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BRUSSELS (Reuters) - World powers raised $15 billion for Afghanistan on Wednesday to fund the country over the next four years, while the European Union said it won support to revive a stalled peace process after almost 40 years of conflict. With the government in Kabul facing a resurgent Taliban 15 years after U.S. forces helped oust the militants, more than 70 governments in Brussels led by the United States and the European Union promised more financial support for a country that governments see as strategic to global security. “The war for the future is being fought in Asia. We must stand our ground in Afghanistan,” India’s deputy foreign minister, M.J. Akbar, told the donor conference, which raised more than the $13 billion the United States initially expected. “India does not believe in an exit option,” he said, echoing a growing recognition that there is no immediate end in sight to the U.S.-led coalition’s involvement in Afghanistan. Despite such largesse, Afghanistan is required to sign up to a host of political, economic and social reforms in return for the money. Most contentious, the European Union wants Kabul to take back its nationals who are not considered refugees, although EU donor money is not linked to such demands. Several hundred members of Afghanistan’s mainly Shi’ite Hazara minority, which has been targeted by Taliban and Islamic State militants, protested outside the conference venue, rejecting a new agreement between the EU and Afghanistan that makes it easier to return Afghans whose asylum requests fail. Related Coverage Kerry calls on Taliban to choose path to 'honorable' peace “(President) Ashraf Ghani and his government is here for European and other countries’ aid in return for accepting a deal to send us back to a war zone,” said Ali Reza, holding a banner with the words: “We Will Not Go Back”. European governments, facing increasing opposition from voters to immigration at home, have pressed Afghanistan to accept more repatriations, saying that many parts of the country, including the capital Kabul, are safe. “I hope that the newly signed repatriation agreement with Afghanistan will be implemented in practice,” German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier told reporters. The policy has faced sharp criticism from aid groups and others who point to the widening Taliban insurgency across the country and the frequent suicide attacks that hit Kabul. “NO TALIBAN VICTORY” In the margins of the conference, the EU focused on getting peace negotiations back on track by bringing together the United States, China, India, and Pakistan at a dinner on Tuesday night. (Front Row L-R) Afghanistan's Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah, President Ashraf Ghani, European Council President Donald Tusk, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Agha Khan pose for a family photo during the Brussels Conference on Afghanistan, in Belgium, October 5, 2016. REUTERS/Francois Lenoir Federica Mogherini, who coordinates EU foreign policy, said there was an understanding “to work on a common basis for regional political support for the peace and reconciliation process in Afghanistan.” There have been several attempts in recent years to broker a settlement between the Western-backed government in Kabul and the Taliban, but all have failed. Without the militants at the table, experts say it is hard to envisage a meaningful solution. Two people briefed on Mogherini’s dinner, attended by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and U.N Secretary General Ban Ki-moon among others, told Reuters that Chinese and Indian officials were willing to consider peace talks. But difficulties abound. Pakistan continues to harbor Afghan Taliban, the United States says. India is unconvinced the militants have changed, judging by the way they rule the 10 percent of Afghan territory they control, one official said. There remain divisions about if, or when, to include Taliban militants. Even if they were invited, it is unclear whether the movement would take part. “There are several countries that actually can help come together, and I urge Russia, China, Pakistan, India and Iran to think about the special role that they could play in this region... in reaching peace with the Taliban,” Kerry told the donor conference. Hope was briefly raised in 2015 when Taliban officials met the Afghan government in neighboring Pakistan, but that process was short lived, and the Taliban insist that foreign forces must leave Afghanistan before peace talks can begin. Slideshow (3 Images) They are also on the offensive, and battlefield successes have exposed the defensive limits of Afghanistan’s NATO-trained armed forces which are supposed to number 350,000 personnel but which have been heavily depleted by casualties and desertion. Militants briefly reached the center of the northern city of Kunduz on Monday, and they are testing the defenses of two other provincial capitals in the south of the country. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg defended the Afghan forces and said it was only right to fight back. “There is no way the Taliban will engage in a peace process if they believe they can reach victory,” he said.

Haskell is useful for writing robust, high quality and reliable software. You can write the same stuff in any other language. But Haskell is designed based on solid mathematical principles. It is statically typed which allows the compiler to detect certain classes of bugs which are impossible for compilers for C++, Java, Python etc. to detect. Haskell compiler can also perform optimizations which cannot be performed for other mainstream languages. Haskell focuses on modularity and composability by virtue of pure functions with no state changes. Code with state changes is neatly separated from code without state changes, allowing you to zero in easily, onto the bugs. Haskell emphasizes a different style of programming with an extremely minimalistic and simple syntax( devoid of colons, braces, brackets and other ugly looking special characters) making your code look like a Mozart or Beethoven masterpiece. Its a truism in the Haskell community that if your code compiles, then it will do what you want it to do.

Old minor hockey teammates, Tecumseh’s Jack Studnicka and Amherstburg’s Mikey DiPietro got to share the ups and downs of the NHL Draft in Chicago. The two, who played more than a half a decade together with the Sun County Panthers, sat through Friday’s first round of the draft at the United Center before hearing their names called on Saturday. “We have the same agent, so we spent the majority of the weekend together,” said the 18-year-old Studnicka, who plays for the Oshawa Generals. For Studnicka, sitting through Friday’s first round was not an issue. “I didn’t have any expectations, but I went there for the full experience,” Studnicka said. When the Dallas Stars moved up late in the first round on Friday, DiPietro thought there might be a chance he could be reunited with former Windsor Spitfires goalie coach Jim Bedard, but the club went with goalie Jake Oettinger instead. “It’s a long wait,” the 18-year-old DiPietro said. “You think it’s a good fit and then you’re not called.” When Saturday’s second round got underway, the anxiety kicked in for both players. “It’s a stressful environment,” Studnicka said. With each pick, the stress level only goes up. It took 22 selections into the second round when Studnicka stood and made his way to the draft floor after the Boston Bruins took the six-foot-171-pound centre. “I’ve been dreaming about being drafted to the NHL since I can’t remember and it’s satisfying to have it happen,” Studnicka said. “I talked to Boston a couple of times during the year and at the (NHL) Combine. I think it’s an awesome fit and I think I’ll fit in well.” After shaking hands and meeting members of the organization, Studnicka made his way to the interview area and wasn’t around 11 picks later when the Vancouver Canucks made DiPietro the second pick of the third round. “I’m happy to hear my name called,” the six-foot, 202-pound DiPietro said. “I think it’s a great situation for myself and I get a team that truly, truly believes in me as a player.” DiPietro admits the wait makes the mind wander, but there was a little irony in seeing Vancouver take him with the 64th pick overall. DiPietro wears No. 64 for the Spitfires in honour of the year his father Vic was born. “It’s a long wait,” DiPietro said. “I started imagining the second pick of the second round because that’s where I was drafted in the OHL. (Vancouver’s pick) was really ironic. I was thinking that was a joke. I got picked and my mom said, ‘You should have picked No.1 (to wear).’” But it was worth the wait. “It’s literally unexpected,” DiPietro said. And an experience the two will never forget. “Best experience of my life,” Studnicka said. DiPietro’s selection followed teammate Gabriel Vilardi, who went 11th overall to the Los Angeles Kings in Friday’s first round. “I couldn’t be happier going to L.A.,” Vilardi said. “Such a great organization that has so many great players and learning from those guys. “(There) really are no words. Just an amazing (experience) for me and my family.” jpparker@postmedia.com twitter.com/winstarparker

Organisms need information about their environment in order to survive and reproduce. Many organisms are able to learn about their environment directly by observing it and interacting with it: this is called "personal learning". However, some species, particularly those that live in social groups, can also learn indirectly by observing and interacting with individuals who already have knowledge. There are plenty of examples of such "social learning" in nature: for instance, many species are able evade predators because they can sense alarm signals produced by other members of their own or other species; this means that they can avoid the predator without ever seeing, hearing or smelling it (Fichtel, 2012). In other cases, females choose territories for breeding based on the appearance and vigor of the males holding the territory, rather than on the quality of the territory itself; this is because strong, attractive males tend to have high-quality territories. Finally, many animals that forage or roost near one another learn about where they can find food by observing the behavior of their companions (Valone and Templeton, 2002). Social learning is often more efficient and less risky than personal learning, although the information gained may be outdated or unreliable (Giraldeau et al., 2002). However, the efficiency of social learning means that social information can potentially spread rapidly through a social group, and then be transmitted to other groups by migrants, as well as being passed on from generation to generation. As such social learning forms the cornerstone of both animal and human cultural behavior. Understanding how it works in groups of social animals will help us to understand the evolution of both animal and human culture (Castro and Toro, 2004). Several previous studies have addressed the question of how socially learned information and skills spread throughout social groups, particularly in socially-living non-human primates. These groups are generally organized around kinship relationships, such that individuals who are closely related to each other favor one another. Not surprisingly, researchers have found that information is often transmitted along family lines and among other close associates. In a classic study of Japanese macaques, a new way to process food was first invented by a juvenile female. It then spread to the juvenile's playmates (both of the same age and older) and their mothers, and then gradually to the rest of their extended families. Eventually, infants learned the skill from their mothers. Adult males, who occupy peripheral positions in the social network, were slow to learn (Kawai et al., 1992). Other studies have shown that additional factors, such as dominance rank (that is, position in the dominance hierarchy of the group), are crucial in determining how social information spreads (Drea and Wallen, 1999). However, it should be noted that some researchers have argued that the results of the study on Japanese macaques are better explained by personal learning (Galef, 1992). Now, in eLife, Alecia Carter of Cambridge University and colleagues – Miquel Torrents Ticó and Guy Cowlishaw of the Institute of Zoology – have used new social network analysis techniques to explore how social information is transmitted in troops of wild baboons (Carter et al., 2016; Figure 1). In particular, they explored how individual characteristics, including cognitive, social, ecological and demographic factors, influenced social learning. Past studies typically looked only at final outcomes: for example, did an individual demonstrate a particular skill? In contrast, Carter et al. break the process down into three sequential stages – the acquisition of information, the application of information, and the exploitation of its benefits – and look at the factors that may limit or favor individuals at each of these three stages. Figure 1 Download asset Open asset Wild chacma baboons in Tsaobis Nature Park, Namibia. Carter et al. found that close social ties between baboons increased the application and exploitation of socially acquired information about the location of food patches. Photograph: Alecia Carter They surreptitiously placed small amounts of maize kernels (a favorite food of baboons) in the paths of two foraging troops of wild chacma baboons (Papio ursinus) in Tsaobis Nature Park, Namibia. As the baboons approached this food patch, Carter et al. recorded the identities of the baboons that found the food independently (and the order in which they did so) and the identities of those that found the food by watching a finder ingest it (information acquisition). They also recorded which baboons entered into the food patch (information application) and which baboons ate the food (exploitation of benefits). After the initial discovery of the food, nearly all the discoveries were made by social learning. A troop of baboons at this site can contain as many as 55 baboons. Each individual baboon forms social bonds with other members of the group – some of these bonds are close, others are distant or some are even antagonistic. Researchers use social networks based on factors such as proximity, grooming and dominance to describe the overall structure of these bonds. Using a technique called order of acquisition diffusion analysis (Hoppitt et al., 2010), Carter et al. identified the particular social network that best accounted for their data. This network connected individuals who travelled together in clusters that were dispersed over 10 meters or less. Networks based on grooming and dominance were less able to predict the results of the observations, as were networks of a different size. Carter et al. then explored whether individual characteristics – such as age, sex, rank, boldness and position within a particular social network – influenced the acquisition, application and exploitation of the social information about the food patches. Individuals that had central positions within the 10 meter proximity network were most likely to learn the food location socially. Having a central position in this network and also in the grooming network (that is, having many strong grooming relationships) facilitated entrance into the food patch (application), as did being male. Strong grooming ties, high dominance status, maleness and boldness facilitated actual feeding (exploitation). On average, less than 25% of baboons acquired the social information about the food and less than 5% exploited it. The results show that is useful to break down the transmission of social information into three sequential stages, with each stage being governed by different individual and social attributes. Carter et al. suggest that when social information can be acquired by visual means alone, the transmission of information is limited only by an individual’s spatial relationships with other group members. However, the application and exploitation of information are both more likely to involve other attributes. In this study, the application of information also involved strong social ties, which suggests that baboons that were feeding tolerated their close grooming partners. Social ties also influenced the exploitation of information, and power relationships were particularly important, with dominant males and bold individuals being most likely to feed. The precise characteristics and success rates identified by Carter, Ticó and Cowlishaw are likely to be specific to the conditions of their study. For example, success rates might be higher at all stages if the food patches were larger. The next challenge, therefore, is to further explore the relevant parameters and general principles that guide the transmission of social information under a range ecological, social and demographic conditions.

0 Teens found dead behind Roswell Publix were shot NORTH FULTON COUNTY, Ga. - Two communities are mourning the deaths of two teens found dead behind a Publix in Roswell. The bodies of Natalie Henderson and Carter Davis, both 17, were discovered by a delivery driver behind the Publix supermarket shortly before 6 a.m. Monday, Roswell police said. According to the Fulton County Medical Examiner's office, the two died from a gunshot wound to the head and the manner of death in both cases was homicide. TRENDING STORIES: "Early indications are that they were killed there. We don't really have reason to believe they were killed elsewhere," Roswell police Det. Zachary Frommer said in an interview Tuesday. Officers say Henderson and Davis were found lying beside their cars. Police say the teens arrived at the shopping center between 2 and 4 a.m. Their parents told officers they thought the teens were still at home in bed. The initial police report lists Henderson's possible relationship to the offender as "XBG," police shorthand for ex-boyfriend. There is no relationship to the offender listed by Davis' name. Police have not announced any persons of interest in the case. "Given what the officers had on scene at that moment, it appeared to be a relationship-involved situation. This information can change quickly as evidence and information is gathered but is only meant to be a starting point," Frommer said. Henderson was a student at Roswell High School and Davis was a student at River Ridge High School. Carter Davis and Natalie Henderson were found dead behind a Publix in Roswell on Monday. © 2019 Cox Media Group. Davis played lacrosse and football. “He, in many ways, was like a coach on the field. In fact, we sometimes joked and called him Coach Carter,” lacrosse Coach Mike Britt said about Davis. He said Carter was someone players looked up to, and now their leader is gone. “Our team is just devastated,” he said. Hundreds of people showed up to a vigil in his honor Tuesday night. © 2019 Cox Media Group. Grief counselors are on hand at both of the students' schools to help console friends. The principal at River Ridge HS said students are having a really hard time with Davis’ death. “We had some tears this morning. A lot of hugs, a lot of talking in the hallways,” Principal Darrell Herring said. “It's devastating when you're so excited about all of your kids coming back to school and then you find out on the first day that something like this happened.” He says adults are trying to provide answers to the many questions the kids keep asking. “When you are talking to kids, you have to tell them that the world is tough, and what we’re trying to prepare them for is life,” he said. A GoFundMe page has been set up for Carter Davis' family. Henderson was an honor student who loved to sing and dance. Video posted online shows her singing on her own and with her sister. © 2019 Cox Media Group.

Manchester, NH (CNN) The lawyer for Walter Scott, the black man who was shot and killed by a South Carolina police officer last year, is changing his endorsement of Hillary Clinton to Bernie Sanders, his campaign announced Monday. Justin T. Bamberg, a South Carolina state lawmaker and lawyer for the Scott family, is withdrawing his support from Clinton. The switch was first reported by The New York Times. "The question to ask is not what Secretary Clinton did to lose it, but what Sen. Sanders did to gain it," Bamberg said on a conference call. "I must acknowledge that from the beginning I, as is the case for many Americans, did not give Sen Sanders as a candidate his fair share (of attention.)" The endorsement comes at a critical moment for Sanders, as he looks to cut into Clinton's strong support from among black voters in South Carolina. "Bernie represents bold new leadership and is not afraid to challenge the status quo or the traditional way of thinking," Bamberg said. "Speaking from personal experience. Such an approach does not come without inherent risks. People will say that our objectives are unachievable, that they are impossible." Read More

Conservative radio host and Donald Trump ally Michael Savage said on his program yesterday that he couldn’t finish watching Monday’s presidential debate because he knew early in the evening that Hillary Clinton had won the contest. “Hillary knew how to trigger Trump and drag him off balance,” he said, pointing to Clinton’s accurate claim that Trump received $14 million from his father and lamenting that the GOP candidate “fell right into her trap.” “When she said to him that he inherited $14 million from his father, she fundamentally was like a sumo wrestler who won the debate right from the beginning with that remark because he took the bait and she threw him off the mat,” Savage said. “He was unbalanced from the point on. She knew that he would take the debate and defend his father. Why? Because he has character and she doesn’t. She’s a lowlife with no character, she has no character whatsoever.” Trump did not in fact “defend his father,” who wasn’t even the subject of the remark, but instead falsely claimed that he had only received a “very small loan.”

KIEV, April 23 (Xinhua) -- Ukraine will cover the collapsed roof of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant with special resin to prevent the spread of radioactive dust, a senior nuclear safety official said here Tuesday. "As soon as the weather permits, we will cover the equipment under the caved-in parts of the roof with special resin," Mikhail Gashev, Ukraine's chief inspector of nuclear and radiation safety, told reporters. Spraying synthetic resin over the inactive plant's equipment was routine procedure, Gashev said, adding that similar work was carried out annually throughout Chernobyl. This year, Ukraine would spend 1.5 million U.S. dollars, up from 1.25 million dollars in 2012, to bolster nuclear safety at the plant, Gashev said. About 600 square meters of the roof at Chernobyl, where an explosion and reactor meltdown occurred in 1986, collapsed in mid-February. Authorities said at the time that the collapse posed no threat to human health.

Theresa May has held Ruth Davidson’s hand aloft in front of a cheering crowd at the Tory conference and declared: “Together we saved the Union.” The Prime Minister, who appeared to be in a boisterous mood, told a Scottish Conservative reception that the general election result in Scotland had demolished the SNP’s dream of a second independence referendum. In a move that will be seen as an attempt to capitalise on Ms Davidson’s popularity and success, she acknowledged the Tories did not achieve “the overall result we wanted” but argued her decision to call the election preserved the UK. Mrs May had earlier said the change in the Tories’ fortunes in Scotland had been “monumental” this year, with the party increasing its tally of MPs from one to 13. The disaster for the SNP, which saw them lose 21 MPs including Alex Salmond and Angus Robertson, forced Nicola Sturgeon to postpone her referendum plans, with no prospect of another vote before the 2021 Holyrood election.

Is your Bitcoin stash burning a hole in your digital wallet? Bitfash is a new startup that wants to help you spend your bitcoins on clothing from top fashion brands. Based in Australia and China, Bitfash serves as an intermediary between retailers and shoppers, allowing them to browse online stores through its web platform. Purchases are completed by paying bitcoins to Bitfash, which then procures the items and arranges for them to be shipped directly from the sellers to buyers. Bitfash’s brand roster currently includes Zara, Forever 21 and men’s clothing retailer Mr. Porter. The startup will add a fourth brand in the next two weeks. The site was launched in April by founders Chris Woods and Keyur Kelkar, who figured that Bitcoin traders might want to splurge their bitcoins on something. “We started learning more about the space from an entrepreneurial perspective and saw that most businesses taking bitcoins are electronics-based,” says Woods. “So we tried to look ahead into the future and see where there is potential for mainstream adoption. [Kelkar] and I both have an interest in fashion, so it was a no brainer and that’s why we really went for it.” Bitfash joins a crop of other startups that offer services or merchandise for bitcoins, including food delivery service Foodler, BTCShop and mobile gift card app Gyft. Bitcoins received a burst of publicity due to price volatility in April, but Woods is not worried about its long-term prospects. “What you will see going forward is stronger exchanges and more businesses, more regulation, bringing in new users and the currency will become quite steady,” he says. Forever 21 and Zara were first added to the site because of their low prices and global brand recognition. Upscale men’s retailer Mr. Porter was chosen as Bitfash’s third retailer to add a luxury brand to the site and because the majority of Bitcoin users are male. Though the retail sites can be accessed through Bitfash’s platform, Woods emphasizes that Bitfash has not struck any commercial agreements with the companies featured on their site. He says, however, that Bitfash does not alter prices and shipping fees, and the store’s terms are strictly adhered to. For example, Bitfash does not ship merchandise to countries that the brands don’t. Currently self-funded, Bitfash makes money through transaction fees, and Woods says the startup has been approached by online fashion retailers who want to be featured on the site. The company isn’t currently disclosing the number or monetary amount of the transactions it has completed since the site’s launch, but Woods says that most of them are male, tech-savvy and between the ages of 18 to 40. Most buyers are located in the U.S., followed by Asia and Europe. Woods says Bitfash has received hits from more than 100 countries.

For about a year, Sony’s PlayStation Vue streaming service was barely worth paying attention to. At launch, the cable-TV alternative only worked on PlayStation game consoles, and although Sony expanded availability late last year, Vue was still only available in a handful of U.S. markets. It didn’t help that Vue lacked channels from the Disney media empire, including ESPN. Everything changed in March, when PlayStation Vue launched nationwide and added ESPN and other Disney-owned channels to its lineup. You can read our full PlayStation Vue review for a verdict on how well the service works, along with our comparison to rival Sling TV. But if you’re just looking for details on what Sony’s streaming service has to offer, read on for answers to some common questions. What exactly is PlayStation Vue? PlayStation Vue is an online video service from Sony that replaces cable or satellite TV. In exchange for a monthly subscription, you get a big bundle of live TV channels, such as ESPN and CNN, along with DVR-like features and on-demand programming, all available on a variety of Internet-connected devices. How much does it cost, and what’s included? Pricing for PlayStation Vue depends on the availability of live local broadcasts, which in turn depends on where you live. In markets that include live feeds from most or all major networks—that is, ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox—service starts at $40 per month. Everywhere else, Sony offers “Slim” packages starting at $30 per month, with ABC, NBC, and Fox offering on-demand video. (Find out live local channel availability by plugging your zip code into the Vue website.) In both cases, the base “Access” package includes about 55 TV channels. An extra $5 per month gets you the “Core” package, which adds regional sports and a few other channels, while an extra $15 per month gets you the “Elite” bundle, which adds even more regional sports and special-interest channels. You can also pay $35 above the base price for an “Ultra” plan, which includes everything in the Elite bundle plus HBO and Showtime. Additional premium channels are available as add-ons or standalone subscriptions. A chart with the entire PlayStation Vue channel list appears at the bottom of the page. Looking for a similar guide to Sling TV? You'll find ours right here! Do I need a PlayStation console to use the service? No, PlayStation Vue is also available on Roku devices (running OS 7.1 and later), Amazon Fire TV devices, Apple TV (fourth-generation and above, running iOS 10.0 or later), Android TV (Android OS 4.4 and later), and on most Windows and MacOS web browsers. What other devices does PlayStation Vue support? Once you’ve signed up, you can also access the service on Android and iOS mobile devices and on Amazon Fire HD6 tablets and above. Some channels, however, are not available for mobile viewing, and some individual shows might not be available either. Google Cast-enabled TV devices such as Chromecast are also supported through the iOS and Android apps, and thankfully, the usual restrictions on mobile viewing do not apply. At the moment, there’s no word on support for other platforms, such as the Xbox or apps for Windows or MacOS. How is this different from cable or satellite TV? PlayStation Vue could be cheaper than traditional TV service, but it depends on your needs and what kind of bundles your local TV service provider offers. The main advantage PlayStation Vue offers is the technology, which lets you bookmark favorite TV channels, get recommendations on shows you might like, save shows to a cloud DVR for access across different devices, and create separate profiles for each family member. Most set-top boxes haven’t yet reached this level of sophistication. There’s also something to be said for Sony’s transparent billing, which doesn’t involve any installation fees, hidden fees, equipment rental costs, contracts, or annual pleas to customer service for lower rates. Will cable users be comfortable with this service? It might take a little getting used to, since the interface focuses on favorites and recommendations rather than a traditional channel grid. But if you want a more familiar layout, there is a “Guide” button in the top menu bar. (The main difference is that show times appear along the Y-axis, and channels are along the X-axis, which is the opposite of how most program guides work.) How does cloud DVR work? PlayStation Vue lets you add shows to a “My Shows” list, which automatically saves new episodes for 28 days after airing. Compared to the scheduling process and storage limits of a traditional DVR, Vue is supposed to be less hassle. On the downside, you only have a limited time to catch up on past programming. And for some shows and channels, DVR might not be available because the content provider doesn’t allow it. Are shows available on demand? Each channel includes a grab-bag of shows that you can watch on demand. Some channels also include three days’ worth of “Catch Up” programming after a show airs. Are there commercials? PlayStation Vue mimics traditional TV service in this regard, so you’ll get commercial breaks while watching channels in real time. The on-demand catalog often includes mandatory ads as well. You can only skip through ads for shows you’ve stored with the cloud DVR. Can you time-shift live programming? Yes, but with limits. On PlayStation consoles, you can pause for up to 30 minutes on live programming. On other devices, such as Fire TV, the video automatically starts playing again after just a few minutes. And some channels, such as ESPN and Comedy Central, don’t allow you to manually fast forward through the time-shifted video without returning straight to the live feed. In other words, PlayStation Vue’s time-shifting features allow for quick bathroom or snack breaks, but you can’t necessarily pause a program and then skip through all the commercials. Can users authenticate with TV Everywhere apps? Yes, PlayStation Vue currently supports logging into more than 50 TV Everywhere apps, such as Watch ABC, Watch ESPN, Fox Sports Go, and Comedy Central. You can even use these apps on platforms that don’t have a PlayStation Vue app. Just select “PlayStation Vue” as your TV provider when authenticating, and enter your login details. Can you add premium channels, such as HBO? Yes. Both HBO and Cinemax are available for $15 per month, with or without a Vue channel bundle. You can also get Showtime for $11 per month, or Showtime and Epix Hits as a $14-per-month package deal. Fox Soccer Plus and Machinima are available for $15 per month and $3 per month, respectively. What’s the deal with NFL Network and NFL Redzone? NFL Network is included in the “Core” bundle. Core subscribers can then add the full season of Redzone for $40. Just one catch: Thursday Night Football games are blacked out on NFL Network during weeks that the games appear on NBC or CBS. If your Vue plan doesn’t include those networks, you’ll have to watch on Twitter. Are there blackouts for sports? With the exception of Thursday Night Football (see above), they’re no different than cable or satellite TV. For instance, if a game is airing on broadcast TV instead of your regional sports network, and you don’t get local channels, you’re out of luck. (Consider buying an over-the-air antenna if you live close enough to a broadcast tower.) Limits on account sharing or simultaneous streams? Oh yes. The biggest restriction is that all TV devices must be tied to a single address, which means no sharing passwords with your cousin across the country or bringing your console to a friend’s house. If you violate this rule, you may be blocked from using the service; and to make things even scarier, Sony says you can only change your own address one time. (We’ve received one report of problems with dynamic IP addresses due to Sony’s location restrictions, though this seems to be an issue with the internet provider mapping IP addresses to the wrong location.) As for simultaneous streams within the home, PS3 and PS4 consoles are each limited to one device streaming at a time (although you can have one PS3 and one PS4 streaming simultaneously). Aside from that restriction, the streaming limit is five devices at a time. What’s the quality of video playback? The maximum resolution is 720p. On most devices, you get smooth 60-frames-per-second for most sports programming, but only 30 frames per second on the first-generation Fire TV and Fire TV Stick. How much bandwidth does PlayStation Vue consume? The service will adapt its bit rate depending on what you have available, but Sony recommends having a 10Mbps Internet connection at home, and it will use around 5Mbps per stream. Will prices go up after a year or two, like cable? So far, prices have been trending downward, and Sony has pointed to its transparent, non-contract pricing as a selling point. Still, there’s no guarantee that prices won’t change at some point in the future. Is it easy to change or cancel the service? It’s much easier than cable. PS3 and PS4 users can cancel directly through the app’s settings menu, and everyone else can cancel through their account settings on psvue.com. There’s no cancellation cost, and best of all, no customer-retention specialists to deal with. Here’s the full PS Vue channel list Have I missed anything? Say so in the comments, or ask me on Twitter. Sign up for Jared’s Cord Cutter Weekly newsletter to get this column and other cord-cutting news, insights, and deals delivered to your inbox. This story, "PlayStation Vue FAQ: Everything to know about Sony’s cable TV alternative" was originally published by TechHive .

Some bands need no introduction. For over a quarter of a century, Doom have been a driving force in Crust Punk and have put out multiple LP’s, EP’s, demos, and split releases. You cannot play or know of crust punk without hearing Doom – they’re that essential and iconic. Which is why I feel chuffed to bits at having the chance to interview a band that’s had a huge impact on my life since the day I first heard them as a confused teenage lad. Read on to read my interview with founding member Bri! – Cheers from Pakistan! How’s everything going? Which member of the band am I speaking to? Hi This is Bri Doom! Hello Pakistan! – Congratulations on the release of your latest LP “Corrupt Fucking System.” It’s been a long while since the last full length release from Doom, so how has the new album been received thus far? Really well. We’ve had an overwhelming positive response from people all over the world. People seem happy that we’re still producing a similar style of noise, that’s still relevant & angry as ever! – The new record harkens back to the early days of Doom by being spontaneous and aggressive as ever – in some respects a bit more, but also with the vintage sounding production that sounds straight out of 1993. What was the recording experience like, considering the long gap since “World of Shit”? It was very positive but also very hard work for me as I also recorded it! (engineered, produced, mixed & mastered!). It’s a great feeling that we have done it ourselves, but also many, many hours of hard work. I know what we should sound like & in fact what we do sound like & I’m pretty happy with the translation onto “tape”. I’m still not 100% happy with it, but then I’m never entirely happy with anything I record. Can be quite frustrating (especially for my wife!) – The band has survived for more than a quarter of a century now, and has kept true to its music and ideologies – despite line-up changes, label problems and even the death of a band member. Did you expect the band to last this long when you started it? What’s kept the motivation strong for keeping the band active despite all the troubles? Definitely not in the beginning, but later on I always felt that Doom would be in my life for along time. Its my “sound”, its what I enjoy playing (on guitar) and the ideologies which the band represent mean a lot to me. Some of the line-up changes were awkward and Wayne’s death was extremely tough, but now we are back doing what we should be. It feels right. – You chose to release the new record on your own label “Black Cloud Records.” What prompted you to start your own label, instead of going through the tried and tested method of releasing through established labels? We’ve always wanted to do it. Its now that we’ve had the opportunity (& the money). We’ve always been let down by other labels (Except one occasion), so this time we wanted to keep in 100% control of it ourselves. Its quite hard work, especially the physical act of posting out vinyl & CD?s. Thank fuck Stick is on the case with that, but hey, I did all the recording hard work so I don’t feel bad. Singers & bassists eh?… The easy life! – Do you plan on releasing records from other bands through your label, or will it purely be to serve Doom as a band? Maybe in the future, it would be nice to help out bands who we like and share ideals. But for now just doing our own stuff is enough. We all work as well, so have limited time. – With the rise of fascism and revival of far-right ideologies via groups such as the EDL, do you think that makes anti-fascist Crust Punk bands like yourself even more relevant today? Always. Punk music with a message is a great way of sticking together and empowering people to stand up to bullies like fascists. Fascism is always there, there’s not really revival with people like the EDL, but they manipulate popular concerns over Islamic fundamentalism to gain support for other hidden fascistic agendas (kind of ironic). There are still groups such as British People Party & New British Union Party as well as Blood and Honour. These goons tend to flitter from one organisation to another, often falling out with each other in the process, but they are dangerous especially when they pretend to be something they are not. There was recent trouble with a band called Pressure28 whose vocalist is a convicted fascist. They supported the UK Subs, which was bad news. There’s also the NSBM idiots around in the UK, under various neo-folk guises who occasionally crawl from beneath a rock to spout their shit. – Lyrically Doom still continues to cover all the important topics. Anti-racism, anti-fascism, anti-war, anti-misogyny, etc. However, looking through the lyric sheet I can hardly find anything against Islamist Extremism/Suicide Bombing. On the contrary, themes like that are for some reason always in right-wing, white supremacist groups. As a Pakistani who has seen Islamic Extremism tear the land apart, it often worries me how all the anarchist or left-wing political Crust and Grind groups ‘avoid’ talking about these things, but the fascists do. Why do you think this is? I am opposed to ALL religions. They are detrimental to the on-going evolution of humanity & are used (Primarily by men) to control other people. Providing false hope and twisted morality. If you read some of our lyrics on previous releases you will see this theme reflected in them, such as “No Religion” or “Thanatophobia”. On Corrupt Fucking System are there various references to our ideology on this subject for example “Prey for Our Souls”. I have also written some lyrics for a new song (left over from the album) which will hopefully appear on a compilation? “They Love Death More Than We Love Life” Verse 1: Brainwashed, blinded drones of faith, “Bombs in Mom’s kitchen” recipe of hate. Explosive-propelled feeble religion, Nails & ball bearings ripping through skin. Chorus: They Love Death Verse 2: Sexual utopian dreams of death, Conspire to eternalise unreasoned last breath. Suicide vest hides sad insecurity Sad waste of human evolutionary. Chorus: They Love Death Verse 3: Murder infidels chop off their heads, Destroy non-believers, blow them to shreds. Hardline true face, not “moderate” lies, Exposes religion & destroys “free” lives. Chorus: They Love Death I hope that addresses the “Anarchist/left-wing-crusty” bias. – As a band that has had considerable influence in the world of extreme music, what’s your opinion on the International Crust Punk ‘scene’ today as compared to 25 years ago? Any modern bands that you listen to? Much more global. Its good in some ways, but then in other ways it seems that it has become more of a fashion. People have the “crust” look down to a T, tight black jeans, studded denim etc etc… all a bit hipster to me (we call them “Crispy’s” haha. The other thing that annoys me is there seem to be a lot of younger “crusties” or punks who pertain to be “nihilists”, which I think is just an excuse not to think about the consequences of their actions. They look the part, but they go to McDonalds or the old “Ironic” excuse for being, basically an idiot! I just wonder what these people are interested in punk for? What are they rebelling against? Wouldn’t it make more sense to just buy a track suit and join the masses? I don’t know, maybe I’m just getting old & bitter. As far as modern “crust” music, the ones I can think of that I like are Afterbirth (Might be no more), Black Code, Putrefaction, Bulletridden, Burning Flag, Infernöh, Napalm Raid. – You’ve played all over the world. Which city has had the best audience? Blimey. Tough question. Too many great audiences all over the world! Er, dunno – Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions. I hope when the situation in Pakistan improves, you guys can come play for all the local punk and metal kids. Any last words for the reader? That would be amazing. Take care & Stay Aware. Don’t let the bastards grind you down! The only good fascist is a dead one! http://www.doomcrustpunk.com Doom on Facebook Doom on Bandcamp Doom Official Website – Hassan Dozakhi Advertisements

FedEx is making an aggressive play to grab some of Amazon's most valuable customers, as competition between the two longtime partners heats up. FedEx Fulfillment, which the shipping giant launched on Tuesday, is an effort by FedEx to cater to the small and medium sized companies whose businesses increasingly rely on online sales. The new FedEx service will handle the entire order fulfillment process: A company can send its products to FedEx and FedEx will handle everything from warehousing the products, packaging, delivering and even taking return orders. FedEx Fulfillment looks almost exactly the same as Amazon's own fulfillment program, called Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA). The biggest difference is that Amazon's program gives the added benefit of making the sellers' products Prime-eligible, giving more exposure to Amazon's most prolific spenders. At the same time, FedEx's solution serves as a good alternative to Amazon's, as some sellers might be wary of exposing their sales numbers to Amazon when they sell through FBA. FBA has been one of the most successful businesses at Amazon. Although it doesn't disclose exact figures, Amazon said in its most recent earnings that FBA delivered more than two billion units on behalf of sellers in 2016. The number of active sellers using FBA grew 70% year-over-year, while FBA represented more than 55% of total third-party sales. FedEx's new fulfillment service also shows the complex relationship between the logistics company and Amazon. Although Amazon publicly denies it, recent press reports suggest the company is ramping up its delivery capabilities under the goal of one day replacing its shipping partners, like FedEx. NOW WATCH: 9 iPhone tricks that will make your life easier in 2017 More From Business Insider

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) appeared on ABC's "This Week" on Sunday, June 25, 2017. (Screen grab from ABC) (CNSNews.com) – Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Democrats are crafting a “strong, bold” economic message that will “resonate” with middle-class Americans. “We better stand for something, and it can't be baby steps,” Schumer told ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday. Schumer said the “number one lesson” from the Democrats’ loss in Georgia last week is that “Democrats need a strong, bold, sharp-edged, and common-sense economic agenda, policy, platform, message” that appeals to the middle class and unites Democrats. “That’s what I’ve been working on for months.” Schumer said he’s been talking to Democrats and Trump voters all across the country – even a self-described “deplorable.” “I was at a Yankees game last Saturday night, and I sat next to someone--you know, just because that's how the seats were, we sit in the grandstand--wearing an ‘I'm proud to be a deplorable voter,’ a truck driver. “This economic message platform is going to resonate. It's what we were missing and it's not going to be baby steps; it's going to bold. We're coming out with it this summer, within a month," Schumer said. “You will see it, and Democrats will try to pass it legislatively for a year and campaign on it in 2018. It's what we were missing in 2016 and in the past. We're going to -- we know that. But you lose an election, you don't blame other people, you blame yourself.” Asked about calls for House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi to step aside, Schumer said, “They always blame the leader” when elections disappoint. “I think if we come up with this strong, bold economic package, it will -- it will change things around. That's what we were missing. People don't like Trump; he's at 40 percent. But they say what the heck do the Democrats stand for?” Schumer said Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio), has a point when he says Democrats need to rebrand themselves: “We better stand for something, and it can't be baby steps,” the senator said. Schumer said the new Democrat agenda will please Democrats: “I'm talking to Bernie Sanders, I'm talking to Joe Manchin. This is going to be really something that Democrats can be proud of, and I'm excited about it.”

Dungeon Defense is a Tower Defense / Action RPG hybrid created entirely within the UDK in just four weeks. Supporting up to four players, Dungeon Defense challenges gamers to defend their lair against hundreds of invading enemies by summoning magical defenses. Developed by indie team Trendy Entertainment, this game demonstrates the ability to rapidly design full-featured content with the suite of UDK tools. The game's the full source code is available for everyone to use for their own UDK projects! The Trendy team opted to merge Tower Defense-style strategy with action RPG mechanics in a demo to see if it would actually be fun. That demo is wickedly addictive, and likely to reduce productivity for even the most disciplined of players. Trendy Entertainment Developer Number on Dev Team: 5 on Dungeon Defense, 12 in studio 5 on Dungeon Defense, 12 in studio Time in Development: 4 weeks 4 weeks Game Development Experience: 5 seasoned indies, 7 modders turning pro 5 seasoned indies, 7 modders turning pro About Dungeon Defense: Tower defense strategy/action RPG proof of concept Tower defense strategy/action RPG proof of concept Plans for Dungeon Defense: Dungeon Defenders! (The full-fledged commercial game based on Dungeon Defense proof) When Trendy started its mission with Dungeon Defenders, the team was no stranger to the indie dev scene or to each other. "About half of us had previously worked together at a prior independent development studio in Gainesville, Florida, called Artificial Studios," explained Trendy Development Director, Jeremy Stieglitz. At Artificial, the team created several commercial titles, including Monster Madness: Battle for Suburbia and CellFactor: Revolution. "The other half of the team – generally talented former mod developers taking their first steps into pro-indie game development – we subsequently met online through forums, primarily via the UDK Community boards" The familiarity with each other certainly helped in getting Dungeon Defense online in record time. "The Dungeon Defense demo, available for download from UDK.com, took us four weeks to develop from concept to completion, and was created with a five-person team," says Stieglitz. The Trendy team opted to merge Tower Defense-style strategy with action RPG mechanics in a demo to see if it would actually be fun. That demo is wickedly addictive, and likely to reduce productivity for even the most disciplined of players. "Once the core fun-factor was confirmed, we opted to expand our scope. The expanded team is currently building that initial proof-of-concept into a full-fledged commercial game entitled Dungeon Defenders, which is available for pre-order on the Dungeon Defenders official site" states Stieglitz. Trendy’s team members are experienced in game development, so they understand the need to move quickly and intelligently. Also, as with most indie teams, Trendy faced limited resources so cutting development time without cutting corners was vital. When we asked Stieglitz why Trendy chose UDK for their project, he explained, “Members of our team had used other big name engines before on various projects. UDK by far had the most mature, battle-tested tools and pipeline, so we're able to focus on creating the gameplay without worrying about what's going on under the hood.” For Trendy, the bonuses of using UDK didn’t stop at the raw power of the engine, however. “Having used Unreal technology before, we already knew that the UDK was going to be the most badass game engine around. What's been most surprising to us are Epic's generous licensing terms for indies, which make it a no-brainer for any team to jump on this opportunity,” says Stieglitz. Between development experience, finding the right tools to complete their project and a strong game design, all seems like smooth sailing for Trendy, right? Not so, says Stieglitz. “Convincing our new team members that we were the real deal was a hurdle. But once we released the original Dungeon Defense demo, that wasn't a problem anymore.” Now Trendy’s cruising along with Dungeon Defenders coming soon on a number of platforms, and plans to create more online arcade games using UDK. Since they have such great forward momentum, we asked Stieglitz to give us a taste of Trendy’s secret sauce. “Start with basic goals. Try creating a simple game before you attempt to develop the next Gears of War. Build up from your experimental projects into ever-more-complex creations, and before you know it, you'll be making something pretty awesome!” Thanks to Trendy Entertainment for speaking with Julianne Capps for this feature.

PTM_Adrestia716 Profile Blog Joined August 2011 United States 10 Posts #1 The first SCII event of the Spring Season will be a very special weekend, indeed. The Top 8 finishers from the Winter Championship will be competing live in NYC. PLAYERS -Terran- MarineKingPrime coLHeart coLGanzi -Protoss- EGHuK ST_Parting SK_MC -Zerg- Empire_Violet MvPDongRaeGu MAP POOL MLG Antiga Shipyard - Cross Spawns Only MLG Cloud Kingdom MLG Daybreak MLG Entombed Valley - No Close 3rds by Ground Spawns MLG Metropolis - No Close by Ground Spawns MLG Shakuras Plateau - No Close by Ground Spawns MLG Tal’darim Altar - All Spawns Allowed MAP UPDATES -Neutral Supply Depots added to all Maps except MLG Tal’darim Altar -Terrain modified on MLG Antiga Shipyard to prevent Pylon Power reaching Natural from 3rd at Bottom Right location SETTINGS 1. Category = Melee 2. Mode = 1v1 3. Game Speed = Faster SCHEDULE Sunday 11:00 AM - 1:45 PM Warm Up 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM Bracket Round 1 3:00 PM - 4:00 PM Bracket Round 2 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM Bracket Round 3 5:00 PM - 6:00 PM Finals Facebook event:https://www.facebook.com/events/418147291528802/ iBarcraft event: Email: adjutant343@gmail.com Join our Facebook group, Cincinnati Barcrafting, for updates. Follow us on Twitter @CincyBarcraft Follow us on Reddit: /r/CincinnatiBarcraft/ Add us to your circle: Join our BattleNet channel: Cincinnati April 22, 2012 - Fox and Hound, Mason, OH - 2pm to 7pm ESTThe first SCII event of the Spring Season will be a very special weekend, indeed. The Top 8 finishers from the Winter Championship will be competing live in NYC.MarineKingPrimecoLHeartcoLGanziEGHuKST_PartingSK_MCEmpire_VioletMvPDongRaeGuMLG Antiga Shipyard - Cross Spawns OnlyMLG Cloud KingdomMLG DaybreakMLG Entombed Valley - No Close 3rds by Ground SpawnsMLG Metropolis - No Close by Ground SpawnsMLG Shakuras Plateau - No Close by Ground SpawnsMLG Tal’darim Altar - All Spawns Allowed-Neutral Supply Depots added to all Maps except MLG Tal’darim Altar-Terrain modified on MLG Antiga Shipyard to prevent Pylon Power reaching Natural from 3rd at Bottom Right location1. Category = Melee2. Mode = 1v13. Game Speed = FasterSunday11:00 AM - 1:45 PM Warm Up2:00 PM - 3:00 PM Bracket Round 13:00 PM - 4:00 PM Bracket Round 24:00 PM - 5:00 PM Bracket Round 35:00 PM - 6:00 PM FinalsFacebook event:https://www.facebook.com/events/418147291528802/iBarcraft event: http://ibarcraft.com/barcrafts/223-mlg-spring-arena-finals Email: adjutant343@gmail.comJoin our Facebook group, Cincinnati Barcrafting, for updates.Follow us on Twitter @CincyBarcraftFollow us on Reddit: /r/CincinnatiBarcraft/Add us to your circle: https://plus.google.com/109400660345577523985/ Join our BattleNet channel: Cincinnati PRAISE THE MONKEY

“I Went to the Woods So I Could Steal Candy From Children”: The Maine Hermit Is A Terrible Hero To Have If you are a particular type of person living in a city, you almost certainly have at least two or three friends who have recently shared the ongoing saga of the Maine Hermit, who was arrested last year and was recently featured in a rather gushing (five-page!) GQ profile. Please do not be impressed by his story; there is no need. There are other heroes more worthy of your distant adulation. No one who lives in the country is impressed with the Maine Hermit; no one with an up-to-date hunting license or who owns a rifle or who has slept more than one night out-of-doors in the last six months finds Christopher Knight’s story captivating. His acolytes are largely young urban people who spend most of their days sitting in front of a computer with a picture of their last trip to Yosemite as the background on their smartphone, who enjoyed Hatchet in elementary school and like to think of themselves as the sort of person who would survive a zombie apocalypse, which is a fictional problem. Thirty years in the woods! That’s a long time. I remember how that kid from My Side of the Mountain learned to build a fire and construct a lean-to that connected to an old oak tree, and teach a hawk to hunt for him, so this guy must have been pretty resourceful — With an expert twist of a screwdriver, he popped open a door of the dining hall and slipped inside, scanning the pantry shelves with his penlight. Candy! Always good. Ten rolls of Smarties, stuffed in a pocket. Then, into his backpack, a bag of marshmallows, two tubs of ground coffee, some Humpty Dumpty potato chips. Burgers and bacon were in the locked freezer. On a previous raid at Pine Tree, he’d stolen a key to the walk-in, and now he used it to open the stainless-steel door. Oh. Knight stated that over all those years he slept only in a tent. He never lit a fire, for fear that smoke would give his camp away. He moved strictly at night. Oh. He confessed that he’d committed approximately forty robberies a year while in the woods—a total of more than a thousand break-ins. But never when anyone was home. He said he stole only food and kitchenware and propane tanks and reading material and a few other items. Knight admitted that everything he possessed in the world, he’d stolen, including the clothes he was wearing, right down to his underwear. Oh, right-ho. That works out, by the way, to about 1200 robberies, give or take, of “food and kitchenware and propane tanks and reading material and a few other items” and also “everything he possessed in the world.” It’s fine to like camping and to not like people. It’s fine to withdraw from society, if that is your particular bag. There is nothing in the world wrong with being socially awkward and feeling ill at ease around other human beings, of being afraid of coming into contact with someone else, of finding eye contact uncomfortable. Should you desire to spend the majority of your life in the woods, you are free to do so; there is no limit to how often an American may go camping. You can work a summer job and save up enough cash to buy a polar sleeping bag, a few MREs and various basic supplies, and go forth (ugh, you probably have to get permits, though) to live off the fat of the land, and to cultivate a life of solitude and silence. It is slightly less understandable, and altogether less admirable, to steal candy from children: At a homeowners’ meeting in 2002, the hundred people present were asked who had suffered break-ins. Seventy-five raised their hands. Campfire hermit stories were swapped. One kid recalled that when he was 10 years old, all his Halloween candy was stolen. That kid is now 34. Man, if you take only one thing away from this story, it is this: If you must live in the woods in complete solitude, and you absolutely refuse to learn to hunt or fish or build your own shelter, and you have to steal from your neighbors in order to eat, and you’re really in the mood for some candy, please steal just a few pieces of candy from multiple kids, so you don’t completely ruin any one particular child’s Halloween. Don’t make this year “the year the man who lives in the woods took all my treats.” That’s so cruel! (By the way, it is super messed up to bury empty propane tanks willy-nilly. Please properly dispose of empty propane tanks.) Knight was ordered to spend about seven months in prison, which is an unbelievably light sentence, all things considered. The generosity of that prison term in the face of decades of theft must be contrasted with the shooting death of Michael Brown, whose murder by police was later justified because he had previously stolen a box of cigars. Just the once; not on and off for thirty years. The fact that Knight was never shot by nervous homeowners, that he was arrested safely and without violence, that he will spend less time in jail than he spent stealing other people’s propane tanks, is enormously lucky; it is hard to imagine a man who was not white doing the same thing for thirty years and getting off quite so easily. But perhaps that is neither here nor there! Nothing seemed to stop him. Or her. Or them. No one knew. A few desperate residents even left notes on their doors: “Please don’t break in. Tell me what you need and I’ll leave it out for you.” There was never a reply. How sad, that the people in his community were still so willing to help him even after he had entered their homes and stolen from them, and that he was not willing to take them up on their generous offer. Society was ready to give him what he was already taking without asking. Frankly, I want to hear more about the resourceful, ingenious homeowners who banded together to non-violently solve a problem in their neighborhood. So: what do we have, exactly? An unfriendly man spent twenty-seven-and-a-bit years living in some very cold woods. “To put it romantically: I was completely free.” (And the article does put it romantically; if you have seen this scene from Seinfeld you have read this article.) Almost completely free! Except for the part where you literally depended upon the labor and possessions of others to meet your every physical need. It says, you know, kind of a lot about the life you have chosen that “constant stealing” and “independence” are not mutually exclusive. Hopefully, the man at the center of the myth can avail himself of the help that has already been offered him; hopefully he will not spend another winter walking up and down the length of his tent to keep his feet from freezing off. I do not think Christopher Knight ought to spend the rest of his life in prison or be turned into a local pariah. But the mythos. The fanboys! The adoring fanboys whose dream it is to live in their own filth in the wood, Nobly Living Alone And Also Eating As Much Fluff As I Want, and Never Having To Talk To Anyone About Awards Ceremonies, And Literally Stealing From Children, the Chris McCandless boys who want nothing more than to live out the last five minutes of Shane on a daily basis, who mistake male-induced anti-social behavior and chronic theft for true independence; what my friend Chris called “the romantic transcendence of listening to Lynyrd Skynyrd for hours while slowly dying from an all-marshmallow diet” — all that must GO. It is very silly that we live in a country where the conversation about people who rely on government assistance runs generally along the lines of “DON’T TAKE HANDOUTS,” while white men who steal from their neighbors are touted as tragic symbols of noble self-reliance! You can spend as much time in the forest as you like; this is America and no one will stop you. Put aside your needless, trumped-up sense of social persecution (“I MUST ESCAPE FROM HUMANITY, but can I have your magazines?”). At the very least, whittle something to leave on the doorstep of the people you steal from most often so they have a whimsical gift from the forest in exchange for a brand-new canoe and a brace of fresh steaks. The mythos must go. Let us puncture it now and watch it deflate. For your analysis: “I don’t know your world,” he said. “Only my world, and memories of the world before I went into the woods. What life is today? What is proper? I have to figure out how to live.” He wished he could return to his camp—”I miss the woods”—but he knew by the rules of his release that this was impossible. “Sitting here in jail, I don’t like what I see in the society I’m about to enter. I don’t think I’m going to fit in. It’s too loud. Too colorful. The lack of aesthetics. The crudeness. The inanities. The trivia.” What kind of colorful, non-aesthetic crudeness do you mean, Maine Hermit? “I gorged myself on sugar and alcohol,” he said. “It’s the quickest way to gain weight, and I liked the inebriation.” The bottles he stole were signs of a man who’d never once, as he admitted, ordered a drink at a bar: Allen’s Coffee Flavored Brandy, Seagram’s Escapes Strawberry Daiquiri, something called Whipped Chocolate Valley Vines (from the label: “fine chocolate, whipped cream & red wine”). We covered hundreds of topics while chatting in jail, and nothing received higher praise than Lynyrd Skynyrd. “They will be playing Lynyrd Skynyrd songs in a thousand years,” he proclaimed. I unearthed a stack of National Geographics with the dates still legible: 1991 and 1992. I also saw People, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, and Vanity Fair. There was even a collection of Playboys. He also stole the occasional handheld video game—Pokémon, Tetris, Dig Dug—but the majority of his free time was spent reading or observing the forest. “Don’t mistake me for some bird-watching PBS type,” he warned. I dug through his twenty-five years of trash, buried between boulders, and kept inventory: a five-pound tub that once held Marshmallow Fluff, an empty box of Devil Dogs, peanut butter, Cheetos, honey, graham crackers, Cool Whip, tuna fish, coffee, Tater Tots, pudding, soda, El Monterey spicy jalapeño chimichangas, and on and on and on. “I went to the woods to live simply. To escape from the hubbub and noise of modern life. To listen to Skynyrd while eating only Fritos and reading the occasional Vanity Fair. Eating Tater Tots and playing some kid’s Pokémon. Are you going to finish that chimichanga.” It is incredibly telling that GQ‘s “artist’s impression” of the Maine Hermit looks like this: (Artist Tim O’Brien) This could easily be a concept sketch of Radagast the Brown from the Lord of the Rings. See the ruggled, grizzled face ennobled by solitude and hardship graced with a manly beard; the sleek, modern-looking backpack with…a handful of twigs strapped to it, for some reason; the long, determined, manly stride; the literal fucking birds swarming about him like he’s goddamn St. Francis of fucking Assisi. This is White Male Solitude at its most cartoonish; this is a drawing of the song “Desperado.” Whereas the actual Maine Hermit looks like this: [Image via]

Since it was first established in 1926, Route 66—the 2,451-mile stretch of highway that extends from northeast Illinois to southwest California—has been woven into American folklore. Yesterday, Missouri’s highway department announced that its portion of the iconic roadway will soon feature the nation’s first solar road panels for public use. The fact that both Route 66 and Missouri are to be the first to carry America into a new frontier is symbolic. When the Interstate Highway System was authorized in 1956, Missouri signed the first contracts for converting roads into highways, with Route 66 the first one to receive the upgrade. “It’s only appropriate that the rebirth of the nation’s interstate system begin at its birthplace,” said Stephen Miller of the Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission (MoDot) in a statement. The announcement is part of Missouri’s Road to Tomorrow Initiative, geared toward integrating modern technology into the state’s transportation system (other plans include truck platooning, which connects commercial vehicles through wireless technology, allowing them to follow one another at close distances for better fuel economy through wind resistance). The solar panels were developed by Solar Roadways, an Idaho-based start-up. MoDot intends to begin with a trial phase, using the 20-by-12-foot panels to cover sidewalks at rest areas off Route 66. In addition to producing renewable energy, the solar panels feature LED lights to create bright lines and signage without paint; these lights are expected to improve conditions for nighttime driving as well. Each solar panel is hexagonal in design and can be replaced without affecting other panels, allowing for easy road repair. A few panels from Solar Roadways display LED lights. Photo courtesy of Solar Roadways Missouri isn’t the first place to line its roads with solar panels. Earlier this year, the French government announced plans to cover 621 miles of roads with solar panels over the next five years. In Missouri, though, the goal is to have the first solar panels in place by the end of 2016.

My first Drunkspin post was last summer's "36 Cheap American Beers, Ranked." It will almost certainly be the most widely read thing I ever publish. Kurt Loder and Steve Inskeep tweeted about it, and it got me booked onto one really cool AM-radio show in Minnesota and one really obnoxious beer podcast in Brooklyn. It's how I fell ass-backwards into my evergreen shtick of "guy who hates Yuengling for no real reason." It was great! Except for the part that was a horrible, irresponsible mistake that I've finally found the courage to admit. The ranking was 97.2 percent accurate, but in placing Schlitz 30th—behind the likes of Miller Genuine Draft, Natural Ice, and even Yuengmotherfuckling—I did a grave disservice to all beer drinkers, blog readers, and truth seekers. Let me set the record straight. After 15 months devoted to learning more about beer, honesty, and my own dark soul, I am ready to admit that Schlitz is the very finest cheap beer available in the United States of America. I wasn't always an idiot. One of my first economic epiphanies was that a dinner of six Schlitz and a tube of cashews was both superior to and cheaper than six Budweisers and a tube of peanuts. I drank plenty of Schlitz in my early twenties, but then I moved to a neighborhood where it was less accessible, got a job that made thrift (slightly) less essential, and switched over to a steady diet of Guinness, middle-of-the-road IPA, and whatever was on special. But although I stopped drinking Schlitz regularly, it still retained a place of honor in that fatty part of my innards where my heart and my liver meet. Then, in 2008, Pabst Brewing Company (owner of Schlitz and dozens of similar heritage adjunct lager brands) reformulated the recipe, replacing the beer I grew up on with a version said to be more reflective of the beer my father grew up on. The proud new tallboy cans even had "Original '60s Formula" printed across the top. I was excited; Pabst spent a few bucks promoting the reinvention, which meant "The Beer That Made Milwaukee Famous" became more widely available, and I never doubted that I'd prefer the classic formula. Something was wrong with either my tongue, my expectations, or my entire wasted life that year, because for whichever regrettable reason, I wasn't ready for the change. I immediately denounced the new-old Schlitz, twisting myself into the idiotic pretzel of a cranky young man nostalgic for the bastardized version of a classic American lager. Advertisement Other, more reputable sources knew better right away. RateBeer, while admittedly scoring the present-day Schlitz a mere 18 due to the beer-ranking world's general prejudice against the pale lager category, still notes that this places it in the 95th percentile among its class. Rival rating site Beer Advocate gives Schlitz a solid 81, which makes it their highest-scoring American adjunct lager (for context, BA rates Budweiser 56, Miller High Life 63, PBR 68, and the top two of my aforementioned almost-perfect ranking, Narragansett and Grain Belt Premium, 77 and 75, respectively). And no less an authority than Cicerone.org Exam Manager Jenny Pfäfflin is a huge fan. People who know what's up have long recognized Schlitz as the best low-rent beer out there, and I am relieved to finally rejoin their proud ranks. Schlitz is not altogether different from its fizzy yellow brethren; it's the same damn thing most high-end beer drinkers scorn, only better. Much better. The key distinction is the presence of real, live, decent hops in both the aroma and the flavor. Schlitz uses a blend of Cascade, Mt. Hood, and Willamette hops to balance the classic (to be kind) bready malt character endemic to its breed. In addition to the hops, Schlitz further distances itself from the field merely by virtue of having no obvious flaws. It doesn't taste like wet cardboard, it's not sour, it's not the bad kind of bitter. Ergo, Schlitz is the best. This is Drunkspin Daily, the Concourse's adequate source for booze news, reviews, and bullshit. We'll be highlighting a beer a day in this space; please leave suggestions below. Advertisement Will Gordon loves life and tolerates dissent. He lives in Cambridge, Mass., and has visited all of the other New England states, including, come to think of it, Vermont. Find him on Twitter@WillGordonAgain. Image by Jim Cooke. The Concourse is Deadspin's home for culture/food/whatever coverage. Follow us on Twitter.

John from the Free Software Foundation sez, From reading the Nintendo 3DS Terms of Service, one could be forgiven for thinking that Nintendo is exiting the video game console business and entering the brick-making business. The 3DS Terms are a perfect storm of 1) Updates will happen automatically without your specific permission any time the device connects to wifi 2) The device will constantly try to connect to wifi 3) Updates will specifically disable devices found to have modified software or unauthorized peripherals. On top of that, Nintendo claims a license to photos and other user-generated material on the devices -- and those things are also automatically uploaded, along with user location data gleaned from wifi network proximity. DRM prevents users from disabling any of these antifeatures, which is why DefectiveByDesign.org has taken an interest, encouraging people to send cardboard bricks to Nintendo. In the wake of all the Sony PS3 news, is this really the direction Nintendo wants to take things?

In association with Mikedolbear.com, PMT Southend and PMT House of Drums, distinguished international drummer Chris Coleman will be hosting a Drum Clinic at local music venue Chinnerys. Get your tickets here! Chris Coleman, drummer for Stevie Wonder, Prince, Israel Houghton & New Breed and Chaka Khan; winner of the 2001 National Drum Competition and sponsored by top brands Vic Firth and Meinl Cymbals. A man of great musical accomplishments and of exceptional groove and rhythm is coming to Southend-on-Sea on Wednesday 24th June to present an evening of drum master classes to a very lucky audience. D'Addario UK will also be at Chris Coleman’s drum clinic showing off the latest Meinl cymbals and Evans Drumheads, with staff on hand before and after the show to help with any enquiries. There will also be a raffle with drummy prizes to giveaway on the night too. “There are always other drummers waiting around who are anxious for their opportunity to play, so if you want to stay on the drums, you have to lay that fire!” – Chris Coleman, Modern Drummer (February, 2011) Chris Coleman’s drum clinic is going to be a fantastic night out, with a seated venue, bar, located right on the award winning seafront on a glorious June evening. This is going to be an event you will not want to miss, so come and learn how to lay the fire! Tickets Tickets are £10 and £7 for students when providing the appropriate student ID (current NUS or University/College ID card) when purchasing the ticket in-store at PMT Southend. Tickets can also be purchased online here. When & Where Wednesday 24th June 2015, 7:30PM Chinnerys, 21-22 Marine Parade, Southend-On-Sea, Essex, SS1 2EJ By Sophie Moss

WAVES Weekly No. 28 Waves Platform Blocked Unblock Follow Following Jan 31, 2017 A transcript of the recent Core Radio interview is now available. This contains a large amount of up-to-date information about a range of Waves-related news, including scaling, smart contracts and business development. Presentations and Conferences Last week, Waves team and community members met in London for the Blockchain Week and Expo — a great chance to meet each other, as well as to network with journalists and other cryptocurrency organisations. Sasha took part in a panel discussion about Crowdfunding Law (watch here), along with several other industry experts. An additional presentation in Moscow explored crowdfunding in the context of Cryptocurrency Regulation in Russia (watch here, with subtitles). You can read an account of this conference here, including further information on the evolving regulatory picture. According to Sasha Ivanov, the general consensus of the speakers was that Russian regulators are close to some form of legal framework for cryptocurrency in the country. Most probable scenario is a separate law concerning the legal status of crypto, analogous NY bitlicense. He also noted the importance of events like this one, stating: “Events like the Cryptocurrency Regulation in Russia are important for the growth of Blockchain technology and extremely useful for the community as they help spread awareness on the regulations imposed on cryptocurrencies, allowing users and companies to operate within the legal boundaries of the country.” Tidex — Beta and Bounties This is good news for Tidex, a new Waves-integrated exchange that is currently in beta — the changing regulatory position for bitcoin and cryptocurrencies in Russia means that it has become possible to operate an exchange openly. Tidex will trade WAVES, major Waves assets, and several other popular cryptocurrencies. In due course there are plans to add fiat options. Waves’ DEX will potentially be integrated on the backend in the future, providing the security and advantages of a decentralised exchange where appropriate, and allowing Tidex to pioneer best practices. Although Tidex is working closely with the Waves developers, they are a separate team and entity, based in Russia and Ukraine. The Waves team recognizes the value of this and fully supports and endorses Tidex. The Tidex team will be releasing more information in due course. There are bounties for bugs found with the exchange. Security bugs will earn 1,000 WAVES or more, depending on severity. We are particularly interested in fixing bugs with the API. To find out more, join the #tidex Slack channel. Further News and Information · We are looking for a new front-end developer. · The Waves challenge is still running — win 1,000 WAVES! · The next distribution of WCT will occur on 16 February. Only WAVES held in a local wallet are eligible. · Be aware of fake assets: always check the token id before trading. Waves Nodes and Lite Client Reminders If you would like to run a full node, please download the latest releases at https://github.com/wavesplatform/Waves/releases/. Anyone can run a node, but you will need at least 10,000 WAVES to generate blocks. You can read the installation guide here. For regular users the Lite client can be downloaded from https://wavesplatform.com. Do not download the client from other sources for security reasons. (Please be aware that there have been issues with fake github repositories, as well as fake Twitter accounts and Slack identities.) Alternatively, the standalone Chrome app will automatically update as new versions are released. Waves Weekly Crypto Round-up In episode #16, we get Brian’s take on the bitcoin markets and hear from Satinder Grewal, a well-known developer for SuperNET and Komodo. Press and Articles A Closer Look at App-tokens Bitcoin’s Rise Amid Economic Woes Points to Emerging Roles for Blockchain Currencies” Waves Community Token (Waves blog) Crowdfunding the Future How to Mine Waves? Multimedia Improving Authenticated Dynamic Dictionaries (Real World Crypto 2017 video) How Not Knowing Waves…(Interview)

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks were little changed on Monday and the euro fell from a six-month high hit after pro-EU centrist Emmanuel Macron’s victory in France’s presidential election, as traders cashed in recent gains. French shares underperformed other European markets after having hit on Friday their highest in more than 9 years. The euro fell the most against the dollar since late March, having risen in overnight trade to just above $1.10 when opinion polls signaled the scale of Macron’s victory over anti-euro nationalist Marine Le Pen. On Wall Street, the S&P 500 ended at a fresh record high after edging up less than a point at the close. The CBOE Volatility Index closed at 9.77, its lowest since December 1993. “We remain largely constructive of the equity market and view that the path of least resistance is higher,” said Bill Northey, chief investment officer at Private Client Group of U.S. Bank. World stocks, as measured by MSCI’s 46-country world index, hit a record high and the main measure of Asia-Pacific shares excluding Japan rose 0.8 percent. Shares resumed trading in Tokyo after a three-day market holiday. The Nikkei closed up 2.3 percent at a 17-month high. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 5.34 points, or 0.03 percent, to end at 21,012.28, the S&P 500 gained 0.09 point to 2,399.38 and the Nasdaq Composite added 1.90 points, or 0.03 percent, to 6,102.66. FILE PHOTO: A trader works at the stock exchange in Frankfurt, Germany, May 8, 2017. REUTERS/Kai Pfaffenbach/File Photo The pan-European STOXX 600 index lost 0.13 percent while France’s CAC 40 index fell 0.91 percent. Emerging market stocks rose 0.70 percent. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan closed 0.82 percent higher. In currency markets, the dollar index rose 0.53 percent, with the euro down 0.69 percent to $1.0919. The euro earlier touched a six-month high of $1.1024. The Japanese yen weakened 0.46 percent versus the greenback at 113.28 per dollar, while sterling was last trading at $1.2934, down 0.35 percent on the day. “A Macron win is largely priced into the euro,” said Shaun Osborne, chief FX strategist at Scotiabank in Toronto. “Heavy trading in the spot market so far today suggests a modest unwind of the April and May rally is coming, at least.” Oil prices, which hit almost six-month lows last week on worries about a persistent global glut, edged up after OPEC hinted there could be an extension to current production cuts, which expire in June. U.S. crude rose 0.54 percent to $46.47 per barrel and Brent was last at $49.39, up 0.59 percent on the day. U.S. Treasury yields rose, with the benchmark yield at a five-week high in advance of the sale of $62 billion in bond supply at this week’s quarterly refunding and following Macron’s victory. Slideshow (2 Images) Benchmark 10-year Treasury notes were down 10/32 in price to yield 2.3868 percent, from 2.352 percent late on Friday. Spot gold dropped 0.1 percent to $1,226.16 an ounce. U.S. gold futures fell 0.05 percent to $1,226.30 an ounce. Copper lost 1.77 percent to $5,486.15 a tonne as Chinese trade data showed April imports of the metal dived 30 percent from March.

A Dutch clothing company been accused of 'selling misogyny' after releasing images from its latest adverts featuring fully clothed men and giant scantily clad female models. Suitsupply's latest campaign called 'Toy Boys' sees miniature men treating women's bodies like a playground, zipping down a model's breasts as though they're a slide in one image and spraying water over another's face from a hose in another. The pictures sparked outrage on Twitter where users branded them 'sexist' however the CEO Fokke de Jong defended them by claiming they showed women with the 'upper hand.' Suitsupply released their latest campaign called 'Toy boys' which saw miniature men pictured on scantily-clad giant women A man in a suit poses next to a woman in just a bikini in the controversial adverts for the Dutch brand In all the photos the men are seen fully dressed, showcasing the brand's fashions. In the most controversial shot, two men appear to use a topless woman's breasts as a slide to promote the brand, which has stores in London and New York as well as across Europe. Ikire Jones posted on Twitter: 'Yo Suitsupply, are you selling suits or misogyny this season? Just wanted to know so I can accessorize accordingly.' @Pepperonina questioned the campaign's name, he wrote: 'Clearly it's still the woman who's the toy here, exploited by some micro-jerks.' @WvSchaik posted: 'Hey Suitsupply, if you want me to buy some suits, please ditch the sexist adverts, OK?' Twitter users were outraged by the 'sexist ads' which the CEO Fokke de Jong claimed showed the women with the 'upper hand' The ad campaign is called 'Toy Boys' and shows the men supposedly being 'playthings' for the women In a press release to explain the images, the company wrote: 'Sometimes it seems like it's a woman's world these days, and we just live in it. The modern woman is a confident tower of power, who knows exactly what she wants. 'She's beautiful. She's brilliant. She's a bona fide titan. It's hard not to feel well, dwarfed. 'So what's a guy to do? You're a modern gentleman, but the tables have turned. You have a certain way with the ladies, that is, until they have their way with you. 'You're a playboy, but what happens when the playboy becomes the plaything?' In response to the negative reaction, CEO Fokke de Jong told FEMAIL: 'The reaction from some people is that this campaign is sexist. The men in our toy boy campaign are depicted as play dolls for the women, we don’t see the men having the upper hand here.' The campaign was photographed by Dutch photographer Carli Hermes and it's not the first time the company has caused outrage with its advertising. CEO Fokke de Jong told FEMAIL: 'The men in our toy boy campaign are depicted as play dolls for the women, we don’t see the men having the upper hand here.' But Twitter users argued the images showed half-dressed women and were 'sexist' in their portrayal The campaign was photographed by Dutch photographer Carli Hermes and it's not the first time the company has caused outrage with its advertising In 2014, Suitsupply used scantily clad women in their campaign which were then pictured topless on its website In 2014, the company's ad campaign showed suited men surrounded by scantily clad or topless women. Visitors to their website had the option to choose the 'uncensored' version which then saw the women with their tops removed. When employees from SuitSupply’s flagship New York store recently conducted an 'Ask Me Anything' online chat for a men’s fashion fashion forum, the response they got to the campaign was far from positive in April 2014.

LA-based multi-platform adult animation producer/distributor MONDO is bringing two very special programming treats to this year’s Rooster Teeth Animation Festival — taking place during RTX 2017 July 7-9 in Austin, TX (rtxaustin.com). Attendees will have a chance to see the English-language premiere of bold ‘n’ brawny graphic novel adaptation Lastman, as well as the global season 4 premiere of irreverent comedy Deep Space 69. The latter will accompany a special screening of Adult Swim’s Apollo Gauntlet, from MONDO’s Six Point Harness studio. “RTX is an incredibly exciting event, and their first-ever Animation Festival in 2016 proved to be so popular that it’s a perfect setting for us to show off our newest projects to an incredible group of fans,” said Brendan Burch, MONDO’s chief creative officer and president of Six Point Harness. A traditionally animated, visually bold graphic-novel adaptation, Lastman originally aired on France4 and has been translated into English in a multi-national creative effort. The series blends martial arts and boxing action with drama and supernatural elements into a unique adventure. On the more witty and whimsical side, Deep Space 69 — created by Daniel Katz (Xemoland, Beer Cops) is an intergalactic tale of sex, sexual exploits and sexual conquests, with the first three seasons racking up more than 50 million views online. Both series will be available exclusively on MONDO’s channel on VRV, the new video platform from Ellation. MONDO will host an hour-long panel at RTX featuring both Lastman and Dead Space 69, featuring a discussion with Six Point Harness prez Burch, head of development Wendy Willis, and creative director Greg Franklin on Sunday, July 9 at 11 a.m. (Room 10AB, Austin Convention Center). The Apollo Gauntlet screening will also be followed by a panel discussion hosted by Adult Swim, with series creator/voice star Myles Langlois with MONDO’s Willis, Franklin and lead editor Tony Christopherson on Saturday, July 8 at 4 p.m. (Center Stage, ACC).

Abortion doctor George Tiller's casket is taken to a hearse after his funeral services at College Hill United Methodist Church on Saturday, June 6, 2009, in Wichita, Kansas. (Photo by Allison Long/Kansas City Star/MCT via Getty Images) The Wichita, Kan., abortion clinic that reopened in April for the first time since the 2009 shooting of Dr. George Tiller is "trying to provoke an incident" of gun violence in order to raise money, a prominent Kansas anti-abortion activist alleged Thursday. Mark Gietzen, chairman of the Kansas Coalition for Life, said he believes the South Wind Women's Center is allowing volunteers to escort women into the clinic in hopes that they will harass the anti-abortion protesters outside and provoke a shooting. He said Julie Burkhart, the founder and owner of the clinic, would blame the incident on the protesters in order to raise money. Gietzen also said it's possible that the father or boyfriend of the woman seeking an abortion might show up to the clinic angry and armed because they disapprove of the abortion, and a security guard or nearby protester could end up getting shot. When one of these men "walks up carrying a gun, and he doesn't want that abortion to happen, somebody is going to get a bullet in their head," Gietzen said in an interview with the Huffington Post. "I think she's trying to provoke an incident so she can say, "Look, these pro-lifers did something," and people from California and New York and these other places will give her money." Burkhart told HuffPost that her clinic is on "high alert" after hearing about Gietzen's comments. She said she does not have volunteer escorts at her clinic because the women can be driven past the protesters right up to the door, and added that she has no interest in provoking violence against anyone on her property. "We absolutely don't have that strategy in mind," she said. "I just find [Gietzen's statements] to be rather curious, shocking and unnerving. We absolutely take everyone's safety and security seriously-- our patients, our employees-- and while we might not agree with what these protesters do outside, of course I would want no harm to come to them either." Any association of Burkhart's clinic with gun violence invokes the memory of Tiller, a former physician at the clinic who was fatally shot by anti-abortion activist Scott Roeder while he was attending church. Burkhart worked with Tiller for years and reopened his clinic with a new name in April. Several anti-abortion groups in Kansas, including Gietzen's, are now trying to convince the Wichita City Council to change its zoning requirements so that the South Wind Women's Center can no longer operate there. Gietzen sparked controversy earlier this week when he warned the Wichita City Council that if it does not force the clinic out of its current location, its neighbors would "continuously be in the line of fire." Compounding the issue is the fact that Kansas recently expanded concealed carry locations in the state, allowing licensed permit holders to carry guns in more public venues. "With the new conceal carry laws enacted since the closure of the Tiller Abortion Facility, the number of armed people present on-site will likely be higher, not lower," Gietzen wrote in a news release. Burkhart said the city has no grounds on which to zone out her clinic. It serves a high level of need, she said, performing over a hundred abortions per month, and the nearest abortion clinic is about a three hours away by car. Plus, her clinic is already in a medical zone. "This area has been zoned medical since the mid 1930s or late 1930s," she said. "If they were to miraculously be able to rezone us, the Crisis Pregnancy Center to the south of us would be zoned out as well as the chiropractic and kinesiology clinics close by. I just don't think they have a lot of standing." Two major Kansas anti-abortion groups, Kansans for Life and Operation Rescue, have joined with Gietzen to try to zone out Burkhart's clinic, but they quickly distanced themselves from Gietzen's remarks about gun violence this week. "Kansans for Life disagrees with and wishes to completely separate ourselves from Mr. Gietzen's controversial remarks citing the potential for gun violence at abortion clinics as a reason to rezone the South Wind clinic," Mary Kay Culp, executive director of Kansans for Life, told the Capital-Journal.

Following a meeting with Rouhani, Löfven told reporters that improved trade with Iran would be beneficial for the country's development and people, as well as for Swedish business. "It will create jobs in Sweden," said Löfven to Swedish reporters. The PM also said that he had raised the issue of human rights, though he declined to comment on the exact nature of their discussion. "We raised the issues that are relevant," said Löfven. These issues include the situation of Swedish residency holder Ahmadreza Djalali, who is currently under arrest in Tehran and faces possible execution. At a joint press conference earlier today, where no questions from journalists were allowed, Rouhani thanked Löfven for accepting the invitation to visit Iran. "We have broadened our dialogue on regional issues as well as human rights. We have discussed the situation in Syria and Iraq, and Iran's relationship with other regional powers, such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia," said Löfven. The speeches given by the two leaders were filled with conventional courtesies, with Rouhani praising, among other things, Sweden's moderate relation with Iran during the period of sanctions against the country. Trade was also discussed during the visit, with many Swedish industries harbouring hopes of increased export to Iran. A parallel business delegation, led by Trade Minister Ann Linde, is also present in Tehran. Transport, the environment, mining, information technology and manufacturing are all areas in which Rouhani hopes to improve links between the two countries. "Both our countries are determined to increase trade back to the levels it was at prior to the sanctions," said the Iranian president. In a nod to EU governments, Rouhani also said that European banks and businesses should be supported in their efforts to trade with Iran, in accordance with the nuclear agreement of 2015 [between Iran, the US, the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and the EU]. Difficulties with financing remain a major obstacle to doing business in Iran, with US sanctions affecting bank transactions still in place. Rouhani also mentioned the conflict and humanitarian situation in Yemen, where Iran and arch-enemy Saudi Arabia support opposing sides. The Yemeni population is under severe pressure with an urgent lack of available food and medicine.

MIAMI — After a 2-3 start to the season, the Heat are looking for answers. That’s why Miami held a team meeting Sunday morning before practice to discuss its recent struggles. The goal is to avoid last season’s 2-8 start that put the Heat in a hole that not even a 30-11 second-half record was good enough to overcome. “We had our discussions this morning,” said forward James Johnson, who is one of the Heat’s three team captains along with Goran Dragic and Udonis Haslem. “We aired it out this morning. A lot of people took heat. I think it was the best thing for us to do, even more important than film. That’s what this culture is about, that’s what we’re about — staring guys in the eyes, telling guys the truth and that’s how you show you really love somebody.” Heat forward Justise Winslow agrees. “Guys were honest today,” Winslow said. “Just opening up and being vulnerable and letting it all out there, not holding anything in. It can go a long way in this league — that honesty and connection part.” But if the Heat are going to snap their two-game losing skid in Monday’s home game against the Timberwolves (3-3), they will probably have to do it without center Hassan Whiteside. Whiteside is in danger of missing his fifth consecutive game with a bone bruise in his left knee, with coach Erik Spoelstra saying he’s “very doubtful” for Monday’s contest. Although it looks like Whiteside won’t play against Minnesota, he continues to make progress. The 28-year-old went through “a full non-contact workout” Sunday, but the Heat still prefer to put players through at least one contact practice before bringing them back from injury. “He certainly is making progress, that’s what we’re all encouraged about, just to see him down here,” Spoelstra said. “He’s working, he’s jumping, he’s running and hopefully there’s no pain tomorrow.” Miami has posted a 2-2 record without its defensive anchor and has struggled to stop teams from scoring in the paint with the Heat allowing the seventh-most paint points in the league at 48.8 per game this season. The Heat also entered Sunday ranked 21st in the league with a defensive rating (points allowed per 100 possessions) of 106.7. If Whiteside is not able to play Monday, the next opportunity for a return will come in Wednesday’s home game against the Bulls. With that contest marking the end of the Heat’s season-long six-game homestand, Wednesday is Whiteside’s final chance to make his return before the Heat embark on a season-long six-game road trip. “Tremendous,” Johnson said when asked how much Whiteside’s absence impacts the Heat’s defense. “People can just get into the paint like that without having to worry about a premier shot-blocker, somebody who really alters their shot or changes the way you see attacking the bucket. We miss him a lot. But there are no excuses. We’re going to keep fighting through it and figure out ways to win without him.” The level of frustration in the Heat’s locker room was high after Saturday’s loss to Boston when Dragic said: “I don’t want to have the [same] season as last year where it’s already late and we figure out things.We need to do it now because it’s important.” But the tone was different Sunday after the Heat’s team meeting. “I don’t think our concern level is worried right now,” Johnson said. “You know, I know we’re not last year’s team. That’s just the past. That’s not what we’re working toward, to be last year’s team. We want to be better than what we were last year. And that’s not even the beginning of the season. I’m talking about the second half, with all our success. We want to be better than that.” Even Dragic offered a more even-keeled analysis of the Heat’s slow start Sunday. “I’m not worried,” Dragic said. “But I just mentioned that of course nobody wants to have that start like we had last season. That’s why we addressed this so early and try to get back. We feel like everybody is on the same page now. We know what we need to do as long as we put some work in. That’s why we had this meeting. “We just talked, open talk. It was nothing serious. It was just open yourself up with what you think. It’s good because everybody can share what their thoughts are. From there on, we can move forward.” And Spoelstra doesn’t mind the emotion Heat players are showing just five games in. He actually prefers it. “I love all the emotions that players go through,” Spoelstra said. “I don’t even care if it boils over. It means you care. And our guys in the locker room really care. This is not the type of start that our group wanted. You can’t guarantee anything in this league and that’s why you love competition.” [Erik Spoelstra reflects on free-agent pitch to Gordon Hayward: ‘We absolutely respected his choice’] [Miami Heat send two-way guard Matt Williams Jr. to G League affiliate in Sioux Falls] [Slimmer frame has helped Heat newcomer Kelly Olynyk ‘all across the board’] [Want more Heat news sent directly to your Facebook feed? Make sure to like our Heat Facebook page]

by Brandon Sanderson Brandon Sanderson, fantasy's newest master tale spinner, author of the acclaimed debut Elantris, dares to turn a genre on its head by asking a simple question: What if the hero of prophecy fails? What kind of world results when the Dark Lord is in charge? The answer will be found in the Mistborn Trilogy, a saga of surprises and magical martial-arts action that begins in Mistborn. For a thousand years the ash fell and no flowers bloomed. For a thousand years the Skaa slaved in misery and lived in fear. For a thousand years the Lord Ruler, the "Sliver of Infinity," reigned with absolute power and ultimate terror, divinely invincible. Then, when hope was so long lost that not even its memory remained, a terribly scarred, heart-broken half-Skaa rediscovered it in the depths of the Lord Ruler's most hellish prison. Kelsier "snapped" and found in himself the powers of a Mistborn. A brilliant thief and natural leader, he turned his talents to the ultimate caper, with the Lord Ruler himself as the mark. Kelsier recruited the underworld's elite, the smartest and most trustworthy allomancers, each of whom shares one of his many powers, and all of whom relish a high-stakes challenge. Only then does he reveal his ultimate dream, not just the greatest heist in history, but the downfall of the divine despot. But even with the best criminal crew ever assembled, Kel's plan looks more like the ultimate long shot, until luck brings a ragged girl named Vin into his life. Like him, she's a half-Skaa orphan, but she's lived a much harsher life. Vin has learned to expect betrayal from everyone she meets, and gotten it. She will have to learn to trust, if Kel is to help her master powers of which she never dreamed.

Angelenos have succumbed to the reality that L.A. is mostly a car-transit city, however, things might be changing, according to a recent report from Walk Score. The website's 2014 City and Neighborhood study found that Downtown is the most walkable area in our city. Cue in the Jefferson's "Movin' On Up" theme song. Downtown has been on the up-and-up with a growing Arts District community, coffee shop scene, and having a hefty number of Metro stops. Although L.A. as a whole ranked 13 in the nation, our bustling Downtown scored a rating of 93 points. We finally aced one of these tests! Walk Score called the 36,194 resident-populated area as having "world-class public transportation," and Chinatown and Koreatown followed in tow. Biking though, could use some more work, as they described it as "somewhat bikeable" with a score of 69. Of the 2,862 restaurant, bars and coffee shop shops in Downtown, the report showed residents can walk to an average of 29 of them within five minutes.

Elected female members of the Republican Party’s national governing body, joined by state lawmakers and county-level party officials, are rallying to Elected female members of the Republican Party’s national governing body, joined by state lawmakers and county-level party officials, are rallying to Donald Trump ’s side. “I am still solidly behind “I am still solidly behind Mr. Trump ,” said Minnesota state Sen. Carrie L. Rudd , a Republican. “Why are we even talking about locker-room comments from 11 years ago when there are so many important issues at hand? The people who supported Trump still do.” The Republican women began to circle the wagons around their party’s presidential nominee after a string of big names loudly parted company with The Republican women began to circle the wagons around their party’s presidential nominee after a string of big names loudly parted company with Mr. Trump in the wake of a press-led attack involving leaked live-microphone sexual comments by him about women. “Those that are jumping ship are establishment GOP that never supported him in the first place,” “Those that are jumping ship are establishment GOP that never supported him in the first place,” Mrs. Rudd said. Some female lawmakers and party officials said Some female lawmakers and party officials said Mr. Trump ’s lewd comments managed to alienate more women, but those who remained on his side spelled out what he needed to do to recover in the town hall debate Sunday night in St. Louis with Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton “I don’t approve of what “I don’t approve of what Trump said, but he apologized, and Hillary was able to accept Bill Clinton’s apology for doing far worse actions toward women,” said Keiko Orrall, who was elected to the Republican National Committee by the party’s central committee in Massachusetts. “We need to move forward focusing on issues and policies each campaign brings to the table in a difficult election with flawed candidates,” Mrs. Orrall said. , an RNC member from Illinois and former national secretary of the RNC, led the female Demetra DeMonte , an RNC member from Illinois and former national secretary of the RNC, led the female Trump brigade’s counterattack by dispatching a letter to the other 167 RNC members reasserting her support for Mr. Trump “Donald J. Trump is not going to step down — nor should he,” “Donald J. Trump is not going to step down — nor should he,” Mrs. DeMonte wrote. “He is our lawfully elected nominee.” She argued that she does not condone the “inappropriate language” She argued that she does not condone the “inappropriate language” Mr. Trump used while talking with “Access Hollywood” host Billy Bush in 2005 — unaware that the microphones they were wearing were recording their lewd conversation about women — but the billionaire developer was “not the first nor will he be the last to utter foul language in the privacy of their home or locker rooms.” spoke the words while exiting a vehicle that had just pulled up to a Hollywood movie lot. Mr. Trump spoke the words while exiting a vehicle that had just pulled up to a Hollywood movie lot. His distaff supporters generally went out of their way to balance their distaste for the language in the leaked tapes while labeling the Trump deserters the moral equivalent of “rat finks.” “I want to make it very clear that I do not in any way condone the words “I want to make it very clear that I do not in any way condone the words Donald Trump used over 10 years ago,” said Janet Beihoffer, a Republican National Committee member from Minnesota. “They are despicable, disgusting and divisive. However, we are a nation without leadership. We cannot allow locker room guy talk to distract us from America’s real problems.” Mrs. Beihoffer refused to join the anti- Mrs. Beihoffer refused to join the anti- Trump chorus and instead lit into Mr. Trump ’s Democratic opponent, saying, “ Hillary Clinton , a lying and failed secretary of state, has jeopardized our national security secrets and weakened America’s positions throughout the world. Those actions are far more deplorable than anything Donald Trump has said. He deserves our vote on Nov. 8.” The Trump defenders could be found deep within the local party ranks. “I am infuriated by anybody jumping ship because of antique locker room talk,” said Vicki Sciolaro, chairwoman of the Kansas Republican Party’s 3rd Congressional District and an evangelical Christian. “The majority of men do it, and all would be mortified if others heard their bloviated stories.” Mrs. Sciolaro said Mrs. Sciolaro said Mr. Trump “has to change the conversation to Bill Clinton. Apparently, all the immoral things Bill has done Hillary condones, so what’s the big deal about Trump ’s locker room talk?” Some female members of the Republican National Committee condemned the words but not the man. A self-described conservative Christian activist had some measured words about what A self-described conservative Christian activist had some measured words about what Mr. Trump should do. “My suggestion is for ‘The Don’ to use the words ‘locker room talk’ and ‘sorry’ a lot,” said Kim Bengard, founder of It Takes a Family Foundation in San Clemente, California. “And maybe he slips in a phrase about him and Bill Clinton accidentally ass-slapping some hot broads — wait, no, never mind. That video will show up soon enough.” Mrs. Bengard, a Christian conservative activist, appears less than fond of a particular cable news channel. “BTW, to see CNN — Clinton News Network — fake as though the campaign is imploding is beyond laughable,” said Mrs. Bengard. “They cover for Clintons, yet they know worse. Watching their fake hysteria is pukeworthy.” , the Illinois RNC member, said Mrs. DeMonte , the Illinois RNC member, said Mrs. Clinton ’s comments Saturday expressing disgust with her opponent’s language was like Capt. Renault in “Casablanca” claiming that he is “shocked, shocked” that gambling was going on in Rick’s Cafe. “ Hillary ,” Mrs. DeMonte said, is “the consummate hypocrite, who while first lady barraged her own Secret Service detail with unspeakably foul language — the very same men who put their lives on the line for hers. Such hypocrisy.” Some Republican women were as candidly pessimistic about the outcome of Some Republican women were as candidly pessimistic about the outcome of Mr. Trump ’s “lewd-gate” as they were dismissive of the shock they said panicky Republicans were feigning over revelations of Trump ’s hot-mic word choices. “I’ve heard all the locker room trash talk before, since we ‘liberated’ women are of the era that tolerated it in entertainment and to a certain extent the ‘Mad Men’ scene of the 1950s and ‘60s,” said Mary Ann Meloy, a Pennsylvania delegate to the Republican National Convention, former Reagan White House official and resident of the upscale Pittsburgh suburb Fox Chapel. “But,” she added, “it never presented itself this way, and I just know we will lose even Fox Chapel because of women’s votes.” Losing the chance to regain the White House isn’t all that’s at stake for Republicans, whose 54-vote U.S. Senate majority may be endangered by a Losing the chance to regain the White House isn’t all that’s at stake for Republicans, whose 54-vote U.S. Senate majority may be endangered by a Clinton landslide win. “We will lose [Sen. Patrick J.] Toomey,” Mrs. Meloy said. “I am not a fan of his, but it could mean control of the Senate. I do not feel very confident. Seems whatever “We will lose [Sen. Patrick J.] Toomey,” Mrs. Meloy said. “I am not a fan of his, but it could mean control of the Senate. I do not feel very confident. Seems whatever Trump says outweighs whatever Hillary does — even her criminal acts.” said party leaders should compare the two candidates’ full records in the wake of the controversy. Mrs. DeMonte said party leaders should compare the two candidates’ full records in the wake of the controversy. “ Mr. Trump may be guilty of uttering foul language, but Hillary is guilty of committing foul deeds — deeds — if she were anyone else would have resulted in prison time,” said Mrs. DeMonte , referring to the deletion of “thousands of documents which she knew was illegal” and refusing “multiple cries for help from our ambassador that resulted in his murder, along with three brave Americans” in Benghazi, Libya. averred that Mrs. DeMonte averred that Mrs. Clinton as a lawyer “laughed when she got off a rapist of a 12-year-old girl — while knowing all along her client was guilty of rape. That is on tape, too.” Why, she asked don’t the news media “play that audio?” Most Republican women dismiss the idea pushed by anti- Most Republican women dismiss the idea pushed by anti- Trump members of their own party and by many in the press that vice presidential nominee Mike Pence can somehow take over the top spot on the ballot. “The dump-Trumpers are just delusional,” Mrs. Bengard said. “It won’t happen. The angry voter loves him and won’t settle for Pence. And as much as I love Pence and believe he would do a good job, I just don’t think he can beat the Clinton machine. I wish he could.” summed up the defenders’ stand by recalling why Mrs. Rudd summed up the defenders’ stand by recalling why Mr. Trump defeated 16 more politically experienced competitors for the Republican nomination. “We are counting on “We are counting on Trump to change Washington, and the establishment will do anything to stop him, but where is all the disgust for Hillary and her behavior and the blood on her hands?” Copyright © 2016 The Washington Times, LLC. Copyright © 2016 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint permission Disqus

The grim warning of Vanuatu President Baldwin Lonsdale in the aftermath of the devastating cyclone which hit the Pacific island last week. John Sparks reports. The president of Vanuatu called it a “monster”. Cyclone Pam hit the Pacific island on Friday, wiping out entire villages. In the aftermath of the disaster, aid officials said the storm was possibly unprecedented in the island’s history and could be one of the worst natural disasters the Pacific region has ever seen, hitting Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands before reaching Vanuatu late on Friday. Latest figures put the death toll at 24, but authorities expect that number to rise, and thousands more are at risk from a lack of essential supplies. Reporting from the island, Channel 4 News Asia Correspondent John Sparks said survivors had begun the clean-up, but a lack of fresh water and local crops meant a quick recovery was not easy. Shops, he said, are now on guard against looters. Aid agencies, along with the Australian government, are sending in provisions and personnel. But Vanuatu President Baldwin Lonsdale, who was in Japan when the storm hit, has warned: “We are going to have to rebuild everything.”

Professional freestyle skier Grete Eliassen during the Cold Smoke Tour 2015. (Photo: Instagram) Freestyle Skier Grete Eliassen and six-time Winter X Games medalist grew up completely confident in her ability to soar and beat out the boys (resulting in a few bruised egos). Thankfully, the six-time Winter X Games medalist met her match. When it comes to acing sports, her hubby holds the title of “partner in crime.” The Redbull sponsored 27-year old lives in Salt Lake City, continues to ski, teaches skiing clinics and has some film projects in the works. There’s no doubt she’s a role model, finding it imperative to mentor younger female athletes. Eliassen credits her Norwegian upbringing and her country’s coverage of women in sports for inspiring her, noting that the media covers female athletes less in the U.S. Hey America, let’s get on that bandwagon ASAP. Yahoo Beauty: You grew up in Norway. How is the perception of beauty, female athletes, and role models different than it is in America? Grete Eliassen: The media does a great job in Norway with showcasing women’s sports. Growing up, there was women’s team handball and skiing. It was always equal on TV. Looking for female athlete role models: there were way more there than in the United States. There are thousands in the United States, but I don’t think the media portrays them that well. That’s where I got the confidence to be a female athlete. I knew it was possible. How has being an athlete helped you in your life? I found skiing when I was two years old. My parents put me in ski boots. I don’t even remember learning how to ski. I remember around age 10 that this was something special and something that I loved to do. When I’m skiing, I don’t think about anything else. I’m just in that moment. For my development, it’s helped me stay out of trouble. I always had a ski competition or a trick I wanted to learn. It kept me clear away from parties and shopping at the mall. Now I like doing those things, but when I was younger, it never occurred to me that I was missing out on anything because I was just so excited about skiing. What makes you feel confident? I’ve never been afraid to go out there and try something that’s new. For example, I just got into skateboarding. I was never really a skateboarder growing up, but it’s so fun to learn a new trick every time you go out. Trying to step out of your comfort zone makes you a better person. Before you were married, did you find that guys were intimidated by your athleticism? For sure. Not intimidated like scared, but it was hard to find someone to date long term because I am better than a lot of guys at certain sports, especially skiing. Did you ever have an awkward date where you kicked the guy’s butt and he became upset? I actually went on a date in Utah with a local boy. I wanted to see what this community was all about. The guy took me out to dinner and bowling. I’m pretty sure he took me bowling because he thought he’d be better than me. I’m not that amazing. Once in a while I’ll get lucky and get a couple of strikes. I just beat him like crazy. I think he was really upset. It didn’t work out – the girl can win sometimes! How about your husband? We can participate in the same sport, but we don’t have to be competing all the time, and we learn new sports together. For example, rock climbing. Is your husband involved within the world of sports? He’s not a professional athlete. He’s an engineer in the renewable energy industry. He wakeboards and snowboards. He’ll play golf with me because I love it. We do the same sports together. It’s like having a partner in crime every day. View photos

Text-To-Speech is one of the many great features built into the Android OS. Many users may only use it for the turn by turn navigation, but that still adds up to lots of time listening to a “tinny” robotic voice. Luckily Android 2.2 introduced the ability to install new TTS libraries to change the voice from the default voice. So far there are only two additional voice libraries in the market, one provided by SVOX and the the other by Loquendo. Watch this video on YouTube SVOX Classic Text To Speech Engine may sound like just another robotic voice generator but actually it has a wide assortment of voices. While the main app is free they have decided to make each different voice a separate app install so that you only have to purchase the one you want or need, these cost $1.99 each at the moment. Once you have the main app and a voice installed all you have to do is change the default voice engine in the Android settings. I tried out the US English “Grace” voice because it was the closest to the default android Pico TTS library. The voices are so much richer with SVOX and while there are still some tinny pronunciations, it is bounds ahead of Pico. Loquendo’s TTS library brings a few new features along with it. It will read different emoticons and play back a relevant emotional response or sound. It also varies inflection with the punctuation so that if you end a sentence with an exclamation point it will sounds excited. It does have a few downfalls though, for it to do directions in Navigation properly you have to manually go in to the settings and set it to navigation mode. The other drawback is the 40MB download to the SD card that is required. Hopefully this app will come with more varied voices soon and have the navigation fixed, once that happens it will be the app to get. Loquendo costs ~$6.84 in the market right now. Between the two SVOX definitely comes out ahead. While is lacks the emotion features that Loquendo has it makes up for it with more voices, smaller size, a cheaper price, and in my opinion better sounding speech. Hopefully more developers come out with even better voice libraries in the future, this is definitely one are that has room to grow.

PORTLAND, Ore., Nov. 7 (UPI) -- Portland, Ore. police said they helped break up minor disturbances early Monday at the downtown square where Occupy protesters have camped for nearly a month. A few arrests were reported. Police said they were kept busy throughout the weekend with a steady stream of calls in the downtown area, including an attempted mugging, several small fires and a noisy confrontation with a pizza delivery person. "Occupy Portland protesters became enraged when Pizza Schmizza ran out of bread sticks to accompany their order," the Portland Police Bureau said in a written update. "They threatened to assault employees and vandalize the restaurant." RELATED Two Occupy Philly protesters marry The protesters' encampment is at Terry Schrunk Plaza, which police said was federal property and under the jurisdiction of the U.S. General Services Administration. The (Portland) Oregonian said the occupiers had formed an ad hoc security team to prevent trouble but they required police assistance with various scuffles Sunday night. One protester raised the idea of electing a more-formal leadership for the camp, but the idea was shouted down at the group's daily public forum. In Atlanta, five people were arrested, including a woman draped in an American flag, after refusing to leave Woodruff Park in the city's downtown area, The Atlanta Journal Constitution reported. The Los Angeles Times said 11 Occupy Riverside (Calif.) participants were hauled away for refusing to strike their tents. Protesters in Honolulu asked for donations to recover $1,700 in bail money after eight people were arrested during a sit-in at one of the city's oldest community parks Saturday. "We are asking support from the community to help raise bail money to pay back those who cannot afford to pay," the Occupy group said on its Web site.

Bringing Birthdays The Beginning And Planet Earth To Life By Spencer . February 15, 2017 . 1:00pm NIS America is bringing Birthdays the Beginning to the West and this game takes players back to the beginning of life on Earth. With help from an alien who can make mountains rise and dig down to the planet’s core you can see life evolve from plankton to mammals. Siliconera spoke with Yasuhiro Wada, the luminary designer behind Harvest Moon to talk about his latest creation. Wada-san you’ve made creative games where you build a world like the Harvest Moon / Story of Seasons series. How do you come up with new video game ideas? Yasuhiro Wada, Director: [Laughs] That is a difficult question. The biggest idea I have is a bit different, when a new game is created, players think this game might be similar to another game. As a creator, I want to create a completely new game so players see something brand new. What did you want to do differently with Birthdays that you couldn’t do with your other titles? I wanted to create a game that allows players to change the planet. There are similar games like SimEarth or SimCity that came out in the past, but I think consumers would stray away from them because they are complex and hard to play. For Birthdays the Beginning, one of the concepts was a strong simulation game, but to make it easy for any casual gamer to play right away. How did Toybox partner with Arc System Works to create Birthdays the Beginning? Mr. Kanazawa was originally working with Arc System Works and I had an opportunity to meet with them and have dinner from time to time. On one of those nights, Mr. Kidooka (President of Arc System Works) asked would you like to create something for us and I has always had an idea about creating a game like this. Mr. Kidooka said, "OK let’s try this out." My interpretation of the meeting is Arc System Works is famous for fighting games, but if Mr. Kidooka can have me make a completely different game it could expand the scope of games they can publish. I don’t know if this is true, it’s just my feeling. [Laughs] In Birthdays the Beginning you create different kinds of characters depending on the temperature and if you make a tall mountain you can quickly create a cold area. Why did you use height as a mechanic? One of the biggest factors in the game is temperature and the reason I chose height is it is really easy for anyone to realize that you visualize when you’re in the mountains it is cold. When you’re close to sea level and desert areas are hot. It’s very easy to visualize. How do these items work in the game? When a new player picks up the game, they want humans and dinosaurs to coexist in the same world. Items can be used to make this happen. Items are a way to support a player’s imagination. If you look at completion rate in this game, if you don’t use items you get rated higher. You aren’t required to use items in the game. One of the most important concepts for this game is to give players the most flexibility as possible. By adding items, I think we were able to make this possible. Birthdays shows life from dinosaurs to humans. What are some of your favorite organisms in the game? I questioned why I was here in this world and I wanted to represent in this game how from nothing human life was created. When you start the game you start with absolutely nothing, but as you play the game you see the history of Earth. You see all of these organisms that lead up to humans. There are 300 species, I’m not saying it is a small number, but I would have like to put over 1,000 species in the game. My favorite animal is the predecessor to humans, Ardipithecus, the branch between monkeys and humans. Baragwanathia is my favorite because one of the staff members at NIS America had a really hard time pronouncing the word at the beginning. [Laughs] Baragwanathia is the base of most of the plant life in the game, so it is like the mother of plant life. After the Baragwanathia is created it gives green life to the world. Even when you start playing the game until you get the Baragwanathia you don’t see much color – gray maybe a little blue – then you start seeing the green color expanding and I really like seeing the visualization of plants expanding in the game. At the beginning of the game do players have single-celled organisms? There is one kind of single celled organism in the game, plankton. These aren’t really visualized, but when you start the game you get plant plankton and animal plankton. From there you get the first visualized creature, the Stromatolite. There is a food chain aspect to the game. Plant plankton is at the bottom of the food chain. After plant plankton is created, animal plankton appear and eat those. That is the first stage of the food chain people can interact with in the game. That being said, it isn’t something players will focus on. It is an idea in the game, but it’s more of a system or function that being a major part of the game. Can dinosaurs eat people in Birthdays? [Laughs] Animals eating each other isn’t visualized in the game, but the carnivores dinosaurs will eat herbivore dinosaurs. What you will see is herbivores will go extinct if the carnivores eat all of them and then the carnivores will go extinct. For now, dinosaurs don’t eat humans for many different reasons. [Laughs] But, that is something we will consider in future iterations of the game. What interested you about the evolution and the history of Earth to create Birthdays: The Beginning? I have always been fascinated with outer space and evolution. When I was younger I read the Origin of Species from Darwin which was the basis for the game. The development team and I used a vast library of books that elaborated on Darwin’s theory of evolution. There is one character in Birthdays that isn’t in evolution books, the alien you control. Can you tell us about him? The alien is more of a facilitator of how the game was designed. I wanted to keep the game as simple as possible and to do that I wanted to create an action aspect to the game. The alien flies around and you move this character to raise and lower the land. The alien allows us to have an action based simulation game. That’s a game system explanation, but from a story aspect the alien also teaches you why you have to create this world from nothing. I’m going to keep this part a secret for now. [Laughs] What are some interesting worlds the development team built while playing Birthdays the Beginning? During Tokyo Game Show, there was a person from Arc System Works who was recreating Japan by making different parts of the country into the game. I found this fascinating and different landmarks like Mt. Fuji were made too! The creator even had details like using an item to add snow to Mt. Fuji. Birthdays the Beginning is coming to PlayStation 4 and also Steam too. What are your plans for the PC version? Have you thought about supporting mods? PC is a great platform. One of the biggest features of Steam is there are users from all over the world that have easy access to the game. The PC version will have three control schemes: mouse-only, mouse plus keyboard and controller mode. Mods are a fun idea that I might implement in the future. From an engine standpoint it’s hard adding mods into this game may break the simulation aspect, but it is something I am interested in. You mentioned "Beginnings" is a subtitle. Do you plan for Birthdays to be a series for Toybox with future installments? I have tons of ideas for Birthdays, which is why the title is Birthdays the Beginning. This is something I want to expand on in the future.

We revealed in our cover story on The Order: 1886 that developer Ready At Dawn is fusing Arthurian lore with an alternate view of 1886 London. The group we call the Knights of the Round Table is referred to in this new game as The Order – a force of dedicated individuals founded by King Arthur centuries ago to confront horrifying half-breed creatures. In the year 1886, Sir Galahad is one of the most respected knights in The Order, but he needs all the help he can get fighting the rebels and other threats lurking among London. These are three of Galahad’s most trusted allies in his battles throughout much of the game. Name: Isabeau D’Argyll Alias: Lady Igraine If you’ve read tales about King Arthur, you may remember his mother was named Lady Igraine. In The Order: 1886, Lady Igraine is a youthful-looking warrior named Isabeau D’Argyll. She and Galahad have a close but guarded relationship which started with her as his knight in training. Over the years the two become fond of one another, though their allegiance to The Order forbids them from ever acting on any underlying feelings. Isabeau’s character extends beyond her relationship with Galahad, however. She is strong-willed, skilled in combat, and fiercely loyal to The Order. “Isabeau is every bit the knight that Galahad is,” says Ru Weerasuriya, creative director on The Order: 1886. “There’s this kind of rivalry between them.” Name: Sebastian Malory Alias: Sir Percival In Ready At Dawn’s story, the title of Sir Percival belongs to a man named Sebastian Malory. Enthusiasts of Arthurian lore may recall that Sir Thomas Malory is the 15th century author of the original Le Morte d’Arthur. In The Order, the gray-bearded Malory is the most seasoned warrior in Galahad’s squad. Malory acts as a trustworthy mentor to Galahad and personifies The Order’s noble agenda to protect the people of London. Malory and Galahad share joint tempered loyalty to The Order, and are close friends because of it. Name: Marquis de Lafayette Alias: Pending Lafayette is The Order’s newest knight-in-training, but he’s no green recruit. The famed Marquis de Lafayette is an actual historic figure who made his name fighting in both the French and American Revolutions. The Order contacts Lafayette and opens his eyes to the larger scale conflict the organization was formed to fight. His strategic expertise and knowledge of the battlefield makes him an invaluable addition to Galahad’s squad, even if he hasn’t earned his knightly name yet. This apprentice has a brash, whimsical sense of humor that lightens the squad’s oftentimes grim demeanor. Check back later this month for a deeper look into the final knight in the squad and the main character of The Order – Sir Galahad.

As the fastest growing open source project in history, OpenStack releases fairly rapidly, with new releases twice per year. Each time, around April and October of every year, a whole plethora of new features and functions move from incubated development status to fully-baked features and accepted into the “core” OpenStack release. Rapidly approaching is the new “Mitaka” release, the 13th release of OpenStack, filled with some great new features. To best share all the updates, we’ve put together a webinar to explain everything in much greater detail. These webinar’s provide you the opportunity to hear from our senior product managers, as well as ask questions about anything that might peak your own interest. To give you an idea of what exactly will be covered, here are some key highlights we’ll be talking about: Compute Support for Real-time KVM compute nodes and custom CPU thread policies for use by latency-sensitive NFV guest applications. Improvements to the reliability of live migration to assist with application management and resiliency. Progress update on Cells V2 implementation for improved scalability. Storage Support for rolling upgrades in Cinder, through backwards compatible RPC and versioned object pinning. New Attached Volumes Extend API was introduced in Cinder, as well as new download/upload support for Cinder volumes in Glace repository. New Disaster Recovery Share-Replication API support in Manila and improved Cinder Replication v2.1 API. Networking Continuing the work on distributed virtual routers (DVR) Tenant resources cleanup Improved Security Groups performance In addition we’ll be sure to cover the state of key emerging projects including Barbican, Freezer, Manila, and Magnum, and provide some initial thoughts on what we might expect to see as we look forward to the “Newton” release cycle. Don’t miss this “What’s New” update about the Mitaka release from two of our senior product managers, Steve Gordon and Sean Cohen. To learn more and register for this webinar, please be sure to register here.

LUCKNOW, India - Three Chinese nationals have been arrested on suspicion of money laundering and spying on border security camps along India's northern borders, Indian police said on Wednesday. The arrests were made in Uttar Pradesh state close to India's border with Nepal. Local police chief Sanjay Kakkar told Reuters the accused, including a woman, said they were employees of Chinese telecoms equipment maker, Huawei Technologies. The arrests come a few weeks after Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao visited India in a display of warmth that, however, failed to lift the veil of suspicion between the two nations or resolve a disputed border, a legacy from their brief 1962 war. "We are suspecting their involvement in some money laundering activity as they were carrying Indian PAN (tax document) cards in their names." Last year, three engineers with a Chinese construction firm were arrested and charged with homicide in connection with a chimney collapse that killed 41 people in central India in 2009. Last year, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh warned that China, India's main rival for regional resources and geopolitical clout, was seeking to expand its influence in South Asia. Those comments came after India briefly banned imports of Chinese telecoms gear over spying fears. A series of attacks on Indian government websites by suspected Chinese hackers has also hardened Indian suspicion about potentially sensitive equipment from China.

The video will start in 8 Cancel Get the biggest daily news stories by email Subscribe Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Could not subscribe, try again later Invalid Email This hilarious video shows the moment an internet cafe owner dropped a massive fart to clear his shop of customers. CCTV footage from the cafe shows the owner impatiently sitting in his office as he waits for customers to leave at closing time. With their backs turned, the owner sneaks into the room before dropping his pants and letting rip right under their noses. He then slopes off into his office with a beaming smile as if nothing has happened, poised for his customers' reactions. As the grim scent begins to diffuse around the shop, the hapless man closest to the stench starts to stir. Read more: The foul prank appears to reap instant results as both computer users rush to the feet with their hands over their mouths. Visibly disgusted, one lifts his T-shirt over his mouth to mask the stench as he quickly exits the room. Meanwhile, the owner is seen sitting smugly in the empty shop, presumably pleased his prank had the desired effect. Read more: The clip has gone viral on Facebook, amassing thousands of views. It's unclear where the footage was filmed.

WordPress powers 25% of all websites Posted by Matthias Gelbmann on 9 November 2015 in News, Content Management, WordPress Summary: The most popular content management systems now runs a quarter of the web. We have a closer look at the detailed statistics behind that success. Two years after WordPress usage reached 20%, it achieved the next major milestone: 25% of all websites now use WordPress. Or, as its founder Matt Mullenweg puts it: Seventy-Five to Go. The dominance of WordPress in the CMS market is amazing. The two closest competitors, Joomla and Drupal combined are used by 4.9%, less than a fifth of WordPress. The market share among the 300+ content management system which we monitor is now at 58.7% Some background to these really impressive numbers: We do count both the self-hosted, open source version of WordPress which can be downloaded at WordPress.org, and we also count WordPress sites hosted at WordPress.com or elsewhere. However, we count the hosted sites only if they are reachable via their own domain (not only as subdomain of wordpress.com), and they must qualify like all other sites in our surveys by getting enough visitors on that separate domain to make it into the top 10 million Alexa sites. As a result, the vast majority of the millions of blogs at WordPress.com are not counted. Only 1.25% of the WordPress sites in our surveys are hosted by Automattic at WordPress.com. That makes the WordPress CMS market share even more remarkable. WordPress is used by some of the best known websites: Time, TechCrunch, When we split up all websites by traffic level, we see that WordPress is leading at all levels, but the market share among the top 1000 sites is significantly lower at 30.3%. Drupal (19.7%) and Adobe Experience Manager (11.8%) are the other dominant systems in that section. Note, however, that using a standard CMS is not very common among the top 1000 sites, more than 90% of them are custom developments. We have indicators that show that WordPress is likely to grow even further. In October, 29.5% of new sites used WordPress. New sites usually show the way where the whole market is heading to. If we look at sites that changed their CMS technology recently, we see that WordPress is mostly gaining from Joomla, Drupal and Blogger. There are also systems that gain more sites from WordPress than they lose, most notably Magento, Squarespace and Shopify, but compared to the overall WordPress user base, these numbers are almost negligible. WordPress is not only the most popular CMS, it is also the fastest growing system: every 74 seconds a site within the top 10 million starts using WordPress. Compare this with Shopify, the second-fastest growing CMS, which is gaining a new site every 22 minutes. Splitting up the whole web into sections by content language reveals further interesting facts: WordPress is used by a staggering 37.3% of English language websites. Usage numbers are between 38% and 40% for Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish and Turkish sites, and they reach 51.3% for Bengali and 54.4% for Bosnian. On the other hand, that number is only 10.6% for Chinese language sites and 6.9% for Korean. Looking at the underlying technologies used by WordPress sites shows that 93.8% of them use a Unix-like operating system, with Ubuntu being the most used Linux distribution. Only 6.2% of WordPress sites use Windows. That is sufficient, however, to make WordPress also the dominant CMS running on Windows servers, ahead of DotNetNuke and SharePoint. With its double freemium model based on open source software and free site hosting, WordPress and Automattic are one of the big success stories of the web. It looks like we have only seen the beginning yet. _________________ Please note, that all trends and figures mentioned in that article are valid at the time of writing. Our surveys are updated frequently, and these trends and figures are likely to change over time. Share this page 1 comment Wordpress, by far, provides the greatest flexibility for most first small business website owners; developers update the CMS frequently, it is easy to install to your own host, and the plugin developers provide thousands of free 'add on' features to the system make it even more useful, for those not learned in coding (Javascript, PHP, CSS). Readers may note that the free Wordpress blog service is very limited compared to WP self-hosted. It prevents the free use of plugins, requires users to pay for premium themes, injects advertisements into posts, and even charges for redirects; so it is easy to see why the self-hosted option is preferred : "Only 1.25% of the WordPress sites in our surveys are hosted by Automattic at WordPress.com" Blogger was a favorite years ago due to its simple and friendly interface, but hasn't kept up to Wordpress' continually expanding capabilities. This entry is closed for comments. Our Book Recommendation

"It looks like something nice to invest in," said Duhaney, a computer programmer who lives in suburban White Plains, New York. "Right now, it's taking off." It's a bet speculators like Duhaney are increasingly making, helping briefly push up Bitcoin's price to more than $1200 in late November as promoters saw the virtual currency gaining wider acceptance by merchants and consumers. Bitcoin, which was valued at only $13 a year ago, has plummeted from its recent peak to $735, underscoring how volatile it remains. Alternative to credit cards Though still far from the mainstream and too complex for the average consumer, Bitcoin already has grown well past its roots as the plaything of anarchists and hackers who viewed it as a political statement against big government and an alternative to credit cards. Today, consumers are using them at coffee shops, hotels, online stores and even, in some cases, to run their businesses. And every day, dozens more companies are offering to let consumers spend or receive Bitcoins for goods and services. In downtown Palo Alto, people can use their Bitcoins at Coupa Cafe, a hot spot for students and entrepreneurs. When they approach the counter to pay and order, they can get their price in dollars or Bitcoins. Next to the register is a laminated card with the cafe's QR code, the square-shaped successor to bar codes. Customers tap a Bitcoin app on their smartphone, and then hold the phone up to the card. A smartphone behind the register alerts the cafe that a Bitcoin transfer has been completed. The process is similar to paying with Square or other payment apps. "As the price of Bitcoin goes up, it's changed the minds of people who have looked at it before and didn't think it would catch on," said Adam Levine, 28, of Napa, who produces the "Let's Talk Bitcoin" podcast and website. "Now it's survived long enough that people are getting more comfortable with it. It's complicated, but it's powerful." Absence of government or corporate interference Created in 2009 by a programmer using the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, Bitcoin is an internet technology standard that runs across a wide number of servers around the world for regulating the creation and trading of Bitcoins. It is not controlled by any nation, governing body or business. The original computer code established the number of Bitcoins in circulation and tracks ownership of the currency. The absence of government or corporate interference made Bitcoin popular among technophiles with strong libertarian streaks. But over the last four years, the currency has been elbowing its way from the digital ether into popular use — simply because people, companies and organisations have decided to believe that it has value as a currency. Indeed, Bitcoin is only the most notable of many virtual currencies that have begun to proliferate worldwide. A university in Cyprus recently announced it would begin accepting tuition payments in Bitcoins. A Newport Beach auto dealership said on its blog on Wednesday it accepted Bitcoins as payment for the first time, in the sale of a Tesla Model S Performance electric car. Last summer, twins Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss — who settled claims that social network Facebook Inc. was their idea — filed paperwork to launch the first Bitcoin-related investment offering on Wall Street. Bank of America Merrill Lynch analysts recently issued their first note on the digital currency. Supporters have formed a political action committee to back Bitcoin in Washington. Retail interest The ranks of retailers using Bitcoin is growing. Ren Sylvain, an independent programmer in Vancouver, Canada, put together Bitcoinmap.org to list places that accepted the currency. Six months ago, he counted 200 businesses. Now the website has 950, including 550 added in just the last month. Levine encourages his advertisers to pay him in Bitcoins by adding a 30 per cent surcharge to any transactions involving dollars. Using Bitcoins enables him to avoid credit card processing fees. Also with Bitcoin, the money is transferred instantly between customer and business, which Levine and others argue makes it safer and more secure. In turn, Levine uses Bitcoins to pay his handful of employees and correspondents, as well as buying them recording equipment to do their jobs. Gyft, a start-up company that enables users to buy and manage gift cards with one phone app, began accepting the currency this year and gave a 4 per cent rebate on all purchases made with Bitcoins on Black Friday. Vinny Lingham, Gyft's chief executive, appreciates how Bitcoin also passes more consumer information directly to merchants than credit cards do, but he declined to say what that information included. Businesses that accept Bitcoin had been enjoying another perk — extra money. Until the recent slump, the currency's dramatic price increase gave them more than the sales price of goods. In some ways, Bitcoin is similar to getting paid in foreign currency or stock, the values of which change daily in trading. At Bubba's Firehouse BBQ in Salt Lake City, manager and co-owner Tom Westland said he thinks more merchants are starting to accept Bitcoins on the belief their recent dramatic rise will net them extra cash down the road. Customers using Bitcoins are only a sliver of Westland's business. But as business slowed in the last few months, he was able to sell about $1000 worth of Bitcoins to cover his expenses. "Most people don't even know what the hell they are," he said. "But it really saved me this month." Bitcoins have a long way to go before rivaling conventional means of payment. There is $1.2 trillion in US currency circulating, according to Francois Velde, a senior economist of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. That compares with only $10.6 billion worth of Bitcoins as of Friday. There are 30 Bitcoin transactions a minute, compared with 200,000 Visa transactions a minute, Velde said. Bitcoin has often been in the news this year for less than savoury reasons, such as the recent federal takedown of Silk Road, the online bazaar for illegal drugs. Worries over potential money laundering have drawn heavy scrutiny from a slew of state and federal government agencies. Benjamin Lawsky, New York state's top financial regulator, said in August his office would examine how to regulate such currencies, calling them "a virtual Wild West for narco-traffickers and other criminals." Still, a congressional hearing last month showed that fear surrounding Bitcoin may be ebbing as several regulators spoke favourably about its potential. Velde offered his tacit endorsement of bitcoin at the hearing, calling it a "remarkable conceptual and technical achievement, which may well be used by existing financial institutions." But he also noted that it remains too technically and conceptually complex to ever have a bigger effect on the economy or to replace conventional currencies. Scepticism Sceptics contend Bitcoin's soaring value is the result of a frothy speculation that could burst if regulators squeeze it or if it fails to gain broad acceptance. Alan Greenspan, a former Federal Reserve chairman, declared Bitcoin's recent price jump a bubble. "You have to really stretch your imagination to infer what the intrinsic value of Bitcoin is," Greenspan said. "I haven't been able to do it. Maybe somebody else can." Bitcoin, meanwhile, is drawing hobbyists who invest large sums in computers to "mine" the virtual currency. Mining is the process through which a new Bitcoin is created. The Bitcoin mining protocol includes a number of increasingly complex puzzles. Bitcoin miners use specially designed computers to solve these problems. When they succeed, they are rewarded with Bitcoins. Will Limratana, a 38-year-old software developer who splits his time between New York and Nashville, bought a sophisticated Bitcoin miner for about $6000 and chipped in for another with some friends. He's optimistic Bitcoin will one day catch on as an alternative payment system. "There's not a lot you can do with Bitcoin right now," he said. "All it takes is one big company in the US to start using it, and then it'll catch on. So we'll see. I think that could happen." Los Angeles Times

A preliminary glance at exit polling data shows a stark racial divide – but the full picture is much more complicated, and offers clues to why polls were so badly off Republican Donald Trump will become the next US president. Many will be wondering who, among the estimated 129 million voters in the 2016 election, Trump has to thank for his victory. Possibly, not most of them. Current projections suggest that Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton might narrowly claim a larger share of the popular vote. But the distribution of votes in the electoral college still means that Trump finished the night with 276 of the 270 college votes needed to win – and, once final counts come in from states that still haven’t officially been called, that count will probably jump to 306. As I have written, part of the reason Trump’s win is being described as a “stunning upset” is because most opinion polling was inaccurate. And yet, the only information we have right now to make sense of Trump’s victory is yet more polling data – this time from exit polls. Those exit polls point to one clear, deep divide in voting behavior – race. White voters chose Trump, non-white voters chose Clinton. This appears to be different from previous polling data, where the difference between candidates’ national popularity was so narrow that relatively small errors could affect the overall accuracy of results. The gap in Trump support between white voters and non-white voters is so large that even if exit polls were inaccurate, that difference probably still stands. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Exit polling data from election night. Photograph: NYT Perhaps that’s not surprising for a candidate who was endorsed by the Ku Klux Klan. What’s more surprising though is that exit polling suggests Trump was able to slightly increase his vote share among black, Hispanic and Asian voters compared with Mitt Romney’s performance in 2012. There are other demographic cleavages in US voting, but they don’t appear quite as dramatic as the racial one. Exit polls suggest that, as expected, more women voted for Clinton while more men voted for Donald Trump. Much like the UK’s Brexit result, younger voters (a demographic which typically has lower turnout rates) seemed to choose the losing candidate. Only 37% of voters aged 18-29 voted for Trump, compared with 53% of those aged 65 and over. Those numbers come from Edison Research, which spoke to 24,537 voters leaving 350 voting places across the country on election day. What will President Donald Trump do? Predicting his policy agenda Read more Exit polling data on income points to another surprising result. The poorest voters, those with an income of $49,000 or less, seemed to choose Clinton over Trump –albeit by a much smaller margin than in 2012. For months, Trump was projected to win big among this group. All this doesn’t necessarily mean that the numbers were wrong. These exit polls don’t reflect how people, or demographics, really work. American voters are not poor or black or female or college educated. In reality, people fit into multiple different groups at once. Two facts are simultaneously possible – that the poorest voters chose Clinton and that the poorest white voters chose Trump. In data analysis, this process of looking at two different variables at once means looking at the “crosstabs”. The exit polling data does offer us one such crosstab – race and educational status. Those numbers suggest that Trump has one very clear group supporting him: white voters who don’t have a college degree. The numbers on race and education point to such a clear cleavage that even if they are slightly inaccurate, the overall conclusion still likely holds true. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Race and education: the dividing line. Photograph: NYT That group might also offer some clues as to why polls were so badly off. Analysts have found that the states where Republican support was underestimated correlate with the states with a large non-college-educated white share of the population. But it might be an overstatement to say that this group secured Trump’s victory. To understand that, we would need a detailed breakdown of votes by state, which we don’t yet have. There are other factors here, such as the millions of votes which went to third-party candidates, and whether Democratic turnout overall was down (it appears that it was). Again, these numbers have their limitations – and they can be dangerous. Similar polling data led the Clinton campaign to feel quietly confident of a victory in Wisconsin and Michigan, and to therefore air few advertisements in those states. Both ended up voting for President-elect Donald Trump.

USC's Steve Sarkisian Powerful Alums & Boosters Pissed ... Calls to Fire Coach USC's Steve Sarkisian -- Powerful Alums & Boosters Pissed ... Calls to Fire Coach EXCLUSIVE The backlash over Steve Sarkisian's drunken comments at a USC event has begun -- with several high-powered alums and boosters calling for the school to fire the coach ... TMZ Sports has learned. Multiple high-ranking USC sources tell us ... ever since reports surfaced about the USC head football coach slurring and cussing at a major USC function Saturday night, the powers that be at SC have been getting complaints from the people who back the program. One high-ranking USC source tells us ... "I've been getting a flurry of phone calls this morning from people who want him out. They feel he's an embarrassment to the program and the community." Sarkisian has already apologized for his behavior -- and says he has assured SC's athletic director that it won't happen again. We're told Sark has NOT yet addressed the football team over the incident -- but he's planning on speaking with the players about it. We spoke to the parents of one USC football recruit who also tells us they're disappointed by Sark's actions -- but were NOT pulling their kid from the program over it. Still, everybody knows how powerful alumni and boosters are at USC -- and if Sark can't fix things with them ASAP, his career with the Trojans could be short lived.

Florida Governor Rick Scott is today signing into law a bill the legislature unanimously passed that would provide medical care and legal protection for babies who are born alive after failed abortions. Governor Scott said, “As a father and grandfather, there is nothing more precious or special than welcoming a new child into this world and by signing this bill, we are protecting the most vulnerable among us and affirming their rights as individuals. This legislation ensures common-sense measures are taken to help care for the babies who survive abortion procedures and grants those infants the same rights as infants who are born naturally. “I also want to applaud bill sponsors Senator Anitere Flores and Representative Cary Pigman for their commitment to ensuring this bill became law. Representative Pigman is a U.S. Army reserve lieutenant colonel who is currently deployed in Kuwait and proudly serving our nation. I was pleased he was able to join our event today via Skype so we could recognize his hard work on this legislation and for his selfless service to our nation.” Lawmakers approved the measure despite opposition from the Planned Parenthood abortion business, which claimed it should be between a woman and her doctor as to whether a baby who survives an abortion attempt receives proper medical care and treatment. At least 1,270 babies are born alive after botched abortions every year in the United States. An AP report indicates: “Florida Gov. Rick Scott is visiting a children’s home in the Panhandle where he’ll sign a bill that requires medical care for newborns who survive botched abortions. Scott is scheduled to sign the bill Wednesday at the Florida Baptist Children’s Home located just outside of Pensacola.” “The legislation (HB 1129) would penalize abortion providers who don’t provide medical care for infants born alive despite attempted abortions,” AP continues. This is the same legislation President Barack Obama refused to support during his time in the Illinois legislature and it mirrors a national law President George W. Bush signed after nurse Jill Stanek exposed how her Chicago-area hospital left babies to die in utility closets after botched abortions. The pro-life measure, HB1129, ultimately cleared the House Criminal justice Subcommittee despite opposition from the abortion giant. The bill would require that medical care be given to newborns, likely to be premature, who survive botched abortions. The care would be given at a hospital and not at the abortion clinic. The Senate supported the bill on a 38-0 Senate vote. Responding to the vote, Americans United for Life president Charmaine Yoest saluted the Florida Senate for unanimously passing legislation to protect infants born-alive following botched abortions. Earlier this month, Dr. Yoest testified in favor of the measure and observed that it provided Floridians with “real protections for children, alive and struggling for life, who deserve a chance.” “Stories of children stabbed with scissors in Dr. Kermit Gosnell’s Philadelphia abortion clinic and the LiveAction videos released this week show that infanticide is an on-going problem in America abortion clinics today,” said Dr. Yoest. “We also call upon states to enact AUL’s model clinic regulations which require abortion clinics to abide by the same basic medical standards as demanded of other out-patient surgical facilities. Florida legislators are an example to the rest of the nation of courageous leadership on behalf of Life.” “The recent statements by Planned Parenthood’s Florida lobbyist illustrate just how fragile even the most humane legal protections for young children really are in America,” she told LifeNews The Florida bill requires that, if an infant is born alive after an attempted abortion, the child must be immediately transported to the nearest hospital and given appropriate medical treatment. A born-alive infant would be entitled to the same rights and privileges as any other infant following a natural birth. In opposing the bill and care of newborns who survive abortions, a Planned Parenthood lobbyist said “any decision that’s made should be left up to the woman, her family, and the physician.” CLICK LIKE IF YOU’RE PRO-LIFE! Previously a national pro-life group released footage of an undercover video showing a Planned Parenthood staff member telling a pregnant woman than babies are left to die after induced labor abortions where the baby survives the abortion procedure. The video shows the student going to a Title X, federally funded Planned Parenthood facility located in Freehold, New Jersey. A Planned Parenthood staffer describes how an abortion would be performed on a 22 week unborn child. In the footage, the Planned Parenthood nurse describes to the pregnant woman that the abortion would entail delivering her son alive. After the woman asks if the baby can be born alive, the nurse admits that “it does happen…but it wouldn’t be able to survive on its own, so eventually the baby does die.” Babies have been left to die before at abortion clinics — such as this one in Florida.

The full exchange shows McHugh stating the truth that all mainstream media establishments seem to dance around, and then reminding someone who is not English that his opinion is not necessarily on point. In return, the Breitbart kaffeeklatsch erupted: A number of Breitbart colleagues, who chose to remain anonymous, also attacked Ms McHugh for her Islamophobic comments. Speaking to CNN anonymously on Sunday, one said they found them “appalling” while another branded them “terrible”. …This is by no means the first time she has made inflammatory remarks about race. She once told her 19,000 Twitter followers: “Mexicans wrecked Mexico and think invading the USA will magically cure them of their retarded dysfunction. Lol.” It is rare for Breitbart, a publication which has been accused of writing racist and misogynist articles, to dismiss its employees for their controversial views. Although one exception is the case of Milo Yiannopoulos. In February, the alt-right figurehead, who was one of the site’s most high-profile writers, was forced to resign from the publication after his apparently pro-paedophilia remarks resurfaced in an old podcast. McHugh said nothing that Ann Coulter, Pat Buchanan and any conservative before 1965 would have admitted was true, and her comments are especially on point regarding recent Muslim terror attacks in the UK and France. If diversity did not exist, the problems of diversity — including the actions of other groups who want to dominate or destroy us — would not afflict us. Breitbart has succumbed to DR3, or the tendency by conservatives to attempt to “prove” they are non-racist by accusing others of racism, creating a circular firing squad: Many on the Dissident Right mock cuckservatives for engaging in “DR3” or DemsRRealRacists i.e. incapable of defending their values on their merits, they concede the Left’s moral premises, but accuse them of being the “real racists”, homophobes, sexists etc. DR3 afflicts the mainstream Right, which struggles for “respectability” or at least less censorship in a Left-leaning time. Big internet giants like Google and Twitter, major publications and big donors often will drop and ignore any publication which crosses the line on race, which in late Leftism means anything but foaming-at-the-mouth advocacy of diversity or having multiple ethnic and racial groups in the same society. As an implicit endorsement of diversity, DR3 subscribes to the “Magic Dirt” idea that if we take people from the third world, bring them to our lands and instruct them in propaganda for our system and culture, they will take it up and suddenly become us. This both replaces us and replaces their own culture with ours as a dominant colonial power. When conservatives take up “magic dirt,” it shows that they have been captured by the very group they claim to oppose, namely the Left, since they have adopted Leftist policies like diversity, equality and indoctrination. Once an organization starts celebrating diversity, cucking and convergence are soon to follow As I said in the Darkstream last night , to prevent convergence, you must resist the urge to excitedly embrace rival identities who happen - or merely claim - to share your values. In most cases, you will learn that identity trumps values, and when they bring in more of their identities, your values, no longer shared, will be rapidly jettisoned in favor of social justice values. Labels: cuckservative, Darkstream, media

The riders spoke and BART listened when designing the new Fleet of the Future train cars. Now the public is invited to experience what the new fleet will look and feel like during an unprecedented outreach effort with 10 events held all over the Bay Area between April 16th and May 9th. The public will get to walk through the model train car and provide feedback on the new modern features. This tour is the final review of the train car design before manufacturing and testing begin. New Features By popular demand, the new cars will be: Quieter: “micro-plug” doors will help seal out noise Cooler: cooling systems will distribute air directly to the ceilings, making it more comfortable for standees on hot days Comfortable: padded seats will have lumbar support and will be covered with wipeable fabric for ease of cleaning Easy to use: routes will be color coded like the BART system map, and next stop information will be readily available via automated announcements and digital screens Watch the above video for a sneak peek. More details about BART's New Train Car Project can be found at www.bart.gov/cars Please find attached the printable invitation. Times & Locations San Francisco—Justin Herman Plaza (Near Embarcadero Station) April 16, 2014 | 11:30am–7:00pm West Oakland Station April 18, 2014 | 2:00–7:00pm Fremont Station April 21, 2014 | 2:00–7:00pm Pittsburg/Bay Point Station April 23, 2014 | 2:00–7:00pm San Francisco—Civic Center Plaza (Fulton Street near Civic Center Station) April 25, 2014 | 11:00am–7:00pm North Berkeley Station April 29, 2014 | 2:00–7:00pm Milpitas/San Jose—Great Mall Main Transit Center (Great Mall Parkway & S. Main Street) May 2, 2014 | 2:00–7:00pm Dublin/Pleasanton Station May 5, 2014 | 2:00–7:00pm Fruitvale Station May 7, 2014 | 2:00–7:00pm Concord Station May 9, 2014 | 2:00–7:00pm

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice may have released an epic trailer during Comic-Con weekend, but it remains one of the most secretive superhero movies of 2016. However, despite the title, other DC Comics heroes will also be making an appearance. Those include Aquaman, The Flash, and Wonder Woman, but is that going to leave the movie too stuffed? “I try and stay central,” director Zack Snyder told Yahoo Movies in a recent interview about the film. “There’s something really fun about bringing the other characters in, but it’s really about staying central to the real core mythology is what I think the audience enjoys most.” The secrecy mentioned above has obviously led to a lot of rumours and speculation about what’s to come, including recent reports that Snyder’s son is going to play Robin in a brief flashback depicting the death of Batman’s sidekick at the hands of Jared Leto’s Joker. However, the filmmaker isn’t letting the rumours get to him and finds them rather amusing: “There are so many, it’s insanity. It’s funny because every now and then someone will touch on something that’s kind of true, but the next thing they say makes me realize that they took a wild guess. They’ll say something and I’ll say “Oh snap, they must have seen the script.” And then they’ll say, “And this happens!” And then I’ll go, They have no idea what they’re talking about. It’s fun for everyone to speculate and take shots and think of things and try to sell it. There’s an industry in selling your guess. [People think], “I’m going to make a fake script and look like I read the real one.” What length are you willing to go?” “There’s a rumor that my son is [playing] Robin. It’s not true. Now there are all these images of him that people have made where he’s dressed like Robin. It’s fun to hear and see them.”

HBO has started to crack down on paying customers who access the HBO Now service from outside the United States. Subscribers from countries including Canada, the UK, Germany and Australia who use VPNs and other unblocking tools are now being threatened with account terminations. In an effort to gain more subscribers HBO launched its standalone “HBO Now” service earlier this year. The subscription allows Americans to access HBO’s content, including Game of Thrones, without the need to have a television subscription. With the offer HBO hopes to drive people away from pirate sites, but it also created a new form of unauthorized use. As with Netflix and Hulu, many people outside the U.S. signed up for the service through VPNs and other geo-unblocking tools. Although they are paying customers, using HBO Now from outside the U.S. is not permitted under the company’s terms of use. While Netflix is still fairly lax about geo-unblocking, HBO is now cracking down on the practice. A few days ago thousands of VPN and proxy “pirates” started to receive worrying email warnings. “It has come to our attention that you may have signed up for and viewed video content on the HBO NOW streaming service from outside of the authorized service area (the United States, including D.C. and certain US territories),” HBO writes. “We would like to take this opportunity to remind you that the HBO NOW streaming service is only available to residents of the United States, for use within the United States. Any other access is prohibited by our Terms of Use.” HBO Now warning The emails in question target users all over the world, including Canada, the UK, Germany and Australia. Unless they were flagged by mistake, HBO will terminate the accounts of affected subscribers within days and without the option of a refund. HBO is cracking down on VPN and proxy pirates to protect the value of their licensing deals. If millions of foreigners use the U.S. version, local partners in these countries are going to complain. However, since legal options are often lacking there’s little doubt that many ‘unauthorized’ viewers will find less official ways to access the shows they love to watch. This time, however, HBO will not get a dime.

“Battle Lines” Written by Hilary J. Bader and Richard Danus & Evan Carlos Somers Directed by Paul Lynch Season 1, Episode 12 Production episode 40511-413 Original air date: April 25, 1993 Stardate: unknown Station log: Dax and O’Brien have found some old files from when the Cardassians had the station, including some of Dukat’s notes on various members of the underground, Kira among them. (Kira is less than thrilled to discover that she’s listed as a minor errand-runner for the terrorists.) Kai Opaka has come on board, to finally take Sisko up on his offer of a tour. It’s the first time she’s ever set foot off Bajor, and Sisko, Kira, and Bashir (she came aboard on a medical transport) take her to the Promenade. She asks to go through the wormhole, and the three of them take her on the Yangtzee Kiang. On the other side of the wormhole, Kira detects a subspace communication—it’s just statistical data with a request for a reply. Sisko intends to follow up later when they don’t have the Bajorans’ religious leader in their runabout, but Opaka points out that she doesn’t get out much. However, when they investigate, they find a moon surrounded by satellites—one of which fires on the runabout, forcing it to crash land. Opaka does not survive the crash; Kira is devastated. She holds Opaka’s hands and starts the Bajoran death chant. Bashir detected life on the moon, and Kira’s funeral ritual is interrupted by the three of them now being at gunpoint. They’re taken to a cave where they’re interrogated by Shel-la, the leader of the Ennis. His people are at war with the Nol-Ennis. Kira, it turns out, was also injured in the crash, but she’s been hiding it. As Bashir treats Kira, Shel-la reveals that this is a prison planet. Just by being in the Ennis compound, the Nol-Ennis will think that the away team is on the Ennis side. They also don’t have any medical personnel, and Bashir agrees to treat their wounded and give them some first-aid training. The Nol-Ennis attack. Sisko, Bashir, and Kira stay hidden—at first. Kira then breaks cover and uses her phaser to start a rockslide, which ends the battle. As they tend to their wounded, Opaka walks into the cave, alive and well. Several other people who were killed in the fighting also get up, fully healed. With Sisko and the others three and a half hours overdue, and Odo being bugged by Opaka’s people every five minutes or so, Dax and O’Brien take the Rio Grande to search for the away team. They try to trace the Yangtzee Kiang’s warp eddies. The Ennis and the Nol-Ennis are ancient enemies who have fought the same war for generations, for reasons no one even remembers. The leaders of their world sent them all to this moon as punishment, injecting them with artificial microbes that keep them from dying. The war simply goes on and on and on. They don’t even bother with proper tactics anymore, for what would be the point? Sisko then offers Shel-la a way out: he’ll take anyone who wants to leave when their rescue shows up. But the offer is for both sides—Sisko convinces Shel-la to set up a meeting with Zlangco, his Nol counterpart. However, those talks go very poorly, and a fight breaks out. Opaka and Kira have a heart-to-heart on the subject of Kira’s violent past and her desire to move beyond it. Meanwhile, Bashir has gotten the runabout computer running, and his analysis reveals that the microbes are environment specific. If anyone with the microbes is removed from this ecosystem, the microbes stop working, and they instantly die. This applies to the Ennis, the Nol-Ennis, and Opaka. Dax and O’Brien find the Yangtzee Kiang thanks to O’Brien pulling a piece of technobabble out of his ass and set a course for the prison moon. They avoid being hit by the satellites, and then manage to punch through the interference to contact the surface. O’Brien and Dax work on a way to make transporters work. Opaka knows she’s supposed to stay on this world before Sisko can even tell her about the microbes. She knew when she came through the wormhole that she wouldn’t be coming back. Her place is to stay on this world and help these people heal. O’Brien and Dax launch a probe to lure one of the satellites out of orbit, which pokes a big enough hole in the satellite field for O’Brien to beam Sisko, Kira, and Bashir up. Can’t we just reverse the polarity?: O’Brien hits on the notion of how to find the Yangtzee Kiang by the best way to find a needle in a haystack: use a magnet. He says he can use a differential magnetomer. When Dax tartly points out that she’s never heard of such a thing and asks what it does, O’Brien sheepishly says he’ll let her know as soon as he makes one. Don’t ask my opinion next time: Kira goes on an emotional rollercoaster in this episode: first finding out that Dukat viewed her as a minor operative who ran errands for the important people, then helping give the kai a tour of the station, then going with her to the Gamma Quadrant, then watching her die, then watching her be resurrected. On top of that, she shows great frustration with the Ennis’s lack of decent battle tactics (and won’t be dissuaded by Sisko’s barking admonition to stay the hell out of it), and is guilted into admitting to Opaka that she’s not sure if she can be forgiven for her life of violence. For Cardassia!: Dukat left a bunch of his files just sitting around in the computer, which Sisko figures might be a useful look into the Cardassian mindset. Keep your ears open: “’A minor operative whose activities are limited to running errands for the terrorist leaders’?” “Major, when you’re through feeling underappreciated, perhaps you’d join me in welcoming the kai aboard.” Kira being outraged, and Sisko deflating her pissiness. Welcome aboard: Camille Saviola returns to the role of Opaka following “Emissary,” while the great Jonathan Banks plays Shel-la. Also Paul Collins plays Zlangco and if you look carefully, you’ll notice regular stuntwoman/actor Patricia Tallman as one of the Ennis. Trivial matters: This marks Kai Opaka’s final present-day appearance onscreen. She’ll be back in “The Collaborator” and “Accession,” in both cases as an orb-related vision. Opaka will return to the Alpha Quadrant in the novels Rising Son and Unity by S.D. Perry (after succeeding in uniting the Ennis and Nol-Ennis). She appears in several other books, including the Terok Nor novels Night of the Wolves and Dawn of the Eagles by Perry & Britta Dennison (taking place during the Occupation), the novel Bloodletter by K.W. Jeter and the short story “Ha’mara” by Kevin G. Summers in Prophecy and Change (both taking place between “Emissary” and this episode), and the novels Fragments and Omens (the Bajor novel in Worlds of DS9 Volume 2) by J. Noah Kym and Fearful Symmetry by Olivia Woods (both taking place after her return to Bajor). Opaka gives O’Brien a necklace for Molly early in the episode. It’s never referenced again onscreen, though O’Brien discusses it in the novel Lesser Evil by Robert Simpson. This episode marks the fifth and final episode directed by Paul Lynch. While he directed five of the first dozen episodes of the show, he’d never direct DS9 (or any other Trek show) again. To be fair, the poor man was probably exhausted, given that he directed as many episodes in two-thirds of one season of DS9 as he had in five seasons of TNG… It’s also the first DS9 credit for both Hilary J. Bader and Richard Danus, both of whom contributed to TNG. Bader will be involved in the writing of three more DS9 episodes, and also write for the Star Trek Klingon CD-ROM game, including the lyrics to the Klingon warrior’s anthem, which was later used in “Soldiers of the Empire.” Danus would later write the story for “The Sword of Kahless.” The Yangtzee Kiang is the first runabout to crash. It is not the last. Walk with the Prophets: “Your pagh and mine will cross again.” The one thing I intensely dislike about this episode are the scenes on the Rio Grande with O’Brien and Dax. Allegedly, Dax is the science officer, yet every scene on the runabout plays out like a Doctor Who episode with O’Brien as the brilliant, eccentric Time Lord with Dax reduced to the “what’s that, Doctor?” role of the companion. Dax does absolutely nothing useful in the episode, leaving all the heavy lifting to O’Brien. It’s an appalling use of the character who’s supposed to be the science officer. It’s actually more annoying in retrospect, knowing that Dax would be allowed to actually function as a science officer. When I first watched this episode two decades ago, I was wondering if it was either a) sexism thinking that only the man could actually Do Science while the woman stood by helplessly or b) lack of confidence specifically in ex-model Terry Farrell’s ability to sound smart, since the episode had two really strong female characters in Kira and Opaka. However, that’s really the only stain on this episode, which is not a great episode by any means, but a pretty decent, if standard, science fiction story. I like the fact that Sisko offers to rescue them, Prime Directive be damned, justifying it while biting Bashir’s head off when he makes a snarky remark on the subject. But every attempt Sisko and later Bashir make to improve the situation fails due to the combatants’ inability to see beyond their own conflict. They won’t accept Sisko’s offer of leaving the planet due to an unwillingness to let their people out of hiding where the other side can find them. Shel-la will only accept Bashir’s offer of reprogramming the microbes if he can use it as a weapon. It’s funny that this is one of only two appearances Camille Saviola made as Opaka in the first season, because if you’d asked me for my recollections of the character it would be that she appeared more than twice. It’s a tribute to Saviola that she imbued the character with sufficient gravitas to make her character seem like more than a two-episode guest shot in the first season. In general, what elevates this episode from its standard space-opera-ness are the performances. Besides Saviola, Nana Visitor really sells Kira’s emotional turmoil. Her devastation upon Opaka’s death is palpable, without ever spilling over into melodrama, ditto her catharsis with Opaka later on, as she’s forced to admit to how much of herself she sees in the Ennis and Nol-Ennis. Nobody ever went wrong casting Jonathan Banks, particularly as an embittered warmonger (nobody sneers better than Banks), and Avery Brooks does a nice job of trying to find a solution to the dilemma (and also not being at all afraid to wade in when combat breaks out around him). The whole “I knew this was my destiny” nonsense from Opaka is kind of irritating, though it does seem like fitting work for someone who held Bajor together during the Occupation. A solid, strong episode with some good character work for Kira, and which sets up lots of future plotlines regarding who the next kai will be. Warp factor rating: 6 Keith R.A. DeCandido reminds everyone that his newest book, the short story collection Tales from Dragon Precinct, is now on sale.

Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window) Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Jay Z will launch his streaming music service, Tidal, with the backing of a host of artists, including Taylor Swift, Madonna, Jack White, country star Jason Aldean and Daft Punk. Jay is throwing a splashy New York launch event at 5 p.m. Monday at NYC’s James A. Farley Post Office building. Jay has cut deals with a host of artists — including those in the Roc Nation stable, such as Rihanna and Kanye West — to stream all of their content on the service. A music industry executive told us, “Tidal isn’t just about streaming music. Users will be able to access audio, video, social media, B-roll, merchandise, ticketing. Users will be able to have a special connection to the artists.” Tidal uses a high-fidelity streaming protocol that boasts better sound quality. And while artists, particularly Swift, have complained that rival service Spotify doesn’t fairly compensate artists, insiders say Tidal is “going to be Robin Hood, the first minority-owned, artist-friendly streaming service.” Jay recently bought Tidal for $56 million from Swedish tech company Aspiro.

Vintage style for the home and garden • Useful, entertaining, and sinister objects for your office or study • costume and gothic style jewellery and fineries • Stylish pocket watches and compasses • Vintage style binoculars and telescopes • Adventurous steampunk supplies • Nostalgic party and wedding • Alice in Wonderland, Sherlock Holmes, and Doctor Who collectibles. The essential tool of detectives, antiquarians, and others on the trail of hidden secrets. I couldn’t find anything like this anywhere else. I love the Victoriana aesthetic. This article is translated from an original project on the Dutch Design on a Budget blog. We have made some very minor edits to make it more applicable to readers in the UK. For more inspiration, take a look at our blog article about budget vintage decor at IKEA. The Moppe storage trays are very popular among IKEA Hackers. I found a lot of different hacks and fun examples on Pinterest! From sle ... Posted by Victoriana Ltd on 18 October 2018 00:41

A GLASGOW councillor is facing calls to quit after he flew the Israeli flag from the City Chambers. Almost 2000 people have signed a petition urging David Meikle to resign. He waved the Israeli flag as civic leaders raised the Palestinian flag over the council HQ to show solidarity with those affected by the conflict in Gaza. Jewish communities reacted angrily to the flying of the Palestinian flag and said it would only stir up tensions and cause "offence and division". Councillor Meikle accused council leaders of failing to condemn the actions of Hamas, the Islamic terrorist group which rules Gaza. Angry residents hit out at his decision and the petition has already attracted more than 1,700 signatures. It reads: "This petition calls for the immediate resignation of David Meikle from his position as Elected Local Councillor with Glasgow City Council representing the Ward of Pollokshields. "His decision to fly the Israeli flag on Friday August 8, without any authority or formal consent from the top floor of the City Chambers, while the Palestinian flag was being officially raised on the approved authority and consent of The Lord Provost of Glasgow leaves us, the citizens of Glasgow with no option but to move a vote of No Confidence in his tenure as a local representative of the ward."

Several months ago, after Einchenwald performed miserably during a Tucker Carlson debate, a troll on Twitter sent him a strobe tweet, which then actually caused Kurt to have a fucking seizure . At the time I thought it was hilarious, not because having seizures or causing them is funny, but because in order to activate the deadly strobe tweet that was sent to Kurt, he had to have clicked on the image to activate it. In other words, stupid Kurt gave himself a seizure. But now the fun is over and the twitter prankster is likely going to prison, alongside another 40 people who thought it was funny to tweet strobe causing images to people who are prone to getting them. Trolls BTFO. When will you fuckers realize that the social media ghettos are nothing more than honey pots? I strongly advise that you start hanging out more on sites like Zerohedge, who don't give a shit about strobe causing GIFs, in favor of 'send a tweet, go to prison' Twitter.

Copyright by WIVB - All rights reserved News 4 Staff - HOUSTON, Texas (WIVB) -- Chances are good that if you have a toddler, he or she has light-up shoes. A story in Texas is making parents everywhere consider throwing them in the trash. A Houston mother woke up over the weekend to find her SUV on fire. Officials found her two-year-old son's light-up shoes charred inside the vehicle. "I'm just glad that my son wasn't wearing it at the time, and if he had been wearing it, I don't know if he could have told me, 'My foot's hot," the mother said. "I don't think he could have taken it off by himself." The Fire Marshal thought the shoes likely started the fire, and the mother is glad it happened overnight and not while her son was wearing them. This has parents asking, "Are light-shoes unsafe?" These are the same shoes that the family in Texas had: Jake and the Never Land Pirates light-up sneakers, purchased at Payless: Copyright by WIVB - All rights reserved Here's what is inside the shoes: Copyright by WIVB - All rights reserved Payless released a statement on the matter, saying, "First and foremost, safety is always a top priority at Payless, and we take the claim made by the customer seriously. We have contacted the family, and we will work with them and local authorities to better understand the circumstances of the car fire and what may have caused it." This appears to be an isolated incident. News 4 has searched for any other reports of fires involving light-up shoes, and haven't found any. The consumer product safety commission doesn't have any warnings about these shoes. Fire experts we reached out to say lithium ion batteries can malfunction, but they had not heard of this happening before with a pair of shoes.

The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited – are you a massive fan? GameCentral talks to the director of The Elder Scrolls Online, about the future of the game and of MMOs themselves. We always find it very difficult to cover massively multiplayer online (MMO) games. The amount of time needed to give them a fair review, and the need to keep up with their constant updates, makes it all but impossible for us. But we are always interested to see how they fare, and although we also try to avoid email interviews where possible we did take up Bethesda’s offer to speak to The Elder Scrolls Online (ESO) director Matt Firor. Together with PlayStation exclusive Final Fantasy XIV, it’s one of the few games of its type available on consoles. And it’s probably no coincidence that both are based on well-known single-player franchises. That’s still no guarantee of success, but with the game soon to celebrate its second anniversary on PC, and with new DLC Thieves Guild out on March 22, it seems to be prospering. Advertisement Advertisement What we wanted to know from Firor is why, and how he thinks the game, and the genre at large, will continue to evolve over the coming years… GC: How do you feel The Elder Scrolls Online has performed since launch and what are you most pleased with? What do you think were the biggest mistakes at launch and what do you think ESO offers that other MMOs do not? MF: ESO is doing awesomely! Our success has gone a bit under the radar so to speak, but we are very happy with where we are. I am very pleased that we developed a game that can take so many different types of gamers and give them different play experiences – but all the while introduce them to other play styles and stay true to the Elder Scrolls lore. I’m also extremely happy with how our technology works behind the scenes. We don’t get to talk about that enough, but we seamlessly hide server transitions and instancing, which allows players to simply choose a region megaserver (Europe or North America), and the technology does the rest. To answer your question about comparing ESO to other MMOs: ESO is not really a traditional MMO, so we don’t use that term much around the office – and it is this distinction that separates it from other games. If you want to play it solo, like you did with other Elder Scrolls games, you can do that. If you want to play it super-grindy with dungeons, Trials, and group bosses as the core of you experience, you can join up with others and do that too. Advertisement Advertisement It’s really up to you to figure out how you want to play it, as we don’t enforce a play style one way or the other. In fact, ESO has been super-successful at taking gamers not used to massive online games, introducing them to the concepts of group play by making it fun and optional, and turning them into online gamers. I think we could have done a couple of things better at launch like setting proper expectations for our betas (which for the first few were done primarily for technical scaling testing, not for game testing), and we definitely launched with a content bug that prevented many players from completing quests. GC: Were there no qualms before release about the game being yet another MMO in a Tolkien-esque universe? Why has that become the standard for the genre and surely it’s damaging to have casual gamers assume you can’t have one without the other? Was there no thought to make Fallout Online instead, and what challenges did adapting the Elder Scrolls universe to an MMO present? MF: Again, we’re not really a traditional MMO, we are much more of a hybrid, kind of like an ‘online RPG’. The term MMO is freighted with a lot of pre-conceived notions, most of which are outdated and obsolete. But, no, of course we had no qualms about making an online Elder Scrolls game – we were following just two and a half years after one of the best-selling (and awesome) RPGs in history: Skyrim, which ignited huge interest in the Elder Scrolls as a brand. Advertisement As far as challenges go, for much of the game’s development, Oblivion was the most recent Elder Scrolls game, and we had to change with the times when Skyrim was so successful. But by far the biggest challenge was to create that Elder Scrolls feeling where you are free to do what you want inside a massive online game where you see other players. GC: What is the breakdown of players within ESO, in terms of casual and more hardcore gamers, and those that have played previous Elder Scrolls games and those that have not? Do a lot of people play the game expecting Skyrim 2 and how have you dealt with this and other misconceptions? MF: The answer to this question came as a very pleasant surprise to us: we always assumed that console players would be more casual than PC players, and boy were we shocked after our console launch when we found that console gamers were just as much into ESO – in terms of hours played and dedication – as our PC community. We don’t really segregate our player base into ‘hardcore’ and ‘casual’, we see it more as players who prefer to play solo and socialise via chat, players who primarily PvP, players who run dungeons and daily quests, etc. Looking at it that way is far more useful to us, as it shows habits, and lets us track players as they discover different play styles as they encounter new systems (and other players, who teach them) in the game. Advertisement We don’t know exactly how many ESO players previously played other Elder Scrolls games, but we assume it is the great majority. After PC launch, and especially leading up to console launch mid-last year, we have done a great job setting customer expectations about what ESO is, and now that it has become so popular, I don’t think we run into anyone thinking the game is Skyrim 2. Our bigger challenge has been to educate players that we are not a traditional 2004-style MMO and much more an expansive online Elder Scrolls RPG. GC: One of the great pleasures of The Elder Scrolls is exploring the world and stumbling on areas that it seems only you can have ever found. How important was this to the experience of ESO and how have you kept them refreshed over time? MF: This concept is the core of our content design – lead the player somewhat, but leaving plenty of areas for the player to explore and wander until their heart’s content. This is the core experience of Elder Scrolls – we refresh this by releasing new DLC game packs periodically that have new areas, and we are constantly refining the game to be less restrictive and let players explore the game more. For example, all of our DLC game packs released allow players of all levels to explore together and the game scales appropriately. This has been very popular with the players, so we are going to continue with that philosophy when creating future content. GC: How have you found that different people are playing the game? What percentage treat it as single-player game like Skyrim and how many as a co-operative experience? How much overlap is there between the two groups and what has surprised you about the way the game has ended up being played? MF: ESO is a huge game with a lot of different types of content, so we encourage players to play the game the way they wish. Most players start out mostly solo, but the game introduces them to new concepts over time – group bosses, which are encountered in the wild and require some help to defeat, along with other auto-grouping features like Dark Anchors and public dungeons. Later, they get introduced to four-man dungeons, PvP, and eventually Trials, our large-group ‘raids’. All of these are best tackled with a group, but players aren’t forced to do them. In fact, you can play the hundreds of hours of solo quest content if you wish and still have a great time. As for overlap, there is a ton. Most of our players have at least tried group content like dungeons, and there are many players who reserve days of the week to do different types of content: Tuesdays, for example, are a popular dungeon and Trial day. We encourage this by having daily quests (via our in-game group, the Undaunted) that take players into dungeons to discover really cool rewards. GC: Do you feel the age of subscription-based MMOs, or games of any kind, is now over? And why? It seems somewhat ironic that as most individual games give up the idea subscription services like PS Plus and EA Access are becoming more prominent. MF: As they say, the forecasting business is best left to palm readers – I would never make a firm ‘never’ statement, as business models tend to evolve so much they eventually come back around to where they were. But, obviously, for now the market is trending towards pay-as-you go and pay-for-entrance type business models, both of which ESO supports. GC: Why are MMOs still rare on consoles and what do you feel the success of ESO can teach other games? Is it the audience that presents a problem on consoles or merely technical and licensing issues? MF: Making games of this type is really, really hard. There are only a few studios in the world that would attempt a project so large and complex to develop as ESO – and the console stakes are really high. You need to have a really solid, experienced development team to pull off a AAA game running on a custom-built private cloud network, make the game fun and engaging, and be able to support it indefinitely with content and infrastructure upkeep. And for a game the size of ESO, it has only been with this current generation of consoles that the devices were even capable of supporting it. GC: From your perspective what has changed for the best, and worst, in MMOs over the last decade? What do you think are the next important evolutions for the genre, in terms of gameplay, monetisation, and technology; and how will ESO approach them? MF: What has happened in the last decade is that the term MMO doesn’t really mean anything by itself any more. Most games are online at this point, and some of them are pretty massive, but wouldn’t be considered MMOs by 2004 criteria (like Grand Theft Auto, Minecraft, etc.). As networking and platform technology has become commoditised, it has become easier to make online games, which has brought much needed competition and opening up to other genres like shooters, strategy games, and of course role-playing games. The online RPG genre is interesting right now, because much of the energy is currently being spent on far smaller player-per-server models that focus on a specific type of gameplay: like Crowfall, for example. Quickly-scaling AWS (Autonomous Web Services) server technology makes session-based games like this easier to do, and focusing on one playstyle (like PvP in Crowfall’s case), makes it smaller and more focused. GC: Will MMOs as a distinct genre always be around or will they perhaps become a style of play, in terms of the persistent world and characters that is merely applied to multiple styles of game? Or will they always be considered something separate? MF: This is a great way to state what I was attempting to answer in the last question: MMO now refers to a technology, not to a genre, and will probably keep moving in that direction. Email gamecentral@ukmetro.co.uk, leave a comment below, and follow us on Twitter

Help us give FREE phpList hosting to your favourite Open Sources projects. We have noticed some super-cool Open Source projects are using closed source (proprietary) newsletter software. We would like to change that by giving away unlimited free phpList hosting, on phpList.com, to any Open Source project that wants it. As part of phpList’s 15th birthday celebrations next month, we will send your favourite a Open Source project(s) a birthday themed phpList goodybag in the mail, to encourage them to make the change. All you have to do is suggest a project using the form at the bottom of the page, we will do the rest. Here’s a map of projects that have been suggested already. Why we care We are passionate about Free and Open Source software: it’s just better. Most of us here at phpList Ltd. have a background in Open Source campaigns and advocacy, we want to “give back” to the wider Open Source community in whatever way we can. Why Open Source projects are using proprietary software There’s no great conspiracy here, just a lot of hurried decisions taken years ago. By the time we offered phpList as a service, many projects were already using proprietary software as a service: the simplicity and speedy set-up they wanted just wasn’t available from us at the time. Now, the obstacles to freedom are falling away: it’s mostly just a case of inspiring people to make the change. Who is eligible Any active Open Source software project, whether it be maintained by individuals, a charity or a business, is eligible. Open Source, Free Culture and Digital activism groups may also be eligible. Suggest a project Suggest a project below. You can suggest several projects, just refresh the page and start again. Notice: JavaScript is required for this content. No Fields Found.

"What was your experience at Princeton like?" The question always stumps me. The simple answer would be to outline the many opportunities for networking, education, and enrichment I've received before and after I graduated in 2009. However, a truer answer would be a flat, "It's complicated." I tend to chalk up my ambivalence about Princeton to my experience as a lower-middle-class black woman on campus. It felt like the expectations of the university were constantly shifting goalposts that I could never hope to meet. My introductory-level science instructors would grant me extensions when I was sick from stress, but then my freshman adviser would admit that he purposely told me to sign up for too many classes in a semester because he wanted to weed me out of premedical studies. I shared that adviser with many students, and from what I heard the only ones who received such treatment were minorities. The university paid for me to go home during an internship to attend my uncle's funeral, but then my department head essentially told me to get over it when I told him that grieving the deaths of my pastor, uncle, and aunt in one year was making it difficult to cope. Based on his response, it seemed impossible for him to believe that a student could have a pastor gunned down in a robbery, an uncle murdered, and an aunt who died of untreated cancer all in one year. He seemed to think that I was making up tragedies in order to get out of classwork or to cover up academic inadequacies. To me, it seemed that since he had never experienced a life that was so frequently beset by setbacks, he couldn't empathize with a student who came from a background where these things happen, maybe not with regularity, but with relative frequency. I never knew whether to expect empathy or indifference when I met with a professor, adviser, or administrator. As long as my experiences fell within paradigms they understood, they could empathize. But as soon as I diverged from the "quintessentially Princeton" mold, I was a problem to be pushed aside. Though I graduated years ago, it's clear that it is still challenging to be a minority at Princeton. In November, student protestors filled the university president's office, hosting a sit-in until their demands were met. These demands included: an acknowledgment of alumnus and former president Woodrow Wilson's legacy of racism and the removal of his name from all buildings, including the school of public policy and international affairs bearing his name; mandatory "cultural competency training" for all faculty and staff, including discussions of how freedoms of speech and intellectual thought can exist in ways that do not reinforce xenophobia and anti-blackness; the addition of courses on "marginalized peoples" to the required curriculum for all current students; and a space for black students on campus. The nature of these protests and the demands articulated speak to a minority population on campus that felt disempowered, unsupported, and misunderstood by faculty, staff, administrators, and the majority of the student population at large. I can't say that I'm surprised. If Princeton treats all of its students the same way it treated me and other minorities during our time on campus, the institution is in need of far more serious reform than just removing Woodrow Wilson's name from various buildings around campus. That time I was interrogated about a crime I didn't commit In the years since I graduated, I've written off many petty experiences at Princeton as just the foibles and anxieties accompanying coming of age and the power struggles between student and authority figures. However, there was one specific incident that was just harrowing enough that even though I spent the better part of a decade downplaying it, it still has the power to send me into a full-fledged anxiety attack. (Vox asked a Princeton University spokesperson to confirm the details in this account, and received this reply: "Given how long ago this is alleged to have occurred, and the fact that many of the key individuals who might have been involved are no longer at the University, we're unable to verify any of the details.") In my first full semester at Princeton, I worked at the campus bookstore. I hated working retail, but the U-Store allowed me to rent textbooks for free, and I needed the paychecks for spending money. My mother was battling breast cancer at the time, and I didn't want to be a burden by constantly asking for money for school supplies and social activities. I worked by myself and did my homework or studied whenever I wasn't helping customers or restocking merchandise. More on Woodrow Wilson Woodrow Wilson was extremely racist — even by the standards of his time There were a few quirks about the job. All the cashiers had the same login code for the register. I'd worked customer service jobs in high school, and I thought that system was weird and potentially unsafe for the company. The store's only locking mechanisms were a couple of metal gates secured by two combination locks that I was informed hadn't been changed in years. This also struck me as strange, because all students and other employees who had worked there in the past few years would not only have access to the store itself from those locks, but also would likely know the code to the register. I brought this up during training and was ignored, so I shrugged and moved on. One afternoon, I was taking a nap between classes. I woke up to the sound of someone banging on my dorm room door so hard that the hinges rattled. Scared that something was seriously wrong, I hustled to the door and opened it, blearily rubbing my eyes. There was a plainclothes detective at my door, barking at me to present myself to the Public Safety Office at 2 pm. I'd already had encounters with Public Safety that year because someone was apparently using my address for credit card fraud, so I didn't think meeting the detective was that big of a deal. I was wrong. I went to the office at the appointed time and was escorted to an interrogation room. There was a two-way mirror, a stainless steel table bolted to the floor with a landline phone on it, and two burly, middle-aged white plainclothes detectives doing their best impression of every good-cop-bad-cop shtick I'd seen on CSI. They asked me questions about my job at the bookstore and what my closing routine was like, and I answered them to the best of my ability. They then asked about one afternoon two weeks prior, which I couldn't remember at all, and I said as much. After about a half-hour of questioning, they left me in the room by myself. Some time passed. I don't know how long it was, because there were no clocks in the room and I didn't have a watch or a cellphone. The detectives escorted me to what appeared to be a command center or an open office area of some sort. They told me they'd decided to "level with me," telling me that $500 had gone missing from the bookstore and that they had proof I stole it. They went on to say that stealing $500 is considered grand theft, a felony in the state of New Jersey, and that I would be expelled and imprisoned ... unless I let them help me. I was in shock. I'd been an honor student since I was 10 years old and was so hopelessly nerdy and sheltered that the worst thing I had ever done was shoplift a book from Barnes and Noble ... and then return it because I felt guilty. I stammered that I definitely didn't steal the money and that they could check my bank statements if they wanted to see how consistently I didn't spend money. I did not have the vocabulary to articulate the times that I felt unsafe, unwanted, and unsupported The detectives told me that they knew without a shadow of a doubt that I was guilty and if I just signed a confession for them, they could reduce my expulsion to a suspension and I could probably just serve probation instead of jail time. I shook my head no, asking them to pull the surveillance tapes to see that I didn't do it. And then they said, "Well, if you're good at what you do, you won't be on the tapes." I felt as though I'd been slapped. It was clear to me that they didn't see me as a person. I asked to call my parents. I was a minor, still only 17. They not only refused to let me call my parents, but also continued to pressure me to sign a confession for the next 25 minutes. I was scared and confused, and I briefly contemplated signing it just to get them to leave me alone, but I knew I was innocent, and I knew better than to sign anything saying something to the contrary. The detectives became increasingly hostile, demanding, and aggressive until I screamed, "I didn't do it! I don't know what you want from me!" and burst into tears. It's then that they shared an uneasy look, offered me some tissues as I sobbed, and finally escorted me back to the interrogation room to let me call my parents. By the time my dad picked up his phone, I couldn't breathe through the tears. I was hiccuping and sobbing incoherently: "police," "arrest," "innocent," "help me." My parents live in a suburb of Chicago, and the 719 miles between home and Princeton never felt larger and longer than it did in that moment. In a voice colder than I have ever heard it before or since, he ordered me to give the phone to the nearest adult. I heard him yelling through the phone, "What the fuck have you done to my daughter?" and heard the detectives stammer and stutter and dissemble as they said, "We only asked her a few questions, sir. She all of a sudden became distraught, and we don't know what happened. We're going to take good care of her." Apparently, their idea of "taking good care" of a crying, scared girl is to put her in the back of a squad car, drive her to the campus health center, and place her under psychiatric watch. Luckily for me, the counselor they turned me over to was sympathetic to my distress. She called my friends to come get me and escort me home. In the meantime, my parents convened at home and, pissed off and terrified on my behalf, they called the university president's office, demanding that someone tell them what was happening to me and if they needed to get a lawyer. No one could give them a conclusive answer, so they refused to stop calling until they got through to someone who could help me. When an administrator finally did offer to help, she promised me a formal apology from Public Safety and apologized herself that something like this would happen in my first semester at Princeton. As I remember, Public Safety responded by filing a formal report against me and informing my residential college dean that I was under investigation for a felony charge. When I asked if they'd questioned anyone else in connection to the theft, I was rebuffed. I couldn't help but wonder if I was being targeted because of my race — as I recall, I was the only person of color working at that store location. The morning shift worker was an older white woman who, I was told, was only questioned over the phone. My understanding is that no other students were brought into Public Safety — they were all questioned and released at the bookstore itself. I quit my job at the bookstore because I couldn't work for someone who didn't trust me, much less for people who would question me for stealing because they couldn't be bothered to replace their stupid locks. I had to use money that I didn't have to purchase copies of the textbooks I had been renting, which were recalled when my employment ended. I wasn't sleeping or eating well due to the stress of the investigation, and I stopped sleeping in my dorm room, bouncing from room to room of my friends' dorms, feeling that if Public Safety couldn't find me, then they couldn't kick me out of school. I couldn't help but wonder if I was being targeted because of my race — as I recall, I was the only person of color working at that store location. Over the next few months, I had mandatory meetings with my dean, during which he tried to keep me apprised of the investigation. I was told that Public Safety had lost any evidence that linked me to the theft and couldn't find several pages of the reports and testimonies that had been filed. It seemed to me they were both uncooperative and uncaring in regards to wrapping up the investigation one way or another so I could get on with my life. I remember they were particularly unrepentant when it was suggested that the investigation had been bungled, and refused to acknowledge any hint of wrongdoing. By contrast, I would be required to meet regularly with a counselor to process my "issues." I had that first meeting with Public Safety in September 2005. My final meeting with my dean was in January 2006, when he told me that Public Safety was dropping the investigation. I never saw any of the evidence. I never got an apology. I never even found out how or why the investigation was dropped. From what I understand, no other students or non-university-affiliated bookstore workers ever saw the inside of that interrogation room. I was the only one. No one I've told this story to even knew that the university had an interrogation room, much less that it was used for students. My parents wanted to sue the university. I didn't want to deal with the stress and pressure of litigation, and I asked them to just drop it so I could continue my education. My minority friends had similar experiences This was only one of many incidents in which I or one of my other minority friends would be denied our rights as students and as people because it was convenient or because someone in power felt that we were less likely to have resources to fight back. I asked a few of my peers for their experiences, and I was uniformly horrified. A friend of mine who has a disability recalled the structural inadequacies of the university, including a time when she was forced to climb several flights of stairs and breathe into a brown bag in order to meet with an administrator. She also related having collapsed outside her dorm and being kicked by someone to determine if she was conscious before the person called for help. Another friend related a class she had to drop because her instructor was so openly hostile to her. It was a rigorous course with only eight people admitted to take it per semester. When my friend offered to answer questions or attempted to participate in class, the instructor would ask for others' opinions, suggest she had not understood the readings, imply she did not do the readings, or sigh impatiently when she requested to chat one on one. After being openly humiliated in the class, she cried, walked out, and dropped the course. As we talked about her experience, she said, "I recall being in class and wondering what exactly it was about me he did not like, because it had nothing to do what I offered the course. Of all the students in the class, I was the only one with multiple jobs to get through my degree and the only queer black woman. I had been doing incredibly well in my department and studies at that point and just could not grapple with the anxiety that would build up every time I entered his classroom." My student mentor was attending a theater show only to have two white women loudly lament that their children would be at Princeton if they only hadn't had to fill their quotas for black students. When he interjected that that was neither true nor fair, they claimed that he was accusing them of racism and loudly took offense. A fight broke out at a hip-hop party sanctioned by the university, and the entire narrative within Princeton and the surrounding news outlets was that there was gang-related violence at Princeton, simply because one of the combatants was black and from a nearby, working-class town. The club hosting the party, of which I was a member, was asked to shut down. I was particularly offended at this because that fight was an isolated incident; it involved people who were not affiliated with the university, not just students. This is not to say that I hated my time at Princeton. I met amazing people, studied literature, science, and art with leaders of their fields, joined clubs, and made friends. I just wish that there had been more programs and protocols in place to make it easier for people from less-advantaged backgrounds feel as though they fit in. I spent the majority of my time feeling as though the admissions office had made a mistake letting me in — not because of my academic performance, but because I came from a completely different class of people. Princeton exposed me to people who would never have the same financial concerns as I did, and while I don't begrudge anyone their socioeconomic stability, I feel that if the university made more of an effort to be inclusive of students of minority and low-income backgrounds, they would have so many more alumni who would be willing to pay it forward upon graduation. Offering financial assistance for unpaid internships, making grants available for students to participate in the same immersion-study language trips as their wealthier peers, and accounting for living expenses when calculating the parental contributions of middle-class students whose parents may make enough money on paper but have very little on hand in reality, would all be great steps to take. Creating a transparent chain of command in reporting instances of discrimination and actively taking an interest in the ways cultural differences contribute to misunderstandings and actual, overt bias against minority students would be transformative. Why I'm proud of the student protesters — even if I don't agree with them about everything Current student protesters have succeeded in many of their demands: that the legacy of Woodrow Wilson be reexamined, and that a physical place on campus be created for black students. The university will also consider giving its faculty "cultural competency training" and including a diversity requirement in the core curriculum for students. I am proud of these and other student protesters around the country. Watching these students stand up for their beliefs and fight to actually create the diverse Princeton that the university claims itself to be has been empowering. I don't necessarily agree with all of the demands; I don't know if they are all feasible from the standpoint of the administration; but then again, I haven't been an enrolled student in almost a decade. What I do know is that I am so happy our society has progressed to such a point that these students are able to articulate the things they need to feel included at school. When I was at Princeton, when I was being investigated for a felony, when I was being set up for failure by advisers, when my realities of life were inconvenient to faculty or administrators, I did not have the vocabulary to articulate the times that I felt unsafe, unwanted, and unsupported. If universities want to retain students and faculty that are engaged and enthusiastic about their experience, then they must create an environment that not only allows people of different races, genders, sexual orientations, cultures, and socioeconomic backgrounds to enroll or work, but also allows them to thrive as members of the university community. Painting over murals and reconsidering legacies of institutional greats is one thing, but truly attempting to create a community where students aren't harassed, intentionally led astray, or made to feel unwelcome — or, you know, investigated for crimes they didn't commit on specious and possibly nonexistent evidence — is a much larger battle to be waged. Brittney Winters is a freelance writer in Chicago, where she lives with her fiancé, dog, and cat. First Person is Vox's home for compelling, provocative narrative essays. Do you have a story to share? Read our submission guidelines, and pitch us at firstperson@vox.com.

President Trump went after Democrats early Wednesday, saying they no longer want Carter Page to testify in the investigation into Russian meddling in the presidential election. "So now it is reported that the Democrats, who have excoriated Carter Page about Russia, don't want him to testify," Trump tweeted Wednesday. "He blows away their case against him & now wants to clear his name by showing 'the false or misleading testimony by James Comey, John Brennan...' Witch Hunt!" So now it is reported that the Democrats, who have excoriated Carter Page about Russia, don't want him to testify. He blows away their.... — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 31, 2017 ...case against him & now wants to clear his name by showing "the false or misleading testimony by James Comey, John Brennan..." Witch Hunt! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 31, 2017 Last week, Page, a former adviser to Trump's campaign, said he would testify before the House Intelligence Committee in early June. Page, who advised Trump on foreign policy, also said he obtained legal counsel. ADVERTISEMENT Page has been the target of lawmakers investigating possible ties between Trump's campaign and Russia during the presidential election. The Trump administration has repeatedly tried to distance themselves from Page, with top officials saying they never met him An intelligence dossier alleged Page met with Russian officials while working for the campaign.

A/N: If you've ever wondered what the Ethereal was saying to you every time a new wave of enemies attacked you on the Temple Ship... congratulations, I couldn't understand him either. The wiki has a convenient transcription of every line the Ethereal says for each new foe (and it's quite interesting), but a few of them are included in this chapter for your enjoyment. The Elerium-enhanced turbojets of the Skyranger roared to life, and Ruby felt the familiar sensation of XCOM's golden chariot delivering her team skyward. Except it wasn't her team this time, but van Doorn's. Bradford asked the Field Commander to take the reigns for what was literally the single-most important operation in XCOM's history, and Ruby had absolutely no objection to the squad leader assignment. With the fate of XCOM riding on the success of this mission, Ruby felt far more comfortable with the prospect of following orders instead of giving them. The ride started off in relative silence. Van Doorn and Annette, designated Actual and Two, sat across from each other by the Skyranger's gangplank and were engaged in a hushed conversation. Ruby's friends from RWBY and JNPR, with designations Three through Ten, filled out most of the jump seats in the cargo hold. Each of them sat next to their respective partners, and while some (like Jaune and Pyrrha) contented themselves with small forms of physical contact, others (like Ruby and Weiss) engaged in no activities beyond sitting next to each other. Ruby didn't mind, though, since she knew how much Weiss valued her 'professional' self-image. Besides, the mission was important, and Ruby wanted her best friend to stay on top of her game. And if getting Weiss 'in the zone' required a silent and absolute focus, then so be it. Captain Beagle, designated Eleven, sat in the back next to Jaune. It seemed like the two were slowly becoming attached at the hip ever since Jaune and Pyrrha first joined Beagle's crew on that fateful Harvester operation, and Ruby enjoyed the idea of Jaune making new friends. Sitting across from Beagle was Strike One's twelfth and final member, Gizmo. The MEC pilot sat in absolute silence, her eyes closed and her face impassive. Ruby vaguely remembered Blake taking Gizmo down to the Fission Generators to instruct her in the art of meditation, and it looked like the Pathfinder had taken the lessons to heart. There was one face missing, and it saddened Ruby when she remembered Bradford explaining to her that Penny would not be joining Strike One aboard the Skyranger. He mentioned something about another project, and how he needed Penny for that instead of letting her join the party. Whatever the case, Ruby trusted that Bradford had a good reason for making his call, so she just made a mental note to see Penny after the successful conclusion of the operation. The sound of a voice on the comm pulled Ruby out of her thoughts, and she smiled as she recognized it. "Big Sky, this is Colonel Lucerno. Central has assigned me to personally escort your craft to the Temple Ship. He suspects that the alien bastards actually want Major Durand to reach her destination, but we agreed that it would be ill-advised to take any chances." "Well, we're happy to have you, Eightball. Ride should be short, but I'll never say no to good company." "Excellent. Central estimates an hour to the drop site, so this should be a piece of cake." Ruby felt a small sense of comfort knowing that Strike One now had Eightball watching over them. After the Overseer dogfight, Ruby always made a point of watching Colonel Lucerno's air battles against UFO contacts. Knowing that he was the one that Bradford sent to escort the Skyranger… Ruby knew they'd arrive at their destination in one piece. As the flight continued, Ruby thought back on her time here at XCOM. She'd come a long way from the naive, idealistic girl that first fell through that portal into Bradford's backyard. Now, she commanded a vast amount of experience in squad tactics and combat acumen, knew the strengths and weaknesses of her fellow huntresses on a much deeper level, acquired a wide array of impressive technology designed to make it even easier to kill aliens and Grimm alike, and (perhaps most importantly) developed friendly and professional relationships that she would carry with her for years to come. She glanced at Annette, who flashed her a grin before turning back to van Doorn. Part of Ruby secretly hoped that Annette would fall in love with Remnant and Ruby could convince her to stay indefinitely. She had close friendships with the rest of XCOM's personnel, of course, but she shared a deeper connection with the French Major thanks to their psionic… adventures. Annette's training helped Ruby strengthen her resolve, giving the young leader an immense boost to her self-confidence and an array of abilities that would surely impress even her Uncle Qrow. The Captain's thoughts turned to Zhang. Ruby felt a little bummed that the Colonel couldn't join Strike One for the final op, but he still needed to recover from his run-in with the Ethereal. Regardless, he was another friend that Ruby wouldn't mind seeing regularly after the war's conclusion. While she was shocked when Zhang initially revealed how he felt about her, Ruby eventually came to realize just how much she appreciated the sentiment. Sure, she already had a father back on Remnant, but it felt nice to have a figure like Zhang looking out for her while she was stuck on Earth. And besides, it sounded like Zhang intended to use his impressive assortment of talents and contacts to be a force of good in the world once the alien threat was officially dealt with. Ruby smiled at the idea that she had a hand in making that possible. Bradford, Shen, and Vahlen… perhaps the three most important members of XCOM's team. Bradford's unwavering confidence served as the thread that tied everyone together while Vahlen and Shen worked as the greatest dynamic duo Ruby had ever seen. Shen's caution and realistic outlook served to temper Vahlen's fiery and oftentimes impulsive nature. If Ruby learned anything over the past six (... or seven?) months, it was that a healthy combination of both caution and audacity allowed XCOM's research and engineering department to perform miracles on a daily basis. She hoped that Shen would be able to spend some time with Ruby and her friends on Remnant, though Ruby knew that he had a small daughter to take care of. Well, maybe she could convince Lily that a vacation to another world would be a great idea, and then Shen would have no choice but to come. "Holy shit, that's a fuckload of Battleships." Ruby's head snapped up at the sound of the pilot's voice. She noticed that the rest of Strike One was likewise at attention, wondering what the news meant for the Skyranger. Van Doorn decided to ask the question on everyone's mind, "Are any of them on a collision course with our trajectory, Papa Bear?" "Negative. They're too busy bombing the hell out of civilian targets. God fucking dammit…" He muttered, "You fellas better find the leader of all this bullshit and wring his fucking neck. 'Cause this is taking 'scorched earth' to a whole new level." As silence resumed in the hold, Ruby strained her ears and tuned out the low hum of the Skyranger's engines. Sure enough, she heard the faint clap of heavy artillery booming as the aliens sought to crush humanity into subservience. Her heart sank as she thought about all the thousands, possibly millions, of lives being snuffed out simply for the sake of satisfying some twisted purpose of the aliens. You can hear them too, can't you? Ruby looked up and saw Annette casting a sideways glance at her. The Major must have opened a mental link without Ruby noticing. Is my expression that obvious? A strange sensation that Ruby finally identified as 'mirth' came across the link before Annette answered, Just a little. But in all honesty, the sounds make me sick. How can they justify this? The ends justify the means, or so they probably believe. That, and they probably don't care about a race that isn't their own. Fair point. Let's just make sure we stop this invasion here and now. We will, Annette. I know we will. "Strike Two is locked and loaded." "Strike Three, ready to kick some ass." "Strike Four, standing by." Zhang sighed as he heard the various Strike Teams sound off on the base comms. He managed to convince the security personnel assigned to the medbay to fetch him a commlink. Even if he couldn't join the fight, he didn't want to remain in the dark when the action started. Still, it hurt to simply listen and remain helpless to do anything, especially since he was the only patient in the maddeningly empty infirmary.. "Strike Seven, all operatives ready to go." "Strike Nine, awaiting orders." "Alright, listen up Strike Teams," Bradford's voice called out over the radio, "We have three main approaches into the base. I want Two, Three, and Four to be on point and keep those locked down. Five, Six, and Seven will remain in reserve, ready to support the point teams with a defensible fallback position or to deploy to any vulnerable locations that our guests have managed to exploit. Nine, you're the last line of defense for key facilities. Your top priority is the research labs, but be ready to move if the aliens manage to strike elsewhere." A sound plan, Zhang thought. He was certain that the front teams wouldn't be able to hold out against the entirety of an Assault Carrier's crew, however. If the reserve teams had any sense, and Zhang trusted that they did, they would use their time to create truly impressive fortresses behind the front teams, allowing the operatives of Two through Four to fall back when their positions became compromised. Everyone had a role to play in the fight. Base Security would try to assist the field operatives with supporting fire while Engineering personnel assembled sturdy barriers and operate SHIVs. Even Vahlen's researchers had the ability to use their superior knowledge of human biology and triage to act as supporting medics for the base defenders. Everyone had a role… except for Zhang. "A terrible fate for a warrior." He muttered. One of the soldiers guarding the medbay glanced over at Zhang, "Something wrong, Colonel?" "No." Zhang answered with a sigh, "Nothing that you can fix, anyway." You hear our voice, New One, now listen well… Annette stiffened as the Ethereal's voice once again found its way into her head. They must have been watching the Skyranger, because the voice began to speak almost as soon as Strike One stepped off of the Skyranger. Long have we watched… and waited. So many promising subjects, so many failed efforts. And now, after untold trials, the New One emerges to face the rigors of our collective… An enduring physical form, paired with an equally adept mental capacity — the rarest of traits, finally within our grasp. "I feel sorry for you, Ruby." Annette groaned, "I've only had these Ethereal assholes in my head for a minute, and I already hate them." The Captain smiled at Annette, "You learn to tune it out." And you have brought the foreigner, the Ace in the Hole, to serve as a contingency plan. We appreciate the forethought, though we hope such measures will not be necessary. "Oh good, now they're talking about you." Ruby raised an eyebrow, "Oh? Well isn't that interesting." Annette checked her shotgun and shrugged, "Eh, just something about they think you're a contingency plan. I'm not sure what they mean by that. Unless it means you're secretly their puppet, and you're going to turn on us at the last minute?" "Nope." Ruby said, shaking her head, "Hate to disappoint you, but that's not gonna happen." "Strike One, this is Central. Have you established a perimeter around your insertion point?" "Yes, sir. No signs of contacts yet." Van Doorn answered. "Good. We're dropping off a package for you that should be arriving very shortly. Something tells me you're going to like this one." The members of Strike One looked at one another curiously, wondering if anyone knew what Bradford was talking about. After seeing everyone either shrug or shake their head, Ruby keyed her mic, "Err, what kind of package are we talking about here, sir?" "A big one. Should be arriving right about… now." Jetboot thrusters fired overhead, and twelve heads snapped up to look at the source of the sound. Ruby caught sight of the second Skyranger flying off at maximum speed towards the direction of HQ before her attention was completely occupied by the hulking machine dropping from above at an alarming rate. Everyone backed away from the center of the landing platform, and the ground shuddered when a giant robot slammed into the metal floor with a resounding clang. Silence reigned as the operatives found themselves too stunned to speak. Support struts shuddered, servos whined, and the robot stood to its full height. Ruby thought she was somehow back on Remnant, staring down Torchwick's Paladin mech in all its heavy artillery glory. However, tell-tale signs of XCOM aesthetics and design choices immediately told Ruby that this was definitely something Dr. Shen cooked up. Twin Rail Guns replaced the usual arms XCOM MECs possessed, while a shoulder-mounted rocket pod, grenade launchers, a Restorative Mist Dispenser, and a smooth, circular plate were fastened to the robot's back. Ruby noted heavy plating adorned almost all external surfaces of the machine, allowing it to withstand heavy punishment while (ideally) remaining relatively unscathed. Just as Ruby was about to hail Bradford once more and ask what exactly her team was looking at, the new arrival turned to Ruby and waved one of its weapon arms. "Hello, Ruby! Did you miss me?" "P-Penny?!" Ruby practically shouted. "Yes! Dr. Shen built me an upgraded combat platform. Mr. Bradford asked me to keep it a secret, though, so I couldn't tell you about the new suit." She flexed her arms and rocked on her feet a bit, "I get the feeling he enjoys using me to surprise you guys about things." "Noted…" Ruby mumbled. She glanced at her sister, who looked completely slack-jawed at the sight of Penny's new hardware. "Does… does it have the capacity to support a MEC pilot?" "Yang…" Blake sighed. "Absolutely! Bradford sent me as the pilot for this mission, but the Odin is also capable of interfacing with a MEC Trooper." "Blake." "No, Yang." "But I wanna pilot it, Blake." "You'd have to de-suit, install yourself, and let the hardware run basic telemetry diagnostics. That would waste a lot of time that we don't have, Yang." "But I wanna!" Yang whined, "It's called the Odin, Blake! Do you have any idea how badass I'd sound if I could brag to our friends that I piloted the Odin?" "You mean the friends that are all standing right here with you?" "Hello!" Pyrrha said with a wave. "Or the friends back at the base who are very likely in on the secret?" "Oh, no. This was one of Bradford's 'dark' projects from Delta Section. He had the engineering crews start work on it around the same time as the second Skyranger." "My point stands." Blake said firmly, "You can play with the new MEC some other time." Yang groaned, "Fiiiiiine. Let's just get this over with, then." "Don't worry, Yang! I still have a co-pilot even without you." Penny gestured towards the circular shell embedded into the MEC's back, "Dr. Vahlen was nice enough to develop a way to interface Gidjit with the Odin!" "Y'know, I feel like I should be surprised." Beagle commented, "But shit just… doesn't surprise me anymore. Because why wouldn't Vahlen integrate a fucking Cyberdisc into a goddamn Gundamn?" "Ignore him." Ruby said, "We're happy to have you, Penny." "Chuffed as nuts, really." Beagle added, rolling his eyes. The air hung heavy with silence as the team cautiously stepped through the towering archway into the depths of the Temple Ship. With their newest squad member in tow, Strike One prepared for the inevitable battle that lay ahead. Hands firmly gripped steel as eyes tried to pierce the darkness, on alert for the possibility of a trap waiting to be sprung by their hosts. The New One faces the earliest effort of the Ethereal Ones, the first… failure. Though possessed of a certain… brilliance… they are marred by their cowardice and frailty… which made them cruel… and ultimately useless. "Contacts." Annette muttered. Beagle raised an eyebrow, "I don't hear shit. What makes you so sure?" "Call it a hunch." Annette answered, moments before the first bolt of plasma flew overhead. "Hunters, form up. Gunners, keep the contacts locked down while the shadow team moves to flank." Van Doorn ordered. Blake and Ren vanished from sight while the other six pulled out guns and began firing into the room. Ruby heard a low hum of Penny's rail guns warming up while pink explosions rocked the far end of the room, courtesy of Nora. A combination of plasma and Dust filled the air as the rest of Strike One took cover and searched for the original source of alien gunfire. "Contacts located." Blake reported over the comm, "Squad of Sectoids holed up down the hall. Looks like their opening shot was just to test the waters, since they don't seem to be in a hurry to step back out into the line of fire." Van Doorn growled, "Their little plan worked, but they'll regret it. Shadow team, tear into the little bastards. BFG and Hammertime, move in to assist while everyone else prepares for Grimm or any other contacts the Ethereals throw at us." "This is Strike Four, reporting first contact in Engineering." Zhang felt the hairs on his neck prickle as the faint crack of distant gunfire reached the medbay. Before, the waiting felt somewhat tolerable because everyone else was doing the same thing. Now that the fighting had begun, the feeling of helplessness multiplied tenfold. "Remind me again why one of XCOM's top field operatives is sitting uselessly in the medbay when he could be out repelling one of the most dangerous alien incursions to date?" He asked to nobody in particular. One of the two infirmary guards stationed to protect Zhang seemed to think the Colonel expected an answer, "Because Dr. Vahlen ordered it, sir. Personally, I agree with you, but I also remember the last time somebody ignored one of Vahlen's bed rest mandates." His eyes glazed over slightly, "I don't think I'll ever be able to erase the smell of vomit and blood from my memory." Zhang rolled his eyes, "You're exaggerating." "Wish I was, sir." "Where is Vahlen, anyway?" Zhang asked, "I doubt that Bradford would risk his chief of research by ordering her to pick up a gun and join the fight." "Strike Two, got some mechanical fliers in Delta Section." The guard shrugged, "Not sure. I think Bradford's keeping the whereabouts of Vahlen and Shen a secret to everyone but their personal squad details avoid a potential mind control leak." "Or you just don't know." Zhang said with an amused smirk. "Or I don't know." The guard admitted, "Look, I really… really look up to you, sir. It's killing me to enforce Vahlen's orders to keep you on bed rest when we both know that's the last place you want to be, but I also don't want to be known as 'the guy that gets Chilong killed because he bent the rules.' So as much as I would love to follow you into combat, sir, I can't." "Looks like the aliens decided to send their zombie-spawning shock troops through the hangar entrance, and there's a shitload of them. Strike Three could use some backup over here." "Three, this is Seven. We have a defensible position set up about fifty yards behind your position. Fall back, and we can support you." Zhang growled, his impatience starting to get the better of him. The guard exchanged nervous glances with his partner. The two of them knew better than to defy Vahlen's orders, but they also knew that Zhang's temper sometimes turned… volatile. The two exchanged nods before the first turned back to Zhang, "Look, I can't let you suit up, but maybe it'd be okay if I help you get out of that bed. Would you feel better if you could at least walk around in here?" "It's a start, at least." Zhang sat up and winced as pain immediately shot through his body. "Uh… yeah, you might not want to move just yet. Vahlen's got you hooked up to, like, a billion different sensors and IV drips. You kinda look like a marionette. I'll help you get unhooked." "You sure that's a good idea?" The guard shrugged, "From what I've managed to overhear when the aides talk, they're pretty much cautionary measures. None of them are giving any sort of life-preserving drug, so I think you'll be alright. Just… take it easy." "Yeah, yeah. Just help me up." The new one faces a great foe, and an equally great… disappointment. When their organic form failed to evolve… it was given the strength of a machine, creating this… merciless, fearless, killer… A fate worse than death. Annette's knuckles turned white as she gripped her shotgun while her eyes darted around wildly in search of contacts, "Uhh, I think we've got Floaters inbound, Actual." "Well, you were right about the Cyberdiscs and Drones, Two, so I'd say you're getting pretty good at this premonition business." Van Doorn said as he put down the last Drone still engaging the team. The Sectoids went down easily enough after initial contact, but the Field Commander suspected their true purpose was to morph into Grimm upon death. While the hunters busied themselves with their natural foes, several Cyberdiscs showed up with their usual Drone entourage to make things difficult. When the mechanicals showed up, Penny and Gidjit proved to be a godsend. With two rail guns and a fully-functioning Cyberdisc fighting for the good guys, the alien newcomers seemed a lot less of a problem. The enemy 'discs still posed a very real threat with their Assault Cannons, especially now that they possessed the 'explosively detonate Grimm' functionality, which forced the hunters to tread cautiously as they waded into combat. Jaune and Ruby stayed behind with the Earth operatives, Ruby providing long-range fire support and Jaune using his tower shield to provide superior cover for the biologicals while the rest of their teams pressed forward to engage the Grimm. Now, the sound of high-energy thrusters echoed throughout the room as a squadron of Floaters (both Heavy and otherwise) blasted into view. In a matter of seconds, plasma fire rained down on the operatives from on high as the Floaters began shooting at anything with a pulse. The hunters were agile enough to dance around the shots, but van Doorn, Annette, and Beagle remained hunkered down behind cover to avoid getting seriously injured. "Elsa," The Field Commander said, "Our new friends seem to be running a little too hot for my tastes. Why don't you work with Hammertime to cool them down a bit?" Weiss and Nora nodded, falling back from the Beowolf fight still in progress on the ground and taking cover behind a large, alien pillar. Magnhild shifted into a grenade launcher while Myrtenaster's revolver locked the vial of ice Dust into the active chamber. Nora gave Weiss a thumbs up before the duo stepped out from behind the pillar's protection. Small weapons fire erupted from the balcony where van Doorn's team tried to keep the attention of the aliens away from the two exposed huntresses. With a dancer's grace, Weiss twirled her rapier in a precise pattern before finishing the performance with a standing thrust towards the Floaters. A large, rotating glyph winked into existence between Nora and her targets. The fiery huntress raised her grenade launcher and unleashed a salvo of explosives at the flying horde. The heart-stamped grenades passed through Weiss's glyph and sailed onward towards their targets, now with blue contrails instead of pink. Seconds later, they detonated in a crystalline cloud of frost, enveloping the Floaters with sub-zero temperatures. Several of the aliens still managed to fight through the cold, but the fliers closest to the blast centers suffered engine failure as their jetpacks seized. Van Doorn smiled as he watched the little cybernetic balls of hate drop out of the air and slam into the metal floor. "Melee team, move in and take them out. We'll handle the rest of the fliers." Van Doorn turned to Beagle, "Isn't that right, Captain?" Beagle heaved the Recoilless Rocket Launcher to his shoulder and took aim at the fliers, "You know me, boss. I love the smell of smoking ayys in the morning. One Flak Rocket coming right up." Van Doorn groaned, though he couldn't keep the smile off his face, "Sometimes, I feel like you could do with a touch more professionalism, Beagle." "Yeah, well… at this point, people would probably wonder who the fuck was mind controlling Beagle and making him talk like a pretentious prick if I changed my ways." The warhead hissed to life and streaked across the room before detonating amid the still-hovering crowd of Floaters. Beagle took a moment to put on a pair of shades and admire his handiwork, "Besides, sometimes you just have to take a moment and appreciate the finer things in life." "On that account, I couldn't agree more." Van Doorn answered before keying his mic, "Prepare for new Grimm contacts, team. I don't know if the cybernetic aspect of the Floaters will interfere with the genesis process, but it's probably safer to assume the worst." "To any available units, Strike Two is getting hammered in Delta Section. We could use some help down here. Preferably with something that can handle Cyberdicks." "Strike Two, this is Six. We're en route and bringing MECs. Sit tight until the cavalry arrives." Zhang sat at the edge of his bed with his head in his hands. This wasn't right. He should be out there with his squad, pushing back the proverbial barbarians at the gates. Instead, all he could do was sit here and listen while the operatives in his squad faced death in his absence. It almost made him wish he never asked for the commlink in the first place. "They'll be alright, sir." The medbay guard assured him, "There's a reason the 'Chilong Gang' is famous throughout XCOM, and that's because they kick ass and take names." "Yeah, but Strike Two is currently missing its squad leader and second-in-command." Zhang pointed out, "In case you forgot, Major Durand is on the Temple Ship operation with Commander van Doorn while I'm stuck here with fuck-all to do." The guard chewed his lip, unsure of how to respond to Zhang's (admittedly solid) point, "Well, Six is Witchy's mob, isn't it? She knows how to snipe the ass off a Sectoid at eighty yards, and she trained up the rest of the squad's GLR hotshots. Those 'discs are toast." "Strike Three-Seven is suffering losses from the Chryssalid offensive, and requesting more security teams for support." "Three-Seven, this is Nine. We can send a few operatives to back you up, but the rest needs to stay in reserve to defend the labs." "Understood, Nine. Any firepower is good firepower. We'll take what we can get at this point." "Three Assault Carriers-worth of contacts." Zhang mused, "Even with seven Strike Teams to fend them off, it's hard to imagine fending off that much firepower." "Central, this is Four. Engineering is lost. Repeat, Engineering is lost." "That's not an option, Four." Bradford growled back, "We lose Engineering, and the aliens have access to a lift that spans the entire base." "It's already lost, sir. I-" Zhang raised an eyebrow at the guard as static filled the channel. Seconds later, Bradford's voice returned, "All available security teams not already engaged with the invaders, haul ass to the labs. I need anyone and everyone capable of picking up a gun and pulling the fucking trigger to get to Research ASAP." He knew that a smile was highly inappropriate at a time like this, but Zhang couldn't help it. His lips curled into a grin as he watched the two guards exchange nervous glances once more. The Colonel slowly stood up and grabbed his handgun off of the table next to his bed before facing the guards once more. "You heard the man: everyone capable of picking up a gun needs to muster at the labs." He held up Aurate Mercy and casually examined it, "Do I need to demonstrate that I'm capable of pulling the trigger as well, or can we just skip that and start moving?" "I… that won't be necessary, Colonel." Zhang nodded, "Good. Congratulations, gentlemen. You are the inaugural members of XCOM's Strike Ten, led by Colonel Zhang." He popped the revolver chamber out and confirmed that it was full before flicking it back into place with a click, "Now show me what you're made of." Now… the New One confronts a greater threat - a rare strength, found in an easily controlled breed. And yet, they are incapable of brilliance, of independence… they will never be more than primitive warriors… serving only to fight, and die, as those who came before them. Annette held up a hand, signaling for the team to stop. She shared a look with van Doorn, who nodded and turned to Blake, "You're up, Shadow Team. Annette's spidey senses are tingling again, so move ahead and figure out what we're up against this time." Blake and Ren saluted before activating their Ghost armor and vanishing without a sound. The rest of the team took cover in the hallway and remained on high alert in the event that the aliens chose to actively seek them out. Ruby, Weiss, Yang, and Penny took up a position in the rear while Jaune, Pyrrha, and Nora kept watch up front. The Earth operatives took cover between the two hunter squads. "How do you think the base defense is going?" Pyrrha asked her partner in a low voice. Jaune looked mildly surprised that Pyrrha wanted to engage in small talk, but he answered all the same, "They'll be fine. Bradford's got seven different Strike teams at his disposal, plus all the tech we've developed over the course of the war. Three Assault Carriers is a lot, but there's only so many places they can funnel in their troops, you know?" Pyrrha nodded, though Jaune could see that she looked unconvinced, "I suppose you're right. Still, it would be awful if this victory turned out to be-" "Pyrrhic?" "You know I don't like that joke." Pyrrha said, glowering. Jaune held his hands up in surrender, "Sorry. I think Beagle's gallows humor is starting to rub off on me." "Joking or no, you're still right." Pyrrha continued, "What if we come back to a completely destroyed base? Even if we've managed to cripple the invasion, Vahlen and her staff is the only way we'll be getting back to Remnant anytime soon. If they die-" "We'll find a way." Jaune interrupted, "I firmly believe that Bradford will mount a successful base defense, but if the worst does come to pass, then we'll find a way." Pyrrha was about to respond, when a panicking Blake cut her off, "We've been detected, and hostiles are closing in! Lots of Muton squads, both ranged and melee." The sounds of plasma fire in the next room reached the hunkered down squad, "We need backup, and we need it now!" Van Doorn swore, "The aliens must have developed countermeasures to our cloaking tech. Haul ass, squad! Penny, lead the charge and go in guns blazing. We need to take the heat of of Shadow, and I can't think of a better way to do that than with a fifteen-foot MEC. Gizmo, make a beeline for Shadow team and pull their asses out of the fire. Everyone else: weapons free. Fuck those Mutons and fuck them hard." The Odin unleashed a gutteral cry that sounded not at all like Penny and the MEC barreled down the hallway. After Penny rushed into the room and started to make some noise with her arm cannons and grenade launcher, the rest of the squad followed suit and took stock of the unfolding situation. Indeed, multiple Muton fireteams were scattered across the room, taking up firing positions while the Berserkers made their way towards Blake and Ren's cover in the far corner of the room. As soon as the two MECs had burst through the archway, several dug-in teams turned to attack the newcomers while the rest continued their assault on the cornered scouts. "Focus fire on those Berserkers." Van Doorn ordered, "If they get into melee range of Shadow, we've got serious problems. Hammertime, give our friends some smoke to help them hold out until we get things under control." "Yes sir!" Nora cocked her grenade launcher, and two canisters whistled as they arced through the air towards Blake and Ren. Seconds later, a pair of concealing pink clouds bloomed into existence. Gizmo jet-boosted herself overhead and started to make a run for the scouts, and the fire teams responded by peppering her with plasma fire. Ruby noticed the MEC's armor plating flare as the superheated munitions struck its surface. "Hostiles possess HEAT munitions." Gizmo reported, before ducking behind a pillar, "I will not survive the run to our comrades." "Then don't try it." Jaune answered as he put away his Plasma Dragon and activated his semblance, "I'll make sure our friends get the cover they need. Pyrrha?" Jaune felt the familiar tug on his armor and found himself soaring through the air seconds later. He tucked himself behind the safety of his shield and watched as it soaked all of the plasma shots that ordinarily would have hit him instead. At the apex of his flight, Jaune stole a look at the battlefield and cringed. The number of Mutons arrayed against Strike one was staggering. Didn't Annette say that the Ethereals wanted her to reach the end? If so, why try so hard to kill their precious 'key to ascension?' He landed with a thud behind the crumbling cover occupied by his friends, "Hey guys. Fancy seeing you here." Blake rolled her eyes, though she looked relieved all the same, "Good to see you too, Jaune." On the other end of the room, Ruby used her enhanced senses and psionically-enhanced reactions to pick off one target at a time before the rest of the fire teams forced her back into cover. The squad managed to decommission most of the Berserkers, and Nora's cloud provided enough cover for Blake, Ren, and Jaune to safely kill the rest without exposing themselves to the plasma fire of the rest of the aliens. As Ruby tried to take another shot at a target, she considered asking Weiss for a Time Glyph to further boost her killing potential. When she remembered how energy-intensive the process was for her friend, however, Ruby decided against it. As Strike One continued to trade blows with the Mutons, Ruby wracked her brain for a solution to the deadlock. "This is taking too long. Every second we waste in this piss fight with those aliens is a second they get closer to taking out Shadow." Beagle said, "Not to mention we'll likely have Grimm trying to chew our asses off in a minute. Permission to use a rocket, Actual?" The Field Commander nodded, "Do it, but make it count. Everyone else, provide covering fire while Beagle makes his shot." "Your best bet is aiming for the upper-middle walkway." Jaune called out over the comms, "I got a good look at their formation on my flight over." "When that rocket goes off, we need to use the opportunity to punch through." Weiss watched everyone gear up for the rocket gambit and felt an uneasy feeling growing in her stomach. Beagle's rocket would be helpful against the central squads, but the outer squads would still be capable of counterattacking and doing considerable damage to her allies. They didn't want to count on Gizmo or Penny for help, because of all the HEAT ammunition flying everywhere, so their couldn't use their heavy firepower against the Mutons. They needed some sort of meat shield, but sacrificing anyone from the squad was not an option. The word 'expendable' simply didn't exist in Strike One. Unless… "On my mark, Strike One!" Weiss knew she had seconds to pull off something that she'd never been able to do before. Eyes closed, she calmed her mind as best she could before focusing on the task at hand. Never before had she summoned a Beowolf, a miniature Nevermore, or even a Creep. How could she possibly do it now? Then again, maybe she didn't have to summon a Grimm at all. Winter told her to think back to her fallen foes, those who forced her into becoming the huntress she is today. Like a lightning bolt, an idea struck her. A long shot, surely, but maybe she could make it work. She wracked her brain for a strong memory she could use for the summoning. When had the aliens forced her into becoming a better fighter? Weiss smirked. "Mark!" As everyone else stepped out and let loose with their rifles and grenade launchers, Weiss brandished Myrtenaster and whipped it at the Mutons attacking from the right. Beagle's rocket screamed towards its target, and the room became enveloped in a flash of white. When Weiss could see again, a pair of white and blue Chryssalids stood before her, facing the Elites she had her eye on. Her heart soared, and she used her soul's essence to command the Alien horrors to charge forward. The summoned spirits shrieked and skittered forward. Friend and foe alike gawked as the evanescent creatures charged the Muton line, tearing into the first one with very real and very wicked talons before everyone remembered how to pull a trigger. A roar from the left indicated that Jaune's team seized the opportunity to push forward towards a more defensible position. "Thanks, Vance…" Weiss whispered. "They're disorganized!" Van Doorn shouted, "Push the attack!" Ruby heard Annette's voice in her mind, Ruby, with me. Let's sow more terror among the Mutons, shall we? The Captain and the Major locked eyes and shared a knowing smile. Ruby channeled her psionic energy and sent it towards Annette, additional fuel for the fire to come. Annette's eyes glowed a bright purple, and the fingers tapping her forehead shot out and pointed straight as an arrow to the fire teams wounded by the rocket. A whirlpool of psionic energy swirled into existence, lashing out and killing the aliens caught within its chaotic grasp. "Forward, MECs! Let's finish them off!" "Targets acquired! Firing solutions ready!" Two deep thumps resounded as Penny's rail guns annihilated a pair of Mutons trying to defend against Weiss's pets. Gizmo's Jetboots fired and launched the Pathfinder into the midst of the Mutons scrambling to mount a defense against Jaune's push. Ruby breathed a sigh of relief. The tide had turned, and the fight was now well in Strike One's favor. Hopefully, the rest of the fighting would get easier from here on out. A/N: Alright, important question for you all. The second half of this battle is already written and ready to go through the editing process before it gets posted next week. The only problem is that 'second half' is kinda stretching it, because the chapter clocks in at a whopping 10,250 words. Now, I have two options for this monstrosity. Option A, just post the whole thing as a single chapter so you don't have to wait even longer for a resolution to the Temple Ship assault. Option B, split up the mission into thirds (like the Terror Mission) so you're not faced with the prospect of tackling a 10k word chapter. I don't mind either way, so I want to hear from you guys which option you'd prefer. Let me know!

A screenshot of an online survey testing cognitive abilities. (The Brain and Mind Institute/Western University ) An individual's IQ score — long-held as the standard measure of human intelligence — is not a valid way of assessing brainpower, say Canadian researchers. A team from Western University is debunking the concept of general intelligence, saying that there is no single component that can account for how a person performs various mental and cognitive tasks. Instead, human intelligence is made up of multiple and distinct components, each of which must be looked at independently. The study, published today in the journal Neuron, included the largest online intelligence survey on record, which recruited more than 100,000 participants. "The uptake was astonishing," said Adrian M. Owen, the project's senior investigator. "We expected a few hundred responses, but thousands and thousands of people took part, including people of all ages, culture and creeds from every corner of the world." The survey, which was open to anyone in the world with an internet connection, asked respondents to complete 12 cognitive tests that tapped into memory, reasoning, attention and planning abilities. The results showed that how people performed at the tests could only be explained with at least three distinct components: short-term memory, reasoning and verbal ability. No single measure, such as an intelligence quotient, or IQ score, could account for how well, or how poorly, people did. The researchers also used a brain-scanning technique known as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to look at the brains of a select group of participants as they performed different tasks. They found that each cognitive component related to distinct circuits in the brain, supporting the idea of multiple specialized brain systems, each one with its own capacity. Link between lifestyle habits and brain function The study also looked at respondents' backgrounds and lifestyle habits and found links between brain function and factors such as age and gender. "Regular brain training didn't help people's cognitive performance at all, yet aging had a profound negative effect on both memory and reasoning abilities," said Owen. Other factors were smoking, anxiety and the tendency to play videogames. "Intriguingly, people who regularly played computer games did perform significantly better in terms of both reasoning and short-term memory," said Adam Hampshire, one of the study's authors. "And smokers performed poorly on the short-term memory and the verbal factors, while people who frequently suffer from anxiety perform badly on the short-term memory factor in particular," Hampshire added. The 'g' factor The concept of a general intelligence factor dates back to at least 1904, when psychologist Charles Spearman suggested that there was a correlation between seemingly unrelated tasks, such as memorization, reading and performing arithmetic. He called this link the 'g' factor, or general factor, and proposed that is accounted for an individual's performance across different mental tasks. Various intelligence tests, using a wide variety of methods, were developed throughout the 20th century as a way to evaluate children, students, military recruits and even potential hires. Intelligence testing has often been criticized for various reasons, such as being culturally biased or for having invalid methodologies. Yet it has been generally accepted that general intelligence does exist, even if it is difficult to measure. "We have shown categorically that you cannot sum up the difference between people in terms of one number, and that is really what is important here," said Owen, adding that further tests still need to be done. "Now we need to go forward and work out how we can assess the differences between people, and that will be something for future studies."

Ed Sheeran, known for his soulful songs, is giving fans a snapshot of a different struggle, his childhood battle with stuttering. The 24-year-old singer was honored on Monday at the American Institute for Stuttering’s Free Voices Changing Lives Benefit Gala in New York City. In his acceptance speech, Sheeran revealed he believes his stuttering stemmed from a procedure affecting his nervous system. Ed Sheeran Professor at University of Central Florida and His Many Other Roles What Ed Sheeran Thinks About Taylor Swift and Calvin Harris “I had a port-wine stain birthmark on my face that I got lasered off when I was very young; one day, they forgot to put the anesthetic on, and ever since then, I had a stutter,” he said. The British singer-songwriter revealed it was another fellow Grammy winner – rapper Eminem – who unknowingly helped Sheeran stop his stutter after a 9-year-old Sheeran’s dad gave him Eminem's “The Marshall Mathers LP” CD. “I learned every word of it back to front by the time I was 10,” Sheeran said. “And he raps very fast and very melodically and very percussively and it helped me get rid of the stutter.” Sheeran joined actress and gala host Emily Blunt – an actress who also dealth with stuttering earlier in life – at the event. The singer told the audience to embrace their inner weirdness. “Just be yourself. Embrace your quirks,” he said. Sheeran went on to perform the next night at a sold-out concert in Des Moines, Iowa, where fans saw a singer who had found his voice. “Kids worry a lot about fitting in but the moment you stop trying to fit in is when stuff fits around you,” Sheeran told ABC News. “Everything you think is wrong with you is actually right with you because that makes you an individual and that makes you an even more interesting human,” he said. “That makes you, you.”

The Cleveland Browns have signed veteran quarterback Josh McCown, the team announced Friday. "Josh is your consummate professional," Cleveland general manager Ray Farmer said, according to Pat McManamon of ESPN. "...We are excited to get him and believe he will help continue to move us in the right direction and help us build the type of team that will bring winning football to Cleveland." McCown agreed to a three-year, $14-million contract with the club, with $6.25 million guaranteed. It appeared Josh McCown was headed to Buffalo. It took old-school recruiting by #Browns to secure him. Pettine, Haslam, Defilippo did work — Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) February 28, 2015 McCown has spent time with a number of teams over the course of his 12-year NFL career, making 11 starts in his lone season with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2014. "I just want to serve our team and help everybody in that locker room, do my best to help everybody in the locker room be better at their job and they're going to help me, too. It's a two-way street," McCown said on Friday. "I'm just excited about coming in and being a part of a team." While the Browns will almost certainly hold a quarterback competition in training camp - giving Johnny Manziel the opportunity to show some much-needed improvement - McCown will be the heavy favorite to earn the starting job going forward. The 35-year-old threw for 2,206 yards, 11 touchdowns and 14 interceptions this past season before being released in early February.

CBS News reports: A Russian television correspondent was dealt a serious blow Wednesday, in a literal sense, as he attempted to cover celebrations marking a national holiday in honor of Russia’s Airborne Troops. The NTV correspondent was reporting live from Moscow’s Gorky Park, where men who served as paratroopers in Russia’s compulsory military service traditionally gather on August 2 to mark the national Day of Russia’s Airborne Troops. In a tradition praised by few Russians, the former paratroopers gather at Gorky Park and others around the country and generally make merry, which often involves heavy consumption of alcohol and results in many jumping, swimming and falling into water fountains. The correspondent was trying to say that the Airborne is one of the most prestigious units for Russian military conscripts to serve in, when a man appearing to be intoxicated begins berating him with profanity and then punches him hard in the face. The correspondent for NTV, one of Russia’s biggest broadcasters, is then chased by the belligerent man until the shot cuts back to the news anchor in the studio, who appears lost for words.

Sebastian Vettel won four successive world titles from 2010 to 2013 Chinese Grand Prix Venue: Shanghai International Circuit. Date: 10-12 April (Race - Sunday, 06:00-09:00 BST) Coverage: Live commentary on BBC Radio 5 live sports extra; text commentary on BBC Sport website; highlights on BBC One (Sunday, 14:00-15:55 BST) Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel has played down the prospect of replicating his Malaysian Grand Prix victory in China. The four-time champion caused a shock by holding off Mercedes to secure his team's first win in almost two years. But Vettel said the victory was partly down to high temperatures at Sepang, which will not be repeated in Shanghai. "We did a great job in Malaysia, but we have to be realistic," said the German ahead of Sunday's race. "Mercedes is in a strong position." The heat in Malaysia caused Mercedes problems on two levels. They were forced to race on the harder and slower of the two tyres because they could not make the softer and faster tyre last long enough. Even on the harder tyre, they were unable to achieve the mileage Ferrari managed on the softer one. Media playback is not supported on this device Malaysian GP: Pits and Giggles from Formula 1's second race weekend "For here and for the next races, things can be up and down," added Vettel. "We want to ensure that there is more 'up' than 'down'." He added that Ferrari's focus is on establishing that they are the "team right behind Mercedes" and try to close the gap as much as they can. Defending champion Hamilton, winner of the opening race in Australia, is three points clear of second-placed Vettel in the championship. The Englishman, who finished second in Sepang, said: "It wasn't the best weekend for us. There were lots of things we could have done better." But he added: "We are not stressed and we will be stronger this weekend." Victory in Malaysia was Ferrari's first since Fernando Alonso won the Spanish GP in May 2013. It was also Vettel's first victory since the final race of the 2013 season in Brazil - and the 40th of his career. It puts him one behind Ayrton Senna as the third most successful driver in terms of wins in F1 history. "It's very special," said Vettel, adding. "It's not really fair compared to the guys in the past, as we have 19 or 20 races a year now." Chinese Grand Prix coverage

The goalkeeper is on loan from Manchester City and has rediscovered his confidence after being dropped by Pep Guardiola. He has repeatedly been linked with a return to the Premier League for the likes of Liverpool and Everton. Joe Hart while at Manchester CityReuters “We will enjoy Hart and cuddle him, but we know he’s not our player and his wages are not accessible for us,” President Cairo told La Stampa newspaper. “We’ll see what we’re going to do in June.” Cairo was also asked about Torino interest in Roma forward Juan Manuel Iturbe. “I like him, but the January transfer market is never banal. Torino remain my priority, we are targeting Europe and declared that from the start of the season. I would’ve liked to aim for the Champions League, but one must balance the books.” Read the original article on Football Italia - The ultimate website for English-speaking fans of Italian football

Chunyun (traditional Chinese: 春運; simplified Chinese: 春运; pinyin: Chūnyùn), also referred to as the Spring Festival travel season or the Chunyun period, is a period of travel in China with extremely high traffic load around the time of the Chinese New Year. The period usually begins 15 days before Lunar New Year's Day and lasts for around 40 days. The number of passenger-journeys during the Chunyun period is projected to be hitting over 2.9 billion in 2016.[1] It has been called the largest annual human migration in the world.[2] Rail transport experiences the biggest challenge during the period, and myriad social problems have emerged. This phenomenon is also seen in parts of East Asia such as Taiwan, Vietnam and South Korea. [3] Pictographic world map comparing the largest periodic human migration events Origin [ edit ] chunyun period Temporary ticket offices in the square outside of Hefei railway station , open for the Year 2011period Three main factors are responsible for the heightened traffic load during the Chunyun period. First, it is a long-held tradition for most Chinese people to reunite with their families during Chinese New Year. People return home from work or study to have Reunion dinner with their families on New Year's Eve. Since the Chinese economic reforms of the late 1970s, new economic opportunities have emerged, often at a considerable distance from people's hometowns. Places such as the Special Economic Zones and the wealthy coastal regions offer employment and often, a more sought-after lifestyle. Consequently, there has been a massive migration from rural to urban areas over the course of the last few decades, reminiscent of other industrial revolutions around the world. The number of these migrant workers was estimated at 50 million at 1990 and unofficially estimated at 150 million to 200 million in 2000.[4] During the Chunyun period, many of these laborers return to their home towns. Second, Chinese education reforms have increased the number of university students, who often study outside of their hometown. The Spring Festival holiday period falls around the same time frame as their winter break.[5] Among the 194 million railway passengers of the 2006 Chunyun period were 6.95 million university students.[6] Finally, because the Spring Festival Period is one of the week-long holiday periods in the People's Republic of China (the only other being National Day, Oct 1), many people choose to travel for pleasure around this time. Tourism in mainland China is reaching record levels, further adding to the pressure on the transportation system. These factors exacerbate current problems with China's current inter-city transportation systems. The railway network is insufficient to handle the number of passengers, and does not reach enough places. The locations not serviced by rail must rely on buses for transportation, which faces problems such as inadequate equipment and road network. Impact on transportation systems and related problems [ edit ] The most affected modes of transportation are inter-city surface passenger transportation systems, namely railway and road networks. Most Chinese middle-class citizens cannot readily afford air transport. International, urban and waterway transportation are slightly affected.[7] Until 2007, due to the high demand, the prices of tickets are increased during the period.[8] In 2007's Chunyun period (Feb 4-March 14), however, the government imposed strict regulations against inflated prices on railway tickets. In 2012, the PRC government announced that national highways would be toll free for Golden Week, and as a result 86 million people traveled by road (13% increase compared to the previous year).[9] The same year, 7.6 million people traveled via domestic airlines, and 60.9 million people traveled via railway.[10] Railways and buses [ edit ] The Ministry of Railways estimated that 340 million passengers would take trains during the 2009 Chunyun period. However, the average daily capacity of the Chinese railway system is 3.4 million. The shortage of railway resources led many passengers to pay double or even triple-priced tickets from scalpers or to wait in lines for up to a day at railway stations. A Chinese railway ticket from 2006 Because of the extremely long waiting period, many customers become frustrated and search for solutions even cutting in line, often resulting in conflict. Fighting over places in line is often seen, and as people get closer to the ticket booth, much pushing and shoving ensues. The overworked ticket booth workers are generally frustrated with the repetitive and dull nature of their work, which, in most places in the country, come in long shifts every time, and therefore reflect a largely negative and frustrated image to the customers. Inquiries by customers are not always answered correctly or at all; customers are not offered many options to begin with, if time is allotted for indecision the customer is usually pushed aside by the next person in the line. The same problem is found with phone lines, which saves the anxiety of waiting in line, but are severely overloaded and the reception is often rude when a ticket agent finally picks up after several hours of waiting. In Shenzhen it is estimated that 23 days worth of tickets can be gone in a matter of 14 minutes if telephone was the only method employed. An internet system is present, but at times inadequate. To fit demand, hundreds of "temporary trains" (Linke) and hundreds of thousands of temporary buses are operated during this period, the number of ticket offices is increased and selling periods are extended to cope with the demand, with temporary booths springing up. Batch orders from schools and factories are organized to distribute tickets ahead of time. These measures, however, are generally inadequate and often tampered with. For example, during the 2005 Chunyun period, the ticket offices in Shenzhen had tens of telephone lines, and at times got millions of calls per hour. In the Guangzhou area, the number of calls reached 19.91 million per hour. Guangzhou Railway Group increased the number of telephone lines at their ticket offices to 8,000 in the 2006 Chunyun period. Due to the basic nature of Chinese railway tickets and the loosely set limitations on the number of "standing tickets" (which is basically a pass to get on a crowded railway car), Scalpers (piaofanzi 票贩子 or huangniu 黄牛, lit. yellow bull in Chinese) profit greatly during the Chunyun period. Organizations of scalpers have emerged, and the scalpers inside the sometimes intricate network work collectively to make the most gain out of the tickets. They pick up tickets in great numbers minutes after they go on sale, and then deal them out in and around the railway station at highly inflated prices. A significant problem has also emerged with the illegal dealing of tickets through obsolete ticket modification or even printing outright fake tickets using computer technology. Although measures have been put in place to prevent fake tickets, passengers who purchase the tickets become extremely frustrated when the authenticity of their tickets is questioned only upon arrival at the ticket validation officer, what would be minutes before boarding the train. Because of the worsening nature of the problem, the government has issued many warnings and began various campaigns to crack down on the scalpers. Unfortunately, because of the complicated nature of the problem and the social networks which surround the scalper organizations, police and other authorities who are supposed to be in charge of the crackdown often become involved in the illicit activity themselves, and take many bribes from the scalpers. There has also developed a significant safety risk during the Chunyun season. Theft, robbery, fraud and other crimes are the most flagrant during the time period. Passenger supervision and checks on luggage become stricter. The common belief in the safety of railway travel is undermined by the fact that many railway cars are severely overcrowded. Bus companies, in order to gain a bigger profit, overwork the bus drivers on irregular schedules, overloading people every round, causing a higher accident rate. Trains also face a problem with scheduling, as an overcrowded network cannot ensure the overall accuracy of train schedules, and some trains are habitually late hours at a time, cause unease and frustration with passengers. The government has taken to passing legislation to regulate late trains, and make a public notice and apology for late trains mandatory. The passenger flow during the Chunyun period is usually imbalanced. Before the Spring Festival, passengers usually gather in developed coastal cities, railway interchange cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Guangzhou, and basically flow from more developed urban areas to less developed rural areas. The passenger flow direction is reversed after the Spring Festival. In addition, passenger flow is very sensitive to disruption, such as bad weather.[11] In 2007, round-trip train tickets became available for college students.[12] Severe snow storms in late January 2008 stranded many thousands of migrant workers as they attempted to get home. At one time over 100,000 people were at the main railway station in the southern city of Guangzhou.[13] Around 1.3 million troops and reservists were drafted in around the country to clear blocked roads and rail lines to enable people to travel. "Real name and ID" requirement for train tickets [ edit ] A Chinese railway ticket with real name and ID (blocked in the photograph) issued in 2015 Despite initial opposition from the Chinese Ministry of Railways, train tickets were upgraded in late 2009 to accommodate QR codes on a ticket, thus enabling personal information to be stored. This would link the ticket with its legal purchaser, paving the way for a "real name and ID" requirement to be implemented. Such a policy went into effect on a trial basis beginning early 2010 (for the duration of the Chunyun period on all non high-speed trains). In 2011, the "real name and ID" requirement expanded to more cities in China, and was made permanent for the Wuhan-Guangzhou High-Speed Railway even after the Chunyun period. The requirement became mandatory for all CRH high speed trains with effect from June 1, 2011 and was expanded to nearly all passenger trains on January 1, 2012.[14] It is now policy for station staff and rail police to check all riders against their document of identity and to deny boarding to those without a ticket or with no linked ID. As a result, stations that see large passenger flow, such as the Beijing West Railway Station, are obliged to set up extra ticket inspection counters to allow only legal holders of train tickets to enter the waiting area or the station area at all, especially during the Spring Festival travel peak. The result has been a requirement for more passengers to arrive earlier at stations. It did not completely eradicate scalpers, but did reduce their activity significantly. Air [ edit ] Air transportation is less affected as most travelers are workers who cannot afford air transport, but nevertheless the Chunyun impact is increasing. In 2008 roughly 28 million passengers used air transportation as their method of travel inside China. Xiamen Airlines, for example, added nearly 210 flights to its roster during the Chunyun period, with thirty flights especially placed to Hong Kong and Macau and another ten flights to international destinations in Southeast Asia and Korea. Cross-strait flights between Taiwan and mainland China were also permitted during this period before regular year-round flights were established.[15] To prevent accidents in the air, the Chinese government has brought in very strict regulations on not overloading planes. The General Administration of Civil Aviation of China (CAAC) estimates at least 36 million passengers will fly during the 2009 Chunyun period.[12] Taiwan [ edit ] In Taiwan, spring travel is also a major event. The majority of transportation before the Lunar New Year in western Taiwan is southbound long distance travel, in which people travel from the urbanized north to their hometowns in the rural south. Transportation in eastern Taiwan and between Taiwan and outlying islands is somewhat less convenient. Cross-strait flights between Taiwan and mainland China began in 2003 as part of Three Links, mostly for "Taiwanese businessmen" to return to Taiwan for the New Year. After the New Year, there are many local family tours throughout the holidays. On the second and the third day, there is a second wave of medium-long distance travel when the families go to the hometowns of the wives. Near the end of the holidays there is a wave of northbound returning travels which is less concentrated than the southbound travels. In 2012, on the second day of the Lunar New Year, there were an estimated 3 million cars on the island's freeways, and on the 8th day (the Friday of the holiday week) there were "2.7 million vehicles, about 1.7 times the average daily traffic volume of about 1.6 million." [16] See also [ edit ] References [ edit ] Bibliography [ edit ]

New Target Discovered for Treatment of Peanut Allergy NOVEMBER 01, 2012 DENVER — Researchers at National Jewish Health have discovered a novel target for the treatment of food allergies. Erwin Gelfand, MD, and his colleagues report in the October 2012 issue of the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology that levels of the enzyme Pim 1 kinase rise in the small intestines of peanut-allergic mice. Inhibiting activity of Pim 1 markedly reduced the allergic response to peanuts. “Pim 1, and its associated transcription factor, Runx3, play a crucial role in allergic reactions to peanuts,” said Dr. Gelfand, senior author and chair of pediatrics at National Jewish Health. “As such, they offer promising new targets for the treatment of allergic reactions to peanuts, and possibly other foods.” Pim1 kinase is involved in many signaling pathways and is expressed in T cells and eosinophils, cell types linked to allergic diseases. Runx3 is a transcription factor associated with the regulation of T cells. In a mouse model of food allergy, the researchers found that Pim1 kinase levels increased in the intestines of allergic mice that had been fed peanuts, as did various inflammatory cells and levels of cytokine molecules associated with allergies. Levels of Runx3 mRNA, however, dropped significantly in the allergic mice. When researchers administered a small molecule that inhibits the activity of Pim 1 kinase, mice no longer experienced diarrhea and other symptoms associated with their peanut allergy. Plasma levels of histamine, a potent cause of allergy symptoms, dropped to almost baseline levels after administration of AR460770, which is produced by Array Biopharma. Inflammatory mast cells, eosinophils, and CD4 and CD8 T cells all increased only slightly in response to peanuts. Levels of several cytokine signaling molecules associated with allergies, IL-4, IL-6 and IL-13, also dropped after treatment with the Pim 1 inhibitor. Runx3 mRNA, rose back to near baseline levels. “Our data identified for the first time that Pim1 kinase contributes in important ways to the development of peanut-induced allergic responses, “ said Dr. Gelfand. “Targeting this novel regulatory axis involving Pim 1 kinase and Runx3 offers new therapeutic opportunities for the control of food-induced allergic reactions.”

High Court will consider appeal over Hatt's sentence in December But banned from having unsupervised contact with young boys for 2 years Hatt given suspended sentence by judge at Swindon Crown Court Spared jail after admitting sex with 11-year-old boy in October Jade Hatt, 21, is on Badoo which has 272 million members worldwide Jade Hatt, 21, who was spared jail for having sex with an 11-year-old boy she was babysitting for, has signed up for a dating app calling herself 'honest and trustworthy' A babysitter spared jail for having sex with an 11-year-old boy has described herself as 'honest and trustworthy' on dating app Badoo. Jade Hatt, 21, was looking after the boy when she stripped off, removed his clothes, then straddled him and had sexual intercourse. But she walked free after the court heard he was mature for his age and the boy's father described him as 'sex mad' and 'fully up for the experience'. The boy's disgusted mother - who is estranged from the father - criticised the 'lenient' sentence, which is currently under review by the Attorney General. Now Hatt has thrown herself into the dating game by joining 'Badoo', a social networking site which encourages users to 'chat date and flirt' with 272 million members worldwide. The word 'trustworthy' was later removed from her profile. She describes herself as being aged 21, 4ft 11in with a slim body, red hair and brown eyes who is single, straight and 'here to chat'. Her 'about me' section reads: 'I am very loyal, kind, caring, loving bubbly, good heart, funny, gets on with everyone, hard worker, honest, trustworthy, understanding, good listener, good personlitey (sic), lively, outgoing, good senses (sic) of humour, hardworker.' Hatt, of Swindon, Wiltshire, pleaded guilty to sexual activity with a child at Swindon Crown Court in October. But she was spared an immediate jail term after the boy's dad said his son saw the experience as a 'notch on his son's belt'. One of the profiles Hatt, of Swindon, Wiltshire, set up on dating app 'Badoo' which has 272 million members Hatt poses with a friend on the dating app, on which she also describes herself as 'very loyal' Judge Tim Mousley, QC, gave Hatt a six-month jail term suspended for two years with supervision and told to register as a sex offender for seven years. He also imposed a sexual harm prevention order banning her from having unsupervised contact with young boys for two years. However there was widespread outrage at the leniency of the sentence and the High Court in London will consider an appeal on December 8. An online petition calling for the sentence to be looked at again had been signed by more than 3,800 people. Speaking after the case, Hatt defended herself and claimed the boy enjoyed their sexual encounter. She said: 'I don't know what made me do it. I'm a better person than that. 'When I stopped I went to the toilet and I was crying and shaking thinking 'What have I just done?' 'He said "What's wrong?" and I said "I can't do this". I wasn't thinking at the time. 'He said he wasn't enjoying it but he was. He loves older girls and likes sex full stop.'

(CNN) The Austrian government has announced plans to ban the full-face Islamic veil in public, part of a raft of measures to contain the rise of the far-right Freedom Party. The plan -- which would ban the burqa, niqab and other face-covering veils -- echoes calls that German Chancellor Angela Merkel made last month for a similar ban in Germany. It also comes amid growing concerns of harassment against Muslims around the world following US President Donald Trump's temporary ban on citizens from some Muslim-majority countries entering the United States. The Social Democratic and Austrian People's parties, which rule in a coalition, released a 35-page document outlining their vision for Austria as an "open society that requires open communication." "Full-face veils in public places are the opposite of that and will be banned," the document said. Photos: Burqa, hijab, niqab: What's what? Do you know the difference between a hijab and a niqab? How about a burqa and a chador? Click through to read about the different types of headscarves some Muslim women wear. Hide Caption 1 of 6 Photos: Burqa, hijab, niqab: What's what? Hijab: The scarf worn tightly around the head and neck does not cover the face. It is the most common Islamic head covering. This Indonesian girl is shopping for a hijab in Yogyakarta. Hide Caption 2 of 6 Photos: Burqa, hijab, niqab: What's what? Burkini: The full-body swimsuit worn by Muslim women leaves only the face, hands and feet exposed. Here a woman in a burkini wades in the water with a child at Ghar El Melh beach in Tunisia. Hide Caption 3 of 6 Photos: Burqa, hijab, niqab: What's what? Burqa: This full-body garment has a mesh over the eyes. The burqa is widely used in Afghanistan and was required under the Taliban. These Afghan women are shopping in Herat. Hide Caption 4 of 6 Photos: Burqa, hijab, niqab: What's what? Niqab: The full-face veil exposes only the eyes. A Palestinian bride in Jericho wears this one. Hide Caption 5 of 6 Photos: Burqa, hijab, niqab: What's what? Chador: The full-body black garment leaves the face exposed. These Iranian women are wearing chadors at a political meeting in Tehran. Hide Caption 6 of 6 Any ban would need the Austrian Parliament's approval to be enforced. The document says that Austria was introducing the reforms to ensure the "state presents itself in a world-open and religiously neutral manner," adding that civil servants in uniform as well as judges and prosecutors should show religious neutrality in the way they dress in public, effectively banning them from wearing Islamic headscarves. 'Integration contracts' for asylum-seekers The announcement was met with a backlash from Islamic groups and Austrian Muslims, who slammed the plan as discriminatory. "It is saddening. This is a setback for Austria, for our democracy and for our understanding of diversity," said Amani Abu Zahra from the Islamic religion department at the University for Teacher Education of Christian Churches. Tarafa Baghajati, chair of the Austrian Muslim Initiative, said that while he didn't necessarily agree with the full-face veil, he considered an outright ban "counterproductive." Baghajati said he found the "de facto headscarf ban" on civil servants more problematic. "This is state-run discrimination against Muslim women that violates the constitution and anti-discrimination laws," he said. The government will also try to force asylum-seekers and some migrants to sign an "integration contract and a declaration of values" and agree to "strict sanctions" if the contract is violated. It will seek to reinforce border controls, increase police presence and tighten asylum procedures. The document is an 18-month plan that will take the government, led by Chancellor Christian Kern, up to the next elections, likely to be held in 2018. The ruling parties are facing a rapid rise in popularity of the far-right, Euroskeptic Freedom Party, which has campaigned against what it sees as the Islamization of the country, calling for "zero migration" and a boost to border security. France became the first European country to ban the full-face veil officially in 2010. Bans are also in place in Belgium and some parts of Switzerland, while other European countries have debated the issue.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/yLM_oNydH7Y I love making things from scratch. I cook constantly, I brew my own beer and I make my own shisha tobacco once in a while. The process can be very simple or very complicated depending on what you want to make, but today we are going to focus on modern style tobacco. Make Modern Hookah Tobacco at Home The ingredients you will need to make shisha tobacco are fairly simple. Tobacco leaves, molasses or honey, glycerin and flavorings. Personally I don’t use glycerin but I enjoy more traditional moassel and tobamel than you are likely looking for. Stay away from black strap molasses and make sure to buy an unsulphured product. If you are using honey, don’t buy anything really expensive. The subtle flavors of honey are mostly lost in the process and don’t really transfer into the smoke. In regards to glycerin, you want to get vegetable glycerin, which can be bought at health and body stores. High quality flavorings like those I discuss in my article about adding more flavor to hookah tobacco are definitely your best bet. Getting traditional tobacco can be a bit harder to manage than the other ingredients. Light pipe tobacco or cigar tobacco is a good choice, but I wouldn’t use anything too expensive as the intention is for the added flavors to be forward in the mix. There are lots of places online that you can order whole leaves or you can get a bag of pipe tobacco or some light cigars to chop up and experiment with. The best option though is tombac, which is just dried tobacco pressed into a brick. It’s another form of Middle Eastern shisha tobacco but with no flavoring or molasses and it has a very light flavor profile to begin with. I will be using some scrap leaves that were packed inside a box of cigars. 1. Soak the Dried Tobacco It is now time to soak the dried tobacco to re-hydrate it, make it pliable and remove a little bit of the nicotine. The longer you soak it the less flavor it will add to the final product and the more nicotine will be taken out. Change the water every 30 minutes or so until you feel you’ve reached your desired level of washing. Modern style tobaccos like Starbuzz or Social Smoke wash and boil their tobacco until the water runs clear and no flavor is left behind. You too can strip the leaves of all character and flavor if you want to make sure your mango tobacco doesn’t smack of maduro. 2. Strip out the Stems and Chop the Leaves If you are using whole leaves then you need to strip out the stems to avoid bitterness, overly high nicotine content and unpleasant flavors. You can do this by hand, but a sharp knife and a cutting board make a big difference. After the spines are stripped, bunch the tobacco up together, squeeze it into one block and cut it up with your sharp knife. You can make it as course or as fine as you want. 3. Add Honey/Molasses and Flavorings The ratio I use for molasses and honey is 3 to 1. For every 3 grams of tobacco I use 1 gram of molasses or honey. So 300 grams of dried tobacco takes about 100 grams of honey for my tobamel. Sometimes it’s more sometimes it’s less depending on the style of tobacco and the type of flavoring. Mix the honey/molasses, all the flavorings you want to use and about 30g of glycerin per 300 grams of tobacco in a bowl and add the tobacco. Start light with the flavorings. Some of them are super strong. A table spoon is all you need to start. Mix it up with wet hands and take a whiff. If it smells good put it in a Tupperware container to sit over night. If you want to take it to the next level you can bake the tobacco before adding the flavorings to help the glycerin and molasses/honey soak into the leaves. I like to wrap all of the tobacco, molasses, etc in tinfoil and bake it on “Warm” for an hour or so. If it’s not traditional moassel then that’s really all you need to get the juices flowing. Now add your flavorings and let it blend together over night. 4. Wait a Day The next day, if the consistency seems right and it smells good, load up a bowl and smoke it. If it’s dry add some more of the honey or molasses. If you don’t like the flavor add some more until you get it right. It can take up to a week or more for the flavors to really mellow out and come together into their final form, so be patient. It’s all about preference but it’s really as simple as that. From this point we can get into more traditional tobaccos but I think that may be a follow up blog post. Here are two good shisha packing guides too: 5. Also See Making Hookah Charcoal at home to learn how to make your own coals too.

One of the things that was problematic for the Wisconsin Badgers this year was the punt game. The coverage was shaky, and even punter Drew Meyer would admit this was not peak Meyer when it came to two steps and booting the ball. While the Badgers weren't going to have space for a scholarship offer, that doesn't mean that help isn't on the way as Brookfield East (Wis.) punter Connor Allen accepted a preferred walk-on offer on Tuesday. Excited to say that I have committed to play football at the University of Wisconsin next year! #Badgers pic.twitter.com/4bzVHlBMos — Connor Allen (@connorallen04) January 28, 2015 Allen was deemed an above-average punter with good directional skills by the Kohl's kicing camp. He still needs to build up strength before he's going to see the field on a regular basis, but he did improve every year in terms of punting average. He's also the guy we haven't seen struggle, which will serve him well. Until, you know, he struggles. Either way, let's look at the highlight reel. Because nothing says fun like punting highlights. Watch the leg.

July 11, 2011 Comments (0) Fishing News Taiwan is the world’s leader in shark fin catching. It has announced plans to tighten it’s laws on shark fin catching, says the island’s top fishers official Sunday. Shark fin fisherman are already barred from releasing a shark back into the ocean once the fins have been sliced off, but most do not obey the law. Shark fins are a delicacy in Chinese culture and the demand for shark fins are increasing as the the population of China grows. Under new laws to take effect early next year, it will be an offense to remove a shark’s fin onboard a fishing vessel. Environmental groups estimate that up to 73 million sharks are killed each year around the world for fins, leading to declines of up to 90 percent of some species of sharks. Comments comments

Here's your inarguable fact of the day: Bob Ross was and is a national treasure. He spent 11 years spreading the "Joy of Painting" to PBS viewers mesmerized by the flicks of his wrist on canvas (and, well, people who just wanted to take a nap, see below), and remains an Internet sensation today. But there was much more to the man than his soothing, soft-spoken voice and cheery landscapes. 1. He discovered his penchant for painting while serving in the Air Force. In ninth grade, Ross dropped out of high school, and at 18 he enlisted in the Air Force. Based in Alaska, he took his first painting class in Anchorage, and was "hooked" immediately — but it would be awhile before art became his full-time gig. It was 20 years before he left service. He said "the job requires you to be a mean, tough, person. And I was fed up with it." Talk about a total 180 — after his military days, Ross essentially made a career out of never being mean or raising his voice again. 2. He didn't love his signature haircut. After his Air Force days, Ross devoted himself to a career teaching art lessons — a pursuit that didn't leave him so flush in the beginning. So he permed his hair and let it grow to save money on haircuts. Eventually he grew to dislike the look, but it was such a part of his brand, that he kept it up — and even wore a wig to maintain his frizz when he was treated for cancer. 3. He was missing a finger. As a teen, while working as a carpenter with his father, his left index finger was a casualty of the job. But, since he held the palette with his left hand to paint, you need to look closely to spot it. 4. His paintings with cabins almost never had chimneys. In an interview with Five Thirty Eight, Annette Kowalski, Ross's business partner, revealed that while Ross loved painting the Alaskan landscape, he never wanted any signs of people in his artwork. (Though eagle-eyed FiveThirtyEight readers have pointed out that he didn't always adhere to this rule — they spotted some chimneys in earlier episodes, like this one, below.) 5. Ross completed 403 (!) episodes of The Joy of Painting. To put that in perspective, Dallas only ran for 357 episodes, Murder She Wrote ran for 264, and Grey's Anatomy (which has basically been on forever) has only so far aired 248 episodes. 6. People loved Ross's calming demeanor and painting style so much, Holland found a way to work it into a radio (radio!) show. We feel like we have to say that again: A radio show. About watching (hearing?) a man paint. And Ross himself wasn't even the subject of the show — a Ross-certified instructor would paint a picture while a DJ played the latest hit tunes. In between songs, the DJ would ask inquire how the painter's "happy little trees" were coming along. 7. He had a squirrel named Peapod. Ross loved animals, and was often drawn to creatures that needed help – even an alligator, which his mother once found him tending to in the bathroom of their Florida home. 8. Ross believed that he completed about 30,000 paintings in his lifetime. And he didn't sell any of the ones he made on the show. Instead, many were donated to PBS stations around the country, which would auction them off as fundraisers. 9. He didn't make a cent from his TV series. It's hard to believe, but the shows acted more as an advertising vehicle for Ross's line of painting kits and art lessons (his company was worth $15 million in 1991, reported the New York Times). So he did the shows for free — and since he could bang out an entire season in just a couple of days, it didn't cost him much in time spent either. Acey Harper Getty Images 10. Ross loved that his show was actually putting people to sleep. Many fans would be embarrassed to admit that they'd flip the television to Bob when they wanted to take a little snooze, but the media director for Bob Ross, Inc. once revealed to the New York Times that Ross didn't mind at all. 11. He was only 52 when he died. Sadly, it was lymphoma that took his life. But his fame is still so pervasive that the headquarters of Bob Ross, Inc. (which still sells Bob Ross painting tools), will get phone calls from fans meekly asking about "rumors" that he died, according to the New York Times. 12. You can still watch him paint whenever you want! The Joy of Painting still appears on TV in certain markets, but the miracle of the Internet means we'll always only be a few clicks away from good ol' Bob. His company recently uploaded many episodes onto Youtube — even the very first one.

Alt-coins surge over the Black Friday weekend! Stocks gain on economic data. POTUS is flexible on his quest for a tax-cut before Christmas. John Conyers & Al Franken defiantly refuse to step down amidst proven sexual abuse allegations. Is the "Me Too" epidemic a sign for a "New Conservatism?" Robert Mueller's "special council" meets with Micheal Flynn's lawyers (Mueller should step down!!!). YouTube and Twitter purge ANYONE who influences audiences politically & socially (unless you're a pedophile apparently); this is the consquence of "Net Neutrality." Saudi Arabia and Iran position for a major confrontation; while Vladimir Putin sells out to radical Islam for protection. Why does South America always want Communism? The slippery slope continues with the rise of the digisexual. Other news and commentary, plus Gab shoutouts and Radio Graffiti. Follow on Gab.ai: @PoliticsGhost

Researchers and businesspeople are constantly guessing how many jobs robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) will destroy. Their prognostications range from the apocalyptic, to the mild, to the reasonably optimistic. But what does the average person think? People’s opinions matter: If they see AI as a threat to their job prospects, for instance, they might support politicians, such as US president Donald Trump, who promise to impede change or even bring back the past. The results from a recently released survey (pdf) by Masayuki Morikawa at Japan’s Research Institute of Economy, Trade, and Industry suggest that how concerned workers are about automation depends highly on their age and educational background. For the survey, conducted in 2016, over 6,500 Japanese workers, randomly selected, were asked, “What do you think about the impact of AI and robotics on the future of your job?” About 30% answered that they thought they might lose their jobs, 39% thought they probably wouldn’t, and the other 31% weren’t sure. The strongest predictor of whether someone thought AI would replace them was age: Young people were more anxious about automation. That’s unsurprising, Morikawa says in an article about the survey—after all, AI and robotics are developing gradually, so young people are more likely to be affected in their lifetimes. Still, the fact that over 40% of 20- to 29-year-old Japanese workers are worried about becoming obsolete is important. As my colleague Allison Schrager points out, workers who face such a threat are ripe for populism, much as workers in the 19th century whose lives were upended by the industrial revolution embraced Marxism, which similarly promised to restore their dignity. Another factor in how people view the security of their job is education. The 5% of Japanese workers in the sample with graduate degrees were the most confident that AI and robotics would not cost them their jobs—probably, Morikawa thinks, because they believe their skills will complement new technologies. Those with less education were not much more likely to think they would lose their jobs, but they were much more likely to answer “I don’t know” to the question.

Sao Paulo mayor Joao Doria (3-L) faces controversy over a food product made from leftovers that is to be given to school kids Sao Paulo mayor Joao Doria (3-L) faces controversy over a food product made from leftovers that is to be given to school kids ADVERTISING Read more Sao Paulo (AFP) Nicknamed "dog food" and made from nearly expired left-overs, a new product designed to fight hunger among school kids in Brazil's largest city has sparked controversy. Sao Paulo mayor Joao Doria this week presented the dry pellets at a press conference and promised they will reduce hunger among the city's poorest school children, while also slashing food waste. In some of its forms, such as the pellets, the recycled food -- officially known as "farinata" -- can be eaten on its own, but it can also be added to other meals, such as spaghetti or cakes. Despite the public outcry over its dystopian appearance and unappealing provenance, the mayor -- from the conservative PSDB party, and tipped as a potential presidential candidate in 2018 -- said he had already authorized the food to be distributed to some the city's schools this month, without specifying how many children would receive it. "The ministry of education has been authorized to use it in school meals, in a complementary form," said Doria. Human Rights secretary Eloísa Arruda said the move had been taken before a full study on the nutritional needs of underprivileged students had been carried out in Sao Paulo, the largest metropolis in South America. - Blessed food - Doria described the pellets as a "blessed food" when he presented them, and defended their immediate distribution to children from lower income families. "Starting in October, we will have a gradual roll-out... to offer it to people who are hungry," he said. But a lack of transparency over farinata's production and exact usage have only sharpened the controversy in a society already plagued by vast disparities between rich and poor. "When we offer pellets to lower income people to eat, we are only exacerbating the inequality in society," said Vivian Zollar, a spokeswoman for the Region Council on Nutrition, saying the move demanded a broader debate within society. The council issued a statement this week questioning the distribution of the pellets, saying it was a violation of the right to adequate food and "flew in the face of advances made in recent years in the field of food security." Zollar also accused the mayor's office of not having sufficiently researched possible alternatives to tackle the problem of food scarcity. "When the city presented the pellets, they said it was a good practise ... but no one ever thought it would replace food," she said. The state of Sao Paulo has a million and a half people suffering from a lack of food, according to 2013 study by the Brazilian Institute for Geography and Statistics. That number rises to 7.2 million across the country. - Depoliticize the debate - "It offends me when people call this dog food, and say it is degrading to the poor" said Sao Paulo Cardinal Odilo Scherer, who supports the mayor's initiative. "It is degrading to deny them food." He called for the debate over the new foodstuff to be depoliticized and carried out "with more objectivity." Rosana Perrotti, a representative for Plataforma Sinergia, the group that developed farinata, said the new product met all the requirements set out under Brazilian law. She described the food pellets as a unique development that could extend by at least two years the shelf life of foods that were about to expire. But she denied an AFP request to visit the facility that produces the pellets, citing the need to protect the group's unique technology. The financing of the product has also raised eyebrows. Plataforma Sinergia, a not-for-profit group, said the development of farinata was sponsored by donors but declined to specify how much the project had cost. The group has already handed out its product to three humanitarian organisations and aims to distribute them to Venezuelans fleeing their country's economic crisis across Brazil's northern border. © 2017 AFP

Week 1 has finally arrived and after a long preseason and I am happy to finally get cracking on our latest QB List installment, Sink or Swim. I will be plugging some of the more mid-tier type players at each position, highlighting why you should start them this week, while also mentioning some prominent players who you shouldn’t expect to return great value. I also won’t be mentioning your typical plug and play studs, because well, there is no decision to make, as they are matchup proof. This can not only be a great tool for year-long fantasy leagues but also daily contests as well. With that, let’s get to it! QUARTERBACK SWIM Ben Roethlisberger: Sure Ben has struggled in early road games in the past but I think this matchup is just too juicy to pass up in week 1. The Browns secondary isn’t much improved while Ben has all of his weapons at his disposal. Carson Palmer: The Lions defense is currently in shambles and scrambling to find answers all over the field. Palmer is another QB, similar to Ben, who has struggled in early road games in the not too distant past, but again, it’s just too juicy of a matchup to pass up. He should be a very safe play against a team that should bleed TD’s to opposing QB’s. Sam Bradford: Bradford’s accuracy and the Saints secondary being prone to allowing big plays makes Bradford a legitimate top 10-12 QB option this week. He has about as high of a floor as any QB going. SINK Dak Prescott: The Giants will be tough to throw on all season if they stay healthy and I’d expect a heavy dose of Zeke and Run DMC this Sunday night. Dak will be in pure game manager mode all night, and if the Cowboys fall behind, it could get ugly fast if Dak is forced to take chances down the field. Matthew Stafford: After becoming a competent game manager last season, Stafford and co. will face a much tougher schedule this year, meaning the highest paid man in the NFL will have to prove he can carry the team on his back and carry them with his arm. I don’t see that happening this weekend against this Cardinals defense and while his floor probably isn’t too low, I don’t see much of a ceiling. Andy Dalton: I’m expecting this game to be fairly low scoring between the two rivals. The Ravens will assuredly game plan to take away AJ Green, which if effective, would obviously limit any upside Dalton has this week. RUNNING BACK SWIM Todd Gurley: This should be an easy call for most, as I fully believe in Sean McVay to improve the Rams offense. What better first “test” for the Rams than facing a banged up Colts team that will struggle to do much of anything this weekend. Gurley should easily see 20+ touches and has a good chance to find the end zone. Theo Riddick: Riddick is one of my favorite sneaky plays this week, as he will most likely be used as the teams 3rd receiving threat. With Patrick Peterson shutting down one side of the field and Mathieu preventing anything over the top, Riddick should be involved heavily on Sunday. Jonathan Stewart: I expect Stewart to be the better RB play for the Panthers this week as he should see some goal line work as well as plenty of late game carries, assuming the 49ers don’t surprise us all and actually take/keep a lead. San Francisco’s run defense was porous last season and there’s no reason to believe they are much improved this year. Danny Woodhead: As long as Woodhead is healthy and ready for a full workload, which it sounds like he is, he could be in for a huge game. Flacco loves dumping off to his RB’s which was why Woodheads fit in Baltimore was near perfect. Baltimore RB’s caught 9.5 passes a games against the Bengals last season and I doubt that trend dips this weekend. Deep Dives–C.J. Prosise, Darren Sproles, Shane Vereen: I think Prosise can be a potential week winning play this weekend as he may be in line for a lot of work in the passing game. Outside of Baldwin and Graham, the Seahawks pecking order in the passing game is unclear. Sproles could be a sneaky flex play as the only RB on the Eagles roster who will definitely have a role this week. I’d expect the Giants to air it out, meaning Vereen could lead the backfield in snaps. Could be a decent flex play if he can see 7-8 targets. SINK Devonta Freeman: Freeman has a very high floor based on the fact the Falcons should be playing from ahead, but the Bears were actually the toughest defense against opposing RB’s for fantasy purposes last season. They have a talented front 7 that should limit Freemans upside, and there’s always a chance Tevin Coleman vultures any red zone work. Leonard Fournette: Fournette still has a chance to boom this week, but after a slow preseason and going against a tough Texans defense, it’s probably safest to stay away. If the Jags fall behind early, they could be forced to pass a ton, which means more reps for TJ Yeldon. Marshawn Lynch: It’s hard to trust Lynch who will be playing in his first regular season NFL game in two years. The Titans are becoming a tough team to face on the road and their defense was stout against the run all last season. Bengals RB’s: Jeremy Hill may be listed as the teams starting RB, but you have to imagine Joe Mixon will be in the mix for some carries. Bernard working on passing downs limits both guys value as well. WIDE RECEIVER SWIM Doug Baldwin: Baldwin is basically a must play every week anyway, but this week in particular is very juicy for him. He has a solid match up working the slot against the Packers and outside of Jimmy Graham is Russell Wilsons only proven option in the passing game. I’d be shocked if he doesn’t see at least 10 targets. Martavis Bryant: While Leveon Bell and Antonio Brown should be in for monster fantasy weeks, I still see a Martavis Bryant deep shot going down against a still shoddy Browns secondary. The offense has proven in the past to be much more explosive with him in the lineup, and I expect his game to be a reminder of that. Larry Fitzgerald: Larry Fitz continues to show no signs of slowing down and has a great track record of starting off the season in great form. The Lions hardly ever move Darius Slay around, so Fitz should be able to take advantage of the Lions slot corners. Jamison Crowder: Crowder didn’t have his best performances last season against the Eagles, but he should still be one of Kirk Cousins favorite options until he grows more of a rapport with Terrelle Pryor. In a game with high scoring potential, Crowder should see upwards of double-digit targets. Sidenote: Crowder showed up on the injury report Thursday, but it sounds like he should be a go Sunday and close to 100%. Deep Dives–Adam Thielen, Rishard Matthews, Robby Anderson, Kendall Wright: I expect a ton of targets for Thielen in matchup he should dominate the majority of the night and should be in for a huge game. I always will like Matthews in a matchup that has high shootout potential. He and Mariota showed great chemistry last season and could potentially torch the Raiders secondary. Anderson is a sneaky play this week against a bad Bill’s secondary. I expect Josh McCown to take plenty of deep shots in this one, with most going towards the teams most talented wide out. Wright is a dart throw of an option, but I like that he should have by far the best matchup of all the Bears receivers in a game they should trail early and often. SINK Alshon Jeffery: Josh Norman may not be quite good enough consider himself an island corner, but he is good enough to limit talented receivers to WR3/4 status a lot of weeks. You probably play Jeffery in 12 team leagues, but definitely avoid in daily formats. Deandre Hopkins: Jalen Ramsey is on his way to becoming one of the leagues best cover guy, and the fact that Hopkins has to deal with Tom Savage behind center doesn’t help. I expect the Texans to win a low scoring, ugly game, featuring a lot of Lamar Miller and keeping the passing game to a minimum. T.Y. Hilton: It’s just way to hard to trust anyone on the Colts offense this week with Scott Tolzien behind center. It’s a shame, because if Luck were healthy, Hilton might find himself on the other end of this list. Hilton is merely a WR3/flex option for owners on Sunday. Keenan Allen: Allen has struggled in his career against the Broncos (as do all wide receivers) and there is no reason to believe that trend will fade on Monday night. Chris Harris is as tough a match up as any for Allen in his first regular season game since tearing his ACL. Demaryius Thomas: The Chargers themselves boast a terrific CB duo, which along with the pass rush, should make things very difficult on the Broncos offense. Neither Thomas or Emmanuel Sanders had any luck last season against the Chargers. TIGHT END SWIM Zach Ertz: He is the only remaining starting offensive weapon from last year and should be able to do some damage in the middle of the field against Washington. Just see week 14 of last season. Delanie Walker: I expect Mariota to lean on his two favorite targets from last season early and often in Sundays game and he has a tasty match up against a team that had a hard time containing opposing tight ends last year. Coby Fleener: he disappointed so many people last season, but with Willie Snead out, he could be the teams #2 option in the passing game. He should have a reasonably high floor this week with a chance to go off and finish as a top 3 tight end. SINK Eric Ebron: Even if the Cardinals weren’t the toughest defense against opposing tight ends last season, the fact that Ebron did next to nothing this preseason would be reason enough to sit him this week. Jack Doyle: Just like Hilton, it’s almost impossible to trust and options on the Colts offense this weekend. He could salvage some value if he can find the end zone, but that’s a complete shot in the dark behind Tolzien. Austin Hooper: he still hasn’t proven much and is likely to be an afterthought in this offense in the early going. The Bears were also solid against opposing tight ends last season, so I’d expect Matt Ryan to attack the edges when throwing the ball. BONUS: NARRATIVE PLAYS SWIM Antonio Gates: I’m sure the Chargers will do everything in their reasonable power to get Gates the touching record as soon as possible, just to get it out of the way. I expect a lot of red zone targets headed his way this week. Adrian Peterson: it’s not a good match up on paper, but I’ll buy into a highly motivated Peterson against his former team that gave up on him this off-season. I think Sean Payton is the kind of coach who will feed into it and make sure he gets the first few goal line touches. SINK Eddie Lacy: Lacy just isn’t good anymore and I’d expect Prosise and Rawls to carry the RB workload this week. No revenge game for Eddie this week.

Buckled Highway Construction crews work on a section of Interstate 20 West that buckled in Atlanta, Monday, April 17, 2017. Another major highway through Atlanta is closed after the fast lane buckled before splitting into several pieces, witnesses said. This latest infrastructure problem will only snarl more traffic in the congested city already complicated by the collapse of an overpass on Interstate 85, a key artery, due to an arson fire. (AP Photo/David Goldman) (David Goldman) As news began circulating on Monday (April 17) of another highway collapse in Atlanta, the internet groaned audibly. Here in New Orleans, the jokes quickly began to fly. A favorite being, "The roads in Atlanta are collapsing like the ." I-85 section in Atlanta collapses, no timeline for when it will reopen A massive fire under the interstate bridge caused the collapse. In the end though, New Orleans knows a (or a lot more than two) about bad roads and traffic headaches. And while we certainly hope that Atlanta is back up and running soon, and that everyone stays safe, we did enjoy a good chuckle at these social media reactions to Atlanta's ongoing infrastructure issues.

During Monday’s White House press briefing, Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders made clear the Trump administration is not interested in any immediate conversations on gun violence prevention legislation in the wake of the Las Vegas shooting that killed at least 58 and injured more than 500. “There’s a time and place for a political debate but now is the time to unite as a country,” Sanders said. Because an investigation is underway and a motive has not yet been determined, it would be “premature to discuss policy when we don’t know all the facts of what took place last night.” She likewise deemed it “premature” to call the shooting “domestic terrorism.” “I think that there will be certainly time for that policy discussion to take place, but that’s not the place that we’re in at this moment.” Monday marked the 275th day of 2017, and the Las Vegas shooting marked the 273rd shooting in 2017. Responding to a separate question, however, Sanders was prepared to throw gun violence prevention measures under the bus. “If you look to Chicago, where you had over 4,000 victims of gun-related crimes — they have the strictest gun laws in the country,” she remarked. “That certainly hasn’t helped there, so when that time comes for those conversations to take place, I think we need to look at things that may actually have that real impact.” Later in the briefing, when prompted by a question about how quickly then-candidate Trump used the Orlando shooting at the gay nightclub Pulse to promote his proposed Muslim ban, Sanders simply said, “There’s a difference between being a candidate and being the President.” Advertisement Multiple questions addressed various gun violence prevention measures, but Sanders avoided taking a position on any of them. When asked point blank what Trump’s position on gun control was, she seemed to suggest he doesn’t support any at all. “The president has been clear,” she said. “He’s a strong supporter of the Second Amendment and I don’t have anything further at this point.” The press briefing ended relatively quickly so that the President and Vice President could lead a moment of silence on the White House’s South Lawn. Earlier in the day, Trump called the shooting “an act of pure evil.” https://thinkprogress.org/cnn-trump-las-vegas-shooting-792e602ca477/

"Family Love Michael," reads the banner in our hearts — "Arrested Development" will be unmaking a huge mistake on May 26 when the years-canceled, once-network television series debuts a brand new Season 4, in its entirety, on Netflix. Promotion has been effective in the weeks leading up to the release. From the traveling banana stand to a premiere at the Chinese Theatre, the return of "Arrested Development" has its fan base in a froth and newcomers joining Netflix faster than you can say, "hop-ons." RELATED: Emmys 2013: 'House of Cards' makes history, 'Arrested Development' earns multiple nominations (video, poll) "Arrested Development" lead editor, Kabir Akhtar, sat down with KPCC to talk about building the ultimate puzzle. "It's really cool to see the public react to every new piece of information that's released — people are excited, and that's exciting," said Akhtar, a director and Emmy-nominated editor with an extensive background in television and a family lineage that includes generations of storytellers and poets. No spoiler alert is necessary — all specifics and surprises are legally off the table until the May 26 release. You are safe to read this interview. What was the biggest challenge in editing the new season? Because the whole season was shot in pieces, none of the episodes were completely shot until they all were. So, while on most shows you finish one episode before starting on the next, here we were working on many of them at once, as sometimes we would move scenes to different episodes where they fit better both story-wise and pacing-wise. So basically you were cutting all 15 episodes at once. Pretty much. But not alone. We had a great team of three editors during production, and down the stretch three additional editors joined to help us get it all done. What did you do to keep track of all the references and jokes and overlapping storylines? The chronology of the season is so complex. This isn't just a very detailed show, it's 15 detailed shows that all had to dovetail together, not just in terms of common footage, but in terms of storytelling and comedy. Plus there was a tremendous sense of responsibility to make the show as great as it could be, and everyone's dedication was really something special. That NPR gag guide and the other joke tracker would have been handy, but it didn't exist. Did you make your own? No. Things changed all the time. There were rewrites almost every day, and things were being cut and added. So how did you keep track of all the new jokes and running gags? I remembered them in my head. Wow. I had to! Well, you've always enjoyed a good puzzle.* I love puzzles. I've done puzzles my entire life and this is just a giant puzzle. Did anyone else have the mental spreadsheet of puzzle pieces during the process? Mitch [Hurwitz, series creator] of course had the whole puzzle in his head, and it was our job to get it into our heads, too. Our co-producer Joey Slamon was an invaluable member of the team, as she had been around from the start of writing, so she also knew how everything fit together, and when in time certain events would take place. I heard that each episode focuses on a central character. Can you elaborate? Was that a special challenge? There are some things that happen that we see from several different characters' point of view, and those moments take on different significance for everybody as they happen. I was constantly making sure that our puzzle pieces fit together; if we see Gob in the background of a scene, and then later in his episode we see that moment again, it was vital to make sure that any dialogue or action from that first scene matched the next time around. There's one scene that we see different parts of from everybody's point of view, and while we don't hear the same dialogue each time, I tried to make sure we had enough overlap that someone online could recut the whole thing into chronological order. Thank you for your precision. The Internet would not stand for sloppy joke management. I thought about that. I left in dialogue and subtle hinges so scenes could reconnect. I didn't want the Internet to be mad at me. You said things were added during the editing process — were there reshoots? There were a few extra things shot as we were finishing post, to help tell the story more clearly. We made sure they fit in seamlessly, so obviously it won't look like we got one random extra shot of a Bluth months after the fact. It's true that these Hollywood shows are so incredibly detailed. How did you add things? We added things in three ways — New Ron Howard voiceover was added to connect stuff and to make sure the right things were clear, and sometimes to make sure the right things were not clear. Rearranging scenes. New dialogue for the actors, which was recorded in postproduction and then played while their backs are turned. This type of ADR [additional dialogue recording] is pretty common across many shows and movies, and again sometimes helped to sharpen the storytelling. Is the new season edited in a similar way to the rest of the series? It feels like the same show. Is it hard to match an existing style? How did you do it? It was like taking the grammar of the existing series and adding new vocabulary to the same language. I definitely studied the style of the first three seasons before starting, but once we were off and running, thanks to the writing and direction, this season naturally started to feel like the same show in post as well. It was important that the show felt the same, from big questions of pacing and style, down to small details like using the same fonts and sizes of split screens. How long did it take to complete the whole season? From August to December we were getting raw footage everyday. All in, post production took about nine months. Is there talk of a Season 5? I haven't heard anything official either way, but who knows! Are you as excited as we are? I catch myself in everyday situations wanting to reference jokes that nobody knows yet. It's a funny position to be in. *Lisa Brenner and Kabir Akhtar have been friends since 1977. Photos of them at Ms. Brenner's Bat Mitzvah are off the record.

Using Affymetrix microarray, we initially discovered the impact of microbes on liver transcriptomes via comparison of germ-free (GF), conventionalized (CONV), and conventionally raised specific-pathogen-free (SPF) mice under regular low-fat chow (RC) feeding conditions. As expected, CONV and SPF were similar; however, their hepatic transcriptomes differed significantly from GF confirming previous findings () ( Figure S1 A). Of the >1,000 differentially displayed genes, the majority mapped to metabolic networks; the most significantly altered pathways are highlighted in Figure 1 A. Two networks were of particular interest: CC and nuclear receptor (NR) families, which contain many nodal genes that serve important roles in integrating downstream effector responses involved in metabolic regulation ( Figure S1 B). CC and NR networks in the liver are intimately linked and populated by many genes that appear to be dependent on the presence of microbes. We speculated that GF mice are metabolically different due to differential expression of these networks, particularly CC, accounting for their resistance to DIO. (D and E) Diurnal circadian gene expression patterns relative to GAPDH in MBH (D) and liver (E) in GF and SPF mice fed RC or HF.p < 0.001;p < 0.01;p < 0.05 via one-way ANOVA followed by Dunnett’s post hoc test relative to SPF-RC control—star color indicates treatment exhibiting significance. See also Figures S1 A–S1F and Table S2 (B and C) Weight gain (B) and food consumption (C) of SPF and GF mice (n = 17 to 18 per group) fed RC or HF. Data represent mean ± SEM. ∗∗∗ p < 0.001; ∗∗ p < 0.01; ∗ p < 0.05 via one-way ANOVA followed by Dunnett’s post hoc test relative to SPF-RC control-star color represents treatment exhibiting significance. (A) GF and CONV C57Bl/6 liver transcriptomes generated via Affymetrix Mouse Genome 430 2.0 array (n = 3 per group). Canonical pathways (A) enriched in GF versus CONV identified by Significant Analysis of Microarray software (FC > 1.5 and FDR < 5%) followed by submission to Ingenuity Pathway Analysis software. Significant pathways were determined by one-tail Fisher’s exact test (p value < 0.05; i.e., −log(p-value) > 1.3, [red line]). Devkota et al., 2012 Devkota S. Wang Y. Musch M.W. Leone V. Fehlner-Peach H. Nadimpalli A. Antonopoulos D.A. Jabri B. Chang E.B. Dietary-fat-induced taurocholic acid promotes pathobiont expansion and colitis in Il10-/- mice. Huang et al., 2013 Huang E.Y. Leone V.A. Devkota S. Wang Y. Brady M.J. Chang E.B. Composition of Dietary Fat Source Shapes Gut Microbiota Architecture and Alters Host Inflammatory Mediators in Mouse Adipose Tissue. J. Parenter. Enteral. Bäckhed et al., 2007 Bäckhed F. Manchester J.K. Semenkovich C.F. Gordon J.I. Mechanisms underlying the resistance to diet-induced obesity in germ-free mice. Rabot et al., 2010 Rabot S. Membrez M. Bruneau A. Gérard P. Harach T. Moser M. Raymond F. Mansourian R. Chou C.J. Germ-free C57BL/6J mice are resistant to high-fat-diet-induced insulin resistance and have altered cholesterol metabolism. Kohsaka et al., 2007 Kohsaka A. Laposky A.D. Ramsey K.M. Estrada C. Joshu C. Kobayashi Y. Turek F.W. Bass J. High-fat diet disrupts behavioral and molecular circadian rhythms in mice. Eckel-Mahan et al., 2013 Eckel-Mahan K.L. Patel V.R. de Mateo S. Orozco-Solis R. Ceglia N.J. Sahar S. Dilag-Penilla S.A. Dyar K.A. Baldi P. Sassone-Corsi P. Reprogramming of the circadian clock by nutritional challenge. To determine how high-fat diet-induced microbial shifts impact CC specifically in DIO, we conducted studies using age-matched SPF or GF individually housed male mice maintained under standard 12:12 L/D conditions (Zeitgeber [ZT] time 0 = 6 AM; lights on and ZT12 = 6 PM; lights off) and fed RC or 37.5% (kcal) milk fat diet (HF) that elicits a known impact on gut microbes () ( Table S1 ). GF mice fed RC or HF gained significantly less weight compared to SPF counterparts, despite nearly identical, if not increased, caloric consumption ( Figures 1 B and 1C). Compared to SPF mice, GF mice fed HF also exhibited reduced gonadal fad pad and liver weight ( Figures S1 C and S1D), reflecting resistance to DIO, as previously shown (). After 5 weeks, liver and mediobasal hypothalamus (MBH) samples were collected every 4 hr (h) over 24 hr for measurements of CC gene expression ( Figures 1 E, 1F, S1 C, and S1D). The majority of CC genes in the liver from both SPF and GF mice fed RC or HF exhibited rhythmicity, while fewer CC genes exhibited cosinor expression patterns in the MBH (see Table S2 for CircWave software cosinor output). Despite rhythmicity in CC genes in SPF and GF mice, further analyses at specific time points showed that diet and the presence of diet-induced gut microbiota influence host CC gene expression. Figure 1 E shows that HF induced expression of Bmal1 and Clock in the MBH of SPF mice during the dark phase but not in GF mice, suggesting microbes mediate this induction. Contrary to the MBH responses, HF suppressed Bmal1 expression in the liver ( Figure 1 E; ZT2, 18, and 22), blunting the hepatic CC pattern, as previously shown (). Similar effects were seen in GF mice, yet a strikingly lower level of CC expression was observed compared to SPF, regardless of diet in many CC genes. In the MBH of SPF mice, HF increases Per2 and Cry1 expression compared to RC. However, in the liver ( Figure 1 E), HF decreases Per2 expression at ZT14 in SPF mice, yet there is a loss of Per2 expression on either diet in GF mice. Thus, these data show that HF has opposing roles in modulating CC genes, whereby HF induces Bmal1 and Clock as well as Per2 and Cry1 expression in the MBH but suppresses expression in the liver of SPF mice. Notably, in the case of Bmal1 in the MBH, and Per2 in the liver, these effects are suppressed in GF mice, implicating microbes as mediators in HF-induced alterations of CC function.

USA Rugby National Tracking Camps The National Tracking Camps are a continuation of the National Team Olympic Recruitment Camp and Eagle Recruitment Festivals, providing athletes with high-class training environments under the supervision of members of current national team coaching staffs to enter the national team pathways, from the Junior All-American entry point to the senior Eagles teams in both XVs and sevens. Coaches and scouts from the past year’s tracking camps have found Eagles – such as HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series-capped Ahmad Harajly and Matai Leuta – in the larger assemblies, but recognized there were improvements that could be made to the process. The NTCs offer a further opportunity to be seen by national team personnel, though they do not replace an athlete’s collegiate, club, or professional competition as a primary reference point for performance. Three of the most recent capped Men’s Eagles – Nate Brakeley, JP Eloff, and Michael Garrity – attended NTCs in the past year, but have also built strong résumés on the pitch with New York Athletic Club, Davenport University and Chicago Lions, and Denver Barbarians and Seattle Saracens, respectively. Athletes that perform at a high level will not only be considered for future selection to specific national team assemblies, but contracts with USA Rugby’s Olympic Development Academy programs, as well. From Nate Augspurger at Northeast Academy to Hunter Griendling of American Rugby Pro Training Center, the National Development Academies play a pivotal role in the ascension of American rugby athletes to the international stage. All athletes above the age of 17 are welcome to apply to attend an NTC. Applications can be filled out using this form. While USA Rugby membership is not required to apply, athletes must register with the national governing body prior to attending an NTC. USA Rugby National Tracking Camps | Summer 2016

From Star Trek to Fringe, J.J. Abrams has more than a little experience when it comes to science fiction. But there’s one thing that still drives him absolutely nuts about genre stories. Never content to have less than a half dozen TV shows on the air at one time, Abrams is prepping the launch of new Fox series Almost Human, a future-set cop series that looks to fill that Fringe void in our hearts (and schedules) quite nicely. While out talking up the new project, Abrams opened up with Time about something that drives him crazy about future-set sci-fi stories — the use of too much modern dialogue that probably won’t be around in a few years, much less a few decades. Here’s an excerpt from his comments: “I don’t often kick my feet up and ponder what it’ll be like 50 years from now, but I find myself — whether it’s been working on movies like Star Trek or a series like Almost Human — I do find myself asking what do I believe about what could happen. Frankly, one of my biggest pet peeves is the use of certain phrases that I just can’t for the life of me believe will exist five decades from now. Even little things. If you read a story about a hard drive, it’s like, There won’t be a hard drive! I’m not saying there won’t be a version of a memory cartridge or some obvious equivalent. If you’re telling a story about the future, we’re going to be bipeds, we’re going to be wearing clothes, we’ll live in structures, we’ll consume comestibles, we’ll inhale oxygen. They’re all things we know we’ll maintain. The truth is that almost every relationship — whether it’s between people or people and their work — there will always be these analogous situations you can get. The thing that drives me crazy is when it’s a literal connection to what exists now. When you think on a day-to-day basis how many little things we might say or refer to that if 30 years ago someone had said to you, ‘You know, I’ll text you in 10 minutes,’ you’d be like, ‘What’d you say?’ It would almost be like alien talk. You have to think in terms of practical dialogue. Producing a TV show or movie, there are just going to be certain phrases and terms that will be completely alien to us now, if we heard them from the future.” Abrams makes some pretty good points, but there are two sides to that coin. Sure, you want your dialogue to accurately reflect the future world you’re building — but you also need the modern-day audience to be able to follow the dialogue. It’s all about finding that balance between old and new, something Joss Whedon did to positively perfect effect with his short-lived Firefly series (shiny!). What do you think of Abrams' peeve? Does this drive you nuts as well? Almost Human debuts Nov. 17 on Fox. (via Time)

By Jake Donovan For nearly two years, Bob Arum has targeted Singapore as a potential future location to stage events, floating the location in the same aggressive manner in which he eventually made boxing in Macau a reality. That dream threatens to come to fruition in 2014, as the Hall of Fame promoter has now attached a timetable for which he plans to expand boxing business in Asia. Tonight will mark Top Rank’s third event at the Venetian Macao, as Manny Pacquaio ends a near-year long hiatus to return to the ring as he faces former lightweight titlist Brandon Rios. While the bout will mark the last piece of boxing business at the luxury resort in 2013, plans are in store to return twice in 2014 along with a stop in Singapore later in the year. “We'll be back February 22, then again in the spring,” Arum promised when interviewed following Friday’s weigh-in. “After that, we're talking about going to Singapore in October.” Singapore was part of the summer press tour spanning 40,000 miles across the globe to promote tonight’s event. For as long as Arum has targeted the nation as a possible future boxing hotbed, naturally associated with such plans was Pacquiao, his company’s biggest star and a revered hero in the Philippines and throughout Asia. Selling such an idea further beyond talk required getting Pacquiao in a major event outside of the United States. His showdown with Rios tonight marks his first appearance in Asia in more than seven years, when he outpointed former 122 lb. titlist Oscar Larios in his native Philippines in July ’06. The expected location for Top Rank’s venture into Singapore would be the Marina Sands Bay Resort. Both the Marina Sands and the Venetian Macao are properties of their parent company, Las Vegas Sands Corp., with whom Top Rank enjoys a tremendous working and business relationship. A pair of boxing events were staged at the Marina Sands Bay Hotel in 2012, both involving featherweight titlist Chris John. The unbeaten Indonesian proved to be a big hit, scoring dominant wins over Shoji Kimura and Chonlatarn Piriyapinyo in headlining bouts of events that entertained in the ring and in between bouts. As was the case prior to Top Rank setting up shop in Macau this year, there exists the opportunity to survey the landscape by first watching another entity in action. Just as the UFC successfully took its business to Macau last year, the world’s leading mixed martial arts promotional outfit takes its hit reality series “The Ultimate Fighter” to both the Venetian Macao and Marina Sands Bay in 2014. The move will be preceded by “UFC Singapore”, which lands at Marina Bay next January. Jake Donovan is the Managing Editor of Boxingscene.com, as well as a member of Transnational Boxing Ratings Board, Yahoo Boxing Ratings Panel and the Boxing Writers Association of America. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox

Los Angeles Angels designated hitter Albert Pujols is one of the best hitters ever. Alas, he's having a miserable season -- and it might be getting worse by the day. Pujols is batting .247/.291/.397 -- marks good for an 84 OPS+. His 96 runs batted in are the only thing saving him from being regarded as a lost cause by analytical and old school fans alike. Even then, there's reason to believe he's authoring the worst 100-RBI season of all time. Ouch. But the greatest indignity of Pujols' season might've come on Thursday night, when the Houston Astros aligned their defense like so during his at-bats: The Astros are playing Albert Pujols to a) pull the ball and b) crawl to first base. pic.twitter.com/J9s4hED6gK — R.J. Anderson (@r_j_anderson) September 15, 2017 That's an extreme overshift -- nothing, too unusual … except the infielders are playing way, way, way back. How far back? Shortstop Carlos Correa was stationed roughly 200 feet away at the beginning of a Pujols groundout: Correa starting depth vs. Pujols: 197 feet from home plate. Altuve: 188 feet. Pujols home-to-1st: 5.22 seconds. Sprint speed: 23.2 ft/sec https://t.co/0NrN4bEYBT — David Adler (@_dadler) September 15, 2017 The Astros showed no respect or regard for Pujols' wheels -- and why would they? Statcast tracks this metric called Sprint Speed that is an attempt to capture the fastest and slowest players. Pujols ranks 444th in baseball -- that's out of 444 players. Pujols is literally the slowest player in the majors, to the extent that it's unclear if a well-placed bunt would allow him to reach first base before the pitcher or catcher could make a play on the ball. Pujols has had a great career. He's worth remembering as one of the best to ever do it. But these are ugly, ugly times.

US law enforcement cracks down on opioid users, lets drug companies off the hook By Brian Dixon 21 December 2017 The response of the ruling class to the opioid epidemic in the US has been to crack down nationwide on drug users and low-level dealers, while ignoring the pharmaceutical companies and drug distributors that are largely responsible for the crisis. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), opioids—including prescription drugs, heroin, and fentanyl—killed more than 33,000 people in 2015. Many of the people who become heroin users first became addicted to opioids after taking prescription painkillers, but turn to heroin as a cheaper alternative. The number of overdose deaths resulting from prescription drugs has quadrupled since 1999. The CDC estimates that more than 183,000 people have died from overdoses on prescription drugs between 1999 and 2015. According to an article that appeared Monday in the Wall Street Journal, law enforcement agencies are now treating overdose deaths as homicides. Prior to this change, police officers’ only involvement in overdose deaths would be to check the scene to make sure the accidental death was not in fact a murder. In response to the opioid crisis, police officers are now viciously pursuing overdose victims’ friends and acquaintances who bought and used heroin together with the victim. In Hamilton County, Ohio, one of the areas looked at by the Journal, individuals have been charged with involuntary manslaughter, which carries a maximum sentence of 11 years. According the Journal, 86 people were sentenced last year for crimes related to the distribution of drugs that resulted in an overdose death or serious injury. Prosecutors in these cases are drawing on the reactionary legislation passed to address cocaine and heroin use in the 1980s and 1990s, but rarely enforced until now. And it is not only drug dealers who are being charged, but also anyone who shared drugs with the overdose victim or sold small amounts to support their drug habit. For example, the U.S. Attorney for eastern Kentucky, Kerry B. Harvey, made drug-overdose deaths a priority starting in 2015, using federal laws to sentence defendants from 20 years to life. Earlier this year, a 38-year-old drug trafficker in Kentucky, Navarius Westberry, was sentenced to life for supplying the heroin and fentanyl that led to the overdose death of 25-year-old Cory Brewer. Westberry admitted that his drug trafficking organization had distributed between 750 and 1,000 grams of heroin and 50 grams of fentanyl. The harsher enforcement of the law, however, will do little to stem the tide of drug overdoses. Moreover, the behavior of opioid users is in many ways dictated by their addiction, which the National Institute on Drug Abuse defines as “a chronic, relapsing brain disease that is characterized by compulsive drug seeking and use, despite harmful consequences.” The treatment of opioid users and low-level drug dealers by law enforcement stands in stark contrast to the kid gloves used on the drug companies that flooded these very same communities with prescription opioids in the first place. For example, over the course of five years drug distributor Miami-Luken shipped 11 million doses of oxycodone and hydrocodone into Mingo County, West Virginia, which has a total population of only 25,000 persons. Drug distributor Cardinal Health alone shipped 241 million pills into West Virginia between 2007 and 2015. What were the consequences for these companies that have unleashed untold harm and damage upon the residents of the state? Miami-Luken agreed to pay $2.5 million and Cardinal Health paid $20 million in settlements reached with West Virginia. Another drug distributor, AmerisourceBergen, paid the state $16 million. For drug companies and distributors, minor fines like these simply represent the cost of doing business. Drug distributors—the big three being McKesson, Cardinal Health, and AmerisourceBergen—act as middlemen between drug companies and retail pharmacies. Together, these three companies account for 85 percent of all drug shipments and have combined annual revenues of over $450 billion. McKesson, the largest drug distributor, stands at number 5 on the Fortune 500 list. According to the company’s most recent annual report, McKesson pulled in $190.8 billion revenues and $2.3 billion in profits in 2016. The company has 30 warehouses located across the country that deliver more than a third of all medicines in the US. The company’s long-time CEO, John Hammergren, is consistently one of the most highly paid CEOs in the country, taking home $639 million over the last 10 years. These companies repeatedly failed to comply with the federal Controlled Substances Act (CSA), which requires drug distributors to report suspicious orders of controlled substances to the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). However, due to successful lobbying efforts on the part of drug companies the DEA’s ability to enforce this law has been sharply curtailed. According to an ongoing joint investigation by 60 Minutes and the Washington Post published in October of this year, the DEA began to crack down on drug distributors in 2005, but eased up starting in 2011 as top DEA officials approved fewer and fewer “freeze” orders against opioid distributors. Civil cases filed by the DEA dropped from 131 in 2011 to only 40 in 2014. Between 2014 and 2016, the three largest drug distributors, along with an industry trade group, spent $13 million lobbying Congress. (The drug industry as a whole spent $102 million on lobbying during this same time period). Their investment paid off in the form of the Patient Access and Effective Drug Enforcement Act, legislation first proposed in 2014 by Republican representatives Tom Marino of Pennsylvania and Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee. The bill, which was written by a former DEA lawyer, had bipartisan support with Democratic cosponsors and the approval of Attorney General Loretta Lynch and the leader of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy at the time, Michael Botticelli. The bill was passed without debate and by unanimous consent. Obama signed the law in April 2016. The Act raises the standard that must be met before the DEA is allowed to suspend the licenses of drug wholesalers. Instead of showing that the company’s operations pose an “imminent” threat, a more expansive standard, the DEA must now show they pose an “immediate” threat, which is much more restrictive and difficult to meet because of the distance between the drug distributors and the consequences of their actions in the neighborhoods and communities afflicted by the opioid epidemic. Republicans and Democrats placed pressure on the DEA to back off of drug companies even before Congress approved the legislation. In 2015, congressional Republicans and the Obama Justice Department pushed Joe Rannazzisi to step aside as the head of the Office of Diversion Control, and eventually forced him to retire all together. Rannazzisi, the primary whistleblower for the October story, told 60 Minutes that it is “a fact” that drug companies knowingly flooded communities with drugs that were killing people. “That’s exactly what they did,” he said. “These weren’t kids slinging crack on the corner,” Rannazzisi told 60 Minutes correspondent Bill Whitaker. “These were professionals who were doing it. They were just drug dealers in lab coats.” None of the politicians involved in the legislation were willing to give interviews to 60 Minutes or the Washington Post. Aides to congressman Marino called Capitol Hill police when a camera crew showed up at his office asking for a comment. The Trump administration nominated Marino to become the next “drug czar,” but had to withdraw the nomination after the 60 Minutes/ Washington Post story broke. The bill’s chief co-sponsor, Blackburn, will likely run for a US Senate seat from Tennessee in 2018. Both Marino’s and Blackburn’s districts have been particularly hard hit by the opioid epidemic. Over the weekend, CBS News published additional findings from the 60 Minutes/Washington Post joint investigation highlighting how the powerful case that the DEA and US Attorneys had built over the course of two years against the drug distributor McKesson was undermined. The report is largely based on an interview by Whitaker with David Schiller, a 30-year veteran of the DEA who recently retired from the agency. He served as the Assistant Special Agent in Charge for the Denver Field Division where he supervised about 100 people investigating drug trafficking and money laundering cases. “It’s the inside story of the biggest case the DEA ever built against a drug company: the McKesson Corporation, the country’s largest drug distributor,” writes Whitaker. “It’s also the story of a company too big to prosecute.” Schiller notes that McKesson was pouring millions of opioids into pharmacies, many of which were simply fronts for criminal drug rings, without conducting any due diligence. This took place not only in Denver, but cities across the country, including Los Angeles, Detroit, and New York City. In the interview, Whitaker asks about the responsibility of the McKesson Corporation for the opioid epidemic: BILL WHITAKER: One of the former D.E.A. Administrators said that the McKesson Corporation has fueled the explosive prescription drug abuse problem in this country. Do you agree with that? DAVID SCHILLER: 100%. If they woulda [sic] stayed in compliance with their authority and held those that they’re supplying the pills to, the epidemic would be nowhere near where it is right now. Nowhere near. “They had hundreds of thousands of suspicious orders they should have reported, and they didn’t report any,” Schiller said. “There’s not a day that goes by in the pharmaceutical world, in the McKesson world, in the distribution world, where there’s not something suspicious. It happens every day.” 60 Minutes also interviewed Helen Kaupang, a retired DEA agent who worked with Schiller on the McKesson investigation. “McKesson is supplying enough pills to that community [unclear, but most likely Denver] to give every man, woman and child a monthly dose of 30 to 60 tablets,” Kaupang said. “Is that not shocking? I found it shocking.” Red flags like these, however, were completely ignored by the company. In order to hide suspiciously large orders, Kaupang says the company simply rigged the system: whenever the number of pills ordered by the pharmacy crossed the threshold that would require reporting the order as suspicious, the company would simply raise the threshold. A 2014 DEA memo obtained by 60 Minutes and the Washington Post, says the company had a pattern of “dramatic increases in thresholds without justification…” It noted that McKesson had “supplied controlled substances in support of criminal…Activities [sic]” to pharmacies. Special agent Schiller and his team wanted to hold McKesson accountable for its criminal actions, including a fine of billions of dollars and jail time for company executives. But the DEA and the Justice Department got cold feet in the summer of 2014 because they were, Schiller says, “intimidated” by the company’s legal representation: BILL WHITAKER: Did a DEA attorney actually tell you that they were not going to pursue McKesson because they had lawyers who had gone to Harvard and Yale? DAVID SCHILLER: They told me those exact words, because the case would take too much time and too much effort and, by the way, “What if we lost?” I said, “What if you lost?” I go, “You—you can’t have a better case on a silver platter.” At the time, attorneys from Obama’s Justice Department were encouraging Ranazzisi, the DEA’s deputy administrator at the time, to lay off of McKesson. Ranazzisi found the request inappropriate, especially since the company refused to comply with the law, despite repeated meetings and warnings. “The time for meetings and reports are over,” Ranazzisi said. “You either comply or you lose your registration.” The DEA dragged its feet for over two years before reaching a $150 million settlement with McKesson this past February, a mere slap on the wrist. The figure represents about what McKesson makes in profits in a week and a half, and is only $50 million more than McKesson CEO Hammergren’s total compensation last year, the third highest in the country. Hammergren, 60 Minutes reports, received a $1.1 million performance bonus this year based on his actions regarding ethics and accountability. “There was [sic] backdoor deals being cut that we didn’t know about, I didn’t know about, and I was representing DEA nationally on the investigation at the highest level,” said Schiller. “How do you settle? How do you say its okay just, ‘Here, write this check this time and—and close this place for a little bit, sign this piece of paper.’ How do you do that? No. Put ‘em in jail. You put the people that are responsible for dealing drugs, for breaking the law, in jail,” he said. “Nobody’s in jail. They wrote a check.” Schiller talked to his supervisor. “David [Schiller]… I am totally against settling,” his supervisor wrote to him in an e-mail, “but how do we hold their feet to the fire…? Our attorneys have us over a barrel with their refusal to go to court.” “There is not a man or woman in the DEA today that’s happy with the settlement and morale has been broken because of it,” Schiller said. A senior DEA official spoke to the Washington Post on the condition of anonymity when the newspaper reached out for comment. “We could have fined them out of existence, or indicted the company and put them out of business,” the official said. “I’d rather have one of the largest drug distributors be the poster child for detection and reporting of suspicious orders.” Another problem hindering the enforcement of the law is the revolving door between the DEA and the drug industry they purportedly regulate. A story published in the Washington Post in December 2016 found that pharmaceutical companies or their law firms had hired at least 42 former DEA officials since 2005. This includes 31 former employees of the DEA’s Diversion Control Division, the very division responsible for preventing prescription drugs from reaching the black market and holding the authority to suspend or revoke the licenses of doctors, pharmacies, and drug companies. Five former employees of the Division went to work at McKesson. Legal action has been taken against drug distributors, but the fines are minuscule compared to the money the companies make by violating the law. For example, before McKesson paid the record $150 million civil penalty, it had been forced to pay a $13.5 million civil penalty in 2008 to settle similar allegations. In December 2016, Cardinal Health agreed to a $44 million settlement. While these and smaller distributors collectively have paid $400 million in fines over the past 10 years, in that same time period the gross revenues for the companies was more than $5 trillion. US attorney generals in 41 states so far have filed lawsuits against pharmaceutical companies. Inevitably, any settlement reached with the drug companies will be a mere pittance compared to money the companies make by violating the law and wreaking havoc on communities across the country. Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.

Let it be understood that this blog is for entertainment purposes only. The advice given is in constant flux and what might help me one day, might not the next. On that note, about 75% of my first dates end in sex. This isn’t because I’m some big player, or have amazing skillz with women. It’s because I’m prepared, and expect to get laid. I facilitate it. Instead of going into a date with the hope of impressing, or winning favour – I give her an enjoyable experience that naturally leads to guilt-free sex. In this article I will speak plainly about my experience so that you may emulate it. Note. I don’t need to get laid. I’m there to enjoy a woman’s company and experienced enough to understand that many women also want to be ravaged on a first date. Many women are looking for an opportunity for easy, guilt-free, non-judgemental, first date sex. True story. Facilitate sex, not objections Minimalist Texting I text as little as possible. Many women I meet aren’t as old as I am, or well read. I’m a bit of a weirdo (we all are); a reformed geek and my humour often fails over text. Because she’s looking for an excuse to blow me off, If I make a joke that she doesn’t understand she will almost always interpret that I’m a creepy stalker who wants to cut her tits off and use them as bath toys (see what I mean about my humour?) So don’t use text for anything other than setting up a date. Don’t try to be witty, eventually you will fail. If you don’t have enough attraction and she’s not investing in the text exchange, it’s because your in real life (IRL) game is off. Note, once you’re in a relationship you can text more. But you’re a busy dude right? Be busy. Have hobbies, a side business, art project, friends. Have a life that keeps you off your text. Let them meet you IRL if they want your energy and time. First Date: My House I picked this up from my friend Eddy Baller. He asks girls, “Do you like Italian food?” If they say yes, he invites them over for home cooked dinner. Surprisingly, this first date works very well. I was shocked how many women would skip the whole going for coffee, or a walk, and just come over for a free meal. First Date Option 2 For when she doesn’t want to come over. This rarely happens because if she doesn’t, it usually means she isn’t interested and is wasting my time. I pick a funky bar close to my place and meet her there for a drink or two. This might cost me $10. If she wants to drink more than that, she pays for it herself. We split the bill. I do not pay for dinner. She pays for her own food. This makes it easy to say, “My place isn’t far. I have wine.” 90% of the time the woman is into this. Saves money and we get to cuddle and make out. She knows this. Paying for dinner is bad because it sets up a provider frame and gives away your power. Do you remember all those Hollywood movies where the guy ends up on the doorstep, invites the girl up and she say’s “No thanks?” If she likes you, she almost always say’s “Yes please.” But you don’t want to wait for the end of the date to kiss her. Try to kiss her in the first thirty minutes. Get it out of the way. “But what if she doesn’t like it when I try to kiss her?” Be willing to walk. If she likes you she will want to break the kiss barrier as well. After a drink, walk to a park, or a different bar. Walking builds trust and rapport. Then go to your house, or her house. Whichever is closer. But your house is better for a first try. Prepare The Chateau Vancouver is hella expensive and I don’t have a fancy apartment. But I keep my place tidy. Before a date I make my bed, clean the bathroom, do my dishes and vacuum. Cleanliness encourages women to take their clothes off. Oh yeah, delete your cookies if you browse lots of porn, just in case she needs to check her Facebook. For easy access, condoms and lube are kept under my bed. I put a bottle of water on the bedside table along with clean hand towels. I have candles throughout the room for mood lighting and I use grooveshark.com for music. Lately I like The XX or the new Arcade Fire album. Don’t be embarrassed about lighting candles or setting music like, “What if she knows I want to bang her?” She knows anyway. She would lose respect for you if you didn’t at least try. Seduction When she arrives she sits on my couch and then we chat while I cook. Or we have a glass of wine. I use this time to cross the imaginary physical barrier. I’ll talk about her rings and hold her hands, or talk about her stockings and graze her legs. If she’s cool with that I’ll give her a hug. Then I’ll put on a movie. Once the movie starts I’ll put my arm around her, lean back and let her cuddle me. About ten minutes later we’re making out. I just move my face towards hers until our lips touch. About an hour into the movie we’re usually very horny from cuddles and make outs that it’s not hard to get into the bedroom. I just stand up, hold out my hand and say, “Let’s go in here.” This doesn’t mean I’m getting laid, but that’s ok. Cuddles and make outs are cool. But I usually get laid. After we bang we hang out. Sometimes they go, and sometimes they stay. It depends on both of our moods, and our compatibility. If I really want my alone time and they don’t get that, I say, “I would love to invite you to spend the night, but I have a big day tomorrow and have a hard time sleeping with someone new in my bed.” They usually understand and bounce. Many girls don’t want to spend the night anyway and are looking for an excuse to go home, to their own bed, and Facebook, and reality tv or Bigfoot porn. When you’re on a date, instead of asking “what should I do next?” Ask, “What do I want?” This is a golden rule of all game. Follow it and create the sort of date you would enjoy most. If that involves riding a carousel, then group yoga and an expensive dinner on you, that’s fine. But I’m there to meet a sex partner, not an activity partner. And sex leads to a sexual relationship so it’s in your best interest to knock boots asap. That’s how most of my dates go down. If you’re my future girlfriend and this is how I Seduced you… Hi Baby. ***Follow me on Facebook and Twitter.*** ***Summer 2015 I’m going to London England, Mexico and Select European Cities. Contact me for a free consultation.***

US President Donald Trump walks in a corridor of the White House to greet visitors, while a portrait of Hillary Clinton hangs on the wall, March 7, 2017 in Washington, DC: Getty Images Donald Trump has said he wants Hillary Clinton to run again for president. In a morning tweet, the President said: “I was recently asked if Crooked Hillary Clinton is going to run in 2020? My answer was, ‘I hope so!’” Ms Clinton has said she is “done with being a candidate”. However, she has expressed that she would remain active in national politics, telling CBS in September that she believed “our country’s future is at stake.” Prior to her 2016 bid for the White House, Ms Clinton ran for the Democratic nomination for President in 2008, eventually losing to Barack Obama. Following her loss to Mr Trump last year, Ms Clinton mostly disappeared from the public eye. But in recent months, while promoting her new book What Happened, the former senator and Secretary of State has been candid about her thoughts on Mr Trump and the events that transpired during the presidential campaign. While speaking on Sunday at the Southbank Centre's London Literature Festival, Ms Clinton said she was worried that Mr Trump could in “a moment of pique” launch a nuclear missile. She also accused the President of “picking fights” with North Korea and Iran for the sake of “point scoring.” Earlier this year, Mr Trump warned that threats from North Korea would be greeted with “fire and fury like the world has never seen”. The Trump administration is currently engaged in a standoff with North Korea over the regime's expanding nuclear weapons programme. On Friday, Mr Trump struck a blow against the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement by choosing not to certify that Tehran is complying with the deal. In the Obama-era accord, Iran had agreed to restrict its nuclear programme for at least 10 years in exchange for the loosening of economic sanctions. Along with calling the deal merely a “temporary delay” on Iran's “path to nuclear weapons”, Mr Trump said the removal of sanctions was giving the Iranian “regime” more funds to support terrorism. In July, Mr Trump joked that Russian President Vladimir Putin would have preferred Hillary Clinton to be in the White House. “[I]f Hillary had won, our military would be decimated,” Mr Trump said in an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network. “Our energy would be much more expensive. That's what Putin doesn't like about me. And that's why I say, why would he want me?” “We're going to be exporting energy – he doesn't want that. He would like Hillary where she wants to have windmills,” the President added. “He would much rather have that because energy prices would go up and Russia, as you know, relies very much on energy.” Mr Trump is expected to seek re-election in 2020.

Relationships Survey Dr. Lisa Dawn Hamilton and Bonnie Fisher Department of Psychology Mount Allison University Researchers at Mount Allison University invite you to participate in a study to pilot test a new questionnaire about relationships. The data from this survey will allow researchers to assess the quality of a new questionnaire.This study involves completing an online self-report questionnaire. You will be asked to reply to a set of statements that pertain to your relationships, sexual attitudes, sexual and romantic behaviors, and your thoughts about monogamy. The survey will take you approximately 20 minutes to complete.There are no risks of harm associated with completing this self-report, however you may choose not to answer any questions that make you uncomfortable. Your participation is completely voluntary. You may withdraw from this study at any time without penalty.All information obtained in this study will be kept strictly confidential. All surveys hosted with SurveyMonkey collectors have Transport Layer Security (TLS) enabled to encrypt respondent traffic. All other communications with the surveymonkey.com website are sent over TLS connections, which protects communications by using both server authentication and data encryption. This ensures that user data in transit is safe, secure, and available only to intended recipients. Our application endpoints are TLS only and score an “A” rating on SSL Labs‘ tests. The results of this study will be presented as a group and no individual participants will be identified.Please note that the online survey is hosted by SurveyMonkey, which is a web survey company located in the USA. All responses to the survey will be stored and accessed in the USA. This company is subject to U.S. laws, in particular, to the U.S. Patriot Act that allows authorities access to the records of internet service providers. If you choose to participate in the survey you understand that your responses to the questions will be stored and accessed in the USA. The security and privacy policy for SurveyMonkey can be viewed at www.surveymonkey.com/mp/policy/security/At the end of the survey, you will have the option to click a website link that will redirect you to a page where you can provide your name and email address to be entered in a $50 Amazon gift card draw.If you have any questions about this study, please contact our research coordinator, Bonnie Fisher at bfisher@mta.ca.This research has been reviewed and approved by the Mount Allison University Research Ethics Board. If you have any questions or concerns about this study, you may contact the Mount Allison University Research Ethics Board, by phone (506-364-2618) or by e-mail at reb@mta.ca.

Berwick, Cranbourne, Narre Warren and Hallam residents could be fined hundreds if they fail to pick up dogs’ mess A Melbourne council’s “number one” priority is cracking down on dog walkers who do not carry plastic bags to pick up their pooches’ number twos. Unprepared owners face a $200 fine for walking pets with no poo-bag on hand, with council officers in south-east Melbourne empowered to approach and question potential offenders. Residents of suburban Berwick, Cranbourne, Narre Warren and Hallam could also be fined $500, up $300 from the previous penalty, if they fail to bin doggy business. “The onus is clearly put back on the people who own dogs to do the right thing,” the City of Casey mayor, Geoff Ablett, told ABC radio on Wednesday. “For those who don’t, you could end up copping a harsh fine.” The council revised its animal waste penalties in late November after complaints from “fed up” ratepayers, Ablett said. “This has been the number one priority, from the animal management side of things, that people want to see changed,” he said. “Responsible dog owners think it’s a great thing, the residents think it’s a great thing.” But local dog-walker Ben Smith questioned the severity of the fines and how the bag law would be enforced. “What if they go twice? Are you going to take three or four [bags]?” the Cranbourne East Dog Owners Facebook group founder told 3AW, noting the council did not provide free bags at a local dog park. “Where do you draw the line?”

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court agreed on Tuesday to hear a challenge to part of the Obama administration’s first wave of regulations aimed at tackling climate change, accepting its biggest environmental case in six years. The court said it would not review the underlying determination that greenhouse gases are a public health concern or a separate regulation that limits greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles. The single question the court will consider is whether the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency correctly determined that its decision to regulate motor vehicle emissions automatically gave it the authority to regulate emissions from stationary sources such as power plants and oil refineries. Industry groups applauded the high court for considering placing a check on what they call regulatory overreach while environmentalists took comfort from the narrowness of the question the court agreed to consider. Oral arguments are likely to be heard early in the new year with a ruling issued by the end of June. Gina McCarthy, the EPA administrator, said in a statement that the court was taking up a “very narrow legal question” that would not substantially weaken the Obama administration’s climate-change agenda. EPA regulations are among President Barack Obama’s most significant measures to address climate change. A federal appeals court in Washington upheld the rules, issued by the EPA under the Clean Air Act, in 2012. The regulations allowed for greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions from a wide range of sources to be regulated for the first time. By agreeing to hear a consolidated challenge from states and business groups, the court could be getting set to limit the reach of its groundbreaking 2007 ruling, Massachusetts v. EPA, in which it held on a 5-4 vote that carbon was a pollutant that could potentially be regulated under the Clean Air Act. The court rejected outright three of the nine petitions that sought Supreme Court review, including one filed by Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, a Republican, that questioned whether the EPA appropriately weighed climate change science. The legal question, crafted by the court itself from those raised in the six petitions it agreed to review, indicates the court does not plan to revisit the underlying reasoning behind Massachusetts v. EPA but will weigh whether the EPA went further than allowed under the act. Jonathan Adler, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio, said the court did not dispute the scientific basis underpinning the EPA’S greenhouse gas regulations or its industry-backed vehicle emissions standards, but focused on the most legally shaky challenges buried in the various petitions. The legal question is “appropriately limited,” Adler said. SOMETHING FOR BOTH SIDES Tom Donohue, president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which filed one of the petitions the court agreed to hear, said the group has from the beginning argued “that the Clean Air Act is the wrong vehicle to regulate greenhouse gases and that EPA exceeded its regulatory authority under the act.” Eric Groten, a partner at law firm Vinson and Elkins, which represents the industry-backed Coalition for Responsible Regulation, said the court’s acceptance of some of the petitions raises the key question of how easily the EPA can use its authority to regulate greenhouse gases. “This bodes well for efforts to cauterize the damage, as the court will consider whether EPA needs to legally and factually justify each action taken to regulate GHG, or whether it can just wave Massachusetts v. EPA as a magic wand and conjure what it wishes,” Groten said. His client’s petition was one of those rejected. Environmental lawyers stressed that because the justices will assess only one of the many legal questions raised in the petitions, it will only have a limited impact on EPA’s broader goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the biggest contributor to climate change. U.S. natural gas futures were little changed on Tuesday despite the news. Prices matched Monday’s nearly four-month spot chart high of $3.855 per mmBtu in overnight trading before being hit by some profit-taking. The most current contract is up more than 9 percent in just over a week. REGULATORY AGENDA Tuesday’s decision does not affect the agency’s ability to require power plants to install the best available technology to reduce emissions. It could, though, impede the EPA’s ability to require new or modified facilities, such as refineries or power plants, to obtain emissions permits. Come June, the EPA is due to propose a major rule that would limit the amount of greenhouse gases the country’s existing fleet of more than 1,000 power plants can emit. The American Petroleum Institute, a lobbying group that along with manufacturing interests filed one of the petitions, said the fact that EPA regulations for cars automatically triggered further regulation of other sources of greenhouse gas emissions was an “overstep” of the agency’s authority under the Clean Air Act. “The EPA is seeking to regulate U.S. manufacturing in a way that Congress never planned and never intended,” said Harry Ng, American Petroleum Institute vice president and general counsel. Whatever the court eventually decides, the EPA’s ability to use the Clean Air Act to regulate emissions from power plants and other stationary sources is not under threat, environmental lawyers say. Even if the court ruled for petitioners, most power plants and refineries would still be required to install best available control technology to limit greenhouse gases, said Sean Donahue, a lawyer representing environmental groups at Donahue & Goldberg.

In Episode 17 of the Chief in the North, I decide it's time to go to the film room to examine the Chiefs' defense in their loss to the Raiders last Thursday. There are a lot of narratives flying around out there about Bob Sutton, Justin Houston, 3 man rushes, pressure on the quarterback, and a whole lot more. It seems like everyone has an opinion as to what went wrong on Thursday. But what does the film say? On closer examination, is there any accuracy to the idea that Bob Sutton's "scheme" (which means different things to different people) is ruining the defense? Are the issues the Chiefs had against the Raiders actually schematic in nature? Or is there something else going on? I reviewed the film and examined all of Oakland's successful passing plays. I also charted 3-man rushes by the Chiefs, times Houston dropped into coverage, and the pass rush in general. There's a whole lot of misinformation out there, and it's time we talk about WHY the defense was bad on Thursday (and make no mistake, it was). It's time to bust some myths. After mythbusting, I answer some mailbag questions and preview the Denver game, talking about why this is a unique chance for both the offense and defense to prove something. Welcome to the Chief in the North, the land of 10,000 takes. Hope you enjoy.

England striker Jermain Defoe has arrived in Canada and is slated to train with Toronto FC for the first time Monday. The 31-year-old, who landed in Toronto on Saturday, missed all of the MLS team’s pre-season due to commitments to Tottenham Hotspur and England. Newly signed Toronto FC striker Jermain Defoe answers reporters questions during a press conference in Toronto in this Jan. 13, 2014 photo. ( Chris So / Toronto Star ) · Ten things you didn't know about Defoe Defoe was on the bench for England’s friendly against Denmark last Wednesday at Wembley but did not get a chance to earn a 56th cap in the 1-0 win over Denmark. Then sidelined by a hamstring injury, the former Spurs star said his farewell to the fans at White Hart Lane on Feb. 27 during halftime of a Europa League match against FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk. Article Continued Below · Defoe, Bradley awed by Toronto fans: Kelly Defoe left Spurs with 143 goals to his credit, behind only Cliff Jones (159), Martin Chivers (174), Bobby Smith (208) and the legendary Jimmy Greaves (266) in the club record book. Defoe also leads all Spurs scorers with 23 goals in European competition. The English forward will be welcomed by Toronto manager and former Spurs teammate Ryan Nelsen, who has seen his strike force hampered by injury. Brazilian newcomer Gilberto has been slowed by a quadricep injury while Bright Dike is gone for the season after tendon surgery. That leaves Defoe, Andrew Wiedeman and Dwayne De Rosario as attacking options. Nelsen said the participation of Defoe and Gilberto in Saturday’s opener in Seattle will depend on how they look this week. “I can only really give you proper answers when we’ve got them both back in training and we can really see where they’re at,” he said. Article Continued Below Defoe, while he has not played much recently, is likely ahead of Gilberto because the Brazilian was out of season when he arrived at training camp. But Nelsen is not likely to rush either to action before they are ready, Defoe was 21 when he joined Tottenham from West Ham in February 2004, scoring on his debut against Portsmouth. He left for Pompey in January 2008 but returned a year later. Defoe only made two appearances for Spurs since his transfer move to Toronto was announced. He scored Jan. 11 as a substitute in a 2-0 win over visiting Crystal Palace before coming on for five minutes in a 1-0 win over Everton on Feb. 9. Defoe, who has scored 19 goals for England, hopes to earn a spot in Roy Hodgson’s World Cup squad. His competition includes Wayne Rooney and Danny Welbeck of Manchester United, Daniel Sturridge of Liverpool, Rickie Lambert and Jay Rodriguez of Southampton and Andy Carroll of West Ham. England has three friendlies left before the World Cup — Peru at Wembley on May 30 before games in Miami against Ecuador and Honduras. Toronto already expects to lose Brazilian goalkeeper Julio Cesar and American midfielder Michael Bradley to World Cup duty. Defoe, Bradley, Gilberto, Cesar and De Rosario are key off-season acquisitions for a Toronto team desperate to make the MLS playoffs after seven years of failure on the field. Other newcomers include fullback Justin Morrow and Bradley Orr and Brazilian midfielder Jackson. Defoe will be able to renew acquaintances with his former Spurs teammates when Toronto FC and Tottenham will meet July 23 in a friendly at BMO Field. Read more about:

Story highlights Gary Player won nine majors and nine senior majors in stellar career South African golfer renowned for his grueling fitness regime Travels world to preach health and fitness message Has a 'passion to save lives' Has Gary Player found the secret to eternal life? The 78-year-old completes 1,300 sit ups every day, follows a strict and mainly vegetarian diet and sleeps on average nine hours per night. During a remarkable competitive career spanning six decades, Player won nine majors and 165 tournaments, adopting a grueling fitness and a practice regime to help underpin his game. "The more I practice the luckier I get," was his most famous quote in reference to his unerring ability to hole shots from green side bunkers. Player's forays on to a golf course are now confined to exhibitions -- "Jack Nicklaus and I were 10-under for a better ball three weeks ago," he says -- though he still regularly beats his age by several shots. JUST WATCHED Gary Player on the Masters Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Gary Player on the Masters 02:35 JUST WATCHED Nelson Mandela embraced power of sports Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Nelson Mandela embraced power of sports 01:51 JUST WATCHED Gary Player: Why I love horses Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Gary Player: Why I love horses 06:17 JUST WATCHED McIlroy targets Open improvement Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH McIlroy targets Open improvement 04:06 "I was 12-under par (18 holes in 66 shots) recently," added the South African, who turns 79 in November. The day before this interview he'd hit 100 practice shots, so it's hardly surprising Player is still able to average about 70 shots per round, which is the mark he achieved during his professional career on the PGA then Seniors Tour, one of the best of all time. Nowadays Player is driven by a different mission. "I have a passion to save lives," he says, in reference to his desire to help confront the western world's growing obesity and type 2 diabetes problem. "Thirteen percent of the world is now obese," Player told CNN ahead of the British Open, which starts on Thursday. "We talk about wars, the number of people dying from diabetes and cancer and heart attacks -- in comparison to the numbers killed in wars are insignificant, but nobody cares about health or exercise. "I don't know why only one out of 20,000 people taka exercise and has a proper diet. How can governments allow it? Golf's "Black Knight" -- a reference to his trademark all-black attire he wore on the fairways -- doesn't expect the world to emulate his own punishing fitness regime, but he does have some simple tips to stay healthy. "My advice to fellow menfolk is every day to take you wife by the hand and go for a brisk 30 minutes walk, or get yourself a dog, they demand to be exercised! "Secondly don't go for all these fad diets, just eat half the portion of food that you originally dished up. It will change your life." The golf icon's foundation, run by his son Marc -- Player has six children and 22 grandchildren -- has raised over $50 million for underprivileged children in South Africa and around the globe. It aims to improve educational outcomes and Player is passionate that his message about health, fitness and diet reaches the younger audience globally. JUST WATCHED How far has women's golf come? Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH How far has women's golf come? 05:30 JUST WATCHED Will Donald Trump's Turnberry be a success? Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Will Donald Trump's Turnberry be a success? 03:54 "We are not teaching children in school, that's a great frustration for me." Player with Nicklaus and legendary American Arnold Palmer revolutionized golf in the early 1960s and under sports management guru Mark McCormack earned the label of the "Big Three" as they dominated the majors and took the sport to a new television audience. Player had an unquenchable thirst for victory, racking up more air miles than any athlete in history as he competed in tournaments around the world. He is particularly proud of his nine 'senior' majors -- in competitions for golfers aged over 50 -- helping to raise the standard and profile of the events as he battled it out with the likes of Palmer and Nicklaus again. Don't dare tell Player that golf isn't a physically demanding sport. The South African recounts a story about basketball legend Michael Jordan, a low handicap golfer, telling him that 36 holes of golf in a day was pretty much as exhausting as playing in a match in the NBA Finals. A slight exaggeration perhaps, but judging by the number of nonagenarians who still inhabit the fairways the notion of Golf: "A Game for Life" -- the title of Player's latest instructional offering -- might not be too far amiss. In keeping with his reputation for supreme physical fitness there is a clip which shows him -- donned in black golf wear -- running at maximum speed on a treadmill -- to the astonishment of the accompanying interviewer. JUST WATCHED Annika Sorenstam's bunker shot Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Annika Sorenstam's bunker shot 02:33 JUST WATCHED A golfing history of Royal Liverpool Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH A golfing history of Royal Liverpool 05:08 It's a breathless demonstration that men several decades younger would fail to emulate but does back up Player's central theme about a healthy life. "I tell you, walk 18 holes, it's tremendous exercise and you can play golf for a lifetime," he said. On the evidence of Player's fitness -- a recent test showed he had a resting heart beat of 39 -- the South African will be gracing the fairways of golf courses for many years to come. But he clearly wants to leave a legacy stretching beyond his sporting fame. "I said when I'm a champion I'm going to change people's lives. "On my epitaph I want it to read: 'Here was a man who contributed to society and saved lives.'" So for now he continues his punishing schedule of travel to meet burgeoning business commitments,such as golf course design, real estate, a winery and farm, as well as work for his foundation, which runs four high profile tournaments each year. "Show me a busy man and I'll show you someone who gets things done." That work ethic was engrained in him from an early age, with his mother dying when he was just eight and his father having to travel away to earn a living in gold mining. "You must accept adversity with gratitude and never give up. You will overcome it," said Player.

Not content with the sheer badassery of sending a humanoid robot to the moon in 2015, Japan has just unveiled a mission for 2020 that will involve setting up a whole robotic moon base. It will be unmanned in the flesh-and-blood sense, but will be populated with a 660 pound rolling bot. The station will be self-powered, and will let its citizen roam over 60+ miles of terrain, gathering scientific samples that can be sent back to earth. While rocks are great, we're even more excited about the HDTV the station will be beaming back as well. The whole project will run somewhere in the ballpark of $2.2, and will be developed simultaneously with Japan's manned moon program. We're going to get working on our "I'm 660 pound a scientific exploration robot" costume right away.

Sustainable and personally tailored materials production is an emerging challenge to society. Living organisms can produce and pattern an extraordinarily wide range of different molecules in a sustainable way. These natural systems offer an abundant source of inspiration for the development of new environmentally friendly materials production techniques. In this paper, we describe the first steps toward the 3-dimensional printing of bacterial cultures for materials production and patterning. This methodology combines the capability of bacteria to form new materials with the reproducibility and tailored approach of 3D printing systems. For this purpose, a commercial 3D printer was modified for bacterial systems, and new alginate-based bioink chemistry was developed. Printing temperature, printhead speed, and bioink extrusion rate were all adapted and customized to maximize bacterial health and spatial resolution of printed structures. Our combination of 3D printing technology with biological systems enables a sustainable approach for the production of numerous new materials.

The long delay in getting Winnipeg Transit's smart-card fare system operational is frustrating the chair of the city's finance committee. "Are we dragging something out that won't be delivered?" Marty Morantz asked members of the city's administration at a finance committee meeting on Thursday. Councillor Morantz- "alarm bells are going off in my head around this one." <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/cbcmb?src=hash">#cbcmb</a> —@SKKav Bus riders were originally promised the $17-million system — which allows them to tap a pre-loaded card on a reader to pay their fare — would roll out sometime in 2013 or 2014. The system is already in place in many cities, including Toronto, Ottawa, Vancouver and Minneapolis. Winnipeg Transit gave it a test run in June, with 100,000 transactions on more than 340 buses, but a number of problems were identified. Those bugs are being worked out, Winnipeg Transit director Dave Wardrop said. The system is still on budget and there is a "high level" of confidence the system will work, he said. A second round of testing starts on some buses today. Transit's Wardrop admits there have been problems but promises won't implement system until bugs are fixed. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/cbcmb?src=hash">#cbcmb</a> —@SKKav

By By Kim I. Hartman Jul 7, 2011 in Crime Rushville - It was the last day of school when high school senior Tyell Morton slipped into a building with a package under his arm, planning to place a blow-up sex doll in a bathroom stall in the restroom. Little did he know a police bomb squad would soon arrive. Morton didn't consider he might be seen on security camera by a janitor who suspected something more sinister was taking place. Video footage showed a person in a hooded sweatshirt, wearing gloves, entering the school building with an box of unknown contents and then leaving just as quickly five minutes later, reports School officials responded by calling local and state police who arrived with K-9 units to lock the school down and search for possible explosives. Instead of bombs, guns and explosives, law enforcement found a blow-up sex doll hiding in the bathroom. The search and investigation resulted in the arrest of Morton, who was hit with a misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct and a felony charge of institutional criminal mischief. The felony charge could mean up to eight years in prison for the young man who has been called "a good student with no criminal record" by the Jonathan Turley, law professor at George Washington University, asked on his blog, "What type of society we are creating when our children have to fear that a prank (could) lead them to jail for almost a decade," according to the Friends of Tyell Morton who have created a School officials say they have reviewed the situation and feel their response was appropriate."When you have an unknown intruder in the building, delivering an unknown package, we come up with the same conclusion. We cannot be too cautious, in this day and age," Rush County Schools Superintendent John E. Williams told the Morton was released on a $30,000 bond but was not allowed to participate in his high school graduation ceremony. Rush County Prosecutor Philip J. Caviness told the Joel Schumm, a professor at the Indiana University School of Law-Indianapolis, questions both charges filed by the prosecution against Morton. He told the Most everyone can remember an immature prank pulled by a classmate who wanted to become a legend before graduating from high school, and that may be what Morton was thinking when the 18-year-old came up with the idea for the final day of classes at Rushville Consolidated High School , in Indiana.Morton didn't consider he might be seen on security camera by a janitor who suspected something more sinister was taking place. Video footage showed a person in a hooded sweatshirt, wearing gloves, entering the school building with an box of unknown contents and then leaving just as quickly five minutes later, reports Associated Press School officials responded by calling local and state police who arrived with K-9 units to lock the school down and search for possible explosives. Instead of bombs, guns and explosives, law enforcement found a blow-up sex doll hiding in the bathroom.The search and investigation resulted in the arrest of Morton, who was hit with a misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct and a felony charge of institutional criminal mischief. The felony charge could mean up to eight years in prison for the young man who has been called "a good student with no criminal record" by the Indianapolis Star Jonathan Turley, law professor at George Washington University, asked on his blog, "What type of society we are creating when our children have to fear that a prank (could) lead them to jail for almost a decade," according to the Washington Post . "What type of citizens are we creating who fear the arbitrary use of criminal charges by their government?”Friends of Tyell Morton who have created a Free Tyell Morton webpage and a Facebook page to gather support for the young man, are asking the same questions, as well as wondering if race is a part of what the Indy Star called 'the prosecutorial zeal in the post-Columbine mindset' of the community and country in general.School officials say they have reviewed the situation and feel their response was appropriate."When you have an unknown intruder in the building, delivering an unknown package, we come up with the same conclusion. We cannot be too cautious, in this day and age," Rush County Schools Superintendent John E. Williams told the Indy Sta r.Morton was released on a $30,000 bond but was not allowed to participate in his high school graduation ceremony.Rush County Prosecutor Philip J. Caviness told the Rushville Republican , "Although it is early, I think the facts bear out that there was no intent to hurt anybody and that a prison sentence is not warranted. I think that would be a little excessive in this case."Joel Schumm, a professor at the Indiana University School of Law-Indianapolis, questions both charges filed by the prosecution against Morton. He told the Indianapolis Star , "The use of the serious felony charge seems beyond the intent of the law. Their reaction is understandable, but use the school disciplinary process. Don't try to label the kid a felon for the rest of his life." More about sex doll prank, High school, high school prank, tyell morton, Rushville Consolidated High School More news from sex doll prank High school high school prank tyell morton Rushville Consolidat... teen high school pra...

Alan Kurdi, left, and his brother Galib Kurdi. Photo courtesy Tima Kurdi/The Canadian Press, via AP Sean Devlin says he is facing charges for resisting arrest and obstruction of justice because he wore a T-shirt to a campaign stop with the prime minister, protesting the Conservatives' lack of action on resettling Syrian refugees. Devlin, known for his role in the Shit Harper Did website, showed up to an event in Surrey, British Columbia on Thursday morning, where Stephen Harper was supposed to address the media firestorm that grew around the death of Alan Kurdi.(Note: Turkish authorities first named Alan as Aylan.) Under his blazer, he was wearing a T-shirt reading "Aylan should be here." During his arrest, Devlin says that shirt got ripped. "Which I thought was rather symbolic," he says. Kurdi, just three years old, drowned when the boat he was travelling in capsized off the coast of Turkey. His mother and five-year-old brother lost their lives as well. A photo of Kurdi's body was splashed across headlines worldwide on Thursday, as a symbolic representation of the growing refugee crisis facing the world. Kurdi's aunt tried to bring her family to British Columbia, where she had relocated, but abandoned those plans after Canada's immigration system denied a refugee application from Alan's uncle. "I went then there this morning. I presented no identification, and I walked right into the event," Devlin told VICE. "When I went inside the event, a photographer said they needed more young faces behind Harper, so they actually invited me to stand in the backdrop behind his podium." Devlin spoke to VICE from inside an RCMP holding cell in Surrey. He was only able to tell part of the story before RCMP officers arrived and told him to hang up the call. "I don't really understand what's happening right now," Devlin said of his circumstances. He says he's facing charges of resisting arrest and obstruction of the peace. It's not the first time that Devlin has done this. He got onstage with the prime minister in 2014, and pulled out a sign reading "Climate Justice Now." This time, however, he could be facing a trial. "I was forcibly removed using pain compliance by three members of his security detail. They arrested me and said I was being arrested for resisting arrest and obstruction of the peace," Devlin said. "I'm still being held, but they've given me my phone back." Devlin says one officer grabbed him by the throat and applied pressure behind one ear, which he calls "pain compliance." Because Devlin was wearing a blazer, he expects that the staffers couldn't see his shirt, with the message scrawled on it. "Once I was at that backdrop, someone in his security detail noticed that I was wearing a T-shirt under my blazer that said 'Aylan should be here.'" "They asked me to leave the stage. I said I'd been invited there, and I didn't want to lose my place, at which point they just used physical force to remove me from the stage," Devlin said. "There were three of them, they grabbed—" Devlin began, before being interrupted by an RCMP officer. "Hang up the phone, dude," the officer could be heard saying. VICE called Devlin back after he was released, roughly a half hour later. "They've taken me to a bus stop," he said. Devlin says he's not currently facing charges, but that the RCMP stressed that they could still prosecute him anytime within the next six months. He says he was forcibly removed from the stage, placed in handcuffs, and then taken out a back exit. "They kept me in the parking lot, in the back, until they could get a car there. They said they didn't want people to see me," Devlin says. He says one of the strange moments during his arrest came when one officer asked: "if I was from Iran," he says. Devlin is Filipino-Canadian, and was born in Ottawa. The Philippines he notes, are "pretty far from Iran." He says the motivation for his protest came from seeing the photo of Kurdi's body lying on that beach. "Knowing that that family could be here right now if this government hadn't reduced the number of refugees being allowed into this country" is what pushed him, Devlin says. Devlin also organizes activism around migrant issues, having recently launched a website aimed at documenting refugee and migrant stories. Follow Justin Ling on Twitter.