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Park rangers in South Africa say that they have found and put down a white rhino which had wandered for days with its horn hacked off and a bullet in its brain.
The young animal had been mutilated by poachers, leaving it with a horrific gaping wound where its horn should have been and severe damage to its eye.
It was spotted by visitors to the Kruger national park on 28 February, and their footage of the rhino was shared widely by a disgusted public on South African social media.
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After a five-day search involving helicopters, sniffer dogs and a team of trackers, the rhino was found still alive but in a grave condition.
"An assessment was conducted to determine the extent of the injuries and suffering. It was discovered that a bullet had lodged in the rhino's brain and therefore any chance of survival was slim," said Reynold Thakhuli, Head of Communications at South African National Parks (SANParks).
He told News24: "People must be able to understand that our main task is conservation, but if you look at the pain that it endured we had to end its suffering. Its brain had been affected by the bullet, as well as one eye."
Warning: some readers may find this footage distressing
SANParks thanked the tourists who brought the rhino's condition to the attention of the authorities, as well as the dedication of the rangers who tracked it over a long distance and challenging terrain.
Thakhuli said the horn could have been hacked off a number of days before it was first spotted, and the fact that the animal survived was down to its young age.
The bullet recovered from the rhino's brain has now been sent for ballistic testing in a bid to determine the rifle used. According to the Mongabay environmental news site, South Africa is in the midst of a rhino poaching crisis, and lost 1,004 rhinos to poachers last year alone.
This year, 146 rhinos have reportedly already been killed - at current pace, the country is losing over two rhinos to poaching every single day, the worst rate in the world.
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Hope earlier in the week that a decision to freeze the construction of new Israeli settler homes in the occupied West Bank could renew the moribund peace process were dealt a blow earlier today when it transpired that permission had been granted to build nearly 300 new houses close to the Palestinian administrative capital, Ramallah.
The announcement will disappoint Americans – especially the Secretary of State, John Kerry - who have spent two months attempting to broker a new deal between the Israeli and Palestinian leaderships.
The Palestinians maintain a long held position that new talks are only possible with a new moratorium of settlement building. The Americans and Israelis say new talks should go ahead without pre-conditions. Settlements are considered illegal under international law.
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Israel’s civil administration yesterday approved a plan to build 296 new houses in the settlement of Beit El. The scheme – which is the first settlement plan to be approved by Israel’s new government since it was sworn in in March - has already won approval from the Defence Minister, Moshe Ya’alon.
The move comes two days after the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu instructed the country’s Housing Minister, Uri Ariel, not to press ahead with government tenders for as many as 3,000 new homes in what the Palestinians have earmarked as part of their future state.
Mr Netanyahu made a similar move in 2010 before the last round of peace talks with the Palestinians that ultimately proved to be fruitless.
The Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erakat said the latest move sent a clear message: that Israel was not interested in resuming direct talks. “We condemn this new decision which is proof that the Israeli government wants to sabotage and ruin the US administration's efforts to revive the peace process,” he told the AFP news agency.
“This is a message to the American administration and a blow to the peace process.”
Tzipi Livni, the Israeli Justice Minister, who also has responsibility for overseeing peace initiatives with the Palestinians, has been in Rome meeting with Mr Kerry ahead of his next trip to Jerusalem and Ramallah later this month. She attempted to quell the Palestinian outrage at the announcement.
“There is no need for this to become a pretext for drama or anger,” she told Israeli Army Radio, adding that the Americans were aware of the latest housing plan. “They listened and they understood, and for the moment, there is no reaction,” she said.
Peace activists inside Israel argued that the green light for the new homes proved that the Israeli government is not serious about any new peace initiative.
Hagit Ofran, who runs the Settlement Watch offshoot of the Peace Now group, said: “It seems Netanyahu is deceiving the public by claiming to have restrained the construction in settlements. The reported pause in publication of new tenders is halting only a small part of the construction in settlements, while the construction on the ground continues, and the initiation of new plans, even in isolated settlements, continues.”
We’ll tell you what’s true. You can form your own view.
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The Duplessis Orphans (French: les Orphelins de Duplessis) were children victimized in a mid-20th century scheme in which approximately 20,000 orphaned children[1] were falsely certified as mentally ill by the government of the province of Quebec, Canada, and confined to psychiatric institutions.[2] The Catholic Church has denied the allegations, and disputes the claims of those seeking financial recompense.[3]
Overview [ edit ]
The 1940s and 1950s were considered a period of widespread poverty, few social services, and Catholic predominance in Quebec. The Quiet Revolution of the 1960s had not yet occurred, so the Roman Catholic Church still held major social power.[4]
Maurice Duplessis, the premier of Quebec, was a strict Catholic. The Church in Canada, as elsewhere in the world, was inclined to be a caretaker of the poor, alcoholics, unwed mothers, and orphans.[5] He put the schools, orphanages, and hospitals in the hands of religious orders, noting he "trusted them completely". He signed an order-in-council, changing orphanages into hospitals in order to provide them with federal subsidies.[6]
Many children were admitted to orphanages because they were abandoned by their parents, not because they were orphans, but often because their parents were unmarried. Children born out of wedlock suffered from poor care.[7]
The Quebec government received subsidies from the federal government for building hospitals, but hardly anything for having orphanages. Government contributions were only $1.25 a day for orphans, but $2.75 a day for psychiatric patients,[4] providing a strong financial incentive for reclassification.
The Loi sur les Asiles d'aliénés (Lunatic Asylum Act) of 1909 governed mental institution admissions until 1950. The law stated the insane could be committed for three reasons: to care for them, to help them, or as a measure to maintain social order in public and private life. However, the act did not define what a disruption of social order was, leaving the decision to admit patients up to the psychiatrists.
The doctors falsely[citation needed] diagnosed the children with various mental illnesses while ignoring their actual mental state. Children in Quebec orphanages were therefore declared "mentally deficient". Schooling stopped, and the orphans became inmates in a mental institution where they were sexually, physically, and mentally abused by lay monitors and nuns. Children who complained about the conditions were sent to local reform schools.[4]
Seven religious orders participated: the Sisters of Providence, the Sisters of Mercy, the Gray Nuns of Montreal, the Sisters of Charity of Quebec, the Little Franciscans of Mary, the Brothers of Notre-Dame-de-la-Misericorde, and the Brothers of Charity.[4]
A commission in the early 1960s investigating mental institutions after Duplessis' death revealed one-third of the 22,000 patients did not belong.[4]
The Bédard report of 1962 put an end to the outdated concept of an "asylum," while many of the orphans reached adulthood and could leave the facility.
Years later, long after these institutions were closed, the children who had survived them and become adults began to speak out about the harsh treatment and sexual abuse they endured at the hands of some members of institutions and medical personnel.[9][10][11]
In a psychiatric study completed by one of the involved hospitals, middle-aged Duplessis Orphans reported more physical and mental impairments than the control group. In addition, the orphans were less likely to be married or to have a healthy social life. 80% reported they had suffered a traumatic experience between the ages of 7 to 18. Over 50% said they had undergone physical, mental, or sexual abuse. About 78% reported difficulty functioning socially or emotionally in their adult life.[12]
Legal recourse in the 1990s [ edit ]
By the 1990s, there remained about 3,000 survivors and a large group formed to start a campaign. They called themselves the Duplessis Orphans after Maurice Duplessis, the Premier of Quebec during that time whose government was responsible for their plight. In addition to government and Church responsibility, the College of Physicians of Quebec came under fire after some of the orphans found copies of their medical records that had been falsified. Labelled as mentally deficient, many of these children were subjected to electroshock, a variety of drug testing and used in other medical experiments.[13] Released upon reaching the legal age of maturity, they were uneducated and ill-equipped to cope with life as adults.[citation needed] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duplessis_Orphans At first, the government of Quebec stonewalled them, but after they started gaining widespread publicity in March 1999, the Parti Québécois government made a token offer of approximately $15,000 as full compensation to each of the victims. The offer was rejected and the government was harshly criticized by the public and even the provincial Ombudsman, Daniel Jacoby, came out saying that the government's handling of the situation had trivialized the abuse the victims alleged.[14] Nevertheless, the government still refused to hold an inquiry. In 2001, the claimants received an increased offer from the Quebec government for a flat payment of $10,000 per person, plus an additional $1,000 for each year of wrongful confinement to a mental institution.[15] The offer amounted to approximately $15,000 per orphan; however, it was limited to each of the surviving 1,100 orphans the government had labeled as mentally deficient, but did not include any compensation for victims of sexual or other abuse.
The offer was accepted by those eligible while the remainder received nothing.[citation needed] The vote on the offer was taken by a show of hands in a closed-door session overseen by Committee chief, the author Bruno Roy, one of very few orphans who enjoyed a successful career following the traumatic experience of youth detention. The results of the vote were later bitterly contested by a group which believed the victims should have received more.[16] Many believe that justice was not done and criminal wrongdoing was allowed to go unpunished.[17]
The Quebec Government declined to prosecute the criminal cases.[18] Opponents of the judgment led by Rod Vienneau of Joliette, Quebec, pointed out that three of the bureaucrats running the compensation program were being paid over $1,000 per day of work,[19] whereas the orphans themselves received the same amount for an entire year of their childhood confined illegally to insane asylums.
The Catholic Church publicly announced that they played no responsibility in the orphans' situation and refused to apologize.[20] The representative for the seven orders, Sister Gisele Fortier, called the allegations "upsetting ... but very much sensationalized, and needs to be put into context."[21] Cardinal Jean-Claude Turcotte, archbishop of Montreal, asserted that the religious orders "deserve our respect and have a right to their good name." This offended many of the Duplessis Orphans. In 2006, one of the Orphans, Martin Lécuyer, stated "it's important for me, that the church, the priests, that they recognize they were responsible for the sexual abuse, and the aggression. It's not for the government to set that peace ... It's an insult, and it's the biggest proof that the government is an accomplice of the church."[22]
Aftermath [ edit ]
In 1999, Researchers Léo-Paul Lauzon and Martin Poirier issued a report arguing that the Quebec government and the Roman Catholic Church made substantial profits by falsely certifying thousands of Quebec orphans as mentally ill during the 1940s and 1950s. The authors made a conservative estimate that religious groups received $70 million in subsidies (measured in 1999 dollars) by claiming the children as "mentally deficient," while the government saved $37 million simply by having one of its orphanages redesignated from an educational institution to a psychiatric hospital. A representative of a religious order involved with the orphanages accused the authors of making "false assertions."[23]
Fate of the remains [ edit ]
In 2004, members of the "Duplessis Orphans" asked the Quebec government to unearth an abandoned cemetery in the east end of Montreal which they believed held the remains of orphans who may have been the subject of medical experiments. According to testimony by individuals who were at the Cité de St-Jean-de-Dieu insane asylum, the orphans were routinely experimented upon and many died. The group wants the government to exhume the bodies so that autopsies may be performed.[24] On December 13, 2015, a new interview with one of the survivors was conducted on RT.[25]
See also [ edit ]
Notes [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Paulin, Marguerite. Maurice Duplessis: Powerbroker, Politician , XYZ Publishing, Montreal, 2005
, XYZ Publishing, Montreal, 2005 Thifault, Marie-Claude and Perreault, Isabelle. "The Social Integration of the Mentally Ill in Quebec Prior to the Bédard Report of 1962", Canadian Bulletin of Medical History, 2002, vol.29, no.1
Further reading [ edit ]
"Les enfants de Duplessis" (Duplessis Children), 1991, by Pauline Gill
"Les fous crient au secours" (The mad cry for help) 1961, by Jean-Charles Pagé
"Naître rien: Des orphelins de Duplessis, de la crèche à l'asile." 2002 by Rose Dufour, with the collaboration of Brigitte Garneau ISBN 978-2-89544-027-7
ISBN 978-2-89544-027-7 Les enfants de la Grande Noirceur. by Rod Vienneau, 2008
by Rod Vienneau, 2008 "Plaidoyer d'un ex-orphelin réprouvé de Duplessis." 2000, by Jacques Baugé-Prévost
"Les heures sauvage" 2001 by Bruno Roy fr]
Matthias Dickert: The Duplessis Orphans. A Historical, Political and Literary Approach. In: Teaching Canada – Enseigner le Canada Ed. Martin Kuester, Claire Köhling, Sylvia Langwald, Albert Rau. Wißner, Augsburg 2017, pp 165–175
The Duplessis Orphans at CBC Digital Archives
O douce Providence a composition by Alyssa Ryvers with Hervé Bertrand, a Duplessis Orphan.
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Come on HTC, save some surprises for the event! We're mere hours away from the announcement for the new HTC One and the nuggets keep rolling in. This time it's a pair of fresh-faced apps on the Play Store: BlinkFeed Launcher and the HTC Service Pack. At present, both apps are incompatible with the HTC One released in 2013, suggesting they may either be intended exclusively for the m8 or Sense 6, or HTC is restricting downloads until after the event. We'll have to wait and see.
Update #1: SenseTV is now up as well.
HTC BlinkFeed
HTC Service Pack
The screenshots match up with those we've seen in the past, so there's not much to learn from them. However, the description for BlinkFeed does confirm that it will sport an Offline Reading mode that caches content over WiFi. Also, notice the BlinkFeed screenshots conveniently cover up the navigation buttons, but the Service Pack left them open for the world to see.
The existence of these apps on the Play Store is the biggest news of all. It indicates that HTC will be following in the footsteps of Google and Motorola by updating stock apps without resorting to full firmware OTAs. Hooray!!!
That's all there is to say for now, but more will surely come when HTC officially unveils it's latest flagship tomorrow!
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FILE - In this Wednesday, Dec. 19, 2012 file photo, a customer checks out a shotgun at Burdett & Son Outdoor Adventure Shop in College Station, Texas. The divide between those who favor gun control and those who don't has existed for decades, separating America into hostile camps of conservative vs. liberal, rural vs. urban. As the nation responds to the massacre of 20 children and six adults in Newtown, Conn., the gulf has rarely felt wider than now. (AP Photo/Pat Sullivan, File)
Throughout its 142-year history, the National Rifle Association has portrayed itself as an advocate for the individual gun owner’s Second Amendment rights. In turn, the NRA relied on those gun owners, especially its 4 million or so members, to pressure lawmakers into carrying out its anti-gun control agenda.
In the last two decades, however, the deep-pocketed NRA has increasingly relied on the support of another constituency: the $12-billion-a-year gun industry, made up of manufacturers and sellers of firearms, ammunition and related wares. That alliance was sealed in 2005, when Congress, after heavy NRA lobbying, approved a measure that gave gunmakers and gun distributors broad, and unprecedented, immunity from a wave of liability lawsuits related to gun violence in America’s cities.
It was a turning point for both the NRA and the industry, both of which recognized the mutual benefits of a partnership. That same year, the NRA also launched a lucrative new fundraising drive to secure “corporate partners” that’s raked in millions from the gun industry to boost its operations.
But that alliance, which has grown even closer in recent years -- and includes ties both financial and personal, a Huffington Post examination has found -- has led to mounting questions from gun control advocates about the NRA's priorities. Is the nation’s most potent gun lobby mainly looking out for its base constituency, the estimated 80 million Americans who own a firearm? Or is it acting on behalf of those that make and sell those guns?
According to a 2012 poll conducted by GOP pollster Frank Luntz for Mayors Against Illegal Guns, 74 percent of NRA members support mandatory background checks for all gun purchases, a position that the NRA has stridently opposed. “There’s a big difference between the NRA’s rank and file and the NRA’s Washington lobbyists, who live and breathe for a different purpose,” Mark Glaze, the executive director of the gun control group, said.
The questions about the NRA's ties to the gun industry, and whether those ties have influenced its agenda, have come to the forefront in the wake of horrific mass shootings last year in Connecticut, Colorado and Wisconsin.
A week after a gunman killed 20 children and six adults in a Newtown, Conn., school, Wayne LaPierre, the NRA's executive vice president and top lobbyist, gave a tense, combative performance at a press conference in which he signalled the organization wouldn't budge from its long-held opposition to most gun control measures.
Instead, LaPierre revealed that the NRA favored putting thousands of armed guards in schools to curb shootings. “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,” he said.
The NRA’s deep ties to the gun industry dismays some lawmakers who have introduced gun control bills responding to the mass shootings.
“The NRA is basically helping to make sure the gun industry can increase sales,” Rep. Carolyn McCarthy, a New York Democrat and longtime gun control advocate, told The Huffington Post. McCarthy last week proposed a bill that would ban new sales of new large ammunition clips that increase the lethality of weapons like those used in mass shootings in Connecticut, Colorado and Wisconsin.
“No one is challenging NRA members' right to own guns,” McCarthy said. "We’ve had large mass shootings which have [involved] large mass assault weapons clips. These clips aren’t used for hunting.”
McCarthy’s husband and five other people were shot dead in a brutal assault in 1993 on a New York commuter train by a man wielding a gun with a large-capacity ammunition clip.
The Obama administration is reportedly considering a much broader approach to curbing gun violence: bans on assault weapons and large ammunition clips, mandatory background checks on all gun purchases, increased mental health checks and expanded penalties for carrying guns near schools. On Wednesday, Vice President Joe Biden said that the White House had determined that "executive action can be taken," though the specifics have not been settled.
The administration is also trying secure backing from big retailers like Walmart that sell guns, with an eye to undercutting the influence of the NRA and gun industry allies -- a strategy that might peel off some of their gun-owner grassroots. Walmart leaders announced this week that they will attend a Thursday meeting at the White House.
Gun control advocates who have lagged badly behind the NRA in fundraising and organization are now are accelerating their efforts. On Tuesday, former Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D), who was badly wounded two years ago in a mass shooting, launched a new gun control political action committee, Americans for Responsible Solutions, to counter the NRA’s legendary financial and political clout with Congress.
The NRA declined to comment. In recent years, it has argued that defending gun owners and the gun industry is one in the same. Any new laws or regulations that would limit the availability of firearms, or restrict who can own them, would violate the Second Amendment, the organization has said. The NRA has said it does support efforts to keep guns out of the hands of felons, those who have been adjudicated as mentally incompetent, or unsupervised children.
The NRA forwarded a letter to The Huffington Post that the group sent to Congress. The letter is signed by Chris Cox, who runs the NRA lobbying arm. “We know that the facts prove gun bans do not work and that is why they are not supported by the majority of the American people,” the letter said. Cox promised that the NRA would adopt a “constructive” stance in the debate, and reiterated past NRA positions that existing laws need to be better enforced.
In 2011, 32,000 Americans died due to gun violence. The homicide rate in the U.S. is about 20 times higher than in other advanced nations.
'YOUR FIGHT HAS BECOME OUR FIGHT'
Close ties between the NRA and gunmakers go back at least to 1999, when the NRA publicly declared its support for the firearms industry as it prepared to defend itself from a rash of liability lawsuits filed by cities and municipalities.
“Your fight has become our fight,” then-NRA president Charlton Heston declared before a crowd of gun company executives at the annual SHOT Show, the industry's biggest trade show. “Your legal threat has become our constitutional threat," he said.
Following the passage of the shield law that dismembered those lawsuits, the NRA launched a new fundraising drive targeting firearms companies the organization had just helped in a big way. That effort, dubbed "Ring of Freedom," paid off handsomely. Since 2005, the NRA drive has pulled in $14.7 million to $38.9 million from dozens of gun industry giants, including Beretta USA, Glock and Sturm, Ruger, according to a 2011 study by the Violence Policy Center, a group that favors gun control.
The Violence Policy Center study cited an NRA promotional brochure about the corporate partnership drive, noting that LaPierre promised that “this program is geared towards your company’s corporate interests.”
Despite the millions of dollars it has collected from the gun industry, the NRA’s website says “it is not affiliated with any firearm or ammunition manufacturers or with any businesses that deal in guns and ammunition.”
Besides its heavy lobbying for the special legal protections for gunmakers and distributors, the NRA pushed successfully in 2004 to ensure that a 10-year ban on assault weapons, enacted in 1994 over strong NRA objections, wasn’t renewed. Since then, annual rifle production by U.S. gunmakers has risen by almost 38 percent, according to federal gun data.
“The NRA clearly benefits from the gun industry,” William Vizzard, a former agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, told The Huffington Post. “There’s a symbiotic relationship. They have co-aligned goals much more than 30 or 40 years ago.”
Vizzard noted that the gun industry has evolved slowly in recent decades from a “stodgy and conservative” business, which sold mostly rifles and sporting arms, to one that now traffics in paramilitary weapons and handguns. The NRA and the gun industry “have grown closer as the business has changed,” he said.
The intertwining interests of the NRA and the gun industry are also underscored by the gun company executives on the NRA board.
Among the gun industry heavyweights on the 76-seat NRA board are Ronnie Barrett, CEO of Tennessee-based Barrett Firearms Manufacturing, which makes a military-style rifle sold with high-capacity magazines. Pete Brownell, who heads Iowa-based Brownells Inc., another maker of high-capacity magazines, also sits on the NRA board.
These companies and other gun industry giants have ponied up big bucks to the NRA since 2005, according to a list of NRA corporate partners posted at its last convention.
For instance, Brownells is in an elite group of donors that have given between $1 million and $4.9 million since 2005. Barrett Firearms in the same period chipped in between $50,000 and $99,000.
Another notable donor is Freedom Group, which owns Bushmaster, the company that made the AR-15 military-style rifle used by Adam Lanza in his bloody assault on Sandy Hook. The Freedom Group has donated between $25,000 and $49,000 to the NRA’s corporate effort.
The NRA’s most generous gun industry backer is MidwayUSA, a distributor of high-capacity magazine clips, similar to ones that Lanza loaded into his Bushmaster rifle and Glock pistol. These clips increase the lethality of weapons by allowing dozens of shots to be fired before the shooter has to reload. According to its website, Midway has donated about $7.7 million to the NRA through another fundraising program that dates back to 1992. Under this program, customers who buy Midway products are asked to “round up” the price to the next dollar, with the company donating the difference to the NRA.
While the bond between the NRA and the gun industry has tightened, the NRA’s annual budget of about $250 million is still largely derived from other sources, including membership dues, merchandising and ads in NRA magazines. The magazines, though, are chock-full of gun industry ads.
Still, veteran gun control advocates said the NRA’s links with the gun industry may backfire as it deploys its lobbying to stave off new curbs.
“I think it’s much easier for policymakers to defend the NRA when they’re perceived as efforts on behalf of gun owners,” Josh Sugarmann, executive director of the Violence Policy Center, said. “That equation changes dramatically when they’re seen as defending the gun industry.”
Whether this prediction holds true in the looming debate over gun control remains to be seen. But in the early-2000s, most lawmakers had few reservations about showing their support for the NRA -- even when the organization was lobbying for a law that would carve out a legal safe haven for the gun industry from civil negligence lawsuits.
'HOW'S THE WAR GOING?'
The fight to pass the liability shield law, known as the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, began after state attorneys general won a landmark $200 billion settlement against tobacco companies on claims they knowingly misled smokers about the dangers of cigarettes.
The success of the smoking cases led more than 30 cities and municipalities to sue the gun industry, citing negligence in the marketing and sale of firearms. The industry also faced increasing negligence lawsuits filed by victims of gun violence.
The most significant of these cases was brought by the families of the 13 people killed or seriously injured over a three-week span by the Washington, D.C.-area snipers, John Muhammad and Lee Malvo. The pair used a .223 Bushmaster semi-automatic rifle, the same model as Lanza. The weapon was allegedly stolen from a gun shop with a history of weapons "disappearing" from its inventory. The victims' families claimed the shop was negligent, as was the gunmaker, for not better policing problem stores.
In 2004, Bushmaster and the gun dealer settled the lawsuit for $2.5 million in a case that gun control advocates hailed as a "major breakthrough."
The gun company warned that cases like this could bankrupt it. Gunmakers described the legal fight in militaristic terms.
"As I walk through the plant, employees stop to ask me 'How's the war going?'" said Rodd Walton, the top lawyer for Sig Sauer, then called Sigarms, at a congressional hearing in 2005. “It's the war we are fighting against plaintiffs filing junk and frivolous lawsuits."
Though the gun industry has its own lobbying arm, the National Shooting Sports Foundation, based in Newtown, Conn., its influence pales in comparison with the NRA, which grades lawmakers on their fealty to the Second Amendment, and runs attack ads against candidates it perceives as on the wrong side of the fight. In the wake of its last major defeat -- the 1994 assault weapons ban -- the NRA mounted a successful campaign to push many of the ban's supporters, especially Democrats from rural areas, out of office.
The gun industry found a ready ally in the NRA, as Heston’s 1999 call to arms demonstrated. To aid its cause in Congress, the NRA enlisted one of its most trusted and powerful soldiers: then-Republican Sen. Larry Craig of Idaho, a longtime NRA board member.
The NRA and its allies argued that the lawsuits could destroy the gun industry, thus endangering Second Amendment rights.
"The cost of these lawsuits threatens to drive a critical industry out of business ... jeopardizing Americans' constitutionally protected access to firearms for self defense and other lawful uses," Craig said.
The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence fiercely opposed the bill to protect gunmakers from liability. "This was entirely a fight for the gun industry and more specifically for the worst actors in the gun industry," said Jonathan Lowry, a lawyer for the organization.
One of the bill's congressional opponents was Rep. Mel Watt. (D-N.C.). "I had no animosity toward guns, I had an animosity for setting precedents for other industries," Watt recently told The Huffington Post. Watt said he didn't understand why gunmakers should gain a legal shield available to no other industry.
But the NRA won the day, handily. Craig, who did not respond to a request for comment made through his lobbying firm, spearheaded the effort to get the bill through the U.S. Senate, where it eventually collected 15 Democratic votes, including that of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).
In May 2006, the NRA's lobbying arm awarded Craig the Harlon B. Carter Legislative Achievement Award, its highest honor.
'MASSIVE OBAMA CONSPIRACY'
Since the passage of the 2005 law, ties between the NRA and the gunmakers have deepened.
The gun industry and other large corporate and individual donors chipped in $71.1 million in 2011 to NRA coffers, compared with $46.3 million in 2004, according to a Bloomberg News review of NRA tax returns.
The NRA’s fierce lobbying for other laws -- especially bills that have passed in almost every state allowing the carrying of concealed weapons -- also seem to have endeared the pro-gun goliath to many companies. After Wisconsin passed its concealed carry law, Fifer of Sturm Ruger told analysts in an earnings call that sales in the Badger State should get a boost.
As the debate about gun control moves forward, some analysts said the NRA's hard-line rhetoric benefits the gun industry in another way: it boosts sales.
“The NRA is generating fear,” said Vizzard, the former federal agent. “The industry has learned that the more controversy there is about guns, the more guns sell -- whether it’s a legitimate controversy over a bill, or a trumped-up one like, 'Obama’s been re-elected, they’re going to take away our guns.'”
A case in point has been the NRA’s strident rhetoric about the threat posed by President Barack Obama. The president, to the dismay of gun control advocates, failed to back new gun curbs in his first term, even though he endorsed renewing the lapsed assault weapons ban during his 2008 campaign.
Even so, the NRA's LaPierre fiercely opposed Obama's reelection, warning in late 2011 of a "massive Obama conspiracy to deceive voters and hide his true intentions to destroy the Second Amendment in our country.” Interestingly, stock prices for gunmakers Sturm, Ruger and Smith & Wesson jumped in the wake of Obama’s November win.
After the Newtown massacre, sales jumped again. Given the NRA's past rhetoric, the odds are good that it will characterize any new gun legislation as proof that it was right to be wary of the president's motives.
Even so, the NRA would be wise to consider whether its rhetoric and agressive anti-gun control stance might alienate some of its membership, Vizzard said. Historically, he said, the NRA membership "appears to be more amenable," to certain types of regulation than the NRA leadership is.
The NRA’s ability to intimidate legislators at the polls may also be waning after last fall’s election. The NRA spent $17.4 million on the presidential and congressional contests in last year's general elections, according to Open Secrets, the web site for the Center for Responsive Politics. The NRA failed to unseat Obama and lost six out of seven Senate races, where it spent more than $100,000, according to Media Matters.
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The NES Remix series on Wii U is a wonderfully ingenious twist on the tired old compilation pack.
Instead of just shoving a bunch of dusty old ROMs onto a disc, Nintendo engineered a gauntlet of quick fire mini-games, ripped from classic games. You might have to stomp on 15 Goombas in Super Mario Bros, or hop three barrels in Donkey Kong.
Each challenge is a bite size chunk - not quite as short or crazed as a WarioWare micro game, but certainly requiring a lot shorter attention span than trying to puzzle out The Legend of Zelda in 2014.
You get medals for your effort, and you score is saved and can be compared on a regional leaderboard or against your friends. You can even watch a replay video of anyone's attempt, complete with an overlay showing button presses.
And then there are the mash-ups, which smash together characters, enemies, levels, and mechanics from multiple games so you have Link fighting Donkey Kong, or Kirby sucking up Boo ghosts from Mario.
Those Wii U games deftly sidestepped the problems with retro mix tapes, offering something new for hardcore fans, actively encouraging the act of flitting between games whenever you hit a hard bit, and retooling the classics for new players who don't have the patience for 1980s game design.
And all that is here in this 3DS version, which pulls together "the best" bits (Nintendo's words) of NES Remix 1 and 2. But it's a shame to see such a smart and knowing series, remixed into something so lazy.
For starters, the game isn't 3D. At all. The games are 2D, the menus are 2D, and the overlays are 2D.
Now I'm no expert in NES engineering (sadly not an accredited university course), but there are emulators that render old games in faux 3D and Nintendo has its own line of three-dimensional NES games. Heck, it would be fine if the overlays were just poking out a bit, or if the screen resembled a curved CRT telly of the era.
Then there's Speed Super Mario Bros. Oh man. This makes me laugh. It is possibly the most unashamedly effort-free excuse to sell SMB to you for the eighteen thousandth time.
This is Super Mario Bros played really fast. Everything moves at double speed, making it practically impossible to play. That's it. It's amazing.
Maybe you can find a twisted challenge in rewiring your brain cells to handle the speed boost but seriously, that's it? If you're going to let us tweak Mario's settings, why not let us fiddle, tweak, and toy with the variables like a ROM hacker or an ambitious kid with a Game Genie and an afternoon in 1985 to kill.
You could have speed Mario, but also slow Mario, moon-gravity Mario, and mirror Mario. You could dial up the speed of each enemy, make coins deadly, or increase the firing rate of Mario's fire flower.
The championship mode is quite interesting. It's a slightly more length challenge (split across Super Mario Bros, Mario 3, and Dr Mario) and styled after the old Nintendo World Championship competitions .
But there's only one challenge, and it's exactly the same as the Championship Remix in NES Remix 2 (but despite this, the leaderboards are kept separate). Been there, done that.
And on top of all this, you can't change the controls. Plus, this doesn't even mention the obvious fact that the handheld version of this series really should be a remix of old Game Boy games. It makes sense, right?
The NES Remix games are great and it's nice to have some version of that in a portable format. But this 3DS remix is interminably lazy. It's phoned in, shows an uncharacteristic lack of effort from Nintendo, and is hardly befitting of the 'Ultimate' tag, or its £30 price tag.
We'll have a full review closer to the game's launch on November 7th in Europe and December 5th in the US.
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A New York church notorious for posting homophobic messages on its billboard may be on the auction block. But if fundraising efforts are successful, the parish's history of hate could be repurposed into something truly beautiful.
A New York state judge has ordered the ATLAH World Missionary Church to be sold at a public foreclosure auction, according to court records cited by DNAinfo New York. The church, which has been known to display messages like "Jesus would stone homos" and "Obama has released the homo demons on the black man" on its billboard, has reportedly amassed debts and tax liens totaling more than $1.02 million.
The Harlem church could prove to be a commodity in Manhattan's cutthroat real estate market. But the Ali Forney Center, an advocacy group dedicated to homeless lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) teens and young adults, hopes that an online fundraiser will help raise $200,000 to secure the property as housing for its clients.
Carl Siciliano, who is the Ali Forney Center's founder and executive director, said in a press release that repurposing the church to house homeless LGBT youth would "truly be a triumph of love over hatred."
"The biggest reason our youths are driven from their homes is because of homophobic and transphobic religious beliefs of their parents," he said. "Because of this, it has been horrifying for us to have our youths exposed to Manning's messages inciting hatred and violence against our community. It has meant the world to us that so many Harlem residents have stood up to support our young people, and are now urging us to provide urgently needed care at the site of so much hatred."
LGBT rights activist Scott Wooledge, who is working with the Ali Forney Center to raise the funds to buy the church and has raised over $200,000 for homeless youth over the past two years, echoed those sentiments.
"We, as a community, have a golden, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to turn what was once a center of appalling hate into a home where our youth can be safe, nurtured, supported and thrive into self-sufficient adults," he told The Huffington Post in an email. "Let's seize the day, and turn the page on an ugly chapter in Harlem's history."
Stacy Parker Le Melle, founder of Harlem's "Love Not Hate" Movement, told The Huffington Post, "When the ATLAH story broke on Thursday, immediately I heard from neighbors: Wouldn't it be amazing if an LGBT group could acquire the property? What if it were the Ali Forney Center? We all knew that this would be poetic justice. We need to care for those kicked out of homes, often on religious-based grounds. We need to care for those most vulnerable to ATLAH's hate speech."
ATLAH's pastor seemed to downplay his parish's debts in an interview with DNAinfo New York, and vowed to cite the church's tax exempt status in its fight against the foreclosure order, which he called a "land grab."
"I assure you, it’s about a water bill and a tax that can’t be levied against this church,” Rev. James David Manning, who made headlines in 2014 when he argued that Starbucks flavored its coffee drinks with "sodomites' semen," told DNAinfo.
C'mon, New York, let's make this happen.
To donate to the Ali Forney Fundraiser, head here.
UPDATE: Rev. James David Manning claims "friend" will give ATLAH Church the funds it needs to pay off taxes:
ATLAH Alert
A friend offers ATLAH Church $1.2M to remedy foreclosure tax. Details at church worship. https://t.co/4BBAcc4YAf — James David Manning (@DrJamesDManning) January 30, 2016
Also on HuffPost:
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Introduction
Venture capitalist Mark Kvamme, right, with Republican Gov. John Kasich of Ohio at his 2015 inauguration. Instagram
A group backing Republican John Kasich‘s presidential aspirations received $500,000 in seed money from a seemingly odd source, according to documents filed today: an obscure limited liability company in Montana.
But a Center for Public Integrity review of business filings indicates the company is linked to someone quite familiar to Kasich, the current governor of Ohio — a venture capitalist who served in Kasich’s administration.
The limited liability company, called MMWP12 LLC, made a half-million-dollar donation to the pro-Kasich New Day Independent Media Committee the day after the company formed.
Making matters murkier: MMWP12 LLC is actually controlled by another Montana-based company called K2M LLC, according to state business records.
This second company lists just two officers: Mark Kvamme, the Ohio venture capitalist and former Kasich administration official, and Paul Johannsen, a real estate developer in Whitefish, Montana, near Glacier National Park.
Some campaign finance reform advocates worry that limited liability companies can serve as vehicles for megadonors to inject big bucks to political efforts while hiding their identities from voters.
That’s because some states, unlike Montana, don’t require LLCs to identify the living, breathing people who own or control them. Instead, they need to provide only the name of a “registered agent,” which is often a company that exists only to serve as the registered agents for LLCs.
Little is publicly known about Johannsen’s political leanings, but Kvamme is a long-time Kasich ally.
After Kasich was elected governor in 2011, he enticed Kvamme to leave California and pursue public service.
Kvamme went on to serve three months as the director of Ohio’s Department of Development and then worked for four months as Kasich’s director of job creation.
He then founded and led a nonprofit group called JobsOhio that promoted job creation and economic development in the Buckeye State.
Ohio campaign finance records show Kvamme has also personally donated more than $100,000 since 2010 to Kasich and other Ohio Republicans, including the state GOP.
Moreover, according to the Columbus Dispatch, Kvamme has provided Kasich his private jet for travel to New Hampshire, which holds the first presidential primary election contest next year.
Neither Johannsen nor Kvamme immediately responded to requests for comment from the Center for Public Integrity.
Kasich officially announced his presidential bid last week, entering a packed Republican field now featuring 17 candidates. A network of pro-Kasich groups, including New Day Independent Media Committee, is also working to amass cash and build support for his campaign.
New Day Independent Media Committee operates as a so-called “527 committee,” after the section of the U.S. tax code that governs its activities. It files campaign finance reports with the Internal Revenue Service instead of the Federal Election Commission. Overall, it raised $600,000 in June.
A separate pro-Kasich group called New Day for America today reported raising more than $11 million, including $200,000 from Kvamme’s parents, Floyd and Jean Kvamme.
Floyd Kvamme is an investor who served on Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s 2012 presidential finance team.
The pro-Kasich committees are allowed to accept unlimited contributions, including corporate contributions. They cannot, however, coordinate their spending with Kasich’s campaign.
Meanwhile, federal candidates cannot collect direct contributions from corporations and cannot accept more than $2,700 per person, per election.
Kasich’s own campaign will not file its first campaign finance report until October.
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As a developer who was raised on procedural and object oriented programming languages like C, C++ and Java it took me a while to figure out what people were raving about when it comes to the benefits of functional programming techniques. I always thought closures and higher order functions were words used by snobby kids from MIT and grad students to show how overeducated they were as opposed to programming tools I'd ever find useful.
This thinking was additionally fueled by articles like Joel Spolsky's Can Your Programming Language Do This? which not only came off as snobby but also cemented the impression that higher order functions like map() and reduce() are for people solving "big" problems like the folks at Google who are trying to categorize the entire World Wide Web not people like me who write desktop feed readers in their free time.
All of this changed when I started learning Python.
With Python I started writing programs that threw around lambda functions and used list comprehensions to map, reduce and filter without even thinking twice about it. Afterwards when I'd go back to programming in C# 2.0 I'd marvel at how much more code it took to get things done. There were tasks which I could perform in a line of Python code that took four, five sometimes up to ten lines of C# code. I began to miss Python sorely.
Then I installed Visual Studio 2008 and got to use the Language Integrated Query (LINQ) features of C# 3.0 and was blown away. The C# folks had not only brought over functional programming constructs like lambda expressions (aka anonymous methods) but also had added the 3 core functions (map, reduce and filter) to all lists, collections and other implementers of the IEnumerable interface. So what are map, reduce and filter? They are higher order functions [which means they take functions as input] that operate on lists of objects. Here are their definitions from the Python documentation along with links to their C# 3.0 equivalents.
Function name in Python Description from Python Documentation C# 3.0 Equivalent map Apply function to every item of iterable and return a list of the results. Enumerable.Select reduce (aka fold or accumulate) Apply function of two arguments cumulatively to the items of iterable , from left to right, so as to reduce the iterable to a single value. For example, reduce(lambda x, y: x+y, [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]) calculates ((((1+2)+3)+4)+5) . The left argument, x , is the accumulated value and the right argument, y , is the update value from the iterable . If the optional initializer is present, it is placed before the items of the iterable in the calculation, and serves as a default when the iterable is empty. Enumerable.Aggregate filter Construct a list from those elements of iterable for which function returns true. iterable may be either a sequence, a container which supports iteration, or an iterator. Enumerable.Where
With these three building blocks, you could replace the majority of the procedural for loops in your application with a single line of code. C# 3.0 doesn't just stop there. There are also a number of other useful higher order functions available on all enumerable/collection objects.
In the next version of RSS Bandit, we will support synchronizing your subscription state from Google Reader, NewsGator Online and the Common Feed List provided by the Windows RSS platform. This means that when the user hits [Update All Feeds] to refresh their subscriptions we need to (i) aggregate the unread item count across the different feed sources and store it (ii) ask each feed source to kick off its update process and (iii) on completion of the update determine if there are new items by recalculating the unread count across all feed sources and see if it differs from the value we got in the first step. Here's what the UpdateAllFeeds() method looks like
public void UpdateAllFeeds( bool force_download)
{
List < SubscriptionRootNode > rootNodes = this . GetAllSubscriptionRootNodes();
if (rootNodes != null )
{
if (_timerRefreshFeeds . Enabled)
_timerRefreshFeeds . Stop();
_lastUnreadFeedItemCountBeforeRefresh = rootNodes . Sum(n => n . UnreadCount);
FeedSources . Sources . ForEach(s => s . RefreshFeeds(force));
}
}
In the UpdateAllFeeds() method we use Enumerable.Sum which is a specialized reduce() function to calclulate the unread count of each of the different subscription sources. Then we use a ForEach extension method to effectively loop through each feed source and call its RefreshFeeds() method. That would have been two for loops in older versions of C# or Java.
We also perform more complicated reduce or fold operations which go outside the norm of just accumulating some numeric value in RSS Bandit. When a user subscribes to a new feed, we populate a drop down list with the list of categories from the user's subscriptions so the user can decide which category to place the feed in. With multiple feed sources, we need to populate the drop down with the list of categories used in Google Reader, NewsGator, the Windows Common Feed List as well as those within RSS Bandit while taking care to eliminate duplicates. The GetCategories() method shown below does the bulk of that work in a single line of code via Enumerable.Aggregate
public IEnumerable < string > GetCategories() { //list containing default category used for bootstrapping the Aggregate function var c = new List < string > (); c . Add(DefaultCategory); IEnumerable < string > all_categories = c; //get a list of the distinct categories used across all feed sources all_categories = FeedSources . Sources . Aggregate(all_categories, (list, s) => list . Union(s . Source . GetCategories() . Keys, StringComparer . InvariantCultureIgnoreCase)); return all_categories; }
The first step is to set up a list with the default category ("Unclassified") and then use Aggregate() to go through each source and perform a union of the current list of categories with the list of categories from that feed source. The categories are compared in a case insensitive manner to remove duplicates from the union. If there are no categories defined in any of the feed sources then only the default category ends up being returned.
When a user is viewing their Google Reader feeds in RSS Bandit, any action the user takes in the application is reflected on the Web. So each time a user marks an item as read, renames a feed title, subscribes or unsubscribes from a feed, a Web request is made behind the scenes to update the user's state on the Web via Google Reader's REST API. Instead of making the Web requests synchronously and possibly tying up the UI I instead add each Web request intended for the Google Reader API to a queue of pending operations. Since the operations may sit in the queue for a few seconds or minutes in the worst case, we can optimize network usage by removing events from the queue if they end up being redundant.
For example. the DeleteFeedFromGoogleReader() method removes every pending operation related to a particular feed if an unsubscribe event is enqueued. After all, there is no point in making Web requests to mark the feed as read or rename it, if the next request from the user is to unsubscribe from the feed. The method uses a filter operation, Enumerable.Where, to determine the events to remove as shown below
public void DeleteFeedFromGoogleReader( string googleUserID, string feedUrl) { var deleteOp = new PendingGoogleReaderOperation ( GoogleReaderOperation . DeleteFeed, new object [] {feedUrl},googleUserID); lock (pendingGoogleReaderOperations) { //remove all pending operations related to the feed since it is going to be unsubscribed IEnumerable < PendingGoogleReaderOperation > ops2remove = pendingGoogleReaderOperations . Where(op => op . GoogleUserName . Equals(deleteOp . GoogleUserName) && op . Parameters . Contains(feedUrl)); foreach ( PendingGoogleReaderOperation op2remove in ops2remove) { pendingGoogleReaderOperations . Remove(op2remove); } pendingGoogleReaderOperations . Add(deleteOp); } }
There are more examples from the RSS Bandit code base but I'm sure you get the idea. The point is that functional programming techniques give you the ability to get more bang for your buck (where bucks are lines of code) even when performing the most mundane of tasks.
If your programming language doesn't support lambda functions or have map/reduce/filter functions built in, you just might be a Blub Programmer who is missing out on being more productive because your programming language doesn't support "esoteric" or "weird" features.
My next step is to spend more time with Lisp. Wish me luck. :)
Now Playing: Lil Wayne - Lollipop (remix) (feat. Kanye West)
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NEW YORK (Reuters) - Republican presidential contender Donald Trump said on Tuesday he would renegotiate America’s role in the U.N. global climate accord, spelling potential doom for an agreement many view as a last chance to turn the tide on global warming.
Republican U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks to supporters in Charleston, West Virginia, U.S. May 5, 2016. REUTERS/Chris Tilley/File Photo
A pull-out by the world’s second biggest carbon-emitting country would hobble the deal reached in Paris last December by nearly 200 nations, who for the first time in more than two decades found a common vision for curbing greenhouse gas emissions.
“I will be looking at that very, very seriously, and at a minimum I will be renegotiating those agreements, at a minimum. And at a maximum I may do something else,” the New York real estate mogul said in an interview with Reuters.
“But those agreements are one-sided agreements and they are bad for the United States.”
Trump said he did not believe China, the world’s top emitter of the carbon dioxide gas that many scientists believe is contributing to global climate change, would adhere to its pledge under the Paris deal.
“Not a big fan because other countries don’t adhere to it, and China doesn’t adhere to it, and China’s spewing into the atmosphere,” he said.
The accord to transform the world’s fossil-fuel driven economy was a potent signal to investors.
It seeks to limit a rise in global temperatures to less than 2 degrees Celsius through combined national pledges to cut emissions, and provide funding for developing nations to mitigate the damaging effects of a sea level rise and climate change.
The Obama administration pledged a 26 to 28 percent domestic reduction in greenhouse gases by 2025 compared to 2005, while China promised it would halt increases in carbon emissions by 2030. Both countries have promised to ratify the deal this year.
Many U.S. Republicans have found fault with the deal for overreacting to what they see as an uncertain threat.
Former French foreign minister Laurent Fabius, who helped broker the deal, said this month that the U.S. election was critical to its future. “If a climate change denier was to be elected, it would threaten dramatically global action against climate disruption,” he said.
Trump has said that he believes global warming is a concept that was invented by China to hurt the competitiveness of U.S. business. One of his energy policy advisers is a climate change sceptic, U.S. Congressman Kevin Cramer of North Dakota.
Hillary Clinton, the leading Democratic contender for the White House, has advocated shifting the country to 50 percent clean energy by 2030.
Trump’s comment drew fire from environmental advocates.
“This is another example of Trump’s dangerous lack of judgement and the very real impacts it could have for all of us,” said Gene Karpinski, president of the U.S.-based environmental group League of Conservation Voters.
“Trump’s denunciation of the Paris climate accord is not only short sighted, but would be terribly costly for America and our ability to lead the world. We cannot go backwards on this important step towards a clean energy economy that benefits all our families,” billionaire environmental financier Tom Steyer said in a statement.
The Paris agreement has an article built into it meant to protect countries in the accord in the event that a new government comes in and wants to dismantle it. The clause says any nation wanting to withdraw will first have to wait four years.
U.S. chief climate envoy Jonathan Pershing said last week that regardless of the outcome of the U.S. election, other countries were likely to be bound by the pact.
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The iPhone 5 And The Economy: Don't Believe The Hype
toggle caption Kiichiro Sato/AP
The iPhone 5 will give a nice boost to U.S. economic growth in the last three months of this year, according to a new note from JPMorgan.
Not surprisingly, lots of people are writing about this note. It's a prediction about the iPhone 5! And the economy!
But the prediction is based on a ridiculous assumption.
The JPMorgan note seems very mathy and precise. It starts with the full cost of the new phone, subtracts the value of the imports in each phone (imports are subtracted from economic growth numbers) and estimates the total number of phones likely to be sold in the last three months of the year.
Bottom line, according to the note: The new iPhone could add 0.33 percent to U.S. economic growth. That's actually a lot, when you consider that total economic growth is only about 2 percent.
But to arrive at that conclusion, JPMorgan assumes that every single dollar people spend on new iPhones would not otherwise have been spent on anything else during the last three months of the year.
Say I want an iPhone 5. And to pay for it, I'm going to cut back on other spending.
My wife and I won't get a babysitter one Saturday night. Instead of going out for a nice dinner and a movie, we'll have mac and cheese and watch cable. (Sorry, honey!) Instead of buying my dad a fancy Christmas present, I'll buy him a book. (Thanks for teaching me to love reading, Pop!)
My purchase of an iPhone 5 has contributed precisely zero to economic growth. I have simply decided to spend less on childcare, restaurant food, movies and Christmas presents (all that spending would have contributed to economic growth).
The JPMorgan note doesn't account for this at all. It assumes that no one is cutting back on anything in order to pay for a new iPhone.
There is a useful, if familiar, idea hidden in this report. It's what Keynes called the paradox of thrift. During an economic slump, Keynes argued, everybody starts spending less and saving more. This, perversely, keeps the economy mired in a slump. So, in the short run, the economy will grow more if people start spending more and saving less.
To the extent that people pay for their iPhones out of savings, it will in fact contribute to economic growth in the next few months. But to the extent that people pay for their iPhones by cutting back on other things — or simply buy an iPhone rather than another, comparable phone — it won't contribute to economic growth at all.
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Former prime minister Malcolm Fraser has made a radical call for Australia to break its alliance with the United States and become a “strategically independent” country.
In his new book Dangerous Allies, released today, Fraser warns that the ANZUS treaty – as now interpreted - might be the biggest threat to Australia’s security, rather than its major protector.
Strategic independence would mean ending the US presence in northern Australia, part of the American “pivot” to the Asia-Pacific region, and closing the Pine Gap facility, which he says nowadays could be used almost in real time to target weapons systems.
Such a stance would necessitate Australia spending much more on defence but it would not be caught up in any future conflict between the US and China. “If a war between China and the United States were to occur with a continuation of current policies, it would be very hard, if not impossible, for Australia not to be involved.”
Fraser was a strong advocate of the alliance when he was prime minister between 1975 and 1983, but argues that the end of the Cold War has transformed the international situation and also that American values have changed with the growth of its view of “American exceptionalism”.
Fraser’s bottom line is that if conflicts break out Australia should be in a situation where it has a totally open choice about whether it goes to war.
He believes the alliance took Australia into costly wars, including Vietnam (when the US did not share some vital information with Australia), and especially Iraq, where the result “is, and was always going to be, disastrous”.
He rejects the option that Australia should simply tell the US it would no longer automatically follow it into future conflicts because “we are too closely ‘intertwined with US strategies and plans. Australian facilities are too heavily involved”.
Fraser admits the US would take “the strongest possible exception” to moves such as closing Pine Gap within five years.
“Every pressure would be exercised on an Australian government so that the United States would maintain strategic control. We would need to resist such pressures and make it clear that, in our view, the risks of a strategic alliance with the United States, of being forced into a war that was not in our interest, were so great that we had to cut the ties.”
Writing a forward to the book former Labor foreign minister Gareth Evans says some of Fraser’s judgements, such as that Australia should have been a much more independent and less subservient alliance partner in recent years, were unarguable.
“Others – in particular, his conclusion that we should now go it completely alone – are much more problematic.”
Fraser traces Australia’s stance of “strategic dependence” from the country’s earliest days – first, dependence on Great Britain, and then on the US, of which it is now “strategic captive”.
“I discount direct threats to Australia as a result of strategic independence,” he writes. “It is strategic dependence that provides the greatest problem to our future in the region.
"Indeed, the current interpretation of ANZUS by Australian leaders is paradoxical – it might be the biggest threat to our own security despite it being presented as the guarantor of our security.”
Fraser does not see China as a source of future danger unless it is provoked unreasonably. “Such provocation could come from the United States, from Japan or, much less likely, from a flare-up in the South China Sea. It would be a major advantage not to be tied to the United States in such circumstances,” he writes.
“An independent Australia could act much more effectively in concert with other Western Pacific countries, on the one hand to avoid flashpoints and points of danger, and on the other to promote initiatives that would do much to maintain continuing peace throughout the region.
"Yet, as part of the American network, we would not be able to take such action. We would merely be regarded as a surrogate voice of America and therefore wield no true influence.”
He says that a strategically independent Australia would still share a great deal with the US. “Strategic independence does not mean ending our relationship with America and cutting out ties. It does mean having a different relationship, a more equal one in which we can feel free to say no or offer a differing opinion.”
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These days only bare walls are left of the Vila Rebar, one of the most mythical places on the outskirts of Zagreb. Situated on the Medvednica mountain overlooking the city, it was once a retreat for Ante Pavelic, leader of the Croatian fascist puppet-state in the Second World War.
Later it became a popular destination for hikers and housed a restaurant which remained famous until 1979, when fire swallowed all of its wooden fixtures and fittings, leaving only foundations and the basic stone structure at the mercy of weeds and graffiti artists.
But 12 years earlier, it was also the site of the most surreal accident in Croatian football history.
Ante Pavelic (left) was a frequent visitor to Vila Rebar
On a lovely morning in June 1967, the Vila Rebar guests were enjoying the sunshine and fresh air on an open terrace. However, this wasn’t a typical day for the people of Zagreb. The night before, their beloved Dinamo had done what had seemed impossible: after losing the first leg against Eintracht Frankfurt 3-0, they defeated the Germans 4-0 to reach the final of the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup.
There awaited Don Revie’s mighty Leeds United. But the two final legs had been scheduled for late August and early September, so Dinamo had more immediate concerns – there were three more league matches to be played, and the Blues were title contenders. Over coffee or spritzer, people on the restaurant terrace discussed Dinamo’s chances. If they beat FK Sarajevo and won at least one of the remaining two away games, they would win the trophy that had eluded them for nine years.
Causing commotion
Could he do without the Zagreb nightlife, which made him even more of a city icon than his on-pitch achievements?
Surely the team, re-energised after this fantastic, improbable win against the Germans, could do it? They had the best players – including Stjepan ‘Stef’ Lamza, the genius playmaker. Jack Charlton surely couldn’t stop him, let alone any defender in the Yugoslav league.
Lamza produced a magical display against Eintracht and the newspapers were full of praise for him. There were also rumours he’d leave for Inter, Milan or Barcelona. But could he do without the Zagreb nightlife, which made him even more of a city icon than his on-pitch achievements?
“Suddenly, there was all this commotion,” says Zvonko Orsag, an eyewitness at the Vila Rebar. “A man fell from the balcony upstairs onto the table next to where I was sitting. He hit it with his shoulder, rebounded off it and banged his head on the ground. We all jumped from our chairs.”
Embedded video for Meet the drunkest footballer EVER: Breakfast booze, night-long sessions and pre-game liquor
The man appeared conscious, but he wasn’t moving and his head was covered with blood. Every one of the terrace were horrified when they recognised his face. It was Lamza himself. His eyes were blinking uncontrollably and he reeked of alcohol.
It wouldn’t be the last time Dinamo were affected by their players’ drinking culture. In 2013, their Brazil-born fantasista Sammir spent the night in police custody when he was apprehended for driving drunk as a skunk the morning after partying all night.
In 2012, defender Domagoj Vida was thrown off the team bus for casually opening a can of beer in front of his coach. Later, tabloids broke the story of Jozo Gaspar, a club legend from the 1990s, stealing a credit card from the locker room of a lower-league club and using it to buy 36 bottles of Jagermeister.
"We'll take 35 more please"
There are many more examples from previous decades. One player was found intoxicated and passed out in his doorway before the team was due to depart for an important match. Another bragged to journalists: “I drank half of the city’s booze...”, while one player urinated in front of reporters on leaving the team bus at an away match.
"I was afraid"
But all that is nothing compared to what was happening in the 1960s, when Dinamo were a riot squad and won their only piece of continental silverware. Their story is soaked in alcohol and almost all anecdotes begin and end with Stef Lamza: probably the most boozed-up player of all time.
Born in 1940 in Sisak, 35 miles south-east of Zagreb, Lamza came to Dinamo as a 20-year-old. The team had just won the Yugoslav Cup and narrowly lost the title to Red Star. They also had Marton Bukovi, the Hungarian coach famous for pioneering the 4-2-4 formation and developing the role of the deep-lying centre-forward.
“I was afraid,” Lamza tells FFT, his piercing and dramatic blue eyes staring from behind white eyebrows and white moustache.
Lamza admits to nerves when he first joined Dinamo Zagreb
“To me, Dinamo players were like aliens – they were like these football gods and it took me a while to gather the courage and join them. They all had their rituals and I was left out as the youngest. I even had to knock on the door when I entered the locker room.”
The road to acceptance, it would seem, led through Zagreb’s bars and restaurants. It’s no secret that Dinamo players were, at that time, epic booze hounds, known as much for their all-night parties as they were for their football.
An urban legend has it that all taxi drivers had to drive them in reverse between two popular bars, because the players were keen to leave an impression: they were proud of their lifestyle and made little effort to hide it. And the fans appreciated them for it – the Zagreb crowd always preferred bohemian characters who played beautiful, technical football.
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INDIANAPOLIS—After rallying to tie the Eastern Conference Finals at one game apiece, members of the Miami Heat expressed their confidence Wednesday that they have the right officiating to ultimately overcome the Indiana Pacers. “Indiana’s a great team, no question, but at the end of the day I think we have the right group of refs on the court to push us to the win,” Heat small forward LeBron James told reporters, adding that late in the game the team can always depend on officials to get them to the foul line. “In a tight series, you need to get the big whistles when it counts, and fortunately guys like [referee Joey] Crawford always deliver for us. They’re obviously great during the regular season too, but they’re really clutch in the playoffs.” James went on to say that in the final seconds of a close contest, he trusts the refs to make the game-winning call.
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DiscoveryNetworks YouTube Channel has released another round of promotional videos from Shark Week 2011. The clip is taken from “Killer Sharks: The Attacks of Black December” and portrays a rather gruesome shark attack reenactment. For anybody familiar with the film “Jaws,” there are more than a few noticeable similarities between this clip and the Alex Kintner scene.
Another clip from “Rogue Sharks” (also a part of this year’s “Shark Week”) features even more blood and gore. The clip from “Rogue Sharks” is narrated by the victim of a white shark attack who recounts his encounter. The victim was bitten twice and after the second bit the shark remained latched on to his leg.
Discovery’s “Shark Week” has faced criticism in the past for this kind of programming, and it seems that these types of shows are in the minority for this year’s “Shark Week.” So, do you think the style of programming seen in the clip above belongs on “Shark Week” or not? You can share your opinion the comments section.
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Former Vice President Al Gore Albert (Al) Arnold GoreOvernight Energy: Trump ends talks with California on car emissions | Dems face tough vote on Green New Deal | Climate PAC backing Inslee in possible 2020 run New climate PAC will back Inslee for president Howard Schultz must run as a Democrat for chance in 2020 MORE on Monday claimed that President Trump has "isolated" himself from the majority of Americans who believe in the threat of climate change.
"A plurality of Trump supporters believe that he should've stayed in Paris, so I think that he has in some ways isolated himself from the overwhelming majority of public opinion in the country as a whole," Gore said during a CNN town hall event hosted by Anderson Cooper, referring to the international climate deal Trump pulled out of earlier this year.
Gore said many of the president's supporters likely voted for Trump for his other key campaign promises, but not for climate.
"Well, I think that he was elected for a lot of other reasons, and surely some who agree with his decision on climate voted for him for that reason, but most, I think, had other reasons," Gore said in part. "And now, two-thirds of the American people including a majority of Republicans believe we should've stayed in the climate agreement at Paris and believe it is a serious problem that we need to address."
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Gore has been promoting his new documentary, "An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power," which was released on Friday. The former lawmaker has also remained publicly critical of the president for his policies on climate.
"Although he is president, he does not speak for the country on this issue, and that was vividly illustrated in the aftermath of his speech pulling the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement," he told Business Insider in an interview last month.
Trump's controversial decision to pull out of the agreement made the U.S. an outlier among the world's nations, nearly all of which support the climate change accord, pledging to lower their countries' greenhouse gas emissions.
Gore's new film follows his efforts in 2015 to get global leaders to support the Paris Agreement, which became the first global climate accord to include nearly 200 nations.
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Police in South San Francisco are trying to locate a man they believe manipulated his mentally disabled girlfriend into prostitution.
Investigators began searching for Nicholas George Geranios, 27, on Wednesday after receiving a report that he was advertising his 21-year-old mentally disabled girlfriend on various websites, police said.
Investigators located the woman and confirmed her sexual services had been offered online throughout San Mateo County, police said. Geranios allegedly received the money from the transactions, according to police.
Geranios, who has addresses in Redwood City and South San Francisco, is described as 5 feet 8 inches tall and about 200 pounds.
Anyone with information regarding the case or Geranios is asked to contact South San Francisco police Officer Limbada at (650) 877-8900.
Copyright © 2009 by Bay City News, Inc. "… republication, re-transmission or reuse without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited.
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A key technology used for virtual currencies is being researched by the Department of Defense to create more secure networks. The goal is to create tamper-proof military computer systems, including those systems used to control America's nuclear weapons.
According to Quartz , the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is looking into using blockchain technology to create more secure military networks, allow military system administrators to determine if a network or database has been tampered with. In September, DARPA awarded a $1.8 million contract to a computer security firm to begin tests.
At its most basic, a blockchain is a decentralized ledger that keeps track of data in a database or network. It then attaches a unique, persistent code, also known as a "block," to the asset being guarded. Each time it is viewed or altered, all authorized users with access to the asset receive new blocks that update it. Each block is chained to another block, thus "blockchain." This tech helps Bitcoin and other virtual currencies maintain integrity across worldwide networks.
Although the technology doesn't prevent unauthorized individuals from accessing networks, it can sound the alarm when the unauthorized user attempts to tamper with anything. Any change is automatically passed to authorized users. Did any of them make the change? If yes, great, the new data is accepted by everyone. If not, the data is rejected.
In the military context, blockchain technology would be used behind traditional internet security like secured networks. If someone does manage to somehow successfully access a classified network, blockchain will be there to make sure the hacker can't do any damage—such as rewrite code having to do with command and control of nuclear weapons. It's like having a vicious attack dog inside your already heavily fortified home.
Hackers couldn't let any nukes fly on their own, but they might be able to interfere with military communications in ways that wouldn't be noticeable—until a crisis arises. Blockchain would hopefully guard against this doomsday hypothetical from becoming a reality.
Source: Quartz
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The weight is only one thing that's changed since its Kickstarter two years ago.
There is a famous (among bike nuts, anyway) quote:
All bicycles weigh fifty pounds. A thirty-pound bicycle needs a twenty-pound lock. A forty-pound bicycle needs a ten-pound lock. A fifty-pound bicycle doesn't need a lock at all.
One has to wonder how heavy a lock you need for a Hummingbird bike.Two years ago Kim covered the Kickstarter launch of this folding bicycle that she called “an eye-popping, carbon fiber model that weighs a feather-light 6.5 kilograms, or about 14 pounds (or the equivalent of four pineapples, according to their video)." It was offered then at £1,100 (USD $1,685). Commenters complained, noting that “Treehugger almost always ignores the price in favor of the "exciting innovation".
© Hummingbird © Hummingbird
Now, two years later, it is on the market and it is beautiful. It is an exciting innovation, and it’s not just the weight that is eye popping. It now weighs a little bit more (6.9 kilos, a bit over 15 pounds) and costs a LOT more: “With prices starting at £3,495, Hummingbird has spared no expense in designing the ultimate product for the urban cyclist.” However, the pound has dropped significantly against the US dollar, so that’s only US$4,604 -- a bargain. I think I can warn you now: Don’t read the comments.
© Hummingbird © Hummingbird
It is being manufactured by race car builder Prodrive to beautiful specifications. "The lower rolling resistance of high pressure slick tyres and the lower drag of high quality sealed bearings allow Hummingbirds to go faster with less effort. Small wheels allow for a lower moment of inertia, meaning faster acceleration and more responsive steering."
Featuring the same carbon fibre manufacturing process as Prodrive’s race cars, each frame is manufactured at the dedicated composites facility in Milton Keynes….Starting as stock prepreg carbon fibre, sheets of carbon are sliced into accurately measured strips before being perfectly aligned to make the frame. The layers are then fused together into one piece, under high pressure and heat. This highly meticulous process results in a perfectly compact, strong and beautiful frame, carefully handcrafted and finished to the highest standards.
The folding design is interesting and a little more time-consuming than my Strida, and folding up not quite as small as a Brompton. But it’s really all about the weight here; 15 pounds is next to nothing for a bike.
© Hummingbird © Hummingbird
And in answer to the question about how heavy a lock should be, the answer is the same as the 50 pound bike. At that price and weight you don’t need a lock; instead you carry the bike everywhere with you and never let go. Or, as Hummingbird partner Robert Campbell notes, “The Hummingbird truly is a thing of beauty, meaning you will never want to take your eyes off it.” Indeed, you cannot afford to take your eyes off it.
Order yours at Hummingbird Bikes.
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GOMEZ FARIAS, Tamaulipas — Human rights activists searching for cartel victims found an extermination field used by Los Zetas to bury and incinerate at least 500 near a UNESCO-protected ecological biosphere.
The extermination field was found in the southeastern part of Tamaulipas in the rural community of Alfredo Bonfil. The area is close to El Cielo Biosphere, a protected ecological site known as Mexico’s northernmost tropical forest and cloud forest region. Breitbart Texas was able to confirm through Mexican court documents that Los Zetas members confessed to operating multiple incineration sites throughout the border state.
Tamaulipas is one region that has two former governors who are wanted by the U.S. Department of Justice on money laundering charges in connection with cartel bribes. Prosecutors believe that Tomas Yarrington and Eugenio Hernandez received bribes in exchange for protecting criminal organizations. Yarrington is also wanted on drug charges for actively helping Los Zetas and the Beltran Leyva Cartels after his term.
The discovery of the most recent site yielded a large number of charred human remains, said Edith Perez, a member of the human rights group “Voice and Dignity for Ours”, during an interview with Breitbart Texas. While the area had previously been searched by state authorities, the human rights group was able to get help from Mexican federal investigators to search some spots described by a Los Zetas regional boss during one of his court hearings.
The human rights group that carried out the search is based out of the Mexican state of San Luis Potosi by relatives and friends of cartel victims who disappeared in Tamaulipas while their loved ones traveled through the state.
The new information that led to the discovery came from statements made by Enrique “Ricky” Santillan, who confessed to personally having ordered or taken part in more than 500 murders and incinerations. For close to 11 years, Santillan spread terror through the rural communities in the southern part of Tamaulipas. In addition to overseeing the smuggling of large drug shipments, Santillan, along with his right-hand man Francisco “Pancho” Carreon, oversaw ransom kidnappings.
Court documents obtained by Breitbart Texas revealed that other Los Zetas members claimed to have incinerated kidnapped victims in the rural communities that lead to the border state of Nuevo León. Breitbart Texas has reported at length on other Los Zetas killing fields where the cartel was able to kidnap, murder, and incinerate more than 300 in the Mexican border state of Coahuila with complete impunity. Half of those victims were incinerated in the state prison at the border city of Piedras Negras.
Editor’s Note: Breitbart Texas traveled to the Mexican States of Tamaulipas, Coahuila, and Nuevo León to recruit citizen journalists willing to risk their lives and expose the cartels silencing their communities. The writers would face certain death at the hands of the various cartels that operate in those areas including the Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas if a pseudonym were not used. Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles are published in both English and in their original Spanish. This article was written by Tamaulipas ’s “Francisco Morales”
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Dragon Quest XI introduces battle system, new characters Martina and Row
Command-based battles on both platforms.
The latest issue of Weekly Jump has new details on Dragon Quest XI, introducing the game’s battle system and latest two characters.
Get the details below.
Battle System The PlayStation 4 version uses a “Free Movement Battle” system where you can freely move the character and viewpoint. There is also an “Auto Camera Battle” system in which you can enjoy immersive battles.
The 3DS version has a “2D Mode” featuring familiar 2D pixel graphics, and “3D Mode” featuring 3D characters and monsters.
Both the PlayStation 4 and 3DS versions use command-based battle systems. The “Falcon Slash” and “Thwack” options can be seen in use in screenshots of the PlayStation 4 and 3DS versions, respectively.
You can preemptively strike enemies (PlayStation 4 screenshot).
There is some sort of new element in which the protagonist is surrounded by a blue aura (PlayStation 4 screenshot).
Two new monsters, Mandra and Ocobolt, are pictured. Characters Martina – The high-spirited female martial artist. “With you, I’ll protect everyone… That is my fight!”
– The high-spirited female martial artist. “With you, I’ll protect everyone… That is my fight!” Row – A mysterious old man with a white mustache. “I’ve been waiting for you all to arrive.”
Dragon Quest XI will launch for PlayStation 4 and 3DS in Japan in 2017. A Switch version is also planned. The final release date will be announced at a presentation on April 11.
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Former St. Francis Xavier University president Sean Riley's final contract allowed him to collect more than $1.2 million for administrative leave he was not able to take in years leading up to 2011.
The university paid him $527,563.63 when he signed the agreement and set aside another $733,074.40 in trust as a retirement allowance.
The details are in Riley's final contract signed in January 2011, obtained through a request made under the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act. Riley retired last year after 18 years at the helm of the Antigonish university.
The head of the university's faculty association says the deal shows a corporate mentality that has been found on many Canadian campuses in recent years.
Brad Long, a professor in the school of business and president of the St. Francis Xavier University Association of University Teachers, calls the contract "egregious."
"Administrative leave becomes a right and it becomes a cash payment, a cashable benefit," he said. "We've heard in the past various justifications for administrative leave by trying to compare it to sabbaticals that faculty earn.
"But this contract highlights the fallacy in making those comparison, [because] faculty have to apply for sabbatical leaves based on a planned program and they can be denied."
New president posts contract
The contract also called for bonuses of between 15 per cent and 30 per cent of Riley's salary, if he met targets set by an executive committee.
Long also says this also pokes holes in arguments made by Frank McKenna — the chair of the university's board of governors at the time Riley's deal was signed — that greedy faculty were driving up the costs of higher education.
Meanwhile, the person who succeeded Riley as St. FX president, Kent MacDonald, has posted his contract online. Long calls the transparency a positive step.
MacDonald's bonuses will be smaller, capped at 15 per cent of his $288,000 salary. However, he also a formula for administrative leave that will pay him one year for every five as president.
Earlier this year, details of former Dalhousie University president Tom Traves's contract showed he received one year's full salary for each five years he served as president. He is the highest paid person at Dal, making more than $450,000 a year, even though he's been retired since 2013.
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This week, to accompany our cover story on worst-case climate scenarios, we’re publishing a series of extended interviews with climatologists on the subject — most of them from the “godfather generation” of scientists who first raised the alarm about global warming several decades ago.
Michael Mann is a climatologist at Pennsylvania State University, known primarily for his 1999 “hockey stick graph” of global mean temperatures (which shoots up quite dramatically in the 20th century). He has also been steadily involved in the United Nations’ periodic IPCC state-of-the-planet reports, and with Lee Kump has even adapted those reports into a popular, accessible book summarizing the findings. The book, which was updated to reflect the most recent reports, is called Dire Predictions.
Shortly after this week’s cover story was published, Mann took to Facebook to voice some criticism of it — primarily about its framing, which he described as counterproductively “doomist.” Personally, I don’t think we’re doomed, just facing down a very big challenge. But I own up to the alarmism in the story, which I describe as an effort to survey the worst-case-scenario climate landscape. We have suffered from a terrible failure of imagination when it comes to climate change, I argue, and that is in part because most of us do not understand the real risks and horrors that warming can bring, especially with unabated carbon emissions. For the sake of clarity: I do not believe that the planet will become uninhabitable in 2100. As I write in the story, our complacency will surely be shaken before we get there. But I do believe that it is important to contemplate the possibility that parts of the tropics and equator will become cripplingly hot, for instance, or that our agriculture will suffer huge losses, so that we may be motivated to take action before we get to those eventualities. And I do believe that, absent a significant change in human behavior across the globe, they are plausible eventualities.
Mann also took issue with a few particular points of science. He stressed that the danger of the carbon frozen in the arctic permafrost was not a “game-changing arctic methane time bomb” and, separately, he suggested that the recent upward revision to a particular satellite data set on warming was less significant than I made it out to be. My purpose in raising the permafrost issue was to illustrate how uncertain much of our current modeling can be, not to suggest a sudden methane release would be the major cause of devastating warming: I based none of the warming scenarios described in the piece on a dramatic methane release effect but rather on the high end of the IPCC’s business-as-usual estimate, which gave a roughly 5 percent chance of our hitting eight degrees of warming by 2100. Regarding the data set, I grant that the upward revision may have been less meaningful to the scientists close to the data, who understood it as a revision toward expectations, than it was to journalists covering the development from afar, who focused on the fact of the revision itself.
I have an enormous respect for Mann, and for his perspective on climate change — he has been an invaluable force both as a scientist and as an advocate. That is one reason why I called him up, during my research, to talk to him about what he thought about the low-probability, high-horror possibilities of climate change. Given his criticisms of my story, we’ve decided to run this transcript unedited.
Maybe the way to start is for me to just tell you about what I’m trying to do and what I’m after. My basic perspective as a kind of close but amateur follower of all this stuff is that the business-as-usual forecasts even in the IPCC get us to some pretty scary places. And then there are some reasons to think that those projections may be a little bit conservative, even over the single-century timescale.
Right.
It seems to me that there hasn’t been much out there about worst-case scenarios. Maybe that’s in part because scientists have been so anxious that the world — or at least the American public — not impugn their work as speculative or dangerous. And so scientists have felt a need to be a bit restrained in talking about what is possible. But to me it seems like it neglects a lot of really terrifying possibilities and that those possibilities are important to consider because they spur action.
Yeah.
So I’m just hoping to do a piece that walks through what would happen in a world that is four, five, even six degrees warmer: What kinds of threats and challenges we’d face; how likely they are; and what are the things that are quite likely that we should be worrying about quite a lot; and the things that are less likely but so scary that we should be watching out for their arriving and being sure to forestall them when we can. So I’m sort of doing a listening tour, trying to talk to as many people as I can about these things to see what they think in that context. What are things that they think, what are the threats that they think have been underemphasized, what do they think the world would look like if it was four, five, six degrees warmer, and how to talk about that world in a way that’s both sensible and, you know, sort of fair to the risks.
Yeah, I mean, there has been quite a bit made about the so-called scientific reticence — the tendency for scientists in general to actually be conservative in what they state and the conclusions that they state, particularly when it involves the public sphere. Naomi Oreskes, I don’t know if she’s on your list of folks to talk to.
Yeah.
So she’s written on this, specifically with regard to climate change and how there has been a tendency for scientists to often understate, sort of, the potential risks and the timeframe on which they may unfold because of this sort of combination of innate conservatism among scientists and also sort of this assault on science by climate-change deniers.
I think the intent of that assault has been to sort of cow scientists into retreating from the public discourse and frankly intimidating scientists into being very guarded and very conservative about their public statements. I think that’s been the intent, or one of the intents, of the fossil-fuel-industry-funded attack on climate science. This is something I’ve written about in a book about my own experiences, The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars, and more recently this book with Tom Toles, The Madhouse Effect. Which is sort of more up to date. And we talk quite a bit about that. So I think your observation is correct. There has been a tendency to understate risk.
And the other point that you make is a very important one, which is that when it comes to societal decision-making, it’s critical to not just consider the most likely impacts, but those sort of low-probability but catastrophic sort of cost scenarios. What we call the so-called tails of the probability distribution. The things that may not be, we can’t conclude that they’re likely, but we can’t rule them out, and if they were to happen, they would have such a catastrophic impact that it makes sense to take them into account. And sort of do any cost-benefit analysis of the importance of acting to avert ongoing warming and climate change. So one scenario, and something I’ve done a fair amount of work on: you have a combination of sea-level rise and potentially stronger tropical storms and hurricanes. The flood risk for New York City may be such that we literally have to abandon New York City and many of our largest coastal cities and many of our largest naval bases like the one in Norfolk, Virginia. All would be very vulnerable to even modest amounts of additional sea-level rise. If you look at the last IPCC report, which is sort of the state of scientific consensus, the report concluded that the sort of upper end of the range of likely sea-level rise was somewhere in the neighborhood of a meter. Over three feet of sea-level rise by the end of the century. But the science that has been done since then, just over the last couple of years, now suggests that we probably have to double that. The most likely sea-level rise by the end of this century is probably somewhere in the neighborhood of six feet, two meters, and that has to do with science that’s been done since the last IPCC report, work by climate scientists to put into the models some of the processes that were not really resolved by the models previously, and that’s a recurring theme.
Uncertainty, of course, can cut both ways, but in many respects, the progress in the science over the last decade or so has been such that we tend to see more risk. We tend to see the probability distribution shifting in the direction of greater impact, larger magnitude impacts. And that’s true with sea-level rise, it’s true with tropical storms and hurricanes, it is true with drought, where we are seeing a pretty dramatic increase in both the extent of drought in middle latitudes. In California, of course, the worst drought on record. The paleo-climate scientists tell us it’s probably the worst drought in at least 1,200 years. There is science that’s emerging, some of that is science that we’ve done, that has isolated sort of subtle mechanisms by which climate change can influence extreme events like droughts and like floods and like heat waves, and again these are things that, there are processes involved that are pretty subtle, and not well resolved by the global models that have typically been used for climate-change projections, and, again, by the nature of the science, is that these sorts of impacts are more likely than the projections would have had us believe just five years ago or ten years ago. So there is this recurring theme of the science moving in the direction of the impacts being larger than we expected and part of that is a function of the reticence of scientists and the tendency to sort of be very conservative.
A good example is the last IPCC report — actually, sorry, well, two IPCC reports ago, the fourth assessment report, and this got quite a bit of attention at the time, this was back in 2006 where the report gave an upper sort of end range of sea-level rise that was just on the order of a foot, a little over a foot over the next century and there was sort of an almost like an asterisk next to that conclusion, it was almost buried in the footnotes if you will, was the fact that they didn’t include the contribution from melting ice sheets, from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, because they couldn’t estimate that contribution. And therein lies the rub, because it’s the major driver and it can only weigh in in one direction, so there’s sort of an asymmetric neglect of processes that almost invariably imply worse changes than what are being projected. So, yeah, your thesis, I would agree with your basic thesis here. A worst-case scenario — and when you asked about business as usual, and I assume by business as usual you mean if we don’t really, if the world adopts a Trump-like approach to climate change over the next century where we literally don’t act at all, we continue to escalate our burning of fossil fuels, we don’t move away from fossil fuels towards renewable energy. In that sort of scenario, then, by the end of the century, you’re probably talking about a four to five degree Celsius, seven to nine degree Fahrenheit warmer globe. The warming is even greater than that where people live because we live on continents rather than in the oceans, and the land warms up faster than the oceans so when people quote a global average temperature that’s actually misleading. Most of us will experience more warming than the global average because the global average is held down by the oceans, that don’t warm as much. Doesn’t help us, those of us that live on land. So more than the seven to nine degree Fahrenheit warming of the globe …
And in certain areas, even more pronounced than that.
Twice that much in the Arctic, where we’re already seeing some of the worst impacts. So the loss of sea ice and the ramifications and all this stuff sort of circles back, again getting at this issue of processes that haven’t really been fully incorporated or represented in the main climate model projections, because when you lose Arctic sea ice, when you warm up the Arctic that fast, you lose Arctic sea ice faster than you expected. Greenland melts faster than you expected. The Greenland ice is of course going, Greenland is losing ice quite a bit faster. The climate models projected that Greenland and the West Antarctic ice sheet probably wouldn’t lose ice mass until the middle of this century. Just ten years ago, that would’ve been sort of the state-of-the-art projection, and what we’ve learned is that first of all, the satellite measurements tell us it’s already happening, so clearly that’s not correct, they’re already losing ice; and now we’re beginning to understand the processes by which that happens and we’re beginning to incorporate those into models and the sea-level-rise projections are increasing, the projection of melting is increasing, and when you melt all that Greenland ice and that water flows into the North Atlantic, not only does it contribute to sea-level rise, it freshens the North Atlantic and it potentially shuts down the so-called conveyor-belt ocean circulation. The Day After Tomorrow scenario — of course the movie is a caricature of the science but there is an underlying grain of truth to that, and we published an article just a couple of years ago, my colleague [Stefan Rahmstorf] and others showing that this already appears to be happening.
Shutdown of conveyor-belt ocean-circulation pattern — that could, you know, it’s not going to lead to about anything that’s portrayed in the movie The Day After Tomorrow, but it would mean potential decrease in the productivity in the North Atlantic, which we rely upon for fish, seafood and fishing, worst drought, far more extreme heat waves, longer duration, more intense heat waves.
A good fraction of the tropics are now too warm essentially for human habitation and there are studies that show that once you warm temperatures by even a few degrees by what they are currently in the tropics, basically you can’t work outside. Productivity plummets, agriculture plummets, basically these regions become unlivable so you’ve got a smaller amount of surface area on the Earth to support a growing global population. You see a tendency for worse drought and decreased freshwater availability over much of the continents of the world. Again, as I mentioned, food, productivity …
That seems like to me a really scary and also quite underappreciated by the broader public, the effect on food.
No, absolutely. Food, water, land, you know? The basic resources that we rely upon. All of them are adversely impacted by climate change and with a growing global population. So you’ve got more competition over fewer resources among a growing global population. It’s a recipe for a conflict nightmare. And this is why when you talk to national-security experts, many of them will tell you that climate change may be the greatest security threat we face in the years ahead, it’s what they call a threat multiplier. It heightens existing tensions, it heightens conflict, especially when you’re talking about more competition for fewer resources. And interestingly enough, and this is not actually that widely appreciated, this is sort of a dystopian scenario that Hollywood imagined decades ago. The movie Soylent Green, with Charlton Heston — if you watch the very beginning of the movie, it’s briefly mentioned, but the underlying cause of that dystopian future is global warming, is climate change. So there was — it was sort of an oddly prescient, some of these early-’70s dystopian novels and films and Soylent Green foresaw exactly the sort of future that we’re talking about where climate change leads to decreased resources. In that case, it was about food for a growing global population, and it’s a dystopian future. A worst-case scenario — a worst-case future does not look that different from the dystopian visions that Hollywood has already provided us.
It’s really interesting to me to think that in the ’70s we were starting to get an understanding that the climate was warming, but it’s also the case that most of the emissions that we’ve seen globally have come since then. I think we have a little bit of a bias in the developed West to think of this all as like a debt from the industrial revolution that we’re repaying, but it’s really striking to me to think about how much of the damage that’s been done just in the last couple of decades, and therefore how much damage we’re doing every day and how consequential it is.
You make a good point. Most of the carbon that has been emitted up through now is still from the industrial world, but as you note, moving forward, it’s all about the developing world. China, India, South America, and so there is this legacy, of course we’re responsible in a sense for much of the climate change we’ve already witnessed, but what will push us over the threshold of dangerous interference with the climate now depends very much on what the developing world does, and that’s where you get into these very tricky global negotiations where you start talking about, Well, what about reparations from the West to— yeah, so it gets into some thorny issues of international diplomacy, but that’s the bottom line. Moving forward what’s going to determine our fate is much more the path taken by the developing world.
Obviously they’re in a position much less prepared to deal with it, they’ve got much less money to build technology, to move people, it’s all, sort of, that’s a threat multiplier too, poverty.
That’s right, and that’s why it’s important to, within the Paris agreement, quite an effort to, for the world to provide resources to help — and reparations, but really resources to help them transition directly to a renewable-energy economy rather than going through the same fossil-fuel energy economy stage that we went through. We can’t afford for them to do that.
Right. Can we talk in a little more detail about sort of each of the scenarios? I don’t know if you have time, we were talking about food, water, and land. I was hoping maybe you could just walk me through in a little more detail how each of those areas, maybe even into particular regions, where you think things will be hardest hit, where you think pain points will show up first, that kind of thing.
Yeah, so in terms of drought, what happens is the sort of dry desertlike subtropical regions expand forward, because the region of subsiding air is what leads to dry conditions. When you have a tendency for rising air, like in the deep tropics, that’s where you get the rainfall, or again in the middle latitudes in the form of mid-latitude storms that are associated with a tendency for rising air, but in the subtropics there’s this tendency in the large-scale circulation of the atmosphere for descending air. So that’s where you get the dry desert belt. And that descending air, the sort of down-welling part of the circulation to the global atmosphere that expands polewards, and so it’s not coincidental that California has seen such bad drought. That Syria, the Middle East, the Mediterranean, these regions are seeing worse drought. The subtropics are both drying, and they’re expanding poleward and so the southern half of the U.S. is increasingly going to experience more and more prolonged and pronounced droughts.
The Middle East, you know, which is of course again— when you talk about all the basic stresses, food and water and land, that’s what’s driven conflict in the Middle East. Some would argue it’s very much been about, ultimately, conflict in the Middle East grew out of competition for precious water resources and so you see in the case of the Syrian uprising, it was driven by another drought that is the worst on record, the Syrian drought. Again, the paleo data suggests it’s the worst drought in at least 900 years — that’s as far back as they could go in fact — and that drought is ultimately what displaced rural farmers. They moved into the cities and there was increased conflict that arose from that and ultimately ISIS was able to flourish in that environment of instability and conflict and now we’re seeing the global repercussions of that from a national-security standpoint. So, drought. That’s a big one. It’s behind a lot of the conflict that we see, it’s increasingly impacting the key agricultural regions in North America for certain, that now, so that’s— I forget, how did you want to break this down in terms of, uh …
I was just going off of what you said. You said land, water, and …Yeah, yeah yeah yeah. Yeah. So land, global sea-level rise, I think it’s something like 25 percent of the global population lives within something like 30 feet of mean sea level. So even three to six feet of sea-level rise will displace many millions of people, and so that’s where you start getting into issues of, hundreds of millions. We’re not yet in the billions department; I think you have to get close to 30 feet until you’re displacing a sizable fraction of the global population, but yeah, in the hundreds of millions of people at six feet of sea-level rise, I think is fair to say. That of course leads to, that’s the source of environmental refugeeism— you know if you’re, you’re literally displaced by flooding, you have to go somewhere else. The worsened drought and worsened heat with basically some studies suggesting that the entire tropical band becomes unlivable at four to five degrees Celsius, seven to nine Fahrenheit warming of the planet. So you basically now have to take all of the population that currently inhabits the entire tropics, which is a good chunk of the global population, and now they are forced to higher latitudes up into Eurasia, up into North America. That’s driven by drought, driven by sea-level rise, driven by excessive heat, so you’ve got environmental refugees and the competition for food that, in the tropics, most cereal crops are growing, it has to do with the productivity of cereal crops, is a function of temperature and in the tropics, you’re very close to sort of the optimal point in that curve. Crops are about as productive as they can possibly be, so you’re right at the peak. And if you’re right at the peak, then even a little bit of warming causes you to go down the other side of the peak, so you see very substantial decreases in agricultural productivity. Rice, sorghum, maize, all of the major crops, very sharp decreases in productivity with even a couple of degrees of warming, and we’re talking about well beyond that. It used to be, though, that warming, a little bit of warming, was actually good in the mid-latitudes, you get longer growing season, shorter winter, but what we’re also finding, and we saw that with the Siberian wildfires two years ago, with some of the devastating floods that we’ve seen in recent years, that weather instability, extreme weather events, are also on the rise. There is an underlying connection with climate change, and the destruction by extreme weather will likely completely offset any marginal gain we might’ve expected from nominally longer growing seasons.
It’s another example of how a sort of naïve view of this issue, even five years ago or so, has now been replaced with a more nuanced understanding of how climate change will impact productivity of crops and livestock, and as we develop a better understanding, we realize that the impacts are likely greater and worse than we thought.
What about freshwater — not water in the sense of drought but the availability of freshwater aquifers and reservoirs, is that something that concerns you?
Yeah, I mean what’s happened, there’s some good examples like Lake Powell in the West. We’re seeing these lakes drop as they’re depleted by human usage, but also as the climate dries, rainfall decreases, and evaporation increases, so you’re getting it from both ends, you’re seeing these reservoirs disappear. And yeah, we can tap aquifers, but that’s sort of a, um, it’s a Faustian bargain in a sense because you know ultimately, that is millions of year old water and once you deplete it, it’s not getting replaced for millions of years. So we go into this sort of water debt. And we can do that for a while, but we’re tapping out a lot of the major aquifers and there are other problems here, like in parts of Texas where they’re experiencing, where they’ve experienced really bad drought in recent years and where the water that they do have is being used for fracking for example in West Texas and central Texas, so they’re actually trucking in drinking water and using the local water that’s available for energy production. That’s sort of a Faustian bargain, you’re sort of going into debt when you’re relying on aquifers when your reservoirs aren’t being replaced, when your loss through evaporation outpaces what you’re accumulating from rainfall and snow melt, and with California, the real problem and what contributed to this record drought was both sort of a decrease in rainfall and snowfall with storms sort of tending to migrate north of the state, but record warm temperatures, soil temperatures, warmest summers on record, meaning increased evaporative loss, and very little snowpack, and when you don’t have snowpack, you don’t have freshwater runoff in the spring that you rely upon for agriculture and other purposes. It’s sort of a perfect storm of more evaporation, decreased snowpack, and decreased rainfall all coming together to yield the worst drought in a millennium or more.
What about disease? Is that something that you’ve thought a lot about, worried about?
Most of these things aren’t things I’ve literally studied, but I’ve tried to review the existing literature so that I’m somewhat knowledgeable about the array of impacts. As it happens, I actually have published some work on infectious disease and climate. Infectious disease, there’s a very strong group here at Penn State and the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences where they study infectious disease, including malaria, and I’ve done some work with those folks taking climate model projections and looking at how that could impact infectious diseases like malaria. And the science again, a lot of it, a lot of what we’re finding is nonintuitive and much more nuanced than if you had asked scientists a decade ago. For example, with malaria it turns out that there are a number of factors obviously that come together. Whether there’s a favorable habitat for the mosquito that carries the malaria parasite, but the other piece there is the malaria parasite itself and how temperature influences the sort of life cycle of the parasite. And it turns out that that life cycle is a very strong function of temperature and once you get above about 18 degrees Celsius, so once you get into the 60s, basically, you start to see, or once you get into the 70s rather, you start to see a very sharp increase in the rate of reproduction of the malaria parasite and you have cities like Nairobi that were built at elevation to be basically above the malaria line and now with global-warming temperatures, that line is moving upward and so, over time, you’re going to have extremely large populations that were once sort of protected from malaria are going to become vulnerable to malaria, like Nairobi, these high-elevation cities in equatorial and tropical Africa. Now, on the other hand, it turns out that some of the warmest parts of Africa at low elevation, interestingly, if you warm temperatures enough, you go, so, at 18 degrees Celsius you’re sort of climbing up that peak, but once you get to about 25 or 26 degrees Celsius you’re coming down the other side of that peak and so some of the warmest parts of Africa could actually see a decrease in at least this factor, the rate of reproduction of the parasite. Now there are other factors that come into it, whether there’s a habitat for the mosquitos, which depends on rainfall, and there are many other factors as well.
You’re also moving the sort of area that’s most affected from regions that have adapted some degree …
That’s exactly right, that’s exactly right. And the faster those changes, the harder it is, the less adaptive capacity you have, and that’s true across the board. The faster climate changes, the harder it is for areas that could in theory see a potential benefit to take advantage of that benefit, and those regions that see negative impacts, the impacts occur faster than they can adapt to — so that’s exactly right.
*At Mann’s request, we removed a brief discussion of an embargoed paper.
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Resilient and healthy ecosystems help to support sustainable industries, local economies and coastal communities across Canada. Canada remains committed to increasing the proportion of our marine and coastal areas that are protected to 5% this year and 10% by 2020. These marine conservation targets will be achieved by establishing marine protected areas and marine refuges to safeguard the health of our oceans for future generations.
The Honourable Dominic LeBlanc, Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard, today announced the two marine refuges through fisheries management measures. These will protect fish and their aquatic ecosystems and contribute an additional 11,787km2 of protected ocean area to Canada’s coasts.
These marine refuges will make a lasting contribution to marine conservation in Canada:
New Brunswick – The existing Miramichi Bay gillnet fisheries closure protects adult Atlantic salmon and one of its important migration corridors. This closure has been in place for many years and prohibits the use of gillnets for all commercial groundfish fisheries.
– The existing Miramichi Bay gillnet fisheries closure protects adult Atlantic salmon and one of its important migration corridors. This closure has been in place for many years and prohibits the use of gillnets for all commercial groundfish fisheries. Nova Scotia – The Western/Emerald Banks Conservation Area supports the productivity of groundfish, particularly as a long-standing nursery ground for haddock. All commercial and recreational fisheries using bottom-contact gear and gear known to interact with groundfish are prohibited in the majority of the closure.
There are five science-based criteria that conservation measures such as the ones being announced today must meet in order to contribute to Canada’s marine conservation targets: the geographic location must be clearly defined; the stock management or conservation objective needs to directly relate to an important species or habitat; the area must contain an important species and important habitat; the measure must be long-term; and the measure needs to protect the important species and its habitat from both existing and foreseeable pressures.
The marine refuges announced today meet the stringent criteria required to count toward Canada’s marine conservation targets. Other fisheries management measures will continue to be evaluated and may contribute to Canada’s conservation targets as well.
Canada will continue to work at the international level on identifying guidelines and a process for considering other effective area-based conservation measures like fisheries area closures. In February 2018, Canada will host an international technical expert workshop as part of this process.
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“It was rough,” she recalls expressionlessly.
LeRoy isn’t hungover. In fact, she wasn’t even among the roughly 20,000 ready-to-rage fans at the day-glo fiesta in Somerset. The emergency physician was working overnights at a nearby hospital to ensure concertgoers who partied too hard got the care they needed.
“They put me out there for a reason,” says LeRoy, who specializes in toxicology. “Friday and Saturday it was nonstop, people on different drugs.”
LeRoy had just finished her third straight 12-hour shift. It was the second straight year the Regions Hospital toxicology fellow was stationed at Westfields Hospital, about 10 minutes from Somerset Amphitheater, during Summer Set. With thousands of young fans, many of whom are on weekend molly missions, the small-town hospital sees a spike in drug-related cases.
While Sunday night was relatively tame, LeRoy says she saw eight people within her first two hours on the job Friday. The partied-out patients ranged from 17 to 30 years old. Some were drunk and simply needed a safe place to sleep it off, but molly — the popular party drug also known as MDMA or ecstasy — was the most prevalent. When drugged out fans appeared “really agitated” or were a danger to themselves, they often landed at Westfields or another larger hospital in the area.
“A couple of them were running around assaulting people, causing trouble, with something we call excited delirium,” LeRoy says. “A lot of drugs that really amp you up can cause that syndrome. It’s a high-risk, high-morbidity syndrome that people can get from certain drugs.”
Although privacy laws prevent LeRoy from talking too many specifics, she says festival goers arrived at Westfields in various conditions. While some were ready to keep the party going, others needed breathing tubes or were subdued by ketamine administered by EMS staff at the festival to calm them down.
“A couple of them were high on LSD or acid,” LeRoy says, noting an uptick in acid cases this year. “They were really scared and couldn’t talk, so I gave them a safe place to be and watched them for a while.”
While Summer Set 2015 kept her about as busy as last year, other Westfields staffers tell her they saw even more action in its earlier years. Onsite EMS tents with doctors who are able to treat and release some fans on the spot cut down on hospital trips, LeRoy says.
Festival security has also gotten tighter over Summer Set’s four years. As LeRoy was heading into work Friday, cops with drug dogs aggressively scoured a long first-day line filled with nervous faces. The coke-nosing canines killed more than a few buzzes, as some fans’ stashes were confiscated before they got in.
Last weekend’s broiling temperatures didn’t make life any easier. LeRoy saw a few heat-related illnesses, and she says hotter temps aren’t kind to hard-dancing molly users.
“One of the big problems with molly is that you have so much muscle activation that your body makes a lot of heat,” she says. “So, if it’s unable to release that heat into the environment because the environment is so hot, then your body is going to get even hotter. That’s how people die a lot of the time when they do molly, by hyperthermia.”
Fortunately, none of her patients paid for their party with their lives.
“I was worried going into it that we would have some worse outcomes, but everyone did really well,” she says.
That’s one thing LeRoy won’t have keeping her awake tonight.
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"Platinum blond" redirects here. It is not to be confused with Platinum Blonde (disambiguation)
A man with blond hair and a blond beard
Blond or fair hair is a hair color characterized by low levels of the dark pigment eumelanin. The resultant visible hue depends on various factors, but always has some yellowish color. The color can be from the very pale blond (caused by a patchy, scarce distribution of pigment) to reddish "strawberry" blond or golden-brownish ("sandy") blond colors (the latter with more eumelanin). Because hair color tends to darken with age, natural blond hair is generally very rare in adulthood. Naturally-occurring blond hair is primarily found in populations of northern European descent and is believed to have evolved to enable more efficient synthesis of vitamin D, due to northern Europe's lower levels of sunlight. Blond hair has also developed in other populations, although it is usually not as common, and can be found among natives of the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, and Fiji, among the Berbers of North Africa, and among some Asians.
In human culture, blond hair has long been associated with female beauty. Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love and beauty, was reputed to have blond hair. In ancient Greece and Rome, blond hair was frequently associated with prostitutes, who dyed their hair using saffron dyes in order to attract customers. The Greeks stereotyped Thracians and slaves as blond and the Romans associated blondness with the Celts and the Germans to the north. In western Europe during the Middle Ages, long, blond hair was idealized as the paragon of female beauty. The Norse goddess Sif and the medieval heroine Iseult were both significantly portrayed as blond and, in medieval artwork, Eve, Mary Magdalene, and the Virgin Mary are often shown with blond hair. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, scientific racists categorized blond hair and blue eyes as characteristics of the supreme Nordic race. In contemporary western culture, blonde women are often negatively stereotyped as sexually attractive, but unintelligent.
Etymology, spelling, and grammar
c. 1644), with characteristic blond hair which darkened with time as confirmed by his later effigies. Detail of a portrait of Crown Prince of Poland Sigismund Casimir Vasa 1644), with characteristic blond hair which darkened with time as confirmed by his later effigies.
Origins and meanings
The word "blond" is first documented in English in 1481[1] and derives from Old French blund, blont, meaning "a colour midway between golden and light chestnut".[2] It gradually eclipsed the native term "fair", of same meaning, from Old English fæġer, causing "fair" later to become a general term for "light complexioned". This earlier use of "fair" survives in the proper name Fairfax, from Old English fæġer-feahs meaning "blond hair".
The word "blond" has two possible origins. Some linguists[who?] say it comes from Medieval Latin blundus, meaning "yellow", from Old Frankish blund which would relate it to Old English blonden-feax meaning "grey-haired", from blondan/blandan meaning "to mix" (Cf. blend).[citation needed] Also, Old English beblonden meant "dyed", as ancient Germanic warriors were noted for dyeing their hair. However, linguists who favor a Latin origin for the word say that Medieval Latin blundus was a vulgar pronunciation of Latin flavus, also meaning "yellow". Most authorities, especially French, attest to the Frankish origin. The word was reintroduced into English in the 17th century from French, and was for some time considered French; in French, "blonde" is a feminine adjective; it describes a woman with blond hair.[3]
Usage
"Blond", with its continued gender-varied usage, is one of few adjectives in written English to retain separate masculine and feminine grammatical genders. Each of the two forms, however, is pronounced identically. American Heritage's Book of English Usage propounds that, insofar as "a blonde" can be used to describe a woman but not a man who is merely said to possess blond(e) hair, the term is an example of a "sexist stereotype [whereby] women are primarily defined by their physical characteristics."[4] The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) records that the phrase "big blond beast" was used in the 20th century to refer specifically to men "of the Nordic type" (that is to say, blond-haired).[5] The OED also records that blond as an adjective is especially used with reference to women, in which case it is likely to be spelt "blonde", citing three Victorian usages of the term. The masculine version is used in the plural, in "blonds of the European race",[5] in a citation from 1833 Penny cyclopedia, which distinguishes genuine blondness as a Caucasian feature distinct from albinism.[6]
By the early 1990s, "blonde moment" or being a "dumb blonde" had come into common parlance to mean "an instance of a person, esp. a woman... being foolish or scatter-brained."[7] Another hair color word of French origin, brunet(te) (from the same Germanic root that gave "brown"), functions in the same way in orthodox English. The OED gives "brunet" as meaning "dark-complexioned" or a "dark-complexioned person", citing a comparative usage of brunet and blond to Thomas Henry Huxley in saying, "The present contrast of blonds and brunets existed among them."[8] "Brunette" can be used, however, like "blonde", to describe a mixed-gender populace. The OED quotes Grant Allen, "The nation which resulted... being sometimes blonde, sometimes brunette."[9]
"Blond" and "blonde" are also occasionally used to refer to objects that have a color reminiscent of fair hair. For example, the OED records its use in 19th-century poetic diction to describe flowers, "a variety of clay ironstone of the coal measures", "the colour of raw silk",[5] a breed of ray, lager beer, and pale wood.[10]
Varieties
Various subcategories of blond hair have been defined to describe the different shades and sources of the hair color more accurately. Common examples include the following:
ash-blond : [11] ashen or grayish blond.
: ashen or grayish blond. bleached blond , bottle blond , or peroxide blond : [12] terms used to refer to artificially colored blond hair.
, , or : terms used to refer to artificially colored blond hair. blond / flaxen : [13] [14] when distinguished from other varieties, "blond" by itself refers to a light but not whitish blond, with no traces of red, gold, or brown; this color is often described as "flaxen".
/ : when distinguished from other varieties, "blond" by itself refers to a light but not whitish blond, with no traces of red, gold, or brown; this color is often described as "flaxen". dirty blond [15] or dishwater blond : [16] dark blond with flecks of golden blond and brown.
or : dark blond with flecks of golden blond and brown. golden blond : a darker to rich, golden-yellow blond (found mostly in Northeastern Europe, i.e., Russia, Estonia [ citation needed ] ).
: a darker to rich, golden-yellow blond (found mostly in Northeastern Europe, i.e., Russia, Estonia ). honey blond : dark iridescent blond.
: dark iridescent blond. platinum blond [17] or towheaded : [18] [19] whitish-blond; almost all platinum blonds are children, although it is found on people in Northern Europe. "Platinum blond" is often used to describe bleached hair, while "towheaded" generally refers to natural hair color. [ citation needed ]
or : whitish-blond; almost all platinum blonds are children, although it is found on people in Northern Europe. "Platinum blond" is often used to describe bleached hair, while "towheaded" generally refers to natural hair color. sandy blond : [20] [21] grayish-hazel or cream-colored blond.
: grayish-hazel or cream-colored blond. strawberry blond [22] or Venetian blond : reddish blond [23] [24] [25] [26] [27]
or : reddish blond yellow: yellow-blond ("yellow" can also be used to refer to hair which has been dyed yellow).[ citation needed ]
A woman with long blond hair
A young man with light blond hair
A woman with long, dark blond hair
Evolution of blond hair
Natural lighter hair colors occur most often in Europe and less frequently in other areas.[28] In Northern European populations, the occurrence of blond hair is very frequent.[clarification needed] The hair color gene MC1R has at least seven variants in Europe, giving the continent a wide range of hair and eye shades. Based on a genetic research carried out at three Japanese universities, the date of the genetic mutation that resulted in blond hair in Europe has been isolated to about 11,000 years ago during the last ice age.[29]
A typical explanation found in the scientific literature for the evolution of light hair is related to the evolution of light skin, and in turn the requirement for vitamin D synthesis and northern Europe's seasonal less solar radiation.[30] Lighter skin is due to a low concentration in pigmentation, thus allowing more sunlight to trigger the production of vitamin D. In this way, high frequencies of light hair in northern latitudes are a result of the light skin adaptation to lower levels of solar radiation, which reduces the prevalence of rickets caused by vitamin D deficiency. The darker pigmentation at higher latitudes in certain ethnic groups such as the Inuit is explained by a greater proportion of seafood in their diet and by the climate which they live in, because in the polar climate there is more ice or snow on the ground, and this reflects the solar radiation onto the skin, making this environment lack the conditions for the person to have blond, brown or red hair, light skin and blue, grey or green eyes.
An alternative hypothesis was presented by Canadian anthropologist Peter Frost, who claims blond hair evolved very quickly in a specific area at the end of the last ice age by means of sexual selection.[31] According to Frost, the appearance of blond hair and blue eyes in some northern European women made them stand out from their rivals, and more sexually appealing to men, at a time of fierce competition for scarce males.[31][32]
The derived allele of KITLG associated with blond hair in modern Europeans is present in several individuals of the Ancient North Eurasian (ANE) lineage, and is recorded in Mesolithic Eastern Europe as associated with the Eastern European Hunter-Gatherer (EHG) lineage derived from ANE. The earliest known individual with the derived allele is the ANE Afontova Gora 3 individual, dated to 14,700 years ago.[33] Ancient DNA of ANE or "steppe" ancestry is found in Mesolithic Northern Europe.
A 2014 study reported seven Mesolithzic hunter-gatherers found at Motala, southern Sweden, dated to 7,700 years ago, as the earliest known individuals in whom the modern Scandinavian phenotype, combining light skin, blue eyes and blond hair, was combined. These individuals had light skin gene alleles in SLC24A5 and SLC45A2, and HERC2/OCA2 alleles associated with blue eyes (also contributes to lighter skin and blond hair).[34] Light pigmentation traits had thus already existed in pre-Indo-European Europeans, since at least the later Mesolithic.[35] Later individuals with Yamnaya ancestry, by contrast, were predominantly dark-eyed (brown), dark-haired and had a skin colour that was moderately light, though somewhat darker than that of the average modern European.[36]
It is possible that blond hair evolved more than once. A 2012 study published in Science reported a distinct genetic origin of blond hair in people from the Solomon Islands in Melanesia, associated with an amino acid change in TYRP1 produced blond hair.[37][38]
Prevalence
Blond hair is most common in light-skinned infants and children,[39] so much so that the term "baby blond" is often used for very light colored hair. Babies may be born with blond hair even among groups where adults rarely have blond hair, although such natural hair usually falls out quickly. Blond hair tends to turn darker with age, and many children's blond hair turns light, medium, dark brown or black before or during their adult years.[39] Because blond hair tends to turn brunette with age, natural blond hair is rare in adulthood; according to the sociologist Christie Davies, only around five percent of adults in Europe and North America are naturally blond. A study conducted in 2003 concluded that only four percent of American adults are naturally blond. Nonetheless, a significant majority of Caucasian women (perhaps as high as three in four) dye their hair blond, a significantly higher percentage than for any other hair color.
Europe
Incidence of Blond hair in Europe
Blond hair is most common in Scandinavia and the Baltic Sea countries, where true blondism is believed to have originated. The pigmentation of both hair and eyes is lightest around the Baltic Sea, and darkness increases regularly and almost concentrically around this region.[43]
In France, according to a source published 1939, blondism is more common in Normandy, and less common in the Pyrenees and the Mediterranean seacoast; 26% of French population has blond or light brown hair.[44] A 2007 study of French females showed that by then roughly 20% were blonde, although half of these blondes were fully fake. Roughly ten percent of French females are natural blondes, of which 60% bleach their hair to a lighter tone of blond.[45]
In Portugal, an average 11% of the population shows traces of blondism, peaking at 14.3–15.1% blond people in Póvoa de Varzim in northern Portugal.[46][47] In northern Spain, 17% of the population shows traces of blondism, but in southern Spain just 2% of the people are blond.[48] In Italy, a study of Italian men conducted by Ridolfo Livi between 1859 and 1863 on the records of the National Conscription Service showed that 8.2% of Italian men exhibited blond hair; blondism frequency displayed a wide degree of regional variation, ranging from around 12.6% in Veneto to 1.7% among the Sardinians.[49] In a more detailed study from the 20th-century geneticist Renato Biasutti,[50] the regional contrasts of blondism frequency are better shown, with a greater occurrence in the northern regions where the figure could be over 20%, and a lesser occurrence in Sardinia where the frequency was less than 2.4%. With the exception of Benevento and the surrounding area in Campania, where various shades of blond hair were present in 10% – 14.9% of the population, Southern Italy as a whole averaged between 2.5% and 7.4%.[51]
Africa
Blondism is a common sight among Berbers of North Africa, especially in the Rif and Kabyle region. Blondism frequency varies among Berbers from 1% among Jerban Berbers and 4% among Mozabite Berbers and Shawia Berbers, to 11% among Kabyle Berbers.[52] In South Africa where there is a significant population of whites, mainly from Dutch and English ancestry, blond people may account for 3-4% of the South African population.
A number of blond naturally mummified bodies of common people (i.e. not proper mummies) dating to Roman times have been found in the Fagg El Gamous cemetery in Egypt. "Of those whose hair was preserved 54% were blondes or redheads, and the percentage grows to 87% when light-brown hair color is added."[53] Excavations have been ongoing since the 1980s. Burials seem to be clustered by hair-colour.[54]
Oceania
Aboriginal Australians, especially in the west-central parts of the continent, have a high frequency of natural blond-to-brown hair.[citation needed] Blondness is also found in some other parts of the South Pacific, such as the Solomon Islands,[37][38] Vanuatu, and Fiji, again with higher incidences in children. Blond hair in Melanesians is caused by an amino acid change in the gene TYRP1.[37] This mutation is at a frequency of 26% in the Solomon Islands and is absent outside of Oceania.[37]
Asia
Blond hair can be found in any region of Asia, including West Asia, East Asia, Central Asia, and South Asia. In these parts of Asia, blond hair is generally seen among children and usually turns into a shade of dark brown in adulthood. Environmental factors, such as sun exposure and nutrition status, often contribute to changes in hair color in Asia.[55] Genetic research published in 2014, 2015 and 2016 found that Yamnaya Proto-Indo-Europeans, who migrated to Europe in the early Bronze Age were overwhelmingly dark-eyed (brown) and dark-haired, and had a skin colour that was moderately light, though somewhat darker than that of the average modern European.[36] While light pigmentation traits had already existed in pre-Indo-European Europeans (both farmers and hunter-gatherers), long-standing philological attempts to correlate them with the arrival of Indo-Europeans from the steppes were misguided.[35]
According to genetic studies, Yamnaya Proto-Indo-European migration to Europe led to Corded Ware culture, where Yamnaya Proto-Indo-Europeans mixed with "Scandinavian hunter-gatherer" women who carried genetic alleles HERC2/OCA2, which causes a combination of blue eyes and blond hair.[34] Proto-Indo-Iranians who split from Corded Ware culture formed the Andronovo culture and are believed to have spread genetic alleles HERC2/OCA2 that cause blond hair to parts of West Asia, Central Asia and South Asia. Genetic analysis in 2014 also found that people of the Afanasevo culture which flourished in the Altai Mountains were genetically identical to Yamnaya Proto-Indo-Europeans and that they did not carry genetic alleles for blond hair or light eyes. The Afanasevo culture was later replaced by a second wave of Indo-European invaders from the Andronovo culture, who were a product of Corded Ware admixture that took place in Europe, and carried genetic alleles that cause blond hair and light eyes. In 2009 and 2014, genomic study of Tarim mummies discovered in the Tarim Basin in present-day Xinjiang, China, showed that they were also a product of a Corded Ware admixture and were genetically closer to the Andronovo culture (which split from Corded Ware culture) than to the Yamnaya culture or Afanasevo culture.[59]
Today, higher frequencies of light hair in Asia are more prevalent among Pamiris, Kalash, Nuristani and Uyghur children than in adult populations of these ethnic groups.[60] About 75% of Russia is geographically considered North Asia; however, the Asian portion of Russia contributes to only an estimate of 20% of Russia's total population.[61] North Asia's population has an estimate of 1-19% with light hair.[62][63] From the times of the Russian Tsardom of the 17th century through the Soviet Union rule in the 20th century, many ethnic Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, Lithuanians, Latvians, and Estonians were settled in or exiled en masse to Siberia and Central Asia. Blond hair is often seen in these groups, whereas the indigenous peoples are more likely to be dark haired.[64][65][66] For instance, their descendants currently contribute to an estimated 25% of Kazakhstan's total population.[67]
Americas
Many actors and actresses in Latin America and Hispanic United States have blond hair, blue eyes, and pale skin.[68][69][70][71][72][73][74][75][76]
Historical cultural perceptions
Ancient Greece
Most people in ancient Greece had dark hair and, as a result of this, the Greeks found blond hair immensely fascinating. In the Homeric epics, Menelaus the king of the Spartans is, together with some other Achaean leaders, portrayed as blond.[78] Other blond characters in the Homeric poems are Peleus, Achilles, Meleager, Agamede, and Rhadamanthys.[78] Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love and beauty, was often described as golden-haired and portrayed with this color hair in art. Aphrodite's master epithet in the Homeric epics is Χρυσεη (Khryseē), which means "golden". The traces of hair color on Greek korai probably reflect the colors the artists saw in natural hair; these colors include a broad diversity of shades of blond, red, and brown. The minority of statues with blond hair range from strawberry blond up to platinum blond.
Sappho of Lesbos ( c. 630-570 BC) wrote that purple-colored wraps as headdress were good enough, except if the hair was blond: "...for the girl who has hair that is yellower than a torch [it is better to decorate it] with wreaths of flowers in bloom." Sappho also praises Aphrodite for her golden hair, stating that since gold metal is free from rust, the goddess's golden hair represents her freedom from ritual pollution. Sappho's contemporary Alcman of Sparta praised golden hair as one of the most desirable qualities of a beautiful woman, describing in various poems "the girl with the yellow hair" and a girl "with the hair like purest gold."
In the fifth century BC, the sculptor Pheidias may have depicted the Greek goddess of wisdom Athena's hair using gold in his famous statue of Athena Parthenos, which was displayed inside the Parthenon. The Greeks thought of the Thracians who lived to the north as having reddish-blond hair. Because many Greek slaves were captured from Thrace, slaves were stereotyped as blond or red-headed. "Xanthias" (Ξανθίας), meaning "reddish blond", was a common name for slaves in ancient Greece and a slave by this name appears in many of the comedies of Aristophanes.
The most famous statue of Aphrodite, the Aphrodite of Knidos, sculpted in the fourth century BC by Praxiteles, represented the goddess's hair using gold leaf and contributed to the popularity of the image of Aphrodite as a blonde goddess. Greek prostitutes frequently dyed their hair blond using saffron dyes or colored powders. Blond dye was highly expensive, took great effort to apply, and smelled repugnant, but none of these factors inhibited Greek prostitutes from dying their hair. As a result of this and the natural rarity of blond hair in the Mediterranean region, by the fourth century BC, blond hair was inextricably associated with prostitutes. The comic playwright Menander ( c. 342/41 – c. 290 BC) protests that "no chaste woman ought to make her hair yellow." At another point, he deplores blond hair dye as dangerous: "What can we women do wise or brilliant, who sit with hair dyed yellow, outraging the character of gentlewomen, causing the overthrow of houses, the ruin of nuptials, and accusations on the part of children?" Historian and Egyptologist Joann Fletcher asserts that the Macedonian ruler Alexander the Great and members of the Macedonian-Greek Ptolemaic dynasty of Hellenistic Egypt had blond hair, such as Arsinoe II and Berenice II.
Roman Empire
During the early years of the Roman Empire, blond hair was associated with prostitutes. The preference changed to bleaching the hair blond when Greek culture, which practiced bleaching, reached Rome, and was reinforced when the legions that conquered Gaul returned with blond slaves. Sherrow also states that Roman women tried to lighten their hair, but the substances often caused hair loss, so they resorted to wigs made from the captives' hair.[93] According to Francis Owens, Roman literary records describe a large number of well-known Roman historical personalities as blond.[94]
Juvenal wrote in a satirical poem that Messalina, Roman empress of noble birth, would hide her black hair with a blond wig for her nightly visits to the brothel: sed nigrum flavo crinem abscondente galero intravit calidum veteri centone lupanar.[95] In his Commentary on the Aeneid of Virgil, Maurus Servius Honoratus noted that the respectable matron was only black haired, never blonde.[96] In the same passage, he mentioned that Cato the Elder wrote that some matrons would sprinkle golden dust on their hair to make it reddish-color. Emperor Lucius Verus (r. 161 – 169 AD) was said to sprinkle gold-dust on his already "golden" blond hair to make it even blonder and brighter.[97]
From an ethnic point of view, Roman authors associated blond and red hair with the Gauls and the Germans: e.g., Virgil describes the hair of the Gauls as "golden" (aurea caesaries),[98] Tacitus wrote that "the Germans have fierce blue eyes, red-blond hair (rutilae comae), huge (tall) frames";[99] in accordance with Ammianus, almost all the Gauls were "of tall stature, fair and ruddy".[100] Celtic and Germanic peoples of the provinces, among the free subjects called peregrini, served in Rome's armies as auxilia, such as the cavalry contingents in the army of Julius Caesar.[101] Some became Roman citizens as far back as the 1st century BC, following a policy of Romanization of Gaul and Lesser Germania.[102] Sometimes entire Celtic and Germanic tribes were granted citizenship, such as when emperor Otho granted citizenship to all of the Lingones in 69 AD.[103]
By the 1st century BC, the Roman Republic had expanded its control into parts of western Germany, and by 85 AD the provinces of Germania Inferior and Germania Superior were formally established there.[104] Yet as late as the 4th century AD, Ausonius, a poet and tutor from Burdigala, wrote a poem about an Alemanni slave girl named Bissula, whom he had recently freed after she'd been taken as a prisoner of war in the campaigns of Valentinian I, noting that her adopted Latin language marked her as a woman of Latium yet her blond-haired, blue-eyed appearance ultimately signified her true origins from the Rhine.[105] Further south, the Iberian peninsula was originally inhabited by Celtiberians outside of Roman control. The gradual Roman conquest of Iberia was completed by the early 1st century AD.[106] The Romans established provinces such as Hispania Terraconensis that were inhabited largely by Gallaeci, whose red and blond-haired descendants (which also include those of Visigothic origins) have continued to inhabit northern areas of Spain such as Galicia and Portugal into the modern era.[106]
Medieval Europe
Medieval Scandinavian art and literature often places emphasis on the length and color of a woman's hair, considering long, blond hair to be the ideal. In Norse mythology, the goddess Sif has famously blond hair, which some scholars have identified as representing golden wheat.[109] In the Old Norse Gunnlaug Saga, Helga the Beautiful, described as "the most beautiful woman in the world", is said to have hair that is "as fair as beaten gold" and so long that it can "envelope her entirely". In the Poetic Edda poem Rígsþula, the blond man Jarl is considered to be the ancestor of the dominant warrior class. In Northern European folklore, supernatural beings value blond hair in humans. Blond babies are more likely to be stolen and replaced with changelings, and young blonde women are more likely to be lured away to the land of the beings.[110]
The Scandinavians were not the only ones to place strong emphasis on the beauty of blond hair; the French writer Christine de Pisan writes in her book The Treasure of the City of Ladies (1404) that "there is nothing in the world lovelier on a woman's head than beautiful blond hair." In medieval artwork, female saints are often shown with long, shimmering blond hair, which emphasizes their holiness and virginity. At the same time, however, Eve is often shown with long, blond hair, which frames her nude body and draws attention to her sexual attractiveness. In medieval Gothic paintings of the crucifixion of Jesus, the figure of Mary Magdalene is shown with long, blond hair, which flows down her back unbound in contrast to most of the women in the scenes, who are shown with dark hair, normally covered by a scarf. In the older versions of the story of Tristan and Iseult, Tristan falls in love with Iseult after seeing only a single lock of her long, blond hair. In fact, Iseult was so closely associated with blondness that, in the poems of Chrétien de Troyes, she is called "Iseult le Blonde". In Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales (written from 1387 until 1400), the knight describes the beautiful Princess Emily in his tale, stating, "yclothed was she fressh, for to devyse:/Hir yellow heer was broided in a tresse/Behinde hir bak, a yerde long, I gesse" (lines 1048-1050).
Because of blond hair's relative commonness in northern Europe, especially among children, folk tales from these regions tend to feature large numbers of blond protagonists. Although these stories may not have been seen by their original tellers as idealizing blond hair, when they are read in cultures outside of northern Europe where blond hair "has rarity value", they may seem to connote that blond hair is a sign of special purity.
During the medieval period, Spanish ladies preferred to dye their hair black, yet by the time of the Renaissance in the 16th century the fashion (imported from Italy) was to dye their hair blond or red.[116]
Early twentieth-century racism
In the early twentieth century, blond hair was considered a hallmark of the Nordic master race ", as shown by these Nazi propaganda photographs, which were intended to demonstrate what pure Nordic Aryans were supposed to look like.
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, blond hair, blue eyes, a tall stature, a long head, and an angled nose were deemed by scientific racists as hallmarks of the so-called "master race". In the nineteenth century, this race was usually referred to as the "Germanic race", but after the turn of the twentieth century, it came to be more commonly known as the "Nordic race". German and Scandinavian scientists and academics throughout the early part of the twentieth century studied racial typology to the point of obsession and debated the features of the Nordic race extensively.
In the 1920s, the eugenicist Eugen Fischer invented the Fischer hair color table (Fischer Haarfarbentafel) to scientifically document hair color, which consisted of twenty-six bundles of cellulose fiber coated in non-fading colors attached to a palette and labeled with numbers. Lighter colors were given higher numbers and darker ones were given lower numbers, with the distinction between "blond" and "brown" being set between seven and eight. Fischer was a passionate supporter of Nazi eugenics and warned that miscegenation would result in the deterioration of modern civilization. Dispute over the exact distinction between blond and brown hair was a heated debate among Norwegian anthropologists during this period, with Halfdan Bryn arguing that the distinction should instead be set between six and seven.
By the end of the 1920s, the International Federation of Eugenics Organizations (IFEO), the leading international eugenics organization, became increasingly dominated by proponents of the racial hygiene movement, who sought to turn the organization into "Blond International", which would be "aimed at the purification and propagation of the Nordic race." After the Nazi Party came to power in Germany in 1933, racial anthropology based on the ideas of genetic superiority and racial psychology "became increasingly hegemonic in Germany." The Nazis revered blond hair as a quality of the herrenrasse ("master race").
The idea of racial superiority, which once dominated the field of anthropology, has now been completely and unanimously rejected by modern scientists. Modern scientists have also rejected the assertions and beliefs of pre-World War II racialists. Classification of race based on physical characteristics such as hair color is seen as a "flawed, pseudo-scientific relic of the past." Many modern scientists dispute whether the concept of "race" is even a useful classification for human beings at all.
Modern cultural stereotypes
Sexuality
In contemporary popular culture, blonde women are stereotyped as being more sexually attractive to men than women with other hair colors. For example, Anita Loos popularized this idea in her 1925 novel Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Some women have reported they feel other people expect them to be more fun-loving after having lightened their hair.
Saturday Evening Post (1910). Fitzgerald was a frequent contributor in the 1920s. The(1910). Fitzgerald was a frequent contributor in the 1920s.
Madonna popularized the short bleached blond haircut after the release of her third studio album, True Blue, and influenced both the 1980s fashion scene as well as many future female musicians like Christina Aguilera, Lady Gaga, and Miley Cyrus.[128]
Intelligence
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953), one of the films in which Monroe portrayed a sexually attractive and naïve "dumb blonde" In(1953), one of the films in which Monroe portrayed a sexually attractive and naïve "dumb blonde"
Originating in Europe, the "blonde stereotype" is also associated with being less serious or less intelligent. Blonde jokes are a class of jokes based on the stereotype of blonde women as unintelligent. In Brazil, this extends to blonde women being looked down, as reflected in sexist jokes, as also sexually licentious.[130] It is believed the originator of the dumb blonde was an eighteenth-century blonde French prostitute named Rosalie Duthé whose reputation of being beautiful but dumb inspired a play about her called Les Curiosites de la Foire (Paris 1775). Blonde actresses have contributed to this perception; some of them include Marilyn Monroe, Judy Holliday, Jayne Mansfield, and Goldie Hawn during her time at Laugh-In.
The British filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock preferred to cast blonde women for major roles in his films as he believed that the audience would suspect them the least, comparing them to "virgin snow that shows up the bloody footprints", hence the term Hitchcock blonde.[131] This stereotype has become so ingrained it has spawned counter-narratives, such as in the 2001 film Legally Blonde in which Elle Woods, played by Reese Witherspoon, succeeds at Harvard despite biases against her beauty and blond hair.
In the 1950s, the American actress Marilyn Monroe's screen persona centered on her blond hair and the stereotypes associated with it, especially dumbness, naïveté, sexual availability and artificiality. She often used a breathy, childish voice in her films, and in interviews gave the impression that everything she said was "utterly innocent and uncalculated", parodying herself with double entendres that came to be known as "Monroeisms". For example, when she was asked what she had on in the 1949 nude photo shoot, she replied, "I had the radio on". Monroe often wore white to emphasize her blondness, and drew attention by wearing revealing outfits that showed off her figure. Although Monroe's typecast screen persona as a dim-witted but sexually attractive blonde was a carefully crafted act, audiences and film critics believed it to be her real personality and did not realize that she was only acting.
The notion that blonds are less intelligent is not grounded in fact. A 2016 study of 10,878 Americans found that both women and men with natural blond hair had IQ scores similar to the average IQ of non-blond white Americans, and that white women with natural blond hair in fact had a higher average IQ score (103.2) than white women with brown hair (102.7), red hair (101.2), or black hair (100.5). Although many consider blonde jokes to be harmless, the author of the study stated the stereotype can have serious negative effects on hiring, promotion and other social experiences.[137][138] Rhiannon Williams of The Telegraph writes that dumb blonde jokes are "one of the last 'acceptable' forms of prejudice".[139]
See also
Science
Society
References
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When her children were small, Mary Campbell took them hunting for frogs in what is now a residential neighbourhood in High River known as Hampton Hills. “It was a swamp,” she recalls from her farm home, overlooking a sprawl of new suburb. So she wasn’t surprised when the flood that swept through the town last summer hit the upscale new housing development particularly hard. “The town should never have allowed houses to be built there,” she says.
Like everyone else in High River, the energetic 80-year-old was ordered to flee the rising waters last June 20th. “That was the worst flood I had ever seen in my 55 years in High River,” she says, describing the water rushing over the banks of the Little Bow Canal just below her homestead, uprooting trees and carrying away vehicles and livestock. “It was a tsunami.”
This wasn’t the first time the town, about a half-hour south of Calgary, lived up to its name. But for a community that measures time according to natural disasters, the flood of 2013 topped all others. The torrential rush of water from the Rocky Mountain foothills forced the evacuation of all 13,000 High River residents, including some 150 rescued from their rooftops. About 1,000 lived much of this past winter in a camp of trailers just north of town, waiting for their homes to be repaired or rebuilt.
The flood killed five Albertans, three of them in High River. Damage across the province was extensive, from Canmore to the Siksika reserve to as far downstream as Medicine Hat. The rising Bow and Elbow rivers put Calgary’s downtown under water for the first time in a century and destroyed some of the priciest real estate in the country. More than 100,000 people province-wide were evacuated from their homes at least temporarily.
The repair bill is expected to reach $6-billion, of which Alberta taxpayers are on the hook for at least $1.7-billion—a dear sum, particularly when the provincial government is already pleading poverty as justification for cutting education and healthcare spending. The rest of the cost will be paid out of federal government coffers, also billed to taxpayers, and from homeowners across the province through uninsured damage and higher insurance premiums.
The 2013 flood was the costliest weather disaster in Canadian history, and High River is considered “ground zero.” But had the Conservative government learned from the province’s three most recent floods, in 1995, 1997 and 2005, billions of dollars worth of property loss may have been spared all across southern Alberta—including the area where Mary Campbell and her children used to catch frogs.
“We had no indication it would flood. None of the province’s information suggested the area was prone to flooding.” —Developer Don Sandford
Officially speaking, Hampton Hills wasn’t supposed to flood. The neighbourhood is built not exactly on hills but on a ridge that appears to be a safe distance from the Highwood River. Although its bowl-shaped composition of fine clay left it marshy in rainy years, the neighbourhood wasn’t flagged in Alberta Environment’s maps as a flood risk, so town council approved it for development in 2005. The typical suburban lots for two-storey homes were snapped up quickly.
A computer-generated simulation on the town’s website shows best how the area flooded. The virtual Highwood River initially resembles a thin yellow trickle bisecting the map. The line widens and spreads with the contours of land, forming big yellow blotches. About 24 sped-up hours after the water starts rising, the river rushes back across Highway 498 north of town into Hampton Hills. By hour 36, almost all of High River is covered.
“There was just that much water and it found a depression and stayed there,” explains mayor Craig Snodgrass, elected last fall to his first term. “In the rest of the town, the water was gone in a day or two, but The Hamptons was under water for a long time.” It took 25 days to pump out the area and allow residents back. “All the emergency measures we had in place were overwhelmed,” Snodgrass said. “No one predicted anything that would be three or four times what we’re used to.”
Maybe somebody should have. Changing weather patterns and the increasing damage they cause have been well documented over the past half-century. Still, many of Alberta Environment’s flood-risk maps were badly out of date and based on invalid assumptions of so-called 100-year floods. Unlike the US, Canada no longer has a national system of flood mapping; the federal government cut funding to it in 1992. The Alberta–Canada Flood Hazard Identification Program began in 1989 in response to extensive flood damage in the early 1970s. The program was ended 10 years later—a responsibility, critics say, the provincial government let lapse. The province admits “the program expired… before flood hazard studies and mapping were completed for all of the original candidate communities.”
Despite the provincial program’s cancellation, Alberta flood maps were still supposed to be updated if there was a change in the local hydrology. High River’s map was not updated following the 1995, 1997 or 2005 floods. When the big one hit last year, the town was still working with data that hadn’t been substantially revised or updated in 30 years.
The flooding in Hampton Hills could offer a grim foretaste of things to come for Alberta and the rest of Western Canada. Referred to by some as the province’s Hurricane Sandy, the flood of 2013 may mark the moment when Albertans finally acknowledged climate change and its widespread consequences. Andre Corbould, the former brigadier general who chairs the government’s flood-recovery task force, says Alberta needs a new way of looking at how we live with nature.
“Climate variability is a key issue,” Corbould says. “We know there will be more floods. We need to take an overall watershed approach. That means dealing with floods in the wet years and drought in the dry years.”
Areas in the province threatened by floods could increase by as much as half in less than 40 years, a government-sponsored symposium on flood mitigation was told last October. “Why are we getting floods impacting every corner of the world?” asked Scott Edelman, with the international engineering firm AECOM, which specializes in remediation of natural disasters such as hurricanes Katrina and Sandy. “It’s for two main reasons—population growth and climate change.”
Alberta, currently with about four million people, will likely have a population of six million by 2041, he says. Based on results from his firm’s study on the impact of climate change on US waterways, Edelman predicts flood plains in this province will increase by 30 to 50 per cent by 2050. “You have all this new population growth, which is impacting where people live, adding to more flooding,” he said. A growing population, in other words, translates into more people and more property in harm’s way.
“Essentially, we do not want a bunch of properties in the middle of a floodway,” says Corbould. “We want to protect the integrity of the floodway so it can do what it is meant to do, which is to allow the flood waters to go through and not hurt people or the economy.”
Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development’s flood maps don’t do enough to reflect climate change. The ministry is redrawing them, expanding the areas considered prone to flooding. The new maps, which will tell municipalities where they can and cannot approve development, will assess risk based on a 100-year flood policy and identify areas that have at least a one-in-100 chance of flooding in any given year. But the recent cluster of floods exceeding predictions suggests the probabilities have changed.
“What we saw in the flood of 2013 was more than a 1 per cent chance,” Corbould says. “We will review the recent cycle of floods and come up with better information for avoiding floods.”
The public has heard much of this before, however. After the High River flood of 2005, Conservative MLA George Groeneveld was appointed to head an inquiry to look at ways to lessen the impact of future disasters. He submitted a report in 2006 calling for updated flood maps and new restrictions on development in flood-prone areas, including a ban on the sale of flood-plain land for development and a system of notification and disclosure for sellers and buyers of property on flood plains.
The report was shelved for six years and only released a year before the 2013 flood, its key recommendations having been ignored. They are now part of the government’s Flood Recovery and Reconstruction Act, passed by the legislature over the winter. Groeneveld believes the suggestions would have made a difference had they been adopted sooner. “The most important recommendation was not to build on a flood plain,” he says. “If that had happened, that would have cut down some of the damage, because I’m sure there has been some building on flood plains in the 60 communities the report covered.”
“What scares me is that once we get further away from the flood of 2013, we’ll lose that sense of urgency.” —George Groeneveld, former MLA and author of an ignored 2006 flood mitigation report
Without question, the flood of 2013 followed an unusual nature event. By some estimates, 220 mm of rain—half the total expected precipitation for the year—fell in the High River area in less than 48 hours. The Highwood River, which has a normal June flow of 30–70 m3 per second, rushed at 50 times that amount on June 20th—about 1,800 m3 per second. During past floods, the Highwood’s flow was 671–803 m3 per second.
Higher up in the foothills, 350 mm of rain fell over a three-day period. “Whenever you have more than 150 mm of rainfall in that short a period, you’re at great risk of flooding,” says John Pomeroy, who holds the Canada Research Chair in Water Resources and Climate Change at the University of Saskatchewan and does much of his research in the Alberta Rockies. He says rain on snow added to greater than normal snowmelt flows, while still-frozen soils 50 cm underground kept the precipitation from soaking into the forest floor and meadows, filling up streams that much faster.
The excessive rainfall was attributed to low-pressure systems over the Rockies trapped by high-pressure systems bringing record high temperatures to Yukon and Alaska, and to a high-pressure system responsible for a record number of forest fires in Colorado. “This wet weather system had nowhere to go, so it just stayed and dropped a lot of moisture on a relatively small area,” Pomeroy says. “When you start to have weather events like this that are really very different from any we have seen before, you have to ask yourself: Was it due to climate change?”
As bad as it was, though, he says 2013’s wasn’t the flood of the century. Pomeroy’s statistical review found that it amounted to only a once-in-32-year flood for the Banff area and once-in-45-years at Calgary, giving weight to the argument that the province should have anticipated the event and been much better prepared.
Indeed, the province has a habit of not learning from the past. The studies that informed Calgary’s old flood maps showed flooding in 1879 and 1897 with estimated peak flows 20 per cent higher than what was experienced in 2013. Despite a flood in 1915 that washed out Calgary’s Centre Street Bridge, much of the city’s downtown—including the newly developed East Village—remains on a flood zone today. And although 2013’s Flood Recovery and Reconstruction Act prohibits new development on flood plains, it exempts Fort McMurray and Drumheller, instead putting its faith in flood-mitigation plans.
Despite their skepticism in the past, the provincial Conservatives appear to accept anthropogenic climate change as the likely cause of unusually destructive weather. As a result, the province has undertaken a number of measures to be ready when future storms hit and to mitigate their impact when they do. The package includes immediate fixes such as higher dikes and waterproofing measures for homeowners who choose to remain on flood plains. It also includes a number of costly diversion projects modelled roughly after the 50-year-old spillway channels that divert excess water from the Red and Assiniboine rivers around Winnipeg.
The province plans to construct four headwater berms with dry ponds in the foothills—two on the Elbow River, two on the Highwood—and a foothills dam and pond on the Sheep River. These would dam up their rivers during times of heavy rainfall or spring runoff and store the water in a reservoir, to be released gradually. Instead of seeing a fury of water rushing through the river system over 24 to 48 hours, as happened on June 20, the flow would be spread out over 10 to 14 days, avoiding most of the damage.
The plan also includes water bypass systems around High River and much of Calgary. The latter would allow managers to divert floodwater from the Elbow River through an underground passageway along 58th Avenue and deliver it to the Bow River near Deerfoot Trail, defusing its intensity to nearly normal levels.
The cost will be high—up to $400-million for the two bypass systems and another $430-million for the berm and dry-pond systems. Water experts estimate that to spare High River another flood like the one it experienced in 2013, the pond on the Highwood River will have to store about 150 million m3 of water—6.6 times the amount held in Calgary’s Glenmore Reservoir.
Referred to by some as the province’s Hurrican Sandy, the flood may mark the moment when Albertans acknowledge climate change.
Although the diversion plans have been greeted with enthusiasm in flood-prone areas, Pomeroy cautions that changing the contour of land in the foothills could have unexpected consequences downstream. Wildlife and wilderness groups have expressed similar concerns. And any breach in the dikes would compound the disaster, as happened in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina.
And the diversion plan offers no protection for areas not now considered prone to flooding due to out-of-date or inadequate information. Where will the next flood hit unexpectedly? Where is the next Hampton Hills? Pomeroy, who studies how mountain snowpack is affected by things like climate change, fires, forestry practices and the mountain pine beetle, says the only solution lies in a comprehensive water-management strategy for the eastern slopes, which supply the rivers in Western Canada with 90 per cent of their water. His advice to future developers: “Stay off flood plains. If you can see water, run the other way.”
A great rush to higher ground is unlikely, however. The province offered to buy out 254 homeowners living in floodways, but a disappointing response prompted High River town council to threaten to expropriate the other homes. By the November 30 deadline, only 101 Albertans had expressed interest in the buyout program, which pays tax-assessment value for their homes, and only 46 offers had been accepted by the province. People who refuse to relocate will not receive money from the province’s disaster recovery programs if they’re flooded out in the future.
The province’s handling of the disaster has prompted criticism from opposition politicians. Wildrose leader Danielle Smith, MLA for the High River area, blames the government for failing to act on the 2006 Groeneveld report. “Millions of dollars in damage could have been avoided,” she says. Calgary Liberal MLA Dr. David Swann cites the province’s failure to address the long-term effects of climate change, which could include more spring runoff as well as more summer droughts. “The government doesn’t seem willing to take the kind of leadership and control over the most basic, foundational aspect of our province—water,” he says. NDP leader Brian Mason accuses the Conservatives of misplaced priorities. “They see real action on climate change threatening their plans for oil development and for coal-fired electricity,” he says.
Government officials haven’t fully explained why they didn’t act on the Groeneveld report. The former High River-area MLA said his Conservative colleagues simply lost interest over time. “We went for a year without a flood, and man that window shut quickly,” Groeneveld says. “What scares me is that once we get further away from the flood of 2013, we’ll lose that sense of urgency.”
The government’s critics say they won’t let that happen. Smith, who in the 2012 provincial election said the science of climate change is not settled, is a recent convert, partly because of the floods. “We have now had three 100-year floods in the past 20 years,” she says. “We have to assume that something has changed to make our area more vulnerable.” Groeneveld, who was also a climate-change skeptic, has changed his thinking as well. “There has to be something causing all these over-the-top storms,” he says.
Back in High River, work is being completed to double the capacity of the Highwood River in time for this year’s flood season, which is but weeks away. Dredging efforts have removed the equivalent of 22 Olympic-sized swimming pools of muck and sludge from the river bottom. The banks have been reinforced with rock to reduce erosion. The town’s signature CP Rail bridge, abandoned in 2010, has been removed and the river widened to reduce impediments. Earthen dikes protecting vulnerable areas, including Highway 498 north of town, are being raised by about a metre.
Over the winter, residents continued to trickle back into their homes after what many described as a frustrating battle with their insurance companies and the disaster recovery programs over who would pay what to fix the flood damage. In Hampton Hills a hand-printed sign on a damaged home reads: “This is not a flood plain”—a sarcastic dig at the area’s designation as a rebuild zone. Many would like to see the neighbourhood declared a floodway so they can sell their homes to the province and move.
“I think there are a lot of people who feel that way,” says Miguel Rodrigues, who plans to return to a rebuilt home later this spring. “If we had the choice, we wouldn’t be moving back.”
As she prepared to move back into her Hampton Hills home, Sara Bruinsma reflected on the day almost a year ago when she and her family were forced out. After helping flooded-out friends living closer to the river, they came home to find their three-year-old dream home underwater. “We never thought the water would reach this high up,” she says. “It was devastating.” By Christmas, only about one-third of Hampton Hills residents had returned.
The developer, Lansdowne Equity, has another 96 lots for sale in the area and also has plans for a 250-unit condominium. Don Sandford, president of development for the company, is frustrated by what he believes are onerous new barriers put on the company because of the flood. The town won’t let the developer proceed before new mitigation measures are in place—which Sandford says is costing $25,000 a week in interest on the company’s investment as well as lost time.
“We could be building on those lots right now and creating a thriving recovery,” he says. “We’re just as much a victim as anyone else. There was never any indication when we started in 2005 that this would ever flood. There was nothing in the area structure plan to indicate it was at risk. None of the information from the province suggested the area would be prone to flooding. And now we have a $30-million investment that we could have been working on over several months that has been stalled.”
The housing lots are among a number of developments slated for the Hampton Hills area that may now be in jeopardy. Alberta Environment is investigating why the area flooded and whether future development there should halt permanently.
Mayor Snodgrass says all development plans are being reconsidered as a matter of caution. “If we don’t learn from the lesson that has just been handed to us, I think it would be extremely irresponsible for me and anyone else to go ‘yeah, we’re still good’ and to keep on doing what we’ve been doing,” he says.
The 42-year-old first-term mayor, whose own house and funeral business were damaged in the flood, said High River is “crossing its fingers” that the higher dikes hold during the coming flood seasons. The long-term solution, he believes, are the proposed water-diversion projects, which could take a year or two to build even if they are fast tracked.
He admits that as a municipal politician and lifelong resident of High River, he has to share the blame for not keeping flood protection top of mind. “You can’t point the finger only at the province for being complacent,” he says. “I’ll tell you that I wasn’t paying much attention. We get to thinking that ‘we know floods, we know what we’re doing.’ ”
He’s paying attention now. “It was going to take an event like this to really get it triggered,” he says.
Larry Johnsrude is a long-time western Canadian journalist and frequent contributor to Alberta Views. He lives in Edmonton.
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(CNN) -- Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi called Thursday for the U.N. Security Council to carry out an independent fact-gathering mission on Monday's NATO attack in the city of Surman, which resulted in civilian casualties.
"The Security Council should hold an urgent meeting to discuss the matter and stop this barbaric attack," he said in a nationally televised address.
In the attack, five houses were hit in Surman, which is west of Tripoli, and 15 people died, including three children, according to a government spokesman.
NATO has said the target was a command-and-control communications node involved in coordinating attacks on the Libyan people. "While NATO cannot confirm reports of casualties, we would regret any loss of civilian life and we go to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties," the organization said on its website. "This is in stark contrast to the Gadhafi regime, which continues its policy of systematic and sustained violence against the people of Libya."
But Gadhafi angrily rejected the claim that the compound was anything but a residential area. "This is not a military factory, munition factory or military port or a fortified castle," he said as video lingered over rubble. "It has no military identity."
"This is the jungle rule," he continued. "The infidels rule. You don't have any conscience."
He blamed the members of the Security Council who approved the resolution in March that authorized the use of military force to protect unarmed anti-government Libyan demonstrators.
"You will be responsible for any outcome," he threatened, "And you will regret it."
Gadhafi singled out U.S. President Barack Obama for blame. "Originally, you're from Africa and originally Arab as well," he said. "You sold out to America. Where will you go? On Judgment Day, you will be in hell. Our dead will be in heaven, and your dead will be in hell. You ought to feel ashamed."
Gadhafi then directed his vitriol toward the "so-called heroic pilots" who flew the NATO planes involved in the attack. "You know we don't have any air defenses or military planes," the Libyan leader said, referring to the no-fly zone that NATO has imposed over Libya. "You have long-range rockets and you have been flying over the Libyan air territory without any deterrent."
He said NATO's true motivation was inspired by hatred. "You hate us because we are Muslims," Gadhafi said. "You hate Libya and people who bear witness to Allah and Mohammed. You bomb them."
Gadhafi's late-night diatribe came hours after China embraced the Libyan opposition as "an important dialogue partner" and urged an end to the fighting and a political solution to the crisis, state media said.
"China is not seeking any private interest concerning Libya, and believes the Libyan situation is essentially an internal issue," said Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi after meeting with Mahmoud Jibril, chairman of the executive board of Libya's National Transitional Council.
Jibril's was the first visit by a Libyan opposition leader. He arrived in China on Tuesday, according to the state-run Xinhua news agency.
For the sake of the Libyan people, Yang called on the two sides to "truly give peace a chance."
Also Wednesday, Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini urged an end to the fighting in Libya to allow for humanitarian aid to flow to the war-devastated North African nation.
Speaking in Parliament, Frattini said Italy backs a cessation to hostilities to negotiate a way for a humanitarian corridor.
Frattini's comments came after he had been critical of reported civilian casualties in NATO airstrikes and said they threatened the credibility of the alliance.
At a weekend summit in Cairo, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Libya was facing shortages of food, fuel and medical personnel and access to water services was dwindling.
"The U.N.'s humanitarian efforts are taking place under extremely difficult circumstances," he said.
The Libyan war erupted from anti-government protests in February. Following a U.N. mandate to protect civilians, NATO began bombing military targets in March. However, Gadhafi still maintains control in Tripoli and other cities.
Meanwhile, pressure has mounted from U.S. lawmakers to withdraw backing for the mission.
"The fact is the president has not made his case to the members of Congress, he has not made his case to the American people," House Speaker John Boehner said Wednesday.
"We've been in this conflict for 90 days and the president hasn't talked to the American people for four or five weeks about why we're there, what our national interest is, and why we should continue," Boehner said.
The day before, Senators John Kerry, D-Massachusetts, and John McCain, R-Arizona, introduced a resolution to counter some of the criticism about the U.S. role in Libya.
That resolution authorizes the commitment of U.S. forces for one year while stressing the lack of support for any use of American ground troops.
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Paul Zachary Myers (born March 9, 1957) is an American biologist who founded and writes the Pharyngula science-blog. He is associate-professor of biology at the University of Minnesota Morris (UMM)[1] where he works in the field of developmental biology.[2] He is a critic of intelligent design (ID), the creationist movement, and other pseudoscientific concepts.[3]
In 2006 the journal Nature listed Myers's Pharyngula as the top-ranked blog by a scientist based on popularity.[4] Myers received the American Humanist Association's 2009 Humanist of the Year award and the International Humanist Award in 2011. Asteroid 153298 Paulmyers is named in his honor.[5]
Early life [ edit ]
Myers was born March 9, 1957, the eldest of six children in Kent, Washington; his mother is of Swedish and Norwegian descent.[6] Regarding his ancestry, Myers wrote: "I'm only half Scandinavian. The blood has been thinned with that of those domesticated English and Irish and Scots."[7] He was named "Paul Zachary", after his grandfather, but preferred the initials PZ to being called "Little Paul". He has described his family as "probably what would be called the working poor nowadays", and noted that "when I was growing up I was called white trash more than a few times".[8]
He claims to have been a "science geek" from an early age, gaining an interest in zoology and marine biology from studying the insides of fish while on fishing trips with his father.
Growing up, Myers attended an Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) church.[9] Prior to his confirmation, Myers says, "I started thinking, you know, I don't believe a word of this."[10] Now an atheist, Myers comments widely on his blog about science, education, atheism and religion.[11][12]
Education and activism [ edit ]
Myers graduated from Kent-Meridian High School in 1975 and subsequently attended DePauw University in Indiana on a full scholarship.[10][13] However, he returned home the next year after his father suffered a heart attack.[10] He then graduated from the University of Washington in 1979 with Bachelor of Science in zoology. Myers drifted away from this field toward evolutionary developmental biology and obtained a PhD in Biology from the University of Oregon.[14]
PZ Myers presents his talk, "You, too, can know more molecular genetics than a creationist!" at Skepticon in 2014.
A self-styled "godless liberal"[15] and outspoken atheist, he is a vocal critic of all forms of religion, superstition, supernaturalism, spirituality and pseudoscience. He is quoted as having "nothing but contempt" for intelligent design, arguing that it is "fundamentally dishonest".[10]
He is also an outspoken supporter of sex-positive feminism.[16] Myers believes women should make their own sexual choices without outside pressure.[17]
In 2009 Myers was named the American Humanist Association's "Humanist of the Year".[18]
In April 2015, Atheist Ireland issued an official announcement, apologizing that they had given Myers "public platforms in Ireland, both at the World Atheist Convention in 2011, and at our international conference in 2013 on Empowering Women Through Secularism" and that now it is "publicly dissociating itself from the hurtful and dehumanising, hateful and violent, unjust and defamatory rhetoric of the atheist blogger PZ Myers".[19]
In 2017, PZ Myers who formerly considered himself one of the "New Atheists", disassociated himself with the New Atheist label. Describing the label as being applied "against our protests, because we were all aware that there was nothing new about it. Maybe we were more aggressive, or maybe suddenly people were listening to us, but really, it was the same old atheism with a fancy artisan label", Myers prefers to be simply referred to as an atheist.[20]
Post-graduate career [ edit ]
Myers has taught and researched at the University of Oregon, the University of Utah and Temple University. He is currently an associate professor of biology at the University of Minnesota's Morris campus.[1] He is a member of Minnesota Citizens for Science Education,[21] and cultivates an interest in cephalopods.[citation needed]
Blogging and writing [ edit ]
Myers has been active on the internet. He was involved in scientific debates on USENET surrounding the growing creationist movement. He was a founding member of The Panda's Thumb blog. In June 2002, he started his website Pharyngula.org, which morphed into a blog now hosted by ScienceBlogs[22] and Freethought Blogs.[23]
Pharyngula [ edit ]
Pharyngula is Myers's personal weblog, promoted as "Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal."[24] The topics Myers covers are eclectic, delving into the non-scientific as well as scientific. While Pharyngula includes many articles discussing breaking science news and research, the blog has become particularly well known for ridicule of intelligent design and of attempts to insert it into science education. In 2006, the science journal Nature listed Pharyngula as the top-ranked blog written by a scientist.[25]
Pharyngula.org was started on June 19, 2002.[26] It started out as an experiment in writing instruction for a class. Students were required to submit mini-essays to be published online. After the project was finished, Myers still had the web-publishing software, and started to use it himself. The blog is named after his favorite stage in embryonic development, the pharyngula stage. Pharyngula moved to hosting at ScienceBlogs, a project of Seed Magazine, in 2005.
On Pharyngula, Myers has repeatedly denounced the Discovery Institute, Answers in Genesis, and other creationist websites, as well as offering rebuttals to Intelligent Design, pointing out that its claims are pseudoscientific. Other posts on Pharyngula cover a broad variety of topics that interest Myers. These include cephalopods; science; religion; local, national and international politics, particularly those involving science and/or education; superstition; and evolutionary developmental biology. Myers dismissed the Discovery Institute's petition A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism, stating that the scientists listed didn't have credentials relevant to Biology, and that the number of them was minuscule compared to the scientific community as a whole.
On his blog in 2007, Myers reviewed Stuart Pivar's book Lifecode, which argues that self-organization at the embryonic and fetal stages determine the development and final structure of organisms.[27][28][29] Myers reviewed the book negatively, stating that the diagrams and ideas in the book arose from Pivar's imagination and had no basis in actual evidence.
How his theory can be reconciled with a large body of embryological evidence that directly contradicts virtually all of it is not clear, and Pivar has chosen not to address any of it. And a book full of geometrically interesting sketches neither explains nor supports Pivar's theory.… Theories are supposed to explain observation and experiment. You don't come up with a theory first, and then invent the evidence to support it.[27]
After some discussion in the comments threads of Pharyngula, Pivar sued Myers for libel.[27][29] Within a week Pivar withdrew the lawsuit, stating that "the real issue got sidelined" and that his problem was more with Seed Media Group.[30]
In addition to articles about keeping religion out of science education, church-state separation, and complaints of misdeeds done in the name of religion, Myers continues to write about science in the disciplines of evolution,[31] palaeontology,[32] genetics,[33] development,[34] and molecular biology.[35]
In 2012, Myers announced that Chris Clarke, an environmentalist and blogger, would become Pharyngula's co-author.[36] Clarke left the blog in August 2013, partly because of the perceived unpleasantness of Pharyngula commenters.[37]
Book [ edit ]
Myers's book, The Happy Atheist, was published by Random House in August, 2013.[38] It is largely a compilation of previous blog posts.[39]
The book has been well-received by critics.[citation needed] Fellow blogger Greg Laden celebrates "the level of refinement of his writing" and noting that "these essays actually have a different feel to them".[40]
Eucharist incident [ edit ]
A controversy arose in July 2008 over a Pharyngula blog entry written by Myers expressing amazement at news reports of death threats issued to University of Central Florida Student Senator Webster Cook. On June 29, 2008, Cook attended a Catholic Mass being held in the student union at UCF by a Catholic student group that receives funding from the student government. Cook received the Catholic Eucharist host but did not consume it immediately. He said later that he wanted to take it back to his seat to show a friend, but when stopped he pretended to put it in his mouth until back at his seat, then a church leader made forcible attempts to take the wafer from him.[41][42] Cook stored the host at his home, then returned it one week later after receiving e-mail threats and pleas.[41][43] Bill Donohue, President of the Catholic League, described the student's actions as "beyond hate speech" and said that "All options should be on the table, including expulsion."[44]
In his July 8 blog entry, Myers criticized the reaction to Cook's act. Myers described the level of harassment including multiple death threats leveled against the student, and accusations against the student which included hate crime, kidnapping, and intent to desecrate the Eucharist which Catholics consider a mortal sin.[42][45] Myers expressed outrage that Fox News Channel appeared to be inciting readers to cause further problems for the student, and ridiculed reports that armed guards would attend the next mass. Myers suggested that if any of his readers could acquire some consecrated Eucharistic hosts for him, he would treat the wafers "with profound disrespect and heinous cracker abuse, all photographed and presented here on the web."[46]
Myers was criticized from both religious and non-religious quarters. The Catholic League accused Myers of anti-Catholic bigotry,[47] described his proposal as a threat to desecrate what Catholics hold to be the Body of Christ, and sent a letter asking the University of Minnesota and the Minnesota State Legislature to take action against Myers.[47][48] The Catholic League argued that, as the Pharyngula website was accessible via a link from the University of Minnesota's website, it should be bound by the university's code of conduct, which requires faculty to be "respectful, fair and civil" when dealing with others.[48] Joe Foley, a member of the Board of the Secular Student Alliance, wrote on the organization's website that Myers had "crossed the line" from "playful satire" to "masturbatory condescension".[49] Foley concluded, "if open-minded believers are willing to join us in polite dialogue, we need to be ready to welcome them with more than ridicule and pranks."[49]
Subsequently, Myers explained to the Star Tribune that while his post was "satire and protest," he had received death threats regarding the incident but was not taking them too seriously.[47] In a talk show featuring Myers on Catholic Radio International, hosted by Jeff Gardner, Myers confirmed that he had been sent an unspecified number of consecrated hosts and said that he intended to “subject them to heinous cracker abuse.” When asked by Gardner to explain why he must do so, Myers said that Donohue of the Catholic League was insisting that he acknowledge the Body of Christ in the Eucharist. Gardner pointed out that Donohue had no authority to insist on such acknowledgment. The show host then asked Myers which individual possessing the Magisterial authority of the Catholic Church had insisted that he recognize the Body of Christ in the Eucharist. Myers replied that no one from the Catholic Church had contacted him.[50]
On July 24, 2008, Myers, in his post, "The Great Desecration," wrote that he had pierced through the "goddamned cracker" with a rusty nail, which he also used to pierce a few ripped-out pages of the Qur'an (in English translation, not the original Arabic) and The God Delusion, and had simply thrown them all in the trash along with old coffee grounds and a banana peel. He provided a photograph of these items in the garbage, and wrote that nothing must be held sacred, encouraging people to question everything. In addition, he described the history of allegations of host desecration, emphasizing the frequent use of such allegations in medieval Europe to justify anti-Semitism.[51] The following day, University of Minnesota, Morris (UMM) Chancellor stated: "I believe that behaviors that discriminate against or harass individuals or groups on the basis of their religious beliefs are reprehensible" and that the school "affirms the freedom of a faculty member to speak or write as a public citizen without institutional discipline or restraint."[52]
Science activism [ edit ]
Interview and screening of Expelled [ edit ]
In April 2007 Myers was interviewed for what he was told would be a documentary titled Crossroads, purportedly about science and religion.[53] However, in September 2007, executive producer Mark Mathis announced that the film was Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed about perceived censorship of intelligent design supporters in academia and elsewhere.[54] Regarding the discrepancy of focus, Myers wrote: "I mean, seriously, not telling one of the sides in a debate about what the subject might be and then leading him around randomly to various topics, with the intent of later editing it down to the parts that just make the points you want, is the video version of quote-mining and is fundamentally dishonest."[53]
On March 20, 2008, Myers was denied entry into a screening of Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed at the Mall of America in Minneapolis. He was waiting with his family and guests to attend a private screening after having reserved seats for himself and guests under his own name using the freely available online procedure set up by the film's promoters. Shortly before the film started, a security guard told him that the producer Mark Mathis had instructed that Myers be removed from the premises. After telling his family of this Myers went to a nearby Apple store and blogged about his amusement that they had expelled him, but allowed his guest entry to see the film—British evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins, who had also been interviewed for the film under similar circumstances.[55] In a question and answer session at the end of the film Dawkins asked why Myers had been excluded, and later said that "if anyone had a right to see the film, it was [Myers]. The incompetence, on a public relations level, is beyond belief."[56] The saga has been described by Dawkins as "an incredible piece of inept public relations" on the part of the film's producers.[57]
Creation Museum visit [ edit ]
Myers at the Creation Museum
Myers's engagement as keynote speaker at the 2009 Secular Student Alliance Conference in Columbus, Ohio[58] developed into an August 7, 2009 trip, in which 304 attendees visited the nearby Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky.[59]
Appearances [ edit ]
Myers has been invited to speak about science, rationalism, or atheism at conferences, symposia, and other events.
In July, 2013, Freethought Blogs organized an online virtual conference called FtBCon or FtB Conscience. Google+ Hangout software was used to enable real-time discussion around the world. Participants included all the Freethought Blog bloggers as well as Jeremy Beahan, Jamila Bey, Virginia Brown, Ania Bula, David Brin, Eneasz Brodski, Ian Bushfield, environmental blogger & author Chris Clarke, James Croft, Heina Dadabhoy, J. T. Eberhard, Daniel Fincke, Debbie Goddard, Julia Galef, Nicole Harris, Rebecca Hensler, scientist and blogger Greg Laden, Robin Marty, science artist & blogger Glendon Mellow, Aoife O’Riordan, Beth Presswood of The Atheist Experience, Kim Rippere, Amy Roth, Jacques Rousseau, Desiree Schell of Skeptically Speaking, David Silverman, Xavier Trapp, blogger Rebecca Watson, Eliezer Yudkowski, scientist & blogger Bora Zivkovic, and others. The conference was free and took place over three days.[61]
Awards [ edit ]
Myers has received several awards for his activism and blogging.
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Official
Pharyngula – Official blog
Interviews/Presentations
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(CNN) — Whether they're sweating in the sauna or plunging into an ice-cold lake, it seems that the Finns love extremes.
And with winter just around the corner, there's no better time to indulge in the national pastime the Finns call "avanto."
The English translation for that? "Hole in the ice."
Photographer Markku Lahdesmaki documented the ice-swimming phenomenon during a trip to his hometown of Tampere, in southern Finland, earlier this year.
His portraits of hardy swimmers facing the elements in nothing but a bikini or a pair of trunks send a shiver down the spine.
'Finland is not most places'
"In most places, when you went to a lake in January, you wouldn't expect to find people swimming," Lahdesmaki tells CNN. "But Finland is not most places."
Photographer Markku Lahdesmaki Markku Lahdesmaki
He found Rauhaniemi Lake "teeming with swimmers" despite below-zero temperatures.
The avanto ritual is combined with that other Finnish staple, the sauna.
Temperatures in these traditional bath houses range between 60 and 100 degrees Celsius (140-212 degrees Fahrenheit).
Swimmers at Rauhaniemi enjoy a blast of dry heat either before or after their bout of ice swimming.
'Spiritual, breathtaking, invigorating'
Lahdesmaki arrived at the lake dressed in his thickest winter clothing.
"I wondered how the swimmers would react to my embedding myself in their avanto moments looking like a North Pole explorer.
"How could I make them comfortable? And then it hit me ... I need to join them."
The photographer underwent his baptism of ice and "ended up swimming six times."
He said, "It was an amazing experience: spiritual, breathtaking, invigorating and, of course, cold.
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Some measure of relief Friday for those affected by the water shortage in southwest Nova Scotia, as bottled water deliveries began to arrive.
The bottles will be given out Wednesday evening at the Shelburne Fire Department, where many are collecting water.
“The situation is quite desperate for many people,” says Shelburne Mayor Karen Mattatal.
As waterways and wells dry up, people are helping one another out. Families who have water are letting neighbours use their showers.
Heather Strang lives in Shelburne and works in Barrington, among the hardest-hit communities. She’s taking enough water home to flush toilets and wash up for a couple of days.
“We shut everything like the toilet off, the hot water tank, we shut that off probably about two weeks ago, the end of August,” says Strang.
Four provincial parks in the area are now offering showers and drinking water to people whose wells have run dry.
Mattatal says the municipal water supply is holding its own and should be able to continue supplying everyone, but they’re asking people on that supply to conserve water in the coming days.
“Only about a quarter of our town is served by public water, so that means most people in the town get their water from a well,” Mattatal says.
Other communities are not faring as well as a result of the area’s longest dry spell in almost 90 years.
As municipal reservoirs continue to dwindle, people in the Windsor area who have been relying on the town utility to fill their wells will now need to fill up at Hantsport.
“I’ve been in the business 46 years, I’ve never seen anything quite like this,” says Wayne Leary, owner of a water delivery business in Windsor.
The town of Windsor says water conservation is now mandatory.
“Every year some people experience dry wells, this year is beyond comprehension,” adds Mattatal.
A harsh reminder that the most basic of resources can dry up, as hot and dry conditions continue.
With files from CTV Atlantic’s Sarah Ritchie.
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The CW (via CBR) has unveiled the first photo of their fully-assembled Suicide Squad from the hit series "Arrow." Set to debut in the upcoming 16th episode of the second season of "Arrow," the Suicide Squad was previously teased in an earlier episode where Amanda Waller (played by Cynthia Addai-Robinson) recruited Michael Jai White's Bronze Tiger to join the team. The rest of the members of the team will include Mark Scheffer, aka Shrapnel (Sean Maher), Floyd Lawton, aka Deadshot (Michael Rowe), and none other than Lyla Michaels (Audrey Marie Anderson) and Oliver's partner John Diggle (David Ramsey).
Also known as "Task Force X," the Suicide Squad have been in DC Comics in many different forms since 1959. The team set to be featured on "Arrow" bears some resemblance to the current iteration of the team which also includes Deadshot and Amanda Waller. A few other villains that have appeared on "Arrow" have also been a part of the Suicide Squad in the source material including Clock King and Count Vertigo.
Click on the photo to see a bigger version!
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Trophy hunting costs do NOT help repopulate endangered animal species
(NaturalNews) The owner of the American fast food chain Jimmy John's is under fire after photos emerged of him smiling and giving a "thumbs up" beside numerous endangered species that he's hunted and killed throughout Africa over the years, for seemingly no other purpose than simply to invoke death for pleasure.Reports indicate that Jimmy John Liautaud has been spending hundreds of thousands of dollars per hunting trip to gain access to these precious species, including one particular "trophy" hunt in which he spent a whopping $350,000 just to kill an extremely endangered female Black Rhino. Graphic photos of Liautaud with this rhino and other animals are available here , but be warned: these images are horrifyingly upsetting.Liautaud's trophy hunts are apparently a routine pastime of his, just as they are for the many other bored millionaires out there with too much time and money on their hands who seem to get a kick out of taking out the rarest animals on our planet – beautiful creatures like leopards, rhinos, lions, and even elephants, which have the largest brains of any land animals. It's the type of thing that, if more people knew about it, they'd likely stop eating at Jimmy John's altogether.Mr. Jimmy John's poaching fetish has been making the media rounds, and many are now calling on a national boycott of the sandwich chain, which has already been exposed for underpaying its employees and treating them like slave workers.(WSJ) reported that social media users had attempted to launch a boycott of Jimmy John's using the "#boycottjimmyjohns" hashtag on Twitter, though the company didn't seem all that phased.Still, the issue hasn't gone away, and many in the public remain outraged over what they say is reckless and reprehensible behavior. Not only is Liautaud killing these rare and exotic animals in cold blood, but he's doing so in such an utterly cruel way that even the most avid hunters would be hard-pressed not to cringe or perhaps shed a few tears."[U]sually the animals are lured from a national park on to private property," Lara Starr, investigative writer and co-founder ofwrites, noting that this is not the method Liautaud uses to kill his prey. "Trophy hunters will leave out bait, play the sounds of other animals to lure them in, or a few other tactics to find their animal victims.""Canned hunting is even worse," she adds. "It is the 'shooting fish in a barrel' version of trophy hunting . The animals are often hand raised so they are tame and don't run away. They leave food out for them one day, then some coward creeps up and shoots them with a high powered bow or rifle. Sometimes they don't even have to creep. Sometimes they just shoot them from the back of a truck, then go back to drinking their gin & tonic like it was just a bit of harmless fun."One of the excuses often used as justification for expensive trophy hunting escapades is that all that cash ends up getting donated to conservation programs that help repopulate the prairies, plains, and jungles with endangered species. But this isn't actually true, as only about two percent of the proceeds from these hunts ends up being used for conservation purposes.Non-trophy hunting tourism, on the other hand, is responsible for the bulk of conservation donations -- up to 15 times than what trophy hunting contributes -- according to Heather Callaghan, editor of. Likewise, the claim that animals killed on trophy hunts are used to provide food for locals is also bunk, as most of the carcasses end up getting left behind for scavengers.
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WASHINGTON ― Republican leaders are eyeing last-minute changes to their health care bill in order to attract votes from conservative lawmakers, including removing the requirement that insurance companies cover maternity care for everyone.
Before the Affordable Care Act became law in 2010, the insurance market was a bleak place for women. They often had to pay more than men for the same coverage. Only 12 percent of individual market plans covered maternity care. And it was completely legal for insurance companies to refuse coverage to women who were pregnant or might become pregnant in the future.
One of the ACA’s most celebrated features is that it attempted to fix this gender disparity. It created a list of 10 essential health benefits that all plans on the marketplace must cover. Pregnancy, maternity and newborn care are on that list. It also said that insurance plans must offer contraception at no cost, along with breastfeeding equipment and services.
These features would likely go away if the band of conservatives known as the House Freedom Caucus gets to change the GOP health care bill, the American Health Care Act, in the way that it wants. These lawmakers want to get rid of the 10 essential health benefits, which could lower premiums, and it’s a concession that President Donald Trump has reportedly said he would agree to.
Indeed, the White House has said publicly that it doesn’t like these benefits, citing mandatory maternity care in particular.
“A 54-year-old doesn’t need certain things. They don’t need maternity care,” White House press secretary Sean Spicer said last week. “They don’t need certain medical services that are being provided to them by this government product that is being forced on them right now.”
Democrats are hitting back hard on these potential changes.
“[Eliminating] essential health benefits means Republicans are making being a woman a preexisting condition,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters Thursday. “Again, stripping guaranteed maternity care is a pregnancy tax, pure and simple.”
Republicans have long opposed the idea of making insurance companies cover benefits like maternity care.
In 2009, during the debate over the Affordable Care Act, then-Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) argued, “I don’t need maternity care, and so requiring that to be in my insurance policy is something that I don’t need and will make the policy more expensive.”
“I think your mom probably did,” Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) shot back.
More recently, Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.) said it wasn’t fair to make men “purchase prenatal care.”
Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) also seemed skeptical of the whole idea of essential benefits on Thursday.
I asked Sen. Roberts if he supports scrapping Essential Health Benefits. "I wouldn't want to lose my mammograms," he snarked. #AHCA — Alice Ollstein (@AliceOllstein) March 23, 2017
(For the record, mammograms also test for breast cancer in men.)
The way insurance works is that everyone pays into a system so people are able to get money when they need it. You may never have cancer, but your insurance payments are helping to cover people who will. Women don’t have prostates, but their insurance premiums help fund men’s prostate cancer screenings and treatments.
“We shouldn’t allow insurance companies to say men’s health care is basic health care, but women’s health care is not,” Stabenow recently told The Huffington Post.
Experts also worry that if insurance companies are given the option of offering expensive services like maternity care, it will become a race to the bottom where that coverage, once again, becomes scarce.
And even though nearly half of pregnancies in the United States are unplanned, women would have to purchase this maternity coverage months in advance of being pregnant ― otherwise it could be considered a preexisting condition for which insurance companies could deny coverage.
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For saving a city and its art. Some philanthropists make big donations to find a cure for a disease, or to help poor children overseas. But what if not-for-profits and some companies could save an entire city? A dozen not-for-profits, acting on an idea hatched by a federal judge and Detroit emergency manager Kevyn Orr, came together in 2014 to form the Foundation for Detroit’s Future, contributing $366 million over 20 years to meet the city’s obligation to its government pensioners and help pull the Motor City out of bankruptcy. Leading benefactors include the Ford Foundation ($125 million), the Kresge Foundation, ($100 million) and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation ($40 million). And additional donors pledged $100 million to save the Detroit Institute of Art and its work. The DIA had been under the control of the city, putting the artwork at risk of liquidation to pay creditors. Now, the DIA stays in a recovering Detroit.
For taking a wacky idea and running with It. The Ice Bucket Challenge was not the brainchild of the ALS Association, which raises money to fund research on amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), otherwise known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease. But the Association deftly embraced the Internet sensation, raising more than $100 million during a 30-day period in the summer of 2014. The challenge, started by ALS patients and their advocates, doesn’t involve donations at all. Instead, people, some of them famous actors and athletes, posted YouTube videos of themselves being doused with a bucket of ice water. The unusual—if baffling—effort brought a great deal of public attention to an illness that hadn’t been getting much of it. The ALS Foundation promoted the idea, and in October announced an initial contribution of $21.7 million to expedite research to find treatments and a cure for the disease, $18.5 million of which was designated for four global research projects.
Sector Forecasting What It Will Take To Get A Nonprofit Job In 2020 Read More >>
For making cybersecurity a philanthropic cause. Governments worry about cybersecurity, whether it’s a matter of official documents being disclosed or the Sony hacking that caused an international incident involving North Korea. But it’s not been a cause in the not-for-profit world until the Hewlett Foundation stepped in. In 2014, the foundation created a “cyber initiative” to explore how to protect privacy, innovation, and the need for data security in an era when so much information is kept electronically. Governments and industry have scrambled to deal with cybersecurity issues, but they have “largely focused their separate, siloed security efforts on the immediate need to thwart enemies, hackers, and thieves,” the foundation says. Hewlett has so far pledged $65 million—the largest such commitment by a private donor—to address cybersecurity issues. Stanford University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the University of California–Berkeley each got $15 million in November to launch academic initiatives aimed at protecting governments, individuals, and businesses from hackers.
For providing the tools for medical innovation. Prescription painkiller abuse ruins lives and costs millions in health care expenses. But what if there was a natural, non-addictive way to register or block the sensations that cause pain? A Chilean researcher launched that project last year, thanks to help from the Boston-based Seeding Labs. The small nonprofit, officially launched in 2007 by Nina Dudnik, doesn’t offer cash grants; it merely sends donated lab equipment to great scientists overseas so they can do research. Dudnik, a graduate of Harvard’s doctorate program in microbiology, came up with the idea while working as a Fulbright Fellow in Ivory Coast in 2001. As of 2014, Seeding Labs had provided $2.2 million worth of lab equipment to nearly 20,000 scientists and their students in 23 countries. Last year, it also expanded into a public-private partnership with USAID, which gave $3 million to Seeding Labs to close the science research gap abroad.
For making health about more than health care. The 43-year-old Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is known for its attention to health care. With more than $10 billion in assets, RWJF is the single biggest philanthropy dedicated to the nation’s health. But in 2014, president Risa Lavizzo-Mourey announced a dramatic change: Instead of treating health care and general public health as separate goals, the foundation would promote a “culture of health” aimed at all the elements that affect a person’s well-being, whether it’s poverty, food security, adequate housing, assistance to the elderly, or bike paths in cities. RWJF won’t stop working for quality, cost-effective health care, Lavizzo-Mourey said in announcing the shift, but will broaden its mission to include other factors that affect the public well-being. One such approach, supported by the Foundation, is Health Leads, which enables doctors and other health care providers to “prescribe” basic resources like food and heat just as they do medication to make sure patients can stay healthy between medical visits.
For making a science out of giving. The Rockefeller Foundation has plenty of cash to throw around; last year, the group spent more than $200 million in grants and other funding for projects in more than 50 countries. To spend the money wisely, the foundation has its own, unique global intelligence unit that identifies needs and figures out what (if anything) the Rockefeller Foundation can do to help. Only a handful makes it to the “development” stage, wherein a project is test-funded to see if it can have a wider impact. In 2014, the Rockefeller Foundation directed $75 million to Smart Power in India, working with utility companies, investors, and NGOs to help a nation in which 290 million people lack basic lighting. The project is expected to electrify 1,000 villages between 2014 and 2017 and will be used as a model for similar projects in Asia and Africa.
For finding a cost-effective way to evaluate its work. Acumen’s approach has always been more than straight-up charity; its model is to do “double bottom line” or “impact” investing, in which investors achieve both a profit and a social dividend. But Acumen wanted to make sure its work was reaching the right target—particularly when the rural, very poor are involved. With the 2014 launch of the Lean Data Initiative, done in conjunction with the Grameen Foundation, Acumen is using mobile-enabled impact measurement tools to assess and evaluate its work. Lean Data resulted in collecting data from 1,000 customers of Ziqitza, an investee in India that provides ambulatory services to the poor, helping Ziqitza learn whether it was reaching the poorest and most isolated people. In Africa, more than 3 million customer texts were sent to Sproxil, a Nigerian-based company that enables customers to verify the authenticity of their medications through SMS.
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According to thousands of Buzzfeed quizzes, your music taste can say a lot about you. From the songs you choose, these quizzes can tell which Harry Potter house you belong to or what era of Kylie Minogue your fashion sense is. Of course, it's all nonsense.
However according to a new – more scientific – study, if you are a big fan of No Diggity ft. Dre, you're more likely to be a psychopath.
It's not often you get to embed No Diggity on a science website, so we're taking advantage of this opportunity.
A stereotype in films is that psychopaths always listen to classical music (e.g. Hannibal Lecter) or Phil Collins (Patrick Bateman in American Psycho). However, according to research conducted by Channel 4 in the UK, on over 3 million participants, people who score highly on psychopath tests are more likely to favor rap and heavy metal, with the least psychopathic favoring classical music and jazz.
Now researchers at New York University have looked at specific songs, studying 200 people and 260 songs, The Guardian reports.
They found that people who scored highly on psychopath tests were more likely to rate songs like No Diggity and Lose Yourself by Eminem. People at the least psychopathic end of the spectrum were more likely to be fans of My Sharona by The Knacks and Titanium by Sia. Two songs you should now claim to love with passion.
Titanium – our favorite song of all time.
The aim of the research was to find a way of identifying psychopaths. The researchers believe that songs could help predict who has the disorder, which affects around 1 percent of people.
They told The Guardian that further tests are needed, and they want to conduct a larger study. They hope to find out whether it might be possible to identify psychopaths from their playlists.
“The beauty of this idea is you can use it as a screening test without consent, cooperation or maybe even the knowledge of the people involved,” Pascal Wallisch, the lead researcher, told The Guardian. “The ethics of this are very hairy, but so is having a psychopath as a boss, and so is having a psychopath in any position of power.”
“You don’t want to have these people in positions where they can cause a lot of harm.”
No Diggity and Lose Yourself were named by the researchers, but other songs were better predictors of psychopathy. The scientists declined to name these songs for fear of disrupting future experiments. We're guessing Galway Girl by Ed Sheeran.
To be clear, you shouldn't diagnose yourself based on your musical taste. If you'd like to read more about how psychopaths are diagnosed by trained medical professionals, see this Hare Psychopathy Checklist.
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The dumbest burglar in Britain? Crook steals next-door neighbour's curtains... then hangs them in his window
Criminal, 38, behind 'not very sophisticated' crime has 28 convictions
A burglar who stole his next-door neighbour’s net curtains was caught when he put them up in his own window, a court was told.
Jason Williams was jailed for two years and five months after admitting his fourth burglary.
The 38-year-old was rumbled when the neighbours went to his home and asked him why he had got their net curtains.
Busted: Burglar Jason Williams, 38, stole his next-door neighbour's net curtains and hung them up in his own window in Slough, Berkshire
The crime was described as 'not very sophisticated' by the defendant’s own barrister.
Elizabeth Lowe, prosecuting, told the court the neighbour had moved out of the property and left only a few items inside.
Williams broke down boarding on the home in Slough, Berkshire, and stole the net curtains, tools, two glass ashtrays and some lamb steaks from the freezer.
'The person at the address had moved out because of an earlier burglary which was nothing to do with this defendant at all,' Miss Lowe said.
'They had boards up as a result of having left some items inside of not very much value.
'They had last checked on May 6 and on May 8 a neighbour had said it looked to him that the boards had been disturbed.
'In the next door flat they noticed that their net curtains were hanging there.'
However, the defendant denied that it was anything to do with him - but could not say how he got the net curtains, a judge at Reading Crown Court was told.
He later confessed to the crime in police interviews and admitted burglary when he appeared before magistrates court.
Alastair Smith, defending, said that it had merely been an 'opportunistic' crime.
'The fact that this defendant went on to place the curtains in his own window shows a lack of sophistication and realisation of the seriousness of the offence,' he said.
'If he realised it could lead to three years in custody he might have taken more time to consider his actions.'
The defendant, who has battled alcoholism and drug addiction, has 28 previous convictions for 76 offences dating back to 1985, the court was told.
Judge Gordon Risius jailed Williams for two years and five months under the 'three strikes' rule because it was his fourth burglary of a dwelling.
He told Williams: 'You knew what had been going on there and took advantage of the situation.
'Your guilty plea means you have been convicted for the fourth time of a domestic burglary and, in the circumstances, the law requires a sentence of at least three years imprisonment unless it would be unjust.
'While I have taken into account that the last of your burglaries was in 2004, some six years ago, you have offended in a number of ways since 2004.
'There are no circumstances in your case which would take the normal minimum sentence unjust. The fact that it would have been opportunistic in nature does not justify a different view.'
He gave Williams credit for his guilty plea and took into account the time he had spent in custody on remand.
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Current Articles | Archives | RSS Feeds | Search Friday, January 4, 2013 2013 Vuelta a España route reported to feature eleven summit finishes by Kyle Moore at 8:43 PM EST
Categories: Pro Cycling, Vuelta a España Organizers expecting to build on success of punchy, difficult 2012 edition For the past month, Spanish media outlets have been pushing rumors of an even hillier edition of the Vuelta a España in 2013, after ten uphill finales fueled a highly successful 2012 Vuelta, won by Alberto Contador (Saxo-Tinkoff). Now Spanish sporting website AS.com is reporting that the 2013 Vuelta will contain eleven uphill or summit finishes, which would be one more than last season.
While the official route isn’t presented until later in the month, the Spanish grand tour, spanning August 24th through September 15th, will follow a similar format as in 2012, when Contador, Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) and Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha) battled in a close race to the end. Rodriguez took three stages to Contador’s one, but the Katusha rider lost critical time on stage 17 to Fuente Dé, Contador’s lone victory. The Fuente Dé climb has been mentioned again for 2013, but its official inclusion is as yet uncertain.
While previous reports had the number of uphill finishes in the 2013 edition as high as thirteen, the number appears to be settled at eleven. It was also reported in December that the route would be heading back to the vaunted Angliru in one of the final stages, and this appears to be the case.
AS.com is reporting that the race will begin in the Galicia region, with climbs to the Alto da Groba and Mirador de Lobeira. There will be three hilltop finishes in the Andalucía region, on the Peñas Blancas, Valdepeñas de Jaén and Haza Llana. Three uphill finishes in the Pyrenees include La Gallina, Formigal and another. In Cantabria, the climb will either be Peña Cabarga or Fuente Dé, while the race is expected to finish in Asturias on the Naranco and the Angliru.
The Galicia region hosts the first five stages, including a team time trial between Vilanova de Arousa and Sanxenxo. After this comes the first two climbers finishes, Alto da Groba, finishing in Bayonne and Mirador de Lobeira, in Arousa. After the Andalucía summits, with finishes in Estepona and Güejar Sierra, should come an individual time trial in Tarazona. The Pyreneean finishes follow, including one on the Coll de la Gallina.
After the Cantabria region and at least one more summit finish, the Vuelta concludes in Asturias, with the final Saturday likely to serve up both the Naranco and the Angliru, which will decide everything heading to Madrid on Sunday.
Stay tuned to VeloNation as the 2013 Vuelta a España route will be officially announced on January 12th in Vigo, Spain.
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(CNN) -- President Obama should lift travel restrictions and adopt other measures to start normalizing relations with Cuba, a Washington think tank said in recommendations unveiled this week.
Analysts are unsure what will happen in Cuba when President Raul Castro is no longer in power.
Working under the auspices of the nonprofit Brookings Institution, a group of 19 academics, opinion leaders and diplomats met for 18 months to formulate 33 short-, medium- and long-term initiatives. The measures were compiled in a report Thursday called "U.S. Policy Toward a Cuba in Transition."
"Although we all come from different backgrounds and political orientations, we arrived at the same conclusion," the report's authors write in the introduction.
The United States broke diplomatic relations with Cuba in 1961, two years after Fidel Castro assumed power. In 1962, the United States established a trade embargo. Both policies remain in place 50 years after Castro took over. In addition, the United States has imposed other restrictive policies over the years, most recently under former President George W. Bush.
Among the short-term initiatives the Brookings panel recommends are: removing travel restrictions to Cuba, reinstating the ability for U.S. residents to send money to people in Cuba, allowing Cubans who meet U.S. requirements to travel in the United States, promoting normal diplomatic activities and opening a dialogue with the Cuban government. The ultimate long-range goal would be to re-establish diplomatic relations.
Former Ambassador Vicki Huddleston, one of two project directors for the Cuba report and a retired 30-year career diplomat, said she believes the Obama administration must try to achieve these goals.
"The status quo is not useful or even possible any more," Huddleston told CNN.
Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, made the same point this week when he released a draft report saying it is time to reconsider U.S. economic sanctions.
"After 47 years ... the unilateral embargo on Cuba has failed to achieve its stated purpose of 'bringing democracy to the Cuban people,' " Lugar wrote in a letter that accompanied the 21-page draft report. "The current U.S. policy has many passionate defenders, and their criticism of the Castro regime is justified. Nevertheless, we must recognize the ineffectiveness of our current policy and deal with the Cuban regime in a way that enhances U.S. interests."
Change is possible because the Democrats control the White House and both houses of Congress, said Bernard Aronson, assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs for President George H.W. Bush from 1989-93. Watch as momentum grows in Congress to change U.S. policy »
Aronson said he supports a new look at U.S. policy toward Cuba, especially since U.S. policy "went backwards" under the previous administration.
"The policies that prevailed in the Cold War had a rationale that was supported by Cold War realities," Aronson said. "With the Cold War over, you really have to re-examine all those policies."
But Otto Reich, a top Latin America official for Presidents Reagan and both Bushes, said the United States has to be careful in how it approaches Cuba. He rejects the Brookings Institution's approach, saying the recommendations are "a series of unilateral concessions" that don't require the Cuban government to do anything in return.
"If you're going to negotiate with another country, you don't put all your cards on the table for everyone to see and say, "Take it,' " he said. "It's frankly a little silly."
Huddleston said the panel's recommendations just reflect the reality of the world today, one in which the United States finds itself increasingly isolated with regard to Cuba.
In October, the U.N. General Assembly overwhelmingly passed a resolution urging the United States to end the trade embargo -- a vote praised by Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque as "a clear and direct message to the next president of the United States about the necessity to change this obsolete and cruel policy."
Huddleston noted that 185 nations voted against the U.S. position. Only two nations supported the United States.
"Latin America is saying to us, 'Enough already. We don't like your hostile policies,' " she said.
Although Reich disagrees with the Brookings panel's approach, he said, "I do believe, by the way, that it's time -- and it's always time -- to review policy."
Huddleston and Aronson said they think more contact with ordinary Cubans could help bring about change.
"I think we need to be more forward-leaning," Aronson said. "We have more influence when we engage people person-to-person."
Reich said though that he does not believe in "this fantasy that increased tourism is going to bring freedom to Cuba. There isn't a single nation that has been liberated by foreign tourism."
Nor does Reich believe in doing away with the embargo.
"The embargo now is mostly symbolic," he said. "The embargo is not the cause of Cuba's problems. ... Cuba trades with 185 nations. ... The cause of Cuba's problems is its Marxist government."
Huddleston said the Brookings group avoided the embargo in its recommendations because the issue is so emotionally loaded.
"This doesn't remove the embargo," she said. "The embargo remains because the embargo remains very symbolic for Cuban Americans."
All sides agree that the next few years will prove pivotal for U.S.-Cuba relations. Castro, 82, has had intestinal surgery and has turned power over to his 77-year-old brother, Raul. No one knows what will happen when Raul Castro is no longer in power.
"We need to establish that platform in Cuba with the people and with the government if we're going to have influence with the next generation," Huddleston said.
That's why, Reich said, it's crucial that U.S. actions not strengthen the current regime.
"If we don't handle this properly," he said, "we're going to ensure the survival of a very corrupt military dictatorship in Cuba."
Aronson sides with the Brookings position, saying, "Dictatorships are almost always more open to change when undergoing transition. ... That's why thinking ahead, the United States should be more pro-active in trying to engage Cuba. Isolation really limits your options."
All About Cuba • Fidel Castro • George W. Bush • The Brookings Institution
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Bitcoin is more or less flat against the dollar on Friday as the cryptocurrency's week-long rally pauses.
Bitcoin charged past $4,400 a coin on Thursday, setting a new record high in the process. Bitcoin dipped in early trade on Friday as much as 2% but, at close to 11.00 a.m. BST (6.00 a.m. ET), Bitcoin is up 0.43% to $4,305.42. Markets Insider
Bitcoin has rallied over the last week. The digital currency broke through $4,000 a coin for the first time ever on Sunday and has since added a further $400 to its peak, although the rise has not been in a straight line. Bitcoin has rallied over 300% since the start of 2017.
Elsewhere, Bitcoin Cash is seeing huge gains against the dollar. The cryptocurrency, which was split off from Bitcoin at the start of the month, is up 12.05% to $499.26 at the time of writing.
Ethereum, the second biggest cryptocurrency by market value after Bitcoin, is up 6.45% against the dollar to $320.45.
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Here are the facts: A woman was hit by a man on a racing bike in New York’s Central Park last Thursday, and died from her injuries on Monday. Swerving to avoid a group of pedestrians on the park’s crowded road loop, the cyclist had crashed into the victim, a mother of two from Connecticut. He waited at the scene for the police. It was the second time in two months a pedestrian has been killed by a cyclist in New York City, and both incidents took place in Central Park.
The death of Jill Tarlov was a tragedy; the circumstances and the contours of fault, blame and criminality have been sketched out elsewhere, so I won’t do the same here.
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The public debate, however, has predictably evolved into something more expansive. It has prompted New York City’s semi-annual referendum on Bike Culture, an event so fraught with threats and hyperbole they ought to sell tickets.
Fortunately, it’s free – so grab some popcorn and start your browsers.
If you want to understand the friction that cyclists cause in the nation’s densest and least car-dependent city, this nebulous phrase, “Bike Culture,” is a good place to start. Many bike riders would have trouble defining it. Yet, like all such designations, it’s a useful term for outsiders. Once we establish that there is such a thing as Bike Culture, we can diagnose its problems and hold it accountable when something goes wrong.
Those who generally have a low opinion of the city’s bike-riding population, especially the New York Post, have viewed the Central Park collision as a moral tale about cyclists at large. Andrea Peyser, a columnist from the depraved tabloid, calls bikers “terrorists on wheels,” putting her in fierce competition with Washington Post writer Courtland Milloy for the annual Bikelash Awards. From the New Yorker to the New York Statehouse, people on bicycles have been denounced as reckless and self-righteous scofflaws.
It feels pointless, as a bicycle rider, to rebut these pieces, because each one is the same as the last. (Adam Sternbergh’s 2011 guide to the form is evergreen.) Suffice it to say that a number of bike riders feel the vitriol is disproportionate. Deaths caused by bicycles are exceedingly rare. Between 1996 and 2005, 11 New York City pedestrians were killed by cyclists. During the same period, 225 cyclists and 1,944 pedestrians were killed by cars. And in the last nine years, six New Yorkers have been killed by bicycles. But a New York City pedestrian is killed by a car every 30 hours.
Those numbers don’t excuse dangerous, aggressive or disrespectful bike riding. (On the contrary, they serve as a reminder that we — despite our own vulnerability amid buses, trucks and cars — can also cause harm.) But they do raise a question bicycle riders ought to confront: Why, when cars are hundreds of times more dangerous, have bicycles become the de facto urban menace?
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Why does state Sen. Diane Savino feel it’s acceptable to yell at cyclists out her car window: “Find a fucking bike lane and get in it!”? (Especially when her borough, Staten Island, has only six bike lanes.)
What, in short, is Bike Culture – and how can we fix it? What unites lycra-clad racers, tykes on trikes, immigrant deliverymen, moms with Dutch step-throughs, dads with baby seats, fixie kids, Citibike bros, and the regular Joes and Janes commuting up Second Avenue with their right pant legs tucked into their socks?
More than anything, I’d argue, this disparate group is defined by what it lacks: proper infrastructure. To ride a bicycle in New York, as in so many other American cities, is to be in a constant state of mental agitation, primed to adapt to dangerous, unfriendly and inscrutable road conditions. Bike Culture has no shape of its own. Its contours are imposed from without, like hot metal filling a mold.
New York drivers tend to believe they have spent the last decade making concessions, and now expect cyclists to adhere to a code of conduct as regimented and rule-bound as their own. But that’s not yet possible. There is no network of bike lanes or paths that mirrors, in the most remote sense, the automobile or pedestrian street grid. Urban cyclists routinely find themselves at junctures that planners simply haven’t foreseen, where no one seems sure of what’s expected.
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Those routes that do exist may be full of people waiting to cross the street (1st Avenue), or plowed snow (Bleecker Street). They may be in the reach of car doors liable to open at any second, or cut through every two blocks by cars turning left (Sixth Avenue). They may switch, at an intersection, from the right side of a busy street to the left — as the bike lane on Lafayette Avenue in Brooklyn does.
Every time a taxi, delivery truck or police car parks in the bike lane, that whole, controversial piece of infrastructure becomes worse than useless. Because cyclists must then join the rapid flow of traffic, a blocked bike lane is more dangerous to cyclists (and more bothersome to motorists) than having no bike lane at all.
I can see how the culture of riding a bicycle in New York might seem, to motorists and pedestrians, like a strategy devised at the offices of the Bike Lobby. But if there’s any appearance of unity about it, it’s because all cyclists are reacting to the same challenge: how to navigate, on a 20-pound bicycle going 10 miles per hour, an environment designed for and occupied by 2,500-pound automobiles going 30 miles per hour. That sometimes means breaking automobile traffic laws. When it does, cyclists (of course) have a responsibility to make sure they don’t put pedestrians at risk.
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Bike Culture, such as it exists, is a highly malleable and responsive thing. Fixing the city’s transportation network will fix the way cyclists use it.
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UFC on Fox 17 will be the site of two middleweight matchups - one puzzling, one intriguing. The first will see ranked fighter C.B. Dollaway taking on Nate Marquardt. The second features the UFC return of Tamdan McCrory, who will face off with Bloody Elbow favorite Josh Samman.
Dollaway (15-7, 9-7 UFC) has lost two in a row, to Lyoto Machida and Michael Bisping. He is currently ranked at number 10 in the middleweight division. Marquardt (33-15-2, 11-8 UFC) has lost four out of five since returning to the UFC in 2013. In his last bout, he took a brutal beating from Kelvin Gastelum before his corner stopped the fight at the end of the second round. He had hinted at retirement, but apparently not.
Samman (12-2, 3-0 UFC) is coming off a big submission win over Caio Magalhaes, which earned him his second performance bonus in a row.
McCrory (13-3, 3-3 UFC) took a five-year break from the sport before returning in Bellator last year. He picked up two very early finishes in a row, and was subsequently re-signed by the UFC.
The main event of UFC on Fox 17 on December 19th sees Rafael dos Anjos defending his UFC lightweight title for the first time against Donald Cerrone.
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Gerald Joseph Mulligan (April 6, 1927 – January 20, 1996) was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, composer and arranger.[1] Though Mulligan is primarily known as one of the leading jazz baritone saxophonists – playing the instrument with a light and airy tone in the era of cool jazz – he was also a significant arranger, working with Claude Thornhill, Miles Davis, Stan Kenton, and others. Mulligan's pianoless quartet of the early 1950s with trumpeter Chet Baker is still regarded as one of the best cool jazz groups. Mulligan was also a skilled pianist and played several other reed instruments. Several of his compositions, such as "Walkin' Shoes" and "Five Brothers", have become jazz standards.
Biography [ edit ]
Early life and career [ edit ]
Gerry Mulligan was born in Queens Village, Queens, New York, the son of George and Louise Mulligan. His father was a Wilmington, Delaware, native of Irish descent; his mother a Philadelphia native of half Irish and half German descent. Gerry was the youngest of four sons with George, Phil and Don preceding him.
George Mulligan's career as an engineer necessitated frequent moves through numerous cities. When Gerry was less than a year old, the family moved to Marion, Ohio, where his father accepted a job with the Marion Power Shovel Company.
With the demands of a large home and four young boys to raise, Mulligan's mother hired an African-American nanny named Lily Rose, who became especially fond of the youngest Mulligan. As he became older, Mulligan began spending time at Rose's house and was especially amused by Rose's player piano, which Mulligan later recalled as having rolls by numerous players, including Fats Waller. Black musicians sometimes came through town, and because many motels would not take them, they often had to stay at homes within the black community. The young Mulligan occasionally met such musicians staying at Rose's home.
The family's moves continued with stops in southern New Jersey (where Mulligan lived with his maternal grandmother), Chicago, Illinois, and Kalamazoo, Michigan, where Mulligan lived for three years and attended Catholic school. When the school moved into a new building and established music courses, Mulligan decided to play clarinet in the school's nascent orchestra. Mulligan made an attempt at arranging with the Richard Rodgers song "Lover", but the arrangement was seized prior to its first reading by an overzealous nun who was taken aback by the title on the arrangement.[2]
When Gerry Mulligan was 14, his family moved to Detroit and then to Reading, Pennsylvania. While in Reading, Mulligan began studying clarinet with dance-band musician Sammy Correnti,[3] who also encouraged Mulligan's interest in arranging. Mulligan also began playing saxophone professionally in dance bands in Philadelphia, an hour and a half or so away.
The Mulligan family next moved to Philadelphia, where Gerry attended the West Philadelphia Catholic High School for Boys and organized a school big band, for which he also wrote arrangements. When Mulligan was sixteen, he approached Johnny Warrington at local radio station WCAU about writing arrangements for the station's house band. Warrington was impressed and began buying Mulligan's arrangements.
Mulligan dropped out of high school during his senior year to pursue work with a touring band. He contacted bandleader Tommy Tucker when Tucker was visiting Philadelphia's Earle Theatre. While Tucker did not need an additional reedman, he was looking for an arranger and Mulligan was hired at $100 a week to do two or three arrangements a week (including all copying). At the conclusion of Mulligan's three-month contract, Tucker told Mulligan that he should move on to another band that was a little less "tame". Mulligan went back to Philadelphia and began writing for Elliot Lawrence, a pianist and composer who had taken over for Warrington as the band leader at WCAU.
Mulligan moved to New York City in January 1946 and joined the arranging staff on Gene Krupa's bebop-tinged band. Arrangements of Mulligan's work with Krupa include "Birdhouse", "Disc Jockey Jump" and an arrangement of "How High the Moon", quoting Charlie Parker's "Ornithology" as a countermelody.
Mulligan next began arranging for the Claude Thornhill Orchestra, occasionally sitting in as a member of the reed section. Thornhill's arranging staff included Gil Evans, whom Mulligan had met while working with the Krupa band. Mulligan eventually began living with Evans, at the time that Evans' apartment on West 55th Street became a regular hangout for a number of jazz musicians working on creating a new jazz idiom.
Birth of the Cool [ edit ]
In September 1948, Miles Davis formed a nine-piece band that featured arrangements by Mulligan, Evans and John Lewis. The band initially consisted of Davis on trumpet, Mulligan on baritone saxophone, trombonist Mike Zwerin, alto saxophonist Lee Konitz, Junior Collins on French horn, tubist Bill Barber, pianist John Lewis, bassist Al McKibbon and drummer Max Roach.
The band only played a handful of live performances (a two-week engagement at the Royal Roost jazz club and two nights at the Clique Club). However, over the next couple of years, Davis reformed the nonet on three occasions to record twelve pieces for release as singles. These were eventually compiled on a Capitol Records long-playing record, titled Birth of the Cool. Mulligan wrote and arranged three of the tunes recorded ("Rocker", "Venus de Milo", and "Jeru", the last named after himself), and arranged a further three ("Deception", "Godchild", and "Darn That Dream").
He was also (with Davis, Konitz and Barber) one of only four musicians who played on all the recordings. Despite the chilly reception by audiences of 1949, the Davis nonet has been judged by history as one of the most influential groups in jazz history, creating a sound that, despite its East Coast origins, became known as West Coast Jazz.
During his period of occasional work with the Davis nonet between 1949 and 1951, Mulligan also regularly performed with and arranged for trombonist Kai Winding. Mulligan's composition "Elevation" and his arrangement of "Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea" were recorded by Mulligan's old boss, Elliott Lawrence. This brought Mulligan additional recognition. Mulligan also arranged for and recorded with bands led by Georgie Auld and Chubby Jackson.
In September 1951, Mulligan recorded the first album under his own name, Mulligan Plays Mulligan. By this point, he had mastered a melodic and linear playing style, inspired by Lester Young, that he would retain for the rest of his career.
In the spring of 1952, seeking better employment opportunities, Mulligan headed west to Los Angeles with his girlfriend, pianist Gail Madden. Through an acquaintance with arranger Bob Graettinger, Mulligan started writing arrangements for Stan Kenton's Orchestra. While most of Mulligan's work for Kenton were pedestrian arrangements that Kenton needed to fill out money-making dance performances, Mulligan was able to throw in some more substantial original works along the way. His compositions "Walking Shoes" and "Young Blood" stand out as embodiments of the contrapuntal style that became Mulligan's signature.
The pianoless quartet with Chet Baker [ edit ]
While arranging for Kenton, Mulligan began performing on off-nights at The Haig, a small jazz club on Wilshire Boulevard at Kenmore Street. During the Monday night jam sessions, a young trumpeter named Chet Baker began sitting in with Mulligan. Mulligan and Baker began recording together, although they were unsatisfied with the results. Around that time, vibraphonist Red Norvo's trio began headlining at The Haig, thus leaving no need to keep the grand piano that had been brought in for Erroll Garner's stay at the club.
Faced with a dilemma of what to do for a rhythm section, Mulligan decided to build on earlier experiments and perform as a pianoless quartet with Baker on trumpet, Bob Whitlock on bass and Chico Hamilton on drums (later Mulligan himself would occasionally double on piano). These early live dates were recorded by Dick Bock on a portable reel-to-reel tape deck. Bock along with Roy Harte would soon after, start the Pacific Jazz label and release Mulligan's records.[4] Mulligan's first recording sessions in Los Angeles were produced by Bock for Pacific Jazz. These three informal sessions took place in June, July, and August 1952 at the Hollywood Hills cottage of recording engineer Phil Turetsky. At these sessions, Mulligan, Chet Baker, and others recorded the material that was released as Pacific Jazz PJ LP-1 and later on PJ-8.[4]
Baker's melodic style fit well with Mulligan's, leading them to create improvised contrapuntal textures free from the rigid confines of a piano-enforced chordal structure. While novel at the time in sound and style, this ethos of contrapuntal group improvisation hearkened back to the formative days of jazz. Despite their very different backgrounds – Mulligan, a classically trained New Yorker, and Baker, from Oklahoma and a much more instinctive player – they had an almost psychic rapport and Mulligan later remarked that, "I had never experienced anything like that before and not really since." Their dates at the Haig became sell-outs and the recordings they made in the fall of 1952 became major sellers that led to significant acclaim for Mulligan and Baker. The recordings included singles such as "Motel" (1953) labelled as 'The Gerry Mulligan Quartet Featuring Chet Baker'.
This fortuitous collaboration came to an abrupt end with Mulligan's arrest on narcotics charges in mid-1953 leading to six months at Sheriff's Honor Farm. Both Mulligan and Baker had, like many of their peers, become heroin addicts. However, while Mulligan was in prison, Baker transformed his lyrical trumpet style, gentle tenor voice and matinee-idol looks into independent stardom. Thus when upon his release Mulligan attempted to rehire Baker, the trumpeter declined the offer for financial reasons. They did briefly reunite at the 1955 Newport Jazz Festival and would occasionally get together for performances and recordings up through a 1974 performance at Carnegie Hall. But in later years their relationship became strained as Mulligan, with considerable effort, would manage to kick his habit, while Baker's addiction bedevilled him professionally and personally almost constantly until his death in 1988.[5]
Middle career [ edit ]
Mulligan on piano in the Netherlands in 1960
Mulligan continued the quartet format with valve trombonist Bob Brookmeyer replacing Baker, although Mulligan and Brookmeyer both occasionally played piano. The quartet played at the third Paris Jazz Fair in 1954, with Red Mitchell on bass and Frank Isola on drums. This quartet structure remained the core of Mulligan's groups throughout the rest of the 1950s with sporadic personnel changes and expansions of the group with trumpeters Jon Eardley and Art Farmer, saxophonists Zoot Sims, Al Cohn and Lee Konitz, and vocalist Annie Ross. In 1957, Mulligan and his wife, Arlyne Brown Mulligan (daughter of composer Lew Brown), had a son, Reed Brown Mulligan.
Mulligan also studied piano with Suezenne Fordham, who was a member of the inner circle of jazz players in New York. She was sought out by jazz musicians of the era to coach them to improve their piano technique. She and Mulligan also had a personal relationship from 1966 through 1972.
Mulligan also performed as a soloist or sideman (often in festival settings) with a variety of late-1950s jazz artists: Paul Desmond, Duke Ellington, Ben Webster, Johnny Hodges, Jimmy Witherspoon, André Previn, Billie Holiday, Marian McPartland, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Stan Getz, Thelonious Monk, Fletcher Henderson, Manny Albam, Quincy Jones, Kai Winding, Miles Davis, and Dave Brubeck. Mulligan appeared in Art Kane's A Great Day in Harlem portrait of 57 major jazz musicians taken in August 1958.
Mulligan formed his first "Concert Jazz Band" in the spring of 1960. Partly an attempt to revisit big band music in a smaller setting, the band varied in size and personnel, with the core group being six brass, five reeds (including Mulligan) and a pianoless two-piece rhythm section (though as in the earlier quartets Mulligan or Brookmeyer sometimes doubled on piano). The membership included (at various times, among others): trumpeters Conte Candoli, Nick Travis, Clark Terry, Don Ferrara, Al Derisi, Thad Jones and Doc Severinsen, saxophonists Zoot Sims Jim Reider, Gene Allen, Bobby Donovan, Phil Woods and Gene Quill, trombonists Willie Dennis, Alan Raph and Bob Brookmeyer, drummers Mel Lewis and Gus Johnson, and bassists Buddy Clark and Bill Crow. The band also recorded an album of songs sung by Mulligan's girlfriend Judy Holliday in 1961. The band toured and recorded extensively through the end of 1964, ultimately producing five albums for Verve Records.
Mulligan resumed work with small groups in 1962 and appeared with other groups sporadically (notably in festival situations). Mulligan continued to work intermittently in small group settings until the end of his life, although performing dates started to become more infrequent during the mid 1960s. After Dave Brubeck's quartet broke up in 1967, Mulligan began appearing regularly with Brubeck as the "Gerry Mulligan / Dave Brubeck Quartet" through 1973. Thereafter, Mulligan and Brubeck would work together sporadically until the final year of Mulligan's life.
In 1971, Mulligan created his most significant work for big band in over a decade, for the album The Age of Steam. At various times in the 1970s he performed with Charles Mingus. The Concert Jazz Band was "reformed" with younger players, including a full-time pianist in Mitchel Forman, in 1978, and toured at various times through the 1980s.
Orchestral work [ edit ]
Mulligan, like many jazz musicians of his era, occasionally recorded with strings. Dates included 1957 recordings with Vinnie Burke's String Jazz Quartet, a 1959 orchestra album with André Previn and a 1965 album of the Gerry Mulligan Quintet and Strings. In 1974, Mulligan collaborated with Argentine tango musician Ástor Piazzolla. While in Milan for the recording sessions, Mulligan met his future wife, Countess Franca Rota Borghini Baldovinetti, a freelance photojournalist and reporter. In 1975, Mulligan recorded an album with Italian pianist / composer Enrico Intra, bassist / arranger Pino Presti, flutist Giancarlo Barigozzi and drummer Tullio De Piscopo. Mulligan's more classic work with orchestra began in May 1970 with a performance of Dave Brubeck's oratorio, The Light in the Wilderness with Erich Kunzel and the Cincinnati Symphony.
In the 1970s and 1980s, Mulligan worked to build and promote a repertoire of baritone saxophone music for orchestra. In 1973, Mulligan commissioned composer Frank Proto to write a Saxophone Concerto that was premiered with the Cincinnati Symphony. In 1977, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation commissioned Harry Freedman to write the saxophone concerto Celebration, which was performed by Mulligan with the CBC Symphony. In 1982, Zubin Mehta invited Mulligan to play soprano saxophone in a New York Philharmonic performance of Ravel's Bolero.
In 1984, Mulligan commissioned Harry Freedman to write The Sax Chronicles, which was an arrangement of some of Mulligan's melodies in pastiche styles. In April of that year, Mulligan was a soloist with the New American Orchestra in Los Angeles for the premiere of Patrick Williams' Spring Wings.
In June 1984, Mulligan completed and performed his first orchestral commission, Entente for Baritone Saxophone and Orchestra, with the Filarmonia Venetia. In October, Mulligan performed Entente and The Sax Chronicles with the London Symphony Orchestra.
In 1987, Mulligan adapted K-4 Pacific (from his 1971 Age of Steam big band recording) for quartet with orchestra and performed it beside Entente with the Israel Philharmonic in Tel Aviv with Zubin Mehta conducting. Mulligan's orchestral appearances at the time also included the Houston Symphony, Stockholm Philharmonic and New York Philharmonic.
1988 saw the premier of Mulligan's Octet for Sea Cliff, a chamber work commissioned by the Sea Cliff Chamber Players. In 1991 the Concordia Orchestra premiered Momo's Clock, a work for orchestra (without saxophone solo) that was inspired by a book by German author Michael Ende.
Last years [ edit ]
Throughout Mulligan's orchestral work and until the end of his life, Mulligan maintained an active career performing and recording jazz – usually with a quartet that included a piano.
In June 1988, Mulligan was invited to be the first Composer-in-Residence at the Glasgow International Jazz Festival and was commissioned to write a work, which he titled The Flying Scotsman. In 1991, Mulligan contacted Miles Davis about revisiting the music from the germane 1949 Birth of the Cool album. Davis had recently performed some of his Gil Evans collaborations with Quincy Jones at the Montreux Jazz Festival and was enthusiastic. However, Davis died in September and Mulligan continued the recording project and tour with Wallace Roney and Art Farmer subbing for Davis. Re-Birth of the Cool (released in 1992) featured the charts from Birth of the Cool, and a new nonet which included Lewis and Barber from the original Davis band. Mulligan appeared at the Brecon Jazz Festival 1991. Mulligan's final recording was a quartet album (with guests), Dragonfly, recorded in the summer of 1995 and released on the Telarc label. Mulligan gave his final performance on the 13th Annual Floating Jazz Festival, SS Norway, Caribbean Cruise, November 9, 1995.
Mulligan died in Darien, Connecticut, on January 20, 1996, at the age of 68, following complications from knee surgery. His widow Franca – to whom he had been married since 1976 – said he had also been suffering from liver cancer. Upon Mulligan's death, his library and numerous personal effects (including a gold-plated Conn baritone saxophone) were given to the Library of Congress.[6] 'The Gerry Mulligan Collection' is open to registered public researchers in the library's Performing Arts Research Center.[7] The library placed Mulligan's saxophone on permanent exhibit in early 2009.
Theatre and film [ edit ]
Mulligan's first film appearance was probably with Krupa's orchestra playing alto saxophone in the RKO short film Follow That Music (1946). Mulligan had small roles in the films I Want to Live! (1958), as a jazz combo member; Jazz on a Summer's Day (1960), featuring his performance at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival; The Rat Race (1960, in which he appears as a tenor saxophonist instead of his usual instrument; The Subterraneans (1960) and Bells Are Ringing (also 1960) with his then partner, Judy Holliday. Mulligan also performed numerous times on television programmes during his career.
As a film composer, Mulligan wrote music for A Thousand Clowns (1965, the title theme) the film version of the Broadway comedy Luv (1967), the French films La Menace (1977) and Les Petites galères (1977, with Ástor Piazzolla) and I'm Not Rappaport (1996, the title theme).
In 1974, Mulligan collaborated on a musical version of Anita Loos' play Happy Birthday. Although the creative team had great hopes for the work, it never made it past a workshop production at the University of Alabama. In 1978, Mulligan wrote incidental music for Dale Wasserman's Broadway play Play with Fire.
In 1995, the Hal Leonard Corporation released the video tape The Gerry Mulligan Workshop – A Master Class on Jazz and Its Legendary Players.
Awards [ edit ]
1981 Grammy Award (Best Jazz Instrumental Performance by a Big Band) for Walk on the Water
Grammy nominations for the albums The Age of Steam , For an Unfinished Woman and Soft Lights and Sweet Music
, and 1982 The Birth of the Cool album inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame
album inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame 1982 Connecticut Arts Award
1984 Viotti Prize (Vercelli, Italy)
1984 inducted into the Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame
1988 Duke Ellington Fellow at Yale University
1989 received keys to the city of Trieste, Italy
1990 Philadelphia Music Foundation Hall of Fame
1991 American Jazz Hall of Fame
1992 Lionel Hampton School of Music Hall of Fame
1992 Guest composer at the Mertens Contemporary American Composer's Festival, University of Bridgeport, Connecticut
1994 Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame
Jazz Hall of Fame 1995 Artists Committee for the Kennedy Center Honors for the Performing Arts
42 consecutive years (1953–1995) winning the Down Beat magazine reader's poll for outstanding baritone saxophonist
Discography [ edit ]
As leader/co-leader [ edit ]
As sideman [ edit ]
With Manny Albam
1957: The Jazz Greats of Our Time Vol. 1 (MCA)
With Dave Brubeck
With Miles Davis
1949-1950: Birth of the Cool (Capitol) collected and released in 1957
With Stan Getz
1966: Stan Getz Plays Blues (VSP (Verve) compilation)
With Lionel Hampton
1977: Lionel Hampton presents Gerry Mulligan (Who's Who in Jazz)
With John Hill
1970: Six Moons Of Jupiter (Finders Keepers) released in 2009
With Billie Holiday et al.
1957: The Sound of Jazz (Mulligan appeared on the television special but due to royalty disputes did not play on the accompanying album)
(Mulligan appeared on the television special but due to royalty disputes did not play on the accompanying album) 1958: At Monterey / 1958 (BlackHawk)
With Quincy Jones
With Michel Legrand
1979: Le Jazz Grand (Gryphon)
With Barry Manilow
With Jay McShann
1979: The Big Apple Bash (Atlantic)
With Sergio Mendes and Pelé
With Charles Mingus
1972: Charles Mingus and Friends in Concert (Columbia)
(Columbia) 1978: Lionel Hampton Presents Charles Mingus (Who's Who in Jazz)
With André Previn and Carmen McRae
1960: The Subterraneans Musical score and soundtrack|The Subterraneans (Soundtrack)]] (MGM)
With Billy Taylor
1957: My Fair Lady Loves Jazz - 1 track (ABC–Paramount)
- 1 track (ABC–Paramount) 1993: Dr. T featuring Gerry Mulligan (GRP)
With Mel Tormé and George Shearing
1982: The Classic Concert Live (Concord) live recording
As composer [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
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Augur is a new application in the works that will run on the Ethereum blockchain. The goal of the application is to give users the ability to predict markets/events. The predictions could be binary, scalar, or categorical. For example, somebody could place predictions on things like “how many Netflix subscribers there will be in Q4” or “will Kanye become president in 2020”.
The markets for this type of application could be endless. The diagram below shows the current process which is shorter and more efficient than before. 6,000 lines of code shorter to be exact!
What was Removed?
Some events had confusing conditions before (so instead of making “Will Elon Musk ever get to Mars” and having one market until say 2030, instead users will create markets like “Will Elon make it to Mars by the end of 2018?” and another one for 2019, etc.)
Vitalik who is the founder of Ethereum suggested taking out the reporting commit because of its complexity and cost (if people collude, the system will just end up going to the next backstop).
Before markets with higher amounts of outstanding shares in the first wave of reporting were getting more reporters so that was removed.
Indeterminate and unethical are lumped under one invalid now.
Release Schedule
1. Security Audits (in progress)
2. Code Bug Bounties
3. Bug Bounty Prediction Market Release
4. Augur Lite release with a maximum amount of shares outstanding / open interest in the markets (meaning only a small amount of money can be locked up in them). Alternatively, make it so users can only deposit a maximum amount, say, 5 ETH.
5. Full Augur Release
The direction for Augur is to launch slowly to avoid risk. In the beginning the core developer team will essentially have power to replace and upgrade contracts in the case of a fault event or vulnerability after launch. They want to keep Augur on “training wheels” to start and slowly remove these help processes over time as the system proves to be secure. Currently, if something went wrong updates could be made very quickly to solve it.
In conclusion, more Dapps like this are getting developed everyday. I believe over the next year the number of use cases as well as ideas for the Ethereum blockchain will rise significantly. Stay tuned for the exciting ramp up of a technology that can revolutionize the world.
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SCHLAPP: CPAC is known for having important moments and I think it’s safe to say by a full room and just a couple of cameras that this is one of those moments.
(APPLAUSE)
And I — I think the first thing that would be appropriate after 30 days of running a continual sprint is to thank these two guys for what they’ve been doing.
(APPLAUSE)
(UNKNOWN): Thank you, thank you, well…
SCHLAPP: On that front — on that front, I also think it’s a perfect moment to thank all of you for helping us elect what will be one of the greatest presidents that ever served this country. It’s because of your work…
(APPLAUSE)
… that he made it happen.
BANNON: And Matt, I want to thank you for finally inviting me to CPAC.
(LAUGHTER)
SCHLAPP: Yeah, there’s no — the — what was the name of the — the…
BANNON: The uninvited.
SCHLAPP: The uninvited.
BANNON: I know there are many alumni out here in the audience.
PRIEBUS: I didn’t like the uninvited.
SCHLAPP: Here’s what we decided to do at CPAC with the uninvited. We decided to say that everybody’s a part of our conservative family.
PRIEBUS: That’s right.
SCHLAPP: And that’s what Donald Trump has done to so many of us around the country politically. And you guys have put together an amazing operation. You know, I know you all know this, but the last time a president came to CPAC in his first year, it was Ronald Reagan.
(APPLAUSE) St. Ronald in 1981. And you’ve put together this — the president has put together the most conservative Cabinet we’ve ever seen according to our CPAC ratings and I think a few of us are pretty happy about what looks like is going to happen on the Supreme Court too, so it’s a…
(APPLAUSE)
Now, let me ask you two. I’m looking in the back of the room as well, but let me ask you two.
PRIEBUS: Is that the opposition party?
(LAUGHTER)
SCHLAPP: Let me ask you two, we read a lot about you two.
BANNON: It’s all good.
SCHLAPP: But I bet not all of it’s accurate — I bet not all of it’s accurate. I bet there’s some things that don’t get written correctly. Let me ask each one of you, what’s the biggest misconception about what’s going on in the Donald Trump White House?
PRIEBUS: Well, in regard to us two, I think the biggest misconception is everything that you’re reading.
(LAUGHTER)
We — we share an office suite together. We’re basically together from 6:30 in the morning until about 11:00 at night.
BANNON: I have a little thing called the war room, he has a fireplace with nice sofas.
PRIEBUS: And it’s — it’s actually something that you all have helped build which is, when you bring together — and what this election showed and what President Trump showed, and let’s not kid ourselves, I mean I can talk about data and ground game and Steve can talk about big ideas, but the truth of the matter is Donald Trump — President Trump brought together the party and the conservative movement.
And I’ve got to tell you, if the party and the conservative movement are together, similar to Steve and I, it can’t be stopped. And President Trump…
(APPLAUSE)
… was the one guy — he was the one person and I can say it after overseeing 16 people kill each other, it was Donald Trump that was able to bring this — this party and this movement together. And Steve and I know that and we live it every day. Our job is to get the agenda of President Trump through the door and on pen and paper.
BANNON: You know, but we’ve known it since August 15th and I think if you look at the opposition party and how they portray the campaign, how they portrayed the transition and now they’re portraying the administration, it’s always wrong. I mean, on — on the very first day that Kellyanne and I started, we reached out to Reince, Sean Spicer, Katie.
It’s the same team that, you know, every day was grinding away on the campaign, the same team that did the transition and if you remember, you know, the campaign was the most chaotic — by the media’s description, most chaotic, most disorganized, most unprofessional, had no earthly idea what they were doing and then you saw them all crying and weeping that night on — on the 8th when…
(APPLAUSE)
… when — and the reason it worked — the reason it worked is President Trump. I mean, Trump had those ideas, had that energy, had that vision that could galvanize a team around him of disparate — look, we’re a coalition. You know, a lot of people think — have strong beliefs about different things, but we understand that you can come together to win and we understood that from August 15th and — and we never had a doubt and Donald Trump never had a doubt that he was going to win.
BANNON: And — and I think that that is the power of this movement.
PRIEBUS: And — and on top of that — first of all, President Trump laid out his vision — what was it? — four or five years ago here at CPAC.
SCHLAPP: That’s right.
PRIEBUS: And it was that vision — it’s nothing different. If you go back and watch the tape of President Trump four or five years ago, that was the Trump agenda.
One of the things that I used to say all the time — and Governor Walker and everyone gets sick of me saying it, but I think that President Trump found it — which is what this country, what all of us, were starving for the whole time because we’re so sick of politics and politicians.
In spite of the fact that we love being here, we — we actually hate politics. But what we were starving for was somebody real, somebody genuine, somebody that was actually who he said he was.
(APPLAUSE)
BANNON: Yep — yep.
PRIEBUS: And the — the — the media attacked us on the campaign; remember, attacked me, you can’t spend the money on Trump, go give it to the Senate. Attacked us on the transition, we — President Trump put in the best Cabinet in the history of Cabinets I think.
Now — feed ridiculous stories and all we do every day and all President Trump does every day, is hit his agenda every single day, whether it’s TPP, whether it’s deregulation, whether it’s Neil Gorsuch, whatever it is, his promise is coming through every day.
SCHLAPP: He’s even — he’s even leaving bathrooms alone, that’s kind of a nice, refreshing thing for a lot of people as well.
(APPLAUSE)
BANNON: They happen to think it’s a state issue.
SCHLAPP: Of course. BANNON: But — but — I think — let’s go back to the point that Reince made for a second. President Trump, when he was running, he made a — and this is the other thing that the — the mainstream media or opposition party never caught is that if you want to see the Trump agenda it’s very simple.
It was all in the speeches. He went around to these rallies, but those speeches had a tremendous amount of content in them, right? I happen to believe, and I think many others do, he’s probably the great public speaker in those large arenas since William Jennings Bryan. This was galvanized.
And remember, we didn’t have money. Hillary Clinton and these guys had over $2 billion. We had a couple hundred million dollars. It was those rallies and those speeches, all he’s doing right now is, he’s laid out an agenda with those speeches for the promises he made. And our job every day is just to execute on that. It’s to simply get a path to how those get executed.
And he’s maniacally focused on that, and I think that’s one of the powers of the transition where many, many people try to come in and try to convince President Trump, hey, you won on this but this is what you want to do.
And he’s like, no, I promised the American people this, and this is the plan we’re going to execute on. And Reince said — and by the way that’s what you’ve seen; the executive orders, what the Supreme Court — the way he’s gone through the Supreme Court. And by the way the other 102 judges that we’re eventually going to pick, it’s just a methodical — and that’s what the mainstream media won’t report.
Just like they were dead wrong on the chaos of the campaign and just like they were dead wrong in the chaos of the transition, they are absolutely dead wrong about what’s going on today because we have a team that’s just grinding it through on President Donald Trump promised the American people. And the mainstream media better understand something, all of those promises are going to be implemented.
SCHLAPP: That’s awesome. It’s been a…
(APPLAUSE)
You know, Steve you’re a really likable guy. You should do this more often.
PRIEBUS: He’s not so bad.
SCHLAPP: He’s not so bad.
PRIEBUS: Most of the time.
BANNON: Yes, exactly.
SCHLAPP: So, what are 30 days of action, and you guys have touched on some of that action. Each one of you, tell me the one or two things that have happened the last 30 days that you think are the most critical. And what is the one thing that you just — like you said Steve — maniacally focused, that has just got to happen early in the administration to really turn this country around? Start first with the first 30 days and then what’s that focus after that.
PRIEBUS: So, I mean, there’s a lot that — that’s happened…
SCHLAPP: A lot.
PRIEBUS: … in the — in the first 30 days. Whether, you know — and you look at the our — the world — our world order and — and some of the things that are going on that I think are — will be dealt with soon, but the first thing I think is Neil Gorsuch, for a couple things.
Number one, we’re not talking about a change over a four year period. We’re talking about a change of potentially 40 years of law, number one. But more important than that — more important to that, it established trust. It established that President Trump is a man of his word. We always knew that. But when he said here’s 20 names on a piece of paper back in July, remember and he said I’m going to pick my judge out of these 20 people that are on this piece of paper and he did it, that’s number one.
PRIEBUS: Because Neil Gorsuch represents a conservative — represents the type of judge that has the vision of Donald Trump and it fulfills the promise that he made to all of you and to all Americans across the country. Second thing, deregulation, what hasn’t been talked about a lot is that President Trump signed an order that puts in place a constant deregulatory form within the federal government. And what it says is, for every regulation presented for passage that Cabinet secretary has to identify two that person would eliminate. And that’s a big deal.
(APPLAUSE)
And then lastly, immigration;, protecting the sovereignty of the United States, putting a wall on the southern border, making sure that criminals are not part of our process. These are all things that 80 percent of Americans agree with and these are all things that President Trump is doing within 30 days.
SCHLAPP: Steve?
(APPLAUSE)
BANNON: I think the — I think the same thing; I think if you look at the lines of work, I kind of break it up into three verticals of three buckets. The first is kind of national security and sovereignty and that’s your intelligence, the Defense Department, Homeland Security.
The second line of work is what I refer to as economic nationalism and that is Wilbur Ross at Commerce, Steven Mnuchin at Treasury, Lighthizer at — at Trade, Peter Navarro, Stephen Miller, these people that are rethinking how we’re gonna reconstruct the — our trade arrangements around the world.
The third, broadly, line of work is what is deconstruction of the administrative state. And if you…
(APPLAUSE)
So I think — I think the three most important things, I think one of the most pivotal moments in modern American history was his immediate withdraw from TPP. That got us out of a…
(APPLAUSE)
… got us out of a trade deal and let our sovereignty come back to ourselves, the people, the mainstream media don’t get this, but we’re already working in consultation with the Hill. People are starting to think through a whole raft of amazing and innovative, bilateral relationships — bilateral trading relationships with people that will reposition America in the world as a — as a fair trading nation and start to bring jobs. High value added, manufacturing jobs, back to the United States of America.
On the — on the national security part, it was certainly the first — I think the first two E.O.s that you start to see implemented here of the last couple of days under General Kelly. And that is, do rule of law is going to exist when you talk about our sovereignty and you talk about immigration. General Kelly…
(APPLAUSE)
… and Attorney General Sessions are adamant — you know, that and you’re gonna start to see I think with the defense budget we’re going to talk about next week when we bring the budget out and also with certain things about the plan on ISIS and what General Mattis and these guys think I think you’ll start to see the other part of that.
But the third, this regulation…
SCHLAPP: Yeah.
BANNON: … every business leader we’ve had in is saying not just taxes, but it is — it is also the regulation. I think the consistent, if you look at these Cabinet appointees, they were selected for a reason and that is the deconstruction, the way the progressive left runs, is if they can’t get it passed, they’re just gonna put in some sort of regulation in — in an agency.
That’s all gonna be deconstructed and I think that that’s why this regulatory thing is so important.
SCHLAPP: We had Dr. Larry Arnn (ph) on the…
(APPLAUSE)
… stage earlier today. And he brought up the fact that we’re promulgating more laws and regulations that we ever had before. And most of that are from these independent agencies that are just on autopilot. You guys can stop that.
And also, coming from the federal bunch as conservatives, we know that a lot of times we fight out the political wars over issues we care about and then all of a sudden, liberals on the bench like a lightening bolt out of the sky just change things.
And so what you guys are saying about changing that order is amazing. You know, we all — we all consume a lot of news; we watch and read a lot of things, there’s been a great democratization in news. People get their news now from literally hundreds and thousands of sites.
What — what would each of you say, what is the — there’s all these polls that are being put out again, is Donald Trump doing a good job, is Donald Trump doing a bad job. I know what you all think. We’ve been hearing it all — all day.
What is it that they keep getting wrong and do you think it ever gets fixed? What does the media keep getting wrong about this Trump phenomena and what’s happening out there in the country? And is there any hope that this changes?
PRIEBUS: I think there’s hope that it’s going to change. I mean we — we sit here, every day and — and the president pumps out all of this work and — and the executive orders and the punching through of the promises that he made to the American people.
So we’re hoping that the media would catch up eventually. But we’re so conditioned to it, I’m personally so conditioned to hearing about why President Trump isn’t going to win the election. Why one — why a controversy in the primaries going to take down President Trump.
I lived through it, as chairman of the party. And — and it really hit me because it was maybe the summer of 2015 and you remember, the media was constantly pounding President Trump. And the polling kept getting better and better and better, for President Trump.
But it was when I went home and got out of this town. And I went back to Kenosha and I talked to my neighbor and I said, “Bob, what do you think?” And he goes, “Man, I really love that Trump.”
(LAUGHTER)
PRIEBUS: And I said, “Sandy — Sandy, what do you think?” She says, “We’re for Trump.”
And it was, as you all lived through it too, because you all had different people you were for, but you kept running into your neighbors and you kept running into people that you know. And what did they keep telling you? They kept telling you “Trump, Trump, Trump.”
And so…
AUDIENCE: Trump, Trump, Trump…
SCHLAPP: So tomorrow — tomorrow, OK? Just be patient.
PRIEBUS: But I knew, and so it was back then, with my family and my sister, who is a doctor out in San Diego. And it just kept — everyone around me — that nothing — it was impenetrable. Because it goes back to what I said before, which is that the country was hungry for something far more — far bigger than one story or on-off issue. It was something that people wanted in this country, that was real, something that was going to change the direction that we were heading. And it was President Trump that was the answer.
BANNON: The reason Reince and I are good partners is that we can disagree. It’s not only not going to get better. It’s going to get worse every day.
(LAUGHTER)
And here’s why. By the way, the internal logic makes sense. They’re corporatist, globalist media that are adamantly opposed — adamantly opposed to an economic nationalist agenda like Donald Trump has. President Trump really laid this out, as Reince said, many years ago at CPAC. It’s really CPAC that really originally gave him the springboard. It’s the first time at Breitbart we start seeing him, and saw how people, you know, his speeches resonated with people.
And then he would go out to these smaller town halls later and really he got traction with the same message he’s bringing today. Here’s the only — here’s why it’s going to get worse: Because he’s going to continue to press his agenda. And as economic conditions get better, as more jobs get better, they’re going to continue to fight. If you think they’re going to give you your country back without a fight, you are sadly mistaken. Every day — every day, it is going to be a fight. And that is what I’m proudest about Donald Trump. All the opportunities he had to waiver off this; all the people who have come to him and said, “oh, you’ve got to moderate.” Every day in the Oval Office, he tells Reince and I, “I committed this to the American people; I promised this when I ran; and I’m going to deliver on this.”
(APPLAUSE)
How novel.
SCHLAPP: How interesting. I remember I was being asked by some reports — they were like why is Trump doing X, Y or Z? And I said, because he said he would do it on the campaign trail.
(LAUGHTER)
It’s really not that complicated, is it?
But no, there are — there are…
(CROSSTALK)
SCHLAPP: … OK, I like that one. There are some — there are some parts of this, though, that are fitful. The American Conservative Union which puts on CPAC was created after Barry Goldwater lost in 1964, in an effort to take all different kinds of voices from the right in the conservative movement and bring them together.
So there is this question. There are those folks that consider themselves, you know, classical liberals or conservatives or Reagan conservatives. There are other folks that consider themselves libertarians. There are other folks that are part of this new Trump movement. And Trump brought a lot of new people. There’s probably in this — people in this crowd that wouldn’t have been in this crowd before.
So there’s a lot of diversity here. We all know it when we’re at the bar at the end of the day. And can this Trump movement be combined with what’s happening at CPAC and other conservative movements for 50 years? Can this be brought together? And is — this is going to save the country?
PRIEBUS: Well, first of all, it has to and we have to stick together as a team. I think that what you’ve got is an incredible opportunity. We’ve got an incredible opportunity to use this victory that President Trump and all of us, and you, and everyone that made this happen, put together.
And work together. Continue to communicate. It’s very similar. Some of the core principles of President Trump are very similar to those of Ronald Reagan. When you look at peace through strength and building up the military, I mean, how many times have you heard President Trump say, “I’m going to build up the military; I’m going to take care of the vets; I’m going to make sure that we don’t have a Navy that’s decimated, and planes that are nowhere to be found.”
Peace through strength, deregulation. You think about the economy, the economic boom that was created. And some of it is going to take a little time, I mean, to get the jobs back; to get more money in people’s pockets. Those things are going to happen.
And in the meantime, we have to stick together and make sure that we’ve got President Trump for eight years. And he’s somebody that we know that we’re going to be very proud of as these things get done. But it’s going to take all of us working together to make it happen.
BANNON: You know, I’ve said that there’s a new political order that’s being formed out of this. And it’s still being formed. But if you look at the wide degree of opinions in this room — whether you’re a populist; whether you’re a limited government conservative; whether you’re libertarian; whether you’re an economic nationalist — we have wide and sometimes divergent opinions.
BANNON: But I think we — the center core of what we believe, that we’re a nation with an economy, not an economy just in some global marketplace with open borders, but we are a nation with a culture and a — and a reason for being.
And I think that is what unites us and I think that is what is going to unite this movement going forward. President Trump tomorrow is coming I think really to express his appreciation.
SCHLAPP: Absolutely. The vice president’s coming tonight.
BANNON: The vice president’s coming tonight and the reason he understand in CPAC there are many, many, many voices, but he’s here to say appreciation and to drive this movement forward. This is really where he got his launch, you know, with his ideas in the conservative movement…
SCHLAPP: Absolutely.
BANNON: … what seven, six years ago — five years ago and he wanted to show his appreciation.
We’re at the top of the first inning of this. And it’s going to take just as much fight, just as much focus and just as much determination. And that one thing I’d like to leave you guys today with is that, we want you to have our back. But more importantly…
(APPLAUSE)
We know — by the way, President Trump — we never doubted that for a second, but also and more importantly, hold us accountable. Hold us accountable to what we promised, hold us accountable for delivering on what we promised.
SCHLAPP: Let me just ask as we — as we close this out. It’s time for — you know you guys have been so sort of kumbaya here it’s kind of time for a little bit of a group hug.
(LAUGHTER)
Let me ask you — OK, I’m sorry I’m going to do the Barbara Walter’s thing for those of you who remember Barbara Walters.
Let me ask you, what do you — you’ve worked really closely with Steve.
PRIEBUS: Right.
SCHLAPP: You say your offices — I know what two offices they are, they are really close to each other. What do you like the most about him?
(LAUGHTER)
Hold on, let him think.
PRIEBUS: I love how many collars he wears, interesting look.
(LAUGHTER)
One thing — we’re different, but where we’re very similar is that I think that he is very dogged in making sure that every day the promises that President Trump has made are the promises that we’re working on every day, number one.
Number two, he’s incredibly loyal. And number three, which I think is a really important quality as we were working together to see to it that President Trump’s vision is enacted is that, he’s extremely consistent.
That, as you can imagine, there are many things hitting the president’s ear and desk every day. Different things that come to the president that want to move him off of his agenda and Steve is very consistent and very loyal to the agenda and is a presence that I think is very important to have in the White House and I consider him…
(APPLAUSE)
… but — and secondly — and a very dear friend — a very dear friend and someone that we — that I work with every second of the day in — and actually we cherish — I cherish his friendship.
BANNON: Yeah, you know, I can run a little hot on occasions.
(LAUGHTER)
And — and Reince is indefatigable I mean, it’s low key, but it’s determination. The thing I respect most and the only way this thing works is Reince is always kind of steady, he’s got Katie and some other people around him, it’s very steady.
But his job is, by far, one of the toughest jobs I’ve ever seen in my life. To make it run every day and to make the trains and you only see the surface. What’s going on underneath it, planning what’s three weeks down the road to the — to the degree that we’re planning it, of all these E.O.s and legislation and — you know, whether it’s the tax reform bill, Reince is indefatigable in saying, we’ve got to drive this forward, we’ve got to drive this forward.
And I think it’s one of the reasons we have such a — and by the way this started back in August when we had this campaign where we were outgunned, out manned, you know, outspent. And it was because President Trump had a message, he had this charisma and he had people like here at CPAC and we just put our heads down and that when we — and Reince has been unwavering since the very first moment I met him.
SCHLAPP: Well it’s a great honor to have you both here.
(APPLAUSE)
I think — I think the best thing we could do is to let these two guys get back to work, what do you think?
PRIEBUS: That’s right.
SCHLAPP: Thanks for being here.
PRIEBUS: Thank you, Matt.
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Donald Trump is the master of lying. He's built a campaign on deception in order to portray a certain image of America, one that largely consists of hate. Doing all that work to spread fear isn't easy but luckily we've compiled a list of the five times Trump has rewrote history to support his warped message.
Reason 1: He Mocks The Handicapped
Trump publicly mocked Serge Kovaleski, a journalist with a physically disability. Donald then claimed to have never met Kovaleski, despite the reporter having written about Trump's troubled business dealings for the N.Y. Daily News from 1987 to 1993.
via GIPHY
Kovaleski says aside from all those meetings Trump should remember him when he covered the launch of the Trump Shuttle and spent an entire day with Trump in 1989. Of course Trump probably wanted to forget about the debt-burdened airline as it closed within its first year of operations.
When asked specifically about having met Kovaleski, Trump's response was to slam the New York Times for asking the question and disgustingly claim Kovaleski was grandstanding on his disability. Here's the Quote:
"Somebody at the financially failing and totally biased New York Times said that, over the years, I have met Mr. Kovaleski. Serge Kovaleski must think a lot of himself if he thinks I remember him from decades ago -- if I ever met him at all, which I doubt I did. He should stop using his disability to grandstand and get back to reporting for a paper that is rapidly going down the tubes."
Reason 2: Muslim's on Rooftops
Trump proclaimed there were thousands of Muslim's dancing on rooftops in Jersey City. Here is Donald Trump's Quote:
"I watched when the World Trade Center came tumbling down. And I watched in Jersey City, New Jersey, where thousands and thousands of people were cheering as that building was coming down. Thousands of people were cheering."
It is so terribly offensive to say that thousands of Muslims were cheering on rooftops when there simply isn't any proof. It's scapegoating and sick but this wasn't the first time Trump used targeted xenophobia to activate a specific groups of people into supporting him.
Reason 3: Trump Claims To Be a Great Businessman
Trump is a brand and nothing more. At this point, he's basically just rubber stamping of his name on things. Donald Trump has zero to do with the daily management of these businesses that sport his name. However, those businesses should do give us a good reflection of the man behind the empire.
One example, and there are many, of his business failures is Trump's Steak House at the Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas, which was sited for 51 health violations including:
Expired yogurt
Month old caviar
Two week old tomato sauce
Expired peanut dressing
An improperly functioning freezer
Five month old duck
Undercooked halibut
Improperly thawed raw tuna
The botulism is supposed to be delicious.
Reason 4: Trump's Extramarital Affairs
Nearly 30 years ago Gary Hart's presidential bid was destroyed on the innuendo and inconclusive facts of an affair with Donna Rice. Yet, today we have Donald Trump working on his third marriage after an extramarital affair with Marla Maples. Trump certainly doesn't back down from his infidelities.
At one point Donald had a radio show called Trumped! The show ran from 2004 to 2008 and infidelity was a continual topic. In one episode Trump shared his disappointment with Boeing's decision to fire an executive because of an extra-marital affair. He said quote:
"If you really did a poll, I would bet you most of the powerful men running companies are having affairs."
Reason 5: Trump's Philanthropy or Lack Thereof...
For an alleged billionaire, Trump is pretty stingy with his money. He set up a foundation to give his money away but in the past 15 years he's donated less than $3 Million dollars. In an interview in 2004 with Howard Stern Trump was asked if he was making more than a million dollars from The Apprentice show. Trump said he was getting a lot more than that and Stern estimated it was more like $2.5 million. Trump said quote:
"Yeah, I don't do it for that. I'm giving the money to charity."
Once again naming AIDS research as one of the benefactors but the facts speak for themselves and the Trump charitable foundation only gave $1,000 to AIDS research that year.
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On Thursday, as Trump’s newest accuser, Karena Virginia, described her 1998 assault in a press conference, doubters tweeted at her. “Attention seeking opportunist,” one wrote . She “looks like a tranny,” wrote another.
“Those stories have been largely debunked. Those people, I don’t know those people. I have a feeling how they came. I believe it was her campaign that did it,” Trump said at Wednesday’s debate.
Trump himself has set the tone. “You take a look. Look at her. Look at her words. You tell me what you think. I don’t think so,” he said of Natasha Stoynoff, who said he sexually assaulted her in 2005. “Believe me, she would not be my first choice, that I can tell you. You don’t know. That would not be my first choice,” he said of Jessica Leeds, who said he groped her in the 1980s.
Donald Trump’s accusers have had to run the gauntlet of victim-shaming since coming forward with their stories of being sexually assaulted or harassed by the Republican nominee for president. The effort to undermine their credibility in order to defend Trump has cast the widest of nets, pulling in a ragtag assortment of attackers, from estranged relatives to right-wing bloggers to social media trolls — and, ultimately, demonstrating precisely why so many victims choose to remain silent.
Few can handle attention they get when going public about being abused by powerful people–why few speak out. Listen to #karenaVirginia
Last Friday, accuser Mindy McGillivray said she planned to leave the country. She stayed in a hotel to keep safe after she went public. “We feel the backlash of the Trump supporters. It scares us. It intimidates us. We are in fear of our lives,” she told the Palm Beach Post.
“She knows she’s BUSTED!” a reddit user posted on the Donald Trump subreddit.
On Saturday, Trump accuser Kristin Anderson told CNN’s Anderson Cooper she has been receiving hate mail. “I was very reluctant to come here and do this. This doesn’t benefit me in any way, you know. I’m getting hate mail now, so this does nothing for me,” she said.
Right-wing websites like the Gateway Pundit and GotNews have leapt to cast doubt on the accusers in any way possible. Both sites ran ran stories saying that Rachel Crooks’ accusations were false because a person posted on Facebook saying so.
GotNews went through the list of accusers and attempted to discredit or insult each one. The site calls McGillivray a “drunken child abuser” — an exaggeration at best; she was arrested in 2012 with charges of a DUI and child neglect because a child was in the car. It says Stoynoff “has rapist fixation, writes like she’s in 50 Shades Of Grey,” a stretch based on an apparent thank you letter for fan mail from Kirk Douglas and a photo taken with Mike Tyson, a rumored rapist and convicted rapist, respectively.
The Gateway Pundit piece that set out to “debunk” the allegations looked at a Facebook post by Trump where he said Summer Zervos recently asked him to visit her restaurant. The article asks: “If Trump did sexually harass Zervos, why would she be reaching out for help with her business by contacting him? Wouldn’t she be afraid and disgusted by him?”
Many of the denials have been issued through the Trump campaign, building on the candidate’s own frequent rejections of the claims at rallies.
The Trump campaign published a statement from Zervos’s cousin, John Barry, who characterized her statement as “nothing more than an attempt to regain the spotlight.”
The brother of Ken Davidoff, the photographer who had been informed by McGillivray of the Trump incident moments after she says she was groped, has been in contact with the Trump campaign as well. “I agreed to make a statement, hope they put both of you away,” Daryl Davidoff texted Ken.
Leeds, the woman who said Trump groped her on an airplane in the early 1980s, faced allegations from a man who claimed he was on the plane and knows she is lying. The man, Anthony Gilberthorpe, told Fox News: “Within the hour I had contacted Trump’s lawyers to tell them what I knew about this woman.”
Gilberthorpe has a “record of involvement in political scandal and unproved allegations,” according to the Guardian.
The efforts to discredit the accusers haven’t led any of them to back down.“Women are talking about this, and they need to,” Stoynoff told People Magazine. “We cannot be silent anymore. I didn’t tell my story for politics, I told it for women.”
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At this late date, many readers in the U.S. know the work of Simon Critchley, the philosopher, public intellectual and provocateur of renown in the worlds of literature and theory. He teaches at the New School, and he writes frequently for the New York Times, having a lot to do with one of its more noteworthy recent series, The Stone.
Critchley has published a great number of books on a wide expanse of ethical and philosophical subjects, and has collaborated with and/or tangled with such eminences of the day in philosophy and literature as Slavoj Zizek and Tom McCarthy. Critchley’s "Book of Dead Philosophers" made the bestseller lists in 2009, and it is an excellent starter volume for people who want to get to know his work.
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Less well known about Critchley, however, is the scale of his engagement with popular music. He came by his voluminous knowledge in the usual way, a misspent youth, with just enough pocket money to invite long afternoons at the record stores (before, during and after the punk revolution in England), but since his misspent youth, he has occasionally seen fit to subject the popular song to the same kind of critical inquiry that he has used, for example, on Shakespeare and Freud. In this regard, he has recently published "Bowie," a collection of meditations on the work of David Bowie, with special attention on questions of identity, sexuality and the postmodern instabilities of Bowie’s work as a lyricist, songwriter and performer.
It’s a magnificent and deceptively slim book, in which no essay takes longer to read than it would take to listen to a David Bowie song, but in which there is a cumulative sense of revelation as regards what makes Bowie special, and why it is that his work seems to yield more, the more time you spend there. The book is delightful, highly readable, with bits of Nietzsche, Ruskin, Roland Barthes and Deleuze rising up like wisps of cloud in its funny, moving and passionate field of inquiry.
It is fair to say, however, that I did not always agree with "Bowie," the book by Critchley, even as I admired the whole immensely, and I was surprised to find, for example, that Critchley did not necessarily like Bowie’s 1979 album "Lodger" as much as I do. So I challenged him to a discussion on the subject, which follows below, and which was begun by e-mail in late summer, once the soccer pitch was cleared of international participants. In the course of this exchange, I should add, I learned that Critchley also write and records himself, which is often the way with people who know this much about music. You can listen to his work here. --Rick Moody
Rick Moody: Please give, if you would, the historical context in which you were first made aware of "Lodger."
Simon Critchley: I was 19. I remember sitting on the floor of my girlfriend's house (her parents were away and we'd only just got together — she loved Bowie too), with the album cover spread out in front of us, with that strangely contorted body image of the fallen, broken Bowie on the cover. I remember turning it over, again and again, looking for something that I wasn't hearing. Like you, I had been knocked sideways by “Heroes,” by tracks like “Blackout” and “Joe the Lion.” What I loved about “Heroes” was the layered intensity of the sound. I thought that everything should sound like that. I heard it on tracks like “Red Sails,” but it was not enough. So, my first response was disappointment. You too, right?
I just checked the exact release date: 18 May 1979. I knew it was 1979, but it makes even more sense that it was May, because my overwhelming memory is of being in London for the first time (a trip I made right after graduating from high school), and finding the Tube much plastered over with advertisements for "Lodger." This somehow impressed me. Bowie, in the Berlin period of "Low" and “Heroes” was not terribly popular in the USA, and I cannot imagine there would have been a lot of plastering up of "Lodger" posters in our neck of the woods. In London, the release was an event. This was evidence that things were better there.
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It is true, yes, that “Heroes” had been of tremendous significance for me. Even the instrumental side was incredibly interesting to me. (I had recently embarked on my total obsession with all things Brian Eno, and I believed Eno had a lot to do with “Moss Garden,” et al., as he did with “Warszawa” on "Low.") Yet it is true that my first reaction to "Lodger" was confused. I would hesitate to say disappointed, because I had not understood "Low" right away, and I had come to believe that maybe Bowie was just smarter than me, and if I didn’t get the idea right away, I could work with the idea. "Low" eventually yielded up its charms to me. I really love that album now. (And I remember hearing it on the same day that I first heard "Animals," by Pink Floyd, which I thought was the better album, but which I now dislike a fair amount.) I definitely did not get "Lodger" right away. And I tried hard. Did your immediate resistance have to do with the blossom of teenage love? I mean, was it just a bad seduction album? Did you subject her to a track by track analysis that day? And what do you mean, exactly, by “intensity of layered sound?”
History often happens in quiet ways, right? Two weeks before the release of "Lodger," Thatcher won her first general election. I had just got a job cleaning toilets in a local swimming pool. I think it was the end of April that year and I remember the lifeguards and the boss at the pool talking about the election and not caring in the slightest who won: Labour, liberal, conservative. It all felt like the same shitstorm at the end of the '70s. I didn't vote. We were punks, but sort of nihilistic. The economy had fallen off a cliff, trash was in the streets, the cities had collapsed. Life was grey, cramped and dull. But the disaster was also kind of glorious. I also remember a lot of marches/demonstrations by the far right, the national front and the British national party.
How wrong we were about Thatcher. But enough about that. We're not doing sociology, right? But it does throw some light on Bowie's pronouncements a few years earlier that Britain needed a fascist leader and that he would make an excellent prime minister. Maybe that was the side effects of the cocaine, but there was a palpable sense that the whole post-war Labour Party project of reconstruction, the national health service and all the rest had gone to pot. That was the dystopian context for Bowie's music, particularly amongst working class kids.
I rewatched Anton Corbijn's "Control" recently. I didn't like it when I first saw it because I was comparing it to "24 Hour Party People," which I liked far too much. But it's a great film when it comes to setting the context for Bowie. The opening shot has Ian Curtis walking back from the record store with a Bowie album and listening to it in his little shitty bedroom in his little shitty house. What can I say, that’s was how it was.
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Unlike you, I got "Low" immediately, probably because I'd been listening to all this German electronic music (Tangerine Dream, Faust, Klaus Schulze, Neu!) and people like Terry Riley ("Rainbow in Curved Air") and I was also deeply into Eno by the time "Low" came out. So the instrumental parts of "Low" felt like elaborations of what Eno was doing in the quiet parts of "Another Green World" and, of course "Discreet Music," which is a work of total genius.
About side one of “Heroes” being densely layered, it was the sheer sensation of all those layers of instrumentation over a solid back beat, with Dennis Davis and George Murray on drums and bass, Bowie’s best ever rhythm section. I just remember thinking this is how music should sound without really understanding why.
My new girlfriend, who I was with for many years, was deep into Bowie, not quite as deep as me, but pretty deep. So listening to the album was something we did together as a way of being together, if that makes sense. You know the way that certain precious pieces of music are essentially shared. I love that. We fell in love around Bowie and around Roxy Music, who she loved more than I did, especially "Manifesto," which came out in March 1979, I think.
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Anyhow, shall we talk about the music on "Lodger"? This was your choice, which I think was oblique and interesting. So, what's on your mind? One thing I recall just now was that the album was originally going to be called "Planned Accidents," which describes the oblique strategy of Bowie perfectly.
I’m going to say that listening to David Bowie for me is always about being wrong about David Bowie. When I really like something (for example, I liked "Let’s Dance" at first), I’m often wrong, and when I really dislike something, I often feel like I am sort of wrong about that too. I disliked “Young Americans” for a long time, and now I think it is very interesting.
(Perhaps the same logic extends to your project. I believe, for example, that in your book, you dislike Tin Machine quite a bit, but I am prepared to defend the Reeves Gabrels collaborations of David Bowie, and I really like the Sales brothers rhythm section (it worked on "Lust For Life," after all), and there are songs among the Tin Machine albums that are of some interest. I think the hatred of Tin Machine has more to do with history than with Tin Machine itself. It was Bowie’s turn to be disastrous. And it lasted for 10 years. (Until, arguably, "1. Outside," a sort of a sequel to the Berlin albums.)
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Therefore, whereas, I tried very hard to like "Lodger" at first, and failed, I came belatedly to think it was kind of great. In fact, I would say, right now, that I like it a lot more than I like anything in the five or so years following, including, e.g.,"Scary Monsters" (although “Ashes to Ashes” is legitimately awesome). So: I want to defend "Lodger." And I want to try to get to what bothered you about it then and to tease out whether it still bothers you.
One thing, oddly, that bothered me at the time, was: unrhymed lyrics. Now, I know that the lyrics are unrhymed (which usually means: cut-up) on "Low" and “Heroes,” but for some reason I had the experience of suddenly figuring out that the lyrics were unrhymed on "Lodger." It starts right at the beginning with “Fantastic Voyage,” which has the very strange opening. The music sounds a bit like “On Some Faraway Beach” by Eno, from "Here Come the Warm Jets," this kind of gospel/country piano part, with some synths holding down the string section, and then that line: “In the event/That this fantastic voyage/Should turn to erosion/and we never get old.”
That is a very strange way to open an album. Even “Joe the Lion” and/or “Always Crashing the Same Car” seemed to have a little narrative. But this is following the disjunction of the language all the way. To its conclusion. Everything about “Fantastic Voyage” is counterintuitive: “Remember it's true/Dignity is valuable/But our lives are valuable too.” The narrator believes in indignity, as long as it is self-preservative. And then there’s the nuclear attack stuff, also in the background there. Along with the “We’re learning to live with somebody’s depression” bridge. Which I assume is extremely arch self-expression of the “side effects of the cocaine” variety. It doesn’t seem to have a chorus exactly, it doesn’t seem to have verses exactly, it was perhaps planned accidents, onto which lyrics were grafted late in the process.
A very strange opening track. But now, at this time of life, the desperately-middle-aged time of life, I find it exhilarating, Brechtian, ironic, funny and oddly panicked in this way I associate with the album as a whole. It’s an anxious song, pretending to be a jaunty, poppy thing.
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I finally slept last night, but that's another story. I also kept listening to "Lodger" and thinking about what you said. And then, on track four, 'Yassassin' (a track I don't really like because of the white boy reggae backbeat. I'm very particular about my reggae, although there is something of Can's ethnographic forgery series about the track), in a Philip K. Dick moment of revelation, the mist cleared and Bowie sang “I'm not a moody guy.”
And then I thought this is why you want to talk about "Lodger." You are not a moody guy or you don't want to be, which also goes back to your father's graduation gift of a trip to London, a gift that you didn't want at some level, where you saw posters for "Lodger." Good lord, I'm waxing all psychoanalytic on you. Gifts refused and received and refused in being received. Poisoned gifts.
Am I a moody guy? Decidedly. But my moodiness is marked by conviction when I hear Bowie songs. I often revise my views, but a track will just hit me and I'm there with it. Thumbs up or down.
I very much agree with what you say about Tin Machine above. I bought all that stuff when it came out and don't want to denigrate the work Bowie did with Reeves Gabrels, much of which is great. But I guess there has to be a fall in order for there to be a redemption, right? So, the '80s become Bowie's fall and the '90s are the slow road to redemption, culminating in "1. Outside," which is a masterpiece and then "Heathen" is the crowning glory, Bowie as Christ triumphant surrounded by a halo of light declaring the last judgment. That's kind of how "Heathen" was received in the UK late in 2001. It just had to be that good, particularly appearing as it was released just post 9/11 when people needed something strong. And "Heathen" is good. But so is "Reality" in my view, the album from the following year, which didn't get the same accolades.
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Let's look at "Lodger," shall we? First, the differences between our reactions are really interesting. I don't know why, maybe it's just the way I'm programmed, but I've always found that Bowie's most abstract, imagistic Ezra Pound-like lyrics make perfect immediate sense to me. The sudden beginning of “Fantastic Voyage” made complete sense to me, but I can see what you mean. It is a really weird series of words and the steadfast refusal of rhyme and narrative is odd, although Bowie for me was completely consistent with everything I went on to read, when I began really reading (Eliot, Pound, Lewis, Joyce, Woolf -- you know). I don't think I’ve ever understood narrative. Always feels fake to me.
I've been trying to revive my first impressions of "Lodger," and these views can be revised and should be, but it was thumbs up for “Fantastic Voyage” and then a lull before thumbs way up for “Red Sails,” “DJ,” “Look Back in Anger,” “Boys Keep Swinging,” and “Repetition.” “Move On,” even without its embarrassing racial profiling of “Africa is sleepy people,/Russia has its horsemen,” just doesn't work for me, although I like the Bo Diddley feel of the track. “Yassassin” is a thumbs down and “African Night Flight” I can never make up my mind about. “Red Money” is just unlistenable for because it uses the same backing track as Iggy's “Sister Midnight.” I know Bowie wrote the music and did all the work on "The Idiot," but Iggy's vocal is so perfect. We could talk about Bowie's Iggy covers, though I find them a little painful. I really loved Iggy.
But I'd like to talk about the sequence from “Red Sails” to “Repetition.” I'll save it for a future moment in this exchange. But the word that comes back to me in re-listening to these tracks is claustrophobia. There is no air in these tracks, especially “DJ” and I love that. It's like Jacobean drama or Trauerspiel. Much of the music I love is claustrophobic. I feel like Ian Curtis just before he hanged himself listening to "The Idiot." I know that must sound weird.
Of course, and not just for the sake of it, I want to defend both “African Night Flight” and “Yassassin.” In fact, I really really love “African Night Flight.” It’s one of my favorite songs on the album. First, there’s that squiggly analogue synth. That is a vintage Eno analogue synth squeak. It’s what I loved about Eno in the old days, his tendency to get his synthesizer to sound like some animal. “African Night Flight” is also the only song in the Berlin trilogy when I’m certain I can hear Eno singing — in the “asanti” chorale section. As I have a conviction that the greater part of "Lodger" was made up in the studio, using Eno-esque instructions (Carlos! You play drums!), I feel like the song is “African” only at a later stage in its development, as a way of describing what the music was already doing, and thus to think of it as a commentary on Africa, or some kind of exoticizing refraction of Africa, is to be critically reductive.
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Meanwhile, we know elsewhere that Eno’s travels were/are responsible for a lot of what he does. (In fact, when I was a teenager — at almost the same moment that I first heard "Lodger" — I conducted an interview for my high school radio station with Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth of Talking Heads. I was very excited to meet them. But even more than meeting them I was very excited to meet someone who knew Brian Eno. They were working on "Fear of Music" at the time, I think. And Frantz said something during the interview about Eno getting ideas from travel.) “Move On” is entirely taken up with travel, and even the title of the album glances off of travel in its constancies. So hit-and-run cultural appropriation is part of the ironic, Brechtian distance of the thing, its cultural anxiety. By the way, I deeply resist “Move On,” too. It has only one virtue, or did at the time, the phase shifter on the electric guitar, but that is a rare example of something that has dated on a Bowie album. There’s a little phase shifting on side two of “Heroes” as well, I think, but it’s not one of Eno’s most lasting engineering tricks, and otherwise, in this case, the song is thin, with some lyrics that do not commend themselves to history.
“Yassassin,” on the other hand, is really a Middle Eastern song that traffics in reggae, not an example of reggae that happens to have Middle Eastern violin. Maybe the Carlos Alomar reggae figure was concocted so that it wouldn’t seem Orientalist for all its Turkish flavors. For me the singing is great on “Yassassin,” and I don’t always love the Bowie croon of 1976-1981. “Move On” has a little bit of crooning, and there are moments here and elsewhere. I always felt like the croon was where Bowie hid out a bit. When he was unsure of his ability to manufacture the pathos, then he would croon. (For me, "Station to Station" is an album of great triumphs, but also bombastic failure, viz., “Wild Is the Wind,” which was the first time that I found myself troubled with respect to the crooning.) There’s a little punk energy on "Lodger," as there was on “Heroes,” and this may be why you keep finding an Ian Curtis analogy here. But I would argue that "Lodger" is more New York punk, in a way, than London punk, in that there was a kind of Romantic-tradition nobility, a Byronic quality, to British punk, but New York No Wave of the 1978-1979 variety (which Eno had just documented on "No New York"), was far more nihilistic. It was anti-Romantic, and that was reflected in the absolute sludge of some of it — Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, DNA and so on. The singing on “Yassassin” has this punky aspect to it. There’s no vibrato here. No crooning. Like Tom Verlaine, or Johnny Thunders, or Arto Lindsay.
Maybe what you are describing as the lack of clarity in the sound — which I now hear better, and understand — is a recognition of this cultural difference. It’s more Eno’s influence on the sound, and his time in New York, and less Tony Visconti’s influence, which is always overlooked on "Low" and “Heroes.” Visconti was the one recording those sessions, not Eno.
Another way of describing this Anglo-American gap, yes, is to note the differences between the two of us having this discussion. Myself, an American, describing an album, "Lodger," that in my recollection dates to my first trip to London, and you, a British citizen (a “subject”) describing, in America, an album that to you is quintessentially British. Bowie himself foregrounds this gap, this divided-by-a-common-tongue-ness, in his “I’m Afraid of Americans” tape that he runs periodically, though he lives in NYC and has lived here a while, and recently made his very good album The Next Day in New York. He knows more about 9/11, it’s fair to say, than either you or I, because he lived south of Houston Street on 9/11. That’s about as New York as you can get. The Anglo-American gap is a recognition of the two things being inextricably linked obverses in the theater of Bowie criticism.
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Therefore, here’s where we agree, without a doubt: I think “Red Sails” is kind of astounding and great. I will let you go there now . . .
Before I blow wind or hot air into “Red Sails,” let me make a point that's important to me. I'm a philosopher, right? And we're meant to be in the reason business, providing arguments, being rigorous, exposing unjustified assumptions. You know the sort of thing. The problem is that it doesn't happen much. It is actually very hard to change people's minds with arguments, especially philosophers' minds. I can't think of a single occasion in the last decade at the New School when someone has given a philosophy talk and the first question is: You are completely right, I was wrong in my basic assumptions, I need to go back and revise my views.
Even more acutely, when it comes to our aesthetic judgments, we tend to cling to our views out of some kind of weird anxiety or we make non-statements like It was interesting in response to some work we saw at the opening of a show. What the fuck does interesting mean? Nothing much.
On the contrary, in relation to sports and music, different sets of conventions apply and this really interests me (interests?). I am a huge soccer fan and have a fanatical religious commitment to Liverpool football club and a devotion to the team and, most of all, the supporters. But that doesn't make me a dogmatist. I meet people all the time in the street (usually when I'm wearing my Liverpool gear — sad, I know, but true) and have conversations with supporters of other teams, where we talk about what happened in a particular game, tactics, prospects for the rest of the season, transfers. The point is that it is a profoundly rational activity. Arguments are presented, evidence is weighed and you can see another's point of view, even a Manchester United fan's point of view. This is because we are relaxed about our basic convictions when it comes to sports like soccer. We are not threatened or wracked with anxiety.
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I think it is similar when it comes to music. Look, we are both huge Bowie fans. Let's just say that there is no more important musical artist than Bowie over the past 40 years. Let's say we agree about that. But then we could meet someone at a party who thought the opposite, let's say a Zeppelin fan or a Floyd fan or even a Little Feat fan. And we could begin an argument, provide evidence, make a case, but also listen to the other's case. At the end of the conversation, our basic assumptions about, say Bowie's greatness, would not be fundamentally altered, but we would have learned something which might lead us to go home and stick on "Physical Graffiti" or "Dark Side of the Moon" or even "Feats Don't Fail Me Now" and say to ourselves, Yeah, that person had a point. This is pretty good.
Part of what I want to do with pop music, and it is important for me hang on to that term — “pop music,” music that is popular— is to show that it is worthy of our most refined aesthetic attention (for me, nothing is more aesthetically important than these little, often puerile three minute songs: they open worlds, they make life bearable, especially when you're young, but in my case long after until right now) and it can become exemplary for how we think about a range of our activities. If we thought about politics or fine art or philosophy in the way we think about pop music, then that would be a massive step in the right direction. One can be passionately committed to a set of beliefs about an artist like Bowie, but that doesn't make you a dogmatist.
So, after I made my case about "Lodger" and which tracks I thought were good and less good, you made your case for “African Night Flight” and “Yassassin” and I went back and listened to them again and I can see why you say what you say. I was wrong about “African Night Flight.” the Eno synth squiggle is genius and it is the weird disjunction between the sluggishness of the rhythm track and the super fast vocals that pulls one in to the song. It sounds out of time all the time. And you are right about “Yassassin,” well, up to a point. I think you are right about Bowie's singing and the problem with his persistent crooning, which is sometimes a kind of cover that he hides behind, maybe because of that fundamental lack of confidence in his voice. Bowie should shout more often.
So I changed my mind a bit. That's the point I was trying to make. We do that with music and I really wish we did that in our other activities.
On the UK/U.S. thing, yes, I agree. Bowie is the quintessential New Yorker. That is, the person who finds a place by being out of place. That means neither being in one place, like England, or another, like the U.S.. New York allows you to be both and neither and that's its unique pull for me, its gravitational field, which neither exhausts nor bores me. I think of Quentin Crisp in this connection too and John Lennon, who said that New York reminded him of Liverpool. When I squint my eyes on the Q train crossing the Manhattan Bridge, I know exactly what Lennon meant. It's a home from home, a home that frees you from home.
Look, I hate England with a genuine passion. It feels dumb and cramped to me. And I know that this hatred is just the flipside of disappointed love, but the only area of Englishness that makes me chauvinistic (apart from Chaucer, Milton, Julian of Norwich, Shakespeare, Blake and Coleridge. You get the picture.) is popular music. England lives on for me as a series of musical memories and cliches, but also some genuine possibilities. I think that's kind of how it is for Bowie: I hate England, I never want to live there again. But when it comes to music, well that's England's dreaming, as Jon Savage so nicely argued ages ago. I like the dreaming, just not the reality.
“Red Sails” is the track I have played most often when listening to "Lodger." I guess this goes back to when I bought "Neu! 75" in 1975. I used to skip lunch, stay hungry and use the money to buy albums. "Neu! 75" was one of my proudest possessions, with a wonderful, gatefold shiny black and white cover. It's not just the Klaus Dinger drum and bass track that is lifted from Neu!, (listen to “Hero” and especially “E musik,” which is simply prophetic of everything that happened subsequently in music for the next decades), the blank motorik beat that reduces rock and roll to a gloriously empty Trauerspiel. The debt to Neu! is also is also in the softly melodic synth and guitar parts that are very close to the work that Michael Rother did, both with Neu! and on his solo albums like "Sterntaler" from 1977. So, when I heard “Red Sails” for the first time, it felt like a vindication of this obscure band that only I seemed to like.
But the moments that just kill me on “Red Sails” are the little, melodic vocal run, when Bowie says “Sailor can't dance like you” and his voice almost breaks and then it's followed by a real or synthetic scream. It makes me wince with total delight every time I hear it. The other moment is the choral shout, “The hinterland, the hinterland, we’re gonna sail to the hinterland.” This opens up onto everything that happens for the next thirty second or so. We get this line, “It's far, far, fa fa fa far far far away/It's a far far fa fa fa da da da da da.” And then Bowie just counts '1, 2' and then pauses slightly before '3, 4' and then emits an unearthly wail. A sail wail.
Again, the slightly droll, Orientalist conceit of the track disappears at the end into a pure phonetic series of signifiers of the most completely obvious kind: ‘1,2,3,4’ or 'da da'. The whole energy of the track seems to dissolve its own pretense and flip over 180 degrees into something devastatingly interesting.
I'm very loquacious today. The only other things I wanted to mention were that “Fantastic Voyage” is obviously an allusion to the 1966 movie of the same name, which is a wonderfully constructed parable of miniaturization and shrinking submarines. Bowie must have seen it. The movie is a kind of fantasy of inner space as opposed to the usual fantasies of outer space. I would connect this to sense of claustrophobia and inner depression that marks that song and much of "Lodger." It is peculiar indeed that when Bowie is talking about outer space, from “Space Oddity” in 1969 through to “Dancing Out in Space” in 2013, he’s really talking about inner space.
The last thing I want to underline is the gender dimension to "Lodger," which occurs in two particular moments. in “Boys Keep Swinging,” we get an apparent celebration of being a boy and popping cherries, but, as the wonderful draggy video for the song shows, this is a kind of performative parody and undermining of masculinity. It is a decidedly queer song, revealing the hollowness of boys playing at being a boy.
The track that follows, “Repetition,” is about domestic violence. It's about a boy that keeps swinging at his wife. Bowie's work is replete with social commentary, but he always handles things in an oblique way, which many people miss. A recent example is the internal monologue of the serial killer on “Valentine's Day.” But “Repetition” is much more direct and it is about the repetitive loops of male violence against women, particularly husbands against wives. The moment of real brilliance in the track (and I would love to ask Bowie about this song) is the fact that whole lyric is told in a distant, impersonal third person form: “Johnny is a man and he's bigger than her.” But there is one moment when Bowie switches into the second person to make a plea, to plead with Johnny, “Don't hit her.” You could miss it on the first couple of hearings, but it's what structures the whole song. The only thing that can arrest these cycles of domestic violence is a commandment, an appeal, which always has to be in the second person, like “You shall not kill.” It is not a law, it is an ethical demand.
There’s a synthesizer riff that starts at 1:47 on “Red Sails,” and it works like a string section, like one of those George Martin production gambits in which the instrumental section is so well composed, so melodic, that it’s like another hook in the song, and it’s the thing that causes the song to lift off for me. It is set off by the “Red sail/Red sail action!/Red sail/Some reaction!” section, and it gives way to just the part you’re referring to, the section with the word salad. Which begins with “hinterland.” The word salad is very interesting to me, coinciding, as it does, with a monstrous Adrian Belew guitar solo. This is one of the most dramatic sections on the album, I think, but you are right (and in this way I agree with your reverie on the infrequence of philosophical reconciliation) that the rhythm section is oddly buried in this recording. The drumming is rather astoundingly great in this out-section of “Red Sails,” but you wouldn’t know. It’s mixed back a lot. If you’re going to have this great, funky rhythm section (and I would single out George Murray, too, who is funky without doing excessive amounts of Larry Graham popping), you should be able to hear them!
I would refer to the “word salad” section of “Red Sails” as the end of the travel theme on "Lodger," which is largely confined to side one, and this odyssey ends in what I have lately been thinking about as the inexpressibility trope. I love when the songs don’t know what to do, because everything that needs to be said lyrically has already been to said, and so the abstract register, which is to say the musical register, has to take over (the best moment of this, or one of the very best is in that Big Star song, “What’s Going Ahn,” where Alex Chilton sings “Always nothing left to say,” and then leaves the last line of the verse empty). Bowie goes “da da da da da da,” and then just leaves the rest of the space to Belew. It can no longer be said!
As you rightly observe, side two is the masculinity side, and since we were both boys verging on manhood at the time of its release, it stands to reason that this side would have a lot of impact (or maybe I speak for myself). It starts with “DJ,” which is really one of the high points of the album (video here). I’m pretty sure the string section is in part Bowie’s chamberlin, which was used to excellent effect on the two earlier Berlin albums. The sound is more rock and roll, with the rhythm section in fine form, and mostly audible. Belew and the chamberlin, and some real violin, I believe, all function at the outside limit of an acceptable harmonic vocabulary for a rock and roll, and then the lyrics would seem to deal with the idiocy of pop machinery, especially the masculine culture in which rock and roll happens. As with that song on "Scary Monsters," “Teenage Wildlife,” which people think is a flipping of the bird at Gary Numan, it’s possible to imagine that “DJ” is directed at a specific deejay somewhere, but who cares? I am never interested in that kind of transparent autobiography. You make the case in your book that Bowie’s autobiography is less frequent than we think, and I would probably take issue, to some extent, because I think it’s often when things appear less autobiographical that they are more autobiographical (like Alain Robbe-Grillet to me is a very autobiographical novelist, and Charles Bernstein feels very autobiographical to me), and so I imagine that the masculinity side of "Lodger" is about inhabiting a series of masculine selves in the same way that side one is about inhabiting a series of “foreign cultures.”
“Look Back in Anger” is not an interesting song for me, because it relies on the crooning tendency, although I love the rhythm, which is a distant relative of the chitter-chatter of the “Lust For Life” teletypewriter rhythm, but that’s not enough. I’m interested again in “Boys Keep Swinging,” with its Jerry Lee Lewis rhythms, and it’s highly ironized lyrics. “When you’re a boy/Other boys check you out/You get a girl/When you’re a boy.” What does swinging mean in the title? It’s all foreshadowing of the very ominous “Repetition,” which follows. All of this from the David Bowie, who, in the popular press, was supposedly an androgyne, or bisexual or perhaps gay. A very inside-the-beltway commentary on all the pitfalls of contemporary masculinity. A great guitar solo here, too, as if to indicate the role that great guitar solos play in constructed masculinity. So great is the solo, in fact, that it happens twice. Unless I miss my guess, it’s two different solos composited, as one does in the studio. “Repetition,” with its No Wave groove (it could almost be James White and the Blacks), continues the theme. “Repetition” reminds me a bit of the kind of fake jazz Lou Reed was doing on "The Bells," too, also a very underrated album.
I probably like “Red Money” more than you do, because I actually like "The Idiot" less than I like "Lust For Life," and I don’t object to filching an old song if a new and better song can be made from it (I was backstage at a gig last year when I heard a certain songwriter of the moment, one I old in high esteem, say, “If people only knew how many of our songs are our other songs backwards!”), and I sort of think that Bowie does more interesting things with the backing tracks than Iggy did with them. I think, that is, that Bowie is a better melodist than Iggy is. Bowie’s melody has some R&B to it (it’s pentatonic), some hooks, whereas Iggy’s is more punk, more elemental.
What is the flavor of the whole? In your book, you say of "Lodger," “I remember sitting alone cross-legged on the floor of my mum’s flat gazing at the distorted accident victim image of Bowie on the cover and trying to like the album more.” I concur with that first response to it, but I guess time has been incredibly kind to "Lodger" for me, and I find that there only a few songs I don’t like on it (“Move On” and “Look Back In Anger”), and for me the overall flavor of experimental tinkering, and anti-pop repurposing of pop-song structure, is welcome, and, in a way, more adventurous, than some of "Low" and “Heroes.” He didn’t give a fuck what anyone thought, he didn’t even seem to give a fuck what Brian Eno thought, and that is some genuine liberty. He wanted to make art. And art is outside of taxonomies of art. Art is hard to talk about, at first, or to evaluate, because art doesn’t fall into a particular set of standards, it’s the category beyond standards.
The irony of "Lodger" is an uppermost feature here, and it extends to ideas of how to make a pop song, and how to make a proper record. The bad sound, one supposes, is part of a rationale, like Bowie and Iggy Pop just giving Tony Visconti the demos for "The Idiot" and telling him to make a record out of it somehow. "Planned Accidents" is too literal for a title, or, if you’re going to make planned accidents the technique for the album the technique has to extend to the title itself too. The "Planned Accidents" thing reminds me of the original title for "Gravity’s Rainbow," by Thomas Pynchon, which you probably know was "Mindless Pleasures." I think "Mindless Pleasures" gave too much away. Probably titles should be hints as to the contents without giving it all away. "Let’s Dance" gives too much away, which is why it’s a popular album. As soon as you start giving things away, then you are courting the mass audience.
Everyone always says "Scary Monsters" is the last great Bowie album, but I think "Scary Monsters" has three good songs on it, whereas "Lodger" is mostly great. Greater with each passing year. Because it’s part of a tradition of genre-busting that includes "Aladdin Sane" and "Diamond Dogs" and "Low" and "Reality" and "The Next Day." I think the danger with Bowie is to presume that it’s all earnest, and the danger is to presume with Bowie that it’s all ironic, and it’s when he’s between things, as with gender and sexuality, then he is at his subtle, artful best . . .
That last reply was really good, Rick. Anyhow, as Lou Reed said at the end of one of his albums, "New York," I think, “Stick a fork in my ass and turn me over; I'm done.” I'm done, but let me just pick at the scabs of a couple of things you said.
What's so great about this exchange is that we both care so much about Bowie and both know the music, but there is just so much that one misses. So I just went back to that moment at 1:47 on “Red Sails” with the stringy-synth part, and you are right: it completely lifts the track and takes it somewhere else, somewhere much more intense.
And this somewhere is nowhere, in the sense that what happens towards the end of “Red Sails” is an exhilaration that seems to accompany the exhaustion of the song, where there is nothing left to say. It's at that point, when something becomes nothing, narrative fades into pure image, or a series of phonemes (da da/fa fa) and sheer sound, that music HAPPENS. Nothing else can do that. Poetry, prose, visual art, culture, horticulture, sericulture. I could go on. none of those things can make this happen. Maybe sex can, but it has to be REALLY good sex.
A few things you said in the last reply really hit home and suggested to me the discipline of an artist like Bowie, his askesis, and his precise use of the oblique as a strategy to generate his art. What I mean goes back to what you say about autobiography and the idea that the less autobiographical writing or music is, the more truly autobiographical it can become. I think that the logic of Bowie's endless ventriloquism, his occupation of different personae and different voices: Scott Walker, Tony Newley, Marc Bolan...
So you remember that T.S. Eliot's first title for 'The Waste Land' was that weird line he borrowed from Dickens: he do the police in different voices. It's a much better title, but I guess Eliot was too interested in money and sales, as you suggest about "Let's Dance." But I think that Bowie does do the police in different voices and he do(es) this because he sits on that razor edge that demarcates the earnest from the ironic. As you say, it is a complete musunderstanding to see Bowie as either earnest or ironic. He is both at once: absolutely serious, absolutely playful. Andy Warhol silver screen, can't tell them apart at all.
So, you are right, the choice of 'The Lodger' as a title is perfect in the sense that it maintains this oblique discipline. Planned Accidents gives way too much away. It becomes just another tedious discourse on the method. There is something menacing about the very word "Lodger," something utterly dodgy. The artful lodger. But the lodger is also the serial killer, the neighborhood threat, Jack the Ripper. It's also obviously an allusion to Hitchcock's 1927 eponymous film, whose subtitle is “A Story of the London Fog.”
In our ends are our beginnings. Or vice versa. Or both at once. Begending. But I think of you in your story of the London fog in 1979, traveling on the underground and seeing those twisted accident pictures from the cover of Bowie's album. And I think of myself back then, aged 19, covered with acne, trying to find something from "Lodger" that it just wouldn't give me at the time. Funny, it took 35 years to speak to me finally, like a radio ghost from the past demanding a blood sacrifice. But it was worth the wait.
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"Now that the elections are over, the fighting has really begun," says Megan McArdle at The Daily Beast. Republicans and Democrats are "playing a game of chicken" as they argue over a deficit-reduction agreement that will be necessary to avoid going over the fiscal cliff on Jan. 1. The Left is insisting on hiking tax rates for the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans, who make $250,000 or more; the Right is demanding deep cuts to Medicare, and extending Bush-era tax cuts for all; and both sides are waiting for the other to flinch first. "Going over the cliff would suck more than $600 billion worth of fiscal stimulus out of the economy in 2013 through a combination of tax increases and spending cuts," which "would be disastrous for everyone, including, one assumes, the politicians who lead us over the edge." But maybe it's the only thing that will scare everybody into attacking our real problem, which is that we're piling up a dangerous amount of debt because our government spends too much and takes in too little in taxes. McArdle explains:
Even a brief dive — a bungee jump, if you will — would be scary indeed. In its latest projection, the Congressional Budget Office predicts that the post-cliff economy would shrink for the first half of the year, at an annualized pace of 1.3 percent. While recovery should come in late summer, growth for the whole year would be a meager half a percentage point. That's a pretty grim picture given the still-sluggish state of the economy.
And yet, our fiscal situation is so crazy that a few analysts have begun suggesting that maybe, just maybe, going over the fiscal cliff is our best hope. Bruce Bartlett, a former Reagan administration official and latter-day critic of the GOP's profligate spending during the administration of George W. Bush, recently wrote for The New York Times website about The Fiscal Cliff Opportunity. Peter Schiff, the head of Euro Pacific Capital, has been even blunter. The biggest risk is not that "we go over this phony fiscal cliff," Schiff said in a recent interview. "It's [that] the government cancels the spending cuts, cancels the tax hikes... [and] instead we end up going over the real fiscal cliff further down the road."
"In fact," he added, "the real fiscal cliff comes when our creditors want their money back and we don't have it."
The time may come for the GOP to "begin passing out parachutes for the group jump over the cliff," says Jennifer Rubin at The Washington Post, but we're not there yet.
It is really too soon to tell if Obama is wasting time (albeit in a dangerously unhelpful manner). It is still preferable to try for a package that includes real spending cuts as well as entitlement and tax reform. If that becomes impossible, only then would the cliff look more attractive.
For now, however, Senate and House Republicans are playing it right. They have even got the mainstream media to notice how unreasonable Obama's non-offer offer is. ("No concessions.") Some even recognized that the president's "offer" in response to the Republicans' move on revenue was identical to his post-election opening bid.
If that's the attitude the GOP's going to take, going over the cliff isn't the worst thing that could happen, says Patrick Sharma at U.S. News & World Report. For one thing, it isn't really a "cliff." The impact of the tax hikes and spending cuts will be felt gradually, over several months, so there will "be plenty of time beyond January 1, 2013 for things to get worked out."
The second reason that going off the fiscal cliff is not necessarily the worst outcome has less to do with economics than with politics... Republican refusals to talk about the possibility of letting the Bush tax cuts on those making over $200,000 per year expire was the reason why the "supercommittee" fell apart last year, which is the reason why the automatic spending cuts are going to happen in January. Again and again, Republican obstructionism has prevented the federal government from being able to budget effectively. So let's not extend the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy one more time, even if it would help avoid the fiscal cliff. Doing this would be bad policy, since tax cuts for the wealthy don't do much to stimulate growth. And it would reward a party that fetishizes hostage-taking and likely lead to more budget showdowns in the near future.
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On Wednesday’s Mark Levin show, Gov. Chris Christie, the pseudo-conservative media and others are demanding that Sen Ted Cruz endorse the man who insulted his wife and father for president. Would anyone honor a pledge to a man who had impugned his wife’s honor and viciously attacked her looks. Doesn’t family come before pledges? Reagan biographer Craig Shirley called in and explained that Ronald Reagan had such strong feelings about Gerald Ford’s behavior that he didn’t endorse Ford during the 1976 Republican convention. As conservatives we don’t need people bullying us around and telling us who to support. Also, if Trump wants to win this Presidency, he needs to reach out to conservatives and stop trying to get Bernie Sanders supporters. After that, 40 years ago Paul Manafort was a deputy campaign manager for Gerald Ford. The same man who helped Gerald Ford stop Ronald Reagan has helped Trump stop Ted Cruz.
THIS IS FROM:
Daily Mail
‘He was kissing Donald Trump’s rear end’: Chris Christie tells loser Ted Cruz to make it official and endorse Republican candidate after showering praise on him
CNN
Christie to Cruz: Keep your word, endorse Trump
You Tube
Ronald Reagan in 1976
Fortune
Here Is Who Donald Trump Wants for Treasury Secretary
Right Scoop
“This is the Trump party now” — Paul Manafort [VIDEO]
NY Post
The end is near for Roger Ailes
Orlando Sentinel
No lawsuit against Disney in alligator attack
Conservative Review
Voter fraud is now an inalienable right…according to the 5th Circuit
The podcast for this show can be streamed or downloaded from the Audio Rewind page.
Image used with permission of Getty Images / Justin Sullivan
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When opening your presents or enjoying a night out this Christmas spare a quick thought for the Romans. We owe much of our festive fun to them.
The Romans celebrated the winter festival of Sigillaria on 23rd of December, part of their Saturnalia¹ festivities. Just like on Christmas Day, Sigillaria saw presents exchanged. So how does Sigillaria compare to a modern day Christmas? And can we say that the Roman's invented Christmas?
Dr Matthew Nicholls, a senior lecturer of classics at the University of Reading, has explored the work of Martial² and Seneca, writers of the time, and found striking similarities including gifts of ugly but warm 'jumpers', ‘Kindlesque' portable storage for books and even a Roman bah-humbug!
Dr Nicholls is the creator of Virtual Rome, an ambitious digital model of the entire ancient city of Rome.
Gifts
That's just what I always wanted
"The poet Martial's work indicates that gift recipients would have faced similar ‘reaction' issues to our own. Quality of presents varied enormously. The traditional present for the Saturnalia was some nuts - not unlike old fashioned handful of walnuts in a Christmas stocking. Martial mentions ‘gifts given and received' some of which sound rather familiar.
"Fish-sauce, jars of honey, bottles of wine, toothpicks, a pencil case, perfume, a flask encased in wicker-work and clothing - even an item that sounds like an ugly but warm Christmas sweater...a ‘shaggy nursling of a weaver on the Seine, a barbarian garment ... a thing uncouth but not to be despised in cold December ... that searching cold may not pass into your limbs ... you will laugh at rain and winds, clothed in this gift'. (Ep. 4.19)
The Roman Kindle that could store the entire Iliad
"Many of us will be hoping for or a Kindle or similar come Christmas Day. Well carrying large amounts of literature was also an issue for the Romans. A scholar would have wished for a Kindle equivalent...which was available!
"Roman books were traditionally scrolls of papyrus - fragile, bulky, and not very practical for travellers. Martial sings the praises of a novel form of book, the sewn-leaf codex, made of tough parchment (ancestor of all of today's books), and ideal for someone who wants to carry a lot of literature around in a small volume.
"He boasts that a single codex can hold the entire Iliad and Odyssey of Homer, or the whole of Livy's multi-volume history 'which my whole library does not contain'. These Roman 'Kindles' were ideal for taking on journeys -‘this parchment shall be your travelling companion. Imagine you are taking a journey with Cicero because they are light, tough, and pack a lot in'."
It was still the thought that counted
"It's warming to hear that the festive spirit was alive 2000 years ago. Martial tells us that the quality of a friendship can't be measured by the value of the gifts, and even tells recipients of his cheap presents that he's been 'mean' to save them the expense of buying something expensive in return (Ep. 5.59: 'people who give much, want to receive much in return'). Simple presents were a token of friendship.
Party Time
Did the Romans get into the party spirit early too?
"Just like our festive season, it seems that the whole of Rome geared up early for Sigillaria. Seneca noted: 'It is now the month of December, when the greatest part of the city is in a bustle. Loose reins are given to public dissipation; everywhere you may hear the sound of great preparations'. (Ep. 18.1)."
What tipple might they have enjoyed on the 23rd?
"There was no 'set' seasonal beverage. Wine was very much to the fore. Martial tells of 'raisin wine, wine flavoured with pitch, honeyed wine, a not very good wine for serving to one's freedmen. Even a special wine for loosening the bowels'..."
A Roman Scrooge....
"Of course not everyone embraced the Christmas sprit. As today, some people found it all a bit too bit much. The elder Pliny, the bah-humbug of his time, even had a special set of rooms in his house he could retreat to in order to hide from the festivities! (Ep.2.17.24).
And did the Romans invent Christmas?
"The works of Martial and his contemporaries tell us that Roman festive celebrations were in some ways not that different to what we enjoy today. Indeed many of those traditions can be traced back to that period. We know that during the conversion to Christianity the Romans weren't keen to end the fun and tradition enjoyed during their annual pagan festival, so traces of Saturnalia celebration may survive in the Christian celebration of Christmas - and many cultures celebrate a winter festival at this darkest, coldest time of the year.
"It's hard to say definitively who invented Christmas but how about raising a glass to the Romans this year. We can be sure our Christmases would be very different if it wasn't for them."
Notes for Editors
¹Saturnalia
Saturnalia began in the very early history of Rome. It was a festival devoted to the god Saturn and seems from its earliest origins to have been associated with 'liberation', which found expression in the holiday's inversion of social norms, so masters served their slaves - gambling and dice playing was permitted.
The popularity of Saturnalia continued into the 3rd and 4th centuries until it was supplanted by the Christian festival of Christmas.
²Martial - poet of short, salty epigrams poking fun at social conventions and individuals in the late 1st C AD. He wrote the special book of poetry commemorating the opening ceremonies of the Colosseum, and quite a lot of obscene poems too.
Ep. for Martial stands instead for 'epigram', followed by book and poem number. All these works are widely published in the original Latin and in translation, in print and online editions. Two books of his poems are short two line descriptions of dozens of different sorts of gift.
Seneca - was a Roman stoic philosopher, dramatist, essayist and tutor to the future emperor Nero, who eventually forced him to commit suicide. His quote comes from one of his letters, which he published as a selection of moral/instructive epistles.
For Seneca and Pliny Ep. = Epistles or Epistulae, followed by book (for Pliny) and letter number. The full reference for Seneca would be Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium 18.1; for Pliny Epistulae book 2 letter 17 section 24.
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Why TPP Threatens To Undermine One Of The Fundamental Principles Of Science
from the and-that's-a-fact dept
Last week, we wrote that among the final obstacles to completing the TPP agreement was the issue of enhanced protection for drugs. More specifically, the fight is over an important new class of medicines called "biologics," which are produced from living organisms, and tend to be more complex and expensive to devise. The Conversation has a good feature looking at this issue in more detail. The central problem with biologics in TPP is "data exclusivity," which the article explains as follows: Data exclusivity refers to the protection of clinical trial data submitted to regulatory agencies from use by competitors. It's a different type of monopoly protection to patents. While a product is covered by data exclusivity, manufacturers of cheaper follow-on versions of the product can't rely on the clinical trial data produced by the originator of the drug to support the marketing approval of their product.
Section 25a of Australia's Therapeutic Goods Act provides for five years of data exclusivity for all medicines. It makes no distinction between biologics and other drugs. Data exclusivity provides an absolute monopoly that, unlike a patent, can't be revoked or challenged in court. As that makes clear, data exclusivity is a kind of super-patent in that it can't be challenged or revoked: if a drug company has run clinical trials to establish the safety of its new drug, it has an absolute and irrevocable monopoly on the use of that data -- for five years in the case of Australia, Chile, Singapore and New Zealand. This is obviously an incredibly powerful form of monopoly, so perhaps it's no surprise that US pharmaceutical companies want TPP to require signatories to grant an even longer period -- 12 years of data exclusivity -- for biologics.
That's useful for them, because even after drug patents have expired, and generic manufacturers can theoretically offer the same products without paying licensing fees, there remains the barrier of clinical testing. If the generic manufacturers can't point to the original clinical trials as proof that the drug is safe, they will need to carry out their own, which will take time and cost money. In practice, they are more likely to wait until the period of data exclusivity is over, effectively extending the original manufacturer's monopoly beyond that provided by patents alone.
So what? You might ask. Surely it's only fair that generic manufacturers cannot piggy-back on the work of the original drug companies? Although that argument sounds plausible, it overlooks the fact that what clinical trials produce is safety data about a drug, which is simply a certain kind of scientific fact concerning a particular complex compound, as unchanging as all its other features. It is not something that depends on the ingenuity of the person measuring it, because it represents intrinsic information about a substance. Granting data exclusivity is thus nothing less than giving a monopoly on knowledge itself, since it forbids any other company from being able to use that newly-established scientific fact.
That is a profoundly retrogressive step. Although dressed up in terms of fairness and recouping investments, the very notion of data exclusivity is an attack on the key idea that no one can own a scientific fact, and that science advances by building on existing knowledge. Arguments about whether the length of that monopoly should be five, eight or even twelve years, are not just pointless, they are pernicious, because any of them would lock the TPP countries into a system that allows basic facts to be owned, and would forbid them from exiting from it. The only acceptable length for data exclusivity is zero years; anything longer turns TPP into an attack on science itself.
Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and +glynmoody on Google+
Filed Under: biologics, data, data exclusivity, science, sharing, tpp
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Des Thurlby, human resources (HR) director at the international car maker, said he had held "pointed" discussions with up to five of the company's best employees urging them to consider moving "out of leafy Warwickshire" to China to help the company capitalise on emerging markets. Those who refused had less chance of being shortlisted for a future top job at the company, Mr Thurlby said.
The HR director is adopting the controversial stance because the luxury car manufacturer is struggling to convince its best workers to relocate on typically three-year assignments. Those with partners, or children in schools, were often put off the upheaval of moving abroad, he said.
China is now Jaguar Land Rover's third biggest market after the UK and USA. The company, owned by India's Tata Motors, is looking to set up a joint venture deal with a Chinese industrial plant to manufacture tens of thousands of cars a year. However, the plans could be dealt a blow if too few UK executives committed to running the overseas operations.
Mr Thurlby said: "We're getting to the point where we're having some quite pointed conversations with people, where we're saying, 'listen matey, if you want to go to the top you're going to have to go to China, Russia or the US. We're an international business, we're 70pc overseas. It's critical you move out of leafy Warwickshire.'"
When asked whether it was unfair to expect workers to up sticks for career progression, he said: "We're not saying you absolutely will not get to the board, but what we are saying is, this will make you a much stronger candidate and it will make the business better and we'll do everything we can to help you."
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As someone who is an ardent and staunch supporter of making our car-obsessed city more pedestrian oriented, I am truly uplifted to see that our city government — specifically Councilmen Mike Bonin and Jose Huizar — is finally stepping in to address the absolutely asinine “jaywalking” tickets the LAPD has been shamelessly handing out to unsuspecting pedestrians throughout Downtown LA (and other parts of LA like Koreatown) despite huge public outcry over the years. Even more egregious, these suburban-minded LAPD cops will actually set up sting operations, frequently I might add, at our busiest intersections like 7th/Figueroa during the crowded lunch rush waiting like wolves to slap anyone who steps into the crosswalk after the countdown timer begins with an unforgiving $200 ticket.
Ka-ching.
As a pedestrian advocate, this is an issue that’s frustrated me for a very long time. Not only are the high ticket fines (up to $250) way too disproportionate to the “crime” ostensibly committed, but it also clearly illustrates the city’s perverse reluctance to shed its suburban car-oriented bias. For a city that’s been shamefully mocked globally for its love affair with the car and its soulless traffic-choked freeways and strip malls, you would think the city would be overly ecstatic that real-life people are actually walking again — voluntarily! — in LA. And instead of doing everything we can to encourage that amazing mode of transit that every other respectable global city on earth desires to nurture, we are slapping our pedestrians with $200 tickets because “they stepped off the curb after the countdown timer begins.” Are you fucking kidding me?
Several years ago, I raised the issue on DTLA Rising that the LAPD was being overly harsh toward pedestrians after watching an officer on a motorcycle rush after a jaywalker on 9th Street in front of Ralphs Fresh Fare as if he was a hard-core criminal. It seemed very odd to me at the time that the officer was so eager to “get him” after I had just returned from a trip to the east coast where I experienced first-hand the incredible difference of being a pedestrian in New York or DC as someone who felt empowered while walking in those cities versus feeling burdened or self-conscious in my own city dominated by drivers and their rules. Subsequently, The New York Times, KCRW, and The Week all caught wind of the LAPD penalizing LA’s true minority: the pedestrian.
Now, thank goodness Bonin and Huizar are finally taking the LAPD to task after a story published in late April on the LA Times by Catherine Saillant exposed undeniably that Downtown LA’s pedestrians were being targeted unfairly. According to Streetsblog LA, just last Friday on May 1, Bonin introduced a motion seconded by urban-minded Huizar to examine the effectiveness of the LAPD’s ongoing “crosswalk stings” (that target mostly Downtown LA) when the CA law invoked by the LAPD references a horribly outdated traffic control signal that includes the words “WALK,” “WAIT,” and “DON’T WALK.” Apparently, nowhere has the law been updated to reflect the new modern countdown timer that’s now ubiquitous on our city streets.
If the motion passes, the onus will fall on the LAPD and the LADOT to not only prove empirically that “pedestrian enforcement” makes walking safer, but also explain why some areas of the city seem to be targeted more than others. In a nutshell, we’re now finally turning the tables, which is an exciting sign that Los Angeles is actually becoming less suburban and more urban minded. Raising a ruckus locally is exactly what’s needed to make real changes happen, because eventually, this jaywalking issue will have to make it up to the state level to update the CA traffic code.
I would love to conclude with Bonin’s marvelous statement at the meeting:
“Excessive and expensive tickets disincentivize walking in Los Angeles. We want people to be safe, but we do not want ‘Do Not Walk’ to be the message we send Angelenos.”
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Glen Hawk, Vice President of the NAND Solutions Group at Micron, was giving the usual polished corporate keynote presentation at this week’s Flash Memory Summit held in Santa Clara, CA. Suddenly, his level tone of voice changed and he got charged up. The reason was that he was about to launch into a description of the early results of Micron’s research on 3D NAND cell technology and it was clear from his changed tone that he’s pretty jazzed about the technology. “We’ve been trapped in flatland” said Hawk. It’s time to think vertically. Geometry shrinks are slowing down and its getting harder and harder to shift to the next process node with each jump. The answer, said Hawk, is 3D NAND. We need to break through into another dimension.
Process shrinks and the associated rising complexity of manufacture are not the only reasons to make a radical change, said Hawk. There’s perhaps an even bigger problem. At 20nm, he said, we’re storing the state of a cell using approximately 20 electrons. Every electron counts in this situation and it’s easy to see why NAND Flash retention times are eroding with each shrink. Lose 10 electrons in a 20nm NAND cell and you’ve lost a lot of signal/noise ratio.
The alternative that Micron is developing is a 3D NAND Flash cell stack, shown as an illustration on the right. With this structure, each electron “trap site” is an annular ring surrounding a select line. That trap site stores 10,000 electrons, which gets NAND technology back to a safe area where there’s plenty of signal/noise margin and where retention time can go back to where it’s been. It’s analogous to the reprieve the semiconductor industry has gotten by switching semiconductor manufacture to high-K metal gate (HKMG) processing, which restored gate oxides to a realistic thickness after they’d gotten down to five or seven atomic layers—something far to delicate for mass manufacturing.
The Micron 3D NAND technology leverages a DRAM technique that Micron is quite familiar with: deep trenches. Micron and other vendors use deep trenches to build storage capacitors for DRAM memory cells. Used in 3D NAND technology, these trenches act as silos that contain NAND Flash cell stacks.
Hawk didn’t just have a nice cartoon to show the audience of 800 people attending the Flash Memory Summit. He had a microphotograph of a 3D NAND Flash memory array. Here it is:
But don’t be looking for 3D NAND Flash chips tomorrow. Hawk claimed that Micron was two years away from production of 3D NAND Flash devices.
For more analysis of presentations at the Flash Memory Summit, see this new blog entry by Richard Goering: “Flash Memory Summit: New Insights Into the Future of NAND Flash”
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Before the Obama administration charges blindly into a European-style feed-in act to promote renewable energies, they may want to look at what experts in Europe are saying about how well their own feed-in efforts are actually doing.
All pain and no gain – certified flop
An independent committee of expert advisors to the German government is recommending in a report that the country’s once highly ballyhooed EEG renewable energy feed-in act be scrapped altogether because it is 1) “not doing anything for the climate”, 2) “not promoting inn0vation” and 3) driving up the cost of energy.
The report will be officially presented to the government today.
In summary, the once highly touted German EEG renewable energy feed-in act has been all pain and no gain, and the experts see no reason to continue it.
$30 billion a year…yet “does not provide more climate protection”
According to the online Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeiting (FAZ) here, the Research and Innovation commission of experts assigned by the German government says in its report that “there is no longer any justification for continuing the EEG Act.”
The experts cite “additional costs of 22 billion euros [$30 billion] per year” and conclude that the renewable energies have an “exaggerated impact on climate change“. Also the reports says the Act has not measurably boosted innovation.
“No measureable impact on innovation”
The results of the experts’ report are damning in the harshest terms. The FAZ writes, quoting the report:
The conclusion of the expert commission is devastating: ‘The EEG act in its current form is not justifiable from an innovation-political view.”
The report also writes that “there has been no measureable impact on innovation“.
Well, why innovate if profits are guaranteed by massive subsidies?
The most damning text in the FAZ article probably is (my emphasis):
That’s why the EEG’s initiated expansion of renewable energies has led to no additional avoidance of CO2 emissions across Europe, rather they have only been shifted elsewhere. ‘The EEG Act thus does not produce more climate protection, rather it just makes it considerably more expensive.'”
Green energy proponents and lobbyists will certainly move quickly to ferociously attack and dismiss the report. The FAZ writes, however, that the expert recommendation is the latest in a series of expert reports that have reached the same conclusion. But the FAZ does not expect the government to follow the recommendations.
But the pressure on the German government to radically scale back the EEG act is mounting as citizens struggle with skyrocketing electricity prices. Germany has also come under heavy fire from other European countries who accuse the German government of misusing the feed-in act in ways to provide competitive advantages to certain companies.
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The other day we found ourselves needing to make a Big Mac from scratch. It happens. To help others who find themselves in this predicament, we documented the process (a part of our continuing service to the community). This is the way we made a decent facsimile of a Big Mac. It's not definitive but it's easy and tastes pretty great.
Requirements for one burger:
• 2 sesame seed hamburger buns • ¼ pound ground beef • 1 slice of that really yellow cheese • 2 tablespoons Kraft Thousand Island dressing (or to taste) • a small handful of shredded iceberg lettuce • 10 dill pickle slices (or to taste) • 2 tablespoons finely chopped onion (or to taste) • salt and freshly ground pepper
To make:
• Divide the ground beef in half and shape into two thin patties approximately the diameter of your buns. Season with salt and pepper. Grill patties on a barbecue or fry in a frying pan until cooked through.
• Divide both hamburger buns, discard top of second bun, and toast the insides of the bun on the grill or in the frying pan. Toast both sides of the bottom half of the second bun (this will be the middle of the hamburger).
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From Smithsonian magazine and the ocean acidification stupid, it burns! department comes this giant load of crap masquerading as science. No really, that’s what it is. From the article:
It’s not easy to get people exercised about ocean acidification. Yes, it’s a nasty consequence of climate change, a potential death sentence for oysters, clams, sea urchins and, most of all, coral. But it’s slow-motion extermination, out of sight of most humans, and that makes it difficult for us to feel much of a connection—let alone any responsibility—for the calamitous process.
…
The Stanford team worked with marine biologists to build a virtual replica of a reef around the Italian island of Ischia. Underground volcanic vents there have been spewing carbon dioxide, and that has given researchers the opportunity to closely analyze the effect on marine life—specifically how, as ocean water absorbs more carbon dioxide and becomes more acidic, it corrodes coral and the shells of crustaceans.
From that model, the researchers programmed a VR experience that speeds up the destructive process, allowing a person to first interact with a reef full of life, and then be an up-close-witness to decay as species disappear. Ultimately, the person takes on the perspective of a coral, one whose branches break off with an audible crack.
At its best, virtual reality, says Bailenson, enables you to have a “dual presence,” where you know you’re still in a room wearing a headset, but also actually can feel that you’re at the bottom of the sea. It’s important, he says, for the VR environment to respond your body’s movements.
It also should to be an experience that stimulates multiple senses, including touch when possible. The coral reef VR, for instance, creates the sensation of a fishing net brushing against you. If it feels natural, notes Bailenson, the brain is able to treat the experience as authentic.
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60 percent of registered voters believe that Iran has already violated the P5+1 nuclear deal with the United States or will do so in the future, according to a Breitbart/Gravis national poll conducted on September 21, 2016 with 1,560 registered across the United States.
Roughly the same number of Democrats strongly approve of the deal as the number who believe Iran has already cheated on the deal or will do so in the future.
Asked “Do you believe that Iran has already or will cheat on this agreement?,” only 11 percent of respondents said no; 29 percent said they were unsure of whether Iran would keep their word. Perhaps a reflection of this distrust, 46 percent of respondents said that they either “strongly disapprove” or “somewhat disapprove” of the Iran deal, while 37 percent responded that they either somewhat or strongly approved.
40 percent of respondents said they “strongly disapprove” of the nuclear deal with Iran.
Approval of the nuclear deal and faith that Iran will abide by it fell largely by partisan lines. Democrats approved of the deal in significantly larger numbers than Republicans and Independents. 38.3 percent of Democrats strongly approved of the deal, while 17.3 percent “somewhat approve” of the deal.
About the same number of Democrats who approve of the deal believe Iran will cheat.
36.5 percent said Iran will either cheat on the nuclear deal or already has. While the number is high, it is significantly lower than for those affiliated differently: 63.6 percent of independents say Iran will cheat or already has, while 84.4 percent of Republicans say the same.
The Obama administration has heralded the Iran nuclear deal signed in July 2015 as the only way to guarantee the rogue Islamic state would not have access to nuclear power. President Barack Obama himself stated the deal was the only way to cut off “every pathway to a nuclear weapon.” As the details of the deal have surfaced – including over a billion dollars paid in ransom to liberate American political prisoners in Iran – that proposition has come into question. Secret provisions appear to allow Iran to develop more advances uranium enriching centrifuges after 11 years, and the lifting of sanctions has allowed Iran to participate more fully in global markets, enriching the Islamic Republic’s despotic mullahs.
Iran, meanwhile, has continually berated the United States for allegedly not holding up their provisions in the deal. During his address to the United Nations General Assembly Thursday, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani alleged that America had practiced a routine “lack of compliance” with the nuclear deal. “This experience demonstrated that the Zionist pressure groups could go as far as having US Congress pass indefensible legislations forcing the highest American judicial institution to violate pre-emptory norms of international law,” Rouhani alleged, referring to U.S. Congressional moves to continue sanctioning the Islamic Republic for belligerent behavior towards both Israel and American military units in the Persian Gulf.
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When Rachel Jeantel explained the difference between “nigga” and “nigger” on CNN last night, she wasn’t just talking to Piers Morgan, she was also speaking directly to Rush Limbaugh. That much was clear from Limbaugh’s radio show this morning, during which he said he can start saying “nigga with an ‘a'” because according to Jeantel, “it’s not racist.”
Limbaugh played the clip from “the ever-penetrating inquisitor” Piers Morgan’s interview with Trayvon Martin‘s friend and witness for the prosecution in the George Zimmerman trial and mocked CNN’s “quest to become the most-respected news organization in the country, perhaps even the world.”
“So, ‘nigga’ with an ‘a’ on the end,” Limbaugh said, “I think can [say it] now, isn’t that the point? Because it’s not racist.” He explained that by Jeantel’s logic, he “could be talking about a male–a Chinese male, guy at the laundromat. I could be talking about a man, that’s what she said it means.”
By saying she regretted not explaining the difference between the two versions of the “n-word” to the jury, Jeantel was likely hoping to portray Trayvon Martin as not racially-motivated in the language he used to describe Zimmerman. It is highly unlikely that she intended to give Rush Limbaugh permission to say this particular word, even if it is, in her estimation not “racist.”
Listen to the audio below, via Rush Limbaugh:
(h/t MMFA)
And in case you missed Jeantel’s comments to Piers Morgan last night, you can watch that clip below, via CNN:
—
>> Follow Matt Wilstein (@TheMattWilstein) on Twitter
Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.com
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Metta World Peace: Carmelo Anthony needs to be more like Kobe Bryant
Metta World Peace was waived by the New York Knicks on Monday after appearing in just 29 games. In his short time in New York, World Peace had a first-hand look at one of the biggest disasters in the NBA.
The Knicks, who many thought had a chance to be one of the better teams in the Eastern Conference, are 21-36 and rapidly sliding out of playoff contention. Carmelo Anthony has not been able to prevent New York from losing nine of its last 11 games. If he was more like Kobe Bryant, World Peace thinks ‘Melo would have a better shot.
“Kobe doesn’t give a (bleep), he just wants to win,” Metta told the NY Daily News. “Melo needs to be more demanding and he needs to see results. The only difference between him and Kobe is that Kobe saw results. When Kobe said something people did that (stuff). Carmelo has no choice but to make it his personality because he’s a great player. There are not too many guys like him.”
Anthony, who can opt out of his contract at the end of the season, has done his best to not be a distraction. He has said all the right things publicly and refused to blame head coach Mike Woodson for the team’s struggles. World Peace described him as a great teammate, but he has a point about Anthony’s leadership skills.
Talent wise, Carmelo is probably one of the top 10 players in the NBA. If he carried himself like Kobe or LeBron James, the Knicks might play with more passion. They need that and then some.
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BESTSELLING SEVEN TO ETERNITY WELCOMES GUEST ARTIST HARREN
The series will feature artwork by James Harren
Image Comics is pleased to announce that James Harren will take the reins as guest artist on the ongoing series created by bestselling writer Rick Remender and artist Jerome Opeña. This second story arc’s SEVEN TO ETERNITY #7 will introduce Harren’s contributions this June.
Suffering from the aftermath of the sentient swamp, The Mosak follow Adam to Jevalia’s childhood home to discover a trampled paradise, the bled souls of its heroes, and a fetid industry thirsting for more.
“I've literally been trying to work with James for seven years, so it's fitting he join Seven to Eternity. He's one of the most talented artists in comics, expressive and unique art with perfect storytelling,” said Remender. “James is joining us for a two-issue story that I can't talk much about or I'd spoil issues five and six, but it's a big tale that digs into who our Mosak are and why they are each so desperate to see Zhal freed of the God of Whispers.”
In this chapter in the SEVEN TO ETERNITY saga, Remender and Harren team up to unveil the heights of heroism in a world awash with corruption.
SEVEN TO ETERNITY #7 Cover A by Harren and Hollingsworth (Diamond Code APR170872) and Cover B by Opeña and Hollingsworth (Diamond Code APR170873) will hit stores on Wednesday, June 14th. The final order cutoff deadline for comics retailers is Monday, May 22nd.
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Sebastian Risse is the man behind the KTM RC16 MotoGP bike which was presented on Saturday at the Red Bull Ring. An automotive engineer by training, Risse has been with KTM since 2008.
He started out as a crew chief and chassis analyst on KTM’s now defunct RC8 Superbike project, but when KTM returned to Grand Prix racing in 2012, Risse took charge of the Moto3 project, which has gone on to be the benchmark in the class.
Risse is currently head of all of KTM’s roadracing activities, and has overseen and led development of the RC16 MotoGP bike.
That machine has both interesting parallels and major differences with the other machines on the MotoGP grid: the bike uses a 1,000cc, 90°, V4 engine housed in a tubular steel trellis frame, and a fairing that looks like an oversize version of the Moto3 bike’s, and sits somewhere between the Honda RC213V and Kalex Moto2 designs.
The bike will also use WP suspension, though as WP is a wholly owned subsidiary of KTM, it will basically be a dedicated factory suspension effort.
After the KTM RC16 was presented, we spoke to Sebastian Risse about the differences and design choices which went into the bike.
David Emmett: Did you ever consider using aluminum beam frame?
Sebastian Risse: Already in past projects, like Moto3, of course we were considering it. There we also had the experience from 125 and 250. So it was a decision which was really well thought through.
We even had some aluminum frames running, but in the end, it was a conscious decision. We know more about the steel frame, we didn’t find any disadvantages, we knew our strong points and can use them, and we know also what to work on to reach the similar level to aluminum.
DE: No theoretical disadvantages or weight disadvantages?
SR: For example, the material damping is not the same between aluminum and steel, between those two and carbon fiber, between very different materials, and it’s something you need to handle.
To say in general, there is an advantage or a disadvantage in weight, this is really hard to say, because the whole bike package depends on this. For example, with a steel frame, it is easier to get the heat away from some areas, where aluminum is closing everything up.
So maybe you can save some heat shields and so on. So there are really secondary aspects you can put together.
DE: It’s not just about the frame, it’s about the whole of the bike as a package?
SR: Exactly, yes. It has to work together. For example, from Moto3, we know we are very weight efficient with respect to the stiffness, and it’s for sure not a disadvantage with the steel frame.
DE: Firing order: big bang or screamer?
SR: We are still doing some investigations about this. Especially now with the electronics, there’s not just the mechanical firing order, there’s more about it, and you can play a lot with it. We will see what we decide at the very end.
DE: Aim is to run without a balance shaft, that also implies certain things for the engine configuration and firing order, or else you have to compensate?
SR: This is true, yes.
DE: Is the aim to be the most powerful bike on the grid?
SR: No. Of course, when you are an engine guy, you always dream of this, and that’s clear for everybody. But also to have a good understanding of what the total package has to deliver. Sure, in the beginning, let’s say in the first season, we will not be always there.
Will have brighter moments and more difficult moments, and then to have a strong engine is for sure not bad. But we know about the total balance, and we see that the strongest bike is not winning the championship for some time now, and this of course has to make everybody think.
Basically, you see on some race tracks that 5% of the time, you have all throttle bodies full open, so how much can you gain? You can pass people, but you can’t make the lap time with engine power.
DE: Which area still needs the most work on this bike?
SR: Basically, now looking back, it becomes more clear that there were really phases in the project. For example, in the beginning, you have to make the rider feel comfortable, so work on the ergonomics before they can tell you more about the stiffness and the setting.
Then of course you have to get the best out of the setting, out of what you have. And then things like turning, handling of the bike, it’s a continuous development process.
And also it was very helpful now to see where the others are. Because when you’re testing on your own, this becomes more and more blurred, and you dream of something that is out of the normal.
But we know now quite well what is normal, what the others are doing, that basically everybody has similar boundaries in some aspects, and now we will improve the aspects that on the one hand we are maybe missing against the others, and on the other hand, the areas where we see we are strong and where know how to do it, of course we can go further.
We don’t have to make the bike which is in no aspect worse than the others, but we can use our strengths.
DE: Did winglet ban affect you and your plans?
SR: To look into downforce in general is something which I think since 10 or 15 years people were doing. Already in the 1950s, 1960s you saw even on them. But now whenever you go in the wind tunnel or you do simulations, you look at these aspects also, even if there are no winglets on the bike.
The rule for next year is there will be no wings, how this wording will be exactly and how people can work with it, we will see. But basically, the rules are the rules, and we try to get the best out of the package inside of the rules, and that means we are looking at the downforce like we always did in conventional ways.
Photo: KTM
This article was originally published on MotoMatters, and is republished here on Asphalt & Rubber with permission by the author.
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TPB-AFK, the documentary about The Pirate Bay and its founders, is finally out. The film has been in the making for four years and follows the lives of the three Pirate Bay founders during their trials in Sweden. TPB-AFK is the first film to premiere both online and at a major film festival, and can be downloaded and shared for free.
The Pirate Bay is one of the best known file-sharing brands and the site has a well-earned place in Internet history.
The BitTorrent site and its founders have been targeted by several court cases over the years, and Swedish filmmaker and producer Simon Klose has documented part of this struggle.
The result is TPB AFK, a dark documentary that follows the three Pirate Bay founders during their trials in Sweden up until the final verdict. The project started more than four years ago and today it premieres at the prestigious Berlin Film Festival.
In a world first the documentary is available simultaneously on a BitTorrent tracker near you as part of the official release.
– Download the TPB AFK torrents (proxy)
TPB AFK
For those who have been following TorrentFreak for a while the film will not bring many shocking revelations. However, it does provide a unique behind-the-scenes perspective on the dozens of news events that were reported during the Pirate Bay trials.
What not many people know is that the three founders of The Pirate Bay often pretended to get along in public, but had some big fallouts in private. This also becomes apparent in the documentary.
Peter Sunde, one of the three founders followed in the documentary, previously told TorrentFreak that he has mixed feelings about the final TPB AFK cut but that “it tells an important story.”
TPB-AFK highlights a lot of the negative events the three founders went through, ending with the final guilty verdict early last year. Needless to say these events had quite an impact on their lives.
“It’s still a fucked up story and the film makes me think about the past years of my life quite a lot,” Sunde says.
The Pirate Bay founder added that he might have chosen other material to include and that many of the good parts have been left out.
“It’s Simon’s decision what to include and it’s his view of our story. I like that he’s independent from us and that he’s promised to release lots of extra material for some of the things that I might have wanted to have included,” Sunde said.
Those who’ve seen TPB AFK will understand Sunde’s sentiment. Perhaps that’s what makes the documentary even more compelling. A must watch.
Let us know what you think in the comment section.
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Close
A new "man-made" species of predators called the "coywolf," a breed mix of the coyote and the wolf, is now said to be growing in numbers across North America, with populations reaching millions.
Wolves have always been condemned by humans, with forests being cleared for farming and men purposely persecuting the species. With this, wolves lack sexual partners, subsequently leading to decreased numbers.
As deforestation continues to ensue, wolves are seeing lesser of other wolves and more of coyotes and dogs. It appears that these carnivores seem to be fine with it, or as experts said, the species have no choice. Hence the two animals have to engage in a one-of-a-kind interbreeding that experts now describe as "amazing."
Forest clearing initiated by humans to rid wolves causes coyotes to wander around and bring in farmer-owned dogs into the picture.
Breeding different animal species often result in an offspring that is less robust than either of the parents. However, the mix of a wolf, coyote and dog DNA appeared like an exception to that rule, as evidenced by the growing number of populations of coywolves. Roland Kays, the head of Biodiversity Research Lab at the North Carolina State University said its numbers are now in millions.
Wolves usually hunt in forests and coyotes in the fields. Kays said combining the species has generated an animal that is efficient in catching prey both in the woods and in open terrains.
Another notable indicator of interbreeding is the coywolves' cry. During the initial howl, the sound resembles that of wolves' which is deep-pitched, but later transforms into a higher pitch just like coyotes'.
With the combination of the species, the prairie-exclusive pure coyotes and persecuted wolves in forests have paved the way for the creation of an animal that is able to spread in massive and otherwise uninhabitable areas.
For nearly a decade now, coywolves have been spreading across the northeastern part of America. The numbers are also said to continue rising in the southeast. Now, coywolves may be seen even in urban locations such as Boston, New York and Washington. Chris Nagy of the Gotham Coyote Project said the number of coywolves in New York alone is 20 and it is persistently rising.
The good adaptability of the coywolves are assumed by some to be because of the presence of dog DNA, which balances wolves' animosity against humans.
"[It's an] amazing contemporary evolution story that's happening right underneath our nose," Kays said.
ⓒ 2018 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
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Abstract Habitat loss, overexploitation, and numerous other stressors have caused global declines in apex predators. This “trophic downgrading” has generated widespread concern because of the fundamental role that apex predators can play in ecosystem functioning, disease regulation, and biodiversity maintenance. In attempts to combat declines, managers have conducted reintroductions, imposed stricter harvest regulations, and implemented protected areas. We suggest that full recovery of viable apex predator populations is currently the exception rather than the rule. We argue that, in addition to well-known considerations, such as continued exploitation and slow life histories, there are several underappreciated factors that complicate predator recoveries. These factors include three challenges. First, a priori identification of the suite of trophic interactions, such as resource limitation and competition that will influence recovery can be difficult. Second, defining and accomplishing predator recovery in the context of a dynamic ecosystem requires an appreciation of the timing of recovery, which can determine the relative density of apex predators and other predators and therefore affect competitive outcomes. Third, successful recovery programs require designing adaptive sequences of management strategies that embrace key environmental and species interactions as they emerge. Consideration of recent research on food web modules, alternative stable states, and community assembly offer important insights for predator recovery efforts and restoration ecology more generally. Foremost among these is the importance of a social-ecological perspective in facilitating a long-lasting predator restoration while avoiding unintended consequences.
Keywords
apex predator
Restoration
recovery
intraguild predation
hysteresis
food chain
competition
INTRODUCTION: WHY APEX PREDATOR RECOVERY? Many of the most iconic and charismatic species in the natural world are apex predators, yet they are also often embedded in controversy. Apex predators (for example, whales, cougars, bears, wolves, sharks, and eagles) are consumers that kill their prey during or shortly following an attack, consume many prey over a lifetime, and are not eaten after reaching adult size (1). Apex predators also evoke strong emotional responses in people, varying from wonder and amazement to fear and spite (2). Because of the fundamental roles that apex predators can play in ecosystem functioning, disease regulation, and biodiversity maintenance, ecologists and conservation organizations have repeatedly sounded the alarm about local, regional, and global declines in apex predator (3) and large herbivore populations (4). Consequently, efforts to recover predator populations that have experienced declines are increasingly widespread. Efforts to recover apex predators are implemented for a variety of reasons that span from the viability of particular populations, to ecosystem functioning, to the resilience of social-ecological systems. In the simplest situation, apex predator recovery is an end in itself. Borrowing from language in the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA), a successful recovery consists of a sequence of four events in which the predator population (i) ceases to decline, (ii) stabilizes, (iii) increases, and finally, (iv) occurs at a level that is self-persistent [U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), 2011]. Moreover, considering the key role that apex predators can play in biodiversity maintenance and ecosystem function, full recovery may require not only persistence but also recovery to some level consistent with historical baseline abundances (5). Thus, recovery is a broad term that can be achieved via a variety of mechanisms, including reintroduction and restocking (see Glossary of Terms in Box 1). Box 1 Glossary of Terms. Reintroduction: Intentional movement of an organism into a part of its native range from which it has disappeared or become extirpated in historic times (Armstrong and Seddon, 2007). Recovery: The first milestone in recovery is halting the decline of the species. Next is stabilizing the species, followed by increasing its numbers and distribution with the ultimate goal of making the species secure in the wild (USFWS, 2011). Restoration: The process of assisting the recovery of an ecosystem that has been degraded, damaged, or destroyed. It is an intentional activity that initiates or accelerates ecosystem recovery with respect to its health (functional processes), integrity (species composition and community structure), and sustainability (resistance to disturbance and resilience) [Society for Ecological Restoration (SER), 2004]. Restocking: Movement of individuals to build up an existing population (Armstrong and Seddon, 2007). Reestablishment: Institution of historical ecosystem structure or processes (70). Carnivore: An animal that feeds on another animal’s body tissue. Synonymous with “predator” in this Review. Community module: A minimum realistic model describing groups of three or four interacting species. Hysteresis: When the pathway of recovery of an ecosystem differs from its pathway of degradation. Some efforts to recover apex predators have shown promising signs of sustained success. For example, gray wolves in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem [but see the study by Berger et al. (6)], harbor seals in coastal regions of the Northeast Pacific Ocean (7), and cheetahs in Tanzania (8) reached desired increases in abundance and distribution following reductions in densities caused by hunting and culling (Table 1). However, many apex predator recovery efforts have not yet met their potential or have encountered unanticipated problems along the way (Table 2) (9). Apex predators that have not yet successfully recovered despite concerted conservation efforts are widespread across ecosystems (land, freshwater, or marine), taxonomic groups (for example, mammals and birds), and exploitation status. In addition, there are several cases in which a focal predator has recovered successfully in one location (for example, sea otters in central California) but not in another (for example, sea otters in western Alaska). Although Table 2 by no means represents a comprehensive review of apex predator recovery efforts, it suggests that success is not universal [for a recent comprehensive review of marine systems recoveries, see the work by Lotze et al. (10) and Lotze and Worm (11)]. Indeed, the widespread occurrence of unsuccessful or stalled recovery efforts provokes the question: what factors encourage versus impede progress in the recovery of apex predators? Table 1 Empirical studies of successful predator recoveries. T, terrestrial; M, marine; F, freshwater; IUCN, International Union for Conservation of Nature; MMPA, Marine Mammal Protection Act. View this table: Table 2 Empirical studies of failed and stalled predator recoveries. View this table: Here, we explore four key aspects of apex predator recovery. In the first section, “Apex Predators Live Slow, Range Widely, and Die Fast,” we focus on how apex predator life history characteristics offer insight into predator recoveries. In the second section, “Ecosystem Context and Apex Predator Recovery,” we focus on the importance of food and habitat limitation, behavior, and species interactions as drivers of predator recovery. In the third section, “When Is as Important as What: Historical Contingency and Predator Recovery,” we discuss the integration of predators into assembly theory and emphasize the role of timing as a key driver in predator recovery. Last, in the fourth section, “Prescriptions for Success? Research Gaps and Ecosystem Restoration,” we emphasize how recovery pathways are not necessarily identical as pathways to decline (that is, hysteresis), discuss theoretical and empirical research gaps, and emphasize the need to consider social as well as ecological systems when seeking targets for apex predator recovery.
APEX PREDATORS LIVE SLOW, RANGE WIDELY, AND DIE FAST There are a variety of reasons why apex predator recovery programs often are marginally successful or even fail. One of the clearest explanations is that species at the apex of the food chain are known for having slow life history characteristics. Relative to prey, apex predators tend to have slower somatic growth rates, larger size at maturity, and longer generation lengths, all life history traits correlated with fewer offspring (12, 13). A low maximal reproduction rate means that it is difficult to mount compensatory responses via recruitment to enhanced mortality. Although not exclusive to the top of the food chain, apex predators also generally have smaller population sizes and slower population growth rates than their prey (14), making them especially sensitive to extinction from demographic stochasticity (15) and causing slow recovery rates even in cases of positive population trajectories. For example, a review of 198 reintroduction studies found that herbivore reintroductions exhibited a 29% higher success compared to carnivore reintroductions (16). Additionally, a recent synthesis of recovery times for overexploited fisheries suggests that higher-trophic level species are likely to exhibit the slowest recovery rates (17). Indeed, this finding almost certainly generalizes that apex predator recoveries often will be slower than those of lower-trophic level species simply because of a disparity in life history strategies. Such slower recovery times require setting appropriate expectations for the time scale of successful recovery. As we will note below, these life history effects on recovery can be amplified by community and ecosystem interactions. Directly hostile human activities can exacerbate the negative effects of slow life history strategies on predator recovery time. Continued (over-) exploitation is perhaps the most substantive of these activities [reviewed by Duffy (18)], but other direct and indirect human influences can also play a role. Strong exploitation and poaching often continue during recovery efforts because the predators are themselves valuable (17, 19). For example, tigers are at risk of extinction due to intentional human impacts because of their lucrative commercial value in some Asian medicines (20). In other cases, apex predators are considered to be a threat to valuable species. For example, unexploited shark and wolf populations have been considered threats to wildlife, fisheries, and livestock, often being killed by poachers [for example, Holdo et al. (21)] and, in some cases, even by the agencies mandated to protect them (22). Given low potential recruitment rates, such imposed extra mortality can greatly hamper apex predator recovery. Even when exploitation rates are reduced to near zero, other human influences can interact with the slow life histories of predators to inhibit their recoveries. Pollution affects many long-lived predators exposed to toxic contaminants via bioaccumulation or accidental poisoning [for example, bald eagles, Arctic wolves, polar bears, ringed seals, and bottlenose dolphins; reviewed by Harrad (23)] and via the chronic stress of anthropogenic noise (24). For instance, Southern Resident killer whales have not been harvested commercially since the 1970s in the North Pacific but remain listed as endangered under the ESA and are exposed to a number of threats, including reductions in prey availability and enormous body burdens of persistent organic pollutants (Ross et al., 2000). The difficulty with pollution is that, even when it is reduced or eliminated (for example, bans on persistent organic pollutants), it can take many years to dissipate from the environment, and long-lived predators with toxins in their tissues can take decades or longer to exhibit signs of recovery (23). Apex predators often have very large home ranges, which implies that they can be exposed to a diverse range of scattered, spatially localized environmental challenges, ranging from exposure to toxins, to vehicular collisions, to hostile ranchers or poachers outside protected areas. There are also genetic and evolutionary factors that can contribute to poor recovery. If historically outbred apex predators have been pushed to low numbers persisting often in scattered local populations, the remaining individuals may exhibit maladaptation due to inbreeding of related individuals, as well as the depletion of adaptive genetic variation needed to cope with an ever-changing environment. For instance, the severely affected Florida panther has shown many developmental abnormalities associated with an abrupt reduction in effective population size and kin breeding (25), which surely hampers its recovery. However, our focus here will be on ecological dimensions of impaired recovery. Nevertheless, constraints on successful predator recoveries extend beyond slow life history characteristics, genetic factors, exploitation, and other direct human influences. For instance, the splendid recovery of the bald eagle depended not only on the prohibition of hunting but also on the banning of DDT, improved water quality at many sites, forceful protection of nest sites, and deliberate careful reintroductions from captive-bred populations. Below, we argue that the importance of considering the full community and ecosystem context is underappreciated yet critical to apex predator recovery programs. In particular, we (i) argue that apex predator recovery programs are unique from the better-studied restoration programs for species that are lower on the food chain; (ii) use a simple model to illustrate how successful apex predator recovery requires an appreciation of the types of species interactions that characterize the community, the degree to which mesopredators, if present, are culled, and the extent to which basal resources are supplemented; and (iii) highlight how the rate and degree of apex predator recovery can depend on an ecosystem’s history of trophic downgrading.
ECOSYSTEM CONTEXT AND APEX PREDATOR RECOVERY Insights into how to enable successful apex predator recovery may be grounded in the lessons learned from ecological restoration practices focused on lower trophic levels, especially plants [reviewed by Young et al. (26)]. The approaches used in ecological restoration fall broadly into three categories, including (i) the noninterventionist, leave-it-to-nature strategy [that is, succession (27)]; (ii) the structure-begets-function or “if you build it they will come” (also known as field-of-dreams) strategy (28); and (iii) the ecosystem function or process-based strategy (29). Modern-day restoration tends to blend elements of strategies (ii) and (iii), often seeking reestablishment of both ecosystem structure and function to achieve restoration of particular species or communities. Efforts to recover predators seem to be unusual in that they frequently adapt a noninterventionist strategy by simply stopping or reducing hunting and assuming that the system will reequilibrate. Exceptions often involve direct reintroductions, such as red kite and osprey in the UK, or peregrine in the United States; here, breeding programs and reintroductions, in a sense, circumvent the low maximal recruitment possibilities for many apex predators. But often, recovery simply involves dampening in imposed mortality regimes. For example, recovery of many marine mammals (30) has largely been attributed to reduced hunting, with little attention given to reestablishing the structure and function of systems within which marine mammals live. There are several lessons learned in plant-based ecological restoration that go beyond leave-it-to-nature, and may help to speed apex predator recovery and augment recovered predator population sizes. In restoration aimed primarily at primary producers, ecologists have advocated for an appreciation of species traits, and the ecological processes that affect ecosystem structure and function in the development of restoration strategies (26). A number of ecological processes (for example, dispersal, resource limitation, competition, predation, and mutualism) and traits (for example, life histories, drought tolerance, and herbivore resistance) have been acknowledged and manipulated to facilitate recovery success [reviewed by Young et al. (26)]. For example, plant restoration often involves seed additions and the use of cages over seeds and seedlings to combat recruitment limitation and seed predation. Predator recoveries similarly rely on a suite of ecological processes influenced by a variety of species interactions, but this has not been formally considered in many restoration attempts. Apex predator restoration differs from restoration of lower trophic levels because predators as individuals tend to have greater food resource needs, larger habitat requirements, and different behavioral responses to environmental change than their prey. In addition, and also in contrast to plant restoration ecology, the community context for a predator tends to be usefully conceptualized around trophic interactions first and foremost. Food resource limitation can constrain apex predator recovery The high metabolic demand of most apex predators necessitates an abundant, stable, and nutritionally diverse prey base (31). Empirically, populations of large carnivores are most abundant in areas with high prey biomass (32, 33). However, resource availability does not always boost predator abundance and persistence. For example, a recent global synthesis of resource limitation in seabirds describes a threshold under which food availability (of low-trophic level fish) led to reduced and more variable seabird productivity (34), but high abundances above a certain level did not. Changes in food abundance above this threshold would be expected to have negligible effects on seabird recovery programs. Restoration efforts need to carefully consider the nonlinear relationship between consumption and food availability; ensuring some food supply is critical, but the marginal value of higher food supplies may not warrant the extra costs, because consumers can be satiated or limited by factors other than food [for example, resting or nest site provision; cf. Samhouri et al. (35)]. Below, we expand on this idea and provide an explicit analysis of how basal resource carrying capacity modulates predator recovery (see Box 2). Box 2 A Model for Understanding How Module Shape Drives Apex Predator Recovery. A three-species Lotka-Volterra model of an intraguild predation (IGP) module aids in illustrating a number of the concepts regarding the likelihood of success for apex predator recovery programs. This model highlights how the module and strengths of species interactions in which an apex predator is embedded can be important for anticipating the effects of (i) restoring resources (Fig. 2), (ii) culling mesopredators (Fig. 3), and (iii) attempting to reestablish apex predator populations with an insufficient initial number of individuals (Fig. 4). The core of this model, which describes the interplay of predation and competition between an (omnivorous) apex predator and a mesopredator (also known as intraguild prey) for a shared resource, has been extensively studied by many authors and is well understood (47, 56, 84, 118), permitting useful insights in the context of apex predator recovery efforts. Model description. Following McCann et al. (119), we illustrate the effects of module type by introducing an apex predator prey preference parameter ω to the basic IGP model. This parameter controls the degree to which the system reflects two further well-studied community modules: the linear food chain (ω = 1, where no competition occurs among predators) (120, 121) and the exploitative competition module (ω = 0, where only competition occurs among predators) (122), in addition to the IGP module (0 < ω < 1, wherein both competition and predation occur) (47, 56, 84, 118, 121). Note that the prey preference parameter may differ substantially between terrestrial and marine apex predators, given that terrestrial apex predators are often highly specialized. For simplicity, we assume that the apex predator’s preference for a given type of resource is fixed rather than responding adaptively to changes in prey density. The population growth rates of the shared basal resource (R), the mesopredator predator (N), and the apex predator (P) are represented by the following three equations. (1) (2) (3) In this model, r and K are the basal resource’s intrinsic growth rate and carrying capacity, respectively, and e is the trophic efficiency at which consumed prey are converted to predators. The functional responses of both predators are assumed to be linear, with α being the mesopredator attack rate on the resource and a being the apex predator’s total attack rate (distributed between the resource and the mesopredator by the apex predator’s prey preference ω). Parameters δ and d are the respective intrinsic per capita death rates of the mesopredator and apex predator and are assumed to be equal. Increases to δ may be interpreted as the culling of mesopredators by the removal of a constant fraction of individuals. The simplifying assumptions here offer clarity but could be readily modified in a given case study. Just as for the well-studied IGP models without an apex predator prey preference term (118), this model exhibits six possible steady-state equilibria (see fig. S1). Our focus is on two of these: the case in which all three species coexist and the case in which only the apex predator and the resource coexist (with the mesopredator being unable to persist). For illustrative purposes, we restrict our focus to parameter values for which these equilibria exhibit stable dynamics (that is, Re(λ 1 ) < 0). The mesopredator’s attack rate was set to be three times the apex predator’s total attack rate because three-species coexistence necessitates the mesopredator being the superior competitor for the shared resource (65). Note that in the apex predator resource-only state, the parameter ω reflects the apex predator’s efficacy at capturing resources rather than its prey preference per se. Baseline parameters were chosen to be ω = 0.5, K = 0.15, δ = d = 0.01, r = 1, e = 0.1, a = 1, and α = 3, with the effects of varying ω, K, and δ being illustrated in Figs. 2 to 4. Model Interpretation: Module Shape Determines the Efficacy of Resource Subsidies and Mesopredator Culling. The model demonstrates how expectations and intuition about the most promising approaches for population recovery can depend heavily on an apex predator’s preferences for basal versus mesopredator species (Figs. 2 and 3). As intuition might suggest, an apex predator embedded within a module dominated by exploitative competition should achieve a higher recovered population density than a predator embedded within an IGP or food chain module because less of the system’s energy is lost to the inefficiency of the mesopredator’s trophic conversion rate (Fig. 2). The model also demonstrates how the consequences of mesopredator culling are affected by module shape and how culling may even be counterproductive for the goal of maximizing apex predator densities (Fig. 3). For example, apex predator recovery may require not just partial culling but rather the complete removal of the mesopredator if competition between the mesopredator and apex predator is strong and the apex predator exhibits little preference for consuming the mesopredator (ω < 0.295). That is, without complete mesopredator removal, the mesopredator’s superior ability to exploit basal resources can permit it to preclude the apex predator’s reestablishment outright. At the other extreme, even a weak increase in the mesopredator’s death rate by the implementation of a culling program will decrease a recovered apex predator’s population size when exploitative competition is weak and the module is more like a food chain. Indeed, for nearly all parameter values that allow the coexistence of all three species, a doubling of the mesopredator’s death rate (that is, culling) reduces the apex predator population’s size by almost half. Only within a narrow window of the apex predator’s prey preference, wherein exploitative competition is strong but not strong enough to affect competitive exclusion (0.295 > ω < 0.31), is the culling of the mesopredator expected to lead to an increase in the population size of a recovering apex predator (Fig. 3, inset). The utility of intermediate complexity models, particularly those considering IGP, which is a common structural feature of real food webs (123), is their capacity to capture much of the dynamic properties of food webs as a whole (124, 125). The model presented here offers highlights on how the tractable consideration of strongly interacting species is useful for developing management strategies that take into account ecosystem context [see also discussion of minimum realistic models by Plagányi et al. (126)]. How habitat can constrain predator recovery: “One hill can’t shelter two tigers.”—C. Elton, 1927 Habitat loss and fragmentation are among the primary drivers limiting recovery of predator populations [for example, Crooks and Soulé (36)], and a number of restoration programs continue to struggle from the constraints of insufficient habitat availability (37). Degraded habitats often have limited reproductive sites, which not only contribute to initial predator declines [for example, (38)] but also constrain successful colonization and persistence of recovering or reintroduced predator populations [for example, (39)]. The success of the international Yellowstone to Yukon corridor in facilitating connectivity for large mammalian carnivores (grizzly bear, lynx, wolverine, and wolf) provides evidence for the benefits of large connected expanses of habitat for struggling predator populations that have high minimum area requirements. In contrast, fragmented habitats without wildlife corridors can strongly inhibit recoveries. For example, an eight-lane highway fragments cougar habitat in southern California, leading to a high incidence of vehicle-cougar collisions (40). The importance of habitat availability and fragmentation in driving apex predator recovery is particularly pronounced in terrestrial systems; however, in marine systems, the loss of apex predators due to habitat shifts or connectivity is less well established. The recovery trajectory of predators is therefore dependent on the size and heterogeneity of the landscape within which they are embedded. Predator behavior can constrain predator recovery Behavior can play a significant role in determining the potential for predator recovery. Prey preference, breeding habitat preference, aggression, mobility, and social organization are five of the most important behavioral considerations. Populations of predators that are dietary specialists are likely to fluctuate more than generalist predators, which can switch to another prey species if a focal prey becomes rare (41). Therefore, it may be more difficult to recover specialist predators to self-persistent levels. In contrast, the diet breadth that often increases with trophic level [for example, Cohen et al. (42)] offers opportunity for restoration that may not exist at lower trophic levels (though exceptions such as Southern Resident killer whales and sea otters exist). Similarly, predator recovery rates may be constrained despite readily available food if they are limited by other key resources such as access to breeding sites or from intraspecific interference. For example, many predators migrate to breeding sites with smaller recently mature individuals following older, larger individuals who know their way. Overharvesting of older and larger predators may lead to the loss of cultural memory of spawning aggregation location [for example, (43)], a mechanism that likely affects species throughout the food web. Intraspecific aggression among Florida panthers may similarly limit their recovery; the aggression that male mountain lions exhibit towards females with cubs and smaller males is thought to constrain recovery (44). Finally, movement behavior can limit predator recovery rates, such as in cases where dispersal is inhibited by modifications to natural landscapes [for example, (40)], leading to localized food resource depletion. Migrations may also be shorter or avoided at low population densities, creating a type of Allee effect. For instance, endangered African wild dogs generate smaller dispersing cohorts when population densities are low (45). Whereas some of these predator behaviors are relatively inflexible and predictable, others are less so, creating substantial uncertainty about the potential for predator recovery even when food resources are replete. It takes a community to recover a predator Like any species subjected to a recovery effort, predators experience constraints driven by a diverse configuration of prey, competitors, and natural enemies (including diseases and parasites). Understanding apex predator dynamics in this light is made difficult by the fact that apex predators are embedded in a complex network of species interactions, with many apex predators being generalist consumers. Whereas theory suggests that the dynamics of generalists may be described by simple single-species models when prey resources are readily abundant (41), prey limitation is one of many hypothesized mechanisms constraining apex predator recovery. Because food webs are often characterized by few strong and many weak interactions (46), full communities can be conceptualized in the form of simpler, digestible, and analytically tractable modules (that is, groups of three to five interacting species) (Fig. 1) (47). Rather than trying to capture the full suite of ecological interactions within a predator’s ecosystem, these modules provide a practical way to narrow the universe of potential influences on a predator’s recovery while going beyond the restricted perspective of resource or habitat limitation alone. For example, modules can focus solely on strongly interacting species within a food web or alternatively can offer a way to simplify a food web by modeling multiple species of similar life history traits as a single node. In Box 2, we focus on the former approach and explore a three-species food web model to consider how different module configurations—ranging from an exploitative competition model, to an IGP module, to a linear food chain—can alter the anticipated recovery of apex predators. Fig. 1 Three-species community modules: Food chain, exploitative competition, and IGP. These modules are generic descriptions of common configurations of predator-prey interactions in the natural world (left), each of which corresponds to a predator recovery example (center) that has followed a restoration trajectory corresponding to the module (right). Fig. 2 Module shape alters how an apex predator’s abundance will respond to the restoration of basal resources, as indicated by the contrast of low (solid lines) and high (dashed lines) resource carrying capacities (red lines, apex predator resource-only state; blue lines, three-species coexistence state). When ω has intermediate values, increases in resource productivity benefit the apex predator’s abundance to the detriment of the mesopredator because the mesopredator’s competetive advantage becomes superseded by the predation pressure that it experiences from the apex predator. (A and B) A continuous gradient of predator’s prey preference (ω) (A) and discrete measures of apex predator equilibrium density for characteristic models, including exploitative competition, IGP, and a food chain (B). For additional model details, see fig. S1 (baseline parameters here are as follows: ω = 0.5, r = 1, e = 0.1, a = 1, and α = 3). The model indicates that, although the supplementation of a community’s resource base will increase an apex predator’s recovered population size regardless of the strength of the interactions in any module configuration, the magnitude of this effect will be least pronounced the more the community resembles a linear food chain. Thus, efforts to increase the production rate of basal resources, a strategy practiced in plant restoration (26), will have the largest impact the more the community in which the apex predator is embedded reflects a module of exploitative competition. Moreover, partial mesopredator culling increases recovered predator densities for only a narrow region of parameter space between exploitative competition and linear food chain extremes (Fig. 3). Therefore, culling may be an ineffective tool in all but the most well-understood IGP systems [for example, Persson et al. (48)]. This inference contradicts the historic and current prevalence of predator culling in management [reviewed by Bergstrom et al. (22)] but corroborates studies emphasizing how the culling of apex predators to maximize fisheries yield will not always be effective (2, 49, 50) as well as those highlighting the potential positive population-level effects of increased mortality [reviewed by Schröder et al. (51)]. Other factors, such as the presence of size-structured interactions between mesopredators and apex predators (52, 53) and the existence of additional predator or prey species in the model, can alter model predictions (54). We emphasize that our model of a three-species representation of reality is not a tactical model meant for supporting specific management decisions. Instead, our model is conceptual and strategic, focusing on developing a broad understanding of the ecosystem process and directional patterns of change. As illustrated through these examples, community modules can be used to calibrate qualitative expectations for the recovery of a focal predator population. Just as in plant-based ecological restoration, predator recovery efforts that focus on restoring key ecological processes—including species interactions—are likely to be those that meet with the greatest success. Of course, identification of the community module that best characterizes a predator and its ecosystem may be difficult at the outset of a recovery effort. Additionally, the results of short-term recovery efforts likely represent transient dynamics and may differ from equilibrium expectations (55). Furthermore, the structure of community modules and the strength of the interactions embedded within them can change with environmental context and the loss or introduction of new species (56) and can depend crucially on the details of population structure (for example, size-dependent predation) (53). Thus, conservation and management structures are likely to meet with greater success if they are shaped by the idea that the conceptualization of a community module will require modification over time (57).
WHEN IS AS IMPORTANT AS WHAT: HISTORICAL CONTINGENCY AND PREDATOR RECOVERY The community module in which a predator is embedded at the beginning of a recovery effort provides critical information about the potential of different recovery strategies. Recent advances in community assembly theory suggest that successful ecological restoration may also require careful consideration of the order and timing in which species come together to form a community. This idea, that historical contingencies can influence community assembly, has been well described in the basic ecology and restoration literatures for primary producers (26). However, for larger carnivorous species, the role of historical contingency in driving community assembly remains poorly studied. Borrowing from these other literatures, we suggest that the importance of correctly timing the occurrence of ecological processes can be summarized with two principles. First, biophysical processes that modify the environment to promote establishment of one or more target species in a restoration effort are critical. For instance, early colonizing plants can engineer hospitable soil conditions that facilitate the colonization success of other, less drought-tolerant, plant species [for example, (58)]. Thus, ensuring drought-tolerant plants established early is necessary, but not sufficient, for restoring drought-intolerant plants. Predator recoveries are similarly sensitive to ordered nonconsumptive interactions. For example, recovery of endangered salmon populations in the U.S. Pacific Northwest likely requires an increase in the quantity and/or quality of available habitat (which is small relative to historical levels) (59). Promising avenues include geomorphological modifications to in-stream conditions (for example, sediment grain size and flow rates) for salmon during the freshwater phase of the life cycle and improved access to spawning habitat (for example, via removal of hydropower dams) (59). The second timing principle holds that, at the outset of a recovery effort, the density of predators relative to their competitors and/or prey can have a strong effect on the outcome. This concept, known as priority effects in the ecological literature (60), has been well documented in the context of competitive interactions, especially among plants and in plant restoration (26). If one species builds up a sufficiently large relative abundance before another species attempting to join the community, the species in high abundance can prevent the competitor from establishing. The competitor’s abundance that is sufficient to preclude a focal species’ establishment need not be greater than the abundance at which the focal species is reintroduced. Both competitive priority effects and predation-mediated priority effects can have long-lasting effects on communities. Indeed, priority effects can provoke alternative community states that persist indefinitely (61, 62). In the context of recovering apex predators, the appropriate initial densities to facilitate predator recovery depend on which community module is most representative of the system (63). Here, too, the IGP model (see Box 2; Eqs. 1 to 3) provides informative insight. In the case of a simple food chain module, the appropriate initial densities within the community are clear: predators are most likely to succeed when resources are most readily available (Fig. 2). Indeed, ensuring sufficient prey availability first is critical to avoiding a predator pit (63, 64). In contrast, to recover a predator population embedded within an IGP module, determining appropriate reintroduction densities, or culling competitors before predator reintroduction of the apex predator commences, can be key to establishing persistent predator populations (Fig. 4) (61, 65). Fig. 3 Module shape alters how apex predator density will respond to the culling of mesopredators, as indicated by the contrast of low (solid lines) and high (dashed lines) mesopredator mortality rates. Culling will increase apex predator recovery success when competition is strong. In most cases, culling rates must be sufficiently high such that only the apex predator and the resource persist (red). In contrast, culling will negatively affect the apex predator’s density across most of the range of apex predator prey preference values (ω), when three-species coexistence is desired (blue). Culling of mesopredators only benefits the apex predator when competition is strong but sufficiently weak so as not to cause competitive exclusion (inset). (A) A gradient of predator’s prey preference. (B) Discrete measures of apex predator equilibrium density for discrete models: exploitative competition, IGP, and food chain. NA, not applicable. Fig. 4 Priority effects occur when final equilibrium population sizes are dependent on initial population sizes, even though all other parameter values (that is, environmental conditions) remain unchanged. Such priority effects occur in the IGP module when competition between the apex predators and the mesopredators is strongest, illustrated here with two simulations that differ only in the initial abundance of the apex predator. (A) The dynamics illustrate the scenario where the apex predator’s initial population size (green, P 0 > 0.1) is sufficient to affect the extinction of the mesopredator (blue, N 0 = 0.01). (B) In contrast, the dynamics illustrate a scenario where the apex predator’s initial population size (P 0 < 0.1) is insufficient to avoid extinction due to exclusion by the mesopredator (N 0 = 0.01) (that is, a failed restoration). Parameters are as in Figs. 2 and 3 but with ω = 0.225 reflecting an IGP module in which exploitative competition is strong. More broadly, the growth and stability of reintroduced predator populations can vary depending on the timing of predator recruitment to a community. For example, predator recovery will likely have maximum success if prey are readily available early in their reintroduction. However, it has only recently become clear that colonization history also drives dynamics and stability of multiple trophic levels (66). For example, in a microcosm study, Olito and Fukami (66) showed that predators reached higher population abundance if they were introduced early during community assembly rather than late, as would at first seem more intuitive. In the context of conservation and management actions, these theoretical and empirical findings together underscore the importance of controlling putative competitor populations before predator recovery implementation, introducing high densities of predators relative to their competitors, and doing so earlier rather than later.
PRESCRIPTIONS FOR SUCCESS? RESEARCH GAPS AND ECOSYSTEM RESTORATION Above, we demonstrated three major lessons in promoting successful apex predator recoveries. First, we argued that, relative to species lower on the food chain, some apex predators are likely to respond slowly to recovery efforts. Apex predators exhibit slow life history characteristics, are particularly prone to human pressures, and can require large amounts of available resources and habitat before they can succeed (67). In the face of these numerous challenges, it is necessary (but not always sufficient: see third lesson below) to identify and counteract the initial driver(s) of the predator decline. Second, we emphasized the importance of ecological context in driving variation in apex predator recovery dynamics. Like primary producers, apex predators are embedded within a complex network of interacting species, where resources, competitors, and pathogens can affect population dynamics. The configuration of these community modules (Fig. 1) can play a key role in defining the appropriate strategy for recovery success. Because the prescription for recovery can differ markedly among these modules, practitioners will benefit from defining the appropriate module for their system at the outset. Existing uncertainty in the number, strength, and shape of food webs (68) may make it difficult to forecast on the time scale of predator recovery; therefore, it may be more beneficial to consider a suite of potential modules and evaluate recovery strategies by integrating over different modules (for example, adding an invasive species and culling a mesopredator). From a practical perspective, defining community modules involves a variety of tactics, including gut content studies and scat samples, to discern predator diet preference, diet flexibility, and foraging behavior. Although certainly challenging, new tools that combine laboratory studies and field observations point to the possibility of quantifying the various aspects of predator foraging behavior in the wild [for example, Wootton and Emmerson (46) and Novak (56)]. The third major lesson relates to a role for ecosystem history in evaluating effectiveness of alternative recovery strategies. The trajectory of an apex predator population recovery may depend closely on the way that predator was harvested, the density of predators, competitors, and resources when a recovery program begins, and the likelihood with which a degraded community/ecosystem becomes entrained by an alternative stable state (see below). Hysteresis Appreciating the context dependency of apex predator dynamics is particularly key where environmental conditions or resource extraction counteracts recovery efforts. There are an increasing number of examples of ecosystems in which critical thresholds (that is, tipping points) to less-preferred states have been crossed (69). In these systems, hysteresis effects (that is, when recovery pathways differ from degradation pathways) may exacerbate the challenge of achieving full ecosystem recovery (26, 70). As noted above, different initial species abundances can promote dynamics, leading to different states of the system even when environmental conditions themselves remain unchanged. The hysteresis associated with the presence of these alternative stable states involving predator-prey interactions (71, 72) increases the difficulty of getting back to the original preferred high predator density state (Fig. 4). Knowing that thresholds between alternative stable states exist can also be beneficial for staying in preferred high predator density states (26, 70). Therefore, following the initial loss of an apex predator, it is important to know what appropriate initial starting densities of predators, as well as their competitors and prey, can be critical to the long-term success of a predator recovery program. For example, the existence of alternative states has been shown to be exacerbated if one or both of the apex predator and mesopredator consume one another’s juveniles (52). Such size-structured interactions in which predators and prey exhibit role reversals are relatively common to fisheries (73) where lower-trophic level forage fish are often competitors of the young life stages of larger predatory fishes. More generally, the exploitation history of a system connected through trophic links can affect assembly and recovery, requiring harvest rules that are more stringent than those that originally caused a population collapse to overcome the hysteresis of the system [for example, Collie et al. (74)]. Research gaps and opportunities Our capacity to take these important lessons and use them to meet recovery goals for depleted apex predator populations requires understanding basic predator-prey assembly ecology. Historically, consumer-resource interactions have been understudied in the context of restoration ecology (26), and in some cases, researchers who study trophic ecology choose to address basic biology questions and ignore more conservation-oriented research (75). Therefore, increased communication between conservation practitioners and research biologists is necessary. Furthermore, it is inevitable that we will develop insights into how to reconstruct intact communities by gaining a deeper understanding of the role of predators in community assembly and succession theory (62, 66, 76, 77). In the past, assembly models have either ignored predators or explored the effects of predation as an exogenous force on prey communities. Just like prey, predators experience variable population and community dynamics due to stochastic colonization, and this variability in colonization is essentially mimicked, intentionally or not, in a restoration program. Ecologists are only at the early stages of understanding the role of predator-prey interactions in driving assembly theory. Predator reintroduction programs offer ideal opportunities to learn more about basic predator-prey assembly ecology by conducting mensurative studies that would otherwise be too difficult to conduct at large spatial scales. Social-ecological context of predator recoveries Restoration goals often extend beyond a single apex predator species into the broader ecosystem and social-ecological system within which predators are embedded. From an ecosystem perspective, some predators may be considered keystone species that can maintain biodiversity, control disease, modify their ecosystem’s biogeochemistry, and provide resistance to invasion (3, 78). If restoration practitioners broaden their goal to define restoration success beyond just apex predator recovery and include the ecosystem structure and function within which that predator is embedded as well, a complex suite of interactions between species and environmental conditions will determine recovery “success” (79). Box 3 provides an example of such an ecosystem context for apex predator recoveries in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, where successfully reintroduced wolf populations have been insufficient to recover riparian willow communities along small streams to date (Fig. 5). This example serves to highlight the promise and complexity of using predator recoveries to achieve ecosystem-level and social-ecological goals. More than anything, it demonstrates that predator recoveries demand an evaluation of trade-offs, especially in light of the potential for human-wildlife conflict (80). Box 3 Yellowstone tipping points and wolf recoveries: An ecosystem perspective. The reintroduction of the gray wolf to the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem is exemplary of success among predator restoration programs (Table 1) (127). The USFWS along with the National Park Service reintroduced 31 wolves in the northern section of Yellowstone in 1995–1996. The wolf population initially expanded to more than 170 individuals in 2002 and subsequently stabilized around 100 individuals in recent years (127). Since reintroducing this apex predator, the northern range elk herd, which peaked at about 12,000 animals in 1995, has declined to around 4000 individuals (128, 129). The elk population decline has been attributed to multiple causes that include wolves, severe winters, and changes to hunting practices (130) Early research found support for cascading trophic effects from wolves to elk to vegetation, documenting increased growth in plants after 1996 [for example, (131, 132)]. Despite the success of this predator restoration and early findings on positive ecosystem consequences, recent work suggests that a classic food chain module is insufficient to describe the dominant interactions, particularly for riparian willows (9, 133, 134). Willows are the dominant woody vegetation along small streams on the northern range and across the semiarid Rocky Mountains. Willows are also an important food source for elk in winter, when snow covers the grassy range. Before wolves were extirpated from Yellowstone, willows also supported a large beaver population on the northern range. Beavers used willow and aspen stems as building material for dams in small streams, flooding areas to create pools in which they submerged large winter food caches, also made of willow and aspen stems (135). Beaver dams raise water tables and lead to flooding upstream and downstream, increasing water availability for willows and creating opportunities for seedling establishment (133, 136). During the 70 years wolves were absent from the ecosystem, elk populations increased markedly, which had negative effects on herbaceous and woody vegetation on the northern range (137, 138). Beavers abandoned much of the northern range by the 1950s, likely because they were outcompeted by the abundant elk population (133, 139). Recent experimental work has shown that positive feedbacks from beaver dams are at least as important as top-down effects from browsing ungulates in regulating willow growth (Marshall et al., 2013). The wolf reintroduction was predicted to improve conditions for vegetation on the northern range, assuming that a simple food chain captured the most important dynamics in the ecosystem. At least for willows along small streams, the effects of wolf reintroduction have been limited because restoring the apex predator has not restored important feedbacks between willows and beavers required for tall willow communities. These plant communities demonstrate asymmetric effects of predator removal and reintroduction, which translates to nonlinear state transitions, and perhaps alternate stable states (Marshall et al., 2013). Restoration of the predator has not yet equated to restoration of this part of the ecosystem. Recovery of the gray wolf was a necessary but not sufficient condition for recovery of the pre-wolf extirpation state. However, recovery must be defined in a broader social-ecological context. Changes in land-use patterns and a warmer, drier climate may preclude ecosystem recovery to the 1920s state. Further, wolf predation on livestock creates conflict between conservation objectives and rancher objectives (140). Trade-offs may also occur between conservation interests and recreational hunting when hunters and predators rely on the same prey populations (141). More conflicts may arise between multiple endangered species in this ecosystem, modulated through food web interactions (142). Explicit ecosystem recovery goals will need to be defined by stakeholders to evaluate trade-offs and find optimal solutions that efficiently meet the needs of multiple invested parties. Fig. 5 Time-varying modules of riparian corridors along small streams within the northern range of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem from the 1920s to present. Northern-range riparian areas have exhibited (at least) three different major types of communities since 1920. Before wolf extinctions (1920s), riparian areas included wolves, elk, beavers, and willows. Following wolf extinctions (1930s to 1990s), these areas were reduced to just elk and willow. Most recently (1990 to present), wolf reintroductions have produced a system with wolves, elk, and willow but few beavers. Qualitatively, these different modules exhibit fundamentally different dynamics, exemplify temporal variability in a single system’s characteristic module, and meet different ecological and social services. [Illustration by Shannon Hennessey, Oregon State University]. Indeed, apex predator population recovery and the associated ecosystem responses are not always well received. The concept of rewilding is controversial (81), and increases in predator abundance or protection of existing populations can produce human-environment and human-human conflicts due to the strong cultural and economic linkages between predators, their impacts, and humans. For example, some fishermen consider their livelihoods to be threatened by increasing populations of whales and seals that eat key fisheries species like cod, salmon, or herring [for example, Yodzis (2)]. Similarly, ranchers have expressed concern over increasing populations of wolves and cougars that eat livestock (22). Therefore, the persistence of predators, and the target biomass at which successful recovery is defined, requires an explicit acknowledgment of the social-ecological trade-offs at play (80). In the case of a protected area, we might define success on the basis of estimates of historic apex predator densities or ecosystem characteristics. In contrast, successful apex predator restoration in the presence of heavy human-wildlife conflict may look substantially different, with lower target predator densities that reduce conflict but maintain a reasonable facsimile of the biodiversity and ecosystem function stewardship that predators can afford. The future of apex predator restoration will therefore require compromise among multiple stakeholders who have different ideas for what successful restoration will mean (43). Although this may generate some conflicts among stakeholders, there are also glimmers of hope for creative solutions that allow the persistence of higher predator densities while avoiding human-wildlife conflict. For example, Can et al. (82) developed a toolbox for minimizing conflict between humans and bears, and Bruskotter and Wilson (83) recently called on psychological theory to generate tolerance for predator recoveries (for example, through increased signage to avoid dangers and increased education about the benefits of large carnivores). The dynamic nature of food webs and the dynamic social preferences for the definition of ecosystem health highlight the need to identify common and conflicting goals of restoration, define ecosystem and social goals, and develop policies that adapt to constantly changing social-ecological systems.
SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIALS Supplementary material for this article is available at http://advances.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2/5/e1501769/DC1 fig. S1. Table of equilibrium solutions for three-species Lotka-Volterra model of IGP for the basal resource (R), the mesopredator (N), and the apex predator (P). fig. S2. Response of the equilibrium densities of the apex predator (P) and mesopredator (N) to increases in the resource’s carrying capacity (K) for stable equilibria in which all three species coexist (RNP), only the resource and mesopredator coexist (RN), and only the resource and the apex predator coexist (RP). fig. S3. Stable (solid line) and unstable (dashed line) equilibrium densities for the apex predator (P) and mesopredator (N) across a range of the apex predator’s prey preferences.
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license, which permits use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, so long as the resultant use is not for commercial advantage and provided the original work is properly cited.
Acknowledgments: We thank M. Mangel, O. Shelton, D. McCauley, and two anonymous reviewers for constructive feedback. Funding: J.F.S. and A.C.S. were funded in part by the Ocean Tipping Points Grant 2897.01 from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and R.D.H. by the University of Florida Foundation. Author contributions: A.C.S. and J.F.S. conceived and designed the study, M.N. and A.C.S. adapted and analyzed the theoretical model, E.J.W. conducted the literature search and synthesis, and K.N.M. contributed the case studies. A.C.S., J.F.S., and M.N. wrote the manuscript, and all authors contributed substantive revisions and conceptual advances. Competing interests: The authors declare that they have no competing interests. Data and materials availability: All data needed to evaluate the conclusions in the paper are present in the paper and/or the Supplementary Materials. Additional data related to this paper may be requested from the authors.
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Marty Morgenstern, the secretary of the California agency that substantially under-reported unemployment claims last week, contributed to President Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential election campaign, The Daily Caller has learned.
On Oct. 11, the federal government reported that weekly jobless claims were down significantly, suggesting a dramatic national increase in economic growth and a steep decline in layoffs. Jobless claims, according to the Labor Department, had fallen by 30,000 to 339,000, their lowest level since February 2008.
The good news for the Obama administration spread quickly, with outlets like CNN and Bloomberg declaring, “Jobless claims fall to four-year low.”
But within hours, the Bureau of Labor Statistics and Labor Department analysts announced that one major state had failed to fully document jobless claims. They declined to name the state.
Speculation among market watchers and economists initially focused on California, but the state’s Employment Development Department strongly denied that it had failed to properly document the data.
“Reports that California failed to fully report data to the U.S. Department of Labor, as required, are incorrect and irresponsible,” California Employment Development Department director Pam Harris said in a statement last week. “The California Employment Development Department, which administers the Unemployment Insurance (UI) program in the state, has reported all UI claims data and submitted the data on time.”
Early Thursday, the federal government finally revealed that California had, in fact, under-reported jobless data, skewing the national jobless claims results. This week’s updated jobs report corrected the error and showed unemployment claims spiking back up by 46,000 to 388,000.
Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown appointed Morgenstern to lead the California Labor & Workforce Development Agency in 2011. The state agency oversees the Employment Development Department.
According to campaign disclosure records, Morgenstern donated $4,600 — the maximum amount allowed by law — to the 2008 Obama camapaign, beginning with a $1,000 contribution to Obama for America in February 2008. Morgenstern followed up that donation with a $1,300 contribution in June, and then a $2,300 payout in early September.
On all three disclosures, Morgenstern indicated that he was either “not employed” or “retired.”
According to the Sacramento Business Journal, however, Morgenstern was employed since 2003 as a consultant for the liberal University of California education system.
California officials have denied wrongdoing.
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Amelia Earhart stands in front of the Lockheed Electra she was trying to fly around the world in 1937.
Courtesy NASA 1937: At 8:43 a.m. local time, the Coast Guard cutter Itasca, steaming off Howland Island, receives this faint transmission from Amelia Earhart: "KHAQQ calling Itasca. We must be on you but cannot see you – but gas is running low…."
She vanishes along with her navigator, Fred Noonan, into the Central Pacific, and they're never heard from again.
The disappearance of the celebrated flier remains perhaps the most tantalizing unsolved mystery in aviation history. In the age of Charles Lindbergh and other daredevil fliers, Amelia Earhart became a household name in 1928, after becoming the first woman to fly across the Atlantic. True, it was as a passenger with a male pilot and copilot, but she soloed across the Atlantic in 1932.
Although fellow pilots rated her as no better than competent, Earhart parlayed her sex and her absolute devotion to flying into a celebrity that few of her contemporaries enjoyed. And it's not like she wasn't legit: Earhart was the first pilot of either sex to successfully fly solo from Honolulu to the U.S. mainland, reaching Oakland, California, on Jan. 11, 1935. She wrote voluminously about her experiences and worked hard to promote aviation, both to women and to the public at large.
By 1937, though, the 39-year-old Earhart was weary of both the celebrity and the flying. Saying she had one last good flight in her, she was determined to make it a doozy: She would fly her specially modified Lockheed L-10E Electra completely around the world.
A first attempt, flying westward from Oakland in March, ended either with a blown tire or pilot error as she was taking off from Honolulu. The plane was badly damaged and shipped back to Lockheed in Los Angeles for repairs.
For the second attempt, Earhart was joined by Noonan. They altered the flight plan for an eastward journey to compensate for shifting weather patterns, and left Oakland on May 21. From Miami, their route took them south along the eastern seaboard of South America, then a hop across the Atlantic Narrows to Africa. They skirted the southern coast of Asia, crossing the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and Australia before arriving in Lae, New Guinea, June 29. They had flown roughly 22,000 miles at this stage and had another 7,000 to go, all of it over the Pacific Ocean.
As they left Lae on July 2, the cutter Itasca was already on station off Howland Island, Earhart's next destination, to help guide the plane in. Ship-to-plane radio contact was established, but something – possibly problems with the radio directional finder aboard the Electra – undermined communications.
Whatever the reason, Noonan was unable to pick up the Itasca's homing signals. Itasca even raised steam for a possible visual sighting, but the aviators were unable to locate either the cutter or Howland Island. Seventy-five minutes after receiving Earhart's last transmission, which included the line, "We are on the line 157/337," the Itasca began searching for the plane.
Such was Earhart's stature that President Franklin Roosevelt dispatched nine U.S. Navy ships and 66 aircraft to help in a search that proved fruitless.
Nevertheless, various stations around the Pacific reported receiving unidentified signals, leading to the hope that Earhart and Noonan had somehow managed to find land somewhere. None of these reports amounted to anything.
Over the years the mystery only deepened, leading to some pretty fanciful theories concerning Earhart's fate, including the possibility that she was captured by the Japanese during World War II and forced to broadcast propaganda to American GIs as Tokyo Rose. Iva Toguri and all the others who broadcast as Rose should have been so lucky.
The likeliest explanation for what became of Earhart and Noonan is that they ran out of fuel, ditched at sea and drowned, but there are other theories out there still being pursued. In any case, they were officially declared dead Jan. 5, 1939.
As for Earhart herself, she knew she was taking a big risk for high stakes:
"Please know I am quite aware of the hazards.... I want to do it because I want to do it. Women must try to do things as men have tried. When they fail their failure must be but a challenge to others."
Source: Various
July 2, 1928: America's First TV Station Goes on the Air
March 6, 1937: Birth of a Soviet Hero, First Woman Into Space
May 6, 1937: A Ball of Fire und Alles Ist Kaput
May 27, 1937: A Bridge Over the Gate? Are You Crazy?
Robot Sub to Hunt for Earhart
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I was walking up the 16th Street Mall this morning when I got stopped by a man offering me a small newspaper called the Denver Voice. It’s a paper written in large part by the homeless, about the homeless, and sold on the streets of Denver by the homeless. For a suggested donation of $1.00, I got a metaphorical smack upside the head, and an article inside the the Voice brought made it smart even more. I hadn’t even noticed, and my lack of noticing was something unusual. Downtown Denver is missing something.
Where are the homeless?
Before the DNC, there were rumors flying around that the homeless would be rounded up and carted away to some other part of the city, or given money for a meal and a bus ticket out of Denver entirely, or even arrested and held for a week on trumped-up charges that would be conveniently dropped Friday or Saturday after the election. But no-one knew for sure. According to the Voice article “Denver Won’t Hide Homeless for the DNC”, New York city police issued “quality of life” tickets in advance of the 2004 convention, and Denver’s homeless were concerned that the same thing would happen here. The article quoted Denver’s Road Home project manager Jamie Van Leeuwen as saying that the DNC would be largely business as usual for homeless shelters, with a few “extending hours or involving the homeless in politics related activities.” And Commander Deborah Dilley, the Denver Police Department’s downtown district commander said in the article that “the homeless won’t be unfairly targeted by any law enforcement during the DNC.”
So where are they?
Most of Denver’s homeless live in the public spaces of downtown and LoDo, panhandle along the 16th Street Mall and the Cherry Creek Path, and sleep in the large parks and public space that have been taken over or blocked off by the DNC, various security forces, and protesters. But they’re all gone. I’ve been getting into downtown between 7 and 8 AM since Monday, walking from one end of downtown to the other, and the only possible homeless people I’ve seen all week were on Sunday up on Capitol Hill, well outside the main areas where the homeless would congregate. And you’d think that, with such a huge influx of people and wealth, panhandlers would be all over the place trying to get as much money from the delegates, press, staff, and politicians as they possibly could. But they aren’t there. They’re not just invisible, they’re actually gone.
I’ve heard rumors that the homeless were given movie tickets during the day to keep them off the streets. But fellow Scrogue Edmundo Rocha, who used as a homeless specialist for the Harris County Community Development Department says that most cities do exactly what DPD Commander Dilley and Van Leeuwen said they weren’t going to do – they round up the homeless and either detain them at an undisclosed detention center, or they ship them off to economically depressed suburbs and away from the throngs of visitors like all of those attending the DNC.
I’ve asked my fellow Scrogues if they’ve seen any homeless, and the only one of us who has seen more than one or two is Edmundo.
It’s terrible thing to be picked up and hauled away, even temporarily, for the “crime” of not being able to afford a home. But they’re not here in downtown Denver, so they have to have gone somewhere. If you know where they’ve gone, if you’ve talked to some of the sudden influx of homeless in your area and they’re from Denver, let us know. We’d like to know who to point a finger at and accuse of caring more for public appearances during the DNC than for the homeless of Denver.
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Updated on January 30th, 2019 by Bob Ciura
Every year, we review all of the Dividend Aristocrats, a group of 57 companies in the S&P 500 Index with 25+ consecutive years of dividend increases.
Leggett & Platt (LEG) might not be a household name, but it is likely that millions of consumers come in contact with one (or more) of the company’s products every day.
Leggett & Platt has also increased its dividend for 47 years in a row. Leggett & Platt has a secure dividend, with the stock currently yielding 3.8%. The company’s dividend is very safe. You can watch the following video for a detailed discussion of Leggett & Platt’s dividend safety:
Keep reading this article to learn more about Leggett & Platt’s business model and investment thesis.
Business Overview
Leggett & Platt is a diversified manufacturing company. It was founded all the way back in 1883 when an inventor named J.P. Leggett created a bedspring that was superior to the existing products at that time.
Today, Leggett & Platt designs and manufactures a wide range of products, including bedding components, bedding industry machinery, steel wire, adjustable beds, carpet cushioning, and vehicle seat support systems. It designs and manufactures products found in many homes and automobiles. The company has a diversified business, both in terms of product mix and geographic split.
Source: Investor Presentation
In late October (10/25/18) Leggett & Platt reported third-quarter sales of $1.1 billion, up 8% from the same quarter last year. Organic revenue increased 6%, including 2% volume growth, indicating strong demand for Leggett & Platt’s products. The company noted growth across multiple product categories, including U.S. Spring, Automotive, Adjustable Bed, Aerospace, Steel Rod, and Work Furniture. Acquisitions, net of divestitures, contributed an additional 2% to quarterly sales growth.
Leggett & Platt generated earnings-per-share of $0.67 for the quarter, up 10% year-over-year. Sales growth was the primary reason for the double-digit earnings growth last quarter, along with higher profit margins in the Steel Rod businesses. Tax reform and share repurchases also helped boost earnings, partially offset by higher raw materials and transportation costs.
Leggett & Platt later released an update for an expected fourth-quarter charge of approximately $16 million pre-tax, approximately half of which is non-cash. The charge pertains to the company’s Fashion Bed and Home Furniture segments, and is related to a restructuring of these operations. The charge will reduce GAAP earnings-per-share by $0.19 for the fourth quarter, although adjusted results are expected to remain unaffected.
We maintain a positive long-term growth outlook for Leggett & Platt.
Growth Prospects
Leggett & Platt aims for at least 6% annual revenue growth. To reach its goal, the company will utilize a multi-faceted approach. First, acquisitions will help boost growth. Leggett & Platt has a long-held policy of acquiring smaller companies to expand its market dominance in existing categories, or to branch out into new areas.
Leggett & Platt continues to pursue bolt-on acquisitions, such as the recent $1.25 billion purchase of Elite Comfort Solutions.
Source: Investor Presentation
The acquisition of Elite Comfort Solutions will significantly expand Leggett & Platt’s exposure to specialty foam and other hybrid bed products. Elite Comfort Solutions generated $611 million in sales last year. And, it has EBITDA margins above that of Leggett & Platt, so the acquisition is expected to be accretive to earnings starting in 2020.
Share repurchases will also help maintain earnings growth. At quarter-end, Leggett & Platt had 130.4 million shares outstanding, a 1.1% reduction over the last 12 months.
Another key component of Leggett & Platt’s earnings growth strategy is cost controls. It continuously evaluates its portfolio to ensure it is investing in the highest-growth opportunities, and it is not afraid to divest low-margin businesses with poor expected growth. For low-growth or low-margin businesses, it either improves performance, or exits the category. The company also drives cost reductions across the business, including in selling, general, and administrative expenses, and distribution costs.
Leggett & Platt has been able to reach its long-term growth targets thanks in large part to its significant competitive advantages in the core industries in which it operates.
Competitive Advantages & Recession Performance
Leggett & Platt has established a wide economic “moat”, meaning it has several operational advantages, which keep competitors at bay. First, the company enjoys a leadership position in the industry, which allows for scale. Globally, Leggett & Platt has 17 business units, with 130 manufacturing facilities across 19 countries.
Leggett & Platt also benefits from operating in a fragmented industry, which makes it easier to establish a dominant position. In most of its product markets, there are few, or no, large competitors. And when a smaller competitor does achieve significant market share, Leggett & Platt can simply acquire them, as it did with Elite Comfort Solutions.
Leggett & Platt also has an extensive patent portfolio, which is critical in keeping competition at bay. Leggett & Platt has impressive intellectual property, consisting of approximately 1,500 patents issued and nearly 1,000 registered trademarks.
Together, these competitive advantages help Leggett & Platt maintain healthy margins and consistent profitability. That said, the company did not perform well during the Great Recession.
Earnings-per-share during the Great Recession are shown below:
2006 earnings-per-share of $1.57
2007 earnings-per-share of $0.28 (82% decline)
2008 earnings-per-share of $0.73 (161% increase)
2009 earnings-per-share of $0.74 (1% increase)
2010 earnings-per-share of $1.15 (55% increase)
This earnings volatility should not come as a surprise. As primarily a mattress and furniture products manufacturer, it is reliant on a healthy housing market for growth. The housing market collapsed during the Great Recession, which caused a significant decline in earnings-per-share in 2007.
Leggett & Platt is also reliant on consumer confidence, as roughly two-thirds of furniture purchases in the United States are replacements of existing products. When the economy enters a downturn, consumer confidence typically declines.
It also took several years for Leggett & Platt to recover from the effects of the Great Recession. Earnings continued to rise after 2007, but earnings-per-share did not exceed 2006 levels until 2012. This demonstrates that Leggett & Platt is not a recession-resistant business.
Fortunately, the company maintains a strong financial position, which allows it to remain profitable and continue increasing dividends each year, even during recessions. The company had a debt-to-EBITDA ratio of 2.3x at the end of last quarter, along with a net-debt-to-capital ratio below 40%.
Valuation & Expected Returns
Using the midpoint of management guidance, Leggett & Platt is expected to generate earnings-per-share of $2.45 for 2018. Based on this, the stock trades for a price-to-earnings ratio of 16.4, compared with our fair value estimate of 18.0.
We believe a higher stock valuation is warranted, due to the company’s steady growth over many years, and long dividend history. Leggett & Platt also has positive earnings growth expectations going forward. Expansion of the stock valuation multiple could boost annual returns by 1.9% through 2024.
Combining valuation changes with 6.0% expected annual earnings growth and the 3.8% dividend yield, we expect total returns of nearly 12% per year for Leggett & Platt stock over the next five years. This is a strong rate of return for a blue-chip company.
Final Thoughts
Leggett & Platt has utilized a proven growth strategy, that has been successful for over 130 years. The company is highly profitable, and has a solid 3% dividend yield.
With an operating history of more than 100+ years, a 3%+ dividend yield, and dividend increases for 47 years in a row, Leggett & Platt has also earned a place on our list of “blue-chip” stocks. You can see the full list of blue-chip stocks here.
As a result, Leggett & Platt is an attractive stock for investors interested in stable dividend growth stocks.
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The St. Louis Rams entered their first season under coach Jeff Fisher with a starting lineup averaging 26.7 years old. That was eight months ago. At least eight of the starting spots figure to change over this offseason. The new starters are almost invariably younger.
As a result, the current projected starters average about one year younger overall even though 14 of them are eight months older than they were entering last season.
Some of the positions remain open for competition, but the trend is unmistakeable. One of the NFL's youngest teams has gotten younger in lots of places. Seven of the 10 oldest players entering last season are no longer with the team (Mario Haggan, Quintin Mikell, Wayne Hunter, Rocky McIntosh, Steven Jackson, Robert Turner and Matthew Mulligan).
We can easily see the Rams' leadership putting its stamp on the organization in ways that make sense for the long term. It's tough to know in some cases whether the benefits will be immediate. There figure to be growing pains and a few disappointments along with the excitement that comes with developing dynamic young talent.
D'Marco Farr, Randy Karraker and I discussed expectations surrounding the Rams in relation to their NFC West rivals during our conversation Tuesday on 101ESPN St. Louis. We'll be talking Rams and the NFC West on Tuesday afternoons from this point forward. This will replace my Tuesday conversations with Bernie Miklasz on the same station. Bernie recently vacated his show. I'm looking forward to the new arrangement and to reconnecting with Bernie as he takes on an expanded role at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and its website.
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Study: What Puts Cyclists at Greatest Risk? It’s Not What You Wear
When a cyclist is killed or seriously injured, the responses you hear often pin the blame squarely on the victim. “Why wasn’t she wearing a helmet?” Or, “Why was he wearing dark clothing? ”
But according to a new study [PDF] by a team of Canadian university researchers, those factors don’t seem to have much impact on the overall severity of injury when cyclists are hurt in collisions.
The report looked at injury severity among about 700 adults in Toronto and Vancouver who were hospitalized after a bike collision or fall. Researchers teased out which factors had the biggest impact on the extent of people’s injuries.
Here’s what they found.
What DID Put Cyclists at Greater Risk?
Being hit by car
Duh, of course! But this point is worth reiterating. The cyclists who were injured in collisions with cars, or by falling to avoid a car collision, were more severely injured than people who just fell, or were involved in a collision with another cyclist or pedestrian.
Riding on sidewalks or shared use paths
Researchers found that people who were injured while riding on sidewalks or shared-use paths tended to sustain worse injuries, even compared to cyclists riding on major roads with no bike infrastructure. These counterintuitive results suggest that riding in places with potential conflicts between cyclists and pedestrians can be more dangerous than people assume. An earlier study by the same research team found people riding on sidewalks and multi-use paths were also more likely overall to be involved in a collision or crash.
Riding downhill
Logically enough, cyclists who were riding downhill at the time of the collision were likely to sustain worse injuries.
Riding in areas with fast-moving cars
There was a statistically significant connection between injury severity and riding along high-speed roads.
What WASN’T Linked to More Severe Injury?
All of these characteristics about the way people rode did not have a statistically significant impact on injury severity among the subjects in this study.
Helmet use
The study looked at all types of injuries, not just head injuries. Helmets only prevent head injuries and only certain types, researchers noted. Those effects did not register in this study, which found helmets had no statistically significant impact on overall injury severity.
Weather conditions
While time of day may be a risk factor, with night-time riding being slightly more dangerous than riding during the day, inclement weather was not associated with greater risk of severe injury.
Location of crash at an intersection
Cyclists were not more likely to be badly injured if their fall or crash occurred at an intersection.
Other factors with no statistically significant link to worse injuries: wearing dark or light clothing, road signage about the presence of cyclists, and whether the cyclist had taken a cycling training course.
The researchers concluded that the study shows an “urgent need” for bike facilities that separate cyclists from motor vehicles, as well as routes that offer slower motor vehicle speeds and gradual inclines.
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An Ashburn, Va. CEO accused of murder showed no reaction when a detective told him his wife was dead, according to court testimony last week.
Braulio Castillo was in court Thursday, on accusations he killed his estranged wife and tried to make her death look like a suicide.
He is charged with the first-degree murder of Michelle Castillo. The couple had five children together. At the time of Michelle Castillo's death, the couple had been going through a divorce, and she had obtained a protective order against him.
Police found her body hanging in a basement bathroom on the morning of March 20. Investigators say she was beaten and suffocated, then hanged in a basement shower to make the death look like a suicide.
Braulio Castillo was arrested 10 days later.
The courtroom was filled Thursday with Michelle Castillo's friends -- friends who've told investigators the mother of five feared for her life.
On Thursday, homicide detective Mark McCaffrey testified that when he called Braulio Castillo on the morning of March 20 to say he had something important to discuss, Castillo said he'd call back. McCaffrey says he then sped to Castillo home and found him on the phone.
"He told me he was on the phone with his attorney and he wasn't going to speak with me," said McCaffrey.
McCaffrey said told Castillo, "'You can't talk to me, but I can tell you something. Your wife is dead.' He just looked at me and said, 'Oh.'"
The prosecutor asked, "Did he ask anything about how his wife died?"
McCaffrey said no.
But defense attorney Alex Levay suggested that Castillo might have given the detective the cold shoulder that day because he had violated a protective order when he picked up his kids at the house that morning, after they couldn't find their mom.
A Loudoun County crime scene investigator also testified about evidence collected in Michelle Castillo's home. He said a "collection of hair" was found both in the bathroom where her body was found, and in the master bedroom. There was also a stain on a pillow.
During a bond hearing earlier this month, Levay told the judge, "There's zero evidence Braulio Castillo was in the house."
Prosecutors say the Castillos' children may have seen some of what happened the night their mother died. Their three-year-old told a detective that "Mommy and Daddy were both together" at the house.
In divorce paperwork, Michelle Castillo complained about her husband's erratic and abusive behavior. She had accused her husband of being physically abusive and threatening her before they separated, according to court documents obtained by News4.
Castillo was the CEO of a small technology contractor in Leesburg.
Tuesday, a judge will set Castillo's trial date.
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Today is the first day of the Xbox Live Indie Games Summer Uprising promotion. Like promotions in the past, this event is created to boost awareness of select indie games from interesting new developers. In an attempt to bolster support for the titles further, the developers have offered their soundtracks free of charge.
The grand total for all games on this list is $11. If you are looking for console gaming on the cheap, pay attention this week. Alongside this announcement is the arrival of a new Xbox Live Indie Games application for Android, Windows Phone 7 and iOS (as soon as it gets approved). I welcome anything that helps highlight high quality games over massagers any day.
The full list of games and their debut dates for the event are as follows:
Week 1
Mon Sep 10th – qrth-phyl – 80 MSP ($1)
Tues Sep 11th – Sententia – 80 MSP ($1)
Wed Sep 12th – Diehard Dungeon – 80 MSP ($1)
Thurs Sep 13th – Gateways – 240 MSP ($3)
Fri Sep 14th – Smooth Operators – 80 MSP ($1)
Week 2
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When the Bills acquired Matt Cassel in a trade with the Vikings this offseason, the idea was that Cassel could be a starter, at least as a stopgap until Buffalo found a long-term answer at quarterback.
But it may not work out that way.
Cassel was so bad at minicamp that Mike Rodak of ESPN writes that there’s a real chance Cassel won’t even make the regular-season roster. At the moment EJ Manuel appears to have a leg up on Cassel, and Tyrod Taylor is being given every chance to win the starting job as well. Cassel could be the odd man out.
A report last month said that Manuel is no lock to make the roster, either, which indicates that things are wide open in Buffalo’s quarterback competition. But there’s an important difference between Manuel and Cassel: Manuel’s contract is guaranteed, meaning the Bills are on the hook to pay him $2.8 million the next two years whether he’s on the team or not. Cassel’s $4.15 million base salary is not guaranteed, meaning the Bills save that money if they cut him before the season starts.
All of which means that if Cassel doesn’t separate himself as the clear top quarterback on the roster, he may not be on the roster at all. And so far, Cassel is not distinguishing himself.
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[vc_row no_margin=”true”][vc_column width=”1/1″]It took a couple weeks more than he hoped, but Carolina Panthers tight end Brandon Williams finally returned to the practice field Wednesday.
A groin injury forced Williams to start camp on the physically unable to perform list. Now off it, and with Ed Dickson out with a stomach bug, Williams jumped right into special teams and even took some snaps with the starters on offense.
“I’m a bit rusty, but I feel good. Really good, as a matter of fact,” he said.
Williams had minor surgery in June for an injury that occurred six months earlier. He first tweaked his groin running down on a kickoff during the regular-season finale in Atlanta. “It felt OK” during the playoffs, but then never fully healed in the offseason.
“I went through OTAs, and it wasn’t right,” Williams said. “Finally I realized there was something wrong.”
Williams made just four receptions his first two years, and returning midway through the preseason schedule has put him on the bubble. But his true value is special teams, and with four-phase special teams guy Richie Brockel dealing with a potentially serious shoulder injury, Williams still has a good chance to make the roster.
He hopes to play in Friday’s preseason game against the Patriots to “knock some of the cobwebs off.” If he doesn’t, he at least took a big step Wednesday.
“It’s so great just being able to be out here with my teammates and do what I love and take some of the load off them. I kind of felt bad not being here, not so much for myself, but for them because they had to take a bunch of extra reps,” Williams said.
“Training camp’s supposed to be a time where guys come together as a team; you lean on each other. It didn’t feel good them not being able to lean on me, so it’s good to be back.”[line][vc_raw_html]
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8 years ago
Washington (CNN) – Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota didn't exactly accept an apology from Fox News' Chris Wallace following an interaction she felt was "insulting" on "Fox News Sunday."
Wallace asked Bachmann "Are you a flake?" in a Sunday interview and later apologized via web video.
"A lot of you were more than perturbed, you were upset and felt that I had been rude to her," Wallace said on his website. "And since in the end it's really all about the answers and not about the questions, I messed up, I'm sorry. I didn't mean any disrespect."
When asked about the apology on ABC, Bachmann, who will announce her presidential campaign Monday, said it is "insulting to insinuate that a candidate for president is less than serious."
"I'm a very serious individual. I have a strong background, a strong resume," Bachmann said. "Those are the small issues, I'm focused on the big ones."
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My project.
This post assumes that the reader has read my last post.
I started the change in the line representation. Instead of a single linked list of free lines, it’s better to work with line groups, to avoid fragmentation inside lines in allocation. I’ve create a struct to represent this line group, with a pointer to the next group, and the size, in lines, of the group. It is stored in includes/rts/storage/GC.h currently, but I’m not sure if this is the best place to put it, and I’m thinking about changing it latter.
#include "rts/OSThreads.h" typedef struct line_ { struct line_ *next; StgWord size; } line; /* -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Then we need to change the code of liberation of lines in rts/sm/Sweep.c .
else if(!(bd->flags & BF_MEDIUM)) { StgBool sequence; sequence = 0; for(i = 1; i < BLOCK_SIZE_W / BITS_IN(W_); i++) { StgPtr start; start = bd->start + BITS_IN(W_) * i; if(bd->u.bitmap[i] == 0 && bd->u.bitmap[i - 1] == 0 && start + BITS_IN(W_) <= bd->free) { printf("DEBUG: line_found(%p)
", start); fflush(stdout); if(gen->first_line == NULL) { gen->first_line = (line *) start; } if(sequence) { last_line->size++; } else { if(last_line != NULL) { last_line->next = (line *) start; } last_line = (line *) start; last_line->next = NULL; last_line->size = 1; } sequence = 1; } else { sequence = 0; }
I’ve tested this code using the same technique as before, checking the produced list trasversing it after it’s done. The list obtained showed the correct lines.
Now I’m back to the allocation code, which never worked. The changes in rts/sm/Evac.c are straightfoward.
if (gen->first_line != NULL && size <= BITS_IN(W_) * gen->first_line->size) { ws->todo_free = (StgPtr) gen->first_line; ws->todo_lim = ws->todo_free + BITS_IN(W_) * gen->first_line->size; gen->first_line = gen->first_line->next; to = ws->todo_free; }
This cause the same kind of errors I was getting before. I should go back to debugging. My co-supervisor in my Oriented Project in Computer Science suggested me using valgrind. I’ll try it.
Last week I forgot to mention I’ve presented my final presentation about my Oriented Project in Computer Science. This week I finished writing my monograph.
Anúncios
Curtir isso: Curtir Carregando... Relacionado
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The latest in free LEGO Worlds DLC is here, the LECO City Emergency brick builds & vehicles! New buildings, rides, and minifigure characters await you in this awesome collection of LEGO Fire, Police & Airport sets! Friend of the site JayShockBlast has already played through the content and shared his video with us, make sure to watch it and check out our break down gallery below!
Four new Brick Build Showcase downloads await you in the home screen featuring three huge LEGO City themed builds with one extra bit of roadwork as a finishing touch!
Police Station
This build is full of new pieces & vehicles to discover plus a handful of missions & new Police (Sunglasses) minifigure!
The Police Station also has four new vehicles to discover and unlock including Crook’s Truck, Police Station Car, Police Motorcycle & Police Helicopter!
Missions include helping a crook break out of jail & filling the station with guard dogs!
Fire Station
The Fire Station Brick Build is packed with great new minifigure firefighter variants, vehicles & building accessories like a rotating glass door & flaming food cart!
Vehicles include a huge Fire Truck, a speedy little Fire Rescue Car & a new Fire Fighter Helicopter variant! You will also be able to unlock a new Dalmatian Fire Station Dog, and complete a few quests.
Airport Terminal & Runway
While the airport is mostly empty (except for a few new discoverable building pieces) it is still pretty great. The giant glass walled building with tall Air Traffic Control tower is fun to explore!
The game already has plenty of planes to store and take off from the Airport Terminal, and now you’ll be able to do that with an official Runway build! This build is a relatively simple road with the addition of one cool new discoverable build element, the blinking runway light!
Overall this is a pretty great free DLC for a wonderful game! Make sure you log in soon and download these build elements as they don’t last in the Brick Build Showcase forever!
Let us know what you think of these items in the comments below!
*If the content isn’t in your Brick Build Showcase you might need to close out your game and wait until morning for the game to recheck the servers!*
Want More Lego Game News?
Make sure you follow, like and subscribe across all our social media pages!
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North Korea has launched a ballistic missile from a submarine off its east coast, South Korean defense officials said in a statement.
The missile, launched about 5:50 a.m. local time Wednesday (2050 UTC Tuesday), flew about 500 kilometers, South Korea's military said. The statement said it wasn't immediately known if the launch was successful.
U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM) said the launch of "a presumed KN-11 submarine launched ballistic missile" occurred off the coast of Sinpo.
"We strongly condemn this and North Korea's other recent missile tests, which violate U.N. Security Council resolutions explicitly prohibiting North Korea's launches using ballistic missile technology," said a statement by the U.S. agency.
Earlier Tuesday, the United Nations Command said North Korea has been laying new landmines on its side of its heavily fortified border with South Korea.
North Korean soldiers have been spotted planting anti-personnel mines on its side of the so-called Bridge of No Return, a river crossing near the border truce village of Panmunjom.
The U.N. Command, which oversees the cease-fire that ended the 1950-53 Korean War, condemned Pyongyang in a statement released Tuesday, saying it "seriously jeopardizes the safety of people on both sides" of the Demilitarized Zone.
North Korea has been blamed for planting landmines along the DMZ that detonated last year, maiming two South Korean soldiers patrolling the border.
The U.S.-led command would not speculate on why North Korea is taking such action, but South Korea's Yonhap news agency said it was told by a government source that the mines are there to prevent front-line North Korean troops from defecting.
Escalating tensions
The launch comes at a time of escalating tensions between the two countries and a day after South Korea and the United States began their annual joint military exercises. About 25,000 U.S. forces and 50,000 South Korean troops are involved in the two-week Operation Ulchi Freedom exercise, which is largely simulated.
North Korea threatened military retaliation. A statement issued Monday by the North's military said its first-strike units were ready to turn the United States and Washington "into a heap of ashes through a Korean-style preemptive nuclear strike," if North Korea's sovereignty is threatened.
Both South Korea and the U.S. insist the exercises are purely defensive in nature.
Tensions on the Korean peninsula have worsened in recent months, with North Korea enduring harsh U.N. sanctions over a series of tests of its nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.
Relations are also aggravated by the recent defection of a high-ranking diplomat, Thae Yong Ho, Pyongyang's deputy ambassador to Britain.
South Korean President Park Guen-hye told her National Security Council on Monday that Thae's defection was a sign of "serious cracks" in North Korea's ruling structure.
North and South Korea technically remain in a state of war dating from the 1950-'53 civil war that ended with a truce rather than a peace treaty.
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Two new smartphones that are powerful work tools compared side-by-side
By Geri L. Dreiling, Esq. and Enrique Serrano
A mobile phone is for more than just talking. A smartphone now functions as a calendar, calculator, GPS, videocamera and an organizer. It is, without a doubt, an indispensable work tool.
Recently, we highlighted the smartphone improvements offered by the iPhone 4S. Now, Google is upping the ante with the Samsung Galaxy Nexus. For our readers pondering an upgrade, we have culled through all of the latest facts and rumors circulating about the Samsung Galaxy Nexus. Here is our analysis of the technical specifications to help you decide whether a new purchase is warranted.
Conclusions of the comparison between the iPhone and the Galaxy Nexus
To summarize the iPhone and the Galaxy Nexus comparisons:
The Galaxy Nexus features a slick, curved design. It’s wider and taller than the iPhone, but it’s also thinner than the iPhone 4S, 4 or 3GS.
than the iPhone, but it’s also than the iPhone 4S, 4 or 3GS. The iPhone is heavier than the Galaxy Nexus, but just by a few grams.
While the iPhone still doesn’t have 4G support, there will be a 4G LTE version of the Galaxy Nexus . Nevertheless, it is rumored that this version will make the phone slightly thicker and heavier.
. Nevertheless, it is rumored that this version will make the phone slightly thicker and heavier. The iPhone 4S and the Galaxy Nexus can record 1080p HD video .
. The 1.3 MP front camera of the Galaxy Nexus, used for videoconferencing, beats the VGA camera of the iPhone 4S. Nevertheless, the 5-element lens, 8 MP camera on the iPhone 4S beats the main 5 MP back camera on the Galaxy Nexus phone. However, the zero-shutter-delay and dual LED flash of the Galaxy Nexus means it is equipped with a decent smartphone camera.
beats the main 5 MP back camera on the Galaxy Nexus phone. However, the zero-shutter-delay and dual LED flash of the Galaxy Nexus means it is equipped with a decent smartphone camera. The iPhone 4’s retina screen was a big step forward when compared to the display of the iPhone 3GS but the iPhone 4 and the iPhone 4S have the same screen resolution. On the other hand, the Galaxy Nexus has a bigger, higher resolution HD Super AMOLED screen of 1280 x 720 pixels and 316 ppi.
pixels and 316 ppi. The iPhone 4S has twice the overall performance than the previous iPhone 4, and around 7 times more graphics speed. Nevertheless, the Galaxy Nexus will probably perform even better due to its 1.2 GHz TI dual core processor and to 1 GB of RAM memory. (The clock speed of the iPhone 4S is limited to 800 Mhz and the amount of RAM memory is 512 MB.)
TI dual core processor and to 1 GB of RAM memory. (The clock speed of the iPhone 4S is limited to 800 Mhz and the amount of RAM memory is 512 MB.) The maximum data speed of the iPhone 4S of 14.4 Mbps duplicated the maximum data speed of the iPhone 4. The data download speed of the Galaxy Nexus on 4G networks is going to be even faster, reaching top download speeds of up to 21.1 Mbps .
is going to be even faster, reaching top download speeds of up to . Battery consumption of the iPhone 4S is probably its main drawback when compared to previous iPhone models. It lasts 100 hours less in standby than the iPhone 4 or the iPhone 3GS. We don’t have any official data on the battery life of the Galaxy Nexus but initial reviews about the battery duration ranged from "average" to "good."
Both smartphones boast upgraded operating systems. ( iOS 4 and Android 4.0 – Ice-Cream Sandwich.) New features abound in both software versions. The personal assistant Siri of the iPhone 4S is probably the most talked about feature, as it allows you to control many tasks on the iPhone using natural language. It is a step beyond the voice recognition features present on the new Android smartphone.
– Ice-Cream Sandwich.) New features abound in both software versions. The personal assistant Siri of the iPhone 4S is probably the most talked about feature, as it allows you to control many tasks on the iPhone using natural language. It is a step beyond the voice recognition features present on the new Android smartphone. Technically speaking, the iPhone 4S and the Galaxy Nexus are clearly superior to their predecessors — and their price reflects it. The iPhone 4S has models with data storage capacity ranging from 16 to 64 GB, its price plans start at $199 – but the contract terms vary, and the 16 GB version locked to AT&T retails for $699.95 USD. (Affiliate link) The Galaxy Nexus is available on 16 GB and on 32 GB models, and its pricing plans are rumored to be starting on $299, while Amazon.co.uk is already listing the unlocked version at a price of £519.99 GBP.
Are you considering an upgrade to an iPhone 4S or a Samsung Galaxy Nexus? If have you have already tried one of those last generation smartphones, tell us about your experience.
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The Mumbai crime branch has busted a three-member gang involved in purchasing stolen mobile phones and selling them back to customers. They did so after changing the IMEI data of the stolen phones with those of outdated or discarded mobile phones using a software.
The arrested accused have been identified as Sameer Bhayani, 47, Ashok Sant and Tushar Rajput. The police claim that Rajput is a software engineer. At least 114 stolen mobile phones have been seized from the gang.
According to deputy commissioner of police Ambadas Pote, information about a gang changing IMEI data of stolen phones and selling them in the market in the Malad and Borivli areas was received by inspectors Deepak Phatangre, Jyotsna Rasam and Sunil Mane.
A trap was laid near Orlem Church in Malad (W) on Wednesday afternoon and Bhayani was apprehended. The police found seven mobile phones whose IMEI numbers were changed, IMEI labels and blank cash memos in his possession. A case was then registered at the Malad police station in this regard under relevant sections of Indian Penal Code and the Information Technology Act.
"Bhayani revealed that he used to buy stolen mobile phones and gave them to Sant and Rajput. The latter two used to change the IMEI numbers with those of outdated or China-made mobile phones. Later, the phones were sold to unsuspecting customers. For every IMEI number, Sant and Rajput used to charge Rs500," said inspector Phatangre.
Inspector Rasam said based on the information provided by Bhayani, the police raided two shops in Malad and Borivli run by Sant and Rajput and seized goods worth Rs4 lakh, including 114 mobile phones. "We have also seized the hard disk of Bhayani's computer from his residence," she said.
"Bhayani has a mobile repairing shop. The stolen mobile phone prices ranged from Rs5000 to Rs50,000. It has been learnt that Rajput has been using flashing software to change the IMEI numbers. The said software is a pirated one. The trio is in police custody. They have been operating for the past six months and are believed to have changed numbers of at least 250 phones," said inspector Mane.
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MUMBAI: Senior NCP leader Chhagan Bhujbal apeared before the office of Enforcement Directorate (ED) on March 14 to record his statement in Rs 870 crore money laundering case connected with the Maharashtra Sadan scam. Last week, ED had issued summon asking Bhujbal to appear before them for questioning.The local police deployed heavy bandobast in the area anticipating that NCP supporters may try to create ruckus in the area. The police issued an order across the city, prohibiting assembly of five or more persons.The ED had arrested Bhujbal’s nephew and former Member of Parliament Sameer in the case on February 1, under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). They want to interrogate Bhujbal about the money trail that they suspect Bhujbals received as kickbacks from the RTO land deal. Sameer is in jail custody presently. The ED had earlier questioned Bhujbal’s MLA son Pankaj in the case.ED had tightened their grip on Bhujbal after state anti-corruption bureau (ACB) had filed a chargesheet against him recently for forgery, cheating, breach of trust, criminal conspiracy and under the Prevention of Corruption act. The ED translated the chargesheet into English and after detail examination they prepared a questionnaire for Bhujbal. They want to question Bhujbal about the suspicious money transactions. The ED will decide their further course of action against Bhujbal based on his replies, said a source.ED officials earlier stated that Bhujbal family paid cash to various individuals and entities, who returned the money by cheque by purchasing shares of the Bhujbal companies at a high premium. ED recorded confessional statement of various witnesses who admitted that they had collected cash from Bhujbals and returned the money through cheques. The ED officials earlier informed the special court that Bhujbals received funds through criminal activities and created bogus entities to channelize the money.The kickbacks identified and provisionally attached by the ED so far are to the tune of Rs 114 crore in the Sadan scam. The money trail, including end use of the proceeds of crime, to the tune of approximately Rs 750 crore is yet to be identified. The present value of the properties purchased through the bribe money could be three to four times more than the actual investment. For instance, the Bhujbal’s purchased an old Bandra building (now a plot) in Rs 18 crore in 2006 from the alleged bribe money. The ED attach the plot and present value of the land is worth Rs 80 crore.
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It has been a decade since Liliane last saw her little girl. She fled Africa in fear for her life, leaving behind everything she knew and loved in the hope of a fresh start in Japan.
Today, she scrapes a living from dead-end jobs, and what Japanese she knows has been snatched from television shows. There is little government help for people like her: free language courses are limited, social housing is hard to find, discrimination is rife.
Yet Liliane is regarded as one of the lucky ones - she was granted refugee status in Japan, a country which refuses more than 99 percent of cases.
"It has not been easy," she tells AFP, speaking under a pseudonym.
She adds: "Here they do not pay for your studies, they do not help you to get bank loans, or give you social housing... we are left to ourselves, we have to fight alone."
Anti-refugee sentiment is rising in Europe and the United States but in Japan those seeking haven from tyranny and war have long faced daunting legal and social gauntlets.
One of the world's wealthiest countries, Japan accepted just 28 refugees in 2016 - one more than the previous year - out of the 8,193 applications reviewed by the Immigration Bureau.
Officials defend the low number, saying applicants are mainly from Asian countries seeking access to Japan solely for economic reasons.
"The number of applications from regions which generate lots of refugees, such as Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, is small," said Yasuhiro Hishida, spokesman for the Immigration Bureau.
Assisted by the UN, Liliane was able to claim asylum on arrival in Japan stating that her life was in danger due to tribal conflict back home. It took two years for officials to accept her as a refugee, a period during which she received assistance from the Catholic Church and charities.
But she feels the status brought few benefits. She is no closer to reuniting with her child - now a teenager, her daughter has repeatedly been denied a permit to even visit.
For Liliane, further education and a stable life, seem out of reach.
Nonnon, a 47-year-old refugee and nail artist from Burma, holding a map of her country at a nail salon in Tokyo Credit: AFP
She explains: "Japan is a very difficult country for foreigners. The language is really a handicap for us. You need to do absolutely everything to try to speak in Japanese but you don't know where to find free lessons."
"Sometimes I think refugee status has no meaning," she sighs.
But for Nonnon, being awarded refugee status would at least give her a sense of belonging.
She fled military persecution in her native Burma, also known as Myanmar, 25 years ago but remains in frustrating legal limbo, accepted only on a humanitarian stay visa, which allows for residence and work but traditionally only on annual temporary permits subject to anxiety-riven renewal.
"It's like I have no nationality," said the 47-year-old, who only gave her childhood nickname.
She has tried to forge a life in Japan, she married a man from Myanmar who was also claiming asylum and they have a son and a daughter. But their children are effectively stateless - not recognised in Burma, nor as Japanese citizens.
Refugee advocates say Japan's system is too harsh.
Lawyer Shogo Watanabe is helping a woman from Burma's Kachin minority who says she risks sexual assault by soldiers fighting ethnic minority militias if she goes home.
"To me, the risk of getting raped by someone who is a member of the military is a legitimate reason to be a refugee," he said of her plight.
"But immigration officials say you need to prove that she is actually targeted by the military."
Critics also say current government policy ignores the country's need for immigrants as the population shrinks.
"Japan has kept a mindset of closing doors to foreigners as it is an island nation that until recently had ample population," said Hidenori Sakanaka, a former Justice Ministry official who heads a pro-immigration think tank.
The population is set to decline to 87 million by 2060 from 127 million today.
An elderly man and woman sit on a bench in a park in Tokyo Credit: AFP
He added that Japan must "accept more migrants, which would make society more open to multiple cultures and... to accepting more refugees".
The first Justice Ministry survey into discrimination against foreigners, released in March, found that 30 percent said they had been on the receiving end of discriminatory remarks.
One in four of the respondents that had sought employment, believed they did not get the job because they were not Japanese.
"For us with our black skin, it is a bit difficult. Sometimes when I sit on the train, some Japanese switch seats," Liliane reveals, though she adds she has never feared for her safety, which is a major concern for asylum seekers in Europe.
She says she was overlooked for teaching work, despite her fluency in English, when employers realised she is African.
Nonnon, who currently works in a nail salon, recalls being paid less than Japanese workers for doing the same job. She contrasts her situation to that of family members who escaped to other countries.
"My relatives in America and Australia were given refugee status and they are naturalised. They can get a job, buy a house and travel overseas," she said, adding: "They can live as normal people. I want to live like a normal person."
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Because Ryan Murphy has nothing but contempt for fans of American Horror Story, he’s bringing back John Carrol Lynch’s Twisty the Clown in some form for the show’s seventh season. The last time we saw this most terrifying figure it was at the end of AHS: Freak Show. After ascending (descending?) to freak heaven, Twisty was beckoned by Elsa Mars (Jessica Lange) to join her in the serene misfit afterlife. If you somehow don’t remember Twisty, he’s this guy:
Oh, that heavy-breathing mountain of terror isn’t stirring any memories? Maybe you need to see him running at you to remember.
Clearly, the only more frightening monster than Twisty is Ryan Murphy, because Twisty only goes where he’s told, and Murphy is summoning the demon once again to infect your dreams.
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© YURI GRIPAS U.S. President Barack Obama's hand with wedding ring
The biggest concern most of us have when shaking hands is The biggest concern most of us have when shaking hands is whether or not to use sanitizer afterward — especially during cold and flu season . But then again, most of us aren't the president of the United States.
Wherever President Obama goes, crowds are eager to reach out and touch him. He's become a handshaking pro who takes precautions — like slyly slipping off his wedding band before extending his hand to an excited group of strangers.
When the president greeted those gathered at an airport in Greensboro, North Carolina, Tuesday, cameras caught him taking off his gold ring and putting it in his pocket just seconds before the handshakes began.
But why take it off at all? Our TODAY anchors pondered all the possible reasons.
"You know what it might be?" Hoda mused. "When someone squeezes (his hand), it hurts. Maybe it's a pain problem."
Savannah suspected it had more do with a fear that the band "will slip off."
"Maybe he landed in Vegas, and those were all magicians he was shaking hands with," Carson suggested.
© JIM WATSON US President Barack Obama greets supporters
Whatever the reason, this isn't the first time the commander in chief has done it.
Obama has been spotted slipping off his ring a few times over the years, but it's an action he does so seamlessly, it rarely gains attention.
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Joining us this week is the director of game entertainment and content for Canucks Sports & Entertainment, Ryan Nicholas.
Before working for the Canucks, Ryan was a producer for EA Sports, where he worked on the NHL and FIFA Franchises. Throughout his career, he has spent time with CTV, MTV Canada and Greedy Productions, where he won an Emmy Award in 2007.
Ryan oversees the conceptualization and production of Canucks digital and broadcast content. He also produces video for television, Canucks.com and presentation at Rogers Arena.
We ask Ryan about last years’ changes to the fan experience and discuss at length about all Canucks’ produced content. Some favourites like All Access, Mic’d up and Sedin vs. Sedin are touched on. We also get the full rundown on the Rogers Arena 20 years in 20 nights that will be happening this year.
Enjoy!
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DH Vancouver Staff Daily Hive is the evolution of Vancity Buzz, established in Vancouver in 2008. In 2016, the publication rebranded and opened newsrooms in Calgary, Toronto, and Montreal. Send story tips to @DailyHiveVan @DailyHiveVancouver Daily Hive is the evolution of Vancity Buzz, established in Vancouver in 2008. In 2016, the publication rebranded and opened newsrooms in Calgary, Toronto, and Montreal. Send story tips to [email protected]
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Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi confirmed Monday that he is donating 10 per cent of his salary to charity.
This makes it the second time in as many years that the Mayor has decided to give money on top his other donations.
On Monday city council began reviewing the formula that's used for determining how much Calgary’s politicians get paid. But Nenshi said he has already decided that he is over-compensated.
"So I will unilaterally be taking 10 per cent of my take home pay and I will be donating it either back to the city or a charity that does good work in the Calgary community," he said.
"I will listen to the debate today and I can be convinced to change my mind but going into the debate, I feel that that's fair."
Nenshi's self-imposed pay cut works out to about $20,000.
The mayor donated last year's mandated pay raise — which took effect two months after he arrived in office — to charity.
Ald. Andre Chabot tried to convince council that this year’s pay raise of 5.35 per cent should be reduced to three per cent, and that future increases be based on Calgary’s inflation rate.
But council voted Monday to uphold the findings of an independent review panel, which concluded that the existing formula —which ties pay hikes to Statistics Canada figures — is reasonable.
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Von Miller got a record-breaking contract from the Denver Broncos on Friday, and some fellow NFL players quickly reacted to the news via Twitter. Here are some examples:
Congrats @Millerlite40! Excited for what the future holds for you & our team. Proud of everyone for getting it done! pic.twitter.com/p95piRYWfM — John Elway (@johnelway) July 15, 2016
Very well deserved. Congrats @Millerlite40! — JJ Watt (@JJWatt) July 15, 2016
Congrats my dog @Millerlite40!! 2011 draft class legendary!! — Mark Ingram II (@MarkIngram22) July 15, 2016
Get paid my brother👌🏾. https://t.co/kEHdoqkr58 — Todd Gurley II (@TG3II) July 15, 2016
They paid you big bro!!!!! @Millerlite40 CONGRATS!! — Jalen Ramsey (@jalenramsey) July 15, 2016
Well deserved @Millerlite40 Congrats brother ... 💰💰💰 — fletcher cox (@fcoxx_91) July 15, 2016
Congrats to @Millerlite40! Much deserved fella!! Proud of you young man. 💰💰💰💰 https://t.co/TAs9ejxgCe — David BRUTON JR. (@D_Brut30) July 15, 2016
@Millerlite40 yessir bout time — Anthony Barr (@itheeayb) July 15, 2016
Earned every dime I see you @Millerlite40 💰#Paid — Charles James II (@CJDeuce_) July 15, 2016
Von Miller with that BAG!!!! Congrats bro! @Millerlite40 — Omar C. Bolden (@OmarBolden) July 15, 2016
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By Jean Christou
Police have extended security precautions at all crossings they said on Tuesday as eyewitnesses spoke of lengthy queues and procedures at checkpoints.
One eyewitness at the Ledra Street crossing told the Cyprus Mail that foreigners crossing north, and those returning, were having their passports scanned. Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots using Republic of Cyprus ID cards were not being registered, the eyewitness said.
“Apart from airports and ports where we already took extra measures, we have applied extra measures to the crossing points,” police spokesman Andreas Angelides told the Cyprus Mail. He confirmed that the additional measures were related to the Paris terrorist attack on January 7 “even though there has been no specific threat” here.
“It’s part of the general precautions being taken,” Angelides said. “There is no imminent threat or knowledge of a threat.”
Angelides said the additional measures applied to people crossing both ways and said extra police had been deployed at the crossings.
“There are extra police everywhere, not just the checkpoints,” he said. “The entire force’s personnel will be utilised for better controls.”
Angelides said he could not outline what the extra measures were for security reasons and would not confirm if passports were being scanned and registered. “I can’t say anything else,” he said. The new measures would be in place for as long as necessary, he added. “All measures are precautionary.”
Normally when someone crosses from the south of the island to the north they are not checked and are free to just walk across. Returning, they may occasionally be asked to show their passports or ID but nothing is registered by police at the crossing points.
Scanning identification would likely be a precaution in case of a terrorist threat or attack in the south of the island in the event the perpetrator or perpetrators fled to the north. Police would then have a record of their movements.
Nicosia Divisional Commander Demetris Demetriou confirmed that passports were being scanned. He told the Cyprus Mail that the extra police presence at the crossings was to help avoid long queues.
Demetriou said the Turkish Cypriot side had implemented similar additional measures, though police in the north already registered everyone who crossed in both directions.
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Everyone's favorite general interest website, Pornhub, has released a brand new round of data and insights, this time in collaboration with the Daily Beast. The website's report on female consumers' porn tastes, "What Women Want," offers a few familiar takeaways: Lesbian porn is the runaway favorite for women of all sexual orientations, getting eaten out is good, Kim Kardashian is the most popular "porn star" on the web, and so on and so forth. But one trend in the Pornhub Insights report stood out:
Women are 113% more likely to view "hardcore" porn than men. They're also more likely to search for such terms as "gangbang," "rough sex" and "double penetration."
The numbers don't lie: Women are super into hardcore porn. This is surprising for a few reasons. For starters, while we typically think of "gangbang," "fisting" and "double penetration" as hallmarks of male-oriented hardcore porn, it looks like ladies are getting off to the rough stuff as well. In fact, they might even be getting off to it more often than dudes are.
The results stand in stark contrast to the central principles of "female-friendly" porn, which is based on the idea that ladies are more turned on by softcore, elegantly shot, story-driven onscreen fantasies (you know, probably because of all those extra emotions they have). Most of the porn in this vein features slower, more intimate sex, as well as an emphasis on female pleasure. In short, it's basically the opposite of the choking, spitting and slapping we typically see on hardcore tube sites on Pornhub.
But do women actually prefer "female-friendly" porn to the hard stuff? Research tells a different story. For instance, a 2008 study assessed the type of porn that heterosexual women were most likely to be physically aroused by. The results indicated that the more action there was onscreen, the more excited a woman got. Videos of masturbation elicited some arousal, but graphic videos of sexual intercourse elicited even more.
Furthermore, A Billion Wicked Thoughts, a 2011 book by researchers Ogi Ogas and Sai Gaddam, found that while only 10% to 30% of women were interested in visual porn at all, the majority of those 10% to 30% of women had no interest in watching "porn for women." Instead, they preferred the hardcore stuff, which could explain why "lesbian scissoring," "gangbang," "extreme gangbang," "threesome" and "squirt" all made their way into women's Top 10 most-searched terms over the past year.
So is "porn for women" really just "porn"? While Pornhub's data and past research suggest that women might be more interested in hardcore porn than we think, it's important to keep in mind that these findings don't tell the whole story about female sexual desire. After all, obviously not all men are interested in masturbating to the same thing, so it follows that there'd be an equal amount of diversity in women's porn preferences as well. And given that only 24% of Pornhub's audience is female, we're clearly talking about a smaller sample size here.
That said, while we can't make any generalizations about women's porn predilections as a whole, the fact that so many women are into hardcore porn throws a wrench into the accepted narrative about female sexual desire. Clearly, many women don't prefer to watch gentle, soft-focus, intimate sex; some of them would rather just turn on their computers and watch some hardcore fucking.
"Female-friendly" porn tries to make porn more palatable for women who are turned off by the objectification of women by focusing less on rough sex and more on female pleasure. But while that genre of porn has several laudable objectives, some women may just want to bypass it altogether and watch some good old-fashioned smut. That doesn't make them bad feminists. It just makes them horny humans who want to get off to some porn.
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Ron Paul, the Texas congressman who unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination for president, has been said to resemble Gandalf, the magician from the movie version of "The Lord of the Rings."
Republican officials seemed to make Paul's supporters magically disappear during Wednesday night's roll call vote, in which the GOP convention officially nominated John McCain as the party's presidential candidate.
During the hour-and-a-half voting procedure, convention Secretary Jean Inman recorded each state's votes. Even though several states cast a portion of their votes for Ron Paul (among them Alaska, Oregon, Washington and West Virginia), none of those votes were repeated aloud by the secretary, and therefore they were not confirmed by the chair.
According to the Oklahoman newspaper, two delegates from Oklahoma also cast their ballots for Paul, but the microphone was cut off before their votes could be recorded.
The result of the roll call vote -- before it was made unanimous by acclamation -- recorded five votes for Paul, while a news reporter counted at least 15.
"There were several discrepancies," said Drew Ivers, Paul's delegate coordinator. "The RNC was roughshod, a little careless. They weren't as respectful as they could have been. I don't think that's very professional, and it's not a good reflection.
"They had five ladies keeping the score, plus the chairman, so they had six people and still couldn't get the numbers right."
The convention did not reject all dissenters to McCain's nomination. Two votes that the Utah delegation cast for Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, were promptly repeated and recorded in the final tally.
-- Ole Jann
Photos: Supporters of Ron Paul, right, disappeared as if by the magic of Gandalf from "The Lord of the Rings," played by Ian McKellen, left. Credits: New Line Productions; Todd Goodrich / Associated Press
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Orion Krause, the 22-year-old man accused of killing four people in Groton on Friday, appeared in Ayer District Court Monday morning to face four counts of murder.
While authorities have not identified the four victims, friends of the family said Krause's mother and grandparents were killed. The fourth victim was a caretaker for the elderly couple.
Authorities called the deaths a "situation of tragic family violence." Krause went to a neighbor's home after the killings and said he just murdered four people.
Krause graduated recently from Oberlin College in Ohio and was known for his music, according to friends.
A vigil for the four victims was held in Groton on Sunday. Local Rev. Elea Kemler asked people to pray for the family and for Krause. She said something must have gone seriously wrong for Krause to commit such acts.
A weapon was recovered from the scene. Investigators believe all four victims, three women and one man, were beaten to death.
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Let’s look at a classic American style, Amber Ale, aka Red Ale. And by classic, I mean the craft beer awakening of the 1990’s, not the historic styles of the 1800’s. In the mid-90s you could count on nearly every brewpub and “microbrewery” to have Amber or Red ale on tap.
Amber ales are not easily defined. It is a broad style whose most common attribute is color. Some have subdued bitterness while other prominently feature big citrusy American hops. Malt flavors fall somewhere between Pale and Brown ales. You’ll notice caramel flavors while some have a bit of fruitness. While Ambers can be toasty or biscuity, they should not have any chocolatey or roasty flavors common in Brown Ales.
Amber/Red ales range from light amber to dark copper, with an SRM* of 10-17. Ambers are on the lower end of the scale, with Reds at the higher end. Bitterness can be barely noticeable to prominent, with wide range from 25-40 IBUs*. The style can also have a wide range of ABV* from a sessionable 4.5% to a bigger 6.2%. Imperial versions are common too, with ABVs of 8-10%.
Commercial Examples
North Coast Red Seal Ale pours a deep amber, nearly a light copper color. There are noticeable hop aromas along with the smell of sweet malt. The beer is balanced. The initial flavors are caramel and bready, a graham cracker like malt, that fades into a light bitterness on the finish. The hop bitterness is spicy, almost European; not the citrus, piney flavors of American hops.
New Holland Sundog Amber is a rich copper. Based on the names of the two featured beers, the colors are opposite of what you’d expect. This beer leans toward malt, there are little hop aromas or flavors that stand out. Rich, caramelly malt is the main feature. There is a touch of toasty and nutty flavors with a slightly sweet finish.
Sundog is a very different Amber from Red Seal, but they showcase the breadth of the style. Both are good beers, it just depends what mood you’re in when you pick one. You have a lot of other options to when selecting an Amber or Red ale. Here are a few I’ve enjoyed in my travels: Anderson Valley Boont Amber Ale, Flat 12 Hello My Name is Amber, Highland Gaelic Ale, Karben4 Lady Luck, Deschutes Cinder Cone Red, Mac & Jack’s African Amber, Sebago Runabout Red, New Belgium Fat Tire and Fat Bottom Ruby Red.
Food Pairings
The char of grilled meats perfectly complements the caramel and toasty flavors of the beer. You can’t beat Amber ale at a cookout of loaded burgers and ribs. Ambers are also big enough to hold their own with dishes with rich tomato-based sauces like barbeque, Pizza or Chili. Amber ales also work great with spicy Thai and Mexican foods and help quench the heat of Nashville Hot Chicken.
Glassware
While there is no specific glass for Amber Ale, any glass suitable for American ales will work. The Spiegelau Lager Glass is great for Pale, Amber and Brown ales. Of course, if you’re at a loss picking a glass for any beer, you can never go wrong with a tulip glass. They make virtually every beer smell and taste better.
Cheers!
*Standard Reference Method
*International Bitterness Units
*Alcohol by Volume
All quantitative specifications are from the BJCP Style Guide
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Kurt Hubert Franz (17 January 1914 – 4 July 1998) was a German war criminal, one of the commanders of the Treblinka extermination camp. Because of this, Franz was one of the major perpetrators of genocide during the Holocaust. Sentenced to life imprisonment in the Treblinka Trials in 1965, he was eventually released in 1993.
Early career [ edit ]
Kurt Franz was born in 1914 in Düsseldorf. He attended public school in Düsseldorf from 1920 to 1928, and then worked as a messenger and as a cook.[citation needed] Franz's father, a merchant, died early. His mother was an observant Catholic. When she remarried, it was to a man with a strong right-wing nationalist outlook. Franz joined several right-wing national groups and served in the voluntary labor corps. He also trained with a master butcher for one year.[2]
Franz joined the Nazi Party in 1932, and enlisted in the German Army in 1935. He fulfilled his military obligation and after his discharge, in October 1937, he joined the SS-Totenkopfverbände. First he received training with the Third Death Head Regiment Thuringia at Weimar, and then served as cook and guard at the Buchenwald concentration camp, where he attained the rank of Unterscharführer (Corporal).[2]
Action T4 [ edit ]
In late 1939 Franz was summoned to Hitler's Chancellery and detailed to take part in the Action T4 euthanasia program. Franz worked as a cook at Hartheim, Brandenburg, Grafeneck and Sonnenstein.[3][4][5] In late 1941, he was assigned as cook at T4 headquarters.
On 20 April 1942, Franz was promoted to Oberscharführer (Staff Sergeant). In spring of 1942, Franz, along with other veterans of Action T4, went to Lublin concentration camp complex in the Generalgouvernement,[6] and was posted to the Bełżec extermination camp, where he stayed until the end of August 1942.[5]
Treblinka [ edit ]
With a change of command in the Operation Reinhard death camp system, Franz was transferred to Treblinka extermination camp. He quickly became the camp's deputy commandant on the orders of Christian Wirth. He was promoted to serve as the last camp commandant from mid August till November 1943 to conclude the Holocaust in Poland.[4][7]
At first, Kurt Franz supervised work commandos, the unloading of transports, and the transfer of Jews from the undressing rooms to the gas chambers.[3] Franz had a baby-like face, and for this he was nicknamed "Lalke" ("doll" in Yiddish) by the prisoners. But Franz's appearance belied his true nature. He was the dominant overseer in day-to-day interactions with prisoners in Treblinka, and he became the most feared man at Treblinka for the cruelty which he visited upon them.
In Treblinka I was commander of the Ukrainian guard unit as I had been in Belzec. In Treblinka as in Belzec the unit consisted of sixty to eighty men. The Ukrainians' main task was to man the guard posts around the camp perimeter. After the prisoners' uprising in August 1943 I ran the camp more or less single-handedly for a month; however, during that period no more gassings were undertaken.[8][9]
Facts prove otherwise. Despite visible damage to the camp during the revolt, the gas chambers were left intact and the killing of Polish Jews under Kurt Franz continued, albeit at a reduced speed with only ten boxcars "processed" at a time until the last transport of victims arrived on 19 August with 7,600 survivors of the Białystok Ghetto Uprising. Franz followed Globocnik to Trieste in November 1943.[10]
Barry the dog [ edit ]
Franz was known for being unusually cruel and sadistic. Franz made his rounds of the camp, often riding a horse, and he would take his St. Bernard dog, Barry, along with him. Barry was trained to follow Franz's command, and Franz's command was usually to bite the genitalia or buttocks of the prisoners.[7]
Barry's first owner was Paul Groth, an SS officer at Sobibor. Depending on his mood, Franz set the dog on inmates who for some reason had attracted his attention. The command to which the dog responded was, "Man, grab that dog!" (German: Mensch, faß den Hund) By "man" Franz meant Barry; the "dog" was the inmate whom Barry was supposed to attack. Barry would bite his victim wherever he could catch him. The dog was the size of a calf so that, unlike smaller dogs, his shoulders reached to the buttocks and abdomen of a man of average size. For this reason he frequently bit his victims in the buttocks, in the abdomen and often, in the case of male inmates, in the genitals, sometimes partially biting them off. When the inmate was not very strong, the dog could knock him to the ground and maul him beyond recognition. But when Kurt Franz was not around, Barry was a different dog. With Franz not there to influence him, the dog allowed himself to be petted and even teased, without harming anyone.[4][11]
The Treblinka song [ edit ]
As reported by lower-ranking SS officers and soldiers, Kurt Franz also wrote the lyrics to a song which celebrated the Treblinka extermination camp. Prisoner Walter Hirsch wrote them for him.[10] This song was taught to the few newly arriving Jews who were not killed immediately and were instead forced to work as slave laborers at the camp (Sonderkommandos). These Jews were forced to memorize the song by nightfall of their first day at the camp. The melody for the song came from an SS officer at Buchenwald concentration camp. The music was written in a happy way, as though the deaths were a joyful process rather than one of mourning, in the key of D major. Franz's lyrics for the song are listed below:
Looking squarely ahead, brave and joyous, at the world. The squads march to work. All that matters to us now is Treblinka. It is our destiny. That's why we've become one with Treblinka in no time at all. We know only the word of our Commander. We know only obedience and duty. We want to serve, to go on serving until a little luck smiles on us again. Hurray![12]
Further torment of prisoners [ edit ]
Kurt Franz reviewed the prisoner roll call and participated in meting out punishments. For instance, when seven prisoners attempted to escape the camp, Franz had them taken to the Lazarett and shot. He ordered a roll call and announced that if there were further attempted escapes, and especially if they were successful, ten prisoners would be shot for every escapee.[13]
Franz enjoyed shooting at prisoners or those still in the rail cars with his pistol or a hunting rifle. He frequently selected bearded men from the newly arriving transports and asked them whether they believed in God. When the men replied "yes", Franz told each man to hold up a bottle as a target. He would then say to them, "If your God indeed exists, then I will hit the bottle, and if He does not exist, then I will hit you." Then Franz would shoot at them with a gun.
Undoubtedly, [Kurt Franz] was the most terrifying of all the German personnel in the camp... witnesses agree that not a single day passed when he did not kill someone.[14]
Kurt Franz also had experience as a boxer before arriving at Treblinka. He put this training to sadistic use by victimizing Jews as punching bags. On occasion he would "challenge" a Jew to a boxing duel (of course the prisoner had to oblige), and gave the prisoner a boxing glove, while keeping one for himself, to give the illusion of a fair fight. But Franz kept a small pistol in the glove that he kept for himself, and he would proceed to shoot the prisoner dead once the gloves were on and they had assumed the starting boxing position.
Oscar Strawczinski wrote:
He rode through the camp with great pleasure and self-confidence. Barry, his big, curly-haired dog would lazily drag along behind...."Lalke" would never leave the place without leaving some memento for somebody. There was always some reason to be found. And even if there were no reason—it made no difference. He was an expert at whipping, twenty-five or fifty lashes. He did it with pleasure, without hurrying. He had his own technique for raising the whip and striking it down. To practice boxing, he would use the heads of Jews, and naturally there was no scarcity of those around. He would grab his victim's lapel and strike with the other hand. The victim would have to hold his head straight so that Franz could aim well. And indeed he did this expertly. The sight of a Jew's head after a "training session" of this sort is not difficult to imagine. Once Lalka was strolling along the platform with a double-barrelled shotgun in his hand and Barry in his wake. He discovered a Jew in front of him, a neighbour of mine from Czestochowa, by the name of Steiner. Without a second thought, he aimed the gun at the man's buttocks and fired. Steiner fell amidst cries of pain. Lalka laughed. He approached him, commanded him to get up, pull down his pants, and then glanced at the wound. The Jew was beside himself with pain. His buttocks were oozing blood from the gashes caused by the lead bullets. But Lalka was not satisfied. He waved his hand and said, "Damn it, the balls haven't been harmed!" He continued his stroll to look for a new victim.[7]
Franz was promoted to Untersturmführer (Second Lieutenant) and became an appointed official on 21 June 1943 on the orders of Heinrich Himmler. On 2 August 1943, Franz along with four SS men and sixteen Ukrainians went for a swim in the nearby Bug River, which depleted the security at Treblinka significantly and helped to improve the chances of success of the prisoner revolt that took place at the camp that day. After the revolt, the camp's commandant Franz Stangl left. Kurt Franz served as his replacement, and he was instructed to dismantle the camp and to eliminate every trace of evidence that it had ever existed.[1] Franz had at his disposal some SS men, a group of Ukrainian guards and about 100 Jewish prisoners who had remained after the uprising. The physical work was carried out by the Jews during September and October 1943, after which thirty to fifty prisoners were sent to Sobibor to finish dismantling there, and the remainder were shot and cremated on Franz's orders.
After Treblinka, in late autumn 1943, Franz was ordered to Trieste and northern Italy, where he participated in the persecution of partisans and Jews until the war's end.[4][5] He was wounded in late 1944 and, after recovery, employed as security officer on the Görz-Trieste railway line.
Post-war trial and conviction [ edit ]
Following the war, Kurt Franz first worked as a laborer on bridges until 1949, at which point he returned to his former occupation as a cook and worked in Düsseldorf for 10 years until his arrest on 2 December 1959.[4] A search of his home found a photo album of Treblinka with the title, "Beautiful Years".[15]
At the Treblinka Trials in 1965, Franz denied having ever killed a person, having ever set his dog on a Jew, and claimed to have only beaten a prisoner once.[16] On 3 September he was found guilty of collective murder of at least 300,000 people, 35 counts of murder involving at least 139 people, and for attempted murder. He was sentenced to life imprisonment.[5] He was released in 1993 for health reasons. Kurt Franz died in Wuppertal in 1998.
References [ edit ]
Kurt Franz biography at Olokaustos. (in Italian)
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The administration at Iowa State University is trying to torpedo an upcoming event featuring Breitbart News senior editor MILO by demanding student organizers pay nearly $2,000 in security fees at the last minute.
“I had paid in full September 7th an amount of $1070 out of my own pocket, which including the rental space, lighting, AV, tech, and the whole shabang” explained the student organizer in an email to Breitbart Tech. “Just yesterday, the event manager at ISU said the ISUPD is requiring 6 officers to secure the rental space which will cost additional but did not say amount. Today, the event manager sent out an email saying it will require an additional $1944”.
In response to the raised security fee imposed by college administrators, the student organizer attempted to raise money to cover the extra costs, and managed to raise just over $500 from fellow students— leaving $1444 left to be raised.
“As far as I can tell, no liberal events even required additional security let alone any at all” continued the organizer. “There is rarely any conservatives events that are held so its pretty obvious they are trying to cancel this event.”
After all the preparation they pull a move like this” he continued. “Where the heck is a college student going to get almost 2 grand a week before an event happens.”
By imposing excessive fees on student groups, administrators at the University of Maryland are likely violating a 1992 Supreme Court ruling, which decided that public universities can not impose security fees based upon their perception of how attendees may react to the event.
In Forsyth County v. Nationalist Movement (1992), the Supreme Court determined that government actors—like public college or university administrators—may not lawfully impose security fees based on their own subjective judgments about “the amount of hostility likely to be created by the speech based on its content.” Such fees amount to a tax on speech an administrator subjectively dislikes, or subjectively believes is likely to cause disruption or violence.
Several universities have previously raised security fees in an attempt to derail MILO’s talks at universities around the United States, including the University of Maryland, where a MILO event was cancelled under similar circumstances in October.
Minnesota State University, where MILO is due to visit on the 15th of December, has also placed an extra security fee on the event, demanding “double the recommended security presence” and “double the funds.”
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props: characters © J.K. Rowling
materials: ink, paper + PS8
music: The Fratellis, "Henrietta"
Please do not reproduce without my explicit permission.
Especially for iexhalevanillalace , who snagged my Tumblr kiriban, and who asked for Harry and Hermione palling around, with her trying on his glasses. I'd said two characters max, but to draw two of the Golden Trio without the third just ain't right [for me]. Plus, j'adore Ron.This is a rehash of a stupid old Hanson drawing I did, but it felt so right! Ron has a Satchel moment, and Harry has his feet propped on a quaffle in an ode to Darby Conley. (Google "quaffle" or "Darby Conley" if you don't know.) And Ron gets a cherry Jolly Rancher lollipop, because wizard candy sucks. (Except for acid pops. I fuckin' LOVE those things, but they are not for the fainthearted.)What is it with these stubborn heroes trying to be loners all the time? Your friends are coming with you, asshole, get used to it. IT'S BECAUSE THEY LOVE YOU.
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ktay95 posted 05/06/2013, 01:05
just started playing this game... this is going to be fun, and controller breaking
Message | Report just started playing this game... this is going to be fun, and controller breaking
thewastedyouth posted 08/01/2013, 05:43
why are the Euro sales so low, LOL EUROPEASANTS
Message | Report why are the Euro sales so low, LOL EUROPEASANTS
Sal.Paradise posted 12/06/2012, 07:59
Certainly is interesting. And it got nowhere near the marketing push/hype of the sequel around launch. Very strange.
Message | Report Certainly is interesting. And it got nowhere near the marketing push/hype of the sequel around launch. Very strange.
mantlepiecek posted 05/03/2012, 09:18
Demon's souls is ahead of dark souls PS3 + 360 combined, that is pretty interesting.
Message | Report Demon's souls is ahead of dark souls PS3 + 360 combined, that is pretty interesting.
Solid-Stark posted 02/12/2011, 01:10
Cant wait till this hits 2m. Great game needs more sales!
Message | Report Cant wait till this hits 2m. Great game needs more sales!
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With the new season ramping up, the boys in Rouge took to the training pitch for the first time this year on Saturday, May 2. We talked to head coach Ben Pirmann after to get his thoughts on the team and the season ahead. Here's what he said:
Q: How did the first training session of the new season go?
A: The scrimmaging, which was the biggest part of today's evaluation, went well. It was highly contested and very intense. So I think that's going to be good. That's going to be the standard for the summer, and these guys know that. We still have probably 14-15 college guys coming in – mainly our attacking group – so we had most of our defensive group and midfield group here. But when we get all of our attacking guys in, the level will go even higher.
Q: Who do you see having a big impact this season?
A: It's all left to be determined. You know, Bennett Jull is a defender from Robert Morris that we brought in to hopefully play right away. Both James Murphy and Andre Morris from Michigan are new guys that we would expect to provide some help defensively and in the midfield. So those are the main guys, but Tyler Channell and Troy Watson from Saginaw Valley trained very well today, so I think it's just going to be a competitive group. There's going to be a lot of games and a lot of friendlies that I think guys are going to go up and down. But, as the fitness levels improve and as the commitment from the guys stays up, we'll see a pretty deep team.
Q: What does it mean to be returning a large corps of veteran players?
A: Really, it's invaluable. With leadership, those guys know exactly how I want to train and how we want to play. Guys like Wade Allan, Spencer Thompson and Josh Rogers, they've been here from day one since the club started. So they're in positions to really lead by example, and they know exactly what the coaching staff wants. So I think that's a pretty invaluable resource to have.
Q: What was your biggest takeaway from last season?
A: Probably for me, personally, the biggest learning curve was managing the match schedule a little more, especially the road games. Obviously, we know going in that we have to deal with some stuff with guys needing to depart to go train with MLS teams. You know, some of the college guys finish up in the middle of July and then you have to figure out how to play without them. But I think the schedule sets up a little better this summer. We still have three double weekends, which isn't ideal, but with that being said, everybody's got to play 12 games. We have to make sure our training habits are a little better than last summer.
Q: What do you consider success in 2015?
A: I told the team, I said, 'I expect us to win every game. Obviously I know we're not going to go undefeated, but I go into every single game – whether it's a friendly, a U.S. Open Cup game, a NPSL game and a playoff game, it doesn't matter; we're going there to win the game. And that all goes back to our training habits. Our biggest thing is if we play as hard and as well as we can in every game, we're going to win a lot of games. We've got some good players. But if we don't train well and we don't prepare well and respect our opponents, then we're not going to win games. So, I think our definition of success is, obviously, being as prepared as possible to go out and play as well as we can.
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EXCLUSIVE - Employees, including players, of Longzhu Gaming revealed that the organization did not pay out the salaries on time without prior consent.
Players and Staffs from Longzhu Gaming revealed to Inven that their salaries and incentives were not being paid out in time for years.
When Longzhu Gaming was acquired by a Chinese retail group Suning Commerce, The team's funding problems were expected to end at last. However, Bontaek "Expession" Gu, Jinhyun "Emperor" Kim and other staff members' revelation showed that it couldn't be further from the truth.
They showed frustration at the organization for neglecting to carry out the terms specified in contracts. After emphasizing that their plight must not happen to anyone else working in esports, they started to tell their stories.
Illustration by Joonkyu "Lasso" Seok
The Case of Bontaek "Expession" Gu
Expession told Inven that he was not paid his incentives, which was specified to be worth tens of thousands of US dollars in his 2016 contract with Longzhu. The said contract has expired at November 30th, 2016; and Head Coach Donghoon "Hirai" Kang told Expession that he'll be paid the amount due by December. However, he told us that he was not paid the incentive even as now.
He also added that the issue regarding payments was not just his own - the entire roster and even staffs had problems with late salary payments. The employees would not be paid for a few months without a prior notice, and the organization would only tell them to "wait awhile".
The Case of Jinhyun "Emperor" Kim
Emperor had a bigger issue - he was not paid at all. He said: "I was not paid a single dime while I was on contract. If I knew this was going to happen, I wouldn't have joined Longzhu Gaming in the first place. The issue affected my performance as a player, and my relationship with the team. How was I supposed to focus on the game?"
The overdue salary was only paid out when his contract with the team has expired; and even then, there are still some outstanding amount remaining. He expressed frustration that the remaining amount were not give a due date at all, and he has no choice but to wait.
The Case of 'Staff A'
A Longzhu staff member ('Staff A') anonymously confided a similar story. He worked for Longzhu from late 2016 until April 2017, and he too suffered from late salary payouts from the organization. Although the salary was eventually paid out, the payments were often delayed for one or two months at a time.
'Staff A' also revealed that the contract for 2017 Season had a problem. The players and the organization couldn't reach an agreement, and the contract was eventually signed well into the 2017 LCK Spring Split.
Without signed contracts, it's not a surprise that the players would not be paid on time. 'Staff A' revealed that the players were not paid at all until early March - well into the 2017 LCK Spring Split. Although the salary is currently being paid out on time, 'Staff A' said that the team was on the verge of collapse around late February due to this issue.
To fact-check the allegations, we contacted Head Coach Hirai and another Longzhu staff in China who also wished to remain anonymous ('Staff B').
Expession's Incentive Issues
Hirai confirmed Expession's claims. "It's true that he was not paid his due. The problem was due to Longzhu's finance team being replaced. I did tell him that the incentive will be paid out in December, but the organization failed to pay it."
He was also aware of what Expession had to go through. "As far as I know, Expession is currently in talks with the organization. However, the org seems to be willing to resolve the issue." He continued, "As such, I tried to pay him from my own pocket, but he declined. He told me that he would have the organization pay his salary."
'Staff B' also confirmed the allegations. "After the organization was acquired in late 2016, the finance team has been completely replaced. This led to several issues including late payment of Expession's incentives. As the finance team has a lot of backlog to go through, the payment is unlikely to happen until they are all cleared; as such, there is no estimate of when the incentive will be paid out. I am also aware that he is in talks directly with the organization."
Player Salary Issues of 2016
Hirai again confirmed that the entire roster also had salary issues in 2016.
"I knew that the payment was being postponed. Apparently, the political issue between China and Korea regarding THAAD also affected private sectors. Again, I was willing to pay the players even with my own money. There should have been players who opened savings accounts, and either way, I thought they should have been paid as soon as possible."
He also explained that he couldn't tell the players in advance as the organization did not inform the staff beforehand. Nonetheless, he stated that he tried to make the players and staffs understand as much as he can.
'Staff B', however, asserted that the salary issue was not due to the political issue. "The salary problem was due to the finance team being replaced on September - The political issue came much later in December."
However, he was not sure why the problem started before September. "I do not know what happened prior to 2017 because I was on another team before then. I'm not sure about the cause of the payment issues that happened before September."
'Staff B' added, "The issue related to Expession was worsened because the organization also had to go through the acquistion and roster changes. No contracts in effect at the time. We have almost cleared the due salary to all personnel, but there might be some outstanding amount due to the finance team being replaced in between. They too will be paid out as soon as possible."
Staff A's Payment Issues
As for Staff A's payment issues, Hirai said: "There were some procedures that caused delay on signing the contracts - Even I was not paid on time." He added that the staffs might have not been paid on time as the organization was trying to clear the payment for the players first.
'Staff B' agreed with Hirai, saying: "'Staff A' was not paid on time due to employment procedures, and the circumstances forced the management to cause delay on payments."
Delayed 2017 Contracts and Salaries
Hirai continued to talk about issues surrounding 2017 contracts. He confirmed that the contracts were not signed on time. "The negotiation did not go well. We only reached an agreement by late February."
He revealed that the contract issues caused the players to be discontent, and even forced the team to change their coach in the middle of the season.
He also confirmed that the salary for 2017 only started to pay out in the middle of the split. Although he emphasized that the payment issue shouldn't persist, the political tension surrounding THAAD caused another delay this year, and the delay was resolved after the contracts have been signed.
'Staff B' also confirmed the problem with contracts. "Due to the acquistion and subsequent restructuring, there were problems with contracts, and both parties had to make concessions." He added that the circumstances forced the organization to postpone the payment until the contracts were cleared.
The picture was clear - Both the players and staffs from Longzhu Gaming were not being paid on time, and even not paid at all.
This could be an explanation behind Longzhu's performance over last couple of seasons. As Emperor said, it is no surprise that players' performance would be affected, when they were deprived of the most basic right of employees.
We'll end the article by sharing concluding remarks from each person that we have interviewed.
Expession: "I just recently heard from the organization that they'll pay out within this year - I'm willing to wait until then."
Emperor: "I wish that the players would be able to focus on the game only. It might sound like an excuse, but I couldn't focus well enough on the game, and it gave me a bad reputation as a player. I hope no one else will have to go through this ordeal."
Hirai: "The players trusted my words, so I feel somewhat responsible for this. I will talk to Expession again, and if the organization doesn't pay, I want to pay his due from my own pocket."
'Staff A': "People in esports are working as hard as they can - They deserve much better than this. I hope problems like this won't happen in future."
'Staff B': "We are done reorganizing our administrative teams, so there won't be further problems. We'll also do our best to resolve Expession's incentive pay issue as soon as possible."
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