leader Naomi Long has said she will not base her decision on joining a future Stormont executive on whether Arlene Foster is nominated again as first minister. Both Sinn Féin and the SDLP have said they would not be prepared to participate in an executive led by Mrs Foster before she is cleared of responsibility by the public inquiry now examining the Renewable Heat Incentive scandal. However, if Alliance is approached to take a department it will not be taking a similar line as Mrs Long believes any decision "should not be about people or personalities, but rather about policy and practice". On reforming the petition of concern, Mrs Long argued that neither the DUP nor Sinn Féin had been genuine in their approach. She told Inside Politics the assembly must continue to have protection mechanisms for minorities and she believes Arlene Foster's suggestion that the petitions of concern could be abolished is in order to have "no restraint on the DUP's ability, or unionists' collective ability to simply override nationalist opinion." On the RHI scandal, the Alliance leader said the publication of the names of RHI recipients of the scheme would only be meaningful if it happened in conjunction with the release of the names of donors to political parties in Northern Ireland.

What do you want done with your body after you die? It is an unnerving but important question, and for most Americans there have long been only two obvious choices: burial or cremation. But a third option, a liquefaction process called by a variety of names — flameless cremation, green cremation or the “Fire to Water” method — is starting to gain popularity throughout the United States. This week, California became the 15th state to outline commercial regulations for the disposal of human remains through the method, chemically known as alkaline hydrolysis. It may seem markedly different from the traditional means of digging graves or burning the dead. A machine uses a chemical bath to dissolve protein, blood and fat, leaving only a coffee-colored liquid, powdery bone and any metal implants, like dental fillings.

Mueller Turns Up The Heat With Unusual Search Warrant In Russia Probe Enlarge this image toggle caption Alex Wong/Getty Images Alex Wong/Getty Images Federal prosecutors have lots of ways to intensify pressure on the people they're investigating, from early morning FBI raids to leaning on relatives of those under government scrutiny. But even by those measures, the special counsel investigating Russian interference in last year's presidential election is moving with unusual speed and assertiveness, according to half a dozen legal experts following the probe. Consider disclosures that FBI agents executed a search warrant last month for business and tax records at the suburban Virginia home of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort. That step would have required them to prove to a judge that there's probable cause a crime has been committed. Kenneth Starr, the Whitewater independent counsel frequently criticized for alleged overreach by then-President Bill Clinton, never utilized search warrants, two members of the team told NPR. Neither did the special counsel investigating the leak of a CIA operative's identity in the George W. Bush administration, said William Jeffress, a Washington attorney who represented White House aide Lewis "Scooter" Libby in that probe. "A search warrant in a case like this is highly unusual," Jeffress said. Lawyers said the special counsel may have been motivated to use a search warrant over concerns that evidence might be concealed or destroyed, which sometimes happens in terrorism and drug trafficking cases. Or, they said, Mueller may have been moving quickly amid a series of existential threats. In recent weeks, President Trump has blasted the Russia investigation as a "witch hunt" and flirted with the idea of firing Justice Department leaders as a roundabout way to get rid of Mueller himself. Talking with reporters Thursday, the president said he was "very surprised" by the FBI raid at Manafort's home and said it sent a "strong signal." Trump also said that the White House is cooperating with the special counsel probe even though, he said, the subjects under investigation never happened. In any case, the Justice Department frequently deploys tough tactics with a larger goal in mind: securing the cooperation of insiders who can guide authorities through a complex investigation and help deliver bigger targets. "I call it 'climbing the ladder,' " Jeffress said. "It happens in every corporate investigation," where investigators question clerks and assistants, and then move up to vice presidents and higher-level executives. A spokesman for Manafort, Jason Maloni, said he is responding to government inquiries. Whether Manafort, former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn or anyone else decides to strike a deal with the government is being closely watched by people in and outside the probe. Authorities routinely enlist relatives to try to turn up the heat. Recent media reports suggested that investigators have reached out to Manafort's son-in-law, with whom he'd entered into some real estate dealings. Indeed, several members of Mueller's 16-lawyer special counsel team have a long history of approaching lower-level figures, including spouses and in-laws, to build bigger cases. Take Andrew Weissmann, a special counsel lawyer who once led the Justice Department's Enron Task Force. Prosecutors looking to uncover and punish fraud at that defunct energy company famously threatened to charge the wife of the company's chief financial officer with tax offenses if he did not agree to plead guilty and testify against his corporate superiors. The finance official, Andrew Fastow, refused. So, authorities indicted his wife, Lea. They both served prison time. A more recent addition to the special counsel team, Greg Andres, helped bring to justice the Bonanno crime family boss as a young mob prosecutor in Brooklyn, N.Y. Through the course of the trial, Andres helped unravel dozens of crimes over three decades, using federal agents and members of the crime family as narrators. One of his key witnesses was the brother-in-law of the defendant, Joseph Massino. "The story principally was told from the vantage point of those involved in the crimes at issue and their credibility was a crucial issue," Andres told the publication Law360 last year. Andres so got under the skin of the mobsters that one later testified he had been targeted for a "hit."

Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Jose Manuel Barroso: "Without the EU Britain will have less influence" The UK would have "zero" influence if it voted to leave the EU, the outgoing president of the European Commission has said. Jose Manuel Barroso said Britain could not negotiate with the US and China "on an equal footing" on its own. He also said free movement of people within the EU was an "essential" principle that could not be changed. Conservative Party chairman Grant Shapps said Mr Barroso was "out of touch" and an "unelected bureaucrat". Mr Barroso was asked about Prime Minister David Cameron's stated intention to negotiate a better deal for the UK in Europe, ahead of an in/out referendum. The prime minister has said he will "not take no for an answer" and "get what Britain needs" on the question of freedom of movement. 'One last go' If the Conservatives remain in power, a referendum would be held by 2017, Mr Cameron has said. Speaking on the BBC's Andrew Marr Show, Mr Barroso, whose term of office ends this month, said he believed Mr Cameron wanted Britain to remain in the EU. "Britain is stronger in the European Union," Mr Barroso said, pointing to the Ebola crisis as an area where Britain would not have the same level of influence if it was outside the EU. "David Cameron wrote to all of us about Ebola... What would be the influence of a prime minister of Britain if it was not part of the European Union? "His influence would be zero." Mr Cameron has said he wants to curb migration within the EU and last week pledged to have "one last go" at renegotiating the rules for Britain. The Conservatives lost the recent Clacton by-election to the UK Independence Party, which wants the UK to leave the EU. Image caption Conservative chairman Grant Shapps said Britain had negotiated "lots of impossible things" from the EU Mr Barroso would not comment on a report in the Sunday Times that the government could limit the number of national insurance numbers given to low-skilled immigrants. But he said that while the EU was willing to discuss benefit fraud and sham marriages, an "arbitrary cap" on migration would "not be in conformity with European rules". He said Mr Cameron had previously asked him to enforce the free movement principle between Spain and Gibraltar. Mr Barroso said 1.4 million Britons lived elsewhere in the EU and it was a "matter of fairness" that other EU citizens had the same rights. He also criticised comments by Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond last week that Britain was "lighting a fire under the European Union" with the proposed referendum. 'Slap-down' Mr Barroso said: "I'm told the foreign secretary was the former minister of defence. I think this reference to fire and weapons is more appropriate for defence than foreign secretary. "It is very important to have a positive tone regarding these issues between Britain and the EU." BBC political correspondent Matt Cole said this was a "bit of a slap-down" for Mr Hammond although Jean-Claude Juncker would shortly be taking over as commission president. Analysis Image copyright Reuters By BBC political correspondent Ben Wright These comments are definitely unhelpful - and a window into Brussels thinking. But Jose Manuel Barroso is on his way out - he's the outgoing president and a whole new commission will take over next month. And in several areas where David Cameron wants to renegotiate, he has allies in Europe. On restricting benefits that EU migrants can claim, his concern is shared in several capitals - most importantly Berlin. I think there is some support for returning powers from Brussels to national governments. But the big hurdle is this question of free movement of existing EU citizens which Mr Cameron is now talking about - even though we don't have a clear policy proposal from the government. A change of treaty would be impossible, I think. There could be an attempt to change the directive that puts the freedom into practice but that would require agreement by EU leaders and the parliament. The incoming commission president Jean-Claude Juncker has said he is prepared to make a "fair deal" with Britain. But it won't be at any price. 'Total free movement' Mr Shapps said Mr Barroso had "dismissed" the UK, adding: "If he can dismiss us... then every other country in the EU ought to look out because apparently no country means anything to him." Speaking on the BBC's Sunday Politics, Mr Shapps said "a whole bunch of things" needed to change in the EU, of which immigration control was "one of the important ones". Image copyright PA Image caption The government wants to get net migration below 100,000 a year He said: "[Mr] Barroso is only the latest person from Europe to tell us we will never get what we want." Mr Shapps said "there are lots of impossible things that we have negotiated" including a cut to the EU budget. UKIP leader Nigel Farage said there was no way of limiting European migration while the UK remained an EU member. "Do not take Mr Barroso's comments on their own," he said. "Everyone in Brussels... says the same thing. "We are committed by treaty - we have been since 1973 - to total free movement of peoples within the European Union." Non-negotiable The level of net migration stands at more than twice the government's target of 100,000 a year. International Development Secretary Justine Greening told Sky's Murnaghan programme: "Free movement of labour was never meant to be an unqualified principle, irrespective of how it might have worked on the ground. "We do need to see action taken in relation to negotiation with the EU." She said the government was "taking a fundamental look at some of the rules that allow unrestricted immigration". Eurosceptic Conservative MP John Redwood said he understood work had been going on "for some time" to come up with ways to limit migration from the EU. But the BBC's Mark Mardell said a senior Brussels source had told him Mr Cameron's plan was "complete nonsense legally and economically". Mats Persson, director of Open Europe, a think tank that calls for EU reform, said free movement was "the most basic principle perhaps of European Union membership, so you are effectively saying to the EU 'we want to renegotiate one of your founding principles'".

0 Since we started our IMAX screening series, we’ve mostly been focused on the newest movies about to be in theaters. While I love promoting new movies, when I first pitched the idea to IMAX for this series, the goal was to show both new and older films and balance the two. The fact is, while I love IMAX, the only negative about the format is that once a film is out of theaters, it’s extremely rare to be able to see it again on their massive screens. Which is why showing older films in our screening series is just as important to me as showing the newest release. And this brings me to our next IMAX screening: TRON: Legacy. On Tuesday, February 28 at 7pm, we’re going to be showing TRON: Legacy for the first time in laser projection and in 3D! Back in 2010, when Legacy was first in theaters, laser projection was still in development. Following the screening, I’ll be moderating an extended Q&A with director Joseph Kosinski where we will go in depth about the making of the film, the amazing Daft Punk soundtrack, and so much more. I’m a huge fan of Tron and the world Steven Lisberger created in the early 80s. I’ve probably watched the film more times than I care to admit and showing TRON: Legacy has been on my wish list for our IMAX screening series since it first started. So if you’d like to see TRON: Legacy in IMAX 3D and watch our Q&A with Joseph Kosinski you need to click this link to enter for tickets. We’ll be accepting requests until February 23rd and soon after we’ll contact the people that won with exact details about the screening. Good luck and hope to see you there!