It was a made-for-TV moment that all presidents would relish, but it seemed especially significant for the man who turned a reality TV career into a successful bid for the presidency. Donald Trump triumphantly greeted the three Americans released by North Korea in the early morning darkness at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington early Thursday, an image one can expect to see over and over again come the 2020 U.S. presidential election campaign. "It was a very important thing to all of us to be able to get these three great people out," Trump told reporters on the tarmac. He then went on to speculate that live television coverage of the arrival "probably broke the all-time in history television rating for 3 o'clock in the morning." It was a moment the president gladly seized given that his White House has been buffeted by a chaotic mix of policy and personal drama in recent days. The prospect of a potentially historic breakthrough on North Korea could move a number of other unwelcome distractions to the side, including the ongoing Russia investigation, the growing legal difficulties for Trump's personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, and the soap opera that the Stormy Daniels story has become. Daniels is the adult film actress who claims she once had an affair with Trump. He denies the claim. Trump also announced Thursday on Twitter that he will meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on June 12 in Singapore. A new CNN poll found that 77 percent of those surveyed support Trump meeting the North Korean leader, and 53 percent approve of his handling of the North Korea issue generally. Those numbers are in keeping with a general trend of late that has seen the president's poll ratings improving, perhaps in part because of the strong economy. Where were the three Americans mentioned in the story held prisoner at? - not enough information - Singapore. - North Korea. - Joint Base Andrews.
North Korea.
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With almost two years left of my law degree, and with no intention of doing anything so idiotic as actually attending lectures or studying law, I had plenty of time to come up with my next bid for online fame. The Griff Rhys Jones TV project had stalled after a couple of meetings when everyone involved realised that the idea - to pipe broadband comedy programming into the nation's workplaces under the noses of bosses - was a bit of a non-starter. But I had become quite good friends with Rhys Jones's partner in the project, a comedy writer called Charlie Skelton, and he, Clare and I frequently met to brainstorm possible projects we might work on together. It was during one of these meetings that Clare proposed the idea of starting a comedy magazine - something like Private Eye, but for the Internet generation. My days as a school magazine publisher had taught me that printing magazines and distributing them was a royal pain in the arse and, anyway, if it was to be a magazine for the Internet generation then shouldn't it actually be on the Internet? The Zingin.com newsletter had attracted a ton of subscribers and had a distribution cost of basically nothing so why, I suggested, didn't we start a weekly comedy ezine, sent out by email? And, in a nod to Charlie's failed office comedy project, we could target it at bored office workers, sending the email to them on a Friday afternoon to cure the crushing boredom of those final few hours of the working week. And with that, The Friday Thing was born. To promote our fledgling publication we came up with a brilliant ruse: an online petition to have Friday afternoons declared a national holiday. British people worked harder than any other Europeans (we made up) and so it was only fair that our working week should end at noon on a Friday. We created an official website explaining our demands, registered a web address - letsgetitoff.com (snigger) - and sent a press release to the media. Clearly we had tapped into a seam of strong feeling among the nation's overworked... The Friday Thing started: - not enough information - AFTER Charlie's office comedy project failed - WHILE Charlie was working on his office comedy project - BEFORE Charlie's office comedy project started
AFTER Charlie's office comedy project failed
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Every so often I see a scenario play out that I find rather disappointing. It works like this: someone posts a topic to their blog that is critical or controversial. This person can either be a community member, commentator, employee or otherwise; it doesn't matter who the person is. Then what happens is a series of comments are posted to that blog entry from readers that are critical of the post, thus challenging the author on their views. The author then either deletes the blog entry or disables the comments based on the feedback. In other words, a viewpoint is shared, an invitation for comment is provided, but that invitation is then revoked when the author of the blog post is dissatisfied with the response from their readers. I have seen this happen countless times over the years and I don't like this. I believe we should all be accountable for our words. Our words have the ability to inspire, to entertain, to challenge, but to also hurt. Actions have consequences, and so do words. As such, when I see someone openly share their thoughts on their blog and invite their readers to provide comments, I see that as a wonderful demonstration of accountability and engagement; debate is a beautiful thing when executed with politeness and respect. To then close that door, seemingly because people disagree with you, is in my mind the equivalent of walking out of a room in the middle of a debate. The excuse when folks are criticized of this behavior is typically "it is my blog and I can run it how I like". This is true: it is your blog, and you can run it how you like, but the true measure of a person is not just in what they say, but also in the conversation and discourse that follows. How long has the author been reading blogs? - he just started reading them this year - exactly two years ago - not enough information - for many years
for many years
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One spring it stopped raining in early March and didn't start again. There was one very well-off bunny in the village who had a large burrow and lots of food saved up. He wasn't worried about the drought at all. The other bunnies, though, looked at the purple-red nettles withering in the fields and the mayweed that hadn't even flowered and wondered if they were going to have enough food to get them through the next winter. The very well-off bunny was named Albertus, but everybody called him Big Al--at least they called him that when they were sure he couldn't hear them. Big Al was in fact a very large bunny with long, white, silky fur. He had lots of land that his parents had left to him, and he never let any of the other bunnies gather food there. The story was that Big Al had sat on the one bunny who tried to make off with some of his carrots until the small bunny begged for mercy. After Big Al let him up, the small bunny moved to another village. One morning a dozen or more bunnies sat around the village square, licking the dew off the dried and wrinkled clover to quench their thirsts, and talking about the drought. There was still a bit of a cool breeze from Possum Creek, a mile or so away. Sophie Bunny, who was large and sleek, with a black circle around one eye, was there with her husband Lenny and their youngest, Ralph, who still lived at home with them. "I don't mind telling you," Lenny said, "I'm getting a little scared by all this." Lenny was a small, tan bunny with buck teeth and big cheeks like a chipmunk. "No need to be afraid," said the short, overweight Reverend Billy Bunny, the village's spiritual leader. "The Easter Bunny will provide." He sat, as he usually did, by the thick green hawthorn bush in the middle of the square--although the bush was neither as thick nor as green as it had once been. After the end of the story, the Easter Bunny - Forgets it is Easter - not enough information - Helps the bunnies - Doesn't show up
Helps the bunnies
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