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Photo: David Wolff - Patrick/Redferns Drake’s new album Scorpion is out and so are all of his secrets. Everything you’ve wanted to know about Drake’s personal life — including that (no longer) alleged secret baby — is an open book on his latest album. From becoming a dad to not addressing Pusha-T to a potential fling with Bella Hadid, here’s everything Drake reveals on Scorpion. Yes, Drake has a secret child. Pusha-T tells no lies! On his searing Drake exposé, “The Story of Adidon,” Push declared that Drake had been hiding a child. On Scorpion, Drake confirms the claim, with a correction: “I wasn’t hiding my kid from the world, I was hiding the world from my kid,” he raps on “Emotionless.” He continues, “From empty souls who just wake up and looked to debate. Until you starin’ at your seed, you can never relate.” He also refutes Push’s claim that he’s a deadbeat dad, saying elsewhere on “8 Out of 10”: “The only deadbeats is whatever beats I been rappin’ to / Never a matter of could I or should I / Kiss my son on his forehead and kiss your ass good-bye / As luck would have it I’m settled into my role as the good guy.” So why all the secrecy? Well, to hear Drake tell it, he just wanted some privacy. “Breakin’ news in my life, I don’t run to the blogs / The only ones I wanna tell are the ones I can call,” he raps. “They always ask, ‘Why let the story run if it’s false?’ / You know a wise man once said nothin’ at all / I’m exhausted and drained I can’t even pretend.” But as we later learn on album closer “March 14,” in what is essentially a song spoken to his son, he mostly kept things hushed because the relationship with the mother of his child, allegedly former adult-film star Sophie Brussaux (whom Drake does not mention by name anywhere on this album, nor the name of his child), is strained. Throughout the song, he alludes to a custody battle (as he did on previous single “I’m Upset”), revealing that he only met the woman twice, his son was born on October 11, but he has only seen the child once since his birth. He claims he and the woman are “co-parenting” the child together. He also admits that some close friends knew of the child’s existence, but that even his father hasn’t met him yet. These are the most telling admissions from “March 14”: Yesterday morning was crazy / I had to come to terms with the fact that it’s not a maybe / That shit is in stone, sealed and signed / She not my lover like Billie Jean but the kid is mine / Sandi [his mother] used to tell me all it takes is one time, and all it took was one time / Shit, we only met two times, two times / And both times were nothing like the new times / Now it’s rough times / I’m out here on front lines just trying to make sure that I see him sometimes / It’s breaking my spirit. Single father, I hate when I hear it / I used to challenge my parents on every album / Now I’m embarrassed to tell them I ended up as a co-parent / Always promised the family unit / I wanted it to be different because I’ve been through it / But this is the harsh truth now. This the first positive DNA we ever celebrated / I can’t forget the looks on they faces / Got the news in Miami that we all now got ones that we raisin’ / Tell Jello bring some, uh, Rosé and Baccarat out for our cheers to the next generation / But this champagne toast is short-lived / I got an empty crib in my empty crib / I only met you one time, introduced you to Saint Nick / I think he must’ve brought you like twenty gifts. October baby for irony sake, of course / I got this 11 tatted for somebody, now it’s yours / And believe me, I can’t wait to get a hunnid more / Sorry I’m vintage, tryna cover ground / They said that in two weeks you’re supposed to come in town / Hopefully by the time you hear this me and your mother will have come around instead of always cutting each other down. Watch: We Baked A Drake Cake Why he hasn’t responded to Pusha-T: The story goes that Drake never retaliated against Pusha-T again because both Kanye West and Drake’s mentor, J. Prince, told both rappers to stand down. Prince, especially, has said that Drake’s response, apparently already recorded, would’ve been too “overwhelming” and damaging to Kanye’s family. On album opener “Survival,” Drake doubles down on why he’s kept mum, saying he didn’t want this rap beef to turn deadly: “I’ve seen this movie a hundred times, I know where it’s headed / Realize someone gotta die when no one will dead it / Niggas gambling with their life for some content / That’s the type of lottery that could get your top picked.” But, of course, he’s not above throwing subliminals at all his enemies. On “Is There More,” he brags, “I mean you know I love a challenge, but challenged by who?” He also diminishes the blow inflicted by Push, rapping on “Peak”: “What you thought of me never had me missing a beat / That’s just a view from a cheap seat / They don’t want problems with me / Talk used to be cheap, nowadays it’s free / People are only as tough as they phones allow them to be.” He might be an independent artist now. It’s never quite been clear when Drake’s record deal with Cash Money, and its Young Money affiliate, is up. But according to Drake, that time is now. He implies on “Is There More” that Scorpion has fulfilled his contract: “Soon as this album drops, I’m outta the deal.” And adds on “Survival, “I’m pretty sure we got a label, I’m still independent,” referring to his own OVO imprint. Interestingly, Lil Wayne also just became free from Cash Money. Uh, so maybe he really did have a thing with Bella Hadid. There were rumors at the end of 2017 that Drake may have broken bro code with the Weeknd and had a thing with Bella Hadid that ended with him ghosting her. None of this was ever confirmed, of course, but Drake is his own personal TMZ. On “Sandra’s Rose,” he raps “My house is full of supermodels just like Mohammed Hadid,” referring to her father. Then on, “Finesse,” the hints get even less subtle. First, he says “I want my baby to have your eyes, I’m going against my own advice / Should I do New York? I can’t decide / Fashion week is more your thing than mine.” Bella Hadid is a model who has walked NYFW several times and, well, yeah, her eyes are very pretty. But just in case wasn’t clear whom he’s talking about here, there’s this: “You stay on my mind / You and your sister too hot to handle.” That sister being Gigi Hadid. Well played, Drake. Diddy definitely punched Drake. In 2014, Diddy punched Drake at Art Basel. This actually happened and we’ve always known it to be true — the reports say it was over the “0 to 100” beat — and Drake’s not afraid to admit it either. On “Survival” he references his beefs with both Meek Mill and Diddy: “I’ve had real Philly niggas try to write my ending / I’ve had scuffles with Bad Boys that wasn’t pretending.” He still has words for Kanye. Drake and Pusha-T’s feud may be over, but whatever ill will Drake still harbors for Kanye, it isn’t settled. Sure, Drake recently attended the Wyoming sessions and contributed writing to Kanye’s song “Yikes,” but that doesn’t mean everything’s peachy. In fact, he mocks Kanye for the whole stunt on “8 Out of 10,” saying “All sevens, no sixes” — a reference to most of the Wyoming albums’ seven-song track lists — “Rest easy get some shut eye / Hold on, hold on / But I miss making ‘em pay.” In other words, he’ll entertain your little mountain excursion if only for a check. Drake also responds to Kanye’s shot at him on “No Mistakes,” in which he said, “Too close to snipe you, truth told, I like you / Too bold to type you, too rich to fight you / Calm down, you light skin!” Drake says on “8 Out of 10”: “Too rich for who? Y’all just got rich again / Who grips the mic and likes to kill they friends?” (That second is also a reference to Kanye’s murderous thoughts expressed on his Ye opener.) And on “Nonstop,” “Yeah I’m light skinned but I’m still a dark nigga.” He considers himself on par with Adele. We already knew Drake thinks being No. 1 is all that matters, but Drake really drives the point home. On “Blue Tint,” he brags that he’s essentially untouchable, diss tracks be damned, because he’s so successful on the charts. “Every title doing numbers like I’m Miss Adele,” he raps on “Sandra’s Rose,” then “Double my price again / Top the charts, back in they hearts / Nigga he strikes again, woah” on “Blue Tint.” (Fact check: Drake hasn’t actually ever done Adele album numbers — remember, she broke the all-time first-week record with 25 — but that’s not to say he still couldn’t.) Jay-Z and Drake are cool again. Jay-Z is featured on “Talk Up,” meaning he’s let Drake back in his good graces. (They’ve had their tiffs through the years, and Drake famously left Jay and Kanye’s verses off a song on Views.) In his verse, Jay-Z makes it clear that his was recorded as recently as last week, as he references XXXTentacion’s murder and once again skewers Trump as he did on Everything Is Love: “I got your president tweeting / I won’t even meet with him / Y’all killed X and let Zimmerman live / Streets is done.” ||||| Drake just dropped a big bombshell — he’s a daddy! The 31-year-old rapper confirmed the long-rumored news that he fathered a child with French artist and former adult-film star Sophie Brussaux on numerous tracks on his new double album Scorpion, which was released just before midnight Thursday. Get push notifications with news, features and more. In “Emotionless,” which samples Mariah Carey, Drake declares, “I wasn’t hidin’ my kid from the world/I was hidin’ the world from my kid/From empty souls who just wake up and looked to debate/Until you starin’ at your seed, you can never relate.” “Breakin’ news in my life, I don’t run to the blogs/The only ones I wanna tell are the ones I can call/They always ask, ‘Why let the story run if it’s false?’ You know a wise man once said nothin’ at all,” he adds. RELATED: Who Is Sophie Brussaux? What to Know About the Mother of Drake’s Son Adonis Drake then seemingly addresses his relationship with 8-month-old son Adonis’ mother by referencing Michael Jackson‘s hit “Billie Jean” in the song “March 14.” “She’s not my lover like Billie Jean but the kid is mine/Sandi used to tell me all it takes is one time, and all it took was one time/ S—, we only met two times, two times,” he raps, referring to his mom Sandi Graham. “Now it’s rough times, I’m out here on front lines/Just tryin’ to make sure that I see him sometimes/It’s breakin’ my spirit/Single father, I hate when I hear it/I used to challenge my parents on every album/Now I’m embarrassed to tell them I ended up as a co-parent/ Always promised the family unit/I wanted it to be different because I’ve been through it.” The rapper continues, “Fairy tales are saved for the bedtime stories I tell you now/I don’t want you worry about whose house you live at/Or who loves you more or who’s not there/Who did what to who ‘fore you got here.” RELATED: Pusha T Accuses Drake of Having a Secret Child in Scathing New Diss Track On the track, Drake confirms his son was born Oct. 11 and says he celebrated in Miami when the DNA test confirmed he was the little boy’s father. However, Drake also reveals while he rushed out and bought a crib for his son, he has only met the boy once at Christmas time. “I only met you one time, introduced you to Saint Nick/I think he musta brought you like 20 gifts/Your mother say you growin’ so fast that they don’t even really fit/But man, you know/I still had to get it for my boy though.” The rapper goes on to say he has high hopes for another visit and an improvement in his relationship with Brussaux, though. “They said that in two weeks you’re supposed to come in town/Hopefully by the time you hear this/Me and your mother will have come around/Instead of always cuttin’ each other down,” he raps. Pusha T and Drake Roy Rochlin/Getty Images; George Pimentel/WireImage Drake addresses the topic again on track “8 Out of 10,” rapping, “The only deadbeats is whatever beats I been rappin’ to,” and “Never a matter of ‘could I?’ or ‘should I?’/Kiss my son on the forehead then kiss your ass goodbye.” Aside from the big baby news, the Canadian star’s album also features JAY-Z, Nicki Minaj, Future and Ty Dolla $ign. Drake also samples Jackson on the track “Don’t Matter to Me” which TMZ reports is unreleased music from the King of Pop. Rumors regarding Drake’s son re-emerged last month when Pusha T released a diss track called “The Story of Adidon,” in which he alleged Drake had a secret love child he was keeping under wraps and refused to acknowledge. “You are hiding a child, let that boy come home,” Pusha raps on the track, claiming Drake is playing “border patrol.” While calling in to discuss the track on The Breakfast Club, Pusha went on to explain the connection he made in his song between Drake’s son and an “Adidas press run.” Drake Taylor Hill/FilmMagic “Allegedly his new line on Adidas is called Adidon, which is named after Adonis, his son,” Pusha T said. He went on to claim that Drake only planned to confirm the existence of his child once he “started selling sweatsuits and sneakers.” “Who rolls out their child with a sweatsuit? Get outta here. What are you doing?” he added. Drake also acknowledged what Pusha T and others have said about him both in the double album and in the “Editor’s Note” on Apple Music. Poking fun at himself, the rapper wrote: “HATE WHEN DRAKE RAPS, DRAKE SINGS TOO MUCH, DRAKE IS A POP ARTIST, DRAKE DOESN’T EVEN WRITE HIS OWN SONGS, DRAKE TOOK AN L, DRAKE DIDN’T START FROM THE BOTTOM, DRAKE IS FINISHED, I LIKE DRAKE’S OLDER STUFF, DRAKE MAKES MUSIC FOR GIRLS, DRAKE THINKS HE’S JAMAICAN, DRAKE IS AN ACTOR, DRAKE CHANGED. ANYBODY ELSE > DRAKE …YEAH YEAH WE KNOW.” Days after the diss track came out, it was reported that Drake has been “financially supporting” Brussaux since shortly before she gave birth. Sources told TMZ that the Canadian star is making sure Brussaux “lives comfortably” by quietly giving her money. The payments reportedly started late during her alleged pregnancy. A representative for Drake offered no comment in response to the report when contacted by PEOPLE. RELATED: Drake Rep Slams Former Porn Star’s Paternity Accusation: ‘She’s Just Another Woman Claiming He Got Them Pregnant’ Rumors began circulating about Drake’s paternity back in May 2017, when Brussaux — who was spotted with the rapper that January following his split from Jennifer Lopez — claimed she was three-and-a-half months pregnant with Drake’s child and hired two major New York City attorneys to begin the proceedings to prove paternity and seek child support, TMZ reported. She also told TMZ that she had text messages from the rapper asking her to get an abortion. “If it’s, in fact, Drake’s child, which he does not believe it is, he will do right by the child,” Drake’s rep told PEOPLE at the time. “She’s just another woman in a long line of women claiming he got them pregnant.” |||||

– "She’s not my lover like Billie Jean but the kid is mine/ Sandi used to tell me all it takes is one time, and all it took was one time/ S---, we only met two times, two times," Drake raps in a new album, Scorpion, which dropped late Thursday. "Sandi" is his mom, Sandi Graham, "she" is apparently French former adult-film star Sophie Brussaux, and "the kid" is apparently the son they share, reports People. The Canadian rapper says DNA confirmed the child, born October 11, is his, and raps that, "I wasn’t hiding my kid from the world/I was hiding the world from my kid." Further, "I used to challenge my parents on every album/ Now I’m embarrassed to tell them I ended up as a co-parent/ Always promised the family unit/ I wanted it to be different because I’ve been through it." Vulture has more reveals from the new album.

A report from the Connecticut State Attorney describes Sandy Hook Elementary School shooter Adam Lanza as having "significant mental health issues" that affected his ability to interact with others. He had been prescribed both therapy and medication, but no health professionals saw any violence tendencies. NBC's Rehema Ellis reports. Newtown shooter Adam Lanza had no clear motive, but was obsessed with Columbine and planned the rampage that took the lives of 20 children and six school staffers at Sandy Hook Elementary, "including the taking of his own life," according to a long-awaited report on last December's shooting released Monday. "Many people have asked why the shooter did what he did on December 14, 2012," said the 48-page report, which was published on the state's Division of Criminal Justice website. "Or in the vernacular of the criminal justice system, 'Did he have a motive to do what he did?' This investigation, with the substantial information available, does not establish a conclusive motive." The report also said that there was "no clear indication" why Lanza chose Sandy Hook for the shooting, other than that it was close to his home. The report said it is "unknown" what contribution his mental health issues made to his attack, though they interfered with his ability "to live a normal life," and that Lanza had a strained relationship with his mother Nancy, telling a witness he would not feel bad if something happened to her. Lanza shot and killed Nancy before he drove to the school. The report described Lanza as obsessed with mass shootings. "He had a familiarity with and access to firearms and ammunition and an obsession with mass murders," said the report, "in particular the April 1999 shootings at Columbine High School in Colorado. Investigators however, have not discovered any evidence that the shooter voiced or gave any indication to others that he intended to commit such a crime himself." Investigators said Lanza had posted on an "internet blog" that "focused on mass shootings and in particular the Columbine shootings." The report's appendix noted that a computer hard drive included a computer game called "School Shooting," in which the player controls a character who enters a school and shoots students. Lanza had also downloaded videos about Columbine shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, surveillance footage of a Cleveland school shooting, video of a mall shooting and two videos of suicide by gunshot. He was also apparently a big fan of “Dance Dance Revolution,” a video game in which the player stands on a platform and moves his feet in sync with instructions on a video screen, the report notes. A commercial version of the game — along with several other games, including “Call of Duty” and “Grand Theft Auto” — is located in the basement of a local theater Lanza frequented between April and December of last year, according to the report. A home version of the game was “seen and photographed in the shooter’s home,” according to the report, adding that investigators discovered several videos of Lanza playing the game “on digital media taken from the home.” He also had “game screen shots” on his computer, the report said. Lanza fired 154 rounds in the school, and had 147 more rounds he could have fired, according to the report. Lanza killed the students and the staffers with an assault rifle and shot himself with a Glock handgun. Police, according to the report, arrived at the school "within minutes of the first shots being fired. They went into the school to save those inside with the knowledge that someone might be waiting to take their lives." Read the report here. Shannon Hicks / Newtown Bee via EPA file Police officers evacuate children from the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., on Dec. 14, 2012 following a school shooting there. According to the report, Lanza refused to take suggested medication and didn't engage in recommended behavior therapy. Investigators found no medication in his system "that would affect his behavior." Lanza's mother Nancy "took care of all the shooter's needs," said the report. "The mother indicated that she did not work because of her son’s condition. She worried about what would happen to the shooter if anything happened to her.” His mother consistently described him as having Asperger's Syndrome, and said he was unable to make eye contact, was sensitive to light and didn't like to be touched. She said there were marked changes in his behavior around the seventh grade, when he became more withdrawn. According to the report, however, a witness said Lanza "did not have an emotional connection" with Nancy. "A person who knew the shooter in 2011 and 2012 said the shooter described his relationship with his mother as strained," said the report, "because the shooter said her behavior was not rational." In November 2012, just a month before the shooting, Nancy was concerned about Adam because "he hadn't gone anywhere in three months," said the report, "and would only communicate with her by email, though they were living in the same house." Nancy Lanza, however, never expressed fear for herself or anyone else at the hands of her son. Nancy Lanza wanted to buy the shooter a new pistol for Christmas, according to the report, and "had prepared a check for that purpose to give the shooter." The long-awaited summary of the second-deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history omitted much information from the investigative file, including transcripts of 911 calls, some witness statements from children and most crime scene photos. The appendix to the report, however, includes photos of the bullet-riddled entrance to the school, photos of the Bushmaster and Glock guns he used in the assault, and photos of the magazines left at the scene. The release of the report, initially expected over the summer, was pushed back several times amid growing pressure from authorities -- including Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy -- to release more information. Throughout the investigation, State’s Attorney Stephen Sedensky III has resisted efforts by the news media and some public officials to release more information related to the shooting. In March, he ordered police to stop discussing details of the investigation at conferences after the New York Daily News reported that state police Col. Danny Stebbins told audience members at a law enforcement conference in New Orleans that Lanza had created a spreadsheet of mass killings going back 30 years. He and the town of Newtown also went to court to try and prevent the release of 911 calls from the school or transcripts of them, arguing that making them public could jeopardize the investigation. The state's Freedom of Information Commission ruled in September that the recordings should be provided to the news media, but a prosecutor obtained a stay while he appeals that order. At a hearing in New Britain, Conn. on Monday morning, a judge said he would listen to the recordings and issue a ruling on whether they can be made public. Handout / Reuters Adam Lanza, in an undated file photo. The summary also represents only a small portion of the investigation by both state and federal authorities. It does not include the entire state police evidence file, which runs thousands of pages, according to Paul Vance, spokesman for the Connecticut State Police. The full report is expected to be released once Sedensky declares the investigation closed, though no date has been announced. And some evidence from the state's investigation may never be made available to the public. A Connecticut law passed earlier this year in response to the shooting prohibits the release of photographs, film, video and other visual images showing a homicide victim if they can "reasonably be expected to constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy of the victim or the victim's surviving family members." Before its release, Sedensky’s office and local authorities did everything they could to brace townspeople for the coming onslaught of attention. Slideshow: Newtown school massacre Jessica Hill / AP A nation mourns after the second deadliest school shooting in U.S. history at Sandy Hook Elementary, which left 20 children and six staff members dead. Launch slideshow Sedensky allowed victims' relatives to review the report at briefings over the previous two weeks. And the interim superintendent of schools in Newtown advised parents to think about limiting their children's exposure to media reports on Monday and to reach out to mental health professionals if family members need help coping with the contents of the report or the approaching anniversary. "We all understand that for the children who were directly affected by this tragedy the release of the report and the upcoming anniversary can carry a very personal meaning," read the Nov. 19 letter from Dr. John Reed. NBCConnecticut, the Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report. More from NBC News Investigations: Follow NBC News Investigations on Twitter and Facebook ||||| Lots of new tidbits in Sandy Hook report today among them shooter weighed only 112 lbs and was carrying almost 31 lbs of ammo. #SandyHook |||||

– Adam Lanza apparently planned the Sandy Hook massacre by himself and left no evidence of why he killed 27 people at a Connecticut elementary school last year, according to a report released today. "Why did the shooter murder twenty-seven people, including twenty children?" wrote Danbury State's Attorney Stephen Sedensky in the report, which closed an 11-month police investigation. "Unfortunately, that question may never be answered conclusively." The report does say Lanza planned all his actions, including his suicide, and even wore ear buds during the assault, the Hartford Courant reports. Also from the report: A blow-by-blow of Lanza's carnage. The 20-year-old fired 154 shots, mostly in the classroom of substitute teacher Lauren Rousseau, where Lanza murdered her and 14 of her 15 students. He killed six more in the classroom of Victoria Soto, where student Jesse Lewis told kids to run when Lanza's gun jammed. Six safely got past Lanza, but Lewis was killed. The Courant is posting interesting points from the report, including the fact that Lanza didn't like holidays and birthdays, communicated with Nancy only by email for 3 months before the shooting, and had expressed an interest in serial murders and mass killings. Lanza was very interested in the Columbine shootings and posted a blog about them, NBC News reports. His mother Nancy stayed home to take care of him, saying he had Asperger's Syndrome, but Lanza refused to take medication or behavioral therapy. He also felt no connection to Nancy and wouldn't care if anything happened to her, according to a witness (Lanza killed her with a gunshot to the forehead). Lanza left his bed made at home and sealed his windows with duct tape. He had carefully taken apart his hard drive and scratched a "W" on the disks before trying to destroy them with a dumbbell. He changed the seven magazines he had on him so often that in some cases he fired off only half of a magazine's 30 rounds before removing it; the Courant notes investigators see this as a sign he approached the school shooting like a video game, as typical gaming practice is to enter a new room with a full magazine.

EnteroMedics Inc.'s weight-loss device uses implantable electrodes to trick the brain into thinking the stomach is full. EnteroMedics Inc.'s weight-loss device uses implantable electrodes to trick the brain... Read More EnteroMedics Inc.'s weight-loss device uses implantable electrodes to trick the brain into thinking the stomach is full. Close A first-of-its-kind weight-loss device from EnteroMedics Inc. (ETRM), which uses implantable electrodes to trick the brain into thinking the stomach is full, was approved in the U.S. The Food and Drug Administration cleared the Maestro Rechargeable System today, the first weight-loss device that targets the pathway between the brain and the stomach that controls feelings of hunger and fullness. The system, approved for obese patients 18 and older who have at least one other weight-related condition such as Type 2 diabetes, is also the first obesity device approved in the U.S. since 2007, the FDA said in a statement. EnteroMedics, which has been publicly traded since 2007, rose 21 percent to $1.42 at 12:30 p.m. in New York, bringing its market value to almost $100 million. The shares had declined 50 percent in the past year through yesterday. Products to help Americans lose weight have been a hot category in the last few years, though one that has had some trouble producing major revenue. The FDA has approved four weight-loss drugs since 2012, three pills and one injection. St. Paul, Minnesota-based EnteroMedics’ system uses electrodes implanted in the abdomen to send electrical pulses to nerves, the FDA said. Patients use external controllers to charge the device and allow doctors to adjust its settings. Source: EnteroMedics Inc. via Bloomberg EnteroMedics’ system uses electrodes implanted in the abdomen to send electrical pulses to nerves, the FDA said. Close EnteroMedics’ system uses electrodes implanted in the abdomen to send electrical pulses... Read More Close Open Source: EnteroMedics Inc. via Bloomberg EnteroMedics’ system uses electrodes implanted in the abdomen to send electrical pulses to nerves, the FDA said. How exactly the system helps people lose weight is unknown, the FDA said. “Obesity and its related medical conditions are major public health problems,” William Maisel, deputy director for science and chief scientist in the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health, said in the statement. “Medical devices can help physicians and patients to develop comprehensive obesity treatment plans.” Adverse Events Serious adverse events for EnteroMedics’ system included nausea, pain at the neuroregulator site, vomiting and surgical complications. Other side effects included heartburn, problems swallowing, belching and chest pain. A clinical trial of the Maestro didn’t achieve its primary objective of getting patients to lose 10 percent more excess weight than the control group, the FDA said. Still, an agency advisory panel found that data from the trial provided evidence of sustained weight loss and that the device’s benefits outweighed its risks for some patients. Even with the FDA ruling, the Maestro faces a tough road for wide adoption. Many insurers and government health programs have refused to cover weight-loss treatments since Belviq, from Arena Pharmaceuticals Inc. and Eisai Co. (4523), and Qsymia, by Vivus Inc. (VVUS), were approved in 2012. To contact the reporter on this story: Anna Edney in Washington at aedney@bloomberg.net To contact the editors responsible for this story: Crayton Harrison at tharrison5@bloomberg.net Andrew Pollack ||||| Federal regulators on Wednesday approved a novel dieting device that acts like a pacemaker for the stomach by manipulating the nerve pathway that makes people feel hungry or full. The device, made by EnteroMedics Inc. of St. Paul, Minn., is the first of its kind to treat obesity by targeting nerves that link the stomach and the brain. The Maestro Rechargeable System would block electrical signals in the abdominal vagus nerve by... ||||| By Scott Roberts, HealthDay Reporter WEDNESDAY, Jan. 14, 2015 (HealthDay News) -- A new electrical stimulation device designed to control obesity by targeting the nerve pathways between the brain and stomach that regulate hunger and fullness has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The Maestro Rechargeable System is the first FDA-approved obesity device since 2007, the agency said Wednesday in a news release. The system is sanctioned for adults with a body-mass index (BMI) of between 35 and 45, with another obesity-related condition such as type 2 diabetes, who haven't been able to lose enough weight with an approved weight loss program. "Obesity and its related medical conditions are major public health problems," said Dr. William Maisel, deputy director for science and chief scientist in the FDA's Center for Devices and Radiological Health. "Medical devices can help physicians and patients to develop comprehensive obesity treatment plans." The Maestro system includes a rechargeable pulse generator and wire electrodes that are implanted in the abdomen. The electrodes stimulate the vagus nerve, which carries signals to the brain that the stomach feels empty or full, the FDA said. The device's safety and effectiveness were evaluated in studies involving 233 people with a BMI of 35 or greater, a height-to-weight measurement that indicates clinical obesity. People who used the device for 12 months lost about 8.5 percent more excess weight than people who didn't use the device, the FDA said. The most serious side effects included nausea, device-site pain, vomiting and surgical complications. More common but less serious side effects included heartburn, problems swallowing, belching, mild nausea and chest pain. As a condition of approval, device maker EnteroMedics must conduct a five-year, follow-up study involving at least 100 users, the FDA said. EnteroMedics is based in St. Paul, Minn. More information Visit the FDA to learn more. Copyright © 2015 HealthDay. All rights reserved. ||||| Español The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today approved the Maestro Rechargeable System for certain obese adults, the first weight loss treatment device that targets the nerve pathway between the brain and the stomach that controls feelings of hunger and fullness. The Maestro Rechargeable System, the first FDA-approved obesity device since 2007, is approved to treat patients aged 18 and older who have not been able to lose weight with a weight loss program, and who have a body mass index of 35 to 45 with at least one other obesity-related condition, such as type 2 diabetes. BMI, which measures body fat based on an individual’s weight and height, is used to define the obesity categories. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than one-third of all U.S. adults are obese, and people with obesity are at increased risk of heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes and certain kinds of cancer. “Obesity and its related medical conditions are major public health problems,” said William Maisel, M.D., M.P.H., deputy director for science and chief scientist in the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health. “Medical devices can help physicians and patients to develop comprehensive obesity treatment plans.” The Maestro Rechargeable System consists of a rechargeable electrical pulse generator, wire leads and electrodes implanted surgically into the abdomen. It works by sending intermittent electrical pulses to the trunks in the abdominal vagus nerve, which is involved in regulating stomach emptying and signaling to the brain that the stomach feels empty or full. Although it is known that the electric stimulation blocks nerve activity between the brain and the stomach, the specific mechanisms for weight loss due to use of the device are unknown. External controllers allow the patient to charge the device and allow health care professionals to adjust the device’s settings in order to provide optimal therapy with minimal side effects. The safety and effectiveness of the Maestro Rechargeable System were evaluated in a clinical trial that included 233 patients with a BMI of 35 or greater. The weight loss and adverse events of 157 patients who received the active Maestro device (the experimental group) were compared to 76 patients in the control group who received a Maestro electrical pulse generator that was not activated. The study found that after 12 months, the experimental group lost 8.5 percent more of its excess weight than the control group. About half (52.5 percent) of the patients in the experimental group lost at least 20 percent of their excess weight, and 38.3 percent of patients in the experimental group lost at least 25 percent of their excess weight. The clinical study did not meet its original endpoint, which was that the experimental group lose at least 10 percent more excess weight than the control group. However, an FDA Advisory Committee (the Gastroenterology and Urology Devices Panel) found the 18-month data supportive of sustained weight loss, and agreed that the benefits of the device outweighed the risks for use in patients who met the criteria in the device’s proposed indication. In considering the benefits and risks of the device in its review of the Maestro Rechargeable System, the FDA considered the clinical study and the Panel’s recommendations. Additionally, the Agency looked at an FDA-sponsored survey relating to patient preferences of obesity devices that showed a group of patients would accept risks associated with this surgically implanted device for the amounts of weight loss expected to be provided by the device. As part of the approval, the manufacturer must conduct a five year post approval study that will follow at least 100 patients and collect additional safety and effectiveness data including weight loss, adverse events, surgical revisions and explants and changes in obesity-related conditions. Serious adverse events reported in the clinical study included nausea, pain at the neuroregulator site, vomiting, as well as surgical complications. Other adverse events included pain, heartburn, problems swallowing, belching, mild nausea and chest pain. The Maestro Rechargeable System is manufactured by EnteroMedics of St. Paul, Minnesota. The FDA, an agency within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, protects the public health by assuring the safety, effectiveness, and security of human and veterinary drugs, vaccines and other biological products for human use, and medical devices. The agency also is responsible for the safety and security of our nation’s food supply, cosmetics, dietary supplements, products that give off electronic radiation, and for regulating tobacco products. ### |||||

– If taking a pill that tricks your body into feeling full isn't appealing, how about some quick zaps instead? The FDA has approved a device that uses electrodes implanted in the abdomen to fool the brain, reports Bloomberg. The electrodes stimulate the hunger-controlling vagus nerve, which in turn tells the brain that the stomach is full, explains HealthDay News. The Maestro Rechargeable System will be available only to obese adults who have one other related condition, such as Type 2 diabetes, says an FDA release. The Wall Street Journal likens it to a "pacemaker for the stomach" and quotes a gastrointestinal surgeon who predicts the cost will be between $30,000 and $40,000, on par with gastric bypass surgery. The device's maker, EnteroMedics of Minnesota, must keep track of at least 100 patients for five years after surgery for a follow-up study. (Click to read why people tend to weigh less on Fridays.)

Paralyzed Bride Opens Up for the First Time About Friend Who Caused Tragic Accident: 'I Had to End the Friendship' Courtesy Rachelle Chapman Martha Manning Courtesy Rachelle Chapman Courtesy Rachelle Chapman Courtesy Rachelle Chapman It's been a big year for Rachelle Chapman The woman known as the "paralyzed bride" celebrated her daughter's first birthday , started driving again for the first time since her 2010 accident and officially cut ties with the friend who pushed her in the pool, paralyzing her from the chest down almost six years ago.Chapman, who lives in Knightdale, North Carolina, became known as the "paralyzed bride" after a freak accident at her bachelorette party left her paralyzed from the chest down. One of her four best friends playfully pushed her in the pool, causing the life-changing injury.Now, for the first time, the 30-year-old is talking publicly about that friend. She has remained fiercely protective of the woman since the accident, even turning down an interview with Oprah when the talk show queen's bookers said they would only have her on if she came on with that friend.Chapman has never named her childhood friend publicly – and still won't – but for the first time, she is telling PEOPLE exclusively about the broken friendship she says she fought hard to maintain."In the beginning, she was there for me and I was there for her. She was distraught and depressed about what happened. But as the years passed, she didn't make the effort, it was just going through the motions and every time we spoke, I just felt like I was remembering the accident and going into the pool and I had negative feelings. I didn't feel that way in the beginning, but that's what's been happening over the last three years."She says her friend came with a few other girls when Kaylee, who turned one this week, was first born, but that's the last time they were together. She and husband Chris, 33, welcomed Kaylee via surrogate last April."I had to actually cut ties with her and end the friendship," she says. "I had to tell her that we couldn't be friends because she just wasn't there for me anymore."Chapman says she was honest after the accident when she was vocal about how the two remained close. But she says when that changed, she realized she needed to be honest once more."One of the things that happens when you have this kind of injury is that you lose people, and I felt like I wasn't being truthful anymore because I did lose some relationships. It's sad and it's complicated, but she wasn't there for me when I needed her."Chapman talks about her lost friendship in a documentary she and husband Chris shot for TLC about their journey to become parents. The network finished shooting in February and tells PEOPLE the as-yet-untitled show will air, they just don't know when.Chapman says she wanted to do the show to let people see the challenges and the joys of becoming a mom, despite being paralyzed."It's so cool, she uses the back of my chair to pull herself up and she has figured out how to come to me when I go to take her out of her crib," she says of her daughter, Kaylee. "She turns on her belly and scoots her way on to my lap. She is the only one who looks at me in the chair and it's normal to her because that's all she knows."And this past weekend – as friends and family celebrated Kaylee's first birthday – she walked to her dad. "Chris opened his arms and she came to him. Everyone cheered and clapped for her!"Chapman is also excited by her newfound independence. A few weeks ago she started driving again for the first time since she was paralyzed."It was a huge mountain to climb and once I did it, it really wasn't that bad at all. It's a workout because I have to get in and out of the chair, but it's nice to know I can go wherever I want, whenever I want."It is a big turning point she says, one that has her excited for the future."It's nice to finally have some independence and to know that I'll be able to do more for Kaylee as she gets older. She laughs all the time and makes me so happy and I just want to be able to do for her." ||||| share tweet pin email Rachelle Chapman considers her daughter “the missing piece” to the home she and her husband created. “I got hurt right before the wedding, so for a long time, all I wanted was to get married,” said the North Carolina mom known around the world as “the paralyzed bride” after a fall into a pool at her bachelorette party left her a quadriplegic. “We were happily wed for a long time, but then I felt that I really wanted a child with Chris.” Rachelle Chapman Rachelle and Chris Chapman, with their daughter, Kaylee, who turns 1 on April 26 The couple’s daughter, Kaylee, turns 1 on Tuesday. Relatives and close friends, including the woman who served as the girl's surrogate, celebrated over the weekend with an Elmo-themed birthday party “because Kaylee is completely obsessed with Elmo,” Chapman told TODAY. “It’s been a blessing and super annoying at the same time!” Chapman said her daughter recently learned how to walk by using her mother’s wheelchair as a prop. “She got a lot of practice holding on to the back of my chair. She would pull up and hold on to the wheel, and then walk to the back and hold on to the bar in the back,” she told TODAY. “My wheelchair was good practice for her. She would basically push my wheelchair. It was so cool she learned how to do that.” Kaylee also has learned to use her special wheelchair-accessible crib to her advantage. She recently learned how to crawl out of it by scooting backward on her stomach and onto her mother's lap. “It’s really hard to just to pick her up and pull her towards me, so this tactic works,” Chapman said. “And she figured it out on her own. Knowing that I can’t reach out and pick her up like everyone else, she just crawled onto my lap on her own.” RELATED: 'Paralyzed bride' finds happiness as a new mom: 'It is a dream come true' Chapman said milestones such as these help quell the criticism she still gets from people who call her selfish for wanting to have a child because of her partial paralysis. Chapman said that single parents rarely get questioned about their fitness to be parents. “Chris and I together as a team are more than capable of taking care of a baby, especially with the help of my mother, who was all in from the beginning,” she said. Rachelle Chapman Rachelle Chapman with her daughter, Kaylee Chapman’s mother lives with the family during the week, mainly to help Chapman get out of bed and into her wheelchair in the mornings, when her husband has to leave for his job as a middle school science teacher. “I want people to realize, yeah, even though my fingers don’t work, I have found a way to manipulate my hands to do a lot of things. I can hold Kaylee. I can feed Kaylee and I can play with her while Chris is washing bottles or whatever. We have a system that works for us,” she said. “And beyond love, Kaylee has a house over her head and food in her tummy. She’s a happy, happy baby who doesn’t realize that I’m different. This is normal for her.” RELATED: 'What I always wanted': 'Paralyzed bride' expecting first child through surrogate Chapman said she’d love to have more children but doesn’t know if she and her husband could afford the cost of another surrogate. Chapman is unable to sustain a pregnancy on her own because of blood pressure medication she has taken since her accident. “I’d love to have more. We did IVF and I have these healthy embryos sitting in California, but I’d still require a surrogate, and it comes down to money,” she said. Courtesy of Rachelle Chapman Chapman's daughter, Kaylee Chapman has been working with the cable network TLC over the past year on an upcoming one-hour show that focuses on her journey to becoming a mother. The show also will feature her talking publicly for the first time about her relationship with the friend whose playful push into the pool led to her accident. “I didn’t blame her for hurting me, because we’ve all pushed somebody in a pool and I was very supportive of her. The first year I made sure that she was OK, even more than me,” said Chapman, who still refuses to disclose the woman's name. Eventually, the relationship grew strained. "We aren’t very close friends anymore and I talk about it for the first time on the show," she said. In addition to becoming a mom within the last year, Chapman also learned how to drive her wheelchair-adapted van. She had delayed learning how, mainly because she's never driven a vehicle so large. But after realizing one day that she had no way of getting to her wheelchair rugby practice, she decided it was time to learn. “Eventually, I want to be able to take Kaylee to dance class or tennis lessons and not have to rely on somebody else to do that,” she said. "Once she can get in and out of her car seat on her own, or old enough not to need one at all, I'll be able to do that." Follow TODAY.com writer Eun Kyung Kim on Twitter. |||||

– Rachelle Chapman, the now-30-year-old paralyzed in 2010 when one of her best friends pushed her in the pool at her bachelorette party, is talking to People and Today in advance of a TLC documentary about her story—a documentary that reveals, among other things, that Chapman is no longer friends with the woman who caused her accident. Though Chapman long defended her friend, refusing to name her publicly (she still hasn't), she says they ultimately drifted apart. Chapman tells People her friend was "distraught and depressed" after the accident, and the two supported each other. "The first year I made sure that she was OK, even more than me," Chapman tells Today. But as time went on, things shifted for both of them. "She didn't make the effort ... and every time we spoke, I just felt like I was remembering the accident ... and I had negative feelings. I didn't feel that way in the beginning, but that's what's been happening over the last three years." Chapman says she ultimately "had to tell her that we couldn't be friends." Still, Chapman says she doesn't blame the woman—"we've all pushed somebody in a pool." The last time Chapman saw the friend was when Chapman's daughter, who celebrated her first birthday this week, was born via surrogate. As for caring for a 1-year-old, while her husband handles bottle-washing (Chapman lost the use of her fingers), "I have found a way to manipulate my hands to do a lot of things." Her mother lives with the family on weekdays to help; Chapman's husband works as a middle-school teacher. (This 5-year-old was paralyzed after doing a backbend.)

The New York Attorney General has sued Bear Stearns over mortgage-backed securities, and of course there are dumb emails involved. | Getty Images "Piece of shit," you've been replaced by "shit breather" in the lexicon of dumb Wall Street emails. Because if there's a Wall Street scandal, you can bet there are some dumb emails involved. The latest example is brought to you by the lawsuit New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman filed Monday evening against Bear Stearns (via JPMorgan Chase & Co., which purchased Bear during the crisis) alleging it knowingly stuffed mortgage-backed securities full of subprime garbage and then foisted them on unsuspecting investors. Sure enough, there are emails. The AG's complaint says it has a bunch of emails showing how Bear Stearns employees and executives, even, were well aware of how ugly the loans they were stuffing into mortgage bonds were: For example, according to a June 2006 internal Bear Stearns email, almost 60% of AHM loans that were purchased through the conduit were 30 or more days delinquent. After learning this information, Defendants went on to issue over 30 subprime and Alt-A securitizations that included AHM loans. ... Other internal communications reflect Defendants’ awareness of the bad quality of loans that were being included in other securitizations. In connection with the Bear Stearns Second Lien Trust 2007-1 (“BSSLT 2007-1”) securitization, for example, one Bear Stearns executive asked whether the securitization was a “going out of business sale” and expressed a desire to “close this dog.” In another internal email, the SACO 2006-8 securitization was referred to as a “SACK OF SHIT” and a “shit breather.” Somewhere, former Merrill Lynch analyst Henry Blodget is shaking his fist in rage: His email about touting a "piece of shit" tech stock in the dot-com bubble has now been upstaged. "Shit breather" is so much more poetic, if a little confusing. How does one breathe shit? Anyway, in another email exchange, an underwriter at mortgage banker EMC Mortgage -- another defendant in the New York AG suit -- writes about how much pressure Bear Stearns was putting on her company to buy and securitize more loans, no matter how much shit they breathed: I refuse to receive any more emails from [a Bear Stearns Senior Managing Director] (or anyone else) questioning why we’re not funding more loans each day. . . . [I]f we have 500+ loans in this office we MUST find a way to underwrite them and buy them. . . . I was not happy when I saw the funding numbers and I knew that NY would NOT BE HAPPY. . . . I expect to see 500+ each day. ... I’ll do whatever is necessary to make sure you’re successful in meeting this objective. Unfortunately, the lawsuit doesn't name any names, and the complaint only offers a couple of examples. We can only hope to learn more in the days ahead. For now, you can dig into this complaint filed by Ambac last year against Bear Stearns and EMC, which seems to include many of the same allegations included in the New York AG's suit. But so far we've already got enough emails to start carving Bear Stearns a spot in the Valhalla of dumb Wall Street emails. Blodget's there, as is former Goldman Sachs sack-of-shit chef Fabulous Fabrice Tourre. Other recent additions to the genre include a series of emails and instant messages showing traders at Barclays and RBS openly soliciting manipulation of the London Interbank Offered Rate and then having a long laugh about it. Great stuff, guys, keep it up. Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly spelled the last name of Fabrice Tourre. ||||| New York's top prosecutor opened a new front in efforts to hold banks accountable for the financial crisis by filing a civil lawsuit against J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., alleging widespread fraud by the company's Bear Stearns unit in the sale of mortgage-backed securities. The case is the first to be brought under the aegis of a group of federal and state prosecutors and regulators formed by President Barack Obama in January. If successful, the lawsuit could point the way to significantly more financial pain for the big banks,... ||||| Every now and then, a lawsuit or legislative report emerges to remind us just how out-of-control the U.S. mortgage business was in the years leading up to the financial crisis, and a civil tort filed today by the New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is a fine example. (A congressional investigation into Countrywide’s program to provide discounted loans to lawmakers, the results of which were published in July, also comes to mind.) Mr. Schneiderman’s suit brings fraud charges against JPMorgan with widespread misconduct in the packaging and sale of mortgage securities committed by Bear Stearns. These practices, of course, helped sink Bear Stearns, leading the investment bank to be acquired by JPMorgan in 2008, and the broad details—that Bear so coveted the profit available by selling mortgage-backed bonds that it became indiscriminate in the loans it purchased for securitization—are well known, and were common to any number of Wall Street banks. For all the ubiquity of the alleged practices, Mr. Schneiderman’s complaint still makes for a shocking read:Bear Stearns was buying junk … “… numerous originators who were top contributors to Defendants’ RMBS were on the Comptroller of the Currency’s ‘Worst Ten’ mortgage originators in the ‘Worst Ten’ metropolitan areas due to their loans’ high rate of foreclosures during the period 2005 to 2007.” … in no small measure, because it residential mortgage-backed securities business was growing so fast … “In 2003, EMC securitized 86,000 loans valued at approximately $21 billion. That number nearly tripled in 2004, to approximately 231,000 loans valued at $48 billion. In 2005, the number jumped to approximately 389,000 loans valued at nearly $75 billion. Finally, in 2006, EMC securitized over 345,000 loans valued at $69 billion. From 2003 through 2006, EMC securitized over one million mortgage loans valued at the time in excess of $212 billion.” … and which rapid mortgage acquiring led to lapsed quality control standards … “To accommodate this massive volume of loans, Defendants’ due diligence process abandoned certain basic inquiries—such as determining the reasonableness of income in a ‘stated income’ loan. According to dozens of former due diligence firm employees and EMC underwriters, the very high volume of ‘stated income loans,’ and their limited ability to probe the reasonableness of the income stated, was one of the greatest challenges of the due diligence review.” … which was plain enough to those involved … “Defendants were aware that many of their loan originators were selling defective loans but continued to buy and securitize those loans. For example, according to a June 2006 internal Bear Stearns email, almost 60% of AHM loans that were purchased through the conduit were 30 or more days delinquent. After learning this information, Defendants went on to issue over 30 subprime and Alt-A securitizations that included AHM loans.” … even if the lapses were expedient to ignore … “Indeed, far from making an effort to improve their due diligence review—and thereby improve the scrutiny of the loans they were purchasing—Defendants, as early as February 2005, began to reduce the amount of due diligence conducted ‘in order to make us more competitive on bids with larger sub-prime sellers.’ As one senior executive acknowledged in testimony, the ‘reduction in due diligence could be a response to a request from a seller.'” … ok, we can’t resist, one more … internal communications reflect Defendants’ awareness of the bad quality of loans that were being included in other securitizations. In connection with the Bear Stearns Second Lien Trust 2007-1 (‘BSSLT 2007- 1’) securitization, for example, one Bear Stearns executive asked whether the securitization was a ‘going out of business sale’ and expressed a desire to ‘close this dog.’ In another internal email, the SACO 2006-8 securitization was referred to as a ‘SACK OF SHIT’ and a ‘shit breather.'” Of course, Mr. Schneiderman’s lawsuit is not mere historical relic. As The Wall Street Journal points out, the suit filed today is merely the first in what could be a series of actions against the banks, and which, if successful, could lead to another round of litigation costs weighing on the lenders’ bottom lines. In the meantime, though, we can only shake our heads at another chronicle of the housing bubble. |||||

– Today's newly filed lawsuit accuses Bear Stearns—now owned by JPMorgan Chase—of knowingly pushing rotten mortgage securities onto investors before the financial meltdown. And how might federal prosecutors go about proving it? It won't hurt that they've got Bear Stearns emails referring to one deal as a "sack of shit" and a "shit breather," reports the Huffington Post. Another shows an exec anxious to "close this dog," and yet another shows that Bear Stearns knew most of the loans it was buying and reselling were more than 30 days' delinquent. "Every now and then, a lawsuit or legislative report emerges to remind us just how out-of-control the US mortgage business was in the years leading up to the financial crisis," writes Patrick Clark at the Observer. And as the Wall Street Journal points out, if this case proves successful, it could be the first of many that seek to hold big banks accountable—brought by private investors as well as the government.

Obama Says Guantanamo Prison Doesn't Help U.S. Security, 'It Undermines It' Enlarge this image toggle caption Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images U.S. operation of the Guantanamo Bay military detention center in Cuba is "contrary to our values" and is seen as "a stain on our broader record" of upholding the highest rules of law, President Obama said Tuesday as he announced plans to close the facility. The administration's proposal is "not expected to go very far," as the Two-Way reported earlier today. Devised by the Pentagon, the plan outlines how a shutdown might work — something that was requested by Congress. But it comes months after lawmakers from both parties approved legislation that prohibits the president from moving detainees onto U.S. soil. Obama made his case for the plan at a live event at the White House. "For many years it's been clear that the detention center at Guantanamo Bay does not advance our national security," he said. "It undermines it." YouTube The president added that this wasn't his opinion alone, but one that's shared by military advisers — and he said that the facility provides a recruiting and propaganda tool for terrorist groups such as ISIS and also hurts America's relationships with its allies. "Let us do what is right for America," Obama said, seeking to close a chapter in the country's fight against terrorism. Several times during his speech, Obama invoked his predecessor, President George W. Bush, noting that Bush oversaw the facility's use to house suspected terrorists — and also wanted to close the prison. "I give him credit for that," Obama said, calling it "an honest assessment on his part on his part of what needed to happen." Toward the end of his remarks, the president said, "I don't want to pass this problem on to the next president, whoever it is. And if as a nation we don't deal with this now, when will we deal with it?" Enlarge this image toggle caption Ben Fox/AP Ben Fox/AP Responding to Obama's plan, the American Civil Liberties Union's executive director, Anthony D. Romero, applauded the effort to close Guantanamo — but he added, "his decision to preserve the Bush-created military commissions is a mistake." Romero also said that the president's "continuing embrace of indefinite detention without charge or trial will tarnish his legacy." More than a third of the current occupants at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay are now eligible to be transferred to other countries, the White House says. Although Republican majorities in the House and Senate are not inclined to go along, the Pentagon plan will fulfill an obligation created by Congress for Obama to at least file such a plan and move the onus for action onto Capitol Hill. "The politics of this are tough," the president said Tuesday, noting that many Americans remain highly concerned about terrorism — and the prospect of holding terrorists prisoner here in the U.S. Defense officials have been surveying sites inside the United States to see how well they might do as the new homes for Guantanamo detainees. There are 46 detainees whom U.S. officials consider too dangerous to release because of the potential threat they might pose, along with 10 others who are either charged or convicted by military commissions. Another 35 detainees held at Guantanamo since the George W. Bush administration are awaiting transfer to other countries. The Pentagon has looked at military and federal prisons in South Carolina, Kansas and Colorado. Its report could include the details of what work each one would require as a potential stateside successor to Guantanamo, but is not expected to pick one over the other. NPR's David Welna, who just returned from a week covering military commissions at Guantanamo Bay, has visited two of the sites the Pentagon has considered. The mayor of Leavenworth, Kan., home to a maximum security Army prison, told Welna she is "absolutely against" the idea of Guantanamo detainees moving there. Many locals in Canon City, Colo., also oppose the idea of hosting the terror suspects, but as home to a prison complex that includes the well-known federal "Supermax," they know why their area makes sense. "I suppose I would prefer not to have war criminals or war prisoners in our community," Canon City Mayor Tony Greer told Welna. "On the other hand, we are a prison community. And if I were assigned the task from Washington to choose a site, certainly this would be on my short list." ||||| Kansas, South Carolina Take NIMBY Stance On Guantanamo Prisoners Enlarge this image toggle caption Julie Denesha/Getty Images Julie Denesha/Getty Images In hopes that it can persuade Congress to drop its prohibition on transferring detainees in Guantanamo to American soil, the White House is hunting for a highly secure place in the U.S. for some 50 detainees. Labeled as "enemy combatants," they've been held for more than a decade without trial in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, at a camp President Obama has promised to close. Unlike the 52 other captives at Guantanamo whose release can occur as soon as a country is found to take them, these detainees are considered too dangerous to release at all. They're known as "unreleasables." "It's that population that we need to find a place to detain," Defense Secretary Ash Carter said last week. "And if it's not Gitmo, then it's gotta be somewhere else. And so we need to get on with the task of finding that 'somewhere else.' " That "somewhere else" could be military prisons at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, which the Pentagon surveyed this month; officials also plan to examine Charleston, S.C., as an option. It's brought an angry response from Republican politicians — and local residents as well. Banners strung from downtown Leavenworth's iron lampposts proclaim this as the first city settled in Kansas — but it's better known as "prison town." Many of Leavenworth's 35,000 residents work at five area penitentiaries — including the Pentagon's only maximum security prison, the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks at nearby Fort Leavenworth. There's apprehension about the prospect of Guantanamo detainees who've been labeled terrorists showing up at that prison. "It has to be in somebody's backyard," says 32-year-old Navy veteran Justin Metz, on his way to the local farmers market. "But I really do feel like if you're gonna put it in a small town like this, you should at least get the opinion of people living around here, so you know what kind of backlash you're going to get from it." Retired U.S. Army colonel and local business promoter Dick Gibson has made up his mind: "I live here," he says. "I don't want 'em in my backyard." At his office just outside the Army garrison, Gibson predicts an economic downside to jailing the detainees at Fort Leavenworth. "It could have a negative effect," he says. "Businesses might say, you know, 'I'm just not in favor of this and I'm gonna move.' " Others have reached an opposite conclusion. "It just means more jobs and more blood in our economy here," says Henry Johns, a Navy veteran who works at the local VA hospital. "And that's what we need, is a boost to the economy." At the Leavenworth Antiques Mall, the talk is lighthearted — until it turns to the Guantanamo captives. Opinions divide along political lines. "I would say no," says Mary Stephenson, a 70-year-old Republican. "I think they should stay in Guantanamo where they are." "I'm just really undecided," says 82-year-old Barbara Evans, a political independent. Diana Bahr, the mall's 69-year-old owner, is a Democrat. "We have great security, we have great staff, we have the security needed," she says of Fort Leavenworth. "I want Gitmo closed down." The town's mayor, Lisa Weakley, is also a Democrat. But she doesn't want any Guantanamo detainees in Leavenworth. "It's a wonderful small town to raise a family," she says, "and we'd want to keep it that way." Weakley says she voted twice for President Obama, and she thinks it's an embarrassment that the U.S. has held captives in Guantanamo for years with no formal charges. Still, she says she's "absolutely against" moving them to Fort Leavenworth. "You know, it would be highlighted here that we do have those detainees, our fort facility as a target, our prison as a target," she tells NPR at her City Hall office. "You need to go up and take a look what they really mean by Supermax." A car tour provided by Fort Leavenworth Public Information Officer Jeffrey Wingo provides a glimpse of the facility. No tours are given at this Supermax- class prison. The U.S. Disciplinary Barracks sits at the far back side of the nearly two-century-old garrison, perched high above the Missouri River. It's low-slung, built in 2002 of gray stone blocks, and is surrounded by double fencing topped by coils of razor wire. No one has ever escaped. Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan, who's been given a death sentence, is among its more than 400 inmates — as is military secrets leaker Chelsea Manning. Some 75 of the maximum security prison's 515 beds are empty. Should the order come to house the Guantanamo detainees, Wingo is certain it would not be challenged — at least not by the fort's authorities. "Pretty much here in the military, you know, we follow the president's orders, whatever they may be," he says, "and, you know, carry on. So we don't voice an opinion." But the Kansas U.S. congressional delegation is certainly voicing its opinion. GOP Sen. Pat Roberts worries that terrorists could travel underwater on the Missouri River to invade the Supermax. Republican Rep. Lynn Jenkins, whose district includes Leavenworth, says she'll keep fighting in Congress to block any Guantanamo transfers. "I think it's irresponsible and reckless and it sets a dangerous precedent to bring them to the United States," Jenkins says. "Certainly to Kansas." Charleston, S.C., is also being eyed by the Pentagon. Officials plan to inspect the U.S. Naval Consolidated Brig there as another possible destination for the detainees. "This is a slap in the face to the people of South Carolina who have sacrificed so much for this country, to turn around and say that you are going to put these terrorists in our backyard," says South Carolina Republican Gov. Nikki Haley. "They are not wanted, they are not needed, and we will not accept them in South Carolina." Haley joined Kansas Republican Gov. Sam Brownback in a letter sent this week to Carter. "Simply put," the two governors said of the detainees, "we do not want them in our states." Federal law currently forbids such a transfer, and for now, the GOP-led Congress shows no inclination to change that. ||||| President Obama sent his plan to close the Guantanamo prison to Capitol Hill, where it was met with immediate condemnation. (Jason Aldag,Julie Vitkovskaya/The Washington Post) President Obama sent his plan to close the Guantanamo prison to Capitol Hill, where it was met with immediate condemnation. (Jason Aldag,Julie Vitkovskaya/The Washington Post) President Obama urged lawmakers on Tuesday to help him close the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, making his case for a White House plan to shutter a detention facility he said symbolizes excesses that followed the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. “This is about closing a chapter in our history,” said Obama, flanked by Vice President Biden and Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter, in remarks at the White House. “It reflects the lessons that we’ve learned since 9/11, lessons that need to guide our nation going forward.” [Read: Obama’s plan to close Guantanamo] Obama’s blueprint, which added some detail to earlier White House plans to move as many as 60 prisoners to the United States for trial or continued detention, was met with immediate condemnation from Capitol Hill. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), one of the few senior Republicans who has expressed openness to closing the detention center, said the nine-page plan failed to address basic questions. In a statement, McCain said Obama had “missed a major chance” to build support for closing the prison before he steps down in January. “What we received today is a vague menu of options, not a credible plan for closing Guantanamo, let alone a coherent policy to deal with future terrorist detainees,” he said. The instant rejection makes it unlikely the plan will advance in the Republican-controlled Congress, meaning Obama must use executive action and further incense his opponents if he intends to achieve one of his core national security goals. At the heart of the debate is whether the U.S. government can securely house or try on American soil any of the 91 prisoners remaining at the prison. [Saudi inmate repatriated as protesters mark Guantanamo milestone] Whether Obama can make good on his long-standing promise to close Guantanamo will also shape his legacy and provide an important measure of how far he was able to go in distinguishing his presidency from that of George W. Bush, who opened the prison in 2002 and filled it with nearly 800 suspected militants. Obama argued Tuesday that Guantanamo remains a rallying call for terrorists. “I don’t want to pass this problem on to the next president, whoever it is,” Obama said. “If, as a nation, we don’t deal with this now, when will we deal with it?” President Obama outlines a plan for closing the military detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. (Reuters) To allow the closure plan to move forward, lawmakers would have to alter current laws that prohibit the administration from spending any money on bringing detainees to the United States or even making plans for doing so. Since he took office in 2009, Obama has resettled overseas 147 Guantanamo prisoners who were deemed to pose a minimal security risk. Of the 91 remaining at the prison, 35 have been cleared for transfer to other nations. Ten more are in some stage of a slow-moving military trial process. Previewing the closure blueprint Tuesday morning, senior Obama aides said that 30 to 60 detainees are expected to be brought to U.S. facilities if the plan is approved. In the document, the administration said it had reviewed 13 potential facilities in the United States that might be used to house detainees, but it did not name them. If brought to the United States, some of those detainees would continue through military commissions; others might face trial in civilian courts. Early in the Obama administration, officials planned to bring a number of Guantanamo prisoners to stand trial in federal court but backed down amid political objections. [Guantanamo population to fall below 100 for first time in 14 years] In instances where prosecutors lack evidence or see potential evidence as problematic, other detainees, deemed too dangerous to release, would probably be detained indefinitely without trial. Laura Pitter, senior national security counsel at Human Rights Watch, said Guantanamo has been a “blight” on the United States’ reputation worldwide. “It is well beyond time to shut it down,” she said in a statement. “But transferring some detainees to the U.S. for continued detention is not a solution. Most detainees at Guantanamo have been held there for nearly 14 years without charge or trial in clear violation of international law.” White House officials have also tried to make a fiscal case for closing the prison. According to the plan, it would cost between $290 million and $475 million to prepare a facility in the United States and transfer detainees there. But officials estimated that within three to five years, the lower annual costs of a U.S. facility with fewer detainees would “generate at least $335 million in net savings over 10 years and up to $1.7 billion in net savings over 20 years.” [Afghan courts said these ex-U.S. detainees should be freed. Why weren’t they?] It costs almost $450 million a year to operate the prison at Guantanamo. Officials conceded that their budgetary estimates were rough, saying the lack of precision was a result of the congressional prohibition on planning for the prison’s closure. The Obama administration must also grapple with objections from critics who argue that Guantanamo detainees are too dangerous to release. According to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, six detainees released since Obama took office were confirmed as of July to have returned to militant activity. Each suspected case has made the White House’s argument harder to make. On Tuesday, Spanish authorities said they had arrested a former Guantanamo inmate who they believe was involved in recruiting fighters for the Islamic State. “President Obama’s determination to move some of the world’s most dangerous terrorists to U.S. soil is inexplicable and unacceptable,” Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said in a statement. Obama declined to address whether he will try to close the prison even if Congress opposes his plan. For months, the president’s top advisers have hinted that the White House may try to take executive action on Guantanamo, essentially going around Congress. While military leaders have signaled that they do not currently believe they have the authority to take steps to close the prison, the White House or the Justice Department could issue a new interpretation of existing law and instruct the Pentagon to do so. A former senior administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss administration deliberations, said that ordering officials to defy Congress would require “the mother of all [Justice Department] opinions.” The blueprint did receive support from some lawmakers, including Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.), who urged fellow lawmakers to consider it. “Let’s be clear,” Reed said in a statement. “Closing GITMO does not mean releasing anyone, setting bad guys free, or doing anything other than putting them in a highly secure prison and on trial under the right military tribunal system or legal process.” Obama’s announcement immediately became fodder for the presidential campaign trail. On Tuesday, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) called for expanding Guantanamo, not closing it. Speaking at a rally in Nevada, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) promised that, if he is elected, future captured militants will not be granted a federal court hearing. “They are going to Guantanamo, and we are going to find out everything they know,” he said. Republican presidential candidates have already promised that if elected, they would overturn any executive action Obama has taken. Ellen Nakashima contributed to this report. Read more: Former Guantanamo prisoner demands Obama close a facility meant to ‘destroy’ people Use of psychologists at Guantanamo Bay prison reduced with general’s order ||||| FILE - In this Nov. 21, 2013, file photo reviewed by the U.S. military, dawn arrives at the now closed Camp X-Ray, which was used as the first detention facility for al-Qaida and Taliban militants who... (Associated Press) WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama on Tuesday proposed to "once and for all" close the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and transfer remaining detainees to a facility in the U.S., though his plan does not specify where. Obama said that despite significant political hurdles and congressional opposition he is making one last effort to shutter the facility. "I don't want to pass this problem on the next president, whoever it is. Are we going to let this linger on for another 15 years?" he said, in an appearance at the White House. "Keeping this facility open is contrary to our values. It undermines our standing in the world. It is viewed as a stain on our broader record of upholding the highest standards of rule of law." Obama's proposal ducks the thorny question of where the new facility would be located and whether Obama could complete the closure before he leaves office. The plan, which was requested by Congress, makes a financial argument for closing the controversial detention center. U.S. officials say it calls for up to $475 million in construction costs that would ultimately be offset by as much as $180 million per year in operating cost savings. The proposal is part of Obama's last effort to make good on his unfulfilled 2008 campaign vow to close Guantanamo and persuade lawmakers to allow the Defense Department to move nearly 60 detainees to the U.S. But with few specifics, the proposal may only further antagonize lawmakers who have repeatedly passed legislation banning any effort to move detainees to the U.S. Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, chairman of House Armed Services Committee, has said his panel would hold a hearing on a closure plan. But he sent a letter to Obama warning that Congress has made clear what details must be included in any plan and that anything less than that would be unacceptable. Obama, meanwhile, planned to make a midmorning statement on Guantanamo at the White House. U.S. officials say the plan considers, but does not name, 13 different locations in the U.S., including seven existing prison facilities in Colorado, South Carolina and Kansas, as well as six other locations on current military bases. They say the plan doesn't recommend a preferred site and the cost estimates are meant to provide a starting point for a conversation with Congress. The seven facilities reviewed by a Pentagon assessment team last year were: the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks and Midwest Joint Regional Corrections Facility at Leavenworth, Kansas; the Consolidated Naval Brig, Charleston, South Carolina; the Federal Correctional Complex, which includes the medium, maximum and supermax facilities in Florence, Colorado; and the Colorado State Penitentiary II in Canon City, Colorado, also known as the Centennial Correctional Facility. According to the officials, the U.S. facilities would cost between $265 million and $305 million to operate each year. The annual operating cost for Guantanamo is $445 million, but the officials said the Cuba detention center will need about $225 million in repairs and construction costs if it continues to be used. They said it will cost between $290 million and $475 million for construction at the various U.S. sites, depending on the location. Some of the more expensive sites are on the military bases, which would need more construction. Because of the annual operating savings, the officials said the U.S. would make up the initial construction costs in three to five years. More detailed spending figures, which are considered classified, will be provided to Congress, said the officials, who were not authorized to discuss the plan publicly ahead of its release, so spoke on condition of anonymity. Late last year, other U.S. officials said that the assessments done by the Pentagon team suggested that the Centennial Correctional Facility in Colorado is a more suitable site to send detainees whom officials believe should never be released. Those officials were not authorized to discuss that matter publicly, so spoke on condition of anonymity. Members of Congress have been demanding the Guantanamo plan for months, and those representing South Carolina, Kansas and Colorado have voiced opposition to housing the detainees in their states. "I remain committed to blocking the transfer of Guantanamo detainees anywhere in the United States, especially Fort Leavenworth," Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., said in a statement Tuesday. "We must safeguard the missions on Fort Leavenworth, the nearly 14,000 military and civilian personnel and their family members, and the thousands of Kansans who live in the Leavenworth community." The administration is currently prohibited by law from moving Guantanamo Bay detainees to the United States. Obama has long opposed that prohibition and the White House has not ruled out the possibility that the president may attempt to close the prison through executive action. The plan submitted Tuesday does not address that option, officials said. Advocates of closing Guantanamo say the prison has long been a recruiting tool for militant groups and that holding extremists suspected of violent acts indefinitely without charges or trial sparks anger and dismay among U.S. allies. Opponents, however, say changing the detention center's zip code won't eliminate that problem. On that point, Obama's proposal faced criticism even from those who endorse closing the detention center. His initial campaign pledge was widely viewed as a promise to end the practice of detaining prisoners indefinitely without charge, not to bring that practice to the U.S., said Naureen Shah, director of Amnesty International USA's Security and Human Rights Program. "Whatever the president proposes, even if it doesn't come to fruition, the administration is changing the goal posts on this issue," she said. There are currently 91 detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Of those, 35 are expected to be transferred out by this summer. The rest are either facing trial by military commission or have been determined to be too dangerous to release but are not facing charges. Some can't be charged because of insufficient evidence and some may face future prosecution or have been designated for indefinite detention under the international laws of war. Seven detainees are in the early stages of trial by military commission, including the five men accused of planning and aiding the Sept. 11 terrorist attack, and three have been convicted and are serving sentences. At its peak in 2003, Guantanamo held nearly 680 detainees, and there were about 245 when Obama took office. |||||

– The White House responded to Congress' request for a blueprint for the closure of Guantanamo Bay on Tuesday—though NPR reports that President Obama's proposed plan is "not expected to go very far." It would see 35 of Guantanamo's 91 inmates transferred to other countries by this summer, while the remaining detainees would be moved to one or several of 13 possible military and federal prisons in the United States, per the Washington Post and the AP. At least some of the sites under consideration are in South Carolina, Kansas, and Colorado. The move would require up to $475 million in construction costs, though officials say closing Guantanamo will save $180 million per year. Annual operating costs for the US facilities would range from $265 million to $305 million. Since a law exists barring Guantanamo detainees from US soil, Congress would need to alter it to approve the plan. Critics say it would put Americans' safety at risk and the mayor of Leavenworth, Kan.—home to the maximum security Army prison under consideration for Guantanamo detainees—previously told NPR that she's "absolutely against" Guantanamo prisoners moving there. Many locals in Canon City, Colo., home to the Centennial Correctional Facility also under consideration, feel similarly. In a live address on Tuesday, however, Obama argued that "Guantanamo Bay does not advance our national security. It undermines it." He also called the prison center a propaganda tool for terrorist groups like the Islamic State.

SEOUL/TOKYO (Reuters) - South Korean and Japanese jets joined exercises with two supersonic U.S. B-1B bombers above and near the Korean peninsula on Thursday, two days after North Korea sharply raised tension by firing a missile over Japan. The drills, involving four U.S. stealth F-35B jets as well as South Korean and Japanese fighter jets, came at the end of annual U.S.-South Korea military exercises focused mainly on computer simulations. “North Korea’s actions are a threat to our allies, partners and homeland, and their destabilizing actions will be met accordingly,” said General Terrence J. O’Shaughnessy, Pacific Air Forces Commander, who made an unscheduled visit to Japan. “This complex mission clearly demonstrates our solidarity with our allies and underscores the broadening cooperation to defend against this common regional threat.” North Korea has been working to develop a nuclear-tipped missile capable of hitting the United States and has recently threatened to land missiles near the U.S. Pacific territory of Guam. On Monday, North Korea, which sees the exercises as preparations for invasion, raised the stakes in its stand-off with the United States and its allies by firing an intermediate-range missile over Japan. On Thursday, its official news agency, KCNA, denounced the military drills in traditionally robust fashion, calling them “the rash act of those taken aback” by the missile test, which it described as “the first military operation in the Pacific.” President Donald Trump, who has warned that the U.S. military is “locked and loaded” in case of North Korean provocation, reacted angrily to the latest missile test, declaring on Twitter that “talking is not the answer” to resolving the crisis over North Korea’s weapons programs. U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis was quick on Wednesday to stress that a diplomatic solution remained possible, but on Thursday he told reporters he agreed with Trump that Washington “should not be talking right now to a nation that is firing missiles over the top of Japan, an ally.” White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders reiterated at a regular briefing on Thursday that all options - diplomatic, economic and military - remained on the table. Japanese Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera spoke to Mattis by telephone and agreed to keep putting pressure on North Korea in a “visible” form, Japan’s defense ministry said. Japanese Prime Shinzo Abe said he and visiting British Prime Minister Theresa May agreed to urge China, North Korea’s lone major ally, to do more to rein in North Korea. May and Abe also discussed the possibility of adopting a new U.N. Security Council resolution on North Korea, a British government source said. SANCTION OPTIONS The 15-member U.N. Security Council on Tuesday condemned the firing of the missile over Japan as “outrageous” and demanded that North Korea halt its weapons programs. But the U.S.-drafted statement did not threaten new sanctions. Two U.S. Air Force B-1B Lancer bombers fly from Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, for a mission, with an escort of a pair of Japan Self-Defense Forces F-15 fighter jets and U.S. Marines' F-35B fighter jets in the vicinity of Kyushu, Japan, in this photo released by Air Staff Office of the Defense Ministry of Japan August 31, 2017. Air Staff Office of the Defense Ministry of Japan/HANDOUT via REUTERS Japan has been urging Washington to propose new Security Council sanctions, which diplomats said could target North Korean laborers working abroad, oil supplies and textile exports. However, diplomats expect resistance from Russia and fellow veto-wielding power China, particularly given that new measures were only announced on Aug. 5 after North Korea tested its first two intercontinental ballistic missiles in July. A U.S. ban on travel by Americans to North Korea comes into effect on Friday, a step announced after the death of a U.S. student shortly after his release from a 15-year prison sentence in the country, where three other Americans are still detained. China repeated a call on Thursday for restraint by all parties. Defence ministry spokesman Ren Guoqiang told a monthly briefing China would never allow war or chaos on the Korean peninsula, its doorstep, and military means were not an option. “China strongly demands all sides to exercise restraint and remain calm and not do anything to worsen tensions,” Ren said, adding that Chinese forces were maintaining a normal state of alert along the North Korean border. Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said the situation on the peninsula was serious. “The current tense situation on the peninsula isn’t a screenplay or a video game,” she told reporters. “It’s real, and is an immense and serious issue that directly involves the safety of people from both the north and south of the peninsula, as well as peace and stability of the entire region.” Slideshow (12 Images) For an interactive on North Korea's missile capabilities, click: here For a graphic on North Korean missile trajectories, ranges, click: here For a graphic on Kim's new act of defiance, click: here ||||| (CNN) North Korea's launch of a missile over Japan was a prelude to more military operations directed at the American territory of Guam, North Korean state media warned Wednesday. The country's state-run Korean Central News Agency reported leader Kim Jong Un presided over the dawn launch Tuesday of the "ultra-modern rocket system," the first missile ever fired from the capital Pyongyang. North Korean officials told CNN in Pyongyang that Kim was "very satisfied with the performance of the missile." The intermediate-range missile, identified by the North Koreans as the Hwasong-12, flew over Japan, further fueling tensions between North Korea and the United States and its allies, Japan and South Korea. Early Wednesday, the US conducted a test intercept of a medium range ballistic missile off the coast of Hawaii, according to a statement from the US Missile Defense Agency. A US official told CNN the test was planned for a long time, before North Korea's launch. A photo released by North Korea state media appearing the show the launch of a missile which flew from North Korea over Japan on August 29. The North Korean launch was "the first step of the military operation of the (North Korean military) in the Pacific and a meaningful prelude to containing Guam," state media said. Guam governor's office said in a statement there is no change in the island's threat level. "We knew, based on North Korea events in previous years, that with the joint exercise between the US, South Korea, and its Allies, we can expect rhetoric and activity in North Korea," said George Charfauros, Guam homeland security adviser. South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe both now believe "pressure on North Korea should be raised to its limit so that North Korea will voluntarily come to the table for dialogue," South Korean presidential spokesman Park Su-hyun said in a statement Wednesday. The two also agreed that the United Nations Security Council should enact more detailed and effective sanctions against North Korea. A new round of sanctions against Pyongyang were unanimously approved by the Security Council earlier this month. Abe and US President Donald Trump spoke on the phone late Wednesday Japan time, Abe told reporters. "I cannot tell you about our forthcoming response to North Korea, but we have just completely agreed on it," Abe said. Guam back in the crosshairs Guam has long been a focal point of North Korea's anger against the US and is often a target of North Korean saber-rattling. It was threatened specifically by North Korea in 2013 and again earlier this month, following a fiery exchange of threats and insults between Trump and the North Korean regime. The small island in the Western Pacific is the closest US territory to North Korea and hosts two important US military installations. One is Andersen Air Force Base, from which the US has been staging B-1 bomber flights over the Korean Peninsula, often in response to North Korea's missile tests. The US flew bombers over North Korea following Pyongyang's two successful tests of intercontinental ballistic missiles in July. Following Wednesday's missile interception test, MDA Director Lt. Gen. Sam Greaves said the US "will continue developing ballistic missile defense technologies to stay ahead of the threat as it evolves." A medium-range ballistic missile target is launched from the Pacific Missile Range Facility on Kauai, Hawaii. 'All options on the table' Tuesday's missile was fired just before 6 a.m. Japan time (Monday 5 p.m. ET). The launch set off emergency sirens in northern Japan, triggering text messages that warned residents to seek cover. "The launch occurred in the vicinity of Sunan Air Base, North Korea and flew east ... The ballistic missile overflew the territory of northern Japan before landing in the Pacific Ocean approximately 500 nautical miles east of Japan," a statement from the Pentagon said. It was the fourth missile North Korea fired in four days -- Pyongyang tested three short-range ballistic missiles, one of which failed, from Kangwon province that landed in water off the Korean Peninsula. Kim Jong Un's regime regularly fires missiles into the sea between its own territory and Japan, however this is the first North Korean ballistic missile to ever fly over the country. Though there is a political aspect to these launches, as much the international community sees them as a provocation North Korea conducts them in order to perfect its missile technology. Trump reacts The launch drew a strong rebuke from President Trump, who again warned that " all options are on the table." "The world has received North Korea's latest message loud and clear: this regime has signaled its contempt for its neighbors, for all members of the United Nations, and for minimum standards of acceptable international behavior," he said Tuesday. "Threatening and destabilizing actions only increase the North Korean regime's isolation in the region and among all nations of the world. All options are on the table." The global community also swiftly condemned the launch as a violation of international law. The United Nations Security Council demanded North Korea stop further missile launches, strongly condemning the country's "outrageous actions." North Korea is "deliberately undermining regional peace and stability," causing grave concerns around the world, Egyptian Ambassador and current Security Council President Abdellatif Aboulatta said in a prepared statement, agreed to by all 15 Council members. Japanese Prime Minister Abe called the launch "the most serious and grave threat ever" against the country. South Korea responded by conducting a bombing drill at 9:30 a.m. local time to test its "capability to destroy the North Korean leadership" in cases of emergency, an official with the country's Defense Ministry told CNN. An undated photo appears to show North Korean leader Kim Jong Un overseeing a missile launch, likely to be the one launched by North Korea on August 29. Retaliation for drills North Korea state media gave more details about the motivation for the launch Wednesday, noting that it came on the 107th anniversary of the annexation of Korea by Japan in 1907. It said it sent a strong message amid ongoing joint US-South Korean military drills in the southern half of the Korean Peninsula. Washington and Seoul say are defensive in nature but Pyongyang believes are preparation for an eventual invasion. Kim praised the crew's "smart and accurate movement" and said the drill "would offer them an opportunity for gaining a good experience in their rocket operation for an actual war," according to KCNA. |||||

– The UN blasted North Korea's missile launch over Japan as "outrageous" while Pyongyang promised the latest provocation was only a "first step," Reuters reports. The UN Security Council called on North Korea to stop its aggressions, saying it was of "vital importance" the rogue nation take immediate steps to wind down rising tensions. North Korea is "deliberately undermining regional peace and stability," said Security Council President Abdellatif Aboulatta of Egypt, per CNN. But the 15-member panel declined to slap the regime with new sanctions, at least for now, despite a joint call to do so by South Korea and Japan. North Korea's state-run news agency on Wednesday warned the intermediate-range missile launch was a "first step" to further operations and a "meaningful prelude to containing Guam." The threat level remained high in the US territory, which North Korea threatened earlier this month, drawing President Trump's counter-threat of "fire and fury." Kim Jong Un was reportedly "very satisfied" with Tuesday's launch, the first conducted from the capital. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe called the launch "the most serious and grave threat ever" against his nation. Meanwhile, North Korean reports of the 1,680-mile missile flight over northern Japan lacked the typical bluster, per Reuters. The Hwasong-12 missile flew a shorter distance and at a lower trajectory than earlier launches before plunging into the sea. One South Korean expert says it was lacking in military significance but "was all about North Korea being stubborn." But, he adds, "North Korea is hinting that there is room for negotiation if the US and South Korea end the joint military exercises." (A North Korea nuclear strike may not be suicide after all.)

(Reuters) - A man was found shot dead at the Florida home of singer and actress Olivia Newton-John, police said on Monday. Newton-John was not at the home in Jupiter Inlet Colony, a town near West Palm Beach, Florida, said Sergeant Scott Pascarella, a spokesman for the Jupiter Police Department. Pascarella said the deceased man was a 42-year-old contractor who was working at the house owned by Newton-John and her husband, John Easterling. Police are investigating the circumstances of his death, Pascarella said. Newton-John starred in the 1978 movie “Grease” with John Travolta. Her hits include the 1981 song “Physical,” a song from the album of the same name. ||||| Just One More Thing... We have sent you a verification email. Please check your email and click on the link to activate your profile. If you do not receive the verification message within a few minutes of signing up, please check your Spam or Junk folder. Close |||||

– A 42-year-old man found shot dead at Olivia Newton-John's Florida home yesterday was a contractor working at the house, police say. Newton-John, who owns the home with husband John Easterling, was not at the Jupiter Inlet Colony house at the time, Reuters reports. The death appears to be a suicide, but police are still investigating, according to the Palm Beach Post. Gossip sites have reported recently that Newton-John was selling the 7,429-square-foot house, possibly to Rosie O’Donnell.

Kris Jenner—Kardashian matriarch and momager extraordinaire—celebrated her 60th birthday over the weekend and leave it up to this clan to celebrate in an over-the-top fashion. In a video posted to Jenner’s YouTube channel Saturday, the entire family and a bevy of famous friends paid musical tribute to Kris. The song is “I Love L.A.” by Randy Newman but the lyrics—referencing Nobu, Givenchy, and the Beverly Hills Hotel—are pure Kardashian. The video starts with something Kris herself whipped up back in 1985 to pay tribute to her friends. The original video includes her tiny daughters Khloe, Kim, and Kourtney along with, jarringly, O.J. Simpson. Fast forward to 2015 and the Jenner/Kardashian lifestyle has changed somewhat dramatically. Gone are references to “bible study” and “The Cheesecake Factory” that pepper the original song. Instead we have Khloe, Kim, Kourtney, Kendall, and Kylie climbing aboard exercise equipment just like their mother did back in the 80s and bringing in a supporting cast of famous faces including Justin Bieber, Katy Perry, and Kanye West to (literally) sing Kris’s praises. The video ends with the biggest change of all to Kris’s life: Caitlyn Jenner. Rumors that the exes have worked through their differences appear to be true and the former Olympian athlete showed off her enviable legs by taping her section of the video from a bubble bath. The video was only one small part of a lavish Gatsby-themed bash the Jenner/Kardashian kids threw for their mom on Friday. Loading View on Instagram Kanye crooned a version of Happy Birthday to his mother-in-law as she contemplated a gorgeous art deco cake. Loading View on Instagram The girls were all dressed to the nines. Loading View on Instagram And the joint was jumping with celebrity guests including the likes of Chrissy Teigen and John Legend. Loading View on Instagram By all appearance, the Kardashians and Jenners know how to party. But you already knew that, didn’t you? ||||| Kris Jenner turned 60 on Thursday, and the reality TV matriarch and “momager” celebrated in a big way on Friday night with a Great Gatsby-themed soiree at The Lot in West Hollywood, California. Kris' daughters, Khloe and Kourtney Kardashian, were spotted arriving at the party dressed in vintage ensembles to fit the theme. Inside the party, Kris and all her daughters -- Khloe, Kourtney, Kim Kardashian, Kendall Jenner and Kylie Jenner -- gathered to snap a family photo in their vintage garb and danced to '20s tunes, spun by DJ Cassidy. Famous guests at the swanky soiree included Kim and husband Kanye West; Kylie's boyfriend, Tyga; Lisa Rinna and Harry Hamlin; Chrissy Teigen and John Legend; Melanie Griffith and daughter Stella Banderas; Courtney Love; Givenchy's Riccardo Tisci; Cheryl Burke; and Mel B. and husband Stephen Belafonte. WATCH: Caitlyn Jenner Wishes Kris a Happy Birthday Alongside Daughters Kim, Kourtney, and Khloe Kardashian All six of Kris’ children, including her son Rob, were listed on the invitation, which promised “champagne flowing” and asked guests to “inspire their attire” in the style of the “Gatsby Era.” WATCH: Khloe Kardashian Plans Lamar Odom's 36th Birthday Party in the Hospital The party was a true vintage throwback, with Classic Party Rentals decking out the space at the luxurious studio complex with lots of feathers, chandeliers and white flowers. Kendall stayed true to the theme, sharing a pic on Twitter of her “Miss Daisy” getup for the party. Kylie donned a silver-beaded vintage dress to pose in some Instagram shots with her dates for the evening, big sister Kourtney and Tyga, who both looked dapper in suits. Kylie later posted a Snapchat pic of her and Tyga smooching from in the party's photo booth. Kim dazzled in a beautiful silver gown, posing alongside her handsome husband. WATCH: Kylie Jenner Posts Underwear Selfie on Mom Kris Jenner's 60th Birthday All of Kris’ kids sent their mom birthday wishes this week, but it was a surprise from Jenner’s granddaughters, North West and Penelope Disick, that got the reality star truly emotional. “I'm not sure how to express my feelings for the best birthday gift ever.... Except to say that in true Kris Jenner fashion, I BURST into tears,” Kris captioned an Instagram pic of the sweet card and cake the girls presented her with on Thursday. “Beyond the best from my two little ballerinas.” WATCH: Caitlyn Jenner Sends Kris Jenner Sweet Birthday Message Alongside Kim, Khloe and Kourtney |||||

– Kris Jenner turned 60 over the weekend, and her family's tribute to her must be seen to be believed. Vanity Fair provides the backstory: When she turned 30, Kris (who was then "Kristen Kardashian") made a music video dedicated to her friends. Set to the tune of Randy Newman's "I Love LA," Kris' "I Love My Friends" featured all the things she and her friends loved ... including "bible study," "church on Sundays," and "Cheesecake Factory." Thirty years later, her five daughters filmed an updated version, "She Loves Her Friends," and needless to say, the list of things Kris and her pals enjoy has gotten noticeably ritzier. (Although there is still a shot of Costco included.) Watch the video, or check out Kris' Gatsby-themed birthday soiree.

The CNN Center in Atlanta is the world headquarters of the Cable News Network. (iStock photo) On Jan. 9, an operator in Atlanta manning the public contact number for CNN received a phone call. According to a federal arrest affidavit unsealed Monday, the male caller launched into a threat. “Fake news. I’m coming to gun you all down. F‑‑‑ you, f‑‑‑ing n‑‑‑‑‑s.” The caller then clicked off. Three minutes later, the same caller, dialing from the same number, again rang the CNN line. “I am on my way right now to gun the f‑‑‑in’ CNN cast down. F‑‑‑ you,” the caller said. The operator asked the caller his name. “F‑‑‑ you,” he responded. “I am coming to kill you.” Thirty minutes later, the caller again reached the CNN public switchboard. He whispered his threats. “I’m coming for you CNN. I’m smarter than you. More powerful than you. I have more guns than you. More manpower. Your cast is about to get gunned down in a matter of hours.” According to federal law enforcement, the man on the other end was Brandon Griesemer of Novi, Mich. In an arrest affidavit released Monday, FBI agent Sean Callaghan wrote that Griesemer “made approximately 22 total calls to CNN” between Jan. 9 and Jan. 10. Four of the calls resulted in threats. In the last message, the caller made disparaging remarks about Jewish individuals, before stating: “You are going down. I have a gun and I am coming to Georgia right now to go to the CNN headquarters to f‑‑‑ing gun every single last one of you. I have a team of people. It’s going to be great, man . . . You gotta get prepared for this one, buddy.” Court records indicate Griesemer was arrested on a charge of interstate communications with intent to extort, threaten or injure. He made an initial appearance in court on Jan. 19. Griesemer is currently free on a $10,000 unsecured bond. On Monday night, a man who identified himself as Griesemer’s father told The Washington Post that “this whole thing has been a mistake. He really didn’t mean any of it.” Griesemer’s father added: “He didn’t know what he was saying, the seriousness of it. We’re not even gun owners or anything like that. We don’t have any, neither does he.” The father declined to comment further. “More will come out later. Hopefully, this can be settled.” The threats were made public less than a week after President Trump unveiled his “Fake News Awards.” The term, trumpeted by the president in his frequent clashes with the press, has become a popular rallying cry among Trump’s base. CNN has been a regular target of the president’s “fake news” attacks; the president has also shared violent images featuring the cable news giant, including pictures of the CNN logo crushed under a shoe and a GIF of the president personally attacking the CNN logo. On Monday night, CNN released a statement about the threats. “We take any threats to CNN employees or workplaces, around the world, extremely seriously. This one is no exception. We have been in touch with local and federal law enforcement throughout, and have taken all necessary measures to ensure the safety of our people.” Public records indicate Griesemer was born in 1998. According to the arrest affidavit, an investigator working for CNN originally traced the threatening calls back to Griesemer. The number allegedly used in the threats traced back to Brandon Griesemer’s father and an affiliated wireless number. At one point, the investigator called the number and spoke with someone who identified himself as “Brandon.” The investigator recorded the conversation, then compared the audio with the recordings of the threatening CNN calls. “The voices sounded like the same individual,” the affidavit states. This was not the first time Griesemer allegedly made threatening phone calls. The arrest affidavit notes that on Sept. 19, an employee of the Islamic Center of Ann Arbor received a phone call. The male caller “made derogatory comments relating to the mosque and Muslims.” Police tracked the number to the Griesemer house. In a phone call with police, Griesemer “stated that he had called the mosque on September 19, and that he was angry at the time of the call.” More from Morning Mix: Neil Diamond says he has Parkinson’s disease, will retire from touring ||||| ATLANTA (AP) — A Michigan man has been arrested after authorities say he threatened to travel to Atlanta and kill people at CNN headquarters. Federal court documents filed in Michigan say 19-year-old Brandon Griesemer of Novi, Michigan, began calling CNN on Jan. 9. He allegedly told a CNN operator, "Fake News. I'm coming to gun you all down." He allegedly made racist and anti-Semitic comments too. Altogether, there were 22 calls from two phones over two days. The phone numbers were traced to Griesemer's family. Court documents say Griesemer had earlier made threatening calls to a local mosque. An FBI affidavit says Griesemer made interstate threats by phone, in violation of federal law. Griesemer, a part-time grocery worker, was arrested, with bail set at $10,000. He is represented by a public defender. ||||| (CNN) Authorities arrested a Michigan man last week after he allegedly called CNN several times, threatening to kill employees at the network's Atlanta, Georgia, headquarters, according to a federal affidavit. Brandon Griesemer made 22 calls to CNN on January 9 and January 10 and four calls, which were recorded, contained threats, according to the affidavit, which was unsealed Friday. Griesemer, whose age was not given, also made disparaging statements about Jewish people, African-Americans and the network in several calls, the affidavit said. He was charged Friday in US District Court with transmitting interstate communications with the intent to extort and threat to injure. He was released Friday on $10,000 bond. A family member at Griesemer's home in Novi, Michigan, declined to comment late Monday. "We take any threats to CNN employees or workplaces, around the world, extremely seriously. This one is no exception. We have been in touch with local and federal law enforcement throughout, and have taken all necessary measures to ensure the safety of our people," CNN said Monday in a statement. Michigan authorities first crossed paths with Griesemer last fall. On September 19, a man -- later identified as Griesemer -- called an employee at an Islamic center in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and made derogatory comments about the mosque and Muslims, an FBI agent said in the affidavit. Ann Arbor police used an online database to identify Griesemer's father as the phone's owner. Two days later, Ann Arbor police contacted Griesemer's mother at the family's home, where Griesemer lived. She told police her son had called the mosque, the affidavit said. Officers told her they wanted to talk to her son. In a call to Ann Arbor police that day, Griesemer admitted he called the mosque on September 19 "and that he was angry at the time of the call," the affidavit said. CNN received the first threatening call around 3 p.m. on January 9. The call was made to a publicly listed phone number at the Atlanta headquarters from the same cell phone number used to call the Islamic center in Ann Arbor on September 19, the affidavit said. It was the first of three threatening calls that day to CNN from that number, according to the affidavit. "Fake news. I'm coming to gun you all down," said the caller, who cursed and used an expletive directed at African-Americans, the affidavit said. "I am on my way right now to gun the f****** CNN cast down .... I am coming to kill you," the caller said a second call to CNN, according to affidavit. On January 9, an investigator employed by CNN searched law enforcement databases for the phone number and discovered it was registered to Griesemer's father, the affidavit said. The investigator learned a second number was associated with the wireless account. The investigator called the second phone number and asked to speak to Griesemer's father. The man who picked up identified himself as Brandon, the affidavit said. The investigator recorded the conversation with Griesemer and compared the audio to the recorded audio of the threatening calls, the affidavit said. The voices sounded like the same person, the affidavit said. On January 10, CNN received the fourth call from the same cell phone number used to make the three prior threats, the affidavit said. The caller again threatened to come to the Atlanta headquarters to "gun every single last one of you," the affidavit said. The CNN investigator collected data from the cell phone used to make the threats. That phone had accessed a cellular tower in Novi, Michigan, the affidavit said. Griesemer could face a fine or up to five years in prison if convicted. |||||

– A Michigan man has been arrested after authorities say he threatened to travel to Atlanta and kill people at CNN headquarters. Federal court documents filed in Michigan say 19-year-old Brandon Griesemer of Novi began calling CNN on Jan. 9, per the AP. He allegedly told a CNN operator in one call, "Fake news. I'm coming to gun you all down." In a second call, he reportedly said: "I am on my way right now to gun the f---ing CNN cast down. ... I am coming to kill you." He allegedly made racist and anti-Semitic comments, too. Altogether, there were 22 calls from two phones over two days. "We take any threats to CNN employees or workplaces, around the world, extremely seriously," CNN said in a statement. "We have been in touch with local and federal law enforcement throughout, and have taken all necessary measures to ensure the safety of our people." The phone numbers were traced to Griesemer's family. In court documents, an FBI agent says Griesemer had made a threatening call to a local mosque in Ann Arbor in September. Cops traced that call, and a couple of days after the incident Griesemer admitted he'd made the call, in which he was said to have made derogatory remarks about the mosque and Muslims, because he "was angry at the time." In the CNN case, an FBI affidavit says Griesemer made interstate threats by phone, in violation of federal law. A man who said he's Griesemer's father tells the Washington Post that "this whole thing has been a mistake" and that Griesemer doesn't even own guns, adding: "He didn’t know what he was saying, the seriousness of it." Griesemer, a part-time grocery worker, could face a fine or up to five years in prison if convicted. His bail has been set at $10,000.

GENEVA Two-thirds of the world's population under 50 have the highly infectious herpes virus that causes cold sores around the mouth, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday, in its first estimate of global prevalence of the disease. More than 3.7 billion people under the age of 50 suffer from the herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1), usually after catching it in childhood, according to a the WHO study. That is in addition to 417 million people in the 17-49 age range who have the other form of the disease, HSV-2, which causes genital herpes. HSV-1 normally causes mouth ulcers rather than genital infection, but it is becoming an increasing cause of genital infection too, mainly in rich countries. That is because improved hygiene in rich countries is lowering HSV-1 infection rates in childhood, leaving young people more at risk of catching it via oral sex when they become sexually active. HSV-2 can increase the risk of catching and spreading HIV, the disease that causes AIDS. Little is known about any link between HSV-1 and HIV/AIDS, although it can lead to other serious complications such as encephalitis. "We really need to accelerate the development of vaccines against herpes simplex virus, and if a vaccine designed to prevent HSV-2 infection also prevented HSV-1, it would have far reaching benefits," said Sami Gottlieb, a WHO medical officer. Nathalie Broutet, also a WHO medical officer, said the U.S. National Institutes of Health and companies including GlaxoSmithKline Plc were involved in trials to determine whether a therapeutic or preventative vaccine was preferable. Gottlieb said GSK had previously abandoned a vaccine trial after finding the product was not effective against HSV-2, although it did show some efficacy against HSV-1. "That was interesting and promising and gave a proof of concept that these vaccines can be developed. There's a lot of work ongoing and we're hopeful that we'll have an HSV vaccine in the future," she said. Several phase-1 and phase-2 trials were underway, she said. Genocea Biosciences Inc recently dropped work on a pneumonia vaccine in favor of its more promising work on genital herpes. (Reporting by Tom Miles; Editing by Gareth Jones) ||||| Two-thirds of the world's population has the virus that causes cold sores, the World Health Organization said Wednesday. That's 3.7 billion people under the age of 50 with the pesky and incurable herpes virus. But it causes more than cold sores. The herpes simplex 1 virus (HSV-1) can also cause sores on the genitals — and oral sex is becoming a leading way it's being transmitted, the WHO reported in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS ONE. "The global burden of HSV-1 infection is huge," the WHO research team writes. "An estimated 140 million people aged 15-49 years were calculated to have prevalent genital HSV-1 infection globally in 2012," they wrote. That means two kinds of incurable herpes viruses are causing sexually transmitted infections in the populations. HSV-2 is traditionally called genital herpes, and it's the kind most people think of as causing sexually transmitted infections. HSV-1, while annoying and sometimes painful, is usually caught in childhood and often via kisses. "The new estimates highlight the crucial need for countries to improve data collection for both HSV types and sexually transmitted infections in general," said Dr. Marleen Temmerman, director of WHO's Department of Reproductive Health and Research. In the Americas, WHO estimates that 49 percent of women, or 178 million women, have HSV-1 and 39 percent of men, or 142 million, do. That's the region with the lowest rates. In Africa, 87 percent of people have HSV-1 while it's close to 60 percent in Southeast Asia. Both viruses cause painful and recurring blisters and both can spread even if someone doesn't have skin blisters. Both can be treated with the same antiviral drugs but the drugs just control the virus - they cannot cure an infection. At least once scientific study suggests that humans caught herpes viruses from chimpanzees. ||||| Abstract Background Herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) commonly causes orolabial ulcers, while HSV-2 commonly causes genital ulcers. However, HSV-1 is an increasing cause of genital infection. Previously, the World Health Organization estimated the global burden of HSV-2 for 2003 and for 2012. The global burden of HSV-1 has not been estimated. Methods We fitted a constant-incidence model to pooled HSV-1 prevalence data from literature searches for 6 World Health Organization regions and used 2012 population data to derive global numbers of 0-49-year-olds with prevalent and incident HSV-1 infection. To estimate genital HSV-1, we applied values for the proportion of incident infections that are genital. Findings We estimated that 3709 million people (range: 3440–3878 million) aged 0–49 years had prevalent HSV-1 infection in 2012 (67%), with highest prevalence in Africa, South-East Asia and Western Pacific. Assuming 50% of incident infections among 15-49-year-olds are genital, an estimated 140 million (range: 67–212 million) people had prevalent genital HSV-1 infection, most of which occurred in the Americas, Europe and Western Pacific. Conclusions The global burden of HSV-1 infection is huge. Genital HSV-1 burden can be substantial but varies widely by region. Future control efforts, including development of HSV vaccines, should consider the epidemiology of HSV-1 in addition to HSV-2, and especially the relative contribution of HSV-1 to genital infection. Citation: Looker KJ, Magaret AS, May MT, Turner KME, Vickerman P, Gottlieb SL, et al. (2015) Global and Regional Estimates of Prevalent and Incident Herpes Simplex Virus Type 1 Infections in 2012. PLoS ONE 10(10): e0140765. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0140765 Editor: Neal A. DeLuca, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, UNITED STATES Received: August 12, 2015; Accepted: September 30, 2015; Published: October 28, 2015 This is an open access article, free of all copyright, and may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, modified, built upon, or otherwise used by anyone for any lawful purpose. The work is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 public domain dedication Data Availability: All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files. Funding: This work was funded by the UNDP/UNFPA/UNICEF/WHO/World Bank Special Programme of Research, Development and Research Training in Human Reproduction (http://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/hrp/en/). WHO commissioned the study, advised as required during the study, co-ordinated data requests, helped with redrafts, and approved the manuscript submission. KJL had full access to all the data in the study and had final responsibility for the decision to submit for publication. KJL received funding from the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Health Protection Research Unit (HPRU) in Evaluation of Interventions, Health Protection Scotland and Sexual Health 24 during the course of this study. ASM received funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH P01-A1-030731-23) during the study. These funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. The authors alone are responsible for the views expressed in this article and they do not necessarily represent the views, decisions or policies of the institutions with which they are affiliated. Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist. Introduction Herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) is a highly infectious virus which is primarily transmitted by oral-oral contact and causes orolabial herpes (notably “cold sores”) in those infected[1]. The virus is highly prevalent and endemic throughout the world[2,3]. The majority of HSV-1 infections occur during childhood and infection is never cleared[1], with lifelong potential for symptomatic or asymptomatic viral shedding episodes[4,5]. In rare cases, infection can lead to more serious complications, such as encephalitis. In developed country settings, HSV-1 is the most common identified cause of sporadic encephalitis in children and adults[6,7]. HSV-2, by contrast, is almost entirely sexually transmitted, and is therefore most closely associated with genital herpes[1]. However, HSV-1 has the potential to be transmitted through oral sex to cause genital infection[1]. In a number of developed settings (e.g., the USA, Western Europe, Australia and New Zealand) there is evidence that the proportion of first episode genital herpes that is due to HSV-1 has increased, particularly among young people[8–13]. It is thought that decreases in rates of childhood infection over time[14], combined with increases in the frequency of oral sex in these populations, are driving this trend[15]. Women are more likely to acquire genital herpes than men, and this holds true for both HSV-1 and HSV-2[9,11,16,17]. The natural history of genital infection differs for the two viral types. Although first episode genital herpes is clinically indistinguishable between HSV-1 and HSV-2, subsequent recurrences are milder and much less frequent for HSV-1[5,18,19]. Neonatal herpes, a rare but devastating illness with high morbidity and mortality, can be caused by both HSV-1 and HSV-2[20]. However, a study of more than 58,000 live births showed that when mothers shed genital HSV at delivery, HSV-1 may be more likely than HSV-2 to be transmitted to the neonate[21]. In one study in Canada from 2000–2003, 63% of neonatal herpes cases were due to HSV-1[22]. This is one of a growing number of epidemiological studies that suggests that the impact of HSV-1 genital infections is widely underappreciated. It is known that HSV-2 increases HIV susceptibility and infectiousness[23–28]. The association between HSV-1 and HIV is unknown. Determining the proportion of HSV-1 infection that is oral versus genital is difficult. Standard type-specific serological tests measure the presence of IgG antibodies to distinguish HSV-1 and HSV-2 infections, but can only tell us whether an individual is infected and not the site of infection[29]. Viral shedding (both symptomatic and asymptomatic) occurring at the site of infection can be detected by a variety of methods. However, viral shedding is episodic. This means that viral shedding studies may not detect viral presence without multiple samples being taken from each person over time[30]. Nevertheless, type-specific viral detection studies remain the most accurate way to assess the site of infection. Quantifying the overall burden of HSV-1 infection, the burden of genital HSV-1, and the relative contribution of HSV-1 versus HSV-2 to genital herpes allows us to appropriately target prevention and treatment resources and tailor prevention counselling. In addition, such data can guide appropriate development of future interventions. The World Health Organization (WHO) has generated estimates of the global burden of HSV-2 twice: for 2003[16] and for 2012[17]. The global burden of HSV-1 infection has never been estimated to our knowledge. In this paper we present first WHO estimates of the burden of prevalent (existing) and incident (new) HSV-1 infection in 0–49 year olds for 2012 both globally and by WHO region. We also estimate the burden of genital HSV-1 infection in those aged 15–49 years. Methods The method of estimation was multi-step and very similar to the method used to generate HSV-2 prevalence and incidence[16,17]. First we searched PubMed and EMBASE databases for studies reporting HSV-1 prevalence (any language) published from 2005 onwards that met our selection criteria. For search terms used see S1 Document. HSV-1 prevalence was defined as the percentage of individuals with type-specific IgG antibodies to HSV-1 cross-sectionally. Reference lists of key publications were also searched. Data from publications published before 2005 and extracted previously[3,16] were included if the selection criteria were met. The key inclusion criteria were: some detail of study location and some information on age. Studies were excluded if participants were selected on the basis of having a medical condition. The rationale for this was that prevalence in such individuals may not be generalizable to the general population. For further details of the selection criteria see S1 Document. Only prevalence values from general populations were retained for the analyses. Data from specialised study populations such as men who have sex with men, STI clinic attendees and commercial sex workers were not used. Studies where enrolment was based on a particular minority subpopulation, for example, elderly Latino people in the Sacramento area, USA, were also not used. Specific regional criteria for use in the estimates were also applied depending on data availability by sex and study year for each region. In particular, only those prevalence values from studies from 2000 onwards were used, except for Africa and South-East Asia, where prevalence values from 1995 onwards were used due to poor data availability. Next we pooled raw HSV-1 prevalence values for general populations by age for each of the 6 WHO regions (and by sex where data availability permitted this). The WHO regions are as follows: the Americas, Africa, Eastern Mediterranean, Europe, South-East Asia and Western Pacific (S1 Table). Pooling was done for the following age ranges: 0–4; 5–9; 10–14; 15–19; 20–24; 25–29; 30–34; 35–39; 40–44 and 45–49 years. A sample size of 20 or more was required for pooling. All prevalence values were adjusted for test sensitivity and specificity prior to pooling[31–33]. Lastly we fitted a model[34] to the pooled HSV-1 prevalence values to estimate smoothed HSV-1 prevalence and calibrate HSV-1 incidence, which were then applied to population sizes for 2012[35] to generate the regional burdens of HSV-1 infection at any site. We estimated the burden of genital HSV-1 infection by assigning values for the proportion of incident HSV-1 infections from age 15 years that are genital from existing literature. This proportion is difficult to determine, and to our knowledge, only two studies have been carried out to estimate it. In a prospective US study of HSV-2 seronegative individuals aged 17–79 years who were “high-risk” or in HSV-2 serodiscordant relationships, 19 had incident HSV-1 infections, of which 12 were symptomatic and the site of infection could be determined. Overall, 50% (6/12) of symptomatic incident HSV-1 infections were associated with genital lesions; the remaining symptomatic individuals had either orolabial lesions or pharyngitis[36]. In a more recent study of HSV seronegative women aged 18–30 years in the control arm of the HERPEVAC Trial for Women in the USA, with 127 total incident HSV-1 infections, 85% (28/33) of symptomatic incident HSV-1 infections were associated with either genital disease or both oral and genital disease[13]. We found no studies to estimate this proportion outside of the USA. Uncertainty bounds around the estimates were computed which accounted for uncertainty in the underlying prevalence data. For a detailed description of the model and estimates calculation see S1 Document. Ethics Statement It was not necessary to seek ethical approval for this study as this study is an analysis of existing published prevalence data and as such did not involve human participants directly. Correspondingly, no patient records or patient information were accessed. Discussion An estimated 3709 million people globally aged 0–49 years were infected with prevalent HSV-1 in 2012. Assuming 50% of incident infections among 15-49-year-olds are genital, an estimated 140 million people were infected with prevalent genital HSV-1. The number of HSV-1 infections was highest for Africa, South-East Asia and Western Pacific, which had the largest population sizes. However, the majority of genital HSV-1 infections were in the Americas, Europe and Western Pacific, where HSV-1 infection continued to increase after adolescence. The prevalence of genital HSV-1 was highest for the Americas, which had the lowest HSV-1 prevalence on entering adolescence of all 6 regions. Taken together with estimates of HSV-2 infection among adults globally, which were all considered to be genital, our new estimates of HSV-1-associated genital infection suggested that 544 million people had genital infection due to either viral type worldwide in 2012, assuming half of incident HSV-1 infections in adults are genital. This figure could be as high as 633 million people, if 85% of incident HSV-1 infections in adults are genital, as suggested in a recent prospective study(13). It is unclear how much of this infection is recognized, as only about 10–20% of HSV-2 infections are diagnosed[14,38,39] and the analogous proportion for HSV-1 is unknown. In adults and adolescents, genital herpes due to HSV-1 is associated with less frequent symptomatic disease recurrences than HSV-2[5,18,19]. Thus, disease burden will vary by region not only by the number of people with genital herpes, but also the relative proportions caused by HSV-2 versus HSV-1. Although the burden of genital HSV-2 is high in Africa and moderate in South-East Asia, the available data suggest that genital HSV-1 is currently less likely to be an important public health problem in these regions. This is because HSV-1 acquisition here appeared to be high prior to adolescence and thus sexual debut, thereby protecting individuals in these regions from genital disease. However, the prevalence data on which the estimates were based were extremely sparse. For Africa, only one pooled prevalence estimate was available, with the remainder of the prevalence data for fitting coming from single studies. Genital HSV-1 could be much higher than estimated if HSV-1 infection continued after adolescence in these regions. Additionally, regional estimates could mask very different patterns of infection, including higher genital HSV-1, in individual countries or in specific settings. Our estimates of HSV-1 are considerably hampered by small numbers of studies across all regions, and by issues of small sample size, quality of data and generalizability within studies. Estimates of the burden of genital HSV-1 are severely hampered by lack of data on the proportion of incident HSV-1 infection from adolescence that is genital. We attempted to account for this uncertainty by generating two sets of estimates for genital HSV-1: the first assuming a value of 50% for this proportion[36], and the second assuming a value of 85%[13]. These values are the best available, but based on very small samples and only US populations. In addition, the site of new HSV-1 infection can only be determined for symptomatic people, and a large proportion of infections are asymptomatic. The estimates assume that the proportions of new HSV-1 infections that are genital versus oral are the same for both symptomatic and asymptomatic people. If new genital HSV-1 infections are more likely than new oral HSV-1 infections to be symptomatic, the estimated proportion of all incident HSV-1 infections that are genital may be inflated. This proportion may also vary considerably by region, setting, age and sex, although this variability may be less important for regions like Africa and South-East Asia with apparently little HSV-1 acquisition after early adolescence. Although we computed uncertainty bounds around the estimates, these are unlikely to fully account for all variation in underlying prevalence, most notably because reliable bounds for the African estimates could not be calculated. Consideration of the estimate reliability in light of these important issues should accompany interpretation and application of these estimates. Recent changes in the pattern of HSV-1 infection, i.e., decreasing rates of oral HSV-1 infection in childhood and increasing sexual transmission of HSV-1, mean that there may be cohort effects in prevalence data whereby older individuals have experienced higher historic rates of childhood infection and lower rates of sexual transmission. In the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES) in the USA, the only nationally-representative general population surveys of HSV-1 prevalence repeated over a number of years, HSV-1 seroprevalence has been declining since the first surveys (1988–1994) and is continuing to decrease, with the largest decreases observed for adolescents[14,40]. We used only data from 2000 onwards (with the exception of Africa and South-East Asia), which minimized the influence of cohort effects to some extent. However this would not have removed the effect of all ongoing HSV-1 trends in the Americas and potentially other settings. The model in effect enables us to fit a function to smooth out observed prevalence, and then estimate the number of incident infections that would result from the fitted function, assuming that over the short period of one year prevalence does not change. Impact and recommendations This is the first attempt to calculate the global burdens of all HSV-1 and genital HSV-1, and hence the first attempt to quantify the extent to which genital HSV-1 presents a public health problem across different regions. To date, prevention and control efforts against genital herpes have focussed almost exclusively on HSV-2. We show that this strategy is likely to be currently appropriate for Africa and South-East Asia, where genital HSV-1 infection is probably not a public health issue at this time. However, for other regions, most notably the Americas, Europe and Western Pacific, such a strategy would fail to address a substantial burden of genital HSV-1 infection. In addition to the consequences of genital HSV-1 infection, orolabial HSV-1 infection is important in its own right. Symptomatic recurrent orolabial herpes can range from a mere annoyance to severe disease in the setting of immunocompromise. In addition, HSV-1 is one of the most common causes of sporadic encephalitis, which is rare but devastating, with high morbidity and associated costs[6,7] and HSV-1 also contributes to neonatal infections and deaths. Patterns of HSV-1 and HSV-2 infection, and their relative contribution to genital disease, are a product of multiple interactions. These include: different routes of transmission, different risk profiles by age, and the role of cross-immunity. Decreases in childhood HSV-1 infection and increases in orogenital sex have the potential to introduce genital HSV-1 as a public health issue in those regions where it is currently minimally present, since decreasing childhood-acquired immunity to HSV-1 (oral HSV-1 otherwise seems to protect against genital HSV-1) means more adults are at risk of acquiring genital HSV-1 through oral sex. Since HSV-1 infection does not seem to follow HSV-2[37], interventions that decrease HSV-2 infection could potentially lead to an increase in genital HSV-1, while a decrease in HSV-1 could lead to an increase in HSV-2 disease[36]. Other considerations for control programmes include: genital herpes due to HSV-1 is less likely to recur compared with HSV-2; the risk of neonatal herpes seems to be higher for HSV-1 than for HSV-2; and genital HSV-1 could in theory enhance HIV acquisition in a similar way to HSV-2 although the association is not understood. Despite the limited availability of data informing these estimates, we hope to increase understanding of the global scope of HSV-1 infection, and guide development of future prevention efforts. In a recent Phase III trial, an HSV vaccine based on glycoprotein D2 failed to prevent HSV-2 infection and disease, but, encouragingly, did show significant efficacy against HSV-1-related infection and disease[41]. Efforts to develop new HSV vaccines are advancing[42]. There are currently a number of HSV vaccine candidates in the development pipeline, with several therapeutic (vaccines which work in those already infected to reduce viral shedding and disease) and prophylactic vaccines in Phase I and II trials, in conjunction with substantial advances in delivery systems, adjuvants and stimulation of mucosal immunity[42]. These estimates lay the groundwork for determining the potential impact of a vaccine against HSV and informing important vaccine characteristics. For the Americas, Europe and the Western Pacific, a vaccine would need to target both HSV types to prevent genital herpes. In Africa and South-East Asia, a vaccine targeting HSV-2 infection would address genital herpes but would need to be effective in the presence of HSV-1 infection if targeted to adolescents or would need to be an infant vaccine. In summary, these WHO estimates show an enormous burden of HSV-1 globally, with regional variation in the age at which HSV-1 is acquired. Increased data on the epidemiology of HSV-1 are needed to strengthen the robustness of these estimates and provide a clearer picture in all regions as to how HSV-1 differs by age and sex. Furthermore, an improved understanding of the interaction between HSV-1 and HSV-2 at different anatomic sites on protective immunity is needed. Genital HSV-1 acquisition is lowest in regions such as Africa with the highest HIV rates, but understanding how HSV-1 affects HIV spread is critical given how common this infection is globally. It is hoped these estimates will be used to develop appropriate prevention messages, manage and counsel patients with symptomatic genital herpes, develop improved treatment regimens and diagnostic tests, and ultimately, develop HSV vaccines. Acknowledgments The authors thank Professor Anna Wald (University of Washington) for valuable input, Dr Gretchen Stevens (World Health Organization) for statistical advice, Dr Fujie Xu (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) for helpful discussion, Jessica Ho (World Health Organization) for helping with population data, Sharanya Rajagopal (University of Washington) for advising on meta-analysis in Stata, and the reviewers who made helpful suggestions for improving the manuscript. KJL, MTM, KMET and PV thank the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Health Protection Research Unit (HPRU) in Evaluation of Interventions for research support. Author Contributions Conceived and designed the experiments: KJL LMN. Performed the experiments: KJL. Analyzed the data: KJL ASM MTM KMET PV SLG LMN. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: KJL ASM MTM KMET PV. Wrote the paper: KJL ASM MTM KMET PV SLG LMN. Contributed to the ongoing progress and direction of the research: KJL ASM MTM KMET PV SLG LMN. Provided technical expertise and input: KJL ASM MTM KMET PV SLG LMN. |||||

– In its first ever global assessment of the prevalence of the herpes virus that causes cold sores, the World Health Organization reports in the journal PLoS ONE that two in three humans under the age of 50 are infected with the incurable virus. That's an estimated 3.7 billion people. The WHO had previously done the same assessment for herpes simplex virus type 2, aka genital herpes, and found that 417 million people ages 17-49 have it. HSV-1, by contrast, is transmitted by oral-oral contact (often via childhood kisses, notes NBC News) and causes cold sores. "However, HSV-1 is an increasing cause of genital infection," they write, with the prevalence of genital HSV-1 being highest in the Americas. Reuters explains why: "Improved hygiene in rich countries" is reducing the number of infections that occur during childhood, and pushing more into young adulthood, where HSV-1 is transferred via oral sex (so not oral-oral but oral-genital). "We really need to accelerate the development of vaccines against herpes simplex virus," one WHO medical officer says. There are currently multiple phase-1 and phase-2 trials, with Genocea Biosciences halting its work on a pneumonia vaccine to focus on genital herpes. As for HSV-1, the WHO estimates that the Americas have the lowest infection rates: 49% of women and 39% of men. That number jumps to nearly 60% in Asia and a whopping 87% in Africa, reports NBC News. (This newborn almost died when a hospital visitor with HSV-1 kissed her.)

Story highlights Eight new cases have been recorded in the last week, a Pentagon official told CNN One of the military service members is a pregnant female Washington (CNN) CNN has learned there are now 41 members of the military who have been diagnosed with the Zika virus since testing began earlier this year. Eight new cases have been recorded in the last week, a Pentagon official told CNN. One of the military service members is a pregnant female. Under Pentagon health policies, female service members are permitted to move out of countries where Zika exists. In addition, a senior State Department official told CNN there have been two confirmed Zika cases among US diplomats serving overseas. The diplomats were serving in countries where Zika has already been contracted. The military tracks the number of cases reported among the ranks each week. Earlier Wednesday, the number stood at 33, but a new update has now been provided. Read More ||||| WASHINGTON – At least 33 active-duty service members, including one pregnant woman, have contracted the Zika virus while serving overseas, a Pentagon spokesman said Monday. Six family members of service members have also contracted the virus outside of the continental United States, said Army Maj. Roger Cabiness, a spokesman for the Defense Department. Those numbers were current as of Friday. The virus has spread through much of Latin America and the Caribbean since its outbreak in Brazil in May 2015. Its connections to pregnancy defects, confirmed by scientists at the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, have led the World Health Organization to declare it a global emergency. The Defense Department has taken steps to monitor and control the populations of mosquitos capable of carrying the virus, which are found at nearly 200 stateside installations from Texas in the west to Florida and as far north as New York, according to Pentagon information. "DOD is actively testing mosquitoes for Zika and other mosquito-borne diseases in the U.S. as part of our ongoing integrated vector control and surveillance programs at bases and installations," Cabiness said. Most people who contract the virus will likely remain asymptomatic, according to the CDC, but "there is now enough evidence to conclude" that Zika can cause pregnancy complications that produce severe fetal abnormalities, including microcephaly, a rare condition that causes unusually small heads and lack of brain development in children. Information about the pregnant servicemember or the condition of her unborn child was not immediately available Monday, said Air Force Maj. Ben Sakrisson, a Pentagon spokesman, who cited privacy laws. There have been at least 1,650 cases of Zika in the United States, according to the CDC. The vast majority have been transmitted outside the continental United States, though some transmissions have occurred through sexual contact with someone who contracted it while traveling. However, Florida health officials have determined mosquitoes in a small area of Miami have spread the virus to at least four people, according to the CDC. The Associated Press, citing Florida Gov. Rick Scott, reported Monday up to 14 people had contracted Zika through local mosquitoes in Miami. There are several DOD installations in and around Miami, but no mosquitos on any of those bases or any others in the United States have tested positive for Zika. |||||

– At least 33 US service members have gotten Zika while serving overseas, the Pentagon says. Six family members of service members have also gotten the virus while outside the continental US, Military.com reports. One of the active-duty service members to contract the virus is pregnant, though details about her health and that of her unborn child were unavailable. The Pentagon didn't specify the countries involved or say how many of the infected troops were still sick or back in the US, notes CNN. (Zika is being transmitted by local mosquitoes in Florida.)

CLOSE Republicans took over the Senate from Democrats and captured big wins across the country in a convincing and dramatic victory in the 2014 elections. VPC Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., celebrates his win Tuesday night in Louisville, Ky. (Photo: J. Scott Applewhite, AP) Election night 2014 was like a tsunami, as Republicans wiped out Democrats to take control of the Senate and won governorships in states that easily re-elected President Obama. A look at some winners and losers: WINNERS Mitch McConnell won more than just a sixth term to represent Kentucky. He'll soon be formally elected as Senate majority leader, a job he's long coveted, and take responsibility for setting the legislative agenda. McConnell's challenge is producing results for the GOP with a Democrat in the White House. Chris Christie wasn't on the ballot, but the chairman of the Republican Governors Association can claim victory. The New Jersey governor stumped for embattled GOP incumbents in Florida and Wisconsin, and helped candidates score upsets in traditional Democratic strongholds such as Maryland and Illinois. Not a bad start to a potential 2016 White House bid. Rand Paul, who arrived in the Senate as a Tea Party firebrand, was a team player and worked with mainstream Republicans to bring the GOP into power. When his candidate didn't win the North Carolina Senate nomination, Paul immediately rallied behind Thom Tillis. When the U.S. Chamber of Commerce wanted to reach independent voters in Alaska, the group turned to Paul. The senator's PAC paid for last-minute advertising in key states, including in Kansas to help Sen. Pat Roberts win another term. Two years ago, it would have seemed impossible that Mitt Romney would appear on an election winner's list. But the 2012 GOP presidential nominee was a popular surrogate in the battleground states that redefined the Senate. The former Massachusetts governor said recently he traveled to 27 states because "almost all those people helped me in 2012." In a bad night for their party, a trio of New Hampshire Democratic women bucked the trend. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, Gov. Maggie Hassan and Rep. Ann Kuster each fought back tough challenges to win new terms. While Rep. Carol Shea-Porter's loss means the Granite State will no longer have an all-female leadership team, the ability of these Democrats to fend off the GOP wave stands out. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., and New Hampshire Democratic Gov. Maggie Hassan wave to the crowd at a rally on Nov. 2, 2014 in Nashua, N.H., that was also attended by former secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. (Photo: Jim Cole, AP) LOSERS President Obama made headlines during the campaign when he said that his "policies are on the ballot." If that's the case, this was a near total repudiation. Democrats lost most of the battleground contests, as Republicans succeeded in linking their opponents to the president and his low approval ratings. Now, Obama will spend the final two years of his presidency working with a GOP-controlled Congress. President Obama and then-Florida Governor Charlie Crist in 2009. (Photo: Joe Raedle, Getty Images) No one will likely find their political standing more diminished than Harry Reid. His nearly eight years as Senate majority leader will come to an end. Reid, who beat back a Tea Party challenger in Nevada four years ago, could face another tough re-election fight back home in 2016. Southern Democrats, once dominant, had reason to hope they could make inroads in 2014. Even though they were defending Senate seats in Louisiana (which will now head to a runoff), Arkansas and North Carolina, they made strong pushes in Kentucky against McConnell and in Georgia's governor and Senate races. Bill Clinton was actively involved in races back home in Arkansas. It wasn't meant to be. Former president Bill Clinton talks with Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., during a campaign rally on Nov. 2 in Texarkana, Ark. (Photo: Justin Sullivan, Getty Images) Scott Brown and Martha Coakley: Brown was once the toast of the GOP after capturing Ted Kennedy's Senate seat by beating Coakley in 2010. But after losing his seat to Elizabeth Warren in 2012, he moved to New Hampshire and lost to Shaheen in a strong Republican year. Maybe Coakley's timing hasn't been great, but the Democratic attorney general now has lost two winnable statewide races in Massachusetts. Charlie Crist: The former Florida governor has the dubious distinction of voters souring on him as a Republican and independent in the 2010 Senate race. Now, as a Democrat, he failed to get his old job back. That pretty much says it all. Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1qoXG0o ||||| The GOP gained control of the Senate Tuesday night, taking hold of the legislative agenda in that chamber. Here are three of the policies Republicans are likely to tackle as they take the reins in January 2015. (Julie Percha/The Washington Post) Elections are all about winning and losing. And there was lots and lots of that on Tuesday night -- with Republicans doing most of the winning and Democrats doing the bulk of the losing. Having dug out from the avalanche of election results and with a few hours of sleep, I came up with some of the less obvious bests and worsts of the night that was. Agree? Disagree? The comments section awaits. Winners * Mitch McConnell: All this guy does is win. In a race that was supposed to be the closest of his life, the senator was named the winner of his reelection race moments after the polls closed in Kentucky. And, given the developments in other parts of the country, McConnell looks very likely to take over as Senate majority leader when the 114th Congress convenes in January. * Chris Christie: If not for the Republican takeover of the Senate, all the political world would be talking about this morning would be the remarkable success the GOP had in the governors' contests. They won where they should have (Illinois, Arkansas etc) and where they shouldn't have (Maryland and Maine). Leading that effort as the chairman of the Reupublican Governors Association was New Jersey's Christie, who will assuredly use the showing from his side as a springboard for his own 2016 ambitions. * National Republican Senatorial Committee: Yes, they had a terrific map. And, yes, it got better when Democrats such as Max Baucus, Jay Rockefeller and Tim Johnson decided to retire. But, they still had to go out and win it. And, after struggling to beat virtually any Senate Democrats in the past few cycles, they ousted Sens. Mark Pryor in Arkansas and Mark Udall in Colorado and might beat Sens. Kay Hagan in North Carolina and Mark Warner in Virginia. And, they managed to save Sen. Pat Roberts from himself in Kansas. * John Kasich: The Republican Ohio governor, as expected, won a crushing victory over Ed FitzGerald, who may well have been the worst heavily-hyped candidate of the election. Winning so big in a state that is at the center of every electoral vote calculation made by 2016 strategists in both parties. Kasich has been mostly mute on his interest in running for president in 2016, but Tuesday night solidified his résumé should he decide to do just that. * Ed Gillespie: Win or (narrowly) lose, Gillespie drastically overperformed expectations in his challenge to Virginia's Sen. Mark Warner (D). And, even if he winds up losing, Gillespie will be very well positioned to run for governor in 2017 in a relatively weak field that could include former state attorney general Mark Obenshain and former lieutenant governor Bill Bolling. * Shelley Moore Capito: Quietly, the West Virginia congresswoman ran one of the best campaigns in the country. She easily won the race to replace retiring Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D) and will be an interesting moderate GOP voice in the Senate. * Al Franken: The Democratic Minnesota senator won the closest race in the country six years ago, and many Republicans promised to make him a one-termer. Franken made no news -- on purpose -- and played down his former celebrity status. It worked brilliantly. * Florida vote counting: Giant state. Fast count. Kudos for a place that has seen its share of criticism of the way it conducts its elections. * America Rising: The Republican opposition research shop -- run by Mitt Romney's 2012 campaign manager -- proved its value this cycle. They had trackers in 36 states and unearthed some gems of opposition research on Democratic challengers, including Iowa Rep. Bruce Braley's pejorative comments about farmers and the detailed memo from Michelle Nunn's campaign about her weaknesses and their overall strategy. Oppo research isn't the sexiest part of campaigns, but it might be the most important. * The Corys: The Senate now has two men named Cory in it: Cory Gardner (R) from Colorado and Cory Booker (D) from New Jersey. I really only made them a winner so I could link to this picture of the other Two Corys. Losers * Southern Democrats: Sen. Kay Hagan in North Carolina, Alison Lundergan Grimes in Kentucky and Sen. Mark Pryor in Arkansas did everything they could to run away from President Obama and insist they were their own independent voices. Ditto Michelle Nunn in Georgia. Didn't work. They all lost. And even Sen. Mark Warner, long considered to be impregnable, found himself in a tight race with former Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie. The results affirmed just how difficult it is for Democrats to win federal races in the South -- particularly in an election cycle like this one where a Democratic president is decidedly unpopular in the region. (An NBC/Marist poll released on Sunday showed Obama with a 32 percent approval rating in Kentucky.) Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) narrowly defeated Democrat Charlie Crist, ending a race that frequently turned nasty and personal. Crist, who served as Florida's governor from 2006 to 2010 as a Republican, was hammered repeatedly by the Scott campaign for being a political opportunist. (WSVN) * Charlie Crist: Crist, as recently as five years ago, was the most popular politician in Florida by a mile. Today he is a two-time losing party switcher with no political future. Crist's abandonment of the Republican Party backfired on him in the 2010 Senate race, and he couldn't overcome Gov. Rick Scott (R), who was deeply unpopular in the state, as a Democrat. Sen. Mark Udall (D) conceded to Rep. Cory Gardner (R) in Colorado Tuesday night. Critics argued Udall's campaign put too much focus on women's issues as the race tightened. (KMGH) * Scott Brown: Speaking of two-time losers, Brown, the former Massachusetts senator, is probably done in politics after losing to New Hampshire's Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen. I will always wonder why Brown opted not to run for governor in Massachusetts, a race that was quite clearly very winnable. Speaking of Massachusetts... * Martha Coakley: It's a very, very difficult thing to lose two major statewide races in Massachusetts as a Democrat. But Coakley, the sitting attorney general who had already lost a U.S. Senate seat to Scott Brown in 2010, did just that when she came up short against Gov.-elect Charlie Baker. Might be time to find another line of work. * Martin O'Malley: The entire race to replace Democrat O'Malley as Maryland's governor was cast as a referendum on his two terms in office by Republican Larry Hogan. Make that Gov.-elect Hogan, who pulled off the most stunning upset of the night when he ousted heavily favored Lt. Gov. Anthony Brown (D). O'Malley's 2016 presidential prospects were never great, but they took a major blow Tuesday night as he couldn't even put down a rebellion in his own back yard. * Mark Udall: Ask any Democrat what happened to Colorado Sen. Mark Udall and they all tell you the same thing: He got caught napping. Sen-elect Cory Gardner (R) initially said "no" to the race but reversed course as the political environment faded for President Obama. Udall's strict focus on reproductive rights -- which Democrats were convinced was a silver bullet against Gardner -- didn't work. At all. * Turnout operations: In a neutral political environment, the superior ground game can matter for a point or so. But in a year in which the national playing field is so clearly tilted to Republicans, the touted Bannock Street Project, Democrats' much-discussed turnout operation, couldn't make the difference. Texas Democrat Wendy Davis, who faced long odds in the contest for Texas governor, conceded to Republican Greg Abbott Tuesday night, telling her supporters "your work is not in vain" during her emotional speech to supporters. (NBC) * Wendy Davis: No one thought Davis was going to be the next governor of Texas. But, few thought the Democrat would lose as badly as she did. Davis was on track to underperform not only Bill White' 42 percent in 2010 but also, potentially, Tony Sanchez's 40 percent in 2002. For a candidate whom many saw as the leading edge of the Democratic resurgence in Texas, that is really, really bad. ||||| Some of the most intriguing races remain undecided as election night winds down. If you’ve read any headlines so far, it’s easy to see Democrats were clear losers Tuesday. But this year’s midterms were about more than who controls Congress and the candidates themselves. So, who else -- or what else -- won or lost? The Huffington Post is taking a look at the broader picture. Loser: Political Legacies Despite the help they got on the campaign trail, candidates with family political legacies did not fare well Tuesday. Georgia state Sen. Jason Carter (D), the grandson of former President Jimmy Carter, lost in his bid for the state’s governorship. Democrat Michelle Nunn, the daughter of former U.S. Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), lost in Georgia’s Senate race. Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) had assistance from his mother and father, former U.S. Sen. David Pryor (D-Ark.), during his re-election campaign. Yet he lost his seat to Rep. Tom Cotton (R). And Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) moved on to a runoff instead of winning re-election outright, despite being the daughter of former New Orleans Mayor Moon Landrieu (D). Perhaps the brightest spot for political offspring on Tuesday was a win for Gwen Graham, the daughter of former U.S. Sen. Bob Graham (D-Fla.). She defeated incumbent Rep. Steve Southerland in Florida’s 2nd Congressional District. Winner: Voter Disenfranchisement Even before Election Day, voters in Texas were having trouble casting ballots because of a new state voter ID law that the Supreme Court allowed to stand. And on Election Day the reports of voters being turned away continued. I witnessed three people turned away from the polls for having the wrong ID in just 10 minutes. One man was hopping mad. — Michael Barnes (@outandabout) November 4, 2014 The Texas law, which Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg called an “unconstitutional poll tax” in her October dissent to the court's decision, requires voters to provide one of seven types of photo ID in order to vote. Concealed handgun licenses are valid, but college IDs are not. The law’s strict provisions have led civil rights groups to argue it was designed to hamper turnout from minorities and young people, who tend to vote Democratic. Texas isn’t the only place new laws were implemented. In all, 14 states are navigating new rules related to voting. Loser: 'Lingerie Parties' Rep. Steve Southerland (R-Fla.) was the first incumbent House representative to lose on Tuesday night, falling to Democratic challenger Gwen Graham in a race in which the congressman's comments about women became a major point of contention. In September, Southerland came under fire for a men-only fundraiser his campaign had held earlier in the year. An invitation to the event told invited members to "tell the misses not to wait up." When Graham's campaign made issue of the fundraiser, Southerland replied by likening it to a "lingerie party." The back and forth led Democrats with Graham's campaign to charge that Southerland was partaking in the so-called "war on women," and the congressman later faced attacks for his vote against reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act. Winner: Bullies For Rep. Michael Grimm (R-N.Y.), winning a third term was as easy as taking candy from a baby. Vote tallies on election night showed Grimm with more than a 10-point lead over his challenger, Democrat Dominic Recchia, even though the congressman is facing a host of federal tax fraud charges and earlier this year was caught on tape threatening to break a TV reporter "in half." Grimm will face trial in February for 20 counts of mail and tax fraud relating to a restaurant he once owned, the New York Observer reports. Loser: Immigration Reform Sweeping immigration reform was dealt another blow Tuesday as Republicans took control of the U.S. Senate. With control of both chambers, the GOP could pass an immigration reform bill on its own terms, in hopes it would boost the party’s standing with Latinos for the 2016 elections. If that were to happen, President Barack Obama would probably feel inclined to sign the bill. However, it’s unlikely to encompass all the changes reform groups -- and Democrats -- have been pushing for. On the other hand, Obama has said he plans to pursue reform through executive action after the elections regardless, so Congress’ unwillingness to address the issue might not prevent it from happening. Winner: Fear-Mongering It’s hard to prove whether campaign tactics of fear won an election for any candidate, but it’s clear plenty of campaigns were cultivating fear about Ebola, the Islamic State and immigration, yet didn’t suffer any major retribution. Even a GOP candidate who used an image from an Islamic State beheading in his campaign ad was polling within 15 percentage points of Sen. Tom Udall shortly before Election Day. Loser: Independent Candidates Even before Election Day, Maine’s independent gubernatorial candidate, Eliot Cutler, told supporters to vote their conscience when he was running behind in the polls. The statement served as a signal that he knew he wasn’t going to win, even though he wasn’t dropping out of the race. Kansas independent Senate candidate Greg Orman, however, was in a tight race with unpopular GOP incumbent Sen. Pat Roberts as voters went to the polls Tuesday. However, he couldn’t pull out a win. Winner: Abortion Rights Abortion rights were upheld Tuesday as two “personhood” amendments on state ballots were rejected. North Dakota rejected Measure 1, which would have added a statement to the state constitution that declared, “The inalienable right to life of every human being at any stage of development must be recognized and protected.” Coloradans rejected Amendment 67 on their ballot. The measure would have included fetuses in the state’s criminal code where the words “person” or “child” were used. The state’s voters have turned down personhood measures in the past. On the other hand, Tennessee’s Amendment 1, which passed in the red state, declares that the state constitution doesn’t protect a woman’s right to an abortion or the funding of abortions. Loser: 2016 Democratic Presidential Candidate This doesn’t bode well for Democratic presidential hopefuls: In recent presidential elections with no incumbent, the party that controls Congress has taken the White House. President Barack Obama was elected in 2008, while Democrats controlled both chambers. When George W. Bush was elected in 2000, the GOP had the House and Senate. Democrats ran Congress in 1992, when Bill Clinton won the presidency. But not all hope is lost. GOP Presidents George H.W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon and Dwight Eisenhower all won while Democrats controlled Congress. Winner: Low-Wage Workers Measures to raise the minimum wage were on the ballot in five states Tuesday. In four Republican-leaning states -- Alaska, Arkansas, Nebraska and South Dakota -- voters considered binding measures to enact hikes, while in Illinois, the referendum was only advisory. Voters in Alaska approved a measure to raise the minimum wage to $9.75 from its current $7.75. In Nebraska, a similar push to hike the hourly wage to $9 from the federal minimum of $7.25 also passed. And in Arkansas and South Dakota, which both currently use the federal minimum wage, voters decided to change the minimum wage to $8.50 an hour. The non-binding referendum in Illinois to raise the minimum wage to $10, from the current statewide $8.25, won as well. First and foremost, this is a win for the low-wage workers who will see more take-home pay next year. But there have been ongoing disputes over the potential long-term effects of wage increases, with some economists suggesting that they will lead to lost jobs and make it harder for low-skilled workers to find work. Others have said the overall effects on the job market will be negligible. FiveThirtyEight has a more complete analysis on how these hikes could affect the workforces in various states. Politically, however, this could be a sign that Obama's campaign to raise the federal minimum wage to $10.10 is an increasingly popular issue that plays well in elections -- perhaps particularly for Democrats, who have stood behind the president's push. While a number of GOP candidates from the states that voted on minimum wage measures eventually announced support for those initiatives, Republicans in Congress have consistently resisted similar nationwide efforts. Loser: Atheist Congressional Representation Going into the 2014 election cycle, there were exactly zero admitted atheists serving in Congress. That didn't change on Tuesday night, as the most viable candidate, James Woods, a blind Democrat running in a deeply red congressional district in Arizona, failed to pull off an upset against longtime GOP Rep. Matt Salmon. Various areligious groups have claimed in the past that there are a number of congressional representatives who don't believe in God. At this point, however, they remain unwilling to express such views in public. Loser: Infidelity Voters on Tuesday told the “kissing congressman” not to return to Congress. Rep. Vance McAllister (R-La.), who was caught on tape with a married former employee earlier this year, said a couple of weeks after the video surfaced that he wouldn’t run for re-election. However, two months later, he re-entered the race. In the end, voters decided to give someone else a shot at his seat. Although the race will go to a runoff, McAllister will not be on the ballot. Winner: GOP Dark Money Just five Senate races received half of all dark money spending -- funds whose sources don’t have to be disclosed under federal rules -- in the 2014 cycle. The majority of the money supported GOP candidates -- and all five of those Republicans won. $92.8 million of the $190 million in dark money spent in the cycle went toward Senate races in Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Kentucky and North Carolina As of mid-October, super PACs spent $29.2 million against Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.), and she lost to Thom Tillis (R). More than $18 million went to support Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R), who won in Kentucky. Some $14.1 million was spent against Sen. Mark Udall (D-Colo.), who lost to Rep. Cory Gardner (R). In Arkansas, $10.4 million was spent against Sen. Mark Pryor (D), who lost to Rep. Tom Cotton (R). In Alaska, $11.7 million in dark money was spent, with $6.6 million backing the winner, Republican Dan Sullivan, and $5.1 million backing Sen. Mark Begich (D). Loser: Perennial Losers Martha Coakley in Massachusetts, Charlie Crist in Florida, Scott Brown in whichever state he’s currently in … all lost once in high-profile statewide races, and then came back this cycle to lose again. Brown has made history with his losses to women, though. Winner: Legal Weed After the passage of some state initiatives Tuesday night, recreational marijuana is on track to be legal in at least three states and Washington, D.C. Oregon’s Initiative Petition 53, which passed, would allow adults 21 and over to possess up to 8 ounces of marijuana at home and 1 ounce when in public. Initiative 71 in D.C. also passed and would allow adults to possess up to 2 ounces and grow up to six plants for personal use. Marijuana sales would still be illegal in D.C., however. Alaska voters approved Ballot Measure 2, which would allow adults 21 and over in the state to possess up to 1 ounce of marijuana and grow up to six plants for their own use. Marijuana paraphernalia could also legally be made and sold. Colorado and Washington were the first states to legalize recreational marijuana in 2012. Medical marijuana is legal in 23 states and D.C., though an amendment to legalize it in Florida on Tuesday was just shy of the 60 percent approval that was required for passage. Politicians in other states have already been talking about proposing legalization in the coming years. Winner: Universal Background Checks For Gun Sales Voters in Washington state on Tuesday approved a ballot measure to require background checks on all gun sales. It was one of two gun-related initiatives, with a competing proposal that would have prevented the state from imposing additional background check requirements unless first enacted by the federal government. The passage of this ballot measure comes more than 18 months after Congress rejected a federal background check measure proposed in the wake of the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, despite polls showing that about 90 percent of Americans supported the policy at the time. With politicians at both the state and national levels having shown little interest in gun control legislation in the period since, this small victory could suggest to proponents that their best chances of success are with voters. The issue of guns was also on the ballot in Alabama, where voters passed an amendment to declare that every citizen "has a fundamental right to bear arms and that any restriction on this right would be subject to strict scrutiny." At any rate, Alabama is a deep red state, and it seemed unlikely legislators would have moved aggressively on any sort of gun control measure in the first place. Loser: The Clintons Tuesday wasn’t a good night for the Clintons, whose endorsed candidates largely failed to pull off wins across the country. Shushannah Walshe of ABC News noted their tallies on Twitter: How did @hillaryclinton do? She stumped for 26 candidates, 10 wins, 14 losses, @ABC has not projected 1 race, and she backed Landrieu. — Shushannah Walshe (@shushwalshe) November 5, 2014 And how did @billclinton do? Out of 41 candidates, 10 wins, 21 losses, Mary Landrieu will go to a run off & @ABC has not projected 10 races — Shushannah Walshe (@shushwalshe) November 5, 2014 That said, many are expecting Hillary to focus on becoming a winner between now and 2016. This post has been updated to include sections on low-wage workers and the Clintons, and to reflect the passage of Alaska's Ballot Measure 2 and results of Alaska's Senate race. ||||| Texas Democrats started the 2014 election cycle with a dream of turning the state blue for the first time in two decades, buoyed by a progressive hero on the ballot and an influx of outside cash and organizers. Instead, the nation's biggest red state just got even redder. On Tuesday, for the fifth consecutive cycle, Texas Republicans swept statewide offices, including the race for governor, where Republican attorney general Greg Abbott cruised past Democratic state Sen. Wendy Davis. It was Abbott who made the decision to hire now-Sen. Ted Cruz to be the state's first solicitor general, and it was Abbott—more so even than retiring Gov. Rick Perry—who epitomized his state's antagonistic relationship with Washington, suing the Obama administration no fewer than 27 times in his first five years. ("I go into the office, I sue Barack Obama, and then I go home," Abbott likes to tell Republican audiences.) Lest he be tempted to move to the center, voters also tapped state Sen. Dan Patrick to be his lieutenant governor, a position that's disproportionately powerful in Texas because it serves a dual legislative and executive function. Patrick has said that God speaks to the world through Duck Dynasty's Phil Robertson, and warned that migrants are bringing "third-world diseases" with them across the border. Winning in the Lone Star State was always supposed to be an uphill battle for Democrats in 2014, a point that Battleground Texas, the field-organizing outfit launched last spring by a group of Obama campaign volunteers, made clear from the get-go. When Davis jumped into the race, the time-frame shifted. As the group's executive director, Jenn Brown, told me in September, Davis' candidacy settled a chicken-and-egg dilemma that had been confounding organizers: "Great people don't want to run unless they feel there's an infrastructure to support them, but it's hard to get great infrastructure without great candidates." But Davis—and Battleground—also had the effect of throwing a football at a hornet's nest. FreedomWorks, a conservative political outfit, launched an $8-million "Come and Take It" project last year designed to thwart Democratic gains. Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who faced minimal Democratic resistance in his re-election bid this year, nonetheless asked for donations to combat "out-of-state organizers"—and "Keep it Red." (That's not to be confused with another group, "Let's Keep it Texas Red," which was formed before Cornyn's group but which per its campaign finance report exists mainly to sell t-shirts.) Even conservative provocateur James O'Keefe—recently seen crossing the border dressed as Osama Bin Laden—got in on the action, publishing a sting video purporting to show Battleground volunteers illegally cribbing phone numbers from voter registration rolls. (The practice is not illegal.) No one took the threat more seriously than Abbott, who warned that Democratic groups constituted "an assault far more dangerous than what the leader of North Korea threatened when he said he was going to add Austin, Texas, as one of the recipients of his nuclear weapons." He walked the walk, too, making repeated visits to heavily Hispanic, heavily Democratic South Texas in the hopes of offsetting any gains the Davis campaign hoped it could make. ||||| You can't win every vote. Interested in ? Add as an interest to stay up to date on the latest news, video, and analysis from ABC News. Add Interest One Kentucky voter showed his disapproval for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell today when he ran into the senator at a Louisville polling location. The campaign for McConnell’s opponent, Alison Lundergan Grimes, quickly turned the photobomb into a messaging opportunity on Twitter. The tweet, which has since been deleted, can be found on the Sunlight Foundation’s archive of politicians’ deleted tweets. ||||| On a night when Republicans took over the Senate and Democrats experienced even more losses than they were originally expecting, some of the longer-term winners and losers were people who didn't have their name on a ballot. Interested in ? Add as an interest to stay up to date on the latest news, video, and analysis from ABC News. Add Interest Fortuitous fundraising and a focus on presidential prospects helped a few Republicans on Tuesday, while two candidates who tried to game the system -- by physically moving to another state in one race and moving to a new political party for another -- didn't work out for them in the end. National Exit Poll Reveals Major Voter Discontent PHOTOS: The Unusual Places Where Americans Vote Updated Results From Around the Country WINNERS J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photo Mitch McConnell Not only was Mitch McConnell able to hold onto his job as Senator from Kentucky, but now he gets a promotion as well after Republicans were able to tilt the balance of power in the Senate. Chris Christie The tough-talking New Jersey governor wasn't listed on any ballots this year but, because of his role as the head of the Republican Governor's Association, he increased his national presence and has the results to prove it. With some races left to call, at least 21 of the 34 candidates that he stumped for ended up winning. Morry Gash/AP Photo Scott Walker After keeping his post as Governor of Wisconsin, Scott Walker has essentially shown his critics that his constituents are fans of his attempts to break unions. This also secured his spot as a top Republican presidential contender. House Republicans While the Senate was the center of most analysts' attention during the race, Republicans in the House also had a good night because now their majority is even stronger than before. Gerry Broome/AP Photo Kay Hagan The incumbent Democratic Senator no longer has a job, but she also lost her job in the most expensive race of the entire election. The cumulative fight between Hagan and Republican challenger Thom Tillis is estimated to have cost more than $1 million. LOSERS President Obama Many are casting these midterms as a referendum on President Obama's policies and a general reflection on Americans' general displeasure with this administration. His low approval ratings and attempts by candidates to distance themselves meant that the president tried to steer clear of the campaign trail for much of the lead up to the election, but he still ended up being the biggest loser on Tuesday night. Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call/Getty Images Harry Reid The Nevada Senator did not have a race to run himself but -- because of how the other races played out -- ended up losing a title out. Reid will have to hand over the Majority Leader mantle to McConnell. Chris OMeara/AP Photo Charlie Crist The fan behind his podium wasn't enough to keep his campaign cool, as Charlie Crist now has the distinct honor of being considered a loser for each political party. He started his political career as a Republican, but decided to rebrand himself an Independent when Marco Rubio beat him in the 2010 Senate race. His time as an Independent didn't work that well either, so he registered as a Democrat in 2012. He lost as a Democrat on Tuesday. Elise Amendola/AP Photo Scott Brown Though he never switched parties, former Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown did try running in another state this time around, but that didn't turn out too well. Brown, who has had a summer home in New Hampshire for years, lost that state's race against incumbent Democrat Jeanne Shaheen. Martha Coakley The former Massachusetts Attorney General isn't going to be able to lose her unfortunate nickname (of "Choakley") after Tuesday's race. She was first appointed to fill Ted Kennedy's Senate seat after he died, but then was beaten by Scott Brown in a special election. This time around, her former foe had moved up north in hopes of friendlier folk in New Hampshire, but that didn't help her new gubernatorial cause as she still ended up losing this race to Republican Charlie Baker. |||||

– Last night's victory for Mitch McConnell was a big one: He was expected to face a neck-and-neck race, but instead he was called the winner just after the polls closed, Chris Cillizza writes in the Washington Post. Starting next year, he's the Senate majority leader. Among the night's other key winners and losers: The National Republican Senatorial Committee finally had a great night after years of trouble against Democrats. They managed to knock out Sens. Mark Pryor, Kay Hagan, and Mark Udall, while keeping a struggling Pat Roberts in the Senate. As chair of the Republican Governors Association, another 2016 contender, Chris Christie, fought hard for important victories in Florida, Wisconsin, Maryland, and Illinois, USA Today reports. On a more conceptual level, the Huffington Post saw it as a big night for "bullies." New York Rep. Michael Grimm beat out Domenic Recchia, even amid tax fraud charges and after a threat—caught on TV—to break a reporter "in half." His win helped Republicans gain what ABC News notes is an even larger majority in the House. As for losers last night, President Obama was a big one: He earlier said that his "policies are on the ballot." The results, then, were a "near total repudiation" of those policies, USA Today notes. What's more, chances for a Democratic presidential victory in 2016 look weaker, the Huffington Post adds: The past three presidents have been elected under Congresses run by their parties. Wendy Davis lost badly in the Texas gubernatorial race. She wasn't expected to win, Cillizza notes, but she was also an icon for those who hoped to see Texas eventually go blue. Instead, Republicans swept last night's races for Texas state offices, Mother Jones reports. Harry Reid is out as Senate majority leader, and he could struggle even to keep his seat during the next election, USA Today reports. (The incoming majority leader, however, did get photobombed at the polls.)

A stunt driver died on the Canadian set of "Deadpool 2" after attempting to do a stunt on a motorcycle, according to a tweet today from the Vancouver Police Department. No other details about the accident were immediately available, including the identity of the driver. “We are deeply saddened by the accident that occurred on the set of 'Deadpool 2' this morning," a spokesman for distributor 20th Century Fox told ABC News in a statement. "Our hearts and prayers are with the family, friends and colleagues of our crew member during this difficult time.” Added star Ryan Reynolds: "We're heartbroken, shocked and devastated... but recognize nothing can come close to the grief and inexplicable pain her family and loved ones must feel in this moment. My heart pours out to them -- along with each and every person she touched in this world." "Deadpool" star Ryan Reynolds confirmed in late-June that "Deadpool 2," which co-stars Josh Brolin, had begun production. Reynolds last week thanked the police department and people of Vancouver "for putting up with road closures and traffic delays" as a result of filming. "Deadpool 2" is slated for a 2018 release. ||||| 'Deadpool 2' Stunt Person Killed On Set Stunt Person Killed On 'Deadpool 2' Set in Motorcycle Crash EXCLUSIVE 11:59 PM PT -- A spokesperson for 20th Century Fox tells us, "We are deeply saddened by the accident that occurred on the set of Deadpool 2 this morning. Our hearts and prayers are with the family, friends and colleagues of our crew member during this difficult time." A stunt person was killed on the set of "Deadpool 2" when a motorcycle stunt went terribly wrong. The rider, who was female, went airborne in Vancouver Monday morning during filming for the movie. Her bike crashed through the glass of a ground-floor studio inside Shaw Tower near Jack Poole Plaza. Witnesses say she never applied the brakes. Ryan Reynolds tweeted about the tragedy. The rider -- whose identity is being withheld -- was pulled from the crash site and taken to the hospital by ambulance. Police taped off the area, and an investigation is underway. It's the second major mishap involving stunts in as many days. Tom Cruise was badly injured during a failed stunt on the set of "Mission: Impossible 6." Story developing ... |||||

– A stuntperson has been killed on the set of Deadpool 2, a spokesperson for distributor 20th Century Fox confirms to ABC News. Details, including the identity of the stunt driver involved in the Vancouver accident, were not immediately available, but sources tell TMZ the Monday morning accident involved a female motorcycle rider who went airborne somehow while filming a scene for the movie. The sources say she never applied the brakes, and her bike ultimately crashed through the glass of a studio inside Shaw Tower. (A stuntman recently died on the set of The Walking Dead).

TOKYO Japan said on Friday it was still trying to secure the release of two Japanese hostages held by Islamic State militants after a deadline to pay ransom for their release passed and there was no immediate word on their fate. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's government considered whether planned legislative changes would give it the legal basis for a military strike on the Islamic State militants and concluded it did not, according to a briefing document reviewed by Reuters. The capture of two Japanese citizens in Syria represents an "unacceptable act of terror," the document said. But it concluded the situation would not meet the legal conditions for the dispatch of Japanese forces, whose activities abroad are constrained by the pacifist, post-war constitution, even under planned changes to the current interpretation of the charter. In an online video released on Tuesday, a black-clad figure holding a knife stood between journalist Kenji Goto and Haruna Yukawa, threatening to kill them if Tokyo did not pay Islamic State $200 million within 72 hours. Abe has said saving the men's lives is paramount but that Japan will not bow to terrorism. Japanese officials have declined to say if they would pay any ransom, a move that would put Tokyo at odds with close ally the United States. "Despite the fact that the situation is severe, we are continuing to seek cooperation from all countries, tribal leaders and religious representatives who might have contacts with an aim to secure the early release of the two Japanese," chief government spokesman Yoshihide Suga told reporters. Goto's mother pleaded for his release just hours before the deadline passed. "My son Kenji is not an enemy of the people of the Islamic faith. I can only pray as a mother for his release," Junko Ishido told a packed news conference, choking back tears. "If I could offer my life I would plead that my son be released, it would be a small sacrifice on my part. "He only went to rescue his friend. He has always looked out for weaker people, he was always helping weaker children than him," she added. Abe has ordered his government to make every effort to secure their safe release, setting off a flurry of activity among Japanese diplomats.However, sources familiar with the matter said Japanese diplomats had told the families of the two captives prior to the video's release that no ransom would be paid. The captor in the video, which resembles those showing previous Islamic State captives, said the ransom demand matched the $200 million in aid that Abe pledged to help countries fighting Islamist militants. Japan in 1977 paid $6 million to Japanese Red Army hijackers in Dhaka, with then-Prime Minister Takeo Fukuda saying "the lives of hostages outweighs the earth". The government hardened its official stance after the 1996 hostage taking at the Japanese ambassador's residence in Peru, when it refused to pay ransom. HUMANITARIAN AID Abe made the pledge during a multi-nation visit to the Middle East earlier this month. Islamic State militants have seized large areas of Iraq and Syria, and beheaded several Western captives. Japan has stressed that its donation is for humanitarian aid, such as helping refugees, and insisted that it will not bow to terrorist threats. In an address at Friday prayers at Tokyo's most prominent mosque, the Tokyo Camii and Turkish Culture Center, the imam, Muhammad Rashid Alas, called for the "immediate release of the two Japanese hostages," quoting from the Quran on the need to show mercy. The center had earlier posted a statement saying Islamic State's actions are "totally against Islam and have a serious impact on Muslim communities all over the world and put Muslims in a precarious position". Abe's handling of the hostage crisis - he must appear firm but not callous - will be a big test for the 60-year-old, but he appears to have few options. Few Japanese are likely to blame Abe if the two captives are killed, but there could be questions raised over why he singled out countries battling Islamic State for the aid when it was known the group was holding two Japanese nationals. "Just when they held hostages and considered what they should do about them, Mr. Abe offered something that would, in their (IS's) logic, raise the hurdle (for resolving the situation)," said Motohiro Ono, an opposition Democratic Party of Japan lawmaker who is a Middle East expert. Yukawa, aged around 42 and who dreamed of becoming a military contractor, was captured in August outside the Syrian city of Aleppo. Goto, 47, a war correspondent with experience in Middle East hot spots, went to Syria in late October to try to help Yukawa. (Writing by Linda Sieg and William Mallard; Additional reporting by Nobuhiro Kubo, Teppei Kasai, Tim Kelly, Elaine Lies and Kiyoshi Takenaka; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan) ||||| Islamic State to issue statement on hostages A spokesman for Islamic State says it will soon release a statement on the two Japanese hostages. He also says the group is aware of Japan's stance that its assistance to the Middle East region is non-military in nature. |||||

– A new post on a forum popular with ISIS militants claims the two Japanese captives are running out of time. The "countdown has begun" for the group to kill Kenji Goto and Haruna Yukawa unless Japan pays $200 million in ransom, according to the post, published today. Japan says it's analyzing the message as it attempts to contact the men's captors through local tribes, though ISIS' original 72-hour deadline has expired, the AP reports. "The situation remains severe, but we are doing everything we can to win the release of the two Japanese hostages," government spokesman Yoshihide Suga says. Meanwhile, Goto's mother, Junko Ishido, is pleading with the government to save her son, who "only went to rescue his friend," Reuters reports. Documents show Japan considered a military strike on ISIS militants but found that one would be outside its legal realm. A Japanese journalist who tried to free Yukawa in September and an expert on Islamic law said yesterday they have an ISIS contact and were willing to negotiate with the group, the AP reports; it isn't clear if Japan was agreeable. Finding the captors would be no easy task: Experts reviewing the hostage video—which seems to show Goto and Yukawa in jumpsuits in the desert—suspect it was actually shot in a studio, the AP notes. Shadows converge, indicating two light sources rather than one bright sun, while noiseless "wind" (perhaps from a fan) doesn't appear to kick up dust. NHK reports ISIS will give a statement on the two captives "soon."

CLOSE San Bernardino County Sheriff's Deputies arrested a pair of parents this week after finding their three children living in a plywood box, surrounded by trash, cats and feces, with no access to electricity or running water. By Brett Kelman, The Desert Sun Mona Kirk & Daniel Panico arrested for willful cruelty to a child after deputies discover the family’s living conditions in the 7000 block of Sun Fair Road in Joshua Tree. (Photo: San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department) Sheriff's officials in San Bernardino County say a Joshua Tree couple kept their three children malnourished and living in a room-sized box for the past four years. While conducting an area check Wednesday morning, deputies noticed a travel trailer that appeared to be abandoned and a large rectangular box made of plywood in the 7000 block of Sunfair Road in Joshua Tree. SIGN UP FOR FACEBOOK NEWS ALERTS: Message us here to get started The property has no electricity or running water, and deputies saw several holes, mounds of trash, human feces, and between 30 and 40 cats, the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department said in a news release Thursday. MORE NEWS: The Turpin kids were starved captives, cops say. So what does freedom taste like? Lasagna The parents, Daniel Panico, 73, and Mona Kirk, 51, were arrested and booked into the Morongo Basin Jail on charges of willful cruelty to a child. Their bail was set at $100,000. The children, ages 11, 13 and 14, were found at the property. Deputies determined that for about four years the children had been living in the box, which is about 20 feet long, 10 feet wide and 4 feet tall. The children did not have enough food and were living in unsafe conditions, officials said. Mona Kirk & Daniel Panico arrested for willful cruelty to a child after deputies discover the family’s living conditions in Joshua Tree. (Photo: San Bernadino County Sheriff's Department) Children and Family Services responded to the property and took custody of the children. The structure where the children were living is on a mostly empty dirt road, two blocks off Highway 62, in the large span of open desert between Joshua Tree and Twentynine Palms. Satellite imagery of the address shows a single white trailer, a few cars and what appears to be large piles of discarded trash surrounding the home. Most of the adjacent lots are empty, but it appears that at least one neighbor lives in a house, surrounded by a fence, directly across the street. The house is about eight miles from the front gate of Joshua Tree National Park and two miles east of the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Station. Neighbor Mike Reynolds said the family moved in about four years ago. The father owned the land and the trailer and talked about building his dream home on the property, Reynolds said. “He was a regular retired guy, and an intelligent man,” Reynolds said. Several of his neighbors live “off the grid” so the family not having electricity or running water didn’t strike Reynolds as odd. The children seemed healthy and happy, Reynolds added. He noted he never saw any cats wandering around. He also suggested people wait for more information before passing judgment on the family. Reynolds believes the father kept the family from being homeless by building their home himself. “This guy was doing the best he could to raise his family,” Reynolds said. “If I was in his shoes and that’s all I could afford to raise my family and keep them alive — I have seen so much worse.” Reporter Brett Kelman contributed. Desert Sun breaking news reporter Barrett Newkirk can be reached at (760)778-4767 or barrett.newkirk@desertsun.com. MORE NEWS: Turpin home has become a tourist attraction six weeks after their children were rescued Read or Share this story: http://desert.sn/2FHiwaR ||||| The Joshua Tree parents of three children, who were found to be living in a large wooden box, were arrested Wednesday morning on suspicion of willful cruelty to a child. A deputy was patrolling the rural area in the 7000 block of Sun Fair Road in Joshua Tree, saw a travel-trailer on a property that appeared to be abandoned and the rectangular plywood box, and checked it out, according to a San Bernardino County sheriff’s news release. The three children, ages 11, 13 and 14, reportedly lived in the large rectangular box — which was approximately 20 feet long by 4 feet high by 10 feet wide — for about four years. They didn’t have adequate food and were living in an unsuitable, unsafe environment due to the property conditions, the news release stated. The mother, Mona Kirk, 51, slept in the box with her children, while the father, Daniel Panico, 73, lived in the trailer or a vehicle, said Cindy Bachman, a Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman, in an email. It’s not known where the children were living prior to living in the box. The box was a shelter fabricated out of scrap wood and other material, Bachman said. A tarp on top of the wooden structure kept the rain out, but there was no heat, running water, electricity or bathrooms. Photos of the location show old furniture, broken children’s toys, storage containers and other assorted junk strewn about the property. Bachman said she doesn’t believe the children were regularly attending school. They were not being locked in or held captive in the box. Several large holes and mounds of trash and human feces were found on the property, and about 30-40 cats were roaming freely inside the trailer. Children and Family Service responded to the scene and took custody of the children. The parents of the children, Kirk and Panico, were arrested on suspicion of willful cruelty to a child and booked into the Morongo Basin Jail in lieu of $100,000 bail each. Anyone with information about the Joshua Tree investigation can call the sheriff’s station in Morongo Basin at 760-366-4175. To remain anonymous, contact WeTip at 888-78-CRIME (27463) or go online at www.wetip.com. ||||| "It's just tragic that these children were being raised in conditions like this," Bachman said. "There are services available to help these folks, and clearly they chose not to ask for any help." |||||

– At first glance, authorities saw what they thought was an abandoned trailer and a large plywood box amid a sea of trash in Joshua Tree, Calif. On second glance, they realized this was the shelter of three children, ages 11, 13, and 14, and their parents. Mona Kirk, 51, and Daniel Panico, 73, were charged with willful cruelty to a child Wednesday after authorities came upon the remote property without running water, electricity, plumbing, or heating, reports the Los Angeles Times. According to officials, the family had been staying at the desert property for four years, with Kirk and the children living in the box—about 20 feet long, 10 feet wide, and 4 feet high—and Panico living in the trailer or a vehicle, reports the San Bernardino Sun. Panico reportedly owned the property and planned to build his dream home there, a neighbor tells the Desert Sun. But the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department called it "an unsuitable and unsafe environment" for the children, who didn't have an adequate amount of food. Authorities say the area, roamed by 30 to 40 cats, featured several feces-filled holes apparently used as toilets, and a rep for the sheriff's department says the kids weathered nights as cold as 20 or 30 degrees. Kirk and Panico are now in jail with bail set at $100,000 each. Their children, who weren't enrolled in public school, are in the custody of Children and Family Services and are in "good spirits," per officials.

Please check back soon. If you are the owner of this website, please log in for additional information or contact us as soon as possible. ||||| Avocados that stay ripe for twice as long as usual thanks to an edible barrier made from plant materials will be sold in the US for the first time this week. The tasteless coating, developed by Santa Barbara company Apeel Sciences, controls the two main factors that cause fresh produce to go bad: the rate at which water escapes the surface of fruit and vegetables and the rate at which oxygen enters. This allows treated produce to stay fresh for longer. “We’re creating an optimised microclimate that can double the shelf life [of the fruit],” said James Rogers, CEO of Apeel Sciences. “The average avocado might be ripe for 2-3 days. Ours will stay ripe for 4-6 days.” Facebook Twitter Pinterest Apeel avocados. Photograph: Apeel Apeel hopes its technology can also reduce the amount of fruit and vegetables that are thrown out by retailers and consumers because of spoilage. Americans throw away on average 400lb of food per person, costing a household of four about $1,800 per year. Although Apeel is starting with avocados, the coating’s formulation can be modified to create optimal conditions for other items including strawberries, mangoes, apples, bananas, kumquats and asparagus. Avocados were a priority because of their notoriously fleeting window of perfect ripeness and relatively high price. “Everyone has an experience of cutting into an avocado and discovering it’s past its prime,” said Rogers. “It’s a visceral reaction when you’ve spent a few dollars on something that ends up in the garbage.” From this week, the Apeel-treated avocados – grown by California-based Del Rey Avocado – will be available in Costco and Harp Foods stores across the midwest, before rolling out across the United States. Facebook Twitter Pinterest The CEO of Apeel Science, James Rogers. Photograph: Apeel Rogers says that in California, where a lot of fruit and vegetables are produced, it’s easier to find good quality items in the supermarket. “When you go anywhere besides California, the quality of fresh produce suffers,” he said, noting that the quality degrades the longer it takes to transport the produce. “We slow down the rate at which the clock is ticking.” Apeel’s coating is made from naturally occurring lipids extracted from discarded fruit or vegetable waste, including tomatoes, grapes, wasted seeds. These lipids are turned into a powder that can be reconstituted with water to create a dip or a spray. “Nature has been solving these problems for millions of years,” said Rogers. “We look at how nature has been protecting itself for years and copy those solutions. The coating can also extend the life of produce in developing countries where refrigeration is not widely available across the supply chain, which explains why the company launched in 2012 with funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The company has carried out pilots in Nigeria and Kenya, treating cassava root and mangoes. “Our technology allows smaller farmers to get their produce from where it’s grown on their farm to city centres where they can earn the economic value associated with what they are producing,” said Rogers. Apeel isn’t the first company to tackle the scourge of the mushy avocado. In 2016 an Australian firm launched what it described as an “avocado time machine”, which slowed the browning process of the fruit by “switching off” the enzyme responsible for the browning using pressure fluctuations generated by steam. California-based avocado distributor Calavo uses a contraption called ProRipe VIP that measures how ripe the fruits is by “listening” to it. The machine taps the side of the avocado and then uses sensors to measure the acoustic response – that is, the way the fruit vibrates. This indicates overall firmness and freshness and allows Calavo to determine the ripeness of the tricky-to-judge flesh. ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| Identity Latinxs, You Better Believe It: The Future Is Ours ||||| Apeel Sciences Avocados are known for their short shelf life. By the time the beloved fruit hits a grocery-store shelf, it will last about a week before it gets too ripe. A Santa Barbara, California-based startup called Apeel Sciences has invented an edible coating that it says will double an avocado's shelf life. Food suppliers spray the product on the produce before it ships to grocers. So far, the startup has developed products for more than three dozen crops, including asparagus, peaches, lemons, pears, and nectarines. Before this week, Apeel had attracted at least $40 million in venture-capital funding from several high-profile investors, including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. On Tuesday, the company announced it received an additional $70 million in a funding round led by Viking Global Investors, Andreessen Horowitz, Upfront Ventures, and S2G Ventures. Walter Robb, Whole Foods Market's co-founder and former co-CEO, will join Apeel's board as well. In June, Apeel debuted its longer-lasting avocados at Costco and Harps Food Stores locations throughout the Midwest. This is the first time the startup has sold its produce. (Harps Food Stores, a regional grocery chain, has 87 locations. Costco is much larger, with more than 500 wholesale locations across 44 states and Puerto Rico.) Harps reports that, over the past two months, it has seen a 65 percentage-point margin increase and a 10% lift in sales across the Haas avocado category. This may be due to Apeel's claim that it helps food retailers reduce food waste, since its avocados can last longer than traditional ones. Made of leftover plant skins and stems, the coating acts as a barrier designed to slow the decay process. After the coating dries, it locks in moisture and acts as a shield against natural gases (e.g., oxygen and ethylene) that make avocados ripen. Slicing open an Apeel avocado will break the shield, and at that point it will brown just as fast as a normal avocado. "Refrigeration has been used to increase produce quality during transportation and storage, but you lose the benefit of refrigeration when a fruit sits on a grocery store shelf or on a kitchen counter," CEO James Rogers told Business Insider. "With our technology, we're able to dramatically reduce the rate that clock is ticking." An untreated avocado versus an Apeel avocado 30 days after harvest. Apeel Sciences The US Food and Drug Administration has approved Apeel's first products as "generally recognized as safe," meaning they're OK to eat and sell. In 2017, the company received approval to use the coating on organic produce, though the avocados at Costco and Harps will not be. They'll also cost the same as any other conventionally grown avocados. Last year, Apeel moved into a 105,000-square-foot facility, and at least six farms in Southern California, Kenya, and Nigeria are now using Apeel's products. In the past several months, the company finalized negotiations to work with over two dozen packing houses and several farms in Mexico, Peru, and Chile to prepare for its commercial rollout. Farms and food-packing houses have been able to buy Apeel's products since early last year. It's usually sprayed on produce during the wash cycle, before it's sorted and packed to go to retailers. The coating is made of discarded materials from organic produce — anything from pear stems to leftover grape skins to grass clippings. But the formula differs for each fruit or vegetable. The company is also working on a second product called Invisipeel that is designed to keep insects away. Invisipeel is not yet widely available. Below is a time-lapse comparison the company created to show Apeel's effect on a variety of fruits and vegetables. The coating could help stores and farmers reduce waste from produce that has ripened too quickly. Since Apeel's plant-based product controls the rate of decay, the company offers Costco and Harps a less costly way to preserve produce (the idea being that grocers will discard fewer spoiled avocados and thus save money). This is one major reason the locations will offer Apeel's fruit at the same price as other nonorganic avocados with a shorter shelf life, Rogers said. If Apeel starts selling more types of produce at Costco, it could also give the chain an advantage over its competitors, including BJ's Wholesale Club and Whole Foods. Costco is known for its low-cost produce, but as Whole Foods lowers its prices following its sale to Amazon, the wholesaler may be looking for ways to differentiate its fresh food. Rogers plans to expand the types of produce Apeel sells and to grow geographically, too. Asparagus could be next. |||||

– Avocados are the frequent subject of teasing over their ever-so-brief period of ripeness—but one California company is looking to change that. Avocados treated by Apeel Sciences will be sold in the US for the first time this week, and thanks to a tasteless and edible coating, those avocados will stay fresh twice as long as a typical avocado. "The average avocado might be ripe for 2-3 days. Ours will stay ripe for 4-6 days," says the company's CEO, per the Guardian. The edible barrier, made from plant materials, creates a "microclimate," controlling the rate at which water leaves the avocado's surface and oxygen enters—the two main things that make produce go bad. Apeel's CEO says it started with avocados because "everyone has an experience of cutting into an avocado and discovering it’s past its prime. It’s a visceral reaction when you’ve spent a few dollars on something that ends up in the garbage." But many other types of produce can be treated with the coating, and Apeel hopes to ultimately help reduce the 400 pounds of food per person estimated to be thrown away in the US per year. Apeel-treated avocados are first rolling out in Costco and Harp Foods stores in the midwest, but will eventually be available across the US. They will cost the same as any other conventionally grown avocado. Business Insider has side-by-side comparison photos of an untreated versus a treated avocado 30 days after harvest.

Add a location to your Tweets When you tweet with a location, Twitter stores that location. You can switch location on/off before each Tweet and always have the option to delete your location history. Learn more ||||| Focused crawls are collections of frequently-updated webcrawl data from narrow (as opposed to broad or wide) web crawls, often focused on a single domain or subdomain. ||||| As Hollywood takes the baby steps to become more inclusive for all races, genders, sexual orientations, and anyone else that has been “othered”, there are bound to be speed bumps along the way. As actress Ruby Rose celebrated her new gig as Batwoman Kate Kane for the CW, people saw this as a great moment as Rose would play the first gay superhero to lead a TV series. This, of course, came with social media backlash which resulted in Rose leaving . Rose took to Twitter one last time before exiting saying in a string of tweets: “Where on earth did ‘Ruby is not a lesbian therefore she can’t be batwoman’ come from — has to be the funniest most ridiculous thing I’ve ever read. I came out at 12? And have for the past 5 years had to deal with ‘she’s too gay’ how do y’all flip it like that? I didn’t change. I wish we would all support each other and our journeys.” She continued, “When women and when minorities join forces we are unstoppable… when we tear each other down it’s much more hurtful than from any group. But hey/ love a challenge I just wish women and the LGBT community supported each other more, My wish was we were all a little kinder and more supportive of each other…Sending everyone my love and gratitude, it’s been a rollercoaster of a year, this month especially.” Rose punctuated her statement with confidence saying, “I am looking forward to getting more than 4 hours of sleep and to break from Twitter to focus all my energy on my next 2 projects. If you need me, I’ll be on my Bat Phone.” Batwoman is expected to make her first appearance as part of The CW’s annual DC Arrowverse crossover event in December. The CW is developing the Batwoman series for next season. |||||

– If you're looking for Ruby Rose, you'll have to try her Bat Phone. The Orange Is the New Black star made headlines last week when it was announced she'd play Batwoman for the CW, the first openly gay superhero in a TV series leading role. But while Rose was "thrilled and honored," she wasn't as thrilled the online backlash—and she's left Twitter because of it, Deadline reports. "Where on earth did 'Ruby is not a lesbian therefore she can't be batwoman' come from—has to be the funniest most ridiculous thing I've ever read," she tweeted in one of her final posts. "I came out at 12?" Vulture notes some of the backlash came under the #RecastBatwoman hashtag, spurring Rose to call for women and minorities, including the LGBT community, to be "a little kinder and more supportive of each other." In the meantime, she wrote, "I am looking forward to getting more than 4 hours of sleep and to break from Twitter to focus all my energy on my next 2 projects. If you need me, I'll be on my Bat Phone." Rose's Instagram and Facebook accounts were still up and running as of Monday morning, though it appears comments have been disabled on Instagram.

Dmitry Savin/Getty They don’t snore, but might creak during their slumbers. For the first time, trees have been shown to undergo physical changes at night that can be likened to sleep, or at least to day-night cycles that have been observed experimentally in smaller plants. Branches of birch trees have now been seen drooping by as much as 10 centimetres at the tips towards the end of the night. “It was a very clear effect, and applied to the whole tree,” says András Zlinszky of the Centre for Ecological Research in Tihany, Hungary. “No one has observed this effect before at the scale of whole trees, and I was surprised by the extent of the changes.” Advertisement Zlinszky and his colleagues scanned trees in Austria and Finland with laser beams between sunset and sunrise. From the time it takes beams to bounce back from branches and leaves, they could measure the movements of each tree, in three dimensions and at resolutions of centimetres. Drooping in the dark “The experiment is the first of its kind,” says team-member Eetu Puttonen of the Finnish Geospatial Research Institute in Masala. “These studies have only been done before in small plants, but here, it was possible to do it outside in fully grown trees.” The team scanned two birch trees, one in Finland and one in Austria, each over the course of a single night. They made 11 scans of the Finnish tree, approximately one per hour, and 77 of the Austrian tree, around one every 10 minutes. Puttonen says they used laser scanning, rather than observing movement photographically, so they didn’t have to illuminate the trees with light that could have affected the outcome. Image courtesy of Vienna University of Technology, TU Vienna Scanning was done on calm nights to avoid wind effects, and at the solar equinox in both countries to ensure the length of night roughly the same. “We’re certain it’s not caused by another effect,” says Norbert Pfeifer of the Technical University of Vienna in Austria, another team member. The drooping effect is probably caused by loss of internal water pressure within plant cells, a phenomenon called turgor pressure. “It means branches and leaf stems are less rigid, and more prone to drooping under their own weight,” says Zlinszky. Turgor pressure, in turn, is influenced by photosynthesis, the process by which plants use sunlight to create sugar from carbon dioxide and water. Photosynthesis stops in the dark, so this in itself may explain why the branches droop, says Zlinszky. A tree alone? The trees may also be “resting” their branches. During the day, branches and leaves are angled higher, allowing leaves to catch more sunlight, because there’s less self-shading from leaves above. But this is energy-intensive and serves no purpose at night, when there’s no light. So is the drooping deliberate, dictated by an active sleep-night cycle, or passive, dictated by differences in the availability of water and light? “This remains to be decided,” says Zlinszky. Next, the team hopes to see whether other tree species “sleep”. “I’m confident it will apply to other trees,” says Zlinszky. The ideal targets would be poplars and chestnut trees, because researchers have decoded the genomes of both and identified genes linked with circadian rhythms, which could help them see which genes are involved in the behaviour. “There have been some studies on circadian rhythms in trees, mostly studying gene expression, but this latest research is a beautiful way to watch it happen in individual trees,” says C. Robertson McClung of Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire. “It shows things are happening in the real world.” McClung says that studies in sunflowers have tied circadian rhythm to the ability of water to travel in the plant’s stem. “The water supply might underlie the effects seen,” he says. “It’s reasonable to suspect that it’s not just the water supply, but that the ability of the plant to transport it might be controlled by the plant itself.” One possibility to explore the underlying mechanisms might be controlled experiments on smaller birch trees in greenhouses, he says. Knowing more about how trees manage their water budgets could have practical benefits. Trees are easier to fell, for example, if the wood is drier. Likewise, insights into how trees manage water could help climatologists understand better the effects of forests on climate change and weather. Journal reference: Frontiers in Plant Science, DOI: 10.3389/fpls.2016.00222 Read more: Root intelligence: Plants can think, feel and learn ||||| The goal of the study was to determine circadian movements of silver birch ( Petula Bendula ) branches and foliage detected with terrestrial laser scanning (TLS). The study consisted of two geographically separate experiments conducted in Finland and in Austria. Both experiments were carried out at the same time of the year and under similar outdoor conditions. Experiments consisted of 14 (Finland) and 77 (Austria) individual laser scans taken between sunset and sunrise. The resulting point clouds were used in creating a time series of branch movements. In the Finnish data, the vertical movement of the whole tree crown was monitored due to low volumetric point density. In the Austrian data, movements of manually selected representative points on branches were monitored. The movements were monitored from dusk until morning hours in order to avoid daytime wind effects. The results indicated that height deciles of the Finnish birch crown had vertical movements between -10.0 and 5.0 cm compared to the situation at sunset. In the Austrian data, the maximum detected representative point movement was 10.0 cm. The temporal development of the movements followed a highly similar pattern in both experiments, with the maximum movements occurring about an hour and a half before (Austria) or around (Finland) sunrise. The results demonstrate the potential of terrestrial laser scanning measurements in support of chronobiology. Introduction Terrestrial laser scanners have gone through rapid development during the past 10 years (Dassot et al., 2011). They produce accurate 3D point clouds of target objects often down to millimeter resolution. Thus, the point clouds provide detailed information about the structure and spatial properties of the targets. In addition to structural modeling and scene mapping, terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) data are widely used in engineering applications to monitor possible changes in the targeted objects or in a target area. TLS-based change detection studies cover a wide range of different applications. These include geodynamic processes such as landslide detection and monitoring (Travelletti et al., 2008; Ghuffar et al., 2013) and morphodynamic changes in coastal beaches (Lindenbergh et al., 2011), thermal karst formations (Barnhart and Crosby, 2013), or in riversides (Milan et al., 2007; Vaaja et al., 2011; Saarinen et al., 2013). Short interval scans are also used in determining dynamic structural stress (Grosse-Schwiep et al., 2013). TLS techniques are utilized to improve safety in quarries and mines by monitoring wall stability over time (Abellan et al., 2011; Hu, 2013; Kovanic and Blištan, 2014). In vegetation studies, TLS is being actively used in static forest and forest parameter mapping (Hopkinson et al., 2004; Moskal and Zheng, 2012; Liang, 2013), tree modeling (Fleck et al., 2004; Hosoi and Omasa, 2006; Bucksch and Fleck, 2011; Eysn et al., 2013; Raumonen et al., 2013), and in estimating forest biomass (e.g., Kaasalainen et al., 2014). Although TLS is utilized in a wide range of both temporal and vegetation studies for scientific and engineering applications, one field of study which has not yet gained wider interest in the TLS community is circadian or diurnal and nocturnal changes in vegetation. In ecology and plant physiology, these changes in plants and their driving factors have been studied intensively for a long time. It has been known for centuries that plants show diurnal cycles of leaf motion, described as “sleep” already by Darwin and Darwin (1880). It has been observed that these motions also happen if the plant is placed in darkness, therefore suggesting an internal mechanism for measuring time. The molecular mechanism of this circadian oscillator has been most extensively studied in Arabidopsis (Barak et al., 2000), but orthologues of the Arabidopsis genes controlling the diurnal rhythm of flowering time have been identified in various tree species such as Poplar (Populus tremula) and Chestnut (Castanea sativa) (Solomon et al., 2010). However, for obvious reasons, carrying out controlled experiments or even quantitative observations on fully grown trees is much more difficult, therefore both the background and the effects of sleep motions in trees are less well-understood. Circadian rhythms of leaf motion are evident for some tree species such as Robinia pseudoacaia. The movement of leaves is connected to changes in turgor pressure (Holmes and Shim, 1968) which is controlled by the osmotic state of the cells. Changes in water transport and in the concentration of various metabolites result in changes in osmotic flow and thus, through changes in the shape of individual plant cells, eventual movement at the scale of individual plants or plant parts. The literature identifies two common reasons that drive these changes, namely plant water balance (Chapin et al., 2002) and photoperiodism (McClung, 2006; Nozue and Maloof, 2006; Sysoeva et al., 2010). It would be plausible that the changes in turgor pressure resulting in a circadian rhythm of leaf movement also apply to the branches and thus cause a circadian rhythm of branch movements in trees. However, in an earlier case study where quantification of diurnal movement was attempted using height measurement of weighted lines attached to branches in a Walnut orchard (Juglans regia), diurnal change was found insignificant (Way et al., 1991). To our best knowledge, circadian movement of tree branches has never been successfully quantified before in the presented level. Methods to monitor plant water balance at a diurnal time scale include: (a) leaf or fruit sample collection and water content measurements (Klepper, 1968; Acevedo et al., 1979); (b) sap flow monitoring (Köstner et al., 1998); (c) leaf and stem conductance measurements (García-Orellana et al., 2013); (d) leaf and stem water potential, photosynthetic capability and hydraulic conductivity measurements (Andrews et al., 2012); (e) branch growth and xylem morphometry measurements (Correia and Martins-Loucao, 1995; Correia et al., 2001). Most of these are invasive processes that involve sampling and are difficult (but possible) to carry out regularly in intervals of a few hours (Chapotin et al., 2006). Therefore, in case of trees, the most common way of observing circadian rhythms is with a dendrograph, an instrument that measures changes in tree diameter or circumference with sub-millimeter precision (e.g., Pesonen et al., 2004). In order to monitor photoperiodism, the amount of light received by plants can be controlled by constructing external shading structures (Wayne and Bazzaz, 1993) or by using external lighting setups with selected filters (e.g., Mockler et al., 2003). Alternatively, in order to monitor the internal clock, a plant can be placed in continuously lit or dark conditions to observe periodic changes in its physiology. Plant physiology measurements are localized and typically consider selected parts of a plant. The measurements often take place in laboratory conditions. This presents a clear challenge when results are extrapolated to model wider areas of multiple plants. Acquiring results also involves a significant amount of manual labor, as experiment setups and sample collection are hard to automatize. TLS measurements offer a potential solution to generalize plant physiology results on larger spatial scales, like whole individual trees, or on orchard plot, and stand levels. Laser scanners can measure individual targets accurately tens of meters away with sub-centimeter point resolution. Moreover, scanning can be performed outdoors with short intervals between individual scans. Furthermore, as the scanners are active measurement devices that both produce and receive the signal, they are insensitive to varying external lighting conditions, i.e., available sunlight and cloudiness. Laser scanning point clouds cannot provide direct biochemical parameters from plants, but they can be used in plant shape and dimension monitoring over time (e.g., branch inclination, branch, and stem swelling, leaf inclination distribution at crown level). If a clear correlation between the geometric changes in point clouds and laboratory or in situ results can be established and verified, the parameterized spatial changes can then act as proxies that estimate physiological changes in a plant. Puttonen et al. (2015) detected and reported birch branch movements during a day-long classification study. The study was carried out with the Finnish Geospatial Research Institute (FGI) Hyperspectral Laser Scanner (HSL) (Hakala et al., 2012). The movements were detected from the variation of the birch Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) response during on an observation period of ca. 26 h. A more detailed inspection revealed a visible change in birch branch stances over time. The study is to our knowledge the first to report spatial changes in tree branch geometry over a day-long cycle. However, the authors did not attempt to quantify the movement amplitude. Hitherto, vegetation time series in TLS have been collected mainly for longer scale time series analyses, typically to determine seasonal changes in tree canopy (e.g., Hosoi and Omasa, 2009; Nevalainen et al., 2014; Hakala et al., 2014; Portillo-Quintero et al., 2014; Calders et al., 2015; Griebel et al., 2015). In imaging, longer term time-series studies have been carried out both in the field and in a laboratory with a close range setup (e.g., more recently by Li et al., 2013; Nijland et al., 2014). However, the use of cameras inherently limits the experimental setup to daylight hours or requires the use of external light sources. Additionally, radiometry measurements and their calibration are typically rather complex. Furthermore, even a short use of external light sources may interrupt the plant photoperiod (e.g., Salisbury, 1981). Meanwhile, since laser scanners are active measurement systems their working efficiency is stable in nighttime conditions with no external light (Arslan and Kalkan, 2013). With modern laser scanners, the laser beam footprint up to a few centimeters in diameter illuminates only a localized patch of the plant surface at a time. Moreover, the footprint swipes over each spot in sub-second scale and the typically used infrared (IR) wavelengths have strong reflectance from green vegetation. Therefore, most of the transmitted energy is not absorbed by the plant. Thus, we assume that plant disturbance with a modern laser scanning system is not significant during an individual scanning measurement. This study now aims (i) to analyze to which degree overnight birch branch movements can be measured with two different TLS scanners and (ii) whether quantifications of crown/branch movements are possible. With these goals in mind, we aim to show that TLS data provides an effective tool to detect and to monitor circadian changes in tree geometry with a centimeter scale spatial and within-hour temporal resolution. As the main focus of the study is in confirmation and quantification of geometric changes in birch branches over time, without further investigation of the cause or mechanism of these movements, the measurement setups did not include comprehensive weather or soil data. Measurements and Data This section is structured as follows: In section Measurement Sites and the Collected Data, descriptions of both the Finnish and the Austrian measurement sites and data collected from them are given. Section Object Point Cloud Delineation describes object delineation from the scanned point clouds. Section FGI Hyperspectral Lidar provides a detailed description of FGI HSL and its properties. Section RIEGL VZ-4000 Long Range Laser Scanner gives a detailed description of the RIEGL VZ-4000 laser scanner. Measurement Sites and the Collected Data Measurements were carried out in two geographically different locations, in southern Finland (Kirkkonummi, 60°09′40″N, 24°32′48″W) and in northern Austria (Horn, 48°39′31″N, 15°39′48″E). Both measurements were performed in the middle of September close to the solar equinox to guarantee approximately similar lengths of night at both sites (http://www.timeanddate.com, accessed on 25th February 2015). Measurement dates were 13–14 September 2013 (Finland) and 19–20 September 2014 (Austria). In both measurements, the test trees were measured from sunset to sunrise. In Finland, the nighttime measurements lasted about 11 h in total, during which 14 separate scans were collected with FGI HSL. Scan intervals were approximately 1 h. Near sunrise and sunset the scan interval was shortened to 40 min. In Austria, data acquisitions were repeated every 10 min for about 12 and half hours, resulting in 77 separate scans. The Finnish measurement site was located on a shallow slope facing southward. The size of the test site was about 7 × 20 m2. The site included the main target, a small silver birch (Betula pendula). Low understory, a large silver birch and goat willows (Salix caprea) were located behind the target. The site was partially surrounded from its eastern side with a sparse, half-open canopy of full-grown birches. The nearby FGI building was located on the western side of the site. The shadow of the building shaded the target site for about half an hour before the sunset. Figure 1 illustrates the Finnish test tree and the reference markers placed around it. The markers were used to validate the distance measurement stability over the experiment. The measurement setting also included an external reference plate (Spectralon®) to calibrate laser radiometry during the experiment. The FGI HSL was mounted on a solid platform and a plastic tent was set up around the scanner to protect it from possible rain and moisture. A heating fan was kept on whole night time inside the tent. This guaranteed a constant airflow and prevented possible surface condensation. FIGURE 1 Figure 1. The birch and reference markers at the Finnish measurement site. Reference markers were used in monitoring the HSL ranging stability. Reference target sizes in the figure have been emphasized for visualization purposes. The scanner was located in the origin (0,0,0). The Austrian measurement site was located on the northern part of an outdoor test and calibration range, an open, cut grass field of size about 130 m by 100 m. The target birch had four stems and it was standing about 10 m away of a manufacturing hall. Thus, the tree was not shaded during sunrise or sunset. The scans were taken to the westward direction and the laser scanner was under a protective roof. Four white polystyrene foam spheres were attached to the birch as reference markers to detect branch movement. Figure 2 illustrates the Austrian test tree and the branches of which movements were followed during the experiment. The branch point clouds were manually selected in CloudCompare software [Available in: http://www.cloudcompare.org/ (Girardeau-Montaut, 2014)]. FIGURE 2 Figure 2. (A) The birch at the Austrian test site. The selected target branches and the three detected reference markers have specific coloring. Ground points are presented with cyan. Reference target sizes have been emphasized in the figure for visualization purposes. The scanner was located in the origin (0,0,0). (B) A close-up of Branch 1 at two different times. Triangles represent the manually selected representative points of which total 3D movements were followed over time. Dark triangles represent the initial point locations at sunset (19:08), bright triangles the corresponding point locations at the time of the movement maximum (04:38). The weather conditions in both measurement sites were similar during data acquisition. The air was calm, with no wind (qualitative observation), during the night. For this reason, the time of sunset was selected as the initial point for monitoring the branch movement. There was no rainfall during either measurement. In the Finnish test site, the leaves of lower branches were verified not to have visible moisture condensation on their surfaces during nighttime. Object Point Cloud Delineation A manual workflow was used to delineate birch and reference target point clouds spatially from the whole point cloud. The same procedure was used for both datasets. The differentiation was started by viewing an object (birch or reference target) point cloud as a 2D projection from a user selected angle and then cutting the object outline by hand with a clear buffer zone. Points inside the outline were included and the rest were rejected. After the cut, a new 2D projection of the included points was taken from another angle and the manual cutting was repeated. In total, 4–5 projections were required to form a sufficiently accurate 3D delineation for the objects in both cases. As the objects had no spatial overlap in either measurement setup, there was no mixing between the object point clouds. The buffer zones in each cut were selected so wide that possible temporal movements within the object point cloud and noise point fluctuations around the object edges (e.g., due to partial hits) were captured for all measurements. All points within the selection area were kept. Intensity-based filtering was not performed. FGI Hyperspectral Lidar The FGI Hyperspectral Lidar (HSL) is a laser scanning system that transmits hyperspectral (white) laser pulses with a continuous spectrum of 400–2500 nm to the target. It can measure up to eight separate wavelength bands from returning pulses. The number of bands is limited by the spectral sensitivity of the silicon detector, but the wavelengths are selectable within the transmittance range. In this study, spectral information was used only to emphasize differences between leaf and stem returns with the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). The main components of the HSL system are the SM5-he supercontinuum laser source (Leukos, Limoges, France), a 2D scanning mechanism (Newport Corp., Irvine, CA, USA), the wavelength separating spectrograph (Specim, Oulu, Finland), a 16-channel high speed detector element (First Sensor AG, Berlin, Germany), and the measurement computer with digitizer cards (National Instruments Corp., Austin, Texas, USA). The HSL works by sending laser pulses to the target in a sweeping pattern and then recording returning waveforms for each wavelength band detected. The waveforms are digitized with 1 GHz frequency, thus giving the system a nominal 15 cm range resolution. However, individual laser pulses can be localized to the waveforms with a de facto range resolution of a few centimetres. The HSL can measure up to 5000 waveforms per second and a maximum of three discrete returns are fitted in each waveform. A more detailed description of the HSL system, its properties, and its measurement configuration are given in articles by Hakala et al. (2012) and Nevalainen et al. (2014). The properties of both the FGI HSL and RIEGL VZ-4000 scanners are compared in Table 1. TABLE 1 Table 1. Property comparison between the laser scanners used in the Finnish and Austrian test sites. RIEGL VZ-4000 Long Range Laser Scanner The RIEGL VZ-4000 has been developed for surveying applications in which very long ranges are required (RIEGL, 2014). The scanner has a net measurement rate of up to 222 kHz. The maximum measurement range of the VZ-4000 is 4 km for targets with 90% reflectance at 23 kHz measurement rate. At 222 kHz the instrument is still capable of measuring targets with only 20% reflectance up to 1000 m. The RIEGL VZ-4000 works, like the HSL, by sending laser pulses to the target, but analyses the recorded waveform internally. The nominal ranging precision is 10 mm. The VZ-4000 can be controlled via its built–in touch screen, via WIFI or LAN. It has a built-in camera, GPS receiver, compass, and tilt sensor, and there are interfaces to attach an additional camera (e.g., IR camera) and/or a high-precision RTK GNSS. Results Finnish Point Cloud Time Series A total of 14 scans were selected from the Finnish point cloud time series in order to determine the temporal variation in the birch crown. Since the FGI HSL is a prototype device, its relative ranging precision during the experiment was first validated. Movements of the reference targets set around the birch were monitored for the duration of the experiment. Table 2 lists the reference target distances to the scanner and their relative movements compared to the initial scan. The target ranges and movements were calculated with respect to the target center that was determined with a least squares sphere fitting (MATLAB code by Alan Jennings, available in www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/fileexchange/34129). The table shows that the reference targets were detected reliably and with higher precision (less than 5 mm standard deviation) than the nominal sampling frequency of the system would imply. This assumption is valid as long as the laser returns can be expected to come from a single reflection, but cannot be directly generalized to more irregular targets, like differently positioned leaves, or to partial hits coming from edges. Nevertheless, the ranging stability test verified the HSL system accuracy for fixed target distances and that the HSL point cloud did not present a systematic drift during the measurement period. TABLE 2 Table 2. The ranging stability of the FGI HSL point cloud during the experiment. After the range precision measurements, points were manually delineated into a new individual point cloud of the studied tree for each measurement as described in Section Finnish Point Cloud Time Series. Then, the point cloud was differentiated into crown and stem point clouds. The differentiation was based on the NDVI distribution of all birch points. The differentiation was performed using a hard NDVI threshold of 0.2, where the points with NDVI values below the threshold were classified as stem and thick branches. The bounding box of the crown point clouds had dimensions of 3.7 × 3.0 × 6.6 m3 (depth, width, height) when averaged over all measurements. The median point number for the crown point clouds was 154,310 ± 10,030 points corresponding to 6.5% variability in the total point number. The goal of the division was to select the returns reflecting from leaves and most of the branches of the birch and to leave the trunk and the thickest branches out of the analysis. After this, five different height percentiles were calculated for the crown point cloud for each scan (Figure 3). The height percentiles in the analysis were: 10th, 30th, 50th, 70th, and the 90th percentile. For example, the 90th percentile is located at the height at which 90% of the points of the whole cloud are below it. Height percentiles were calculated because a manual selection of corresponding points in consecutive scans was not possible due to the low volumetric point density. Height percentiles, on the other hand, are robust descriptions of the measurement height distribution and should therefore allow a reliable tracking of vertical movements of the crown point cloud. FIGURE 3 Figure 3. (A) Movement of height percentiles of birch crown points in the Finnish dataset. Height and time are reported with respect to the scan closest to sunset. Vertical lines mark sunset (blue) and sunrise (red). (B) Maximum movement of height percentile positions overnight. Black points represent the birch crown at sunset. Blue points represent the birch crown at the time of sunrise. Red points represent the birch stem and the thickest branches. The stem and crown points were differentiated with NDVI thresholding. Horizontal lines represent the height percentile locations at sunset (dashed, about 19:40 o'clock) and in morning (solid, 06:40 o'clock). The results show clear and systematic temporal variation in height statistics of the birch crown point cloud (Figures 3, 4, Video 1). In Figure 3, all height percentiles show a declining temporal trend about 1 h after sunset (blue vertical line). The four highest percentiles also share another common trend: the height percentiles after sunrise (red line) were still lower than their sunset value. At this point, their values have decreased about 0.05 m from their sunset value. After reaching the minimum, all four percentiles show a rapid return toward the sunset value. The return takes about 3 h. The lowest percentile shows a differing temporal response compared to the others. Its value declines more slowly than the others during night, to about 0.03 m from the sunset value. Furthermore, the lowest point is reached about an hour later than for the other percentiles. The overall trend of the lowest percentile is also not as clear as with the other percentiles: the declining trend is less clear and shows more variance. FIGURE 4 Figure 4. (A) Finnish birch point cloud profiles at the time of sunset (black) and at the time of the maximum movement around 06:40 o'clock (red). Black frames mark zoomed in boxes in the upper (B) and in the lower (C) crown. Video 1 visualizes the geometrical change in the Finnish birch point cloud over night. It is provided in the Supplementary Material. Austrian Point Cloud Time Series The RIEGL VZ-4000 was factory calibrated and mounted on a solid pillar throughout the experiment, and so its ranging properties were not inspected as with the Finnish datasets. The bounding box around the birch had average dimensions of 6.0 × 7.0 × 9.3 m3 (depth, width, height). The median point number inside the bounding box was 9,388,000 ± 724,000 corresponding to 7.7% variability in the total point number. Manual branch point selection was carried out for three branches. Reference target movement was measured from the fitted sphere center. Three of the four attached reference targets were detected reliably. The fourth one was not detected due to it being occluded from the scan position by birch branches and leaves. Figure 5 illustrates the total movements of the selected points on the branches and the reference target centers. FIGURE 5 Figure 5. (A) Total movements of the representative points on Branch 1 over time. (B) Total movements of the representative points on Branch 2 over time. Branch 2 is missing the last epoch due to internal occlusion. (C) Total movements of the representative points on Branch 3 over time. (D) Total movement of reference target centers over time. Vertical lines in all subplots mark sunset and sunrise. All values in (A–D) represent the absolute 3D movement compared to the initial point selection at the scan closest to sunset. Manual point selection in (A–C) was performed by picking scans once per hour which was sufficient to represent the general movement trend over time. In (D), reference centers were extracted automatically for all 77 scans. The reference spheres were attached on thicker branches and closer to the stem than Branches 1–3. This resulted in smaller movement amplitudes in the sphere center movement than with the branches. The graphs in Figure 5 show clearly how all points measured on branches had a similar movement pattern over time. The absolute branch point movement was limited mainly to within 2 cm, with the exception of a few points, until 5 h after the sunset. Thereafter the movement trend began to increase, reaching its maximum around 9–11 h after sunset. The maximum movements varied from 5.0 to 8.5 cm for Branch 1, from 3.5 to 7.0 cm for Branch 2, and from 6.5 to 10.0 cm for Branch 3. After the movement maximum was reached, all branches returned rapidly toward their sunset values around sunrise (about 07:00 h in the graph). The movement was dominated by the downwards component, but included also a comparatively small radial contribution. In addition to the similar time response, the amplitude of point movements was dependent on the point distance from the trunk in general. For every branch, the point indexing was selected so that the index increased when moving away from the trunk (Figure 2). As a general trend, points with higher index values moved more compared to points with smaller indices. The subplots show exceptions from this rule at different times, but the general trend is visible. For reference targets attached to the branches, movement of their centers showed a similar, but attenuated, temporal trend compared to the branch points. Reference targets 1 and 3 showed relatively little movement until about 6 h after sunset, excluding occasional noise points. Then, both reference target centers showed a sharp movement with amplitude of 1 cm. The movement then increased until 05:30 o'clock, after which it diminished rapidly by about an hour after sunrise. Reference target 2 differed from the two others in that its movement amplitude was lower and the maximum movement occurred already around 05:00 o'clock. However, the movement diminished in the same way as in the case of the other reference targets. Considerations on Result Comparability The results show similar temporal behavior between the two birches. This is despite the difference in location of over 12 degrees of latitude, and the difference in form of growth: the Austrian tree was a cultivar with mainly hanging branches while the Finnish study tree had more erect branches with only the branchlets hanging. Growing conditions in the measurement sites also differed from each other, the Finnish site was more covered and in a slope, whereas the Austrian site was on an open and flat grass field. Although both experiments showed clear temporal correlation in birch branch movement overnight, the absolute branch movements cannot be compared directly. The spatial resolution obtainable with the FGI HSL was not detailed enough to determine individual branch points reliably between consecutive scans. Thus, the temporal development of the Finnish birch was treated on a crown level. The use of crown point height percentiles shows how the different parts of the crown move with respect to each other, but this level of detail was not sufficient to analyze the movement amplitude of individual branches. The RIEGL VZ-4000 point clouds were dense enough for individual representative point monitoring. In addition, the reference markers attached to birch branches gave another point of reference to determine the movement amplitude. Since the representative points on branches were picked by hand, this resulted in an uncertainty of about 1 cm. However, all manually selected branch points showed systematic movement amplitudes of several centimeters that was several times larger than the point ranging uncertainty and were thus interpreted as a result of changes in branch position. In the Finnish dataset, the thickest lower branches adjacent to the stem were measured to be about 15 mm in diameter. In the Austrian dataset, the selected branches were about 10–20 mm in diameter as measured from the point clouds. In order to better compare the results for estimating required point densities for future measurement planning, a comparative table of the two measurement setup is presented in Table 3. The table sums up both the differences and the similarities between the measurements. TABLE 3 Table 3. Comparison between the similarities and differences in the Finnish and Austrian measurement setups. The question arises, which density of the point cloud is required for doing the first or the second type of movement analysis, i.e., height percentiles vs. points on individual branches. To achieve this, the point density must be quantified. This was done by calculating the number of populated 5 × 5 × 5 cm3 voxels for the point clouds, and this was further monitored through time. The normalized cumulative number of voxels populated with at least a given number of points is illustrated in Figure 6 for both cases. In other words, the metric shows how many voxels contain at least n points within the voxel point cloud. This value is normalized by dividing through the number of voxels which have at least 1 point. The point density graphs were drawn at three different times in order to evaluate whether scanning time would have had a significant effect on point cloud density due to any external factors. FIGURE 6 Figure 6. Normalized cumulative number of voxels populated with at least N points. Voxel size was set to 5 × 5 × 5 cm3 in each Finnish and Austrian birch point cloud. (A) Normalized cumulative number of voxels with at least N points calculated for the Finnish birch crown point clouds and for the full Austrian birch point clouds. (B) Normalized cumulative number of voxels with at least N points calculated for the selected branch point clouds differentiated from the full Austrian point clouds. In the Finnish full canopy point clouds, the Figure 5A illustrates clearly how the cumulative point density in voxels decreases rapidly. This means that most of the populated voxels had only a few hits in them. Only about 35–40% of the populated voxels have five or more laser returns localized in them. There is also about a 5% percentage point difference between the scans taken at sunset and at night. In the Austrian point cloud, the corresponding number shows that over 65% of the populated voxels have at least five hits in them and there is no significant difference between the scans taken at different times. The amount of voxels with one or two laser returns is important as they represent spatially isolated returns of which a significant portion may consist of noise, and partial or otherwise low quality hits on target. The graphs in Figure 6A) show that while there is some variation in the point density on the crown and tree level, the point densities between different scans drop in a consistent manner for both scanners regardless of scanning time. The graphs in Figure 6A) showed the point density for the full crown and tree point clouds. Thus, the inherently noisy backsides of the point clouds with lower point densities are also included. Therefore, similar graphs were also produced separately for the differentiated Austrian birch branches (Figure 6B) that were used for movement measurements to see if they would show different point density variations compared to the full tree point cloud. The branches were selected on the outer edge of the birch and with clear visibility to the scanner (Figure 2). The graphs show that about 85% of all populated voxels inside the bounding boxes of branches 1 and 2 have five or more hits, and over 75% of the voxels have 10 or more hits. The only exception here is the sunrise measurement of the branch 1, where the results are several percentage points lower. Branch 3 results show systematically lower point densities. About 80% of these voxels have at least five hits, and about 65% of the voxels have at least 10 hits. In general, the number of multi-hit branch voxels is over 10% points higher than the number of corresponding voxels in the whole birch point cloud. Results on the point density variation in the Finnish and Austrian datasets and their effect on manual branch point selection give a rough metric to estimate required point densities for future studies. The representative point monitoring was possible with manual selection for all branches delineated from the Austrian datasets, whereas for the Finnish data similar monitoring was not possible due to lower point density. The lowest tested branch point density here had about 80% of hits coming from voxels with at least five points or more, which would correspond to a point density of at least 40,000 pts/m3. Voxels with 10 or more hits (at least 80,000 pts/m3) constituted about 65% of all voxels. In the Finnish dataset, the voxel population ratio of over 65% was obtained only when voxels with at least two points (16,000 pts/m3) were included. Thus, to perform a similar point selection from a natural birch branch surface (i.e., without additional reflective material), the point densities should be at least close to 40,000 pts/m3. This estimated value is not a universal lower limit, but it gives an initial approximation for planning new similar experiments. Measurement settings and weather conditions were also similar between the experiments: i) Both experiments were carried out with a single scanner setup. Therefore, only one side of the test trees could be monitored over the duration of the experiments. This is sufficient to determine individual branch movements, but determination of the whole crown movement is not possible and would require a minimum of two separate scans from different positions, preferably more. Multiple scans would allow branch movement determination around the tree to get a better insight on possible directional movement differences within the crown. Multiple scans would also provide better information about effects related to growing location or sun position. ii) In both experiments the weather was similar, with no observed wind and no rainfall during night. As high-resolution laser scans require typically minute-long collection times for tree-sized objects, this means that the measurements are susceptible to occasional gusts of wind and need to be accounted for in measurement planning. In order to eliminate most wind effects from point clouds, external wind covers would be needed or the scans should be performed in an enclosed setting, for example in a greenhouse. However, in our experiments no disturbance by wind occurred. Discussion The Study in Context with Previous Research In this study we quantified a diurnal cycle of branch motion in mature birch (Betula pendula) trees growing under natural conditions, and therefore demonstrated the potential of TLS point clouds to monitor diurnal branch movements in birch trees. To our knowledge, the study is the first to report overnight branch and crown movement with centimeter level spatial resolution and with (less than) hourly intervals. The study approach presented here is novel in utilizing TLS point clouds with short interval outdoor scanning. The study comprises two separate measurement settings with different equipment and geographic location, namely Finland and Austria. Target objects were individual birch trees located in the study areas and night time movements were detected by scanning their canopies for a period lasting from sunset to sunrise. The results obtained from the measurements showed that the crown movement in the Finnish and the branch movement in the Austrian study case presented similar temporal response. Close to sunrise, the branches were hanging lower than at the time of sunset. Detected crown and branch movement amplitudes varied from a few centimeters up to 10 cm from their initial locations at sunset, depending on the position of the branch and the measurement point on it. The movements were observed to happen systematically over a time span of several hours, which ruled out occasional wind effects. Both the molecular background of the circadian rhythm and the resulting movement of various plant parts (the leaf, stem, and flower) have been extensively described for small herbs growing under laboratory conditions. The circadian activity pattern of trees is also of interest, both for generalizing the findings of experimental chronobiology and for commercial use of tree products such as the tree sap [e.g., for the gum tree (Hevea brasiliensis)] and the wood (which is best harvested when it has a low water content). Understanding ecophysiological processes of individual trees, including their diurnal water use pattern and how this changes under water stress is becoming increasingly important for climate research, as near-global coverage of high-resolution remote sensing has revolutionized the up-scaling of findings from individual tree-based models to continental scale (Shugart et al., 2015). Until now, in situ measurements at the scale of full trees were not possible due to the lack of a non-invasive, non-contact method with high spatial accuracy. Our study demonstrates that TLS satisfies these criteria. To our knowledge, previous and present TLS time series literature on vegetation mainly concentrates on detecting seasonal changes. The seasonal change studies have mainly focused on collecting physiological parameters, like leaf or needle chlorophyll content (Hakala et al., 2014; Nevalainen et al., 2014), or to follow the growth and phenological changes by studying changes in Leaf area index (LAI), plant area index (PAI), and Plant Area Volume Density (PAVD), e.g., in Griebel et al. (2015) and Calders et al. (2015). A study by Hosoi and Omasa (2009) determined the seasonal changes in vertical leaf area density (LAD) profiles. Measurement intervals in these studies vary from daily and weekly measurements to individual seasonal scans. These scan intervals are sufficient for detecting overall changes on crown level, but cannot capture systematic inter—and intraday dynamics as reported here. Most of the TLS time series studies are performed during light hours, mainly due to technical restrictions that require presence of measurement staff to set up and monitor the data collection. A change to this is a new operational system, VEGNET, that has been developed and successfully applied for long-term forest monitoring (Portillo-Quintero et al., 2014; Griebel et al., 2015). The main limitation of VEGNET is its limited spatial resolution and a fixed angle rotation plane that have been designed to monitor overall crown structural dynamics around the system instead of focusing on individual trees. The VEGNET operates night time to optimize its ranging capabilities and to minimize possible wind effects. In general, any wind or local airflows present a significant source of noise in TLS point clouds and have to be accounted for either during the measurement. Another reported error source is precipitation on the scanning equipment and on target. Another feasible approach to collect longer-term time series data with high temporal resolution is short-interval photography. Li et al. (2013) performed a plant growth analysis study where they studied the structural changes in a pot plant in laboratory conditions for 35 days where the same viewing geometry was repeated every 5 min. A 4D (3D structure and time) point cloud representation was then post processed from the imagery to study geometrical changes in the plant. Nijland et al. (2014) used infrared converted consumer grade cameras to collect plant health and phenology information in an outdoor setting for several months with 1-h interval. The main weakness of the imaging approach is the requirement of external lighting and comprehensive radiometric calibration to guarantee correct radiometry between imagery taken in dynamic lighting conditions. Li et al. (2013) applied constant lighting on their targets, whereas Nijland et al. (2014) had to limit their outdoor imaging sequences to light hours. Neither solution allows studying of possible dark time dynamics in plants as reported in this study. Summary and Future Work The study scope was limited to analysis and quantification of the geometric movements in birch crown and branches. The validation of possible mechanisms behind the movement was not possible within the study scope and further investigations are required. Possible mechanisms contributing to the branch and crown movement may be related to plant water balance or to plant photoperiodism, but their validation was out of the scope of this article. Circadian changes in plants have been studied extensively in plant physiology and they can be quantified with high detail in laboratory conditions or in-situ for individual plants and their parts (e.g., Perämäki et al., 2001). However, extending the results to larger areas is prohibitively laborious. We conclude that whereas laser scanning point clouds are not able to give as detailed information about the physiological changes in plants as laboratory or on-the-spot measurements, they still have a significant potential to provide additional geometrical information that can be correlated with the physiological measurements, and then possibly extended to cover whole plants in their natural environment and over wider areas. Perhaps the most important open question is whether the observed branch movements take place under the influence of light from sunset and sunrise, or if they are independent from light and governed by the internal circadian clock of the plant. The fact that some branches started returning to their daytime position already before sunrise would suggest this latter hypothesis, but the temporal frequency of our investigations is not sufficient for confirming or rejecting it: ideally, measuring several full 24-h cycles of a tree isolated from natural light would be required for this. To explore the potential of TLS-based sleep movement of trees as an indicator of water use and water stress, further studies are required with simultaneous physiological measurements of trunk diameter, water potential, and photosynthetic activity and reference comparisons. This will allow (i) quantification of the limits of reliability of different terrestrial laser scanners to detect the temporal movements in different plant and tree species and (ii) modeling and further simulation of the relationship between the detected geometric behavior and direct physiological observations of plant water use and circadian rhythms. Author Contributions EP is the main author and took part in the planning of both experiments, collection of Finnish data, and performed the data analysis. CB, GM, and NP planned the Austrian dataset collection and contributed to the writing. MP planned and arranged the collection of Austrian dataset and contributed to writing the manuscript. MW processed the Austrian dataset for analysis. AZ strengthened introduction and discussion from biological and ecological perspective, and commented the whole manuscript. Funding This article received support from Academy of Finland grants no. 265949 and no. 272195, and from the Finnish foundations mobility grant “Tutkijat maailmalle, osaamista Suomeen.” AZ was supported by the OTKA grant PD 115833 of the Hungarian Research Fund. Conflict of Interest Statement The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. Acknowledgments The authors thank Sanna Kaasalainen, Teemu Hakala, Olli Nevalainen, Mika Karjalainen, Anssi Krooks, and Kati Anttila for their help with collecting the Finnish data, and Reinhard Plessl for collecting the Austrian data. We also acknowledge the support of Hermann Heilmeier, Biology and Ecology group at TU BAF in Freiberg (Germany). Supplementary Material The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpls.2016.00222 Video 1. Animation of the overnight movement in the Finnish birch point cloud from sunset to sunrise. Video is created by drawing birch point cloud of each scan collected during night. The point cloud scanned around sunset (19:40 o'clock) is drawn with black as a reference. The laser scanner was located in origin (0,0). References Abellan, A., Vilaplana, J. M., Calvet, J., Garcia-Selles, D., and Asensio, E. (2011). 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L., Berger, D. K., Myburg, A. A., and Myburg, Z. (2010). Diurnal and circadian patterns of gene expression in the developing xylem of Eucalyptus trees. South Afr. J. Bot. 76, 425–439. doi: 10.1016/j.sajb.2010.02.087 CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar Sysoeva, M. I., Markovskaya, E. F., and Shibaeva, T. G. (2010). Plants under continuous light: a review. Plant Stress 4, 5–17. Available online at: http://www.globalsciencebooks.info/Online/GSBOnline/images/2010/PS_4%281%29/PS_4%281%295-17o.pdf Travelletti, J., Oppikofer, T., Delacourt, C., Malet, J.-P., and Jaboyedoff, M. (2008). “Monitoring landslide displacements during a controlled rain experiment using a long-range Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS),” in International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences, eds J. Chen, J. Jiang, and H.-G. Maas (Beijing: International Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing), 485–490. 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But even to this day, such studies have only been done with small plants grown in pots, and nobody knew whether trees sleep as well. Now, a team of researchers from Austria, Finland and Hungary measured the sleep movement of fully grown trees using a time series of laser scanning point clouds consisting of millions of points each. Trees droop their branches at night “Our results show that the whole tree droops during night which can be seen as position change in leaves and branches”, says Eetu Puttonen (Finnish Geospatial Research Institute), “The changes are not too large, only up to 10 cm for trees with a height of about 5 meters, but they were systematic and well within the accuracy of our instruments.” To rule out effects of weather and location, the experiment was done twice with two different trees. The first tree was surveyed in Finland and the other in Austria. Both tests were done close to solar equinox, under calm conditions with no wind or condensation. The leaves and branches were shown to droop gradually, with the lowest position reached a couple of hours before sunrise. In the morning, the trees returned to their original position within a few hours. It is not yet clear whether they were “woken up” by the sun or by their own internal rhythm. “On molecular level, the scientific field of chronobiology is well developed, and especially the genetic background of the daily periodicity of plants has been studied extensively”, explains András Zlinszky (Centre for Ecological Research, Hungarian Academy of Sciences). “Plant movement is always closely connected with the water balance of individual cells, which is affected by the availability of light through photosynthesis. But changes in the shape of the plant are difficult to document even for small herbs as classical photography uses visible light that interferes with the sleep movement.” With a laser scanner, plant disturbance is minimal. The scanners use infrared light, which is reflected by the leaves. Individual points on a plant are only illuminated for fractions of a second. With this laser scanning technique, a full-sized tree can be automatically mapped within minutes with sub-centimeter resolution. “We believe that laser scanning point clouds will allow us to develop a deeper understanding ofplant sleep patterns and to extend our measurement scope from individual plants to larger areas, like orchards or forest plots,” says Norbert Pfeifer (TU Wien). “The next step will be collecting tree point clouds repeatedly and comparing the results to water use measurements during day and night”, says Eetu Puttonen. “This will give us a better understanding of the trees’ daily tree water use and their influence on the local or regional climate.” This study was published in an open access article in the journal Frontiers in Plant Science: Puttonen, E., Briese, C., Mandlburger, G., Wieser, M., Pfennigbauer, M., Zlinszky, A., Pfeifer N. (2016). “Quantification of Overnight Movement of Birch (Betula pendula) Branches and Foliage with Short Interval Terrestrial Laser Scanning”. Frontiers in Plant Science, 7:222. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2016.00222 Picture download: http://www.tuwien.ac.at/dle/pr/aktuelles/downloads/2016/sleepingtrees Further information: Norbert Pfeifer Department für Geodäsie und Geoinformation TU Wien, Österreich T: +43-1-58801-12219 norbert.pfeifer@tuwien.ac.at Eetu Puttonen, Finnish Geospatial Research Institute (FGI) National Land Survey of Finland, Finnland eetu.puttonen@nls.fi András Zlinszky Centre for Ecological Research, Ungarische Akademieder Wissenschaften zlinszky.andras@okologia.mta.hu ||||| If a tree snores in the forest, does it make a sound? Ok, trees probably don't snore, but it turns out they might actually sleep, according to recent research. Most living organisms respond to the variations in temperature and light that come during the nighttime. A team of researchers from Austria, Finland, and Hungary have discovered that trees might also need their shut-eye. The researchers used laser scans and examined two different silver birch trees, one in Finland and one in Austria, to look for patterns. They used the lasers to monitor specific points on the trees and then created point cloud maps of the organisms’ movements and the surrounding forest canopies. What the researchers found is that the trees’ branches made very subtle but discernible movements at sunset, and again at sunrise. “Our results show that the whole tree droops during night which can be seen as position change in leaves and branches,” Eetu Puttonen, of the Finnish Geospatial Research Institute, said in a press release. “The changes are not too large... but they were systematic and well within the accuracy of our instruments.” Both the Finnish and Austrian trees slowly drooped beginning at sundown, and then gradually returned to their original position after sunrise. The researchers haven’t conclusively determined whether this is because they are capitalizing on the availability of sunlight for photosynthesis or the trees are actually following a circadian rhythm. What is clear to the researchers, though, is that this isn’t a case of unusually high winds tossing the trees around. Both experiments were conducted under calm and clear conditions, where no wind or rain was observed. The research team plans to use these findings to conduct future studies on the difference between trees’ water use at night and during the day, and whether their sleep patterns play a role. Get the Monitor Stories you care about delivered to your inbox. By signing up, you agree to our Privacy Policy "Understanding ecophysiological processes of individual trees, including their diurnal water use pattern and how this changes under water stress is becoming increasingly important for climate research," the researchers write in a paper published in the journal Frontiers in Plant Science. “The next step will be collecting tree point clouds repeatedly and comparing the results to water use measurements during day and night,” Dr. Puttonen said. “This will give us a better understanding of the trees’ daily tree water use and their influence on the local or regional climate.” |||||

– Well this gives the phrase "sleeping like a log" a whole new meaning. New research shows trees might sleep like any other living organism, the Christian Science Monitor reports. Scientists used lasers to make models of silver birch trees in Finland and Australia and discovered the trees' branches "droop" up to 10 centimeters at night, according to New Scientist. They published their findings earlier this year in Frontiers in Plant Science. Studies on flowers and other small plants undergoing changes between night and day go back centuries, according to a press release. But it was never clear if large plants like trees did the same thing. “No one has observed this effect before at the scale of whole trees, and I was surprised by the extent of the changes,” one of the researchers tells New Scientist. Researchers used laser technology that allowed them to monitor the trees' movements without using lights, which would have produced a photosynthetic response in the plants. They found the trees' branches were at their lowest point a few hours before sunrise. So far, it's unclear if the trees were moving due to their own internal clock or because of reactions to photosynthesis during the day. The drooping could be attributed to the loss of water pressure inside plant cells at night or because it takes energy to hold branches up to the sun during the day. Researchers plan to next study the water use of trees during the day and at night to get a better idea of what's going on. (If you're a woman, trees could extend your life.)

Things got really real during Monday night's Dancing With The Stars. Following a spectacular performance, Dancing with the Stars contestant/Olympic gold medalist/all-around badass Simone Biles was not here for critiques about her smiling—and let the world know about it in a no holds barred comment. SEE ALSO: Bow down to badass Simone Biles The judges, who begin their remarks below at the 3:15 mark, start by talking about her emotional improvement, compliment her authentic smile—all while critiquing how her dancing was too precise. But before hearing the rest of the judges' comments, host Tom Bergeron had something to say. "I was waiting for you to smile at some of the compliments—you didn't," he said. "Smiling doesn't win you gold medals," she fiercely responded, eliciting a fumbled "OK" from Bergeron, who just got served by an Olympic champion. "I feel like everyone has their own opinion, clearly, and I feel it's just how you take it," Biles told Entertainment Tonight after the show. "I feel like I am trying, I am being honest, but if they don't see that, I don't know what more I can do," she said, explaining as she had tears in her eyes. "I almost ran to the bathroom at one point, but I pulled it together." People watching at home jumped online to stand behind Biles' comment. My new response when men tell me to smile-"Smiling doesn't win you gold medals." SO GOOD @Simone_Biles! �?🙌 — Alyshia Bagley (@thebaglelady) May 9, 2017 Can't stop laughing. Best answer ever: "I smile when I win gold medals." Totally understand how @Simone_Biles meant that. #DWTS — Adina Porter (@AdinaPorter) May 9, 2017 The host asked @Simone_Biles about her absent smile and she said "Smiling doesn't win you gold medals" and I INSTANTLY GOT UP AND CHEERED pic.twitter.com/iB0cPDqHeP — Inkwell J (@iAmInkwellJ) May 9, 2017 They criticized @Simone_Biles for smiling too much then ask her why she doesn't smile? Mixed signals much? #DancingWiththeStars — Lauren Paletz (@Laurenipal10) May 9, 2017 And every woman around the world clapped simultaneously for @Simone_Biles shutting down the "Smile!" — Lauren Rao (@LoreRayo) May 9, 2017 Even Bergeron knew he should not have gone there. "The question I should have asked (and have of many contestants) was 'What's your reaction to the judges comments?'" he tweeted. Next time, please do. �? ||||| A Brooklyn artist takes on street harassment in a clever portrait series that's spreading across America. You hear it all the time. Hey baby, smile for me a little bit. Why are you so upset? Come on I know how to make you feel better. Some women decide to respond to the constant teasing, cat-calling and harassment with a cold shoulder. Brooklyn based artist Tatyana Fazlalizadeh took her resistance to the streets. Her project “Stop Telling Women to Smile” places portraits of women, defiant and impactful, in the very spaces where strangers have hounded her. The real power of Fazlalizadeh’s work, however, is not in reliving those moments of fear, but in allowing women to fight back. The Daily Beast: “Stop Telling Women to Smile” developed from your experiences with street harassment, and has grown into a larger commentary on how women are treated and expected to act in the public spaces they occupy. You’ve lived in many settings—you grew up in Oklahoma, lived most of your life in Philly, and just recently moved to Bed-Stuy, where you began this art project. Why did you conceptualize this as a public art piece and how were you informed by the various public spaces you have lived in? Tatyana Fazlalizadeh: I am primarily an oil painter, but for the past couple of years I worked on a large mural project that allowed me to interact more with the public space. Street harassment is something I have wanted to work on for a while, and I toyed around with sketches and ideas for oil paintings, but it didn’t come out the way I wanted to until I took it outside. But that’s just the site of it; the actual work involved talking to women about their experiences with street harassment and then drawing their portraits. I put them up in Bed-Stuy because that is where I live and spend most of my time. It is an excuse for me to ride my bike around Brooklyn at night to put these up. But I have ventured this project out to Chicago, Harlem, Philadelphia and D.C. I can remember even when driving my car in Oklahoma, being approached and harassed by men. I wasn’t aware it was street harassment; I didn’t even start using the term ‘street harassment’ until a year ago. Before it was just men trying to holler at me. How did you come to embrace the term? I discovered a whole street harassment movement happening on line—Hollaback!, StopStreetHarrasment.org. All these different forums for anti-street-harassment movements online informed me about women’s experiences and brought that term into my vocabulary. (CLICK BELOW TO SEE MORE IMAGES FROM THE PROJECT) CLICK TO SEE MORE IMAGES FROM THE "STOP TELLING WOMEN TO SMILE" PROJECT (Tatyana Fazlalizadeh) Your work starts from the issue of street harassment, yet the tone of the phrases you choose point to the fact that women don’t need to be sensible to men’s needs. They do not need to appease or seem agreeable to anyone, both on the street and in personal relationships. That's especially true for the “smile” comment. That piece in particular has received a lot of backlash. A lot of people don’t understand why women would have a scowl or a neutral facial expression. Women are looked at as needing to have this kind of emotional response, to always be happy, always be nice, and caring, and pretty, and lovely. You have to be dainty and poised and have a pleasant demeanor. It is put on us as our responsibility. Many people feel entitled to women’s emotions or expressions, particularly in the public space. Men often tell a woman to smile or initiate a conversation with a woman without her wanting to respond. She doesn’t owe you anything; she can move around the world however she wants to without having to feel like she has some responsibility to give something to someone else, to a stranger. While that definitely happens on the street, these posters and their sayings can shift into a lot of other contexts and situations. How do you find the women you interview and feature? Most of the women that I have interviewed so far have been women that I know, my friends and my colleagues. For many of them, I know they have had these experiences, so I want to hear more about what they have gone through. I am also looking at who they are, what they look like. I try to choose a variety of women to portray in these portraits. Not all of them live in my community. The last woman I interviewed was my friend who lives near Sunset Park in Brooklyn. She is half Guatemalan and half Mexican and lives in a Dominican neighborhood. Her situation is very different from where I live and my background, what I look like, what my face looks like, what I experience. I try to pick many experiences and perspectives, but they are all women that I personally know and have asked to participate. Let’s talk more about how race affects women’s experiences in public spaces. How race connects with street harassment is something I think about a lot. I started this project using images of women of color for the posters because most of my work portrays people of color. A lot of my work has been around identity and telling the stories and experiences of people that look like me. So, I wanted to insert these images of women of color to allow our experiences and voices to be heard in a feminist conversation. But now that this project has gotten some attention and I'm getting stories and emails from women all across the world, I'm realizing how complex race is when it comes to street harassment. I think when we talk about street harassment we're talking about a type of power and privilege that's being exerted over women in public spaces. And whenever we talk about any type of oppression or privilege, there's always the other types of oppression or privilege that come in to play. That includes race, sexuality, class, gender, etc. How do queer women experience street harassment, how do trans women experience it? As the project is growing, this is all stuff that I'm trying to be more aware of and articulate in the work. It plays a huge part in what women experience outside. Another Mexican friend told me that sometimes a group of guys who clearly don’t speak Spanish will come up to her and try to speak some Spanish words to her in order to impress her or whatever. That is a way that her race and ethnicity directs her own experience of street harassment. What you look like and who you are will be reflected in the way that some men approach you. Women are generally made out to be sexual beings and therefore deserving a sexual approach whenever we walk by; we are a sexual thing out there for men’s consumption. While that affects most women across the board, I also known that as a black woman, we are hypersexualized in the media and society in general. For me, as a black woman, I am made to be this kind of really exotic sexual thing—or even creature. That perception affects the ways that I interact in public spaces with men of all colors. That is an important part of the project—trying to find out what other women experience. I want to know how Indian women treated, how white women are treated, how their race is perceived in society and how that affects others’ treatments when they are outside. This project has, for good reasons, received a lot of attention. What has surprising you most about the responses you have received? The most surprising thing has been just how extreme the responses are. People either feel they love and support this or they hate it and can’t understand how I could do this. I get a lot of emails from women telling me their stories, saying thank you for this project and telling me what they have experienced. I get a lot of long emails, and I really appreciate women opening up to me. This project elicits such strong emotions from people. As a woman I can relate because I am also passionate about this and understand how upsetting it can be. At the same time I am getting responses from guys telling me that I am being stuck up, that its not that big of a deal, to get over it, to take it as a compliment, and all these other condescending things. When you have women tell their experiences, to say “This is what I go through. I don’t like it. I don’t want to go through this,” few people actually engage in a conversation like we are right now. Instead there is a bunch of defensiveness and accusations. Whenever women speak up for themselves there are always people that try to shut them down. It’s very frustrating for someone to tell you that what you experience is not valid. Especially when people say it’s “just a compliment.” I am an adult and I have been interacting with human beings all of my life. I know what a compliment is and I know what a compliment isn’t. So, what’s next? I am actually starting to take this project to the next level. A lot of women have asked to purchase a piece and put them up in their own city. A couple weeks ago I opened it up for women to do this. They pay me for the shipping and handling and I send them a piece and some information on wheat pasting. So I am now looking at the project as more participatory. It’s not just mine any more, not just me in Bed-Stuy. It’s women around the world who are all doing this in their neighborhoods. I just shipped out the first posters a few days ago so we will see how it goes. I’d like women to document these and share pictures and reactions. I also want to create these portraits in different cities and interview women there and create new works specific to their cities. It would be great to do it in different languages as well. Absolutely—different languages, different communities. I would like to travel internationally with this. I think it would be more impactful and powerful if I have women enacting this in their own communities. I am looking for funding now, maybe staring a Kickstarter or partnering with Hollaback!. I think it has a lot potential and I think that traveling with it is the next step. ||||| This is a set of web collections curated by Mark Graham using the Archive-IT service of the Internet Archive. They include web captures of the ISKME.org website as well as captures from sites hosted by IGC.org.These web captures are available to the general public.For more information about this collection please feel free to contact Mark via Send Mail ||||| Simone Biles set the internet on fire during Monday's Dancing With the Stars when she clapped back at the judges, who criticized both of her routines for not having enough emotion. After her second dance of the night, Biles did not look pleased to hear some inexplicably harsh feedback about her routine, especially from Carrie Ann Inaba, who shared her notes along with some kind words and supportive comments. When asked by host Tom Bergeron why the positive comments didn't elicit a smile from the 20-year-old Olympian, Biles replied "Smiling doesn’t win you gold medals." WATCH: Simone Biles Confides in ‘DWTS’ Partner Sasha Farber About Her New Dating Life The biting comeback received an outpouring of support from her fans, who applauded Biles for standing up for herself against the judges' surprisingly lackluster feedback. Biles has been one of Dancing With the Stars' fan favorites since the season began, but the four-time Olympic gold medalist has had a tough time connecting with the judges and has yet to earn a perfect score. On Monday, she earned 36 out of 40 for both of her routines. ET's Nischelle Turner caught up with Biles and her pro partner, Sasha Farber, after the show, where they opened up about the disappointing response and how they are going to move forward. "I feel like everyone has their own opinion, clearly, and I feel it's just how you take it," Biles said, adding that, in spite of the judges saying that they can't get a feel for who she really is during her performances, she's doing her best to convey real emotion. "I feel like I am trying, I am being honest, but if they don't see that, I don't know what more I can do," Biles explained. NEWS: Simone Biles Gets Tattoo of Olympic Rings With Jake Miller "I just know how hard this girl works," Farber shared. "Each week she comes in and she delivers something different. There's a lot of expectation on her shoulders, and we're just gonna go back into the studio and keep digging." One thing Biles has struggled with is knowing and understanding what the judges want from her, in terms of her emotions in her performances. While some of the dances call for her to show her sexy side, others require nuanced emotion, and from her point of view, there's never a clear sign as to what will impress them from week to week. "You don't know which wild card of sexy or of happy they want to bring, and you almost have to read their minds and find it," she explained. While Biles dealt with the criticism like a pro, the young star admitted that she nearly started crying. "I had tears in my eyes," she recalled. "I almost ran to the bathroom at one point, but I pulled it together." WATCH: 'DWTS': Normani Kordei Gets Candid About Being the Target of Racist Bullying, Earns Second Perfect Score ET also caught up with the night's highest scoring star and this season's frontrunner, Normani Kordei, along with her partner, longtime DWTS pro Val Chmerkovskiy, who opened up about how much of an "honor" it is to have Biles on the show. "Thank you for embracing our show, thank you for doing it, thank you for putting yourself out there," Chmerkovskiy said, addressing Biles. "Hopefully this [incident] doesn't leave a bitter taste in her mouth. I know that she's loved, she's welcome, everybody loves having her here." The 31-year-old dancer said he fully supports the Olympic champ, and backed her up when it came to her response. "She kept it real, you know, and sometimes the truth hurts," he said. "Smiles don't get you gold medals and I agree with her as an athlete and I side with her. It doesn't always sound pretty, you know, the gym, the locker room, none of these places are all fun and games. There's hard work and sweat and tears and, most of the time, everything but smiling." WATCH: 'Dancing With the Stars' Biggest Ballroom Bombshells: Engagements, Baby Announcements, Feuds and More! As the competition said goodbye to Bonner Bolton on Monday and moved forward to the semifinals, Biles and Kordei are the only remaining female competitors, and the Fifth Harmony singer says she's developed a close friendship with her castmate. "We're literally the best of friends," Kordei shared. "I love her to death… the cool thing about Dancing With The Stars is that it creates amazing relationships and friendships that will last a lifetime." WATCH: Simone Biles, Mr. T, Nancy Kerrigan and More Bring the Tears During 'Most Memorable Year' Performances Related Gallery ||||| Simone Biles will be in the Dancing with the Stars Final Four, but she’s being challenged to do more than just the steps required to impress the judges … and that’s brought out her fiery side. First, watch her super-intense Paso Trio: Then, listen to the exchange with judge Carrie Ann Inaba, who praises Biles, but tells her to be careful not to dance “like a metronome” precisely on the beat. Her response to host Tom Bergeron wondering she didn’t smile is straight fire. “Smiling doesn’t win you gold medals.” Bergeron appreciated the candor. Loved @Simone_Biles crisp response to my clumsy question. Curious how she felt about judges comments, I unwittingly added to the smile pile. — Tom Bergeron (@Tom_Bergeron) May 9, 2017 UPDATE: Biles responded to Bergeron’s tweet on Wednesday. Here’s how Twitter reacted: Can't stop laughing. Best answer ever: "I smile when I win gold medals." Totally understand how @Simone_Biles meant that. #DWTS — Adina Porter (@AdinaPorter) May 9, 2017 "Smiling doesn't win you Gold medals." Oh Simone Biles you savage. #DWTS — Eric Mueller (@EricJ_Mueller) May 9, 2017 Biles spoke with E! afterwards and explained how intense and “scary” it is to stand in front of the judges to hear what they have to say. Ultimately, she concluded that maybe and her partner Sasha Farber need to work on “fluidity.” But she may have stumbled on the perfect phrase for a gymnastics t-shirt that I would totally buy, ||||| Product Details Designed by: Claire Quigley Our designs are printed direct-to-garment and on-demand as your orders are received. Please note that crewnecks and v-necks have different fits, view our sizing chart here for more information: www.feministapparel.com/pages/sizes ||||| Simone Biles set the internet on fire during Monday's Dancing With the Stars when she clapped back at the judges, who criticized both of her routines for not having enough emotion. After her second dance of the night, Biles did not look pleased to hear some inexplicably harsh feedback about her routine, especially from Carrie Ann Inaba, who shared her notes along with some kind words and supportive comments. When asked by host Tom Bergeron why the positive comments didn't elicit a smile from the 20-year-old Olympian, Biles replied "Smiling doesn't win you gold medals." WATCH: Simone Biles Confides in 'DWTS' Partner Sasha Farber About Her New Dating Life The biting comeback received an outpouring of support from her fans, who applauded Biles for standing up for herself against the judges' surprisingly lackluster feedback. 21 PHOTOS Simone Biles on 'Dancing With the Stars' See Gallery Simone Biles on 'Dancing With the Stars' LOS ANGELES, CA - MAY 08: Olympian Simone Biles attends 'Dancing with the Stars' Season 24 at CBS Televison City on May 8, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by David Livingston/Getty Images) LOS ANGELES, CA - MAY 08: Olympian Simone Biles (R) and dancer Sasha Farber attend 'Dancing with the Stars' Season 24 at CBS Televison City on May 8, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by David Livingston/Getty Images) DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2407' - The seven remaining couples are presented with an all-new challenge, as they dance to celebrate 'A Night at the Movies.' One couple will receive immunity; the remaining couples will compete in a Dance-Off; and a double elimination will take place at the end of the night, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, MAY 1 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless/ABC via Getty Images) SASHA FARBER, SIMONE BILES DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2407' - The seven remaining couples are presented with an all-new challenge, as they dance to celebrate 'A Night at the Movies.' One couple will receive immunity; the remaining couples will compete in a Dance-Off; and a double elimination will take place at the end of the night, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, MAY 1 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless/ABC via Getty Images) SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2407' - The seven remaining couples are presented with an all-new challenge, as they dance to celebrate 'A Night at the Movies.' One couple will receive immunity; the remaining couples will compete in a Dance-Off; and a double elimination will take place at the end of the night, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, MAY 1 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless/ABC via Getty Images) SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2407' - The seven remaining couples are presented with an all-new challenge, as they dance to celebrate 'A Night at the Movies.' One couple will receive immunity; the remaining couples will compete in a Dance-Off; and a double elimination will take place at the end of the night, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, MAY 1 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless/ABC via Getty Images) SASHA FARBER, SIMONE BILES DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2407' - The seven remaining couples are presented with an all-new challenge, as they dance to celebrate 'A Night at the Movies.' One couple will receive immunity; the remaining couples will compete in a Dance-Off; and a double elimination will take place at the end of the night, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, MAY 1 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless/ABC via Getty Images) SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2407' - The seven remaining couples are presented with an all-new challenge, as they dance to celebrate 'A Night at the Movies.' One couple will receive immunity; the remaining couples will compete in a Dance-Off; and a double elimination will take place at the end of the night, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, MAY 1 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless/ABC via Getty Images) SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2407' - The seven remaining couples are presented with an all-new challenge, as they dance to celebrate 'A Night at the Movies.' One couple will receive immunity; the remaining couples will compete in a Dance-Off; and a double elimination will take place at the end of the night, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, MAY 1 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless/ABC via Getty Images) SHARNA BURGESS, BONNER BOLTON, LINDSAY ARNOLD, DAVID ROSS, NANCY KERRIGAN, ARTEM CHIGVINTSEV, PETA MURGATROYD, NICK VIALL, EMMA SLATER, RASHAD JENNINGS, SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER LOS ANGELES, CA - MAY 01: Olympian Simone Biles attends 'Dancing with the Stars' Season 24 at CBS Televison City on May 1, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by David Livingston/Getty Images) DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2407' - The seven remaining couples are presented with an all-new challenge, as they dance to celebrate 'A Night at the Movies.' One couple will receive immunity; the remaining couples will compete in a Dance-Off; and a double elimination will take place at the end of the night, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, MAY 1 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless/ABC via Getty Images) TOM BERGERON, SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2406' - The eight remaining celebrities will dance to songs from some of the most popular boy bands and girl groups throughout history, and the men and women will also compete against each other in team dances, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, APRIL 24 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless / ABC Via Getty Images) SASHA FARBER, SIMONE BILES LOS ANGELES, CA - MAY 01: Olympian Simone Biles (L) and dancer Sasha Farber attend 'Dancing with the Stars' Season 24 at CBS Televison City on May 1, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by David Livingston/Getty Images) DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2406' - The eight remaining celebrities will dance to songs from some of the most popular boy bands and girl groups throughout history, and the men and women will also compete against each other in team dances, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, APRIL 24 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless / ABC Via Getty Images) SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2406' - The eight remaining celebrities will dance to songs from some of the most popular boy bands and girl groups throughout history, and the men and women will also compete against each other in team dances, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, APRIL 24 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless / ABC Via Getty Images) SIMONE BILES LOS ANGELES, CA - APRIL 24: Olympian Simone Biles (R) and dancer Sasha Farber attend 'Dancing with the Stars' Season 24 at CBS Televison City on April 24, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by David Livingston/Getty Images) DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2406' - The eight remaining celebrities will dance to songs from some of the most popular boy bands and girl groups throughout history, and the men and women will also compete against each other in team dances, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, APRIL 24 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless / ABC Via Getty Images) HEATHER MORRIS, NORMANI KORDEI, SIMONE BILES, NANCY KERRIGAN LOS ANGELES, CA - APRIL 17: Olympian Simone Biles (R) and dancer Sasha Farber attend 'Dancing with the Stars' Season 24 at CBS Televison City on April 17, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by David Livingston/Getty Images) DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2404' - The 10 remaining celebrities will take a stroll down memory lane and celebrate with a dance to a time in their lives that left a lasting impression, as they commemorate their most memorable year, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, APRIL 10 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless/ABC via Getty Images) SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2404' - The 10 remaining celebrities will take a stroll down memory lane and celebrate with a dance to a time in their lives that left a lasting impression, as they commemorate their most memorable year, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, APRIL 10 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless/ABC via Getty Images) SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2404' - The 10 remaining celebrities will take a stroll down memory lane and celebrate with a dance to a time in their lives that left a lasting impression, as they commemorate their most memorable year, on 'Dancing with the Stars,' live, MONDAY, APRIL 10 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless/ABC via Getty Images) SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER Up Next See Gallery Discover More Like This HIDE CAPTION SHOW CAPTION of SEE ALL BACK TO SLIDE Biles has been one of Dancing With the Stars' fan favorites since the season began, but the four-time Olympic gold medalist has had a tough time connecting with the judges and has yet to earn a perfect score. On Monday, she earned 36 out of 40 for both of her routines. ET's Nischelle Turner caught up with Biles and her pro partner, Sasha Farber, after the show, where they opened up about the disappointing response and how they are going to move forward. "I feel like everyone has their own opinion, clearly, and I feel it's just how you take it," Biles said, adding that, in spite of the judges saying that they can't get a feel for who she really is during her performances, she's doing her best to convey real emotion. "I feel like I am trying, I am being honest, but if they don't see that, I don't know what more I can do," Biles explained. NEWS: Simone Biles Gets Tattoo of Olympic Rings With Jake Miller "I just know how hard this girl works," Farber shared. "Each week she comes in and she delivers something different. There's a lot of expectation on her shoulders, and we're just gonna go back into the studio and keep digging." One thing Biles has struggled with is knowing and understanding what the judges want from her, in terms of her emotions in her performances. While some of the dances call for her to show her sexy side, others require nuanced emotion, and from her point of view, there's never a clear sign as to what will impress them from week to week. "You don't know which wild card of sexy or of happy they want to bring, and you almost have to read their minds and find it," she explained. While Biles dealt with the criticism like a pro, the young star admitted that she nearly started crying. "I had tears in my eyes," she recalled. "I almost ran to the bathroom at one point, but I pulled it together." WATCH: 'DWTS': Normani Kordei Gets Candid About Being the Target of Racist Bullying, Earns Second Perfect Score 18 PHOTOS 'Dancing With the Stars' season 24 premiere See Gallery 'Dancing With the Stars' season 24 premiere DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) TOM BERGERON, NORMANI KORDEI, VALENTIN CHMERKOVSKIY DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) BONNER BOLTON DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) SHARNA BURGESS DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) NANCY KERRIGAN DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) GLEB SAVCHENKO DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) ERIKA JAYNE, GLEB SAVCHENKO DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) SHARNA BURGESS, BONNER BOLTON DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) ERIKA JAYNE DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) MR. T, KYM JOHNSON DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless / ABC Via Getty Images) CARRIE ANN INABA, LEN GOODMAN, JULIANNE HOUGH, BRUNO TONIOLI DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless / ABC Via Getty Images) SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER, SHARNA BURGESS, BONNER BOLTON, CHARO, KEO MOTSEPE, LINDSAY ARNOLD, DAVID ROSS, TOM BERGERON, ERIN ANDREWS, WITNEY CARSON, CHRIS KATTAN, ERIKA JAYNE, GLEB SAVCHENKO, HEATHER MORRIS, MAKSIM CHMERKOVSKIY, KYM JOHNSON, MR. T, NANCY KERRIGAN, ARTEM CHIGVINTSEV, PETA MURGATROYD, NICK VIALL, NORMANI KORDEI, VALENTIN CHMERKOVSKIY, RASHAD JENNINGS, EMMA SLATER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) VALENTIN CHMERKOVSKIY, NORMANI KORDEI DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless / ABC Via Getty Images) EMMA SLATER, RASHAD JENNINGS, SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) RASHAD JENNINGS, EMMA SLATER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) SIMONE BILES, SASHA FARBER DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (Eric McCandless / ABC Via Getty Images) EMMA SLATER, RASHAD JENNINGS DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) KYM JOHNSON, MR. T DANCING WITH THE STARS - 'Episode 2401' - 'Dancing with the Stars' is back with a new, dynamic cast of celebrities who are ready to hit the ballroom floor. The competition begins with the two-hour season premiere, live, MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EDT), on The ABC Television Network. (ABC/Eric McCandless) NICK VIALL, KEO MOTSEPE, SHARNA BURGESS, ERIKA JAYNE, BONNER BOLTON, NORMANI KORDEI, NANCY KERRIGAN, ARTEM CHIGVINTSEV, TOM BERGERON, ERIN ANDREWS, PETA MURGATROYD, MAKSIM CHMERKOVSKIY, CHARO Up Next See Gallery Discover More Like This HIDE CAPTION SHOW CAPTION of SEE ALL BACK TO SLIDE ET also caught up with the night's highest scoring star and this season's frontrunner, Normani Kordei, along with her partner, longtime DWTS pro Val Chmerkovskiy, who opened up about how much of an "honor" it is to have Biles on the show. "Thank you for embracing our show, thank you for doing it, thank you for putting yourself out there," Chmerkovskiy said, addressing Biles. "Hopefully this [incident] doesn't leave a bitter taste in her mouth. I know that she's loved, she's welcome, everybody loves having her here." The 31-year-old dancer said he fully supports the Olympic champ, and backed her up when it came to her response. "She kept it real, you know, and sometimes the truth hurts," he said. "Smiles don't get you gold medals and I agree with her as an athlete and I side with her. It doesn't always sound pretty, you know, the gym, the locker room, none of these places are all fun and games. There's hard work and sweat and tears and, most of the time, everything but smiling." WATCH: 'Dancing With the Stars' Biggest Ballroom Bombshells: Engagements, Baby Announcements, Feuds and More! As the competition said goodbye to Bonner Bolton on Monday and moved forward to the semifinals, Biles and Kordei are the only remaining female competitors, and the Fifth Harmony singer says she's developed a close friendship with her castmate. "We're literally the best of friends," Kordei shared. "I love her to death... the cool thing about Dancing With The Stars is that it creates amazing relationships and friendships that will last a lifetime." WATCH: Simone Biles, Mr. T, Nancy Kerrigan and More Bring the Tears During 'Most Memorable Year' Performances ||||| The question I should have asked (and have of many contestants) was "What's your reaction to the judges comments?"https://www.romper.com/p/simone-biles-response-to-not-smiling-on-dancing-with-the-stars-was-honest-totally-understandable-56568 … |||||

– Many women don't like being told to smile, and might appreciate Simone Biles' response in the face of such an expectation. When the judges started offering their critiques of the gymnast's performance Monday night on Dancing With the Stars, host Tom Bergeron interjected to note, "I was waiting for you to smile at some of the compliments—you didn't." At that point Biles did smile, but she did so while replying, "Smiling doesn't win you gold medals." Mashable calls the response "perfect," while USA Today notes that the phrase should be put on a T-shirt. Twitter users loved it, too, and the backlash to Bergeron's comment ultimately elicited a response from him: "Loved @Simone_Biles crisp response to my clumsy question. Curious how she felt about judges comments, I unwittingly added to the smile pile," he wrote, adding that he should have simply asked for her reaction to the judges' comments. As AOL explains, Biles has been a fan favorite this season, but has struggled to connect with the judges. She has DWTS pro Val Chmerkovskiy in her corner; he told ETOnline of her comment, "She kept it real, you know, and sometimes the truth hurts. Smiles don't get you gold medals and I agree with her as an athlete and I side with her."

A Sauk Village nail salon allegedly burned a man so badly during a pedicure his leg was later amputated and his injuries caused or contributed to his death, according to court records. According to a wrongful death lawsuit filed in Cook County court Thursday by the man’s wife, Darryl Carr went to AZ Happy Nails for a pedicure in November 2013. His feet were soaked in a hot water and chemical solution, followed by a hot wax solution, the lawsuit states. The suit alleges AZ Happy Nails was careless or negligent in using contaminated or unsafe chemical and wax solutions, soaking Carr’s foot in the solutions too long, using excessive heat on Carr’s left foot and failing to test whether Carr might suffer an allergic reaction or ask whether he had any medical conditions. They also failed to warn Carr about the risk of harm and failed to properly train and supervise its employees, the suit claims. "As the proximate result … (Carr) suffered injuries of a personal and pecuniary nature, including serious burns to his left foot and leg, which subsequently became infected, resulting in the amputation of his left foot and leg, and other medical complications that ultimately caused or contributed to his death on June 4, 2015," the lawsuit states. The lawsuit also names A-Z Nail Spa, Inc., Wen Hua Cong and Xiao Xian Wang. During a call to AZ Happy Nails, a person answering the phone said the salon’s owners or manager were not available to comment Friday evening. Carr’s wife is seeking more than $50,000 in damages, according to the complaint. ||||| A man who went to a South suburban nail salon for a pedicure lost his leg, and then his life, after he contracted a gruesome infection, according to a lawsuit filed Friday. Darryl Carr got the pedicure on Nov. 13, 2014, at AZ Happy Nails, 1715 Sauk Trail in Sauk Village, according to the lawsuit filed by his widow, Latania Peterson-Carr, in Cook County Circuit Court. Workers at Happy Nails soaked Darryl Carr’s feet in a hot water and chemical solution, followed by a hot wax solution, the suit claims. But the solutions were contaminated and Darryl Carr’s left foot soaked for an excessive period of time, it’s alleged. He suffered “serious burns” to his left foot and leg, which then became infected and had to be amputated, the suit claims. The infection and amputation eventually led to “other medical complications that ultimately caused or contributed to his death on June 4, 2015,” according to the suit, which also claims the workers did not determine whether their customer was at risk for an allergic reaction and did not inquire about underlying medical conditions. Darryl Carr is survived by his wife and two children, ages 10 and 13, the suit claims. Latania Peterson-Carr is seeking at least $50,000 in damages. A representative from Happy Nails could not be reached for comment Friday evening. |||||

– A widow in suburban Chicago blames a nail salon for killing her husband in a pedicure-gone-wrong. A lawsuit filed in Cook County Circuit Court alleges that Darryl Carr suffered a grisly infection that led to the amputation of his left leg and, ultimately, his death, reports the Chicago Tribune. Carr's family says the AZ Happy Nails salon in Sauk Village soaked his feet in a chemical solution and then in a hot wax solution, but it alleges that the solutions were contaminated and that his left foot was left soaking for too long, reports the Chicago Sun-Times. Carr suffered "serious burns" to his leg, which then became infected, says the lawsuit. It faults the salon for lax safety and training procedures, and for failing to test Carr for possible allergic reactions or warn him of any risks. He visited the salon in November 2013 and died this month, leaving his wife and two kids, ages 10 and 13. His widow is seeking at least $50,000 in damages from the salon, which hasn't responded publicly. (In New York, authorities are cracking down on the exploitation of nail salon workers.)

The pizza parlor owners who received death threats and were subjected to an online hate campaign will reopen for business tomorrow with the backing of $842,000 from well wishers and a defiant message that they stand by their opposition to gay weddings. They were going to open today but were advised to hold off for security reasons. In an exclusive first interview inside Memories Pizza restaurant since it closed down last week, owner Kevin O’Connor and daughter Crystal emerged from hiding and told Daily Mail Online they had been heartened by the support of 29,000 people who donated and many more who wrote to them. They revealed they are set to share their new fortune with disabled children, a women’s help group, fire fighters, police trusts, Christian churches and Washington florist Barronelle Stutzman, 70, who was fined after declaring she would not serve a gay wedding. The tiny pizza joint in the unremarkable town of Walkerton, which has a population of just over 2000, became the focal point of a raging national debate over Indiana’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which was passed last month. Scroll down for video Back in business: Kevin O’Connor and daughter Crystal emerged from hiding and told Daily Mail Online they had been heartened by the support of 29,000 people who donated and many more who wrote to them Controversy: The tiny pizza joint in the unremarkable town of Walkerton, which has a population of just over 2000, became the focal point of a raging national debate over Indiana’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which was passed last month Critics said it would allow individuals and businesses to use religion as a defense against any accusation of discrimination from gay people. The bill was severely tested over the last week after Crystal, 22, a devout Christian, told a local radio station that the restaurant she runs with her father would never cater a wedding of two people of the same sex. Mr. O’Connor and his daughter were still adamant today, despite the furor that has engulfed them, that they would refuse to serve gay marriages with their pizzas. He added: ‘ If any child of mine came out as gay and entered into a gay marriage, I would still love them, but Daddy wouldn’t be going to the wedding.’ The O’Connors, who serve around 100 pizzas a week to locals, admitted they had never actually been commissioned to provide their 16 inch $12.99 cheese pizzas or pulled pork $5.75 sandwiches to a same sex wedding. Crystal said:’ I was asked a hypothetical question and that was the answer I gave. But I didn’t hope to gain anything by saying what I said. ‘I wasn’t trying to score points. It is something I believe in from my heart and my faith about gay weddings. But I don’t regret what I said. ‘I have been scared, but God is giving me strength. I think it is nothing compared to what Christ had to suffer.’ Speaking to ABC57 a week ago, Crystal said: 'If a gay couple came in and wanted us to provide pizzas for their wedding, we would have to say no.’ The remark was quickly picked up by opponents of the new law and sparked an intense and angry debate, with threats being made against the O’Conners, forcing them to close down and go into hiding until today. Crystal said: ‘I don’t like attention, period. Before all this I was the “Pizza Girl” and I didn’t like that and now I got even more attention. People were looking at me and all that brought my spirits down. But the support we got also lifted me and made me stronger and humbled. But it has been difficult. Crystal O'Connor ‘I don’t know how to take it.' She said the abuse in telephone calls and in online remarks had frightened her of being attacked when walking along the sidewalk in tiny Walkerton which is primarily set around a small stretch of a busy highway. ‘I didn’t want to leave my apartment. I was scared. ‘People were looking at me and all that brought my spirits down. But the support we got also lifted me and made me stronger and humbled. But it has been difficult.’ Her father, who has owned the business for around nine years, said: ‘I am overwhelmed and not just because of the money, but the positive feedback that we have met with. ‘There are just a lot of good people out there. It seems like all we hear about is the bad ones and when something like this happens, it seems like the bad ones are the first to come out and get after you. ‘I don’t hate these people. They are just angry. I am not really sure what they are so angry about. So many things today are topsy turvey. What used to be wrong is now right and what used to be right is now wrong. I don’t hold anything against them. ‘When this country was founded it was a Christian nation and those were the rights given to us by the founders and before that by God. People just don’t want you to have those rights any more. ‘I just don’t understand it all. But it is kind of like fighting the fire. The fire burns big until thefire trucks get there. The fire rages and the more supportive people are like the fire trucks as they come in and start displacing the flames, putting itdown and building your spirits back up.’ Postman Kevin Kollar delivers the mail to Memories Pizza and More in Walkerton yesterday. Kollar said the restaurant went from receiving about four letters a day to 40 or more He recalled how the fury began over a few words Crystal chose to reveal her deep rooted opposition to same sex marriages. ‘This all happened last Tuesday. Crystal was by herself and I was by myself in a different spot.’ He said his daughter telephoned him to discuss a reporter’s request for an interview on the ramifications of the new law and whether she should agree to talk. Mr O’Conner said he considered the situation after he recalled a verse from the Bible ‘ when Christ said ‘If you deny me before a man, I will deny you before the father’. He said he felt it would be denying his and his daughters Christian beliefs if they did not admit to their opposition against gay marriage. After the interview had been broadcast and the negative remarks began, he said he saw his daughter’s despair. ‘She was feeling more and more helpless about it and I was telling her ‘Its going to be ok...its not going to be that big. ‘And then it just blew up and the ugliness arrived. But it was not a throwaway remark that she made. We do not believe in gay marriages, so we will not support them.’ A local teacher sent a message out on Twitter, which was quickly deleted, calling for Memories Pizza to be firebombed. The message is now the subject of a police investigation and charges are being considered against her. The sports school coach has been suspended. Creating memories: The O’Connors, who serve around 100 pizzas a week to locals, admitted they had never actually been commissioned to provide their 16 inch $12.99 cheese pizzas or pulled pork $5.75 sandwiches to a same sex wedding Mr O’Connor said he had read some of the remarks against him and his daughter and he found them ‘vile and disgraceful’. ‘I have seen some of the stuff and it disgusts me and I don’t know how one human being can think about doing something like that to another. I had never really thought about being hated before. ‘But on the day after which was a Wednesday, stuff started rolling in and it really started lifting ourspirits. ‘There were a whole lot of people out there who began voicing our support and just building our confidence. ‘It is very encouraging to know there are other people out there who think the way you do and feel thesame way you feel. ‘They support our right to be able to have that belief and I compare this case like that of conscientiousobjectors. ‘There were people who kind of beat them up because they wouldn’t go to war for their country, but they understood. And some of them did fight. They shouldn’t suffer in the way they have and my only problem with them is that I don’t like their pizzas very much. A friend ordered one once and I didn’t really care for it. Whitney Doody ‘But some were allowed the right not to have to fight for their country because that was there religious belief… that is how I see it. ‘ He denied being homophobic and wanting to raise opposition to gay weddings. Pointing to the front of the restaurant, which is decorated with pictures of Jesus and Christian verse and pictures of Elvis, he said: ‘I don’t care who comes through that door. ‘They are people. I don’t care if they are gay. I don’t care if they walk in on their hands. I don’t care if their heads are attached to their knee. ‘They are more than welcome to come in and eat. ‘That is not what is about. We believe that it is not right for a man to marry a man and for a woman to marry a woman. People could end up marrying trees…come on!’ Whitney Doody, 26, a lesbian who lives in Walkerton, said she had no ill feelings against the owners of Memories Pizza. “They are entitled to feel how they feel. They have their religious rights just the same as I have my gay rights. ‘They shouldn’t suffer in the way they have and my only problem with them is that I don’t like their pizzas very much. A friend ordered one once and I didn’t really care for it.’ Bar owner Larry Stoner has installed a sign outside his business Club 23 which says ‘ We don’t discriminate.’ He said: ‘I don’t have any problems with gays in Walkerton. They are as welcome in my bar the same as anybody else. ‘But I do have a problem with people who have no money because my business cannot operate with those kind of people coming in.’ Mr O’Connor, whose cell phone rings to the tune of ‘When You Wish Upon A star’ from Disney's Pinocchio, said he was re-opening his restaurant after receiving police assurances about his safety. But his decision to lift the shutters for the first time in a week was also for commercial reasons as business had been slack and the till hasn’t rung in a week. Whitney Doody, a Walkerton, Ind. resident and openly gay woman, said she has not been discriminated against in the small community. despite the recent controversy involving a restaurant in the town ‘Business was slow. But it starts picking up. We do a little over 100 pizzas a week. We are not a big city and can’t charge much more than we do.’ He said he would not describe himself as a rich man or a near-millionaire because much of the donated money will be given away to what he deems are worthy causes and he will also make up the deficit caused by the enforced shut down. The news and entertainment network Blaze began a fundraising campaign on the website GoFundMe to help the O'Connors and the fund stood at $842,592 from 29,166 people when it closed. The O’Connors are being advised by financial guru Ed Butowsky, an expert in the investment wealth management industry. He said: ‘Mr O’Connor and Crystal are genuine people. He is devastated that he has given Walkerton a bad name and people around the US might view it as a gay hating town. ‘It is not that. But the O'Connors believe what they believe and that is their right. They want to share the money they have received and we are discussing how best that should happen. ‘Nothing has been decided 100 per cent, but some charities will receive money as will Barronelle Stutzman who they wish to support. Christian Ms Stutzman refused to sell flowers for the 2013 wedding of longtime customers Robert Ingersoll and his partner Curt Freed, on religious grounds. A judge declared last month that her refusal to sell flowers to the gay wedding couple violated the Washington Law Against Discrimination, which makes bias based on sexual orientation illegal. She was fined $1,000, but a separate fund-raising campaign on her behalf has brought in $94,000 and is rising. ||||| Help Barronelle! (Arlene's Flowers) 12 HOURS AGO UPDATE #7 Barronelle Stutzman, a Christian florist, referred her friend and long-time customer to other florists because she could not in good conscience provide full wedding support for a same-sex wedding. Although the couple received flowers, the Washington State Attorney General, and later, the same-sex couple, sued Barronelle. The court found her liable for violating the Washington Law Against Discrimination and ruled that both the state and the couple may collect damages and attorneys' fees from Barronelle's business and personal assets. The 70-year-old grandmother may lose her business, her home, and her savings - because she stood for her faith, she could lose everything she owns! But you can help! Give today to protect Barronelle against the financial risk she faces. ____________________________________________________________ I am a friend of Barronnlle Stutzman and work for the legal organization helping Barronelle defend her constitutional rights. I am doing this campaign with her knowledge and cooperation. The funds will be held until the legal challenge has been resolved and the full extent of the need is assessed. Funds may be used to help cover any outstanding legal fees and costs imposed from the opposition. Funds may also be used to help replace the assets taken as a result of the legal challenges brought against Barronelle. The total cost to Barronelle is unknown because the legal challenges are ongoing. In the event the funds provided by donors exceed Barronelle’s needs, the funds will be used to cover those same expenses for others who defend their constitutional right to live consistently with their faith. The highest priority is to protect Barronelle and her livelihood. The funds will either be paid directly to Barronelle, a trust established to assist Barronelle, or a non-profit organization that will hold the funds to assist Barronelle and those in similar circumstances. 21K TOTAL SHARES COPY, PASTE & SHARE: http://www.gofundme.com/Arlenesflowers What is GoFundMe? ||||| Many customers wait for service as Memories Pizza reopened for business Thursday, April, 9, 2015, in Walkerton, Ind. The restaurant was closed, and its operators said they'd gone into hiding after their... (Associated Press) Many customers wait for service as Memories Pizza reopened for business Thursday, April, 9, 2015, in Walkerton, Ind. The restaurant was closed, and its operators said they'd gone into hiding after their... (Associated Press) WALKERTON, Ind. (AP) — A northern Indiana pizzeria that closed after its owner said his religious beliefs wouldn't allow him to cater a gay wedding opened Thursday to a full house of friends, regulars and people wanting to show their support. "It's a relief to get going again and try to get back to normal," said Kevin O'Connor, owner of Memories Pizza. O'Connor closed the shop for eight days after comments by him and his daughter, Crystal, to a local television station supporting a new religious objections law. The law, which has since been revised, sparked a boycott of Indiana. O'Connor said the criticism hasn't changed his beliefs. He said gays are welcome in his restaurant in the small, one-traffic-light town of Walkerton, 20 miles southwest of South Bend, but that he would decline to cater a same-sex wedding because it would conflict with his Christian beliefs. "I'd do the same thing again. It's my belief. It's our belief. It's what we grew up on," he said. "I'm just sorry it comes to this because neither one of us dislike any of those people. I don't hold any grudges." A crowdfunding campaign started by supporters raised more than $842,000 with donations from 29,160 contributors in 48 hours. O'Connor said he hasn't received the money yet, but said he plans to give some to charity and use some money to make improvements to the restaurant. The 61-year-old father of eight who has owned the restaurant for nine years said he never thought about taking the money and retiring. "I enjoy it. I don't want to leave here," he said. "I want this to be something that my daughter can enjoy." Crystal O'Connor said the amount of money was overwhelming. "We were like, 'Stop! Stop! Stop!'" she said. "It was really making us uncomfortable," her father said. The restaurant reopened about 4 p.m. Thursday. He says that within an hour, all eight tables were filled and six people were waiting for carryout orders. There were no protests as of 7 p.m. Jeanne and Ken Gumm from outside LaPorte, about 20 miles northwest of Walkerton, said they had been waiting for the pizzeria to reopen so they could show their support. "We couldn't wait to get down here," said Ken Gumm, 66, a tank truck driver. "To us this whole thing isn't about gay marriage. It's mostly about freedom of religion." |||||

– Memories Pizza is open and ready to serve once again, assuming you're not a gay couple looking for a wedding caterer. The Indiana pizzeria gained either fame or infamy, depending on your views, after the owner backed the state's controversial religious freedom law and said he would happily serve gay customers but would not cater a gay wedding. Kevin O'Connor was hit with threats and closed the eatery for eight days, but it reopened yesterday to what the AP terms "a full house of friends, regulars, and people wanting to show their support"—and, at least as of last night, no protests. As for the brouhaha, it didn't change O'Connor's mind; he still says gay customers are welcome but gay weddings are off the table. "I'd do the same thing again. It's my belief. It's our belief. It's what we grew up on," he says. "I'm just sorry it comes to this because neither one of us [his daughter echoed his original comments] dislike any of those people. I don't hold any grudges." In addition to the threats and criticism, the pizzeria will also receive $842,387 donated by about 29,000 people in a now-finished crowdfunding campaign. O'Connor says he'll use some of the money to improve the restaurant, but will also donate to charity ... and to Barronelle Stutzman, a Washington state florist who was fined when she refused to provide flowers for a gay wedding, O'Connor tells the Daily Mail.

Patrick Fitzgerald, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, speaks at a news conference on Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2011, in Chicago, after former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was sentenced to... (Associated Press) Rod Blagojevich starts his Thursday facing a bleak countdown _ 71 days before the twice-elected Illinois governor must say goodbye to his family and begin serving a 14-year sentence for corruption. During those days, he will scramble to get his financial affairs in order and spend a final birthday and Christmas at home with his wife, Patti, and their two young daughters before heading off to prison to serve the sentence handed down Wednesday. The next time Blagojevich gets to spend Christmas or his birthday with his children _ 15-year-old Amy and 8-year-old Annie _ they will likely be young adults. Blagojevich, whose 55th birthday is Saturday, won't be eligible for early release for about 12 years, when he will be around 67 years old. "I've had a lot of clients who've had to start making preparations the day after they were sentenced," said Gal Pissetzky, a federal defense attorney based in Chicago. "But not a single one of them has been able to prepare for saying goodbye to their children." Judge James Zagel sentenced Blagojevich on Wednesday on 18 counts of corruption, including his June convictions on charges that he tried to sell or trade an appointment to President Barack Obama's U.S. Senate seat for campaign cash or a top job. The impeached governor must report to prison on Feb. 16. The Blagojeviches, who say his legal troubles also devastated them financially, put their home up for sale after he was convicted in June, and he would likely want to find a buyer before he heads off to prison. They initially listed it for $1.07 million but reportedly lowered the price recently by several thousand dollars. To make sure his wife can make those and other financial transactions on her own, Blagojevich will also want to make sure he signs necessary papers to give her power of attorney, Pissetzky said. There's also the issue of an appeal, something Blagojevich and his attorneys can finally focus on now that the judge has pronounced the sentence. Federal authorities must still make a final decision about where Blagojevich will serve his time. Wherever it is, Blagojevich will be largely cut off from the outside world. He will have to share a cell with other inmates and work a menial job, possibly scrubbing toilets or mopping floors, at just 12 cents an hour. On Wednesday, the Rod Blagojevich who once challenged a prosecutor to face him like a man, the glad-handing politician who took to celebrity TV shows to profess his innocence, was nowhere to be found. Frowning and pulling nervously at his tie, the disgraced former governor did his best to display humility in hopes of convincing Judge Zagel to hand him a lesser sentence. He licked his lips nervously as he stepped up to address the judge _ mouthing the words, "I love you," to his wife. Leaning into a hefty oak podium, gripping its sides, the normally fast-talking Blagojevich spoke slowly, sometimes pausing to search for the right word. "My life is ruined," he told Zagel. Accentuating each word, he added, "I have nobody to blame but myself. ... I am just so incredibly sorry." The two-term Democrat offered more than half a dozen apologies, including to his former constituents across Illinois. But he stopped, seemingly to gather his composure, when he said he also owed an apology to his family. "I have ruined their innocence," he said quietly. It was not enough for Zagel, who proceeded to give Blagojevich close to the 15 to 20 years prosecutors had sought. "When it is the governor who goes bad," Zagel said, "the fabric of Illinois is torn and disfigured and not easily repaired." Blagojevich slumped forward in his chair, momentarily frozen as the judge pronounced the sentence. Moments later, his wife, Patti, fell into his arms; when he pulled back from their embrace, he brushed tears from her cheek. It took two trials for prosecutors to snare Blagojevich. His first ended deadlocked with jurors agreeing on just one of 24 counts _ that Blagojevich lied to the FBI. Jurors at his retrial convicted him on 17 of 20 counts, including bribery and attempted extortion. Blagojevich responded to his Dec. 9, 2008, arrest with defiance, proclaiming his innocence with a media blitz. He pursued the spotlight after he was removed from office, appearing in reality TV shows such as "Celebrity Apprentice." But Blagojevich clearly dreaded the idea of prison time. Asked in an interview before his retrial about whether he dwelled on that prospect, he answered: "No. I don't let myself go there." ___ Associated Press writer Deanna Bellandi contributed to this report. ___ Michael Tarm can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/mtarm. Don Babwin can be reached at http://twitter.com/dbabwin ||||| SPRINGFIELD — Former Gov. Rod Blagojevich 's $65,000-a-year state pension won't be sent his way when he turns 55 Saturday — and it's a chunk of change he's likely to be forever denied.The Democratic politician still is likely to get a federal pension for the six years he spent as a congressman, however.The difference? Blagojevich's misdeeds took place when he served as governor, not in Congress.In October, the board of the General Assembly Retirement System made the decision to block payments, at least temporarily, to newly convicted ex-officials. The move was made because Blagojevich's upcoming birthday put him in a position to be a potential, though still unlikely, candidate for a state pension. The pension system typically used to wait for an attorney general opinion once a politician is sentenced to see whether any of the crimes were connected with official state duties.In Blagojevich's case, payments will be stopped before they can get started, said Tim Blair, who oversees the state pension system for retired lawmakers and statewide officials. Blair asked Attorney General Lisa Madigan to review the Blagojevich pension issue shortly after the former governor's 14-year sentence was pronounced Wednesday. Madigan's office will respond as quickly as possible, a spokeswoman said.Madigan's review of the Blagojevich pension matter may be academic given his convictions for attempting to shake down a children's hospital and a racetrack in exchange for political contributions as well as trying to leverage personal gain from a U.S. Senate appointment.Big money is at stake. If Blagojevich loses the state pension, he still would get a refund of about $128,000 for the personal contributions he made to the retirement fund during four years as a state legislator and six years as governor. At age 62, his federal pension would be roughly $15,000, officials said.Convicted ex-Gov. George Ryan , a Republican now in a federal lockup for his own corruption, raked in $635,000 from Illinois taxpayers in the three-plus years between his retirement and his conviction, according to pension officials. Ryan received a refund of $235,500 when his pension was halted.Twitter @RayLong |||||

– Gone was the defiant Rod Blagojevich who protested his innocence, promised a comeback, and called himself "frankly … stunned" at his guilty verdict: The Blago on display yesterday at his sentencing was apologetic and emotional, but he was sentenced to 14 years for corruption nonetheless. Now he has just 71 days of freedom before going away for at least 12 years, the earliest point at which he will be eligible for early release. The disgraced ex-governor, who turns 55 Saturday, will get one last birthday and Christmas with wife Patti and daughters Amy, 15, and Annie, 8, before reporting to prison Feb. 16 to share a cell and work a menial job for 12 cents per hour. "I've had a lot of clients who've had to start making preparations the day after they were sentenced," a federal defense attorney tells the AP. "But not a single one of them has been able to prepare for saying goodbye to their children." In addition to that, Blagojevich probably hopes to see his house sold and get his financial affairs in order, giving his wife power of attorney so that she can complete financial transactions without him. He's not likely to ever receive his $65,000-per-year state pension, the Chicago Tribune notes, although he will probably still get a federal pension, since his misdeeds took place during his governorship and not during the six years he served as a congressman.

These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. |||||

– Charles Manson is back behind bars, a California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation spokesperson confirmed to the Los Angeles Times on Friday. "He is at the prison," Terry Thornton says. "I don't know how much plainer it can be." Manson, currently serving a life sentence, was transported from Corcoran State Prison to a hospital in Bakersfield on Tuesday for a serious medical issue. Officials aren't giving out details, but the New York Daily News reports the 82-year-old Manson had gastrointestinal bleeding but was too weak for surgery. His current condition is unclear. Hospital visits are likely the only time Manson will get beyond prison walls; he's already been denied parole 12 times.

At least 18 Florida lawmakers plan to live on a minimum wage this week to draw attention to efforts to increase the state's minimum wage to $15 an hour. Starting Monday, the lawmakers will live for five days on $17 per day. That figure represents what a minimum wage worker has after the costs of taxes, childcare and housing are deducted from an $8.05-an-hour paycheck. The lawmakers — mostly Democrats — will also go grocery shopping with a minimum wage worker at the start of the week. State Sen. Dwight Bullard and state Rep. Victor Torres are pushing legislation to increase Florida's current minimum wage from $8.05 to $15 an hour. ||||| - Two Florida lawmakers are pushing to raise the state’s minimum wage to $15 an hour. Sen. Dwight Bullard and Rep. Victor Torres, both Democrats, have both filed bills SB6 and HB109, respectively, to raise Florida’s minimum wage from $8.05 to $15 an hour. Sen. Bullard will soon announce he is taking the Minimum Wage Challenge and will live on the same pay as those living on minimum wage for five days. "I'd like my colleagues to see that supporting this bill to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour is the right thing to do for Florida's working families who struggle every day just to make ends meet," said Bullard. The filing of similar bills is a trend across the country. Cities such as Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles have all passed $15 an hour. Even New York City’s fast-food workers are expected to receive a higher wage as well. |||||

– At least 18 Florida lawmakers say they'll take the "Minimum Wage Challenge" this week to show the need for a minimum wage hike to $15 an hour. From Monday to Friday, each of the lawmakers, who are mostly Democrats, will live on just $17 a day—the remains of an $8.05-an-hour paycheck after the costs of taxes, childcare, and housing, reports the AP. They'll also go grocery shopping with a minimum wage worker to see how they cope. State Sen. Dwight Bullard, who has filed bill SB6 to raise Florida's current minimum wage to $15 an hour, says he'll be among those taking part. "I'd like my colleagues to see that supporting this bill to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour is the right thing to do for Florida's working families who struggle every day just to make ends meet," he says, per Fox 35. State Rep. Victor Torres has also filed similar legislation.

He thought the box was empty, but a California husband accidentally sold his wife's $23,000 diamond wedding ring for $10 at a garage sale on June 1. "Every year our community holds a garage sale. I was in the hospital, I just had a baby, so my husband thought it would be fun for my other kids if they could sell some things at the garage sale," said Racquel Cloutier, 31, of Laguna Niguel, Calif., who owns the ring. For the sale Eric Cloutier chose things he thought the family no longer needed, including a seemingly empty watch box. "He didn't know that before I went to the hospital, I put my ring in that box. I wanted the ring to be in a safe place and out of reach from my 2-year-old twins," Cloutier told ABC News. Cloutier realized her ring, and the box it was in, was missing a day after she returned from the hospital, June 5. "I go into my husband's closet, can't find the box, and then he tells me he sold it. I said, 'You sold it? What do you mean you sold it?' I immediately started crying," Cloutier said. "I'm very, very, very upset," Cloutier continued. "I'm trying to remain optimistic but I don't know anymore. There's a small chance whoever bought the box doesn't know the ring is in there." According to Cloutier, the ring was inadvertently bought by a blonde woman who was at first unsure if she would even buy the watch box. "I would never, ever keep the ring if I had found it," Cloutier said. "If you're honest, you're honest. Clearly, the ring was in the box by accident." As for Cloutier's husband, "He feels really terrible," she said. ||||| Tweet with a location You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more ||||| LAGUNA NIGUEL, Calif. (KTLA) — A husband who accidentally sold his wife’s wedding ring at a garage sale was hoping the person who bought it would bring it back. Racquel Cloutier hid her $22,000 wedding ring under a cushion in a wooden watch box for safe keeping before she went into the hospital to deliver her fifth child. While Cloutier was in the hospital, her husband, Eric, sold the box at a neighborhood garage sale for $10. “We never use it so I said let’s make somebody happy. I looked in it, I didn’t see anything and I sold it,” Eric Cloutier said. Racquel Cloutier is offering a reward for the return of her wedding ring. “It’s my wedding ring and its a one of a kind,” Cloutier said. “It’s such a bad feeling whenever you lose something, especially when it means so much to you.” The woman who bought the box was described as middle-aged with shoulder length blond hair and glasses. “We’re hoping maybe she can see this on TV and maybe realize and look in the box and hopefully she’ll be honest enough and bring it back,” Eric Cloutier said. The family can be contacted by email at racquelcloutier@gmail.com. The ring can also be dropped off anonymously at the security gate of the San Joaquin Hills community, located at 27380 Aliso Niguel Road. ||||| Poker player Eric Cloutier made headlines this week for accidentally selling his wife’s wedding ring — reportedly valued at $23,000 — for just $10 at a neighborhood garage sale. Note: Cloutier deleted a Tweet that was originally embedded in this article. The Tweet referred to the lady who reportedly bought the ring as “shady.” Cloutier’s wife, Racquel, was in the hospital at the time of the sale. She had taken off her ring and put it in a box prior to her hospital visit, but when she returned she discovered a problem. “I go into my husband’s closet, can’t find the box, and then he tells me he sold it. I said, ‘You sold it? What do you mean you sold it?’ I immediately started crying,” Racquel Cloutier told ABC News. “I’m very, very, very upset. I’m trying to remain optimistic but I don’t know anymore. There’s a small chance whoever bought the box doesn’t know the ring is in there.” Eric Cloutier is a former professional hockey player. He has more than $550,000 in career tournament earnings. He finished runner-up in a 2010 World Series of Poker event. On Wednesday, less than two weeks after the incident, Cloutier said on Twitter that he is thinking about coming to the World Series of Poker, currently underway in Las Vegas. |||||

– Husbands, there's a lesson for you in Eric Cloutier's very big mistake: Never sell anything at a garage sale without first checking with your wife. The California man offloaded a watch box he thought was empty at a June 1 community garage sale for $10. Little did he know his wife had hidden her $23,000 diamond wedding ring beneath the box's cushion ... before she went to deliver their fifth baby at the hospital, which is where she was during the garage sale. "Every year our community holds a garage sale. I was in the hospital, I just had a baby, so my husband thought it would be fun for my other kids if they could sell some things at the garage sale," Racquel Cloutier explains to ABC News. She discovered the box, and the ring, were missing after she got back home last week; the couple is publicizing their story in the hope that the bargain shopper will return the ring. KTLA notes they are offering an unspecified reward. An added ouch: The blonde woman who bought the box couldn't decide at first whether she even wanted it. And a quirky side note: Per Card Player, Eric Cloutier is a former professional hockey player/accomplished poker player.

Coke's ad for the 2013 Super Bowl ad, entitled "Mirage," asks viewers to vote on Twitter via hashtags to choose the end of the commercial and whether the "Showgirls," "Cowboys," or "Badlanders" win the race. Over 50 commercials will air during the Super Bowl this year, all screaming, preening, and strutting for your attention. But there's five that are definitely worth skipping out on re-filling the chip and dip trough and watching with your full attention, Matt Miller, President & CEO of the Association of Independent Commercial Producers told TODAY. This year, it's all abut the social, and getting people to pass on the ads and replay them, for free, online. "It's all about the engagement, we're teasing spots, people are watching using a second screen, and we're hoping they will pass them on. And the numbers say they are," said Miller. "35 percent are looking at the ads beforehand and 40 percent are sharing them after." Coke is really getting into the social media game with their fun ad, "Mirage." It features three teams racing to be the first to the Coke desert oasis and viewers can vote in Twitter via hashtags whether the "Showgirls," "Cowboys," or "Badlanders" are the winners. "It brings in gamification of advertising," said Miller. "It's a real buzzword, people are watching and voting as the ad airs." Doritos, for the 7th year in a row, is reprising their "Crash the Superbowl" campaign which lets fans submit their own home-made commercials and the best one gets aired during the big game. This year's winner features a father whose daughter bribes him with a bag of Doritos to turn down hanging with the bros and play pretty princess instead. Doritos, for the 7th year in a row, is reprising their "Crash the Superbowl" campaign which lets fans submit their own home-made commercials and the best one gets aired during the big game. The winner gets $1 million and a chance to work with director Michael Bay on the next "Transformers" movie. Almost a decade later, the mere fact that the ad is user-created no longer automatically makes the strategy compelling. But with the cost of prosumer cameras falling, the production quality on some of them is actually pretty good, and the jokes aren't half bad either. This year's features a father whose daughter bribes him with a bag of Doritos to turn down hanging with the bros and play pretty princess instead. "It's a sitcom brought to you by Doritos," said Miller. The "Crash the Super Bowl" campaign, "jumped the shark for a while with professionals jumping into the act," said Miller, "but this year's is a student piece." Go Daddy is keeping it classy with this year's Super Bowl ad featuring a rich guy on a private jet shouting, "More everything, sky waitress!" after he beats his peers around the world in registering his big idea online. GoDaddy, the king of cheeky Super Bowl ads that have drawn flack for pushing the "sex sells" maxim a bit too far, is back again, and this time they're going to play it classy. The domain name registration companies new spot focuses on "Your Big Idea," and while there's beautiful women aplenty in the ad, based on the leaked online previews they all seem to be fully clothed. In SuperBowl ad land, this counts as maturity. Then again, the ad does end with a rich guy on a private jet shouting, "More everything, sky waitress!" "It's a great punchline," said Miller. Danica Patrick has appeared in 12 of their Super Bowl ads over the past 9 years, but, said Miller "GoDaddy always made them in-house but this year they went with the Deutsch agency to bring in some new ideas." Which is good, he said, because with the ads before "we didn't really know what GoDaddy was about." (Speaking of controversy this year, does the "Jamaican flavor" of Volkswagen's Super Bowl ad go too far? Watch and vote.) Taco Bell has already "leaked" the online teaser for its 60-second "Viva Young" ad, and with over 350,000 YouTube hits, it's officially gone viral. It features 87 year-old Bernie Goldblatt and friends on an epic nighttime adventure. They escape from their retirement home, take some unauthorized dips in someone else's pool, hit the dance club and tattoo parlor, and finally cruise to Taco Bell for their "Fourth Meal." When you think SuperBowl ads, you think Budweiser, and when you think Budweiser Super Bowl ads, there's gotta be some of their famous Clydesdales in there. The brand has launched its first Twitter account and its first tweet was a photo of a new Budweiser Clydesdale born January 16. The beer brand is asking fans to submit their name suggestions via Twitter using #clydesdales. The foal, along with its user-generated moniker, will appear on Sunday. ||||| LOS ANGELES Arab-American groups have sharply criticized a Coca-Cola Super Bowl ad depicting an Arab walking through the desert with a camel, and one group said it would ask the beverage giant to change it before CBS airs the game on Sunday before an expected audience of more than 100 million U.S. viewers. "Why is it that Arabs are always shown as either oil-rich sheiks, terrorists, or belly dancers?" said Warren David, president of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, or ADC. Coca-Cola released an online teaser of the commercial last week, showing the Arab walking through a desert. He soon sees cowboys, Las Vegas showgirls and a motley crew fashioned after the marauders of the apocalyptic "Mad Max" film race by him to reach a gigantic bottle of Coke. In its ad, Coke asks viewers to vote online on which characters should win the race. The online site does not allow a vote for the Arab character. "The Coke commercial for the Super Bowl is racist, portraying Arabs as backward and foolish Camel Jockeys, and they have no chance to win in the world," Imam Ali Siddiqui, president of the Muslim Institute for Interfaith Studies, said in an email. "What message is Coke sending with this?" asked Abed Ayoub, ADC's director of legal and policy affairs. "By not including the Arab in the race, it is clear that the Arab is held to a different standard when compared to the other characters in the commercial," he said. CBS declined comment. Coca-Cola spokeswoman Lauren Thompson said Coke took a "cinematic" approach with the ad, employing the characters as a nod to movies of the past. "Coca-Cola is an inclusive brand enjoyed by all demographics," she said in an email. "We illustrate our core values, from fun and refreshment to happiness, inspiration and optimism across all of our marketing communications." Ayoub said ADC intended to contact Coke and CBS Corp on Thursday to "hopefully start a dialog." "I want to know why this happened and how can we fix this if possible before Sunday," he said. The ADC garnered attention back in 1992 when it complained that lyrics in the Walt Disney animated film "Aladdin" were racist. Ronald Goodstein, professor at the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University, said he was surprised by the image as well. "If Coke's vision is to be an arm's distance away from every customer, why would they want to offend the Arab world?" said Goodstein. Ayoub said the commercial could harm Coke's business with the Arab community. "Coke should understand and respect their consumers and have a better understanding of the market they are sharing," he Ayoub. The company has a large market share in the Middle East and North Africa, he noted, and many convenience stores and other retail outlets in the United States that offer Coke are owned by Arab-Americans. (Editing by Eric Walsh) ||||| Published on What's hot? The all-new Mercedes-Benz CLA. What's hotter? Kate Upton washing it in slow motion. To see more Kate, visit: http://mbenz.us/CLA_FB Category Autos & Vehicles License Standard YouTube License Show more Show less Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Ratings have been disabled for this video. Rating is available when the video has been rented. ||||| Don’t misunderstand John Norman, the chief creative officer at TBWA/Chiat/Day Los Angeles. He is excited to be working on a commercial, for Pepsi Next cola, that will appear during Super Bowl XLVII on Sunday — the biggest day of the year for advertising as well as for football. Still, he is disappointed that consumers can already watch an extended version of the commercial online, in stark contrast to a decades-old strategy of building anticipation for Super Bowl spots by keeping them under wraps until the game. “I’m more of the old school; I like the element of surprise,” Mr. Norman said. “If I ruled the world, I’d go back to holding out and waiting.” His client, the PepsiCo Beverages division of PepsiCo, which makes Pepsi Next, sees it differently. The company is among a long list of Super Bowl sponsors jumping the gun by sharing commercials — shorter versions, longer versions or the versions that will appear on Sunday — hours, days or even weeks before the game. “The world has changed,” said Angelique Krembs, vice president for marketing for the Pepsi trademark at PepsiCo Beverages. “The conversation used to happen after the game. Now, enabled by social media, there’s a lot of conversation before the game about what’s coming up, and we want to be the most talked-about brand in that conversation.” The willingness of consumers to watch ads on social media like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube — and to discuss and share them with friends and family — is rewriting the Super Bowl playbook for Madison Avenue. Marketers and agencies are deciding that it’s better to give up the benefits of surprising viewers during the game in favor of gaining additional attention before. “We don’t see any down side” to forgoing the “aha!” moment during the game, said Scott Campbell, general manager for integrated marketing communications at Colgate-Palmolive, which bought a Super Bowl commercial for its Mennen Speed Stick deodorant and uploaded the spot to the brand’s YouTube channel on Wednesday. “I don’t think we’ll get 110 million viewers before the game,” Mr. Campbell said, referring to the number of people expected to watch the Super Bowl, “but whatever we get by giving it to our online community is all to the plus.” Another reason Colgate-Palmolive released the commercial early on social media was that it is part of “a campaign that was social from the get-go,” he said. The campaign began with a contest on Twitter, and the commercial was produced through Tongal, a company that uses a crowdsourcing model to develop creative ideas for ads. To be sure, priming the pump before a Super Bowl spot runs does not guarantee success. “Pre-announcements can build up hype, but if the ad isn’t seen as dynamic, innovative or exciting, I don’t think the sneak peeks work,” said George R. Cook, executive professor of marketing and psychology at the Simon Graduate School of Business at the University of Rochester. “There may not be so much ‘wow’ or positive bounce.” Another risk, Professor Cook said, is that “the message can wear out” before the game, lowering the return on the large investment in a Super Bowl campaign. CBS, which is broadcasting Super Bowl XLVII, is charging an estimated $3.7 million to $3.8 million for 30 seconds of commercial time, with some going for $4 million. Opening the kimono before Super Bowl Sunday may also backfire if consumers dislike what they see. For instance, Volkswagen of America has been fending off negative responses to its Super Bowl ad since previews began online on Monday. The Volkswagen spot features an actor playing a white Minnesotan who speaks with a lilting “Yah, mon” Jamaican accent, meant to encourage drivers to “get happy.” The commercial, by Deutsch L.A., has been denounced as culturally insensitive or racist. “We didn’t go in saying, ‘Could there be a backlash?’ ” said Tim Mahoney, chief marketing officer at Volkswagen of America, because testing showed that the ad conveyed “the message we want to deliver, that this is a brand that can put a smile on your face.” “I’m pretty pleased that within 24 hours we had 1.1 million people watch the spot” on YouTube, Mr. Mahoney said. That figure had grown to more than 2.1 million Wednesday night, and despite the criticism, he said, reactions have been “overwhelmingly positive.” The additional time to scrutinize the contents of Super Bowl commercials also means a much earlier start to the postgame tradition of challenging the ad industry’s creativity by pointing out all of the spots that echo one another. For example, several commercials, including Pepsi Next’s, will promote free coupons and other giveaways. And at least two commercials, for E*Trade and Kia, include images of baby astronauts, while a third, for the new Axe Apollo line of products, sold by Unilever, features a young male astronaut. Matthew McCarthy, senior director of brand development for Axe North America at Unilever, said he was undaunted by pregame comparisons. “Do I hope having assets out there before the Super Bowl generates buzz?” he said. “Of course I’d like that.” The Axe Apollo commercial was created by Bartle Bogle Hegarty. As for E*Trade, “luckily, our spot has only one second” of a baby astronaut amid a variety of images, said Tor Myhren, president and chief creative officer at Grey New York, which creates E*Trade’s ads. The commercial, scheduled for social media on Friday, features the “talking” E*Trade baby advising investors not to waste money on 401(k) fees. In addition to visiting space, the baby indulges in pursuits like playing polo and drinking — milk — at a nightclub. “I have mixed emotions about running Super Bowl spots early,” Mr. Myhren said, because it dilutes the appeal of the game as “America’s last campfire, where everyone gets together to watch the same thing at the same time.” Even so, “you spend a lot of money on a 30-second commercial in the Super Bowl,” he said. “You may be a fool not to leverage the opportunities.” ||||| At least 15 advertisers are expected to launch teasers for their ads running during Super Bowl XLVII. The goal is to create interest for ads without spilling the beans on the Game Day spot. Here are 5 teaser ads to seek out online before the game on Sunday: (Click Prev or Next to continue viewing images.) ADVERTISEMENT (Click Prev or Next to continue viewing images.) This screenshot provided by Gildan Activewear shows the Super Bowl teaser advertisement for Gildan Activewear. In the teaser, an unknown man wakes up wearing furry handcuffs, his face covered in smeared... (Associated Press) This screenshot provided by Kraft shows the Super Bowl teaser advertisement for Volkswagen called “Get In. Get Happy. (AP Photo/Volkswagen) (Associated Press) 1. Mercedes-Benz: In a spot that has gotten 5.4 million views on Youtube.com, supermodel Kate Upton wears a low-cut tank top as she oversees football players washing her car. On the Web: http://www.youtube.com/watch?vuPq7jVGPs3g 2. Volkswagen: Volkswagen's teaser spot shows people who have starred in videos online previously erupting in temper tantrums on a sunny hilltop to sing "Get Happy" with reggae singer Jimmy Cliff On the Web: http://www.youtube.com/watch?vNfCm9P8naDQ 3. Gildan Activewear: First-time Super Bowl advertiser Gildan Activewear teases a spot that shows a man waking up dazed in a bedroom with furry handcuffs around his wrist. On the Web: http://www.youtube.com/user/GildanTV?v_KIKjcMTKPk 4. Kraft's Mio: "30 Rock" star Tracy Morgan appears to say a bleeped out profanity in a teaser to introduce Mio's sports drink drops, Mio Fit. On the Web: http://www.youtube.com/watch?veenSfU7YYnY 5. Toyota: "Big Bang Theory" star Kaley Cuoco grants wishes to a peppy song in the teaser for Toyota's spot. On the Web: http://www.youtube.com/watch?voKnuMIIEtoo ||||| Published on The Chase may be over, but you can catch Coca-Cola's epic 2013 Super Bowl ad here! To see more videos, check out http://www.CokeChase.com/ |||||

– It used to be that people actually had to wait for the game to watch the Super Bowl ads, but as the New York Times points out today, those days are long gone for Madison Avenue. Most companies roll out the spots, or versions of them, on YouTube and social media to generate early buzz. Some talkers, for better or worse, this year: Coke: The company has an ad about a race in the desert (viewers can vote on who wins) complete with an Arab and stubborn camel. It's "racist, portraying Arabs as backward and foolish camel jockeys, and they have no chance to win in the world," says the president of the Muslim Institute for Interfaith Studies. It and other groups are demanding that Coke pull or alter it before Sunday, notes the Hollywood Reporter. See it here. Volkswagen: It, too, is being accused of racism for a spot that features a white office worker talking in a Jamaican accent throughout, reports Reuters. See it here. Mercedes-Benz: Its ad featuring Kate Upton washing a car, or at least supervising, already has gotten more than 5 million views on YouTube, reports the AP. See it here. Today.com has more of this year's buzzy ads here.

Music Shortcuts Need some pain relief? Try a dose of Robbie Williams or Elton John Music can soothe away your pain, says a new survey, with Simon and Garfunkel's Bridge Over Troubled Water narrowly beating Robbie and Elton to the top of the pain-relieving pops Elton John … better for pain than ibuprofen? Photograph: Jean-Sebastien Evrard/AFP/Getty Images As soppy Guardian types who like to blub at music know, music can mend a broken heart or comfort us through the darkest torments of the mind. It can also, according to a survey by Lloyds Pharmacy, help if someone stamps on your toe. Apparently, 40% of people who suffered from persistent pain reported that music helped to relieve symptoms – with Simon and Garfunkel's Bridge Over Troubled Water, Robbie Williams's Angels and Elton John's Candle in the Wind among the songs they found most soothing. This slightly contradicts my own survey, which found that 100% of all respondents (sample size: one) thought Candle in the Wind induced chronic pain, but there you go. Young people got the most help from music (66%) and although we should be cautious about trusting the kind of freak who reaches for Robbie Williams in a time of crisis, this does at least explain why pop music is the favoured genre of pain-alleviating music (classical, then rock/indie follow close behind). So what is it about the pop songs that seems to relieve pain? A "soothing", laidback vibe seems to be important in view of the songs listed as potential rivals to ibuprofen: the Commodores' Easy and Fleetwood Mac's instrumental Albatross were both on the list, whereas the back catalogues of Dying Fetus and Goatwhore were conspicous by their absence. Reading this on mobile? Click here to view the video I originally assumed that lyrical themes about healing and overcoming difficulty would be important provided they didn't mention pain or hurt itself – after all, it would be hard to take your mind off that gammy knee with the chorus to REM's Everybody Hurts blaring away in the background. However, this doesn't seem to be the case: Bridge Over Troubled Water mentions "pain is all around", and Angels refers to pain walking "down a one-way street". Easy goes further, opening with the line: "Know it sounds funny but I just can't stand the pain." Really, distraction seems to be the central concept. Any pastime could make a difference, but it makes sense that music – where you channel your thoughts and emotions into the experience – would be especially helpful. Andrew Mawhinney of Lloyds Pharmacy says it is now trialling the use of music at some of its pharmacies. So next time you say you need something for a sore back and the pharmacist starts cranking out Robbie Williams, you'll know who to blame. ||||| Four in ten people living with persistent pain (41 per cent) told researchers their favourite songs helped them relax and feel better. Pop music was found to be the most effective for 21 per cent of patients, followed by classical (17 per cent) and rock or indie (16 per cent). The most effective songs were "Bridge Over Troubled Water" by Simon and Garfunkel, "Angels" by Robbie Williams, and "Albatross" by Fleetwood Mac. These were followed by "Candle in the Wind" by Elton John, and "Easy" by "The Commodores". Now LloydsPharmacy - which commissioned the study of 1,500 people - is piloting the recommendations at selected stores across the UK. This includes Selfridges, in Oxford Street, central London; Jubilee Crescent, Coventry; Barton Hill Road, Torquay; and Fallowfield, Manchester. Around ten million people in the country suffer pain most days, including back and neck pain, arthritis, joint pain, and headaches or migraines. Music has the biggest impact on younger people, with 66 per cent of those aged 16 to 24 claiming it helps with their pain management. Pharmacist Andrew Mawhinney, from LloydsPharmacy, said: "There are lots of different ways of managing pain, not only with medicines but also with lifestyle changes such as moderate exercise and relaxation. "After speaking to many people who are living with pain we were interested to learn just how many found music beneficial, which is why we're now trialing the use of music within our pain service in some of our pharmacies." David Bradshaw, a Research Assistant Professor at The University of Utah Pain Management Centre, said: "People in pain should try to find some activity to get fully engaged in. "Listening to favourite music is excellent for that because it can involve both thoughts and feelings. "No matter how anxious you may feel, if you can get absorbed in the music this can help with your pain. "Choose music you like and know well, humming or singing along can help you engage in listening and distract you from your pain." Of those who listen to music to help with their pain, one third (33 per cent) do so as "often as possible" and 40 per cent chose to listen in the evenings. |||||

– Walk into select Lloyds Pharmacy locations in the UK complaining of a headache, and you may be more likely to walk out with a Simon & Garfunkel CD than a bottle of painkillers. The pharmacy chain commissioned a study that found 41% of all people suffering persistent pain (and 66% of people aged 16-24) felt better after listening to music, reports the Telegraph. Now the store is "trialing the use of music within our pain service in some of our pharmacies," says a company pharmacist. "There are lots of different ways of managing pain, not only with medicines but also with lifestyle changes such as moderate exercise and relaxation," he says. The study of 1,500 people found pop music was the most effective pain reliever, followed by classical, then rock or indie music. The songs with the highest pain-relieving powers reported were "Bridge Over Troubled Water" by Simon & Garfunkel, "Angels" by Robbie Williams, "Albatross" by Fleetwood Mac, "Candle in the Wind" by Elton John, and "Easy" by The Commodores. This may be an eyebrow-raiser for some people—like the Guardian's music editor, who jokes: "This slightly contradicts my own survey, which found that 100% of all respondents (sample size: one) thought 'Candle in the Wind' induced chronic pain, but there you go."

Three baby otters — Han, Luke and Leia — have made their public debut at the Kansas City Zoo. ‘Star Wars’ actor Mark Hamill said “thanks” for reuniting the trio. ||||| UPDATE: A man who shot himself and a woman at a graduation ceremony at the Augusta High School on Sunday could be charged with a misdemeanor. The Augusta Police Chief has presented a case to the Butler County Attorney Monday morning. Chief Tyler Brewer said he will recommend the charge of criminal use of a weapon/possession of a firearm on school grounds. "Let's just cut to the chase here," said Brewer. "The gun should've stayed in the car. An ankle, in a sock, is not an adequate place to put your weapon." Chief Brewer said the concealed weapon was a Kel-tec semi-auto 380. When it got uncomfortable in the man's sock, he tried to re-adjust it. Instead, the gun triggered shooting the man in the foot. It then ricocheted off the ground, flying more than 50 feet, into a women's calf. The man drove himself to Kansas Medical Center for treatment. The woman was taken to Wesley Medical Center in serious condition. "She was released from the hospital and is fine as can be. You know, she's got a bullet that's in her leg," said Brewer. He says the class B misdemeanor he's recommending for the incident carries a fine of up to $1,000 fine and up to one year in prison. The man could also lose his license, but under Kansas law, he'd still be able to carry a gun legally because he has no felony. "Unfortunately, sometimes people just don't use common sense." said Brewer. No federal charges will be filed in this case. FactFinder12 wanted to know: is it illegal to take a concealed gun, with a permit, into a high school football stadium? It comes down to what the state means by two words - "grounds" and "building." According the Kansas attorney general's website, concealed carry permit holders are allowed to carry on the "grounds of a K-12 school," but district's can post signs on school "buildings" prohibiting concealed carry inside. No one FactFinder 12 spoke with is exactly sure what lawmakers meant by the terms grounds and buildings. Attorney General Derek Schmidt clarified that a parking lot is grounds, meaning concealed or open carry is allowed. But what about a football stadium? Lawyers with the Kansas Association of School Boards say they advise districts to post signs anywhere they don't want guns. "At least let your intent be known as to what your feelings are, what you want to have happen at certain sorts of structures, those sorts of things," said Lori Church, KASB attorney. Attorneys believe the Augusta shooting could help clear confusion, if the county attorney decides to take the case to court. ----- Two people were hurt, one seriously, in an accidental shooting at Augusta High School's graduation ceremony. Augusta police say a little before 2 p.m. Sunday, a man's concealed gun accidentally discharged when he was in an area of bleachers at Hillier Stadium, where the outdoor commencement was held. Police say a bullet from the gun wounded the man's foot, then, either the bullet or shrapnel ricocheted about 50 feet and hit a woman in the lower leg as she was standing under the press box. This happened as people were filing into the football stadium for the graduation. Police say the gun owner has a permit, and was carrying a small, semi-automatic gun in his sock. They say it was uncomfortable and he was adjusting the gun when it went off. The man was reported to have accidentally shot himself in the right foot and was able to drive himself to a hospital. The woman was taken to Wesley Medical Center in serious condition after suffering a wound to the calf. One witness who knows the woman who was taken to Wesley, said he heard the shot a little before the commencement ceremony began. He said he looked down at the woman's calf muscle and noticed the wound, which was "bleeding like crazy." He said he ran over to the concession stand and grabbed a lot of paper towels in an effort to stop the bleeding. The woman's family says she is going to be okay. Augusta police say the man whose gun went off should not have had a gun on school grounds, even outside. Police say they will present the case to the district attorney's office Monday. The district attorney will decide what, if any charges are filed. There has been some confusion over whether having a gun at the graduation ceremony would be legal if the owner has a concealed carry permit. The short answer is, 'No,' police and lawmakers say. A sign outside Hillier Stadium is clearly posted at the entrance. Whether the man with the concealed gun saw the sign is part of the investigation. Lawmakers who serve on the committee in charge of writing firearms laws in Kansas say a school is covered by federal law, not state law. Guns are illegal on campus, inside the building, or anywhere outside on the grounds, they say. |||||

– Two people were shot and injured after an accidental discharge at a high school graduation ceremony in southern Kansas, the AP reports. The Wichita Eagle reports that the Butler County Sheriff's Office says the shooting happened around 2pm Sunday at the Augusta High School ceremony. Per KWCH, a man's concealed gun accidentally went off, wounding his foot, and he drove himself to the hospital. A woman also suffered a serious leg injury, either because the bullet ricocheted or because she was hit by shrapnel, and she was transported to a nearby hospital via ambulance.

× 79-Year-Old Retired Barber Sentenced to Life in Prison for Murder of Newport Beach Urologist A 79-year-old retired barber was sentenced Friday to life in prison, plus 10 years, without the possibility of parole for fatally shooting a urologist inside the doctor’s Newport Beach office in 2013. An Orange County Superior Court jury on Aug. 21 had swiftly found Stanwood Elkus of Lake Elsinore guilty of first-degree murder for making an appointment with Ronald Gilbert using a fake name and shooting the physician 10 times when he walked into the exam room. Jurors also affirmed a special-circumstance allegation of lying in wait and a sentencing enhancement allegation of personal use of a gun, which added 10 years to Elkus’ life sentence. Elkus had pleaded not guilty to the first-degree murder charge by reason of insanity, but jurors determined he was sane at the time of the killing. Had they found that he was insane, Elkus likely would have been sent to a mental health facility. Read the full story on LATimes.com. ||||| SANTA ANA – A talented doctor, good friend and loving husband and father – that is how loved ones remembered Dr. Ronald Gilbert on Friday. On Jan. 28, 2013, the successful urologist was shot 10 times at his Newport Beach medical practice by a disgruntled former patient who blamed the 52-year-old doctor for his prostate problems. The killer, Stanwood Elkus, 79, sat in a wheelchair for the duration of his trial in Orange County Superior Court last month. But for his Friday sentencing, he walked into the courtroom without the use of his wheelchair, as many in the room gasped. The Lake Elsinore resident sat quietly as Superior Court Judge Patrick Donahue sentenced him to life in prison without the possibility parole. Elkus had pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, but the jury last month found that he was mentally sound when he plotted to kill the doctor, used a fake name to schedule a medial appointment and then gunned him down in an exam room. “There can be no punishment as great as the hate he has in his heart,” Gilbert’s childhood friend, Julie Harold Carter, said to the judge. Gilbert first saw Elkus in 1992 while he was working as young resident at the VA Long Beach Hospital. Elkus complained of frequent urination and was diagnosed with a narrowing of the urethra. Gilbert recommended he undergo a procedure to widen his urethra; the operation was performed by different doctors. The operation was a simple, outpatient procedure, but Elkus argued with nurses and refused to leave the hospital until he believed he was “fully healed.” Days later he returned to the hospital and demanded that doctors remove his temporary catheter. The prosecution said Elkus became obsessed, believing that the procedure had damaged his prostate and caused his erectile dysfunction. For decades, he seethed over his medical issues and would talk about his prostate to anyone who would listen, attorneys said. Elkus’ defense attorney had said that he suffered from dementia and psychotic depression that was exacerbated by his health issues. In late 2012, Elkus bought a .45-caliber handgun and mapped out directions to the Hoag Health Center in Newport Beach, where Gilbert worked. At the sentencing, several close friends and family members described in court how they have been affected by the devastating loss. Elkus stared straight ahead and removed his hearing-aid headphones as some loved ones read statements. Glenn Gilbert said his brother was a “brilliant” and “selfless” man who “brought joy into the world and enriched countless people’s lives. … His absence has been painful and profound.” Glenn Gilbert said Elkus caused his own problems by refusing to follow post-operative care and medical advice from the doctors who did the procedure: “If he wanted to kill the person responsible, he should have just looked in the mirror and shot himself.” Gilbert’s wife, Elizabeth, said her husband was a wonderful father to their two sons. “Ron welcomed everyone into our home with open arms and a huge smile,” she said. “Our life will never be the same.” ||||| Halfway through family members' statements, Elkus, who has hearing loss, removed the headphones that helped him hear the proceedings. He stared ahead, only occasionally glancing back to the podium where Gilbert's family and friends stood to address the court. He placed the headphones over his ears again when it was time to hear his sentence. |||||

– A retired barber who murdered a urologist inside his Southern California office in 2013 over a 21-year-old grudge was sentenced Friday to life in prison plus 10 years without the possibility of parole, the Los Angeles Times reports. In 1992, Ronald Gilbert—then a medical resident at the veterans hospital in Long Beach—worked with other doctors to diagnose Stanwood Elkus, who was dealing with frequent urination, with a narrowing of the urethra. Two other doctors at the VA ultimately performed a simple urethra-widening surgery without Gilbert; Elkus firmly believed the surgery was botched and damaged his prostate, the Orange County Register reports, causing incontinence, erectile dysfunction, and diminished sex drive, all of which led his longtime girlfriend to leave him. A DA on the case told jurors that Elkus held a grudge against Gilbert over the incident. More than two decades later, Elkus—who had often seethed about his medical issues in the ensuing years "to anyone who would listen," per the Register—used a fake name to make an appointment with Gilbert on Jan. 28, 2013, at his Newport Beach office, where he entered the exam room and shot him 10 times, killing him. The now-79-year-old pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, but jurors found that he was sane and convicted him last month of first-degree murder. Per KTLA, jurors also affirmed a special-circumstance allegation of lying in wait. That, along with a sentencing enhancement allegation of personal use of a gun, added 10 years to his sentence. "The world was robbed of a model citizen … our children were robbed of an amazing father," said Elizabeth Gilbert, Ronald Gilbert's wife, at the sentencing hearing, recalling her husband's death just days before his 53rd birthday.

Male fruit flies that have been rejected by females drink significantly more alcohol than those that have mated freely, scientists say. Inan article in Science, researchers suggest that alcohol stimulates the flies' brains as a "reward" in a similar way to sexual conquest. The work points to a brain chemical called neuropeptide F, which seems to be regulated by the flies' behaviour. Human brains have a similar chemical, which may react in a similar way. The connection between alcohol and this chemical, which in humans is known as neuropeptide Y, has already been noted instudies involving hard-drinking mice. The new work explores the link between such reward-seeking and the study of social interactions, said the lead author of the report Galit Shohat-Ophir, now of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in Virginia, US. "It is thought that reward systems evolved to reinforce behaviours that are important for the survival of both individuals and species, like food consumption and mating," Dr Shohat-Ophir told BBC News. "Drugs of abuse kind of hijack the same neural pathways used by natural rewards, so we wanted to use alcohol - which is an extreme example of a compound that can affect the reward system - to get into the mechanism of what makes social interaction rewarding for animals." 'Control system' Working in thelaboratory of Ulrike Heberleinat the University of California, San Francisco, Dr Shohat-Ophir and colleagues subjected a number of flies to a wide variety of fates. In one set of experiments, male flies were put in a box with five virgin females, which were receptive to the males' advances. In another, males were locked up with females that had already mated and which thus roundly rejected the males' attempts at sex. Offered either their normal food slurry or a version charged with 15% alcohol, the mated males avoided the alcohol, whereas the sexually deprived males went on a comparative bender. The team then went on a hunt for a chemical that could tie the two parts of this story together, hitting on neuropeptide F (NPF). Image caption In mammals, the "rewarding" brain chemical is called neuropeptide Y They found that the heavy-drinking rejected males had a lowered level of the chemical, and sated, mated males had an elevated level. "What we think is that these NPF levels are some kind of 'molecular signature' to the experience," Dr Shohat-Ophir explained. To show that the NPF is actually responsible for the change rather than just associated with it, the researchers actively manipulated just how much NPF was in the flies' brains. Those with depressed levels acted like the rejected males, and those with elevated levels behaved like the mated males. "What this leads us to think is that the fly brain - and presumably also other animals' and human brains - have some kind of a system to control their level of internal reward, that once the internal reward level is down-regulated it will be followed by behaviour that will restore it back," Dr Shohat-Ophir said. It is tempting, given that humans share a similar brain chemical, to imagine that NPF drives human behaviour as well. However,in an accompanying article in Science, Troy Zars of the University of Missouri wrote that "anthropomorphising the results from flies is difficult to suppress, but the relevance to human behaviour is obviously not yet established". Nevertheless, he suggested that the work linked "a rewarding social interaction with a lasting change in behaviour". "Identifying the NPF system as critical in this linkage offers exciting prospects for determining the molecular and genetic mechanisms of reward and could potentially influence our understanding of the mechanisms of drugs of abuse." ||||| Thank you for your interest in spreading the word about Science. NOTE: We only request your email address so that the person you are recommending the page to knows that you wanted them to see it, and that it is not junk mail. We do not capture any email address. |||||

– Entomology as country song: Researchers say male fruit flies denied sex drown their sorrows in alcohol, reports the BBC. Or more precisely, boy flies who get some action turn up their noses at food dosed with alcohol, while boys who get rejected are far more likely to indulge. Researchers think it's because the booze triggers a "reward" chemical in the brain to compensate for the "reward" they would have gotten through sex. Yes, humans have a similar chemical. How did they find this out? The scientists put some male fruit flies in a box with females who might only be called Rush Limbaugh's favorite descriptor. Things happened. Others went in boxes with females who had already mated and had no interest in doing so again. Then they gave each set of males a choice of normal food or spiked food, and the more-frustrated flies kept the bar open all night. The study appears in Science.

A federal jury on Thursday awarded more than $50 million in damages to neighbors of an industrial hog operation found responsible for intense smells, noise and other disturbances so bad people couldn't enjoy their rural homes. Jurors on Thursday awarded the 10 neighbors of a 15,000-head swine operation a total of $750,000 in compensation, plus $50 million in damages designed to punish the corporation that owns the animals. Lawyers didn't sue the Bladen County farm's owner, instead targeting the hog-production division of Virginia-based Smithfield Foods. The Chinese-owned company uses strict contracts to dictate how farm operators raise livestock that Smithfield owns. The decision is the first in dozens of lawsuits filed by more than 500 neighbors complaining about hog operations. Jurors decided that “the defendant owed them (neighbors) a standard of care in terms of trying to minimize the odors and other undesirable fallout from their processes,” said Wake Forest University law professor Sidney Shapiro, who has followed the cases. “Apparently the jury decided they (Smithfield) knew about and disregarded all this fallout even though they could do something positive to reduce it.” Rural residents have complained about smells, clouds of flies and excessive spraying for decades. But local and state politicians have either supported or backed down in the face of a politically powerful industry. North Carolina legislators last year changed state law to make it much more difficult to replicate the string of nuisance lawsuits targeting hog operations like the one decided Thursday. Smithfield Foods said it would appeal the decision. “The lawsuits are a serious threat to a major industry, to North Carolina's entire economy and to the jobs and livelihoods of tens of thousands of North Carolinians,” Senior Vice President Keira Lombardo said in a statement. Smithfield Foods hasn't changed the locally dominant method of hog waste disposal since intensive hog operations multiplied in North Carolina in the 1980s and `90s. The practice involves housing thousands of hogs together, flushing their waste into holding pits, allowing bacteria to break down the material, then spraying the effluent onto fields with agricultural spray guns. Neighbors say the spraying sends the smells and animal waste airborne, allowing it to drift into their homes and sometimes coat outdoor surfaces on their properties. “We are pleased with the verdict. These cases are about North Carolina family property rights and a clean environment,” said Mona Lisa Wallace, a Salisbury attorney whose firm teamed with two Texas-based firms to prepare the series of trials covering similar ground. “We are now preparing for the next, which is scheduled for the end of May.” This case, presenting with the plaintiffs and the specific farm, was chosen by suing attorneys. Although the size of the jury award is large, the result of the next trial could be more telling since the parties were chosen by Smithfield's attorneys, said Drew Kershen, an emeritus law professor at the University of Oklahoma and a past president of the American Agricultural Law Association. “If you got a second test case, chosen by the defense attorney, which turns out to have damages like this, then you would really have to say, my goodness these are really significant claims against the industry in North Carolina,” he said. ||||| A North Carolina jury on Thursday reached an unanimous verdict against pork producer Murphy-Brown LLC in a landmark case that could pave the way for more nuisance lawsuits against large-scale livestock operations. The company plans to appeal. In all, jurors awarded more than $50 million to 10 plaintiffs who live near the hog farm, setting... ||||| The case involved ten plaintiffs in North Carolina who are unlucky enough to live near a major industrial hog operation. That operation, Kinlaw Farms, is not the target of the lawsuit; Kinlaw is ultimately beholden to Smithfield Foods, theh company for which they raise hogs. The plaintiffs alleged that the use of anaerobic lagoons – literally huge pits of hog feces – has negatively affected their quality of life thanks to putrid odors, buzzards, and swarms of insects. (For more info on the case, check out our earlier coverage.) A federal jury, after a two-day deliberation, awarded over $50 million to the plaintiffs: $75,000 each in compensatory damages and $5 million each in punitive damages. Interestingly, and disturbingly, even if the case survives on appeal, the plaintiffs may not be able to secure the latter money. In the past four years, since the suit was filed, lawmakers with financial ties to the lucrative hog industry have attempted to put a hard cap on the amount of money a plaintiff can receive in this kind of lawsuit. Despite a veto from the North Carolina’s governor, that hard cap passed, which limits the amount of damages to three times the compensatory damages, which would be only $225,000, far less than the amount the jury ruled the plaintiffs are entitled to. Smithfield released a statement calling the verdict “an outrageous attack on animal agriculture, rural North Carolina and thousands of independent family farmers who own and operate contract farms.” (The Office of the Inspector General recently declared that contract farmers are so thoroughly controlled by their corporate clients that they can’t be considered independent. And Kinlaw Farms, the “independent” family farm in this case, wasn’t even a defendant.) In the statement, Smithfield vowed to appeal the decision. |||||

– The 10 North Carolina plaintiffs who say a pork farm near their homes is endangering their health by, among other things, spraying hog urine and feces onto nearby fields, have won a big victory. A federal jury has awarded each plaintiff $5 million in punitive damages and $75,000 in compensatory damages, Modern Farmer reports. The more than $50 million in awards is to be paid by Smithfield Foods—the company for which the North Carolina hog operation, Kinlaw Farms, raises the animals. In their lawsuit, the plaintiffs complained of large pits holding hog feces that, in addition to causing horrible smells, attracted buzzards and insects. They say the sprayed feces sometimes even ends up in their homes, the Daily Press reports. Smithfield says it will appeal. The case, the ham giant says in a statement, is "an outrageous attack on animal agriculture" and that this and dozens of similar lawsuits—involving more than 500 neighbors in total—"are a serious threat to a major industry, to North Carolina's entire economy, and to the jobs and livelihoods of tens of thousands of North Carolinians." Modern Farmer points out that even if Smithfield loses its appeal, lawmakers with ties to the hog industry successfully put a limit on the amount of money plaintiffs can receive in this type of lawsuit, so the plaintiffs may ultimately only be able to collect $250,000 in punitive damages. The Wall Street Journal says it's unclear whether the new state law will apply in this case.

IRBIL, Iraq (AP) — Airstrikes pounded the area around Iraq's largest dam on Saturday in an effort to drive out militants who captured it earlier this month, as reports emerged of the massacre of some 80 members of the Yazidi religious minority by Islamic extremists. Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community settle at a new camp outside the old camp of Bajid Kandala at Feeshkhabour town near the Syria-Iraq border, Iraq, Friday, Aug. 15, 2014. The U.N. this week declared... (Associated Press) Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community gather at a park near the Turkey-Iraq border at the Ibrahim al-Khalil crossing, as they try to cross to Turkey, in Zakho, 300 miles (475 kilometers) northwest... (Associated Press) Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community settle at a new camp outside the old camp of Bajid Kandala at Feeshkhabour town near the Syria-Iraq border, Iraq, Friday, Aug. 15, 2014. The U.N. this week declared... (Associated Press) Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community walk on the Delal bridge in Zakho, 300 miles (475 kilometers) northwest of Baghdad, Iraq, Friday, Aug. 15, 2014. The U.N. this week declared the situation in... (Associated Press) Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community settle at a new camp outside the old camp of Bajid Kandala at Feeshkhabour town near the Syria-Iraq border, Iraq, Friday, Aug. 15, 2014. The U.N. this week declared... (Associated Press) German's Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, speaks to the press upon his arrival at the airport in Baghdad, Iraq, Saturday, Aug 16, 2014. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban, Pool) (Associated Press) Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, right, speaks during a meeting with German's Foreign Minister Frank-Walter, left, in Baghdad, Iraq, Saturday, Aug 16, 2014. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban, Pool) (Associated Press) An Iraqi woman and her son from the Yazidi community sleep at a park near the Turkey-Iraq border at the Ibrahim al-Khalil crossing, as they try to cross to Turkey, in Zakho, 300 miles (475 kilometers)... (Associated Press) Residents living near the Mosul Dam told The Associated Press that the area was being targeted by airstrikes, but it was not immediately clear whether the attacks were being carried out by Iraq's air force or the U.S., which last week launched an air campaign aimed at halting the advance of the Islamic State group across the country's north. The extremist group seized the dam on the Tigris River on Aug. 7. Residents near the dam say the airstrikes killed militants, but that could not immediately be confirmed. The residents spoke on condition of anonymity out of fears for their safety. A Yazidi lawmaker and a Kurdish security official meanwhile said Islamic State fighters massacred scores of Yazidi men Friday afternoon after seizing the village of Kocho. Both said they based their information on the accounts of survivors and warned that the minority group remains in danger despite U.S. aid drops and airstrikes launched to protect them. Islamic State fighters besieged the village for several days and gave its Yazidi residents a deadline to convert to Islam, Yazidi lawmaker Mahma Khalil said Saturday. "When the residents refused to do this, the massacre took place," he said. Halgurd Hekmat, a spokesman for Kurdish security forces, said the militants took the women and children of Kocho to the nearby city of Tal Afar, which is controlled by the Islamic State group. Their accounts could not immediately be confirmed. Areas held by the extremist group are not accessible to reporters. Tens of thousands of Yazidis fled when the Islamic State group earlier this month captured the northern Iraqi town of Sinjar, near the Syrian border. The Yazidis practice an ancient religion that the Sunni Muslim radicals consider heretical. The plight of the Yazidis, tens of thousands of whom were stranded on a desert mountaintop for days, encircled by the Islamic extremists, prompted the U.S. to launch aid lifts as well as airstrikes to help Kurdish fighters get them to safety. Most of the Yazidis were eventually able to escape to Iraq's largely autonomous Kurdish region. Some 1.5 million people have been displaced by fighting since the Islamic State group's rapid advance across northern and western Iraq began in June. The decision to launch airstrikes marked the first direct U.S. military intervention in Iraq since the last troops withdrew in 2011, and reflected growing international concern about the extremist group, which has carved out a self-styled Islamic state in large parts of Iraq and neighboring Syria. On Saturday, Britain's Ministry of Defense said it deployed a U.S.-made spy plane over northern Iraq to monitor the humanitarian crisis and movements of Islamic State militants. It said the converted Boeing KC-135 tanker, called a Rivet Joint, would monitor mobile phone calls and other communication. Germany's Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier was in Baghdad on Saturday, where he announced his government would provide more than 24 million euros ($32.2 million) in humanitarian aid to Iraq. "The first German air force planes are flying to Irbil at this moment to deliver humanitarian aid," Steinmeier said in a joint press conference with Iraq's acting Foreign Minister Hussein Shahristani. "In the current situation where minorities, especially in northern Iraq, are expelled and murdered, where children are orphaned and women are enslaved, humanitarian aid is extremely important." Two British planes also landed Saturday in the Kurdish regional capital Irbil carrying humanitarian supplies. Khalil, the Yazidi lawmaker, said the U.S. must do more to protect those fleeing the Islamic State group. "We have been calling on the U.S. administration and Iraqi government to intervene and help the innocent people, but it seems that nobody is listening," Khalil said. ___ Yacoub reported from Baghdad. Associated Press writer Vivian Salama in Baghdad, Frank Jordans in Berlin and Shawn Pogatchnik in Dublin contributed to this report. ||||| Iraqi children, displaced by the siege of Mount Sinjar by Islamic State militants, speak of the lives they left behind. (Reuters) Iraqi children, displaced by the siege of Mount Sinjar by Islamic State militants, speak of the lives they left behind. (Reuters) Extremist fighters have killed more than 80 men and detained hundreds of women in a Yazidi village, Yazidis and Kurdish officials said Saturday, offering a reminder that the ancient minority sect is still at risk despite President Obama’s conclusion that the threat had passed for those stranded on Mount Sinjar. Islamic State militants drove into the village of Kocho, about 15 miles southwest of the town of Sinjar, on Friday, following a week-long siege in which the al-Qaeda inspired group demanded that residents convert to Islam or face death, said the reports, which could not be independently verified. The men were rounded up and executed, while the women were taken to an undisclosed location, according to Ziad Sinjar, a pesh merga commander based on the edge of Mount Sinjar, citing the accounts of villagers nearby. Six men were injured but survived, and managed to escape to a nearby village where they are being sheltered by sympathetic local Sunni Iraqis, he said. One of them told him that 84 Yazidi men were lined up and shot and that more than 300 women were taken away. Yazidi activists and Kurdish officials said at least 80 men were killed and hundreds of women taken away after the fighters entered the village shortly after 1 pm on Friday. “The villagers had received local assurances that they were safe,” said Hoshyar Zebari, Iraq’s former foreign minister who is now working closely with the Kurdistan Regional Government. “Maybe they killed them in revenge for the setbacks they have suffered from the air strikes.” 1 of 10 Full Screen Autoplay Close Skip Ad × Majority of Yazidis return to Iraq View Photos Many who had been trapped at risk of death fled to Syria and now are in northern Iraq, shaken but no longer in imminent danger. Caption Many who had been trapped at risk of death fled to Syria and now are in northern Iraq, shaken but no longer in imminent danger. A Yazidi girl enters the temple in Lalish, Iraq, the Yazidi holy sanctuary. Tens of thousands of the Iraqi minority sect have been displaced after being attacked by the Islamic State militant group. They are spilling across northern Iraq — sleeping in fields, cars and abandoned buildings — but at least they are safe. Sebastian Meyer/For the Washington Post Buy Photo Wait 1 second to continue. The accounts could not be independently confirmed nor the conflicting numbers reconciled, but fears had been growing for the welfare of Yazidis in the village since the Islamic State siege began on Aug. 7. The U.S. Central Command said Friday that it had carried out a drone attack south of the town of Sinjar after receiving reports of an attack in the area. The drone “struck and destroyed two vehicles,” it said. The alleged killings came a day after Obama called off plans for a military evacuation of Yazidis trapped on Mount Sinjar, saying they were no longer at risk. If confirmed, the events in Kocho would constitute the worst single atrocity committed against the Yazidis since the Aug. 3 assault on Sinjar triggered a humanitarian crisis and contributed to the Obama administration’s decision to intervene. At least 10 U.S. airstrikes and drops of food and medicine have since helped tens of thousands of Yazidis reach safety after they sought refuge on the mountain nearly two weeks ago, then got stranded in the barren terrain without water or food. Obama declared Thursday that the U.S. effort “broke the ISIL siege of Mount Sinjar.” A team of U.S. Special Forces and aid officials dispatched to the mountain Wednesday concluded that the intervention had dispelled the imminent threat to the lives of ­Yazidis, he said. But although the airstrikes appear to have helped those trapped on the mountain reach safety, people who did not join the initial exodus are still at risk, Yazidis say. “The sole mission of the airstrikes was to protect the people on the mountain, not to free anyone outside the mountain,” said Murad Ismael, a Yazidi activist based in Washington. Kocho is south of the town of Sinjar, from which the exodus took place, and many residents were unable to join the flight because they were cut off by the Islamic State advance, according to Yazidi refugees in northern Iraq. After the Islamic State fighters surrounded the village last week, they issued a deadline of Sunday, which was extended to Monday, then extended again several times as the week wore on. On Friday, the fighters moved in, apparently unopposed. Ismael said he believed the Islamic State was emboldened to strike against the village after Obama called off the evacuation plan. The Islamic State fighters “did not kill [the people in Kocho] when there was air coverage,” he said. “They started killing only after Obama said the siege is over. They got the message and decided to kill these people.” Obama has said the airstrikes will continue, even though the plan to evacuate Yazidis from the mountain has been dropped, and stressed that Iraqis still face a “dire” threat from the Islamic State. The administration also has said it will send arms directly to Kurdish forces, with the approval of Iraq’s central government. On Friday, the effort to arm the Kurds against the Islamic State received a boost when the European Union gave its blessing to individual European nations sending weapons. The E.U. also said it would look for ways to prevent Islamic State jihadists from benefiting from oil sales. So far, France and the Czech Republic have said they will supply arms, and other countries, including Germany and the Netherlands, have indicated they are open to the possibility. British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said Britain would “consider favorably” any Kurdish request for weapons. At the United Nations, Iraqi Ambassador Mohammed Alhakim said his government has asked the United States to increase its airstrikes against the Islamic State in Iraq beyond the limits set by Obama of targets related to humanitarian missions and protection of U.S. personnel. “We are working with the United States on this,” Alhakim said. His remarks followed the U.N. Security Council’s unanimous adoption of a resolution condemning the Islamic State and Jabhat al-Nusra, or the al-Nusra Front, and ordering all U.N. member states to take action to prevent terrorist recruits from traveling to the region and to stop efforts to finance them. In a release Friday by the U.S.-backed Syrian Opposition Coalition, Syrian rebels fighting against the Islamic State and the al-Nusra Front, as well as government forces, said they were in desperate straits in the northwestern area near the Turkish border and pleaded for supplies from the West that have been withheld from them but are flooding into Iraq. “We have limited time to face this danger,” rebel commander Abdallah Awda said. “All of Syria’s neighbors will be threatened by ISIS.” ISIS and ISIL are acronyms for alternative names for the Islamic State. Karla Adam in London and Karen DeYoung in Washington contributed to this report. ||||| U.S. Airstrikes In Iraq Pound Area Near Mosul Dam Enlarge this image toggle caption Youssef Boudlal/Reuters/Landov Youssef Boudlal/Reuters/Landov Update at 1:25 p.m. ET. U.S. F/A-18s and drones are conducting airstrikes around the Mosul Dam in northern Iraq, a senior U.S. official tells NPR. The region has seen stepped up fighting in recent days between Kurdish peshmerga forces and Islamic State, or ISIS, militants. Residents living near the Mosul Dam told The Associated Press that the area was being targeted in airstrikes. Islamic State fighters seized the dam on the Tigris River on Aug. 7. The residents near the dam told AP that the airstrikes killed militants, but that could not immediately be confirmed. Meanwhile, more details are emerging from the latest alleged massacre of minority Yazidis by Islamic State militants in northwestern Iraq. As we first reported on Friday, Iraqi and Kurdish officials said at least 80 individuals from the religious community were killed. Last week, officials in Baghdad said hundreds of Yazidis had been executed in similar fashion. NPR's Peter Kenyon reports from Dohuk that Yazidi villagers and activists say extremists demanded that residents of Kocho village, about 15 miles southwest of the town of Sinjar, convert to Islam or face execution. When they refused, the men were reportedly killed. He said reports claim that the women of the village were rounded up and the men taken outdoors and executed. Peter says estimates of the number dead range from 80 to "much higher figures." Senior Kurdish official Hoshiyar Zebari, a former Iraqi foreign minister, told Reuters that the militants "arrived in vehicles and they started their killing" Friday afternoon. "We believe it's because of their creed: convert or be killed," the official said. "The villagers had received local assurances that they were safe," he was quoted by The Washington Post as saying. "Maybe they killed them in revenge for the setbacks they have suffered from the [U.S.] airstrikes." Officials warned that the Yazidis, an ancient religious minority, remain in danger despite U.S. aid drops and airstrikes launched to protect them. In a statement from U.S. Central Command, the Pentagon said it destroyed two armed vehicles in the area where the massacre was reported. ||||| Displaced people from the minority Yazidi sect, fleeing violence from forces loyal to the Islamic State in Sinjar town, walk towards the Syrian border, on the outskirts of Sinjar mountain, near the Syrian border town of Elierbeh of Al-Hasakah Governorate August 10, 2014. BAGHDAD Islamic State insurgents "massacred" some 80 members of Iraq's Yazidi minority in a village in the country's north, a Yazidi lawmaker and two Kurdish officials said on Friday. "They arrived in vehicles and they started their killing this afternoon," senior Kurdish official Hoshiyar Zebari told Reuters. "We believe it's because of their creed: convert or be killed." A Yazidi lawmaker and another senior Kurdish official also said the killings had taken place and that the women of the village were kidnapped. A push by Islamic State militants through northern Iraq to the border with the Kurdish region has alarmed the Baghdad government, drawn the first U.S. air strikes since the end of American occupation in 2001 and sent tens of thousands of Yazidis and Christians fleeing for their lives. Yazidi parliamentarian Mahama Khalil said he had spoken to villagers who had survived the attack. They said the killings took place during a one-hour period. The resident of a nearby village said an Islamic State fighter from the same area gave him details of the bloodshed. "He told me that the Islamic State had spent five days trying to persuade villagers to convert to Islam and that a long lecture was delivered about the subject today," said the villager. "He then said the men were gathered and shot dead. The women and girls were probably taken to Tal Afar because that is where the foreign fighters are." That account could not be independently confirmed. Islamic State militants have killed at least 500 members of Iraq's Yazidi ethnic minority during their offensive in the north, Iraq's human rights minister told Reuters on Sunday. Mohammed Shia al-Sudani said the Sunni militants had also buried alive some of their victims, including women and children. Some 300 women were kidnapped as slaves, he added. (Reporting by Isabel Coles, Michael Georgy and Raheem Salman; Writing by Alexander Dziadosz; Editing by Mark Heinrich) |||||

– The Yazidis who managed to escape to the mountains seem to be protected from Islamic State militants, but those who stayed in their villages clearly are not. Reports from the village of Kocho in northern Iraq say that extremists executed about 80 Yazidi men yesterday and took away about 300 women and children. "They arrived in vehicles and they started their killing," a Kurdish official tells Reuters. "We believe it's because of their creed: convert or be killed." A resident of a nearby village said the militants had spent the better part of a week trying unsuccessfully to convince the Yazidis in Kocho to convert to their brand of Islam. “The villagers had received local assurances that they were safe,” Hoshyar Zebari, Iraq’s former foreign minister, tells the Washington Post. “Maybe they killed them in revenge for the setbacks they have suffered from the airstrikes.” The accounts have not been confirmed, though NPR notes that Iraqi officials reported an even larger massacre last week. Elsewhere, the AP reports airstrikes near the giant Mosul Dam in an apparent attempt to wrest control of it back from the militants. It wasn't clear whether US or Iraqi planes were involved.

CLOSE Skip in Skip x Embed x Share PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH IN THE HOSPITAL Health of Former President, First Lady Improves | 0:39 Former President George H.W. Bush is set to be moved from intensive care unit after doctors report health improvements. His wife, former first lady Barbara Bush, has been discharged from the same Texas hospital. (Jan. 23) AP 1 of 7 CLOSE Skip in Skip x Embed x Share PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH IN THE HOSPITAL Former Pres. Bush, wife improving at hospital | 1:09 A spokesman for the Bush family says the 41st president George H.W. Bush, and his wife, Barbara Bush, are 'on an upswing' as they're being treated for illnesses at Houston Methodist Hospital. (Jan. 19) AP 2 of 7 CLOSE Skip in Skip x Embed x Share PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH IN THE HOSPITAL Bush spokesman talks hospitalization | 1:34 Former President George H.W. Bush and his wife, Barbara, remain hospitalized in Houston, where he was in intensive care for pneumonia, and she was being watched after complaining of fatigue and coughing. (Jan. 19) AP 3 of 7 CLOSE Skip in Skip x Embed x Share PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH IN THE HOSPITAL Obama: 'Prayers' and 'love' to George H.W. and Barbara Bush | 0:40 During his final press conference, President Obama expressed well wishes for both George H.W. and Barbara Bush who were hospitalized on the same day. USA TODAY NETWORK 4 of 7 CLOSE Skip in Skip x Embed x Share PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH IN THE HOSPITAL George H.W. Bush in ICU, Barbara Bush also hospitalized | 0:37 Former President George H.W. Bush and wife Barbara Bush have been hospitalized due to separate health issues. USA TODAY 5 of 7 CLOSE Skip in Skip x Embed x Share PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH IN THE HOSPITAL Former President George H.W. Bush hospitalized | 1:06 The former president's spokesman says the 92-year-old is in stable condition. USA TODAY NETWORK 6 of 7 CLOSE Skip in Skip x Embed x Share PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH IN THE HOSPITAL George H.W. Bush showed how to graciously concede the presidency | 1:22 Bush 41 may be the classiest presidential loser in history. Video provided by Newsy Newslook 7 of 7 Last VideoNext Video Health of Former President, First Lady Improves Former Pres. Bush, wife improving at hospital Bush spokesman talks hospitalization Obama: 'Prayers' and 'love' to George H.W. and Barbara Bush George H.W. Bush in ICU, Barbara Bush also hospitalized Former President George H.W. Bush hospitalized George H.W. Bush showed how to graciously concede the presidency Former president George H.W. Bush and his wife, Barbara Bush, left, speak March 29, 2015, before a college basketball regional final game between Gonzaga and Duke, in the NCAA basketball tournament in Houston. (Photo: David J. Phillip, AP) HOUSTON — Former first lady Barbara Bush, cleared a day ago to leave the hospital where she has been a patient since midweek this past week, was discharged Monday, her doctors said in a morning press conference. Since Jan. 14, her husband, former president George H.W. Bush, has been in intensive care with bacterial pneumonia at Houston Methodist Hospital, and she was hospitalized Wednesday with fatigue and coughing that later was diagnosed as viral bronchitis. He is expected to remain in the hospital but move from the ICU sometime Monday. "He is sitting up and watching TV and anxiously awaiting his favorite oyster stew for lunch. He’s on minimal oxygen, joking and laughing with the nurses and doctors," said Dr. Amy Mynderse, a hospitalist at Houston Methodist. A hospitalist works in internal medicine but exclusively at a medical center, working with a person's primary care physician. Both of the Bushes are in their 90s: The former president is 92, and his wife is 91. Because the former president has bounced back so well, his doctors expect that he could leave the hospital as early as Friday, said Dr. Clint Doerr, his pulmonologist or lung specialist. But more likely will be a discharge over the weekend or next week. Both Bushes are eager to return home in time for the Super Bowl, the doctors said. The New England Patriots and the Atlanta Falcons play Feb. 5 in Houston, and the family's spokesman, Jim McGrath, said Sunday that the couple want to attend the game. “They kind of get after each other if one of them is being a noncompliant patient. They take care of each other.” Dr. Amy Mynderse, Houston Methodist Hospital They watched the inauguration together with their son Neil and his wife on a TV in the former president's room but refrained from political commentary, the doctors said. Back in September, the elder Bush told Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, daughter of the late Robert F. Kennedy and a former Maryland lieutenant governor, that he couldn't back the GOP nominee, Donald Trump, and instead would vote for Democrat Hillary Clinton in November. He and Barbara Bush have not commented on their votes. "She's back to her normal self," Mynderse said of Barbara Bush. Barbara Bush's doctors allowed the former first lady to spend much of her time by her husband's side though she did have her own room outside of intensive care, the doctors said. The Bushes have been married for 72 years, the longest of any presidential couple in U.S. history. "She's been sitting at his bedside getting most of her medications" as they watched TV, Mynderse said. And each has been encouraging the other through the sometimes tedious but necessary treatments. "They kind of get after each other if one of them is being a noncompliant patient," the hospitalist said. "They take care of each other." Although the former president is 92 and has a form of Parkinson's disease that keeps him from walking, both doctors stressed that he is a strong man for his age. "Any time you hear about a 92-year-old with a breathing situation that requires intubation, that's a serious situation," Mynderse said. "He's also a very strong person. He's not your average 92-year-old." Intubation is more serious than receiving supplemental oxygen via a tube in the nose. The former president continues to receive some supplemental oxygen now, and a device that's clipped onto many hospital patients' fingers allows doctors to monitor the dissolved oxygen in a person's blood easily. During an intubation, a breathing tube is inserted into the windpipe, generally through the mouth, to open up the airway and allow a ventilator to be hooked up. George H.W. Bush, vice president under Ronald Reagan and president for one term from 1989 to 1993, was put on a ventilator because of his breathing difficulties and at one point had a procedure to clear his bronchial tubes, the doctors said. He also has been receiving intravenous antibiotics. "It doesn't take much from a respiratory standpoint to get into trouble," Doerr said. His Parkinson's did not play a role in his catching pneumonia. The elder president Bush was hospitalized in July 2015 after he broke a bone in his neck during a fall at his Kennebunkport, Maine, summer home. He also was hospitalized around Christmas 2014 in Houston for shortness of breath, and in 2012 he was hospitalized in Houston for two months including Christmas because of bronchitis and a persistent cough. As the former president responded to treatment this time, the help that the ventilator was providing was decreased, Doerr said. Before the tube was removed from his throat, the machine was at its lowest setting, essentially natural breathing with the option of additional assistance if necessary. "We did not see a rebound in difficulty breathing ... or a reaccumulation of things in his airways," the pulmonologist said. Both doctors were struck by the humility of the couple who not only have occupied the White House but also are parents to former president George W. Bush and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush. "They're truly very humble people," Mynderse said. "He just doesn't feel like he is, he doesn't understand how loved he is — her, too." Follow KHOU-TV on Twitter: @KHOU Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/2jQLcFC ||||| FILE - In this Nov. 6, 1997, file photo, former President George H.W. Bush hugs his wife, Barbara, after speaking at the dedication of the George Bush Presidential Library in College Station, Texas. The... (Associated Press) FILE - In this Nov. 6, 1997, file photo, former President George H.W. Bush hugs his wife, Barbara, after speaking at the dedication of the George Bush Presidential Library in College Station, Texas. The Bushes were married Jan. 6, 1945, and have had the longest marriage of any presidential couple in... (Associated Press) FILE - In this Nov. 6, 1997, file photo, former President George H.W. Bush hugs his wife, Barbara, after speaking at the dedication of the George Bush Presidential Library in College Station, Texas. The Bushes were married Jan. 6, 1945, and have had the longest marriage of any presidential couple in... (Associated Press) FILE - In this Nov. 6, 1997, file photo, former President George H.W. Bush hugs his wife, Barbara, after speaking at the dedication of the George Bush Presidential Library in College Station, Texas. The... (Associated Press) HOUSTON (AP) — Former first lady Barbara Bush was discharged from a hospital Monday while former President George H.W. Bush is expected to be moved from the hospital's intensive care unit soon. The 92-year-old former president was struggling to breathe when he was admitted to the Houston Methodist Hospital Jan. 14, and had since been treated for pneumonia in the intensive care unit. Ninety-one-year-old Barbara Bush was suffering from bronchitis and entered the same hospital Wednesday. Two doctors who have been treating the Bushes, Dr. Amy Mynderse and Dr. Clint Doerr, talked about the Bushes medical treatment during a news conference at the hospital. Mynderse said the former president had been sitting up and watching television, describing him as "not your average 92-year-old." She said Mrs. Bush has been discharged and that "she is back to her normal self." Bush family spokesman Jim McGrath said Sunday that the former president's vital signs were normal and that doctors hoped he could be moved out of intensive care in the next day or so. At one point during the former president's stay, doctors inserted a breathing tube and a ventilator was employed to assist his breathing. The tube was removed Friday. McGrath said Mrs. Bush was given the option of leaving the hospital Sunday, but that she opted to stay overnight to continue her recovery and be close to her husband. The Bushes thanked "their well-wishers for their kindness, and especially their prayers," McGrath said. The couple's 72-year marriage is the longest of any presidential couple in American history. |||||

– A double dose of good news for the elders of the Bush family: Barbara Bush, 91, is out of the hospital, and husband George HW, 92, is about to leave ICU, reports the AP. The former president was admitted to Houston Methodist Hospital on Jan. 14 because of breathing trouble, and he was subsequently treated for pneumonia and moved into ICU. His wife entered the same hospital Wednesday with bronchitis. She's now "back to her normal self," says one of the doctors treating the couple, and her husband is "not your average 92-year-old." He could be discharged this week, per KHOU-TV.

River Martinez, 10, breaks camp at the Upper Pines Campground in Yosemite National Park, Calif., on Wednesday, July 25, 2018. Martinez's family, visiting from Los Angeles, had to cut their stay short... (Associated Press) River Martinez, 10, breaks camp at the Upper Pines Campground in Yosemite National Park, Calif., on Wednesday, July 25, 2018. Martinez's family, visiting from Los Angeles, had to cut their stay short as portions of Yosemite close today to allow crews to battle the Ferguson fire burning nearby. (AP Photo/Noah... (Associated Press) IDYLLWILD, Calif. (AP) — A fast-moving wildfire — believed to have been sparked by arson — tore through trees, burned five homes and forced evacuation orders for an entire forest town as California sweltered under a heat wave and battled ferocious fires at both ends of the state. The so-called Cranston Fire, which erupted Wednesday in the San Jacinto Mountains east of Los Angeles, turned into a wall of flame that torched timber and tinder-dry brush. In a matter of hours it grew to 7 1/2 square miles (19 square kilometers). It was threatening an estimated 600 homes, authorities said. The fire was the largest of at least five that police believe were purposely set Wednesday by a man whose car was reportedly spotted at the starting point of the blaze in Riverside County, officials said. Brandon N. McGlover, 32, of Temecula was booked on suspicion of five counts of arson, state fire officials said. It wasn't clear whether he had an attorney. Authorities ordered residents to leave Idyllwild and several neighboring communities, home to about 12,000 people. William Blodgett of Idyllwild said he couldn't get home because of the fire and had to wait along with others at a gas station in nearby Mountain Center — until the fire hopped a highway and began to move in his direction. "We were all peeling out of there as fast as we could," he told KNBC-TV. "It was apocalyptic." Horses and other animals were taken to shelters as were several hundred children who were evacuated from summer camps. About 200 were at a local high school serving as a shelter, KCAL-TV reported. The fire in the San Bernardino National Forest sent up a cloud 50,000 feet high that was so enormous it created its own weather in the form of lightning, the National Weather Service reported. Throughout the day, helicopters and planes dumped water and fire retardant that turned swathes of land and homes pink. Fire engines also were stationed to protect homes. The fire is one of several across California amid a heat wave that has seen days of triple-digit temperatures. To the north, in the San Francisco Bay Area, at least one home burned in a fast-moving blaze in Clayton, where houses are spread out around windy roads. Yosemite Valley, the scenic heart of the national park, was closed at noon Wednesday during the height of tourist season as smoke cast a pall on the region from a fire in the Sierra Nevada. The closure was heartbreaking for travelers, many of whom mapped out their trips months in advance to hike and climb amid the spectacular views of cascading waterfalls and sheer rock faces. "We had one guest who planned a weeklong trip," said Tom Lambert, who owns a vacation rental property near Yosemite Valley. "It was a father-daughter trip, for her high school graduation ... Now it's done. It's sad." Another guest had to delay plans to climb Half Dome. Officials emphasized that Yosemite wasn't in imminent danger from the fire. Authorities decided on the shutdown to allow crews to perform protective measures such as burning away brush along roadways without having to deal with traffic in the park that welcomes 4 million visitors annually. Yosemite Valley will be closed until at least Sunday, along with a winding, mountainous, 20-mile (32-kilometer) stretch of California's State Route 41 that leads into the area, Gediman said. At least 1,000 campground and hotel bookings were canceled — to say nothing of the impact on day visitors, park workers and small businesses along the highway, Gediman said. The last time the 7.5-mile-long (12-kilometer-long) valley was closed because of fire was 1990, he said. Over nearly two weeks, flames have churned through 60 square miles (155 square kilometers) of timber in steep terrain of the Sierra Nevada just west of the park. The fire was just 25 percent contained. More than 3,300 firefighters are working the fire, aided by 16 helicopters. One firefighter was killed July 14, and six others have been injured. In the state's far north, a 7-square-mile (18-square-kilometer) wildfire has forced the evacuation of French Gulch, a small Shasta County community that dates to the Gold Rush. ___ Noah Berger reported from Yosemite; Chris Weber from Los Angeles. AP reporters Robert Jablon, Michael Balsamo and John Antczak in Los Angeles contributed. ___ Follow Weber at https://twitter.com/WeberCM ||||| An arson suspect was arrested in relation to the Cranston Fire in Idyllwild, which grew to 4,700 acres Wednesday night. Robert Kovacik reports for NBC4 News at 11 p.m. on July 25, 2018. (Published Thursday, July 26, 2018) What to Know Investigators were looking into the possibility that the cause was arson The fire has burned thousands of acres in the San Jacinto Mountains in Riverside County Highway 74 between Cranston Fire Station and Lake Hemet and Highway 243 between Pine Cove and Mountain Center were closed A 32-year-old man from Temecula was arrested on suspicion of arson Wednesday night after he was accused of setting multiple fires, one of which burned thousands of acres in the San Bernardino National Forest, destroyed homes and forced thousands to flee. Brandon N. McGlover was arrested on suspicion of five counts of arson to wildland after the Cranston Fire erupted earlier the same day. The Cranston Fire consumed at least 4,700 acres, leveled five residential structures and closed roads. As of Wednesday night, the fire was 5 percent contained. Booking photo of Brandon n. McGlover, 32, of Temecula, who was arrested in relation to Cranston Fire in Idyllwild. Photo credit: San Bernardino National Forest The Cranston Fire was reported at around noon off state Route 74 in the forest area between Hemet and Mountain Center, according to the U.S. Forest Service. The fire was burning "with a rapid rate of spread," according to the USFS. Photos: Wildfire Tears Through Riverside County Mountains No injuries have been reported in connection with the blaze, which was zero percent contained as of Wednesday night. The cause of the fire has not been confirmed, but California Highway Patrol Officer Darren Meyer said a motorist who witnesses said was spotted "near the origin of the fire" was detained. A light-colored sedan matching the description provided by witnesses was spotted at around 12:30 p.m. near Newport Road and State Street in Hemet, Meyer said. An enforcement stop was conducted by the CHP, Riverside County Sheriff's Department and Hemet Police Department and the driver was arrested. Authorities had not yet confirmed whether the man captured on video being detained by officers was McGlover. Mandatory evacuations have been ordered for residents of Idyllwild, Mountain Center along McGaugh and McCall Park roads and the communities of Pine Cove and Fern Valley. Cranston Fire Rips Through Homes (Published Wednesday, July 25, 2018) "Leave the area immediately," a USFS Twitter post advised. At least 110 homes in southwest Idyllwild have been evacuated, and officials said at least 600 more structures were threatened by the blaze. Television news footage showed at least a few homes going up in flames. Authorities have established an evacuation center for residents and campers at Banning High School, 100 W. Westward Ave. Small animals can also be evacuated to Banning High School, while animals of all sizes can be taken to the San Jacinto Valley Animal Campus at 581 S. Grand Ave. Road closures include state Route 74 between the Cranston Fire Station and Lake Hemet, as well as state Route 243 between the communities of Pine Cove and Mountain Center, where authorities say flames jumped the highway near the Idyllwild Grinding Facility. The fire has also taken out power to more than 7,700 Southern California Edison customers in the Idyllwild area, according to an SCE online outage map. Full restoration was expected at around 2 a.m. Thursday. Authorities have also issued a smoke advisory for the region, advising that winds could bring smoke into various parts of Riverside County, including the Coachella Valley, Banning Pass, the Hemet/San Jacinto Valley, Perris Valley and Anza. The advisory will be in effect through Thursday morning. McGlover was also accused of setting several other fires Wednesday in the southwest Riverside County area and along Highway 74. A fire information call center for the public has also been established at (909) 383-5688. |||||

– A fast-moving wildfire—believed to have been sparked by arson—tore through trees, burned five homes, and forced evacuation orders for an entire forest town as California sweltered under a heat wave and battled ferocious fires at both ends of the state. The so-called Cranston Fire, which erupted Wednesday in the San Jacinto Mountains east of Los Angeles, turned into a wall of flame that torched timber and tinder-dry brush. In a matter of hours it grew to 7.5 square miles, threatening an estimated 600 homes and forcing the evacuation of Idyllwild, authorities say. The fire was the largest of at least five that police believe were purposely set Wednesday by a man whose car was reportedly spotted at the starting point of the blaze, the AP reports. Brandon N. McGlover, 32, of Temecula was booked on suspicion of five counts of arson, state fire officials say. Authorities ordered residents to leave Idyllwild and several neighboring communities, home to about 12,000 people. William Blodgett of Idyllwild says he couldn't get home because of the fire and had to wait along with others at a gas station—until the fire hopped a highway and began to move in his direction. "We were all peeling out of there as fast as we could," he tells KNBC. "It was apocalyptic."

Getty Fourth Estate Put on Your Big-Boy Pants, Journos President Trump’s lies don’t call for extraordinary media measures. Just do your jobs. Extraordinary times—and we are living in an extraordinary time—do not necessarily call for extraordinary measures on the part of the press, as comforting as a full berserking might make many of us feel. The opening minutes of the Trump administration—the lies told by press secretary Sean Spicer about the size of the inauguration crowd, the president’s whopper at CIA headquarters claiming the media made up his feud with the agency, presidential counselor Kellyanne Conway’s notion that “alternative facts” support Trump’s imaginary numbers—have stirred bladder-emptying panic among some in the press corps. But the Trump administration cannot by itself pollute the river of truth with its bogus tweets, its press conferences in which no questions are allowed, or by Conway jibber jabber. Extraordinary times like these call for normal measures: The meticulous, aggressive, and calm presentation of the news. One of our examples should be the Washington Post’s David Fahrenthold. Fahrenthold could have assessed the Trump candidacy by filling Twitter with angry comments or by setting himself on fire. Instead, as everybody knows, he excavated the self-dealing garbage dump that was the Trump Foundation as if he were an archeologist and published a series of patient stories that resulted in a penalty against the foundation and its planned closure. Story Continued Below Reporters tend to be emotional souls, which gives them an advantage when hauling a load of bricks up a ladder for their ungrateful, demanding editors and indifferent readers. Emotion fuels their sense of justice and motivates them to keep on keeping on. CNN’s Brian Stelter says he hears from readers that reporters should boycott Spicer’s press briefings in protest of his misrepresentations. Others, such as media scholar Jay Rosen, are stating that the press corps should perhaps think about avoiding interviews with Conway if all she’s going to do is contradict Trump rather than speak for him. Boycotts and bans may fill a journalists’ heart with vengeance, or at least keep it from being bruised. But their maker designed reporters to be resilient, to take disparagement, derision, scorn, and sneering from lying government officials in stride. And for good reason. To quote from Jon Ronson once again, “It’s good for journalists to feel demeaned. It means we’re onto a story.” Rather than treat the Spicer, Trump, Conway ingenuities as an excuse to pout and leave the field, the experienced members of the press will be propelled by the weekend to pick up their mobiles and notebooks and go maximum Fahrenthold on the administration. As I’ve hypothesized before, there is a method to Trump’s tweets. Whenever he finds the noose of news lowering over his thick orange neck, he takes to Twitter to change the subject. The more outrageous and self-serving (or should I say “self-dealing”?) the tweets are, the better his results. On Saturday, the obvious news peg for the press was well-attended protests against his inauguration in Washington, Los Angeles, Boston, Chicago and elsewhere in the world. So Trump sent his press secretary out to essentially speak one of his tweets by falsely stating that “the largest audience to witness an inauguration, period” viewed the Trump event. In doing so, Trump-Spicer snipped the peak off of the protest coverage by making muddy what was clear about the audience size. To believe Spicer, you must accept that an invisible majority filled the Mall and that stealth supporters dressed as bleachers occupied those near-vacant grandstands along the parade route, and as you contemplate the truth value of his statement, you begin to forget about the massive scale of the anti-Trump protests. Rather than tying itself up in knots over the Trump obfuscations, the press would be wiser to stop thinking of him as the outlier liar and the worst enemy the press has ever known and come to view him as a politician whose behavior is different only in degree, not in kind. Consider the Obama presidency. As former Politicos Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen wrote in 2013 in a piece titled, “Obama, the Puppet Master,” he was “a master at limiting, shaping and manipulating media coverage of himself and his White House.” Obama didn’t camouflage the news with tweets or with shameless posturing in front of the CIA’s wall of martyrs as Trump did on Saturday, a move that caused former CIA Director John Brennan to growl in protest. Obama, VandeHei and Allen explained, took “old tricks for shaping coverage (staged leaks, friendly interviews) and put them on steroids using new ones (social media, content creation, precision targeting).” In doing so, “Media across the ideological spectrum [were] left scrambling for access.” I don’t recall anybody calling for a boycott of Barack Obama or his myrmidons for his media scheming and for tipping the “balance of power between the White House and press … unmistakably toward the government,” as the Politico past-masters put it. The press mostly carried on, threading the thicket of treacheries as best it could. Governments always have and will always impede the press from doing their job, and they will use any means necessary. “All governments lie,” as journalist I.F. Stone once wrote, “but disaster lies in wait for countries whose officials smoke the same hashish they give out.” From my vantage, the Obama administration got Choom Gang stoned on their media pirouetting and the Trump administration seems to have come close to matching them in just a couple of days. It is unseemly and counterproductive for journalists to sulk every time the Trump administration yanks their chain. Satisfying, yes, but unseemly and counterproductive. Because I believe in a multiverse of journalistic approaches, I would be the last person to ban moping among the press corps. Sometimes there’s nothing better than a long stay in the weeping room to embolden the beaten. But if you’re feeling whipped and you want my advice, ask yourself, “WWFD?” “What Would Fahrenthold Do?” ****** Well, Fahrenthold has become a part-time CNN contributor, something I’m not suggesting pressies do! Send Fahrentholdian advice to Shafer.Politico@gmail.com. My email alerts owns a special sobbing towel, my Twitter feed hiccups when it cries, and my RSS feed grimaces like Charles Bronson whenever it hears a lie. Jack Shafer is Politico’s senior media writer. ||||| The presidency is not a reality show, but President Trump on his first full day in office made clear that he’s still obsessed with being what he once proudly called “a ratings machine.” He cares enough about it to send his press secretary, Sean Spicer, out to brazenly lie to the media in his first official briefing. “This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration — period — both in person and around the globe,” Spicer said. And he added a scolding about widespread reports that differ from his evidence-free assessment: “These attempts to lessen the enthusiasm of the inauguration are shameful and wrong.” Crowd size experts estimate Trump’s audience at far fewer than the million or more that Trump is claiming, and at far less than the size of the following day’s women’s march, which the new president has said little about. And side-by-side photographs showed the contrast between the comparatively thin gathering for Trump’s inauguration and the record-setting one in 2009 for former president Barack Obama’s first. Ari Fleischer, a former George W. Bush press secretary, saw Saturday’s bizarre session for what it was. (Monica Akhtar/The Washington Post) “This is called a statement you’re told to make by the President. And you know the President is watching,” Fleischer wrote. (MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski pegged it as “Sean Spicer’s first hostage video.”) The mainstream media, including The Washington Post, appropriately made clear note of the falsehoods about crowd size. The New York Times called out “false claims” in a prominent headline, and many broadcast journalists challenged Spicer immediately — although they didn’t get a chance to do so to his face, since he took no questions. CNN wisely chose not to air the briefing in full, but to report on it and to show parts, providing context. Fox News showed it in its full glory, infomercial style. Some journalists, afterward, sounded stunned at what had transpired. “Astonishing,” said Jim Acosta of CNN. “Jaw meet floor” was the reaction of Glenn Thrush of the New York Times. The reaction is understandable. Some semblance of truth from the White House ought to be reasonable enough, especially on Day Two. But nothing about this should shock. 1 of 83 Full Screen Autoplay Close Skip Ad × See photos of White House senior staff being sworn-in at the White House View Photos President Donld Trump staff members, including advisor Kellyanne Conway and Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, are sworn-in in the East Room. Caption The beginning of the president’s term has featured controversial executive orders and frequent conflicts with the media. March 17, 2017 President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and their son, Barron, walk to Marine One at the White House en route to Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla. Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post Buy Photo Wait 1 second to continue. Anyone — citizen or journalist — who is surprised by false claims from the new inhabitant of the Oval Office hasn’t been paying attention. That was reinforced when Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway told “Meet the Press” Sunday that Spicer had been providing “alternative facts” to what the media had reported, making it clear we’ve gone full Orwell. Official words do matter, but they shouldn’t be what news organizations pay most attention to, as they try to present the truth about a new administration. White House press briefings are “access journalism,” in which official statements — achieved by closeness to the source — are taken at face value and breathlessly reported as news. And that is over. Dead. Spicer’s statement should be seen for what it is: Remarks made over the casket at the funeral of access journalism. As Jessica Huseman of ProPublica put it: “Journalists aren’t going to get answers from Spicer. We are going to get answers by digging. By getting our hands dirty. So let’s all do that.” She’s right. So was Tim O’Brien, executive editor of Bloomberg View and a Trump biographer, who urged journalists to remember that the White House briefing room is “spoon-feeding and Trump is a habitual fabulist.” There’s a deeper story here, beyond a single briefing, no matter how memorable. Saturday made clearer than ever that President Trump intends to make the American media his foremost enemy. During his first official visit to the CIA, Trump once again attacked the media, as he did throughout the campaign as he blacklisted news organizations and called reporters “scum.” Journalists shouldn’t rise to the bait and decide to treat Trump as an enemy. Recalling at all times that their mission is truth-telling and holding public officials accountable, they should dig in, paying far more attention to actions than to sensational tweets or briefing-room lies — while still being willing to call out falsehoods clearly when they happen. They also should quickly acknowledge and correct their own inevitable errors, as Time’s Zeke Miller did — multiple times and with an apology — after erroneously reporting that a bust of Martin Luther King Jr. had been removed from the Oval Office. That didn’t keep the president from making Miller’s reporting error a major issue as he raged during his CIA visit: “This is how dishonest the media is.” Trump wants a flat-out war with the nation’s media for one well-calculated reason: Because he believes it will continue to serve his political purposes, as it has for months. Journalists should respond by doing their jobs responsibly, fairly and fearlessly, in service of the public good. Somebody has to be the grown-up in the room. We’ve just been reminded of who it won’t be. For more by Margaret Sullivan visit wapo.st/sullivan. ||||| It looks like we have the first leaks of the Trump administration, to reporters at the New York Times and New York Magazine, no less. First Maggie Haberman of the Times reported early on Sunday that “a few people close to Trump administration suggest” that the new president might have set a “trap” for his new press secretary when he sent Sean Spicer out to read a statement yesterday on the size of the inauguration crowd: Putting everything else aside, I've had a few people close to Trump administration suggest this may have been a trap for the press sec. — Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) January 22, 2017 He was not Trump's first choice for press secretary, and was pushed by Priebus. — Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) January 22, 2017 And he may have walked himself into it. — Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) January 22, 2017 @lrozen there were a few, but as @KellyannePolls told me on NYT podcast, she declined that job — Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) January 22, 2017 And then more recently Sunday night, New York Magazine’s Gabriel Sherman reported a similar sentiment from a “longtime Trump adviser”: Trump sent Spicer out to give statement yesterday, a longtime Trump adviser says, but afterwards Trump said "he was terrible." — Gabriel Sherman (@gabrielsherman) January 22, 2017 Also Trump sources reminding me that Trump didn't want Spicer in the job. He wanted Kellyanne as press secretary. Spicer was a Priebus pick. — Gabriel Sherman (@gabrielsherman) January 22, 2017 As they say, bigly if true. *** ||||| “Inaccurate numbers involving crowd size were also tweeted,” Spicer continued, because the NPS did not count. (My colleague Robinson Meyer explained how crowd counts at events like the inauguration come about.) He incorrectly characterized ridership statistics provided by WMATA, D.C.’s transit authority. Then came the big whopper: “This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration—period—both in person and around the globe.” Spicer’s statement required dismissing all available evidence: ridership count, eyewitness testimony, independent crowd-counts, and Nielsen television ratings. Spicer cut his teeth at the Republican National Committee as the combative voice of a body often at odds with the media, but even by those standards, his furious insistence on assertions at odds with the evidence were peculiar. They are, however, emerging as a hallmark of the administration. For days ahead of the inauguration, Trump aides insisted that the president-elect was writing his own inaugural address, without the aid of speechwriters. They went so far as to stage a photograph that purported to show him writing the speech—though the image showed Trump wielding a Sharpie, and some internet sleuths speculated that the desk he was using is typically used as a reception desk at his Mar-a-Lago estate. On Friday, however, The Wall Street Journal reported, “Much of the speech was written by Stephen Miller and Steve Bannon, two of Mr. Trump’s top advisers, a White House official said.” Why mislead the public about who wrote the speech? After all, the news that Miller would be assisting in writing the address had emerged days ago, and there’s certainly no shame in a president employing speechwriters, nor has the practice dimmed positive reception for past presidential addresses. Ahead of the inauguration, Trump threw a concert in front of the Lincoln Memorial. “This started out tonight being a small little concert, and then we had the idea maybe we’ll do it in front of the Lincoln Memorial,” Trump said in brief remarks. “I don’t know if it’s ever been done before. But if it has, very seldom.” That claim was also ridiculous, whether it was intentionally misleading or simply badly misinformed. There was a huge, widely covered concert at the memorial to kick off Obama’s inauguration festivities eight years ago. These are only three examples of Trump and his aides offering statements that are not only provably false, but easily checked. (There are plenty more where they came from, like Trump’s claim that Russian hacking was not brought up before the election.) There was a brief skirmish within the journalism world around the new year, when Wall Street Journal editor Gerry Baker professed wariness about how some of Trump’s statements had been labeled. “I’d be careful about using the word ‘lie.’ ‘Lie’ implies much more than just saying something that’s false. It implies a deliberate intent to mislead,” he said. Baker took some heat for that statement in some more progressive parts of the press, but his distinction is real and important. ||||| Dan Rather warned Americans about the Trump administration in a Facebook post on Sunday, saying these are not "normal times." The former CBS Evening news anchor targeted President Trump, adviser Kellyanne Conway and press secretary Sean Spicer for comments in the last 24 hours. “When you have a spokesperson for the president of the United States wrap up a lie in the Orwellian phrase 'alternative facts'...,” Rather wrote. ADVERTISEMENT "When you have a press secretary in his first appearance before the White House reporters threaten, bully, lie, and then walk out of the briefing room without the cajones to answer a single questions...," he added. "When you have a President stand before the stars of the fallen CIA agents and boast about the size of his crowds (lies) and how great his authoritarian inaugural speech was...” “These are not normal times.” Rather wrote that the press, the public and the political leaders of both parties have "never seen anything like this before." He urged fellow journalists to demand follow-ups and satisfying answers rather than accept elected GOP officials' non-answers. “Facts and the truth are not partisan," he said. "They are the bedrock of our democracy. And you are either with them, with us, with our Constitution, our history, and the future of our nation, or you are against it. Everyone must answer that question.” ||||| For wary Washington journalists, it seemed only a matter of time before Donald J. Trump’s presidency would lead to a high-tension standoff between his administration and the news media. But on Day 1? The news media world found itself in a state of shock on Sunday, a day after Mr. Trump declared himself in “a running war with the media” and the president’s press secretary, Sean Spicer, used his first appearance on the White House podium to deliver a fiery jeremiad against the press. Worse, many journalists said, were the falsehoods that sprang from the lips of both Mr. Trump and Mr. Spicer on Saturday. Mr. Trump accused the news media of confecting a battle between himself and the intelligence services (in fact, he had previously compared the services to Nazi Germany in a Twitter post). And among other easily debunked assertions, Mr. Spicer falsely claimed that Mr. Trump’s inauguration was the most attended in history (photographs indicated it was not). |||||

– Dan Rather has been in the news business for longer than most of Donald Trump's aides have been alive and he says the weekend's goings-on were like nothing he has seen before. In a Facebook post, the former CBS anchor slams adviser Kellyanne Conway for the "Orwellian" use of the phrase "alternative facts," press chief Sean Spicer for "bullying and lying" in his first White House appearance, and Trump himself for boasting about the size of inaugural crowds "before the stars of the fallen CIA agents," the Hill reports. "These are not normal times," Rather writes, calling for reporters to ask congressional Republicans about what they plan to do about "lying from the White House." "Facts and the truth are not partisan," he writes. "They are the bedrock of our democracy." In other coverage: Twitchy reports that sources have told reporters at New York magazine and the New York Times that Saturday's press conference may have been a "trap" for Spicer. The sources say Spicer was RNC chief Reince Preibus' choice, not Trump's, and the president described the press secretary's performance Saturday as "terrible." The New York Times reports that many others in the media reacted with alarm to a standoff developing with the Trump administration this quickly. In Sunday's coverage, many outlets described Spicer and Trump's statements as "lies" or "falsehoods," the Times notes. In a single press conference, Spicer managed to kill off the traditional way of reporting on a president, writes Margaret Sullivan at the Washington Post. But "journalists shouldn’t rise to the bait and decide to treat Trump as an enemy," she writes. They should remember that their mission is to hold public officials accountable and "dig in, paying far more attention to actions than to sensational tweets or briefing-room lies—while still being willing to call out falsehoods clearly when they happen." At Politico, Jack Shafer says there is no need for the "extraordinary measures" Rather is calling for if journalists just do their jobs and report the facts. He says journalists should view Trump "as a politician whose behavior is different only in degree, not in kind," noting that the Obama administration was no stranger to media manipulation. David Graham at the Atlantic looks at what he calls the Trump administration's devotion to a "particular variety of pointless falsehood." The Trump administration appears to be going "double-or-nothing" on the campaign gamble that it could get away with easily disprovable mistruths, he writes.

Flooding in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu has killed more than 40 people in the past 48 hours, authorities said Thursday, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Chennai, the country’s fourth-largest city, which has borne the brunt of the deluge. Taking stock, on the ground…PM taking overview of flood relief operations at INS Rajali, Arakkonam. pic.twitter.com/XY1qm3fwfE — PMO India (@PMOIndia) December 3, 2015 Hundreds of soldiers and sailors from India’s armed forces have been deployed to assist in relief efforts after weeks of heavy rains that have left more than 250 people dead since the start of November. Chennai’s international airport, closed on Wednesday because the runway was under seven feet of water, will remain shut until at least midday on Sunday, according to the state-run Airports Authority of India. The city is one of India’s auto-manufacturing hubs and home to scores of international car makers and suppliers. Ford Motor Co. and Hyundai Motor Co. were among automakers forced to shut operations because of the heavy rains. Hyundai’s two factories in the city, which have a combined production capacity of close to 700,000 cars, had stopped operations late Tuesday and wouldn’t resume until Friday, said a company spokeswoman. India’s Home Minister Rajnath Singh told lawmakers on Thursday that the government had released 9.4 billion rupees ($141 million) for flood relief and restoration. On his arrival in Chennai Thursday evening, Mr. Modi announced an additional 10 billion rupees for relief operations. “The Government of India stands shoulder to shoulder with the people of Tamil Nadu in this hour of need,” he said. In November, Mr. Modi said the torrential rains in Chennai were a result of climate change. “We are feeling climate change’s fast-growing impact now,” he said. Others blamed rampant construction, including building in areas close to the city’s rivers, for the flooding. “Development in the city has not taken into account that many parts are low-lying,” said Anil Kumar Gupta, head of policy planning at India’s National Institute of Disaster Management. Construction “has been done in a way that narrows and blocks drains,” said Mr. Gupta who co-authored a 2011 research paper titled “Urban floods in Bangalore and Chennai: risk management challenges and and lessons for sustainable urban ecology.” The India Meteorological Department has forecast heavy rain for Tamil Nadu until Friday. Incessant downpours have caused the Adyar River, which flows through Chennai, to swell to dangerous levels and overflow its banks. Formerly known as Madras, Chennai is low-lying and most areas of the city are only just above sea level, making drainage difficult even when rainfall levels are normal. According to the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority, inadequate sewerage infrastructure causes river beds to silt up, creating blockages that prevent floodwaters from draining into the sea. Television footage on Thursday showed residents in the city wading through muddy waters and complaining about the sluggish pace of relief operations. Chennai’s main railway station suspended services on Thursday. Tamil Nadu’s chief minister, J. Jayalalithaa, was quoted as saying in November that “losses are unavoidable when there’s very heavy rain.” “Swift rescue and relief alone are indicators of a good government,” the website of the news channel NDTV quoted Ms. Jayalalithaa as saying during the first spell of downpours during the monsoon. The rains have left more than 30 aircraft stranded at the airport, the Airports Authority of India said in a statement. Almost 300 passengers had been sent by bus to the neighboring city of Bangalore to catch flights from there, but hundreds more remained stranded at the airport, the AAI said. Anurag Gupta, a senior official in the National Disaster Management Authority, said efforts are underway to ferry stranded passengers in helicopters to a naval air station in Arakonnam, about 60 miles away. They are to be flown from there to other cities. The inundated airport, lack of mobility owing to poor roads and a breakdown of telecommunication links has severely hampered rescue operations, Mr. Gupta said. The National Disaster Response Force has deployed more than 1,000 personnel and 130 boats to Chennai. So far, they have evacuated more than 2,000 people. Meanwhile, on Twitter, social-media users were organizing help through hashtags #ChennaiRainsHelp and #ChennaiRains, with users offering food, medicines and tweeting details of shelters where those affected could take refuge. Here’s a list of specific hashtags you can use during #ChennaiRains pic.twitter.com/NxIpYgFbAj — Twitter India (@TwitterIndia) December 2, 2015 Some volunteers on the ground managed to tweet information about the kind of aid available in different parts of the city. Facebook Inc. initiated its “safety check” feature, which allows people in disaster zones to mark themselves as safe on the social-media site so friends and family can know their whereabouts. Photos below show the impact of the floods in the city in the past 24 hours. People stood on a rail bridge under construction as they watched the rising levels of the Adyar river in Chennai, Dec. 2. Associated Press People travel on a boat through a flooded road in Chennai, Dec. 2. Reuters People waded through a water-logged street in Chennai, Dec. 2. Zuma Press This photo released by India’s Press Information Bureau showed the submerged Chennai airport, Dec. 2. Reuters A temple is submerged in flood waters in Chennai, Dec. 2. European Pressphoto Agency People travelled on a boat as they move to safer places through a flooded road in Chennai, Dec. 2. Reuters –Santanu Choudhury contributed to this post. For breaking news, features and analysis from India, follow WSJ India on Facebook. ||||| As the flood-ravaged Indian city of Chennai got some respite from torrential rains, a trade body said losses to businesses from the record downpour could reach more than 150 billion rupees ($2.2 billion). Water released from overflowing lakes and reservoirs wreaked havoc across a vast swathe of the metropolis of 9 million and surrounding areas, with the monsoon season’s death toll climbing to 269. As authorities struggled to deal with the disaster, activists, film stars and executives started campaigns on social media including Twitter and Facebook for rescue and relief. The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India termed the situation as “total chaos.” “The city has come to a virtual standstill and is in the grip of fear and panic,” Assocham said in a statement on Thursday, urging the federal government to “immediately” handle this “extreme crisis” with a suitable package. Air Evacuation Prime Minister Narendra Modi set out on an aerial survey of the broken city, while the Indian Air Force started evacuating hundreds of passengers stranded at the local airport, which is expected to be shut at least until Dec. 6. Apollo Tyres Ltd. expected a production loss of 450 metric tons at its factory in the outskirts. The state administration has advised manufacturers to keep their operations shut till Dec. 7, BMW AG’s local unit said. Small and medium enterprises, automobile, engineering, information technology and tourism are among the sectors which are the worst-affected, Assocham said in the statement on its website. The government of the state of Tamil Nadu, whose capital is Chennai, said it deployed senior officials to undertake precautionary measures in three districts, distribute food and shift people to higher ground. Television images showed residents in almost neck-deep, brown water in many neighborhoods as local fishermen and volunteers helped ferry the elderly, women and children in boats. Relief efforts were proving to be challenging as some roads have been washed away and telephone networks were down, Home Minister Rajnath Singh told lawmakers on Thursday. Royal Enfield Shares of Chennai-based TVS Motor Co. have slumped 7.1 percent this week, the worst since July 2014. Apollo Tyres had its biggest loss in more than a month. Chennai Petroleum Corp., a unit of Indian Oil Corp., slumped 5.1 percent, the most in a month, after saying it may shut one or two of its three crude units in Tamil Nadu. Local operations of Ford Motor Co. to Infosys Ltd., the nation’s second-biggest software maker, remained shut for a second day. Eicher Motors Ltd., which makes the Royal Enfield motorcycles, said it closed its two plants near the city and lost about 9 percent of its output in November. Additional Flights As many as 34 aircraft, including those of budget carrier SpiceJet Ltd., were stuck at the airport. Of those, at least five each belonged to Jet Airways Ltd. and state-owned Air India Ltd., according to flight-tracking website FlightRadar24. The nation’s biggest airline IndiGo had two of its own stuck there. It said it will operate additional flights from nearby Bengaluru to accommodate passengers fleeing Chennai by road. Some relief came on Thursday from the weather department, which downgraded an earlier forecast for heavy rainfall to “light to moderate” for the next few days in the city. When asked if the worst was over, L.S. Rathore, director general of the Indian Meteorological Department told reporters, “Hopefully. We have to be watchful for the next 48 hours.” Chennai saw a record 1,218.6 millimeters of precipitation in November, three times more than normal, according to forecaster Skymet. The northeast monsoon typically sets in between October and December over India’s east coast, where Chennai is located. Radio stations and television channels formed partnerships to help people reach out to families and authorities, while Twitter started as many as three hashtags to connect the stranded and rescue volunteers. Facebook activated its recently-introduced "Safety Check" feature that identifies and checks on people in the vicinity of natural disasters. Power outages to prevent electrocutions added to the misery. One Twitter user sought help to rescue 200 colleagues from an office building with no electricity, while another looked for food to feed his infant. Assocham, the trade body, attributed the disaster mainly to “unplanned growth.” “Authorities in all metros should review their disaster management plans at regular intervals and make long-term plans to improve drainage systems,” it said in the statement. |||||

– India's fourth largest city—along with its approximately 9 million residents—is pretty much completely underwater after a record amount of rainfall in the past month, Bloomberg reports. According to the Wall Street Journal, the runway at Chennai's international airport was under 7 feet of water Thursday, leaving 30 planes and hundreds of passengers stranded. Multiple businesses—including Ford and Hyundai factories—and the city's main railway station have shut down. Meanwhile, Bloomberg adds that water is neck-deep in many neighborhoods, telephone networks are down, roads have been washed away, and many are without power. More than 250 people in Chennai and the surrounding state of Tamil Nadu have been killed in flooding since the start of November, and more than 2,000 people have been evacuated, according to the Journal. Chennai received nearly 48 inches of rain in November, more than three times the normal amount for November, Bloomberg reports. And with most of the city barely above sea level to start with, even minor flooding can be a big problem, according to the Journal. Prime Minister Narendra Modi blamed the fatal flooding on climate change, while others looked toward heavy construction along the city's rivers. The Indian government has allocated $141 million for flood relief. But Bloomberg reports losses to businesses could reach $2.2 billion, with the tourism, automobile, and information technology industries being especially hit hard. One Indian business association calls the situation "total chaos." Rains were expected to continue at least through Friday, the Journal reports.

Sometimes as a photojournalist, I find myself in uncomfortable situations. Such was the case as I photographed Joshua Mitchell at the Reynolds High School graduation ceremony Thursday night. Mitchell's brother, Emilio Hoffman, was killed Tuesday morning in a shooting at the school by fellow student Jared Padgett. To honor his brother at the ceremony, Mitchell wore Emilio's Reynolds Raiders soccer jersey over his graduation gown. I was one of a few photographers who had floor access during the ceremony. Before Mitchell walked the graduation line, I evaluated where I might position myself to best shoot his photo. I noticed that students weren't reacting to the crowd when they received their diplomas, but rather when they walked down a ramp toward assistant principal John Dixon. Based on this I opted for the left side of the ramp, but at the diploma exchange I found my view blocked so I quickly moved to the other side as Mitchell made his last handshake. It was then that Mitchell turned his back to the crowd, revealing Emilio's number 29, and raised his arms, a diploma and plaque in one hand and his other hand made into a fist. The discomfort came for me when he turned back and I could see the emotional intensity in his face. There I was, standing, in front of all the students and the friends and families in the audience, feeling a bit like an intruder in the moment. I quickly downloaded my camera cards into my laptop and sent the arms up photo first, feeling like it was THE moment and then followed with several pictures from the ramp walk and Mitchell's hug with Dixon. I woke up early this morning, wondering if I had violated Mitchell's moment. Only he can answer that. The photo of Mitchell turning back has been very popular on social media, with more than 900 retweets and thousands of Facebook likes. What do you think about the photo? I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments section below. ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. |||||

– Graduating seniors at Reynolds High School in Oregon collected their diplomas this week just two days after a fatal shooting at their school. And one of those seniors happens to be the older brother of 14-year-old victim Emilio Hoffman. In tribute, Joshua Mitchell wore his little brother's soccer jersey over his formal cap and gown—and he turned his back to the audience to raise his arms and flash them the No. 29 on stage, reports the Oregonian. His classmates stood and cheered, and the photographer who captured the emotional, unplanned scene writes about it here.

FILE — Arron Lewis is escorted by authorities at the Pulaski County sheriff's office in this September 2014 file photo. - Photo by Ron Blome / NBC News Authorities overnight found the body of missing real estate agent Beverly Carter buried in a shallow grave on property in Cabot, and the man arrested in her kidnapping has entered a preliminary innocent plea to a capital murder charge. The Pulaski County sheriff's office questioned Arron Lewis for more than 12 hours after his arrest Monday in the abduction of Carter, who disappeared Thursday after going to show a home in Scott. Investigators found her body more than 20 miles away Tuesday at Argos Concrete Co., 12117 Arkansas 5 in Cabot, in a rural area about 25 miles northeast of Little Rock. Lewis used to work for the business. "We have reason to believe he's been on the property and is familiar with it," Pulaski County sheriff's office spokesman Lt. Carl Minden said. Lewis admitted kidnapping Carter, the sheriff's office said, but wouldn't say where she was during the lengthy questioning. Shortly after being taken to the jail, investigators got a "major break in the case" that led them to the concrete business in far northern Pulaski County. "They obtained permission to search the property," Minden said at the scene. "During the search of the property, they did find a shallow grave toward the back of the property," he said. "After they uncovered it, it was positively identified as Beverly Carter." Lewis told reporters Tuesday as he was being taken from the jail to the sheriff's office that he didn't kill Carter, and described her as "a woman that worked alone — a rich broker." [FULL VIDEO] Lewis did say he was sorry, Minden said, and he admitted to investigators that he abducted Carter, evidence that "strongly ties him to the case." But there are unanswered questions. "Why'd he pick her? Why'd he do what he did? There's a lot of things we'll have to piece together," Minden said. In the video of him being escorted from the sheriff's office, Lewis says he has a "codefendant" named "Trevor." But Minden said authorities aren't seeking anyone else believed to be involved in the kidnapping and murder. "[Lewis] is the only suspect we have in the case and at this point the only person we're going to be looking for," he said. Pulaski County Sheriff Doc Holladay also addressed the subject of "Trevor" at an afternoon news conference, saying, "We had him yesterday, interviewed him extensively. We do not believe at this point he was involved in the commission of this crime.” Pulaski County Chief Deputy Prosecuting Attorney John Johnson said Lewis appeared Tuesday morning in Pulaski County District Court and entered preliminary innocent pleas to charges of capital murder and kidnapping. He was ordered held without bail. Johnson said he couldn’t comment about the case itself. Carter, 50, an agent for Crye-Leike Realtors in North Little Rock, told her husband by phone Thursday evening that she was going to show someone a home at 14202 Old River Drive. When she didn't return home later that night, Carter's husband went to the house and found her sport utility vehicle parked outside with her purse in it and the door to the home open. But there was no sign of Carter. Police and dozens of volunteers spent the weekend searching the area around the home for clues in the disappearance. Minden said the sheriff's office "extends their deepest condolences to the Carter family for their tragic loss." "It's just not what we wanted," he said, standing outside the concrete business. "Our hope was and the fact of him not coming out and saying 'I did it' — that kept our hopes up we could find her alive. But once he ceased talking to us and we were out here on this location, it's devastating to a certain point. Because you just had better hopes." Police haven't said how investigators linked Lewis to Carter's disappearance, but the sheriff said more details will be released at a Tuesday afternoon news conference. "I just want to express my condolences to the Carter family and her friends who have worked so hard to find her and these investigators who were committed to finding her," Holladay told reporters Tuesday morning. See Wednesday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for more on this story. To view this video, you need to have Flash Player 8.0 or later installed. Click here to get the latest Flash player. To view this video, you need to have Flash Player 8.0 or later installed. Click here to get the latest Flash player. Officials discuss Beverly Carter case at news conference Pulaski County Sheriff Doc Holladay and Prosecutor Larry Jegley were among those answering questions Tuesday afternoon at a news conference on the Beverly Carter case. (By Gavin Lesnick) [View Full-Size] Realtor's body found in shallow grave; Lewis charged with murder Authorities early Tuesday found the body of missing Realtor Beverly Carter in a shallow grave outside Cabot. Aaron Lewis, who had been arrested in her kidnapping, is now charged with capital murder. (By Gavin Lesnick) [View Full-Size] Photo by Pulaski County sheriff's office Arron Lewis Photo by Gavin Lesnick Pulaski County sheriff's deputies work Argos Concrete Co., 12117 Arkansas 5 in Cabot, where Realtor Beverly Carter's body was found buried behind the building Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2014. Photo by Gavin Lesnick Pulaski County sheriff's deputies work in 12100 block of Arkansas 5 in Cabot, where Realtor Beverly Carter's body was found buried behind the building Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2014. ||||| The Arkansas man who faces capital murder charges in the death of a real estate broker whose body was found early Tuesday in a shallow grave told reporters she was chosen because "she was a woman that worked alone -- a rich broker." Arron Lewis, the suspect, denied killing Beverly Carter, and mentioned a co-defendant during the brief comments to reporters Tuesday while being led by police in handcuffs. Police said at a Tuesday press conference they are not seeking any other suspects. Lewis appeared in court Tuesday and pleaded not guilty to one count each of capital murder, kidnapping and robbery, as well as four weapons charges, according to the office of Pulaski County District Judge Wayne Gruber. Carter had been missing since Thursday afternoon, when authorities say she had planned to show a house in the town of Scott, but never returned from the appointment. Her body was found in a shallow grave at a concrete company in a rural area about 25 miles northeast of Little Rock. Police say Lewis has admitted to kidnapping Carter. More On This... Lewis was arrested Monday morning, a day after authorities identified him as a suspect in the case. Fox16.com reported that a passerby recognized him outside a Subway restaurant in West Little Rock and chased him into an apartment complex along with a group of other men. Lewis was hiding in a manager's office when he was apprehended, police said. It is not clear how investigators initially connected Lewis to the case. According to the sheriff's office, Lewis was questioned for more than 12 hours Monday. Lewis admitted to kidnapping Carter, but did not divulge her whereabouts. At some point Monday, investigators received a tip leading them to the address where she was found. Pulaski County Lt. Carl Minden said that Lewis was on parole until 2017 for previous convictions in northwest Arkansas. He did not reveal whether Lewis was the client Carter was planning to meet. Police said Carter’s purse was found in her vehicle outside the home Friday and the door to the residence she was showing was left open. Detectives believe Carter was taken from the home. Carl Carter, her husband, told First Coast News that he received a text from Beverly around 1 a.m. Friday, the morning after her disappearance. But he said the message didn’t sound like her at all. "All of a sudden I received three texts in a row. One said 'Yes.'… Then she sent another text that said, 'My phone's low. The battery's down, and I'll call you whenever I get signal.' …And, then, straight back-to-back, I received a text that said 'Oh, I'm out drinking with some friends,'" he told the station. "Beverly's not a drinker." The Associated Press contributed to this report. Click for more from Fox16.com. ||||| This undated photo provided by the Pulaski County Sheriff’s Office shows Beverly Carter. Authorities say Carter's body was found early Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2014, in a shallow grave at a concrete company,... (Associated Press) This undated photo provided by the Pulaski County Sheriff’s Office shows Beverly Carter. Authorities say Carter's body was found early Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2014, in a shallow grave at a concrete company,... (Associated Press) LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — A man accused of abducting and killing a real estate agent in rural Arkansas pleaded not guilty Tuesday to preliminary charges of kidnapping and capital murder, hours after the woman's body was discovered in a shallow grave. Arron Michael Lewis appeared in court Tuesday and pleaded not guilty to one count each of capital murder, kidnapping and robbery, as well as four weapons charges, according to the office of Pulaski County District Judge Wayne Gruber. Early Tuesday morning, investigators found the body of Beverly Carter, 49, at Argos Concrete Company in a rural area about 25 miles northeast of Little Rock and more than 20 miles away from Scott, where she had an appointment to show a house Thursday but hadn't been seen since. Pulaski County Sheriff's Office Lt. Carl Minden said Lewis admitted to kidnapping Carter but did not lead authorities to her body. He said investigators received a tip that led them to the concrete company where Carter's body was found. Lewis previously worked for the concrete company, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported Tuesday. Lewis, 33, was being held on $1 million bail in the Pulaski County jail. Lewis spoke briefly to reporters Tuesday morning as he was taken from the jail to the sheriff's office, where he was interviewed again after spending more than 12 hours with investigators Monday. When asked by reporters why Carter was targeted, Lewis responded: "Because she was just a woman that worked alone — a rich broker." He denied killing her. Police haven't said how investigators linked Lewis to Carter's disappearance, but Sheriff Doc Holladay said more details will be released at a Tuesday afternoon news conference. "I just want to express my condolences to the Carter family and her friends who have worked so hard to find her and these investigators who were committed to finding her," Holladay told reporters Tuesday morning. ___ Follow Jill Bleed on Twitter at www.twitter.com/jzbleed |||||

– A little more light is perhaps being shed on the death of real estate agent Beverly Carter: A suspect in the murder, Arron Lewis, told reporters that Carter was targeted because "she was a woman that worked alone—a rich broker," Fox News reports. But he's not saying he was to blame. He referred to a co-defendant, Fox News notes; meanwhile, the AP reports that Lewis has pleaded not guilty to preliminary kidnapping and capital murder charges—though he reportedly admitted the kidnapping to authorities. Carter's body was found this morning at a concrete company property more than 20 miles from where she went missing; Lewis once worked for the company, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports.

ES News Email Enter your email address Please enter an email address Email address is invalid Fill out this field Email address is invalid Email cannot be used. Try another or register with your social account A gas consultant who officially changed his name to Bacon Double Cheeseburger today said: "I’ve got no regrets at all". Sam Smith, from Muswell Hill, changed his name by deed poll to reflect his love of the food after a night in the pub. He told the Standard that the Burger King favourite was the first thing that popped into his head when friends convinced him to do go ahead with the stunt. Mr Cheeseburger explained: “It was the culmination of probably too many drinks in the pub where there was a conversation about names. “Bacon Double Cheeseburger was pretty much the first thing that came up. Everyone loves bacon don’t they? “It was largely the most ridiculous thing we could think of. My friends were quite supportive of anything that makes me look silly, as good friends are.” He made an application to the UK Deed Poll Service and, perhaps unfortunately, was drinking with the same friends when the paperwork arrived a few weeks later for him to sign, making the name change official. Mr Cheeseburger added that he was lucky his colleagues had a sense of humour. The 33-year-old, who said he proudly signs off his work emails as "B D Cheeseburger", said he particularly got a kick out of booking into hotels on business trips. My fiancée is fairly reluctant about marrying a Cheeseburger He explained: “I spend a lot of time in the Far East and most people out there wouldn’t know Bacon isn’t a standard British first name. But in Europe people think it's pretty weird. “What people call me is up to them but that's my name legally speaking now. My mum was furious but my dad thinks it’s hilarious. He’s more than happy to use my new name.” But this fiancée Isabella, is less happy and he admitted another name change might be needed ahead of their wedding. He said: “My fiancée is fairly reluctant about marrying a Cheeseburger. That’s something we’re discussing a lot. No girl ever dreams of spending her big day marrying a man called Bacon. “But I’ve got no regrets at all. It’s been a very fun experience and it’s made a lot of people laugh.” His was revealed as one of a host of strange things people have chosen to change their names to in the past year. Mr Cheeseburger is one of a record-breaking 85,000 people who changed their name last year. ||||| We've detected that JavaScript is disabled in your browser. Would you like to proceed to legacy Twitter? Yes ||||| Have you ever had a really delicious meal and then wished you could find some way to properly honor the glorious food you’ve just consumed? Well, this man in the U.K. apparently once ate a bacon double cheeseburger so delicious that he decided to honor it by literally changing his own name to Bacon Double Cheeseburger. That’s dedication. This man used to be known as Simon Smith, according to The Times. “A name is the least important part of your personality,” the 33-year-old London resident reportedly told the Sunday People. “It’s given to you by someone else.” The Brief Newsletter Sign up to receive the top stories you need to know right now. View Sample Sign Up Now So how did he choose his new identity? It was simply the first thing he thought of. Last year, he officially changed his name by deed poll. We can only assume that he really, really loves bacon double cheeseburgers and is not a vegetarian trying to be ironic. Contact us at editors@time.com. ||||| Simon Smith from north London is one of the many people each year who decide to change their names by deed poll. More unusually, he chose to change his name to Bacon Double Cheeseburger. You would think a man who uses his name to pay tribute to fast food wouldn't be overly bothered by references to his past moniker. You would be wrong. London newspaper The Evening Standard interviewed Mr Cheeseburger about his decision to adopt a beefy new moniker (it had a lot to do with being in the pub), but it seems they were paying so much attention to his delicious new name they forgot to check his birth name. They mistakenly called him Sam Smith, which according to Mr Cheeseburger, would be a ridiculous name. Sorry Sam. Perhaps the hassle was worth it though, it looks like he could be going on a beefy tour of Britain's burger restaurants. So does his new name cause him problems with work or travel? "Surprisingly no," Mr Cheeseburger tells Newsbeat. He currently works as a consultant for the oil and gas industry and says: "My work speaks for itself... people keep hiring me." It's not Bacon Double Cheeseburger on his CV though. "I usually drop that bombshell after the contracts have been signed," he says. Despite his hassle-free name change, he does have a warning for anyone who fancies changing their name to Chicken Caesar Salad. "On the side of beer bottles it says drink responsibly for a reason, think carefully before you do it." Despite all of that, people do still call him Bacon. "My dad included," he adds. What is a deed poll? Anyone over 18 can start using a new name at any time but to apply for official documents such as a passport or driving licence you'll need a legal document called a deed poll. For a fee you can put your name on public record by "enrolling it" at The Royal Courts of Justice. Alternatively you can make your own deed poll, but some record-holders will only accept a new name that's been 'enrolled' using the official forms. The process is slightly different if you were born in Scotland; you apply to the National Records of Scotland who will charge a recording fee. How much does it cost? Making your own deed poll is free, but the more widely accepted official method of enrolling your new name at the Royal Courts of Justice costs £36. Specialist agencies or solicitors will also charge a fee to make a deed poll for you. In Scotland a change of name is subject to a recording fee of £40, but families who are all changing their name together can pay an additional £10 per family member instead of paying the full fee for each person. For more stories like this one you can now download the BBC Newsbeat app straight to your device. For iPhone go here. For Android go here. |||||

– We get that if your name is Simon Smith, you might long for more exotic nomenclature. But this British bloke admits his recent name change was "the culmination of probably too many drinks in the pub," per the Evening Standard. Smith, now officially known as Mr. Bacon Double Cheeseburger, says he and his pals were chatting about switching up names when his Burger King-inspired moniker was suggested. "It was largely the most ridiculous thing we could think of," says the 33-year-old, whom Time calls a "hero." "My friends were quite supportive of anything that makes me look silly, as good friends are." He filled out the required application, and when the final papers arrived for him to sign, he was—"perhaps unfortunately," the Standard notes—drinking with the same group of friends. They prodded him to seal the deal, for which he now says he has "no regrets." Reaction to his new name has been mixed: He says his mom was "furious," his dad thought it was "hilarious," and his fiancee—well, she'll probably make him change it back before the wedding, per the Standard. He travels a lot for work to the Far East, where he says they don't realize "Bacon" isn't a valid first name, but he concedes people he meets in Europe think it's "pretty weird." And he does keep his original name on his résumé, preferring to "drop that bombshell [only] after the contracts have been signed." He's still prickly about his erstwhile appellation: Cheeseburger took the Standard to task for reporting he was previously known as Sam Smith, tweeting, "You got my name wrong, it was SIMON SMITH. FFS. Sam Smith would be a ridiculous name." Whatever his former name, the man now known as Cheeseburger is reaping at least one perk: Burger joints are offering him free bacon double cheeseburgers if he provides proof of the name change, the BBC reports.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers says an article in The New York Times on Benghazi doesn’t square with intelligence assessments about last year’s attacks on the U.S. consulate in the Libyan city. Appearing on “Fox News Sunday,” the Michigan Republican declined to answer when asked by host Chris Wallace whether The Times story was designed to exonerate Hillary Clinton, who was the secretary of state at the time of the attacks. “I find the timing odd,” Rogers said. “I don’t want to speculate on why they might do it.” In a story published online Saturday, The Times said it had “turned up no evidence that Al Qaeda or other international terrorist groups had any role in the assault” and that the attacks were, in fact, “fueled in large part by anger at an American-made video denigrating Islam.” Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), a senior member of the House Intelligence Committee, said intelligence assessments indicate that Al Qaeda was involved in the attacks. But, he said, The Times story “adds some valuable insights.” “It is a complex picture,” he said. Read more about: Hillary Clinton, Mike Rogers, Benghazi ||||| poster="https://v.politico.com/images/1155968404/201312/81/1155968404_2990356625001_video-still-for-video-2989614297001.jpg?pubId=1155968404" true Rep. Darrell Issa, who chairs the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, on Sunday during an interview with NBC's 'Meet the Press' defended his past statements on Benghazi in response to a New York Times story. Issa on defense over Benghazi statements Rep. Darrell Issa, who chairs the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, on Sunday defended his past statements on Benghazi in response to a New York Times story that said it had “turned up no evidence that Al Qaeda or other international terrorist groups had any role in the assault.” “There is a group that was involved that claims an affiliation with Al Qaeda,” the California Republican said on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” insisting that he was accurate in his past assertion that Al Qaeda was involved in the attacks. Issa’s committee has been investigating last year’s assault on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya, and the congressman has repeatedly slammed the Obama administration for its handling of the issue. (Also on POLITICO: Rogers knocks NYT over Benghazi) On Sunday, “Meet the Press” host David Gregory asked Issa to respond to The Times story, which was published online Saturday. The story also said the Benghazi attacks were “fueled in large part by anger at an American-made video denigrating Islam.” “We have seen no evidence that the video was widely seen in Benghazi,” Issa said Sunday. “People from this administration … have said under oath there was no evidence of any reaction to a video. “What we know, David, is the initial reports did not name this video as the prime cause,” he added. Issa also commended The Times for doing “some very good work” in its reporting on the issue. ||||| Lieberman stands by Obamacare vote Former Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman said Sunday that, knowing what he knows today, he still would have voted for Obamacare. “The rollout of Obamacare has been bad,” Lieberman acknowledged on “Fox News Sunday.” But, he said, the status quo before Obamacare was also bad. “The best thing that could happen now is for both parties to sit down and figure out how to fix the current system,” he said. Lieberman, a former Democratic vice presidential candidate, retired from the Senate as an independent. Austin Wright is a defense reporter for Politico. ||||| Focused crawls are collections of frequently-updated webcrawl data from narrow (as opposed to broad or wide) web crawls, often focused on a single domain or subdomain. ||||| Dean predicts more Obamacare problems Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean acknowledged on Sunday that Obamacare would suffer additional setbacks as it continues rolling out next year — but, he said, ultimately the health care overhaul “will work.” “There are going to be problems,” Dean said on “Fox News Sunday,” explaining that the Obama administration was having trouble getting young, healthy people to sign up for health care plans — an issue that could drive up costs. “The data does show that less healthy people are signing up,” he said. “Younger people are signing up less frequently than hoped.” Dean, a physician who formerly chaired the Democratic National Committee, also defended Obamacare and knocked its critics, accusing them of “hyperbole” and saying they “look incredibly partisan.” “I think the first year is going to be more successful than most people think,” he said. Dean sparred on Sunday with Scott Gottlieb, a resident fellow at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, who said the health care plans offered under Obamacare are “very, very narrow” and “exclude a lot of specialists.” ||||| Navarro: Senate GOP won't get 'Lugared' again Senate Republicans have learned their lesson since their colleague, Dick Lugar, was felled by a tea party challenger in Indiana in 2012, GOP commentator Ana Navarro said Sunday on CNN's "State of the Union." Several Republican incumbents - including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and Sens. John Cornyn of Texas, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Mike Enzi of Wyoming - are facing challenges from the right in next year's midterm elections. "I think you're going to see them win their primaries because they're taking it seriously, they're campaigning hard, they're raising the money and they're doing what they have to do," Navarro said. "They're not about to get Richard Lugared." "They see it coming now," said host Candy Crowley. Cited as one indicator of congressional Republicans' changing frame of mind: House Speaker John Boehner's "Are you kidding me?" moment, when he was discussing outside groups' support — and low expectations — for the government shutdown earlier this year. Republicans need to net six seats to take back control of the Senate in 2014. ||||| Sen. Ted Cruz is unapologetic for what he acknowledges was a “whirlwind” first year as a senator. “This is a city where it’s all politics all the time. And I’m trying to do my best not to pay attention to the politics, to focus on fixing the problems,” the Texas Republican said in an interview that aired Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.” “Really,” interjected ABC correspondent Jonathan Karl, who did the interview. “I know it’s hard to believe,” Cruz went on, “because no one in this town does that. This is a time for people to step up and do the right thing. And that’s what I’m trying to do.” Read more about: Ted Cruz, Jonathan Karl |||||

– Congressmembers took turns today swinging at yesterday's New York Times report that al-Qaeda wasn't involved in the attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, with Darrell Issa defending his past statements implicating the terror group. "There is a group that was involved that claims an affiliation with al-Qaeda," he said, per Politico. Of the Times' conclusion that the attack was "fueled in large part by anger at an American-made video denigrating Islam," Issa countered, saying, "We have seen no evidence that the video was widely seen in Benghazi. People from this administration … have said under oath there was no evidence of any reaction to a video." Democrat Adam Schiff of California stood by Qaeda's involvement, but said the Times report "adds some valuable insights," reports Politico. "It is a complex picture." Said Michigan Republican Mike Rogers, "I find the timing odd. I don’t want to speculate on why (the NYT) might do it." Elsewhere on your Sunday dial, as per Politico: Ted Cruz on his 'whirlwind' first year: "This is a city where it’s all politics all the time. And I’m trying to do my best not to pay attention to the politics, to focus on fixing the problems. I know it’s hard to believe, because no one in this town does that. This is a time for people to step up and do the right thing. And that’s what I’m trying to do." Howard Dean on ObamaCare: "There are going to be problems. The data does show that less healthy people are signing up. Younger people are signing up less frequently than hoped." Critics, however, are guilty of "hyperbole" and "look incredibly partisan," and "the first year is going to be more successful than most people think." GOP commentator Ana Navarro on GOP incumbents vs. the Tea Party: "I think you're going to see them win their primaries because they're taking it seriously, they're campaigning hard, they're raising the money and they're doing what they have to do. They're not about to get Richard Lugared." Joe Lieberman says he would still vote for ObamaCare: "The rollout of ObamaCare has been bad," as was the status quo. "The best thing that could happen now is for both parties to sit down and figure out how to fix the current system."

A young woman was walking with her father in a Brooklyn playground on Thursday night when five men approached them, pulled out a gun, ordered her father to leave and then took turns raping her, the police said on Saturday. The woman, 18, was with her father inside the Osborn Playground in Brownsville, near the intersection of Lott Avenue and Osborn Street, when five men approached them, the police said. One of the men, who was armed, pointed a gun at them and ordered her father to leave. The authorities said the father left the woman with the group of men, who then each raped her at gunpoint. The men fled the scene when her father returned a short time later with two uniformed police officers, the police said. The playground provides turquoise and red climbing equipment for young neighborhood children. On school days, middle school students from the neighboring Knowledge and Power Preparatory Academy V play on the playground’s handball and basketball courts. The Police Department released surveillance video that it said showed the men in a bodega before the suspected rape. The video shows a group of young black men in hooded sweatshirts and light jackets laughing and smiling. One wore a red backpack. The police have asked for the public’s assistance in identifying and locating the men. The woman was taken to Kings County Hospital Center, where she was treated and released, the police said. Her name has not been released. ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| NEW YORK (Reuters) - New York Mayor Bill de Blasio on Sunday denounced the rape of a woman by five men at a Brooklyn playground, pledging police would work to swiftly apprehend the suspects in “this vicious crime.” Police said on Saturday the men took turns raping the 18-year-old woman at the playground operated by the New York City Parks Department in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn just after 9 p.m. on Thursday. One man pointed a gun at the father and told him to leave, police said. After the father left, the men each assaulted the woman, police said. They fled when her father returned a short while later, accompanied by two officers. The woman was treated at a hospital and released, police said. Police released surveillance video taken in a nearby bodega that they said showed the five suspects before the attack. The video depicts a group of black men in jackets and sweatshirts talking and laughing inside the store. Police asked for the public’s help in identifying the suspects. “We will take every step possible to find and swiftly prosecute the assailants of this vicious crime,” de Blasio said in a statement. “Every New Yorker in every neighborhood deserves to feel safe and protected, and we will not stop until the perpetrators of this disturbing attack are held accountable for their actions.” De Blasio and his police commissioner, Bill Bratton, have faced criticism over the perception that major crime is rising in America’s most populous city. Major crimes reported dropped 1.7 percent last year and by 5.8 percent since de Blasio took office two years ago. But some categories have increased, according to a report issued earlier this month. Rapes were up 6.3 percent last year. |||||

– A group of five men raped a teenager one-at-a-time in a Brooklyn playground on Thursday night after ordering her father to flee at gunpoint, police say. The 18-year-old survivor, unnamed in media reports, was with her dad in Osborn Playground at about 11:15pm when the suspects allegedly came up, the New York Daily News reports. One of the men is said to have drawn a gun in the Brownsville facility and given the father a simple order: "Get the f--- out of here." The father then fled to call 911, and when he came back with two cops, the suspects ran in all directions. The survivor received treatment at Kings County Hospital, but the suspects all escaped. Now police are seeking help by releasing video of five black, male suspects in a nearby bodega before the assault, Reuters reports. They're wearing light jackets, hoodies, and can be seen smiling and laughing, the New York Times notes. Now nearby residents are taking a second look at Osborn Playground, which includes climbing equipment and is normally used by middle-school kids during the day. "I have to keep an eye out," says a 52-year-old who adds that her 16-year-old daughter is no longer allowed in the playground. "To me, I thought this was safe."

WASHINGTON—Fracking can affect drinking water supplies in certain circumstances, the Obama administration said in a long-awaited report issued Tuesday, leaving open the possibility of more widespread impacts that it says can’t be determined with current data. The report, written by Environmental Protection Agency scientists, includes findings that are more open-ended than those in a draft version last year, when the agency said fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, isn’t having “widespread, systematic impacts on drinking water.” ... ||||| Due to a lapse in appropriations, EPA websites will not be regularly updated. In the event of an environmental emergency imminently threatening the safety of human life or where necessary to protect certain property, the EPA website will be updated with appropriate information. Please note that all information on the EPA website may not be up to date, and transactions and inquiries submitted to the EPA website may not be processed or responded to until appropriations are enacted. ||||| Sunflower stalks punctuate the snow in a field near dormant oil drilling rigs, which have been stacked in Dickinson, N.D., in this Jan. 21, 2016 file photo. Top US shale producers are pushing fracking technology to new extremes to get more oil out of their wells. Last summer, in a draft report, the agency concluded hydraulic fracturing has no national 'widespread, systemic' impact on drinking water. In the final version released Tuesday, that sentence was removed. —When the Environmental Protection Agency released its draft report in 2015 on the safety of hydraulic fracturing, industry groups seized on one sentence as proof that fracking is safe: a conclusion that the process has no national “widespread, systemic impact” on drinking water. On Tuesday, the EPA released its final report on fracking’s impact on drinking water – a 1,200-page behemoth that was five years in the making – and that sentence was removed. Instead, the report says that, in certain circumstances, fracking does pose a risk to drinking water. It’s a major U-turn for the agency, one that was immediately hailed by some fracking critics, who have long said that the process poses significant and poorly understood dangers to drinking water, and criticized by industry groups who say the report creates unjustified doubts about the safety of fracking. And it’s a U-turn that comes right before a new administration takes power, with a nominated EPA chief who is a fracking advocate. The report refrains from drawing too many conclusions – including saying with any certainty how severe the risk to drinking water is – and it details many remaining gaps in knowledge and data. “There are instances where fracking has impacted drinking water resources,” said Thomas Burke, a deputy assistant administrator and science adviser with the EPA, in a phone call with reporters Tuesday morning. But when it comes to a “national, systemic conclusion” about fracking’s impact, he said that “that’s a different question [that] this study does not have adequate evidence to make a conclusive, quantified statement about.” Overall, Dr. Burke said, the final report is “a strong and clear representation of the science that exists on hydraulic fracturing and drinking water resources…. Most importantly, it provides states, tribes, and communities around the country with critical resources to identify how better to protect public health and drinking water resources.” Hydraulic fracturing is a process in which large amounts of water, sand, and chemicals are pumped into rock formations underground to fracture the rock and release oil and gas. Critics have long contended that the process poses a risk to drinking water, and some residents near wells have complained about contaminated water, but the industry has insisted it has sufficient safeguards to protect water. Rather than drawing widespread conclusions, the final EPA report documented identified instances of drinking water contamination and highlighted the insufficiency of evidence to know how frequently contamination exists. Industry groups immediately criticized the new report, condemning it as politically motivated, and also highlighted the fact that the instances of contamination are still quite small. “It is beyond absurd for the administration to reverse course on its way out the door,” said Erik Milito, director of upstream and industry operations at the American Petroleum Institute, in a statement. “The agency has walked away from nearly a thousand sources of information from published papers, technical reports and peer reviewed scientific reports demonstrating that industry practices, industry trends, and regulatory programs protect water resources at every step of the hydraulic fracturing process.” And Energy In Depth, an industry-funded outreach group, emphasized that despite the changed wording, the new report still shows only anecdotal evidence of contamination. “This study took five years to complete, and in that time EPA found nothing to suggest that fracking is a serious risk to groundwater,” wrote Katie Brown, a spokeswoman for the group, in a response to the EPA report. “If there were any evidence to suggest widespread, systemic impacts to drinking water from hydraulic fracturing, it would have been uncovered in EPA’s five-year study and during the past decade of extensive research. It most certainly was not and EPA’s report reflects that.” But environmental and health groups say it was the original finding that was both politically motivated and unsubstantiated, and they cheered the fact that the final report rested on science, and also included data and findings from fracking sites in Parker County, Texas; Dimock, Pa.; and Pavillion, Wyo. – all sites where scientists had found early evidence of contamination but where investigations had ended early. The report refrained from drawing conclusions about the role of fracking in contamination at those sites. “It’s a huge victory that the EPA has stuck to the science with this final report and not gone out on a limb and made pronouncements based more on political considerations than the science,” says Hugh MacMillan, a senior researcher on water, energy, and climate issues at Food & Water Watch, an environmental group that has opposed fracking. Scott Pruitt, President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to lead the EPA, is the attorney general in Oklahoma, has deep ties to the fossil-fuels industry, and has been a staunch defender of fracking. And one of Mr. Trump’s key energy advisers has been Harold Hamm, a billionaire who was one of the major pioneers in fracking. The EPA report is unlikely to change any of the next administration’s positions on fracking, but it puts a clear paper trail in place. “Moving forward, you have an assessment of the science of the impacts of fracking on drinking water,” says Mr. MacMillan. “It’s going to inform decisionmakers at a local level who one would think would be able to exercise some local control over the practice.” Among the findings in the report were conditions that make drinking-water contamination from fracking more likely. They include water withdrawals from areas with low water availability, particularly in areas with limited groundwater resources; spills during the handling of fracking fluids and chemicals; injection of fluids directly into groundwater or into wells with inadequate mechanical integrity; and storage of fracking wastewater in unlined pits. “Most of the extraction happens Colorado and eastward, but the western US has some unique risks associated with oil and gas extraction,” says Robert Jackson, a Stanford earth sciences professor who has studied fracking and drinking water, and who helped write a study that raised concerns about the contamination in Pavillion. The report also added about 400 new chemicals to its list of chemicals associated with fracking, and acknowledged that of the 1,606 chemicals included in the final study, a large number have very little peer-reviewed data around their toxicity. While the report details large gaps in knowledge and data, getting that data is difficult, says MacMillan, given that the oil and gas industry has control over fracking sites and getting access to the sites is often impossible for researchers. Ultimately, says Professor Jackson, the final EPA report, without the “widespread, systemic impact” line, “more accurately reflects the body of the report and the state of the science so far.” It "doesn’t say that contamination is normal, but it acknowledges that it happens. It also presents ways to reduce the likelihood of contamination,” says Jackson. “I hope it is helpful to everyone, including the industry. If people know their concerns are being taken seriously, I think they’ll be more likely to support the industry in the future.” Staff writer Henry Gass contributed to this report from Boston. ||||| WASHINGTON — The Environmental Protection Agency has concluded that hydraulic fracturing, the oil and gas extraction technique also known as fracking, has contaminated drinking water in some circumstances, according to the final version of a comprehensive study first issued in 2015. The new version is far more worrying than the first, which found “no evidence that fracking systemically contaminates water” supplies. In a significant change, that conclusion was deleted from the final study. “E.P.A. scientists chose not to include that sentence. The scientists concluded it could not be quantitatively supported,” said Thomas A. Burke, the E.P.A.’s science adviser, and deputy assistant administrator of the agency’s Office of Research and Development. The report, the largest and most comprehensive of its kind to date on the effects of fracking on water supply, comes as President-elect Donald J. Trump has vowed to expand fracking and roll back existing regulations on the process. His choice to run the E.P.A., Scott Pruitt, the attorney general from Oklahoma, has built his career on fighting E.P.A. regulations on energy exploration. |||||

– Weeks before it gets an exceptionally fracking-friendly new chief, the Environmental Protection Agency has done a U-turn on the threat the process may pose to drinking water. The final version of a long-awaited report has removed a sentence that says fracking is not having a "widespread, systemic impact" on America's water, the Christian Science Monitor reports. The report now leaves open the possibility that fracking could be having a major impact. "While the number of identified cases of drinking water contamination is small, the scientific evidence is insufficient to support estimates of the frequency of contamination," EPA spokesman Thomas Burke tells the Wall Street Journal. "Scientists involved with finalizing the assessment specifically identified this uncertainty in the report." The report had been in the works since 2010 and industry groups slammed the EPA for reversing course just before President Obama leaves office. Environmental groups, however, praised the agency for delivering a conclusion they said was based on science instead of political considerations. "This report acknowledges what far too many communities across this country know to be true—fracking is a threat to our clean drinking water," Madeleine Foote of the League of Conservation voters tells the New York Times. "Given EPA administrator nominee Scott Pruitt's record of fighting fracking regulations, it will be important during the confirmation process for senators to ask him if he will follow the recommendations of the agency's scientists, or continue to rely on industry spin." (The EPA shut down 17 wells after a strong quake in Oklahoma earlier this year.)

The Red Room Looking for someone who shares my beliefs, and is similar to me. Spiritual Passions: Report This Profile ||||| The Douglas County sheriff says he will never utter the name of the man responsible for the deadly attack at Umpqua Community College and has called on news media to do the same. "Let me be very clear: I will not name the shooter." Sheriff John Hanlin said during a Thursday night briefing at a fire station near the Roseburg campus. "I will not give him credit for this horrific act of cowardice." He encouraged the news media and community to "avoid using it, repeating it, or engaging in any glorification and sensationalization of him. "He in no way deserves it," he said. "Focus your attention on the victims and their families and helping them to recover." Law enforcement swarmed the college after an active shooter was reported at 10:38 a.m. The campus was put in lockdown while officers tracked down the gunman and exchanged gunfire. Shortly thereafter, officials confirmed the shooter had been "neutralized," but not before he killed nine people and wounded seven others. Meanwhile Thursday afternoon in nearby Winchester, crime scene tape marked off an apartment complex where the gunman, already identified by The Oregonian/OregonLive and other media as Chris Harper-Mercer, lived. Rita Cavin, the college's interim president, offered her heartfelt condolences to those affected by the tragedy. "This has been a long, sad tragic day at Umpqua Community College," she said. Yet she thanked all for their outpouring of support. It shows the "power that love can bring to this community" and the "blessings of a small town...we're so interconnected," she said. Local, state and federal officials have arrived to help with the investigation of the shooting, which took place on Umpqua's hilltop campus overlooking the Umpqua River. The FBI has created a tips line -- 800-225-5324 -- for those with information about the attack. Staff writers Maxine Bernstein and Andrew Greif contributed to this report. -- Nuran Alteir nalteir@oregonian.com 503-294-4028 @whatnuransaid ||||| Umpqua college shooter, who was born in England according to media reports, had a varied online presence that indicated support for the IRA The Umpqua shooter has been named as Chris Harper Mercer, a 26-year-old who lived with his mother at an apartment only a few miles from the college. American media reports said he was born in England and moved to the US at a young age: his stepsister, Carmen Nesnick, told CBS Los Angeles that he travelled to the US as a young boy. Other accounts report that Nesnick specified that Harper-Mercer was born in England. 'Another mass shooting in America': Oregon killings a grim familiarity for US Read more Harper-Mercer was the son of Ian Mercer and Laurel Margaret Harper. Mercer and Harper filed for divorce on 6 June 2006. He appears to have left an online footprint that hints at interest in mass shootings as well as apparent support for the IRA. He also appears to have been a prolific user of the file-sharing system Bittorrent. An email address, “ironcross45@gmail.com”, was found to be associated with a Chris Harper Mercer of Winchester, Oregon, via a public records search. That address is linked to an account on the torrent upload site kat-ph.proxy-x.com, which bears the username “Lithium_Love”. The final video uploaded by Lithium_Love to the torrent site, just three days ago, was a BBC documentary called Surviving Sandy Hook about the school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, in 2012. Other uploads include PDFs of the occult magazine Phenomena, conspiracy-themed documentaries including Lost Secrets of the Illuminati, and assorted soft pornography. Facebook Twitter Pinterest The father of Chris Harper Mercer says he is ‘devastated’ by the campus shooting. Link to video There is also a blog attached to the upload account. The first entry was posted on 6 July 2015 and is titled “The material world is a lie.” It says: “Most people will spend hours standing in front of stores just to buy a new iphone ... I used to be like that, always concerned about what clothes I had, rather than whether or not I was happy. But not anymore. “Since then I have learned the truth that such attachments are falsehoods and will only bring misery. This is my first blog post, there will be more to come.” Other blogposts complain about the uploading habits of other users. Another bemoans the death of horror filmmaker Wes Craven. A Myspace page bearing Mercer’s name is filled with pictures of masked gunmen and references to the IRA, including a picture of the front page of a the Irish republican newspaper An Phoblacht, bearing the headline “British Army Could Not Defeat IRA”. Another photo to the page carries the words “IRA undefeated army”. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Screengrab taken from Chris Harper-Mercer’s myspace page. Photograph: myspace.com/PA The page gives Mercer’s home location as Torrance, California. A Whitepages page – which tracks addresses and phone numbers – gives two addresses for Mercer: one in Torrance, California, and the other in Winchester, Oregon. The latter is also the address associated with the registration of the “ironcross45” email address. Using that email address, Mercer also appears to have advertised for penpals on the website Morgue Pals, which describes itself as “the hippest place for pen pals who identify with any sort of alternative culture”. In his advertisement, Mercer, then aged 20, said he was looking for email pals and described his hobbies as “music movies and news”. In his profile, he described himself as: “I’m 20 years old, in college, I like to listen to music, mostly goth/punk/industrial/electronic, and I love to watch movies, Horror movies are the best, but i also like some action films, depending on the type, and I like crime dramas as well.“ He added: “I’m looking for penpals who are similar to me, but anyone is welcome to email me.” A posting on the Spiritual Passions dating and social networking site uses a picture that appears to be Mercer under the user name IRONCROSS45, which Mercer also used as his email. He described himself on the site as a 26-year-old, mixed-race “man looking for a woman”. He said he was “not religious, but spiritual”, and was a “teetotaler” living with his parents and a conservative Republican. Socially, he said, he was “shy at first” and “better in small groups”. He described himself as “always dieting” and looking for “the yin to my yang”. The email address Ironcross45@gmail.com is also associated with a crowdfunding webpage to help the user pay for uploading and storing bittorrent files for downloading videos as well. According to the cached version of the webpage, the most recent video uploaded was Collection Of Hot Lesbians (Nudes) Vol. 8. Two phone numbers associated with the name appeared to have been disconnected. A profile on the site belonging to Mercer on the website Spiritual Singles, which advertises itself as “a free online dating & social networking site specifically for spiritual singles,” and bears a picture of the same person as Mercer’s Myspace page, the alleged killer describes himself politically as a “conservative, republican” whose hobbies are “internet, killing zombies, movies, music, reading” and who lives with parents. In the profile, the personality type he is looking for is “intellectual, punk, introvert, loner, lover, geek, nerd” with an “individuality” of “piercings, psychic, tattoos, vampire”. His preferred religious views are “Pagan, Wiccan, Not Religious, but Spiritual” as well. On the image-sharing message-board 4chan, rumours were flying on Thursday night that the killer may have been one of their own. In an anonymous post at 1:19am on Thursday morning on the /r9k board – all posts to 4chan are anonymous – someone said “Some of you guys are alright. Don’t go to school tomorrow if you are in the northwest.” There is no way of verifying that the post came from the shooter. Facebook Twitter Pinterest A conversation on the website 4Chan where an anonymous poster warns of violence to come in the northwest of Oregon, USA. Photograph: 4Chan A spokesperson for the Douglas County sheriff’s department, which is handling the investigation, said it could “neither confirm nor deny” at this point that they were investigating the post, though federal officials reportedly told the New York Times that they were doing so. It is not known if Mercer was affiliated with the college, but his name was listed as a production assistant for an upcoming production of the Noel Coward play Blithe Spirit at Umpqua. Facebook Twitter Pinterest A post on Facebook showing the name of Chris Harper Mercer, the alleged gunman in the Oregon shootings, 2 October 2015. Harper Mercer is named as a production assistant in the post. Photograph: Facebook The gunman’s father, Ian Mercer, said he was “just as shocked as everybody” at his son’s actions. Speaking from his home in the US, he told reporters: “I’ve just been talking to the police and the FBI and all the details I have right now is what you guys [reporters] have already. “I can’t answer any questions right now, I don’t want to answer any questions right now. It’s been a devastating day, devastating for me and my family. Shocked is all I can say.” ||||| ROSEBURG, Ore. (AP) — A gunman opened fire inside a classroom at a rural Oregon community college Thursday, killing at least nine people before dying in a shootout with police, authorities said. One survivor said he demanded his victims state their religion before he started shooting. A woman is comforted as friends and family wait for students at the local fairgrounds after a shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Ore., on Thursday, Oct. 1, 2015. (AP Photo/Ryan Kang) (Associated Press) Students, staff and faculty are evacuated from Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Ore. Thursday, Oct. 1, 2015, after a deadly shooting. (Michael Sullivan/The News-Review via AP) MANDATORY CREDIT (Associated Press) President Barack Obama pauses as he speaks in the Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House in Washington, Thursday, Oct. 1, 2015, about the shooting at the community college in Oregon. The shooting... (Associated Press) Hannah Miles, center, is reunited with her sister Hailey Miles, left, and father Gary Miles, right, after a shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Ore., on Thursday, Oct. 1, 2015. (AP Photo/Ryan... (Associated Press) A bullet casing is marked at the scene of a deadly shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Ore., Thursday, Oct. 1, 2015. (Michael Sullivan/The News-Review via AP) MANDATORY CREDIT (Associated Press) Authorities respond to a report of a shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Ore., Thursday, Oct. 1, 2015. (Michael Sullivan /The News-Review via AP) MANDATORY CREDIT (Associated Press) Police search students outside Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Ore., Thursday, Oct. 1, 2015, following a deadly shooting at the college. (Mike Sullivan/Roseburg News-Review via AP) (Associated Press) The attack shattered the first week of classes at Umpqua Community College in the small timber town of Roseburg, about 180 miles south of Portland. The killer was identified as 26-year-old Chris Harper Mercer, according to a government official who was not authorized to speak publicly and provided the name on condition of anonymity. Authorities shed no light on his motive and said they were investigating. Hannah Miles, a 19-year-old freshman, was in her writing class when her teacher got a call from security saying the school was in lockdown. She heard gunshots from a neighboring classroom. Huddled together in the locked classroom, the students and teacher heard a footsteps outside and a man's voice call out to them, "Come on out, come on out," Miles said. They remained quiet and didn't open the door. Police soon arrived, Miles said, and after students were convinced that it was indeed officers, they opened the door. "It was like a huge burden had been lifted," she said. "A huge sigh of relief that we were going to be OK." Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin said at least two officers acted heroically in the shootout, but it was not clear if the gunman was killed by authorities or whether he took his own life. At a news conference, a visibly angry Hanlin said he would not name the shooter. "I will not name the shooter. I will not give him the credit he probably sought prior to this horrific and cowardly act," he said. Mercer had been living at an apartment complex in nearby Winchester. Yellow police tape surrounded the building Thursday night. A neighbor, Bronte Hart, said Mercer would "sit by himself in the dark in the balcony with this little light." Hart said a woman she believed to be Mercer's mother also lived upstairs and was "crying her eyes out" Thursday. Sarah Cobb, 17, was in a writing class when gunfire erupted in the next room. She heard a shot, but thought a book had fallen. Then a teacher said they needed to get out, and the class ran out the door as she heard two more shots. "I was freaking out. I didn't know what to think, what to do," she said. Distressed parents rushed to the county fairgrounds, where students were being taken by bus to reunite with families. Jessica Chandler was at the fairgrounds desperately seeking information about her 18-year-old daughter, Rebecka Carnes. "I don't know where she is. I don't know if she's wounded. I have no idea where she's at," Chandler said. Carnes' best friend told Chandler that her daughter had been flown by helicopter to a hospital, but she had not been able to find her at area medical centers. The sheriff said 10 people were dead and seven wounded. An FBI spokeswoman said the gunman was included in that number. Earlier, Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said 13 people had been killed. It was unclear what led to the discrepancy. "It's been a terrible day," a grim-faced Hanlin said. "Certainly this is a huge shock to our community." Hours after the attack, a frustrated President Barack Obama spoke to reporters at the White House, saying the U.S. is becoming numb to mass shootings and that the shooters have "sickness" in their minds. Repeating his support for tighter gun-control measures, the president said thoughts and prayers are no longer enough in such situations because they do nothing to stop similar attacks from happening a few weeks or months later. He challenged voters wanting to confront the problem to vote for elected officials who will act. Police began receiving calls about a campus shooting at 10:38 a.m. The school has a single unarmed security guard. Kortney Moore, 18, said she was in a writing class when a shot came through the window and hit the teacher in the head. The gunman then entered the Snyder Hall classroom and told people to get on the floor, she told the Roseburg News-Review newspaper. He told people to stand up and state their religion before opening fire. Next door, students heard a loud thud and then a volley of gunfire, Brady Winder, 23, told the newspaper. Students scrambled "like ants, people screaming, 'Get out!'" Winder said. He said one woman swam across a creek to get away. The gunfire sparked panic as students ran for safety and police and ambulances rushed to the scene. Lorie Andrews, who lives across the street from the campus, heard what sounded like fireworks and then saw police cruisers streaming in. She spoke with students as they left. "One girl came out wrapped in a blanket with blood on her," she said. Some students were in tears. Police lined them up in a parking lot with their hands over their heads and searched them. Roseburg is no stranger to school gun violence. A freshman at the local high school shot and wounded a fellow student in 2006. The sheriff has been vocal in opposing state and federal gun-control legislation. In 2013, Hanlin sent a letter to Vice President Joe Biden after the shooting at a Newtown, Connecticut, elementary school, declaring that he and his deputies would refuse to enforce new gun-control restrictions "offending the constitutional rights of my citizens." Before the Roseburg shooting, a posting on the message-board site 4chan included a photo of a crudely drawn frog used regularly in Internet memes with a gun and warned other users not to go to school Thursday in the Northwest. The messages that followed spoke of mass shootings, with some egging on and even offering tips to the original poster. It was unclear if the messages were tied to the shooting because of the largely anonymous nature of the site. Roseburg is in Douglas County, a politically conservative region west of the Cascade Range where people like to hunt and fish and pursue other outdoor activities. Many of the students in local schools go on to attend the college of 3,000 students. Former UCC President Joe Olson, who retired in June after four years, said the school had no formal security staff, just one officer on a shift. One of the biggest debates on campus last year was whether to post armed security officers on campus to respond to a shooting. "I suspect this is going to start a discussion across the country about how community colleges prepare themselves for events like this," he said. There were no immediate plans to upgrade security on the campus in light of the shooting, Cavin said. ___ Associated Press writers Steven Dubois in Portland, Oregon; Martha Mendoza in Santa Cruz, California; Gene Johnson and Donna Blankinship in Seattle; and Eric Tucker in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report. Brian Melley contributed writing from Los Angeles. ||||| The gunman who opened fire at Oregon's Umpqua Community College targeted Christians specifically, according to the father of a wounded student. Before going into spinal surgery, Anastasia Boylan told her father and brother the gunman entered her classroom firing. The professor in the classroom was shot point blank. Others were hit, she told her family. Everyone in the classroom dropped to the ground. The gunman, while reloading his handgun, ordered the students to stand up if they were Christians, Boylan told her family. "And they would stand up and he said, 'Good, because you're a Christian, you're going to see God in just about one second,'" Boylan's father, Stacy, told CNN, relaying her account. "And then he shot and killed them." [Last update posted at 11:28 p.m. ET] (CNN ) -- Ten people were killed when a gunman opened fire at Oregon's Umpqua Community College on Thursday, forcing the nation to face yet another mass shooting. Seven other people were injured, and the shooter is dead, Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin told reporters. Earlier estimates had put the number of people hurt much higher. Multiple law enforcement officials familiar with the investigation identified the gunman as 26-year-old Chris Harper Mercer. Investigators have interviewed members of his family and friends, they said. "I will not name the shooter," Hanlin said. "I will not give him the credit he probably sought." Authorities credited a quick response by law enforcement for keeping the death toll from climbing higher. A law enforcement official said the shooter had body armor with him and was heavily armed, with a large amount of ammunition -- enough for a prolonged gunfight. Hanlin said tactical teams and bomb squads had cleared the buildings on campus and were working to clear hundreds of vehicles parked on campus. Tactical teams/bomb technicians have cleared all campus buildings; officers working to clear hundreds of campus-parked vehicles #UCCShooting — Douglas Co Sheriff (@DouglasCoSO) October 2, 2015 Huddled together Cassandra Welding is a student at the Roseburg campus and was in class when the shooting started. "I heard a popping noise, almost like a balloon popping," she told CNN's Wolf Blitzer. "I knew something wasn't right and so I get down." She said all of the students in her classroom dropped to the ground. They huddled together behind backpacks and chairs, underneath tables. "We locked the doors, turned off the lights, and we were all pretty much in panic mode," Welding said. "We called 911 and called our parents, our loved ones ... We didn't know what was going to happen, if those were our last words or not." Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college Community members attend a candlelight vigil at Stewart Park for those killed during a shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, on Thursday, October 1. The massacre left nine people dead and nine wounded. The gunman also died. Hide Caption 1 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college In response to the shooting on October 1, President Barack Obama delivers the 15th statement of his presidency addressing gun violence. "Somehow this has become routine," he said. "The reporting is routine. My response here at this podium ends up being routine, the conversation in the aftermath of it. We've become numb to this." Hide Caption 2 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college Students and faculty are reunited with friends and family at the county fairgrounds on October 1. Hide Caption 3 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college People wait for information at the fairgrounds on October 1. Hide Caption 4 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college Hannah Miles, center, is reunited with her sister Hailey and father, Gary, on October 1. Hide Caption 5 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college A student waits to walk off a school bus at the fairgrounds on October 1. Hide Caption 6 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college Friends and family are reunited on October 1. Hide Caption 7 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college A woman is comforted after the deadly shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, on October 1. Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin announced at a news conference that the shooter was dead. Hide Caption 8 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college Authorities secure the campus after the shooting on October 1. Hide Caption 9 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college Students, staff and faculty leave the school on October 1. Hide Caption 10 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college A bullet casing is marked at the scene of the shooting on October 1. Hide Caption 11 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college People gather at a roadblock near the entrance to the college on October 1. Hide Caption 12 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college Authorities respond after reports of the shooting on October 1. Hide Caption 13 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college Police search students outside the school on October 1. Hide Caption 14 of 15 Photos: Shooting at Oregon community college A patient is wheeled into the emergency room at Mercy Medical Center in Roseburg on October 1. Hide Caption 15 of 15 The shooting The shooting appears to have started in one building before the gunman moved to the school's science building, a source with knowledge of the investigation told CNN. Those killed and wounded were found in at least two classrooms. "We arrived to find multiple patients in multiple classrooms. Law enforcement was on scene and had the shooter neutralized," said Douglas County Fire Marshal Ray Shoufler. He told CNN that two patients died while being transported to a hospital. JUST WATCHED Multiple guns found at scene of UCC shooting Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Multiple guns found at scene of UCC shooting 01:51 Mercy Medical Center posted on Facebook that it had received 10 patients. The extent of their injuries was not known. Three female victims were at PeaceHealth Sacred Heart Medical Center at RiverBend in Springfield, according to a hospital spokeswoman. It wasn't immediately clear why the hospitals' numbers conflicted with the figure provided by Sheriff Hanlin. A law enforcement official told CNN three pistols and one rifle believed to have belonged to the suspect were recovered at the scene. ATF agents were also on scene and canine teams were en route to search for explosives, fire arms casings and ammunition, a spokesman said. FBI agents were en route. The community Roseburg is a city of about 22,000 people about 70 miles south of Eugene, Oregon, and some 180 miles south of Portland. The school itself is up on a hill outside the city center, according to Rick Francona, a CNN military analyst who lives nearby. Francona said that logging is a big industry in the region, which is fairly rural but easily accessible from Interstate 5. "This is so out of character for this whole area," he said. News of the shooting quickly reached Washington, with the state's senior senator, Ron Wyden, visibly shaken and Sen. Jeff Merkley tweeting that he was praying for the victims and their families. Oregonians everywhere want Roseburg to know we're praying for them. — Ron Wyden (@RonWyden) October 1, 2015 Horrific news from Umpqua Community College in Roseburg. My heart and prayers are with the victims and their families. — Senator Jeff Merkley (@SenJeffMerkley) October 1, 2015 U.S. President Barack Obama was briefed on the situation and will continue to receive updates throughout the day. He pushed for a change in gun laws when he spoke to reporters about the shooting Thursday. "Somehow this has become routine. The reporting is routine. My response here at this podium ends up being routine, the conversation in the aftermath of it. We've become numb to this," he said. The President continued: "Our thoughts and prayers are not enough. It's not enough. It does not capture the heartache and grief and anger that we should feel, and it does nothing to prevent this carnage from being inflicted someplace else in America -- next week, or a couple months from now." The school A picturesque campus in the North Umpqua River Valley, Umpqua Community College prides itself on a "a peaceful, safe atmosphere, and year-round recreational activities," according to its website. It's not a traditional institution of higher learning, as the average age of its 13,600 students was 38 during the 2013-2014 school year. Only 740 of those were full time, 2,437 were part time and more than 10,000 fell under the umbrella of "community education." It first began teaching classes out of rented facilities in 1961. Elton and Ruth Jackson donated 98.5 acres to house the campus in 1965. The school will be closed until Monday as a result of the shooting. The interim leader of Umpqua Community College called Thursday "the saddest day in the history of the college." |||||

– The man who opened fire at a community college in Oregon Thursday has been identified, but the local sheriff refuses to say his name. Multiple law enforcement sources have identified the shooter as Chris Harper Mercer, a 26-year-old who lived in Winchester, Ore., a few miles away from Umpqua Community College, the BBC reports. Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin, however, says he will never utter the man's name, the Oregonian reports. "I will not name the shooter," the sheriff told reporters at a Thursday night briefing in Roseburg. "I will not give him credit for this horrific act of cowardice." The sheriff says the shooter is among the nine dead, and although he exchanged fire with deputies, it's not yet clear whether he was killed by police gunfire or took his own life. In other developments: The father of a wounded student tells CNN that the gunman targeted Christians. He says his daughter has told him that after the shooter entered the classroom, students dropped to the ground and he told them to stand up if they were Christian. "They would stand up and he said, 'Good, because you're a Christian, you're going to see God in just about one second,'" the father says. "And then he shot and killed them." Mercer lists "organized religion" as one of his dislikes in a dating site profile where he describes his views as "conservative, republican," reports the Daily Beast. His online presence also includes a Myspace page where he shows support for the IRA, and a blog in which he talks about Roanoke gunman Vester Flanagan. "A man who was known by no one, is now known by everyone," he writes. "His face splashed across every screen, his name across the lips of every person on the planet, all in the course of one day. Seems the more people you kill, the more you're in the limelight." Mercer has also been linked to an account on a torrent upload site with the username "Lithium Love," the Guardian reports. His final upload, around three days ago, was a documentary on the Sandy Hook school shooting. A California man who was married to the suspect's aunt tells the Daily Beast that Mercer is biracial, with a black mother and a white father who was "out of the picture" before he was born. He says the mother is from a "very upper middle class" household in Torrance, Calif. The apartment complex where Mercer lived has been surrounded by police tape, the AP reports. A neighbor says Mercer would "sit by himself in the dark in the balcony with this little light." She says he lived with his mother, who was "crying her eyes out" Thursday afternoon. (A visibly angry President Obama called for stronger gun laws in the 15th statement on a mass shooting of his presidency.)

Communications and Information Systems Able Seaman Andrew Bailey (L), Communications and Information Systems Seaman Georgina Brooks (C) and Gunner Richard Brown aboard the Australian Navy ship HMAS Perth look towards the HMAS Success during manoeuvres as they continue to... Gunner Richard Brown (L) of Transit Security Element looks through binoculars as he stands on lookout with other crew members aboard the Australian Navy ship HMAS Perth as they continue to search for missing Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 in this picture released by the... SYDNEY/PERTH, Australia A new acoustic signal was detected in the hunt for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 on Thursday, further boosting confidence that officials are zeroing in on the missing plane after weeks of searching. The signal, which could be from the plane's black box recorders, brings to five the number of "pings" detected in recent days within the search area in the Indian Ocean. The first four signals were detected by a U.S. Navy "Towed Pinger Locator" (TPL) aboard Australia's Ocean Shield vessel, while the latest was reported by an aircraft picking up transmissions from a listening device buoy laid near the ship on Wednesday. "Whilst conducting an acoustic search this afternoon a RAAF AP-3C Orion aircraft has detected a possible signal in the vicinity of the Australian Defence Vessel Ocean Shield," Angus Houston, head of the Australian agency co-ordinating the search, said in a statement. The data would require further analysis overnight but it showed the potential of being from a "man-made source", he said. The mystery of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, which disappeared more than a month ago, has sparked the most expensive search and rescue operation in aviation history, but concrete information has proven frustratingly illusive. The black boxes record cockpit data and may provide answers about what happened to the plane, which was carrying 227 passengers and 12 crew when it vanished on March 8 and flew thousands of kilometres off its Kuala Lumpur-to-Beijing route. But the batteries in the black boxes have already reached the end of their 30-day expected life, making efforts to swiftly locate them on the murky ocean floor all the more critical. "We are still a long way to go, but things are more positive than they were some time ago," Martin Dolan, chief commissioner of the Australian Transport Safety Board, which is involved in the search mission, told Reuters. NARROWING THE SEARCH AREA Up to 10 military aircraft, four civil aircraft and 13 ships are involved in the search effort that has proven fruitless in identifying any physical evidence of wreckage from the flight. Efforts are now focused on two areas - a larger one for aircraft and ships about 2,240 km (1,392 miles) northwest of Perth and a smaller area about 600 km (373 miles) closer to that west Australian city. The smaller zone is around where the Ocean Shield picked up the acoustic signals and where dozens of acoustic sonobuoys were dropped on Wednesday. Each of the sonobuoys is equipped with a listening device called a hydrophone, which is dangled about 1,000 ft below the surface and is capable of transmitting data to search aircraft via radio signals. "That does provide a lot of sensors in the vicinity of the Ocean Shield without having a ship there to produce the background noise," said Australian Navy Commodore Peter Leavy, operational head of the Australian search. But experts say the process of teasing out the signals from the cacophony of background noise in the sea is a slow and exhausting process. Operators must separate a ping lasting just 9.3 milliseconds - a tenth of the blink of a human eye - and repeated every 1.08 seconds from natural ocean sounds, as well as disturbances from search vessels. An autonomous underwater vehicle named Bluefin-21 is also onboard the Ocean Shield, and it could be deployed to look for wreckage on the sea floor once the final search area has been positively identified. As with so many things in this unprecedented search effort, experts say that will not be easy. "Working near the bottom of the ocean is very challenging because this is uncharted territory; nobody has been down there before," Erik van Sebille, an oceanographer at the University of New South Wales, told Reuters. (Editing by Lincoln Feast and Robert Birsel) ||||| Story highlights Search agency: The fifth signal is unlikely to be from the black boxes "There has been no major breakthrough," the head of the agency says Friday's search is focused on a smaller area A U.S. Navy supply ship is joining the search for the missing plane Elevated hopes that Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 might soon be found were tempered Friday, when the joint search agency said the latest signal probably isn't from the missing plane. The most recent acoustic signal detected by an Australian aircraft in the search Thursday is "unlikely to be related to the aircraft black boxes," Australian chief search coordinator Angus Houston said in a statement Friday. "On the information I have available to me, there has been no major breakthrough in the search for MH370," Houston said. "Further analysis continues to be undertaken by Australian Joint Acoustic Analysis Centre." But Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott told reporters in China on Friday that authorities are "very confident" the signals picked up by acoustic detectors are coming from the black box of missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, CNN affiliate Sky News Australia reported. It's unclear whether Abbott was referring to four signals detected earlier this week. As planes and boats scoured the Indian Ocean for more signals and signs of wreckage, a senior Malaysian government official and another source involved in the investigation divulged details about the flight to CNN on Thursday, including new information about what radar detected, the last words from the cockpit and how high the plane was flying after it went off the grid. JUST WATCHED Sources: Malaysia plane dropped altitude Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Sources: Malaysia plane dropped altitude 01:21 JUST WATCHED CNN joins MH370 search over Indian Ocean Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH CNN joins MH370 search over Indian Ocean 02:45 JUST WATCHED Search area for Flight 370 shrinks Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Search area for Flight 370 shrinks 03:48 Photos: The search for MH370 Photos: The search for MH370 Two years after Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 went missing, a relative of one of the passengers burns incense in Beijing on March 8, 2016. Flight 370 vanished on March 8, 2014, as it flew from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to Beijing. There were 239 people on board. Hide Caption 1 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 On July 29, police carry a piece of debris on Reunion Island, a French territory in the Indian Ocean. A week later, authorities confirmed that the debris was from the missing flight. Hide Caption 2 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Staff members with the Australian Transport Safety Bureau examine a piece of aircraft debris at their laboratory in Canberra, Australia, on July 20. The flap was found in June by residents on Pemba Island off the coast of Tanzania, and officials had said it was highly likely to have come from Flight 370. Experts at the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, which is heading up the search for the plane, confirmed that the part was indeed from the missing aircraft. Hide Caption 3 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 In late February, American tourist Blaine Gibson found a piece of plane debris off Mozambique, a discovery that renewed hope of solving the mystery of the missing flight. The piece measured 35 inches by 22 inches. A U.S. official said it was likely the wreckage came from a Boeing 777, which MH370 was. Hide Caption 4 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Relatives of the flight's passengers console each other outside the Malaysia Airlines office in Subang, Malaysia, on February 12, 2015. Protesters had demanded that the airline withdraw the statement that all 239 people aboard the plane were dead. Hide Caption 5 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A police officer watches a couple cry outside the airline's office building in Beijing after officials refused to meet with them on June 11, 2014. The couple's son was on the plane. Hide Caption 6 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Members of the media scramble to speak with Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, director general of Malaysia's Civil Aviation Department, at a hotel in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on May 27, 2014. Data from communications between satellites and the missing flight was released the day before, more than two months after relatives of passengers said they requested it be made public. Hide Caption 7 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Operators aboard the Australian ship Ocean Shield move Bluefin-21, the U.S. Navy's autonomous underwater vehicle, into position to search for the jet on April 14, 2014. Hide Caption 8 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A member of the Royal New Zealand Air Force looks out of a window while searching for debris off the coast of western Australia on April 13, 2014. Hide Caption 9 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 The HMS Echo, a vessel with the British Roya; Navy, moves through the waters of the southern Indian Ocean on April 12, 2014. Hide Caption 10 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A Royal Australian Air Force AP-3C Orion, on a mission to drop sonar buoys to assist in the search, flies past the Australian vessel Ocean Shield on April 9, 2014. Hide Caption 11 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A relative of a missing passenger cries at a vigil in Beijing on April 8, 2014. Hide Caption 12 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Australian Defense Force divers scan the water for debris in the southern Indian Ocean on April 7, 2014. Hide Caption 13 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A towed pinger locator is readied to be deployed off the deck of the Australian vessel Ocean Shield on April 7, 2014. Hide Caption 14 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A member of the Royal New Zealand Air Force looks at a flare in the Indian Ocean during search operations on April 4, 2014. Hide Caption 15 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 On March 30, 2014, a woman in Kuala Lumpur prepares for an event in honor of those aboard Flight 370. Hide Caption 16 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 The sole representative for the families of Flight 370 passengers leaves a conference at a Beijing hotel on March 28, 2014, after other relatives left en masse to protest the Malaysian government's response to their questions. Hide Caption 17 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A member of the Royal Australian Air Force is silhouetted against the southern Indian Ocean during the search for the missing jet on March 27, 2014. Hide Caption 18 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Flight Lt. Jayson Nichols looks at a map aboard a Royal Australian Air Force aircraft during a search on March 27, 2014. Hide Caption 19 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 People in Kuala Lumpur light candles during a ceremony held for the missing flight's passengers on March 27, 2014. Hide Caption 20 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, center, delivers a statement about the flight on March 24, 2014. Razak's announcement came after the airline sent a text message to relatives saying it "deeply regrets that we have to assume beyond any reasonable doubt that MH 370 has been lost and that none of those onboard survived." Hide Caption 21 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Grieving relatives of missing passengers leave a hotel in Beijing on March 24, 2014. Hide Caption 22 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A passenger views a weather map in the departures terminal of Kuala Lumpur International Airport on March 22, 2014. Hide Caption 23 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A Chinese satellite captured this image, released on March 22, 2014, of a floating object in the Indian Ocean, according to China's State Administration of Science. It was a possible lead in the search for the missing plane. Surveillance planes were looking for two objects spotted by satellite imagery in remote, treacherous waters more than 1,400 miles from the west coast of Australia. Hide Caption 24 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Satellite imagery provided by the Australian Maritime Safety Authority on March 20, 2014, showed debris in the southern Indian Ocean that could have been from Flight 370. The announcement by Australian officials raised hopes of a breakthrough in the frustrating search. Hide Caption 25 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Another satellite shot provided by the Australian Maritime Safety Authority shows possible debris from the flight. Hide Caption 26 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A distraught relative of a missing passenger breaks down while talking to reporters at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on March 19, 2014. Hide Caption 27 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 On March 18, 2014, a relative of a missing passenger tells reporters in Beijing about a hunger strike to protest authorities' handling of information about the missing jet. Hide Caption 28 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 U.S. Navy crew members assist in search-and-rescue operations in the Indian Ocean on March 16, 2014. Hide Caption 29 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Members of the Chinese navy continue search operations on March 13, 2014. After starting in the sea between Malaysia and Vietnam, the plane's last confirmed location, search efforts expanded west into the Indian Ocean. Hide Caption 30 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A Vietnamese military official looks out an aircraft window during search operations March 13, 2014. Hide Caption 31 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Malaysian air force members look for debris near Kuala Lumpur on March 13, 2014. Hide Caption 32 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Relatives of missing passengers wait for the latest news at a hotel in Beijing on March 12, 2014. Hide Caption 33 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A member of the Vietnamese air force checks a map while searching for the missing plane on March 11, 2014. Hide Caption 34 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A Vietnamese air force plane found traces of oil that authorities had suspected to be from the missing Malaysia Airlines plane, the Vietnamese government online newspaper reported on March 8, 2014. However, a sample from the slick showed it was bunker oil, typically used to power large cargo ships, Malaysia's state news agency, Bernama, reported on March 10, 2014. Hide Caption 35 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A U.S. Navy Seahawk helicopter lands aboard the USS Pinckney to change crews on March 9, 2014, before returning to search for the missing plane in the Gulf of Thailand. Hide Caption 36 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Buddhist monks at Kuala Lumpur International Airport offer a special prayer for the missing passengers on March 9, 2014. Hide Caption 37 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Members of a Chinese emergency response team board a rescue vessel at the port of Sanya in China's Hainan province on March 9, 2014. Hide Caption 38 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 The rescue vessel sets out from Sanya in the South China Sea on March 9, 2014. Hide Caption 39 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, center, arrives to meet family members of missing passengers at the reception center at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on March 8, 2014. Hide Caption 40 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 A relative of two missing passengers reacts at their home in Kuala Lumpur on March 8, 2014. Hide Caption 41 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Chinese police at the Beijing airport stand beside the arrival board showing delayed Flight 370 in red on March 8, 2014. Hide Caption 42 of 43 Photos: The search for MH370 Malaysia Airlines Group CEO Ahmad Juahari Yahya, front, speaks during a news conference at a hotel in Sepang on March 8, 2014. "We deeply regret that we have lost all contacts" with the jet, he said. Hide Caption 43 of 43 Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappeared from military radar for about 120 nautical miles after it crossed back over the Malay Peninsula, sources say. Based on available data, this means the plane must have dipped in altitude to between 4,000 and 5,000 feet, a senior Malaysian government official and a source involved in the investigation tell CNN. The dip could have been programmed into the computers controlling the plane as an emergency maneuver, said aviation expert David Soucie. "The real issue here is it looks like -- more and more -- somebody in the cockpit was directing this plane and directing it away from land," said CNN aviation analyst and former National Transportation Safety Board Managing Director Peter Goelz. "And it looks as though they were doing it to avoid any kind of detection." But former U.S. Department of Transportation Inspector General Mary Schiavo was not convinced. She said the reported dip could have occurred in response to a loss of pressure, to reach a level where pressurization was not needed and those aboard the plane would have been able to breathe without oxygen, or to get out of the way of commercial traffic, which typically flies at higher altitudes. That would have been necessary had the plane's transponder been turned off and it lost communications. "If you don't have any communications, you need to get out of other traffic," Schiavo said. "We still don't have any motive and any evidence of a crime yet," she said, adding that most radar can track planes at altitudes below 4,000 feet, so the plane's descent may not have indicated any attempt by whoever was controlling it to hide. She held out hope that the black boxes hold the answers and that they will be found soon. New flight details revealed Malaysian sources told CNN that Flight 370's pilot, Capt. Zaharie Ahmad Shah, was the last person on the jet to speak to air-traffic controllers, telling them "Good night, Malaysian three-seven-zero." The sources said there was nothing unusual about his voice, which betrayed no indication that he was under stress. One of the sources, an official involved in the investigation, told CNN that police played the recording to five other Malaysia Airlines pilots who knew the pilot and copilot. "There were no third-party voices," the source said. The sources also told CNN that Malaysian air force search aircraft were scrambled about 8 a.m. March 8 to the South China Sea and the Strait of Malacca, soon after Malaysia Airlines reported that its plane was missing. The aircraft took off before authorities corroborated data indicating that the plane turned back westward, a senior Malaysian government official told CNN. But the air force did not inform the Department of Civil Aviation or search and rescue operations until three days later, March 11, a source involved in the investigation told CNN. Possible signal raises hope The possible signal heard by a search plane was picked up through sonar buoys equipped to receive such electronic data and was detected near the Australian ship Ocean Shield, said the Joint Agency Coordination Centre The Australian Defense Force source said the signal detected was not at the 37.5 kHz frequency consistent with the pingers from flight data recorders but in a range that suggests strongly that it is from something that is man-made. Commodore Peter Leavy of the Royal Australian Navy said Wednesday in Perth that existing technology in RAAF P3 aircraft had been modified to allow the acoustic processor to pick up sounds in the frequency range. Using the technology in this way is experimental, according to the source. The source said four RAAF P3 Orions have been modified with this technology, with the sonar buoys expiring and sinking about eight hours after they are deployed from the aircraft. On Wednesday, Leavy said that each P3 is capable of deploying 84 buoys, laid in a pattern or grid coordinated with the Ocean Shield. Although Leavy said the buoys have sensors that can detect signals "at least" 1,000 feet below the surface, the source is confident that the technology has been tested at a "much deeper depth." Crews have been narrowing the search area in the Indian Ocean. Search areas shrinks Up to 12 military aircraft, three civil aircraft and 13 ships were assigned to assist in Friday's search for the Boeing 777-200ER, which was carrying 239 people when it vanished March 8 on a fight from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to Beijing. There were no sightings reported by search aircraft or objects recovered by ships on Thursday, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre said. JUST WATCHED Titanic founder: Search crews are close Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Titanic founder: Search crews are close 04:07 JUST WATCHED See AUV used to scour ocean in search Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH See AUV used to scour ocean in search 02:18 JUST WATCHED MH370 passenger's husband speaks out Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH MH370 passenger's husband speaks out 03:40 Friday's search area was about 18,000 square miles (46,700 square kilometers), centered 1,436 miles (2,312 kilometers) northwest of Perth. That's far smaller than the search area's size a few weeks ago. "It's pretty incredible, if you look at where we started, which was virtually the entire Indian Ocean, now getting it down to what's essentially a couple hundred square miles (where the pings have been detected) is pretty miraculous," Marks said. The Ocean Shield first picked up two sets of underwater pulses on Saturday that were of a frequency close to that used by the locator beacons. It heard nothing more until Tuesday, when it reacquired the signals twice. The four signals were within 17 miles of one another. "I believe we are searching in the right area, but we need to visually identify wreckage before we can confirm with certainty that this is the final resting place of MH370," Houston said Wednesday. As the search continues, a U.S. Navy supply ship will help provide supplies and fuel to the ships that are looking for the missing plane. The USNS Cesar Chavez will help supply Australian naval ships involved in the search "in the coming days," the Navy said in a statement. That's likely a sign that search teams are preparing for a lengthy hunt, analysts said. "I think they're getting ready for the long haul," Goelz said. "Even if they do get four or five more pings, once they drop the side-scanning sonar device down, that is going to be painstaking and long. So I think they are settling in for the long search." Friday is Day 35 in the search. Time is of the essence: The batteries powering the flight recorders' locator beacons are certified to emit high-pitched signals for only 30 days after they get wet. "The signals are getting weaker," Houston said Wednesday, "which means we're either moving away from the search area or the pinger batteries are dying." |||||

– An aircraft searching for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane picked up the fifth "ping" detected in recent days, bolstering hopes that searchers are indeed closing in on the plane's location, Reuters reports. The latest signal appears to be from a "man-made source," says the head of the Australian agency coordinating the search, meaning it could be from the airplane's black box recorders; it will be further analyzed overnight. It was picked up thanks to one of the dozens of "sonobuoys" dropped yesterday; they listen underwater and transmit data to aircraft. More reason to hope the plane will be found soon: CNN reports that the signals picked up over the weekend have been analyzed, and authorities say they likely did come from electronic equipment, not marine life, and they seem to be consistent with signals from a flight data recorder. Meanwhile, Malaysian sources have given CNN more details about the search and the plane's final moments. They say: Police played the recording of the final words spoken from the cockpit to air traffic controllers for five Malaysia Airlines pilots who knew the pilot and co-pilot of Flight 370, and those pilots confirmed it was in fact the captain speaking. "There were no third-party voices," one official source says. Sources add that there was no apparent stress, nor anything else unusual, in his voice. The plane vanished from military radar for about 120 nautical miles after crossing back over the Malaysian Peninsula, meaning it likely went as low as 4,000 feet.

Add a location to your Tweets When you tweet with a location, Twitter stores that location. You can switch location on/off before each Tweet and always have the option to delete your location history. Learn more ||||| This will appear next to all of your comments This will NOT appear anywhere on Newser ||||| One of the most emotional moments of President Obama's farewell address in Chicago Tuesday night was when he turned his attention to the first lady, professing his love and admiration for his wife of 24 years. Interested in Michelle Obama? Add Michelle Obama as an interest to stay up to date on the latest Michelle Obama news, video, and analysis from ABC News. Add Interest Following his address, the first lady took to Twitter to express a similar sentiment, posting a black-and-white photo of the Obamas with daughters Malia and Sasha waiting for the results of his senate bid on election night 2004. "So proud of @POTUS and all that we've accomplished together," the first lady wrote. "An incredible journey filled with remarkable people. I love you Barack. -mo" So proud of @POTUS and all that we've accomplished together. An incredible journey filled with remarkable people. I love you Barack. -mo pic.twitter.com/TFUN3GDLyz — The First Lady (@FLOTUS) January 11, 2017 Both the president and the first lady were noticeably emotional when the subject came to their relationship. "Michelle LaVaughn Robinson, girl of the south side, for the past twenty-five years, you’ve been not only my wife and mother of my children, you have been my best friend," the president said to the first lady, who was seated next to Malia, 18. (A White House official tells ABC News that Sasha remained in Washington because she has an exam at school Wednesday morning). The president continued, "You took on a role you didn’t ask for and made it your own with grace and grit and style and good humor. You made the White House a place that belongs to everybody. And a new generation sets its sights higher because it has you as a role model. So you have made me proud. And you have made the country proud." POTUS breaks down in tears when talking about FLOTUS: "You've not only been my wife and mother of my children, you've been my best friend." pic.twitter.com/7QCDjPWDFk — ABC News (@ABC) January 11, 2017 And addressing his daughters, he said, "Malia and Sasha, under the strangest of circumstances, you have become two amazing young women, smart and beautiful, but more importantly, kind and thoughtful and full of passion. You wore the burden of years in the spotlight so easily. Of all that I’ve done in my life, I’m most proud to be your dad." Pres. Obama to daughters Malia and Sasha: "Of all that I have done in my life, I’m most proud to be your dad." https://t.co/dS8XgbuhUB pic.twitter.com/nrkqmC8hLz — ABC News (@ABC) January 11, 2017 ABC News' Jordyn Phelps contributed to this report. ||||| Saltar todo Benvido á casa! This timeline is where you’ll spend most of your time, getting instant updates about what matters to you. Tweets not working for you? Hover over the profile pic and click the Following button to unfollow any account. Di moito cun pouco When you see a Tweet you love, tap the heart — it lets the person who wrote it know you shared the love. Únete á conversa Add your thoughts about any Tweet with a Reply. Find a topic you’re passionate about, and jump right in. Learn the latest Get instant insight into what people are talking about now. Get more of what you love Sigue máis contas para recibir actualizacións instantáneas dos temas que che importan. Find what's happening Mira as últimas conversas sobre calquera tema ao momento. |||||

– On one of the last days of his presidency, President Obama sent out the most popular tweet ever tweeted from the @POTUS account, the AP reports. "Thank you for everything," Obama tweeted following Tuesday's farewell address. "My last ask is the same as my first. I'm asking you to believe—not in my ability to create change, but in yours." The tweet had more than 550,000 retweets by Wednesday afternoon, topping the account's previous most popular tweet about gay marriage becoming legal. The @FLOTUS account also sent out a tweet following Obama's farewell address, per ABC News. "So proud of @POTUS and all that we've accomplished together," Michelle Obama tweeted. "An incredible journey filled with remarkable people. I love you Barack."

New anti-rape female condom, Rape-axe, debuts at South Africa's World Cup Guercia/Getty South African inventor Sonette Ehlers explains how her new anti-rape female condom works, at her house in Klaemond in South Africa. She is distributing 30,000 of the device at the World Cup. A South African doctor has developed a new female condom that she hopes will combat rape in the most painful way possible. Dr. Sonnet Ehlers has invented Rape-axe, a female device with jagged hooks that latch onto a man's penis during penetration. The doctor is distributing 30,000 of these condoms in South Africa during this year's World Cup. "It hurts," Ehlers told CNN. "He cannot pee and walk when it's on. If he tries to remove it, it will clasp even tighter." South Africa has one of the highest rape rates in the world, according to Human Rights Watch. It is also believed that 16 percent of the population is living with HIV. Rape-axe is inserted like a tampon and when embedded to a man the device can only be removed by a doctor. Some have accused Ehler of creating nothing more than a new-age chastity belt. "It not only presents the victim with a false sense of security, but psychological trauma," said Victoria Kajja, from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Uganda. But Ehlers said that she had taken the proper research and development steps before launching the product. "I consulted engineers, gynecologists and psychologists to help in the design and make sure it was safe," she said. Ehlers also pointed out how women take extreme measures such as placing razor blades in their nether regions to prevent rape in South Africa. "I believe something's got to be done," she said. "This will make some men rethink before they assault a woman." ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. |||||

– Rapists will soon be in for a nasty surprise from a medieval-looking female condom designed to deliver on-the-spot punishment. The "Rape-axe" device sports jagged hooks that latch onto a man's penis during penetration. South African doctor Sonnet Ehlers, the inventor of the mini-torture chamber, is distributing 30,000 of the condoms during the World Cup. "It hurts," Ehlers said. "He cannot pee and walk when it's on. If he tries to remove it, it will clasp even tighter." South Africa has one of the highest rape rates in the world, and some 16% of the population has HIV, reports the New York Daily News. Rape-axe is inserted like a tampon. Once embedded in a man's penis, it can only be removed safely by a doctor. "It's time to fight back," Ehlers announces on her web site.

Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered 755 US diplomats to leave the country in retaliation for Congress’ approving new sanctions for Moscow’s interference in the 2016 presidential election. “We waited for quite some time that maybe something will change for the better, had such hope that the situation will somehow change, but, judging by everything, if it changes, it will not be soon,” Putin said in an interview on Russian television, according to Interfax news agency. ​Putin made good on a threat he issued on Friday when he said he would ​expel 455 US diplomatic staff in Russia and seize two American properties after the Senate and the House voted overwhelmingly for new sanctions against Moscow. The diplomats have to leave Russia by Sept. 1. He said the ouster of the US diplomatic personnel will put the two former Cold War foes on equal footing. “The personnel of the U.S. diplomatic missions in Russia will be cut by 755 people and will now equal the number of the Russian diplomatic personnel in the United States, 455 people on each side,” Putin said. The Russian president left open the possibility that he could take additional measures against the US. “I am against it as of today,” he said. ​Earlier Sunday, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, appearing on ABC’s “This Week” said retaliation is “long, long overdue” after the Senate “voted so overwhelmingly on a completely weird and unacceptable piece of legislation​. I​t was the last drop.” Asked how Russia would strike back, Rybakov said the Kremlin has a long list of options. “We have a very rich toolbox at our disposal. It would be ridiculous on my part to start speculating on what may or may not happen​,” he said, adding “I can assure you that different options are on the table and consideration is being given to all sorts of things.” Russia has denied it meddled in the election despite the US intelligence community concluding otherwise. The Senate approved the bill by a 98-2 vote last week. The House previously approved the measure by a 419-3 margin. ​It awaits President Trump’s signature, and the White House said he “intends” to sign it.​ Russia has denied meddling in the election despite the US intelligence community concluding otherwise. A number of congressional panels – as well as the FBI and special counsel Robert Mueller – are investigating Russian involvement and whether Trump associated colluded. Moscow is also still fuming over former President Obama’s decision in December to oust 35 diplomats and seize two Russian diplomatic compounds in Maryland and Long Island because of the Kremlin’s involvement in the election. Still, Rybakov said he hopes that the US and Russia can find common ground on other issues. “I believe there are several areas where the U.S. and Russia can and should work together cooperatively. Nonproliferation of weapons of mass destruction, countering terrorism, illicit immigration, trafficking in people, climate change, you name it,” ​he said. ||||| This will appear next to all of your comments This will NOT appear anywhere on Newser |||||

– Russian President Vladimir Putin says the US embassy in Moscow will have to cut staff by 755 under new Russian sanctions, reports the AP. The move comes swiftly after the sanctions were overwhelmingly approved by Congress and the White House announced that President Trump intends to sign the legislation. The measure, which will limit Trump's ability to suspend sanctions, targets Russia for interfering in the 2016 US election and for military aggression in Ukraine and Syria. According to the New York Post, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said moving forward with such sanctions would cause retaliation. “We have a very rich toolbox at our disposal. It would be ridiculous on my part to start speculating on what may or may not happen?,” he said early Sunday on ABC’s This Week. “I can assure you that different options are on the table and consideration is being given to all sorts of things.” An official from the US Embassy in Moscow told the Post that there are currently around 1,100 diplomatic and support staff serving in Russia.

Justice The Simply Breathtaking Consequences Of Justice Scalia’s Death CREDIT: AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta Twenty-four hours ago, Republicans were headed into what remains of the current Supreme Court term with a solid majority and a docket strewn with some of the most consequential cases in decades. Affirmative action, abortion, birth control, immigration, an effort to shift congressional power to Republicans — all of these issues are before the justices this term. The issues remain before the Court, but the balance of power just changed. Justice Antonin Scalia, the longest-serving member of the Court and one of its most outspoken conservatives, is dead. When the sun rose this morning, Republicans enjoyed a 5-4 majority on the nation’s highest Court. It sets on an evenly divided bench. President Obama will undoubtedly nominate someone to fill the vacant seat on the Supreme Court (pro tip: you should probably get used to hearing the words “Judge Sri Srinivasan” a whole lot in the coming months). The GOP-controlled Senate, meanwhile, is overwhelmingly likely to refuse to confirm anyone Obama nominates. News of Scalia’s death had barely broken when one Senate Judiciary Committee member’s communications director offered this assessment: What is less than zero? The chances of Obama successfully appointing a Supreme Court Justice to replace Scalia? — Conn Carroll (@conncarroll) February 13, 2016 The most important rule to bear in mind now that the Court is likely to remain evenly divided for the foreseeable future is that, when the Court divides evenly on a case that is pending before it, the lower court’s order stands and the Supreme Court’s consideration of the case has no precedential value. Ordinarily, it is as if the justices never agreed to take up the case in the first place. For this term, here’s how this rule is likely to impact the Court’s docket: Immigration United States v. Texas concerns the legality of Obama administration immigration policies that, if allowed to take effect, will temporarily enable close to five million undocumented immigrants to remain in the county. It is also the case that presents the most opportunity for chaos if the Court evenly divides on the outcome. In a highly unusual order, a federal district judge issued a nationwide halt to the policy and refused to stay that decision. A conservative panel of the conservative United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld those decisions by the district judge. Thus, if the Court splits 4-4 in the Texas case, the Fifth Circuit’s order will stand. Where things get complicated is if the Justice Department successfully obtains an order from a different circuit upholding the program, or if an immigrant who hopes to benefit from the program obtains a similar order. The Fifth Circuit is among the most conservative courts in the country, and it is unlikely that every circuit will follow its lead. In that case, there will be competing court orders holding the policies both legal and illegal, and no possibility of Supreme Court review. It is not immediately clear what happens in such a case. Abortion Another case out of Texas, Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, also could lead to confusion if the Court evenly divides. Whole Woman’s Health is the greatest threat to Roe v. Wade to reach the Supreme Court in a generation. If five justices back the Texas law in this case, it is unclear that there will be any meaningful limits on states’ ability to pass anti-abortion laws. Without Scalia’s vote, however, the chances that the Supreme Court will uphold the Texas law outright is vanishingly small. Should they split 4-4, however, the Fifth Circuit’s decision upholding the Texas law will stand and states within the Fifth Circuit (Louisiana, Texas and Mississippi) will most likely gain broad discretion to restrict abortion while Scalia’s seat remains open. Meanwhile, the fate of the right to choose would rest upon which federal appellate circuit a woman happened to reside in. Women in fairly liberal circuits would likely continue to enjoy the same rights they enjoy under existing precedents, while women in conservative circuits could see their right shrink to virtual nothingness. Birth Control Geography could also play a significant role in deciding women’s ability to access birth control. To date, every federal appeals court to consider the question but one, the Eighth Circuit, has upheld Obama administration rules enabling women to obtain health plans that cover birth control even if their employer objects to contraception on religious ground. There is a good chance that Justice Anthony Kennedy, a conservative who occasionally votes with the Court’s liberal bloc in politically charged cases, could vote to uphold these rules as well, producing a 5-3 vote. If Kennedy votes with the conservatives, however, women’s access to birth control will vary from circuit to circuit. Though it is likely that most circuits will follow the majority rule and uphold the rules, women in the Eighth Circuit (Arkansas, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota) will not be as lucky. Unions Public sector unions are saved, at least for now. After oral arguments in Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, it appeared likely that an ambitious effort to defund public sector unions would gain five votes on the Supreme Court. Now this effort only has four votes. Moreover, because the plaintiffs in this case lost in the court below, a decision affirming the lower court in an evenly divided vote is effectively a victory for organized workers. Redistricting Similarly, the plaintiffs in Evenwel v. Abbott, a case that could have effectively forced many states to redraw their congressional maps in ways that would give more power to white voters and less to communities with large numbers of immigrants, almost certainly will not have five votes. Because the court below ruled against these plaintiffs, states will not have to redraw their maps, for now. Affirmative Action One case where Scalia’s absence could matter less is Fisher v. University of Texas, a challenge to affirmative action programs in university admissions. Although the court below upheld the University of Texas’s program, liberal Justice Elena Kagan is recused from this case. Therefore, four votes are enough to make up a majority. If the Court’s remaining conservatives vote against affirmative action, that is enough for them to get their way. That said, Justice Kennedy did appear somewhat reluctant to kill affirmative action outright at oral arguments (although he may want to task a lower court with the job of killing Texas’ program). In any event, if Kennedy votes with the three liberals who are not recused from this case, what would have otherwise been a 4-4 decision will now be a 4-3 decision in the liberals’ favor. The Fate of the Earth As a final note, it’s worth nothing that Scalia’s last act as a Supreme Court justice may have been to supply the fifth vote in a series of orders handed down on Tuesday halting President Obama’s most ambitious effort to fight climate change. If the Court remains evenly divided in this case, it could matter a great deal that the two judges assigned to this case in the court below are Democratic appointees. If they vote to uphold the administration’s policies, that order will stand unless there is a fifth justice who votes to reverse that decision. ||||| Supreme Court Justice Scalia speaks to Washington Metro Area Corporate Counsel Association at Ritz Carlton Tyson's Corner at their annual luncheon, with Justice Scalia in Washington, DC. on Jan.18,2012 . (Jeffrey MacMillan/The Washington Post) Antonin Scalia was certainly one of the most outspoken Supreme Court justices in American history. He always had something to say, and his angry, sometimes-furious, and often-sarcastic dissents produced some of the most memorable quotes of any Supreme Court decisions. Scalia's penchant for the colorful was evident throughout his tenure on the court. Below are 10 of his most memorable, quirky, scathing and pithy quotes. June 2015, King v. Burwell (The decision that decided the fate of the Affordable Care Act): “We should start calling this law SCOTUScare.” (In reference to the court having upheld the law for the second time, over his objections.) “This case requires us to decide whether someone who buys insurance on an Exchange established by the Secretary gets tax credits. You would think the answer would be obvious — so obvious there would hardly be a need for the Supreme Court to hear a case about it.” Antonin Scalia died on Saturday, Feb. 13. Here's a look back on his tenure, his judicial philosophy and the legacy he leaves behind. (Monica Akhtar,Natalie Jennings/The Washington Post) “The Court’s next bit of interpretive jiggery-pokery involves other parts of the Act that purportedly presuppose the availability of tax credits on both federal and state Exchanges.” June 2015, Obergefell v. Hodges (The decision that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide): “When the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified in 1868, every State limited marriage to one man and one woman, and no one doubted the constitutionality of doing so. … Since there is no doubt whatever that the People never decided to prohibit the limitation of marriage to opposite-sex couples, the public debate over same-sex marriage must be allowed to continue. But the Court ends this debate, in an opinion lacking even a thin veneer of law.” “The opinion is couched in a style that is as pretentious as its content is egotistic. It is one thing for separate concurring or dissenting opinions to contain extravagances, even silly extravagances, of thought and expression; it is something else for the official opinion of the Court to do so.” March 2012, on the Affordable Care Act: "Could you define the market -- everybody has to buy food sooner or later, so you define the market as food, therefore, everybody is in the market; therefore, you can make people buy broccoli." The U.S. Supreme Court raised its flags to half staff on Feb. 13 in honor of Justice Antonin Scalia, who passed away earlier that day. (Andrew Heining/The Washington Post) January 2012, Citizens United v. FEC (opening the door to increased outside spending in elections): "I don't care who is doing the speech — the more the merrier. People are not stupid. If they don't like it, they'll shut it off." May 2011, California Lawyer magazine interview: "Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex. The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn't. Nobody ever thought that that's what it meant. Nobody ever voted for that. If the current society wants to outlaw discrimination by sex, hey we have things called legislatures, and they enact things called laws. You don't need a constitution to keep things up-to-date. All you need is a legislature and a ballot box. You don't like the death penalty anymore, that's fine. You want a right to abortion? There's nothing in the Constitution about that. But that doesn't mean you cannot prohibit it. Persuade your fellow citizens it's a good idea and pass a law. That's what democracy is all about. It's not about nine superannuated judges who have been there too long, imposing these demands on society." May 2001, PGA Tour Inc. v. Martin (on whether a handicapped golfer could use a motorized cart): "If one assumes, however, that the PGA TOUR has some legal obligation to play classic, Platonic golf — and if one assumes the correctness of all the other wrong turns the Court has made to get to this point — then we Justices must confront what is indeed an awesome responsibility. It has been rendered the solemn duty of the Supreme Court of the United States, laid upon it by Congress in pursuance of the Federal Government’s power “[t]o regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States,” to decide What Is Golf. I am sure that the Framers of the Constitution, aware of the 1457 edict of King James II of Scotland prohibiting golf because it interfered with the practice of archery, fully expected that sooner or later the paths of golf and government, the law and the links, would once again cross, and that the judges of this august Court would some day have to wrestle with that age-old jurisprudential question, for which their years of study in the law have so well prepared them: Is someone riding around a golf course from shot to shot really a golfer? The answer, we learn, is yes. The Court ultimately concludes, and it will henceforth be the Law of the Land, that walking is not a “fundamental” aspect of golf." June 1996, United States v. Virginia: "If it were impossible for individual human beings (or groups of human beings) to act autonomously in effective pursuit of a common goal, the game of soccer would not exist." Read more: Scalia's death could lead to a historically messy political fight What happens when a Supreme Court justice passes away? Can Republicans really block Obama’s Supreme Court nomination for a year? Probably. Prior to Scalia’s death, the Supreme Court was almost as old as ever before ||||| John Gress/ASSOCIATED PRESS Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia died while on a trip to the Big Bend area of Texas, according to the U.S. Marshals Service. The longtime conservative jurist, known for an acerbic wit and occasionally biting opinions and dissents, was 79. Below are some early reactions to the news from the legal world: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott: He was the solid rock who turned away so many attempts to depart from and distort the Constitution. His fierce loyalty to the Constitution set an unmatched example, not just for judges and lawyers, but for all Americans. We mourn his passing, and we pray that his successor on the Supreme Court will take his place as a champion for the written Constitution and the Rule of Law. Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr. On behalf of the Court and retired Justices, I am saddened to report that our colleague Justice Antonin Scalia has passed away. He was an extraordinary individual and jurist, admired and treasured by his colleagues. His passing is a great loss to the Court and the country he so loyally served. We extend our deepest condolences to his wife Maureen and his family. Loretta Lynch, U.S. Attorney General “Justice Antonin Scalia was, and will always be remembered as, one of the most influential and eloquent Justices ever to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court. His indomitable conviction and his fierce intelligence left a lasting imprint – not just on the way the Supreme Court resolves cases, but on the legal landscape that he helped to transform. A lion of American law has left the stage, and it is up to all of us – every American – to keep our national constitutional dialogue as lively and as learned as he left it.” Donald Verrilli, U.S. Solicitor General “I am saddened by the passing of Justice Antonin Scalia. He was a great jurist and a great man who served the Court and the country with honor and distinction. We will miss him very much.” Laurence Tribe, professor at Harvard Law School: I’m still in shock, but one thing I can say is that I liked the Justice personally and greatly admired his contribution to our legal system even when I disagreed profoundly with his views. Carter Phillips, longtime Supreme Court advocate and chair of Sidley Austin: I argued 73 cases before him and it will be very strange to be at the podium later this month and not have him come out from behind the curtain and walk into the bench. He always made oral argument more interesting, even when he disagreed with me. I’ll miss that. Rachel Barkow, professor at NYU Law School, member of the U.S. Sentencing Commission, former clerk to Justice Scalia: I’m in rough shape today with the news of his passing, so I don’t think I have the capacity to write something as eloquent as he deserves. He was the best professional mentor I could have hoped to have and a true model of excellence in all respects. He was warm, funny, and generous —with his time and his intellect. I will miss him so much. The Federalist Society: Justice Scalia was among the greatest members of the Supreme Court in our nation’s history, and will long be remembered for his intelligent, principled, and tenacious dedication to our Constitution and to faithful interpretation of the law as its is written. He has had an enduring impact on the way our country approaches law and the Constitution, and we are grateful for that extraordinary contribution as well as the tremendous kindness he has shown the Federalist Society and many of its leaders and members since our founding. People for the American Way: Although our views on the law differed greatly, no one can doubt that Justice Scalia possessed a brilliant intellect and a profound love of our Constitution. Americans of every stripe should be grateful for his service to our nation. Nan Aron, Alliance for Justice president Alliance for Justice extends its condolences to the family, friends, and colleagues of Antonin Scalia. His death creates a vacancy at a critical time in the history of the Court, the law, and our nation. We urge President Obama to exercise his constitutional duty to nominate a replacement and for the Senate to fulfill its obligation to fairly and expeditiously consider the nominee. For the Senate to do otherwise would be an abdication of its responsibilities and a blow to public confidence in our democratic institutions. We are confident that the president will nominate someone who understands the lives and struggles of everyday Americans, and trust that that the Supreme Court of the United States will not become a casualty of the politics of destruction, denial, and obstruction. Neal Katyal, appellate lawyer at Hogan Lovells and former acting Solicitor General: Justice Scalia was THE game changer of the Court. In our lifetimes, no one has had a more profound impact on the Court–from its methodology to its opinions to the rigor of oral argument–than he did. His opinion in Morrison v Olson, a lone dissent, is the very best opinion written during my lifetime. I did not always agree with him l, but I, and every member of the Supreme Court bar, treasured him. Gregory Garre, appellate lawyer at Latham & Watkins and former Solicitor General: My first reaction is sadness at his passing and, my second, is that it is almost impossible to imagine the Court without him. I don’t think it’s possible to overstate his impact on the Court, from almost single handedly changing the nature of oral argument, to the many areas of law that his opinions shaped, to the way that he altered the manner in which judges and lawyers think about how to even approach the interpretation of the Constitution and statutes. Few Justices in our history have had the impact on the court, and the law, that Justice Scalia had. Jeffrey Fisher, appellate lawyer and Stanford Law professor He was a great man who had an incredible influence on our law. Every lawyer who ever went up there, you think about preparing for every justice, but I think it’s fair to say that Justice Scalia is at the forefront in your mind, how you’ll deal with his questions. I’ve done 28 arguments, and every one has been with him on the bench. He understood the Constitution, and the 6th Amendment in particular, as a document really meant to restrain the government. That really played out in certain ways liberals might not like on the civil side, but played out in ways that benefited criminal defendants. Michigan Supreme Court Justice Joan Larsen, former Scalia clerk: Justice Scalia had a profound effect on the shape of American law, particularly in the fields of statutory and constitutional interpretation….There were many, many people who admired Justice Scalia’s commitment to first constitutional principles, and to reading the text of statutes for what they said, not for what the judges wished they would say. But even those who disagreed with his approach, could not take him lightly. His was a brilliant mind and everyone knew it. He was a force to be reckoned with.What I wish more people knew about him is that behind his “sharp pen” lay a warm and gregarious person. He was utterly gracious and disarming in person. He could talk to anyone and make that person feel completely at ease. He had a big laugh that could fill a room and he would get this impish twinkle in his eye when he was about to deliver the “gotcha” punchline of one of his jokes. Joseph Kearney, dean of Marquette University Law School, former Scalia clerk He very much believed in—indeed, was committed to—the distinction between law and politics. He thought that distinction to be something real and worth preserving. In that regard, I recall his considering, during my clerkship, whether to interview a law clerk applicant who had distinguished himself in another field before law school. Justice Scalia was attracted to considering the applicant because of the person’s intelligence and learning. Yet upon reviewing the applicant’s law school transcript, he thought it rather devoid of law courses. I will never forget his saying, “I need a lawyer,” and thereupon putting down the application, never to pick it up again. Alex Azar, president of Lilly USA LLC, a subsidiary of Eli Lilly and Co., former Scalia clerk I’m often asked by people what was it was like to clerk for Justice Scalia. I always tell people it was intimidating, it was inspiring and it was an experience I thank God for everyday. The intimidating part was…you’re with somebody that I believed at the time and believe to this day is one of the top ten greatest figures in the history of Anglo-American law. Joshua Rosenkranz, head of appellate practice at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, former Scalia clerk: ||||| Justice Antonin Scalia’s death opens the possibility that the Supreme Court could rule 4-4 in a case before a replacement is confirmed. If that were to happen, the decision of the lower court would stand. The decision would be binding on the immediate parties but would not set a national precedent, as a normal Supreme Court decision would. It would be as if the court never ruled at all. ||||| Photo illustration by Juliana Jiménez. Photo By Tom Williams/Roll Call. Appointed to the Supreme Court by President Ronald Reagan in 1986, Justice Antonin Scalia was the pugilistic and charismatic face of the court’s conservative wing. He died Saturday at the age of 79, leaving one of the most important intellectual legacies in Supreme Court history. With a staggeringly original mind, a ferociously quotable pen, and a cult following among young conservatives, Scalia made believing in the Framers cool again. Dahlia Lithwick Dahlia Lithwick writes about the courts and the law for Slate, and hosts the podcast Amicus. His almost 30-year tenure at the high court was transformational; perhaps most striking was his advocacy for originalism (or, more correctly, textualism)—a mode of constitutional interpretation that focused on the interpretation of the law by looking scrupulously to the intent of the legislators who wrote the law. Under his leadership, the court went from an institution often divided on the best way of interpreting the Constitution to a court that often deferred completely to Scalia’s textualist preferences. So profound was his originalist influence on his colleagues that when the court decided United States v. Heller in 2008, even the liberal dissenters approached the D.C. gun laws through the lens of originalism, leading many commentators to observe that Scalia had won: “We are all originalists now.” Advertisement There is no doubt that Scalia was a hard-line conservative—a juggernaut in reversing the Warren court revolution—he led the court into culture war battles over race, abortion, religion, the death penalty, and gay rights. But Scalia was also an occasionally surprising hard-liner when it came to protecting the rights of criminal defendants who could not, for instance, challenge witnesses testifying against them or the privacy rights of those who objected to the use of thermal imaging in searches of their homes. Professionally, Scalia was perhaps most famous for his deep friendship with Ruth Bader Ginsburg—one of the court’s staunchest liberals. His regard for her intellect was so profound that it transcended all ideology. While he was the court’s larger-than-life bon vivant, and she was its diminutive whisperer, the two could not have been more respectful of each other. In an article I once did about Ginsburg’s approach to persuasion, Scalia noted, “She does it quietly; but she’s very effective.” Scalia did nothing quietly. His speeches were bombastic, his dissents lashed and slashed: In his famous dissent on the King v. Burwell ruling that upheld the Affordable Care Act, Scalia accused his colleagues of committing “interpretive jiggery-pokery” and dismissed their reasoning as “pure applesauce.” Dissenting in a case about the Defense of Marriage Act, he sneered that the majority was using “legalistic argle-bargle.” Sometimes the caustic tones would nudge other justices away from Scalia’s camp. But it won him undying admiration among the legion of young law students and lawyers who found his prose eminently readable, urgent, and scorching. On a court largely embodied by reserve and dignity, Scalia lived and wrote in Technicolor. |||||

– The death of Antonin Scalia has many wondering whether President Obama will be able to fill his Supreme Court seat. But there's lots more coverage pouring in about the late justice: So what happens if a case ends in a 4-4 tie before a new judge is in place? The lower court ruling stands, and the case ends up being kind of a waste of time for the Supremes, reports the New York Times. Votes cast by Scalia in cases that have been argued but not publicly decided are now void, and SCOTUSBlog says his death will have the biggest effect on a major union dispute. A conservative majority is now unlikely in the case. The Washington Post rounds up 10 of Scalia's most memorable lines. USA Today takes a look at five of his most notable dissents. Dahlia Lithwick at Slate explains why Scalia's "staggeringly original mind" will leave such an important legacy. The liberal site ThinkProgress lays out why the consequences of Scalia's death are "breathtaking." The Wall Street Journal is collecting reaction from the legal world.

The witness who was with Kim and Huang stated that both individuals had taken LSD earlier in the evening, and at some point Huang began to act very strange, becoming aggressive, removing his clothing and he began to destroy the apartment. Police blotter for Hunterdon, Somerset and parts of Union counties. File photo webart, police, crime, cops, drugs (Photo: Getty Images ) Story Highlights Kim and another witness identified Kevin Huang, 22-year-old city man and Rutgers University student, as the suspect who stabbed Kim inside the Sicard Street residence. The witness who was with Kim and Huang stated that both individuals had taken LSD earlier in the evening As officers secured Huang's apartment and took him into custody, they observed large quantities of drugs and paraphernalia about the apartment. NEW BRUNSWICK - City patrol officers found Andrew Kim, 23-year-old Rutgers University student, outside a Sicard Street home bleeding profusely from the neck on Saturday morning at about 1:20 a.m. Kim and another witness identified Kevin Huang, 22-year-old city man and Rutgers University student, as the suspect who stabbed Kim inside the Sicard Street residence. Officers quickly located Kevin Huang on the second floor of the Sicard Street home, naked and pacing back and forth. Huang was taken into custody while Kim was transported to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital where he was treated for his injuries. The witness who was with Kim and Huang stated that both individuals had taken LSD earlier in the evening, and at some point Huang began to act very strange, becoming aggressive, removing his clothing, and he began to destroy the apartment. The witness left the apartment to find help, and when returning, found Kim fleeing the apartment, bleeding from the neck. As officers secured Huang's apartment and took him into custody, they observed large quantities of drugs and paraphernalia about the apartment. A subsequent search warrant uncovered approximately 15 pounds of marijuana, approximately 500 bars of Xanax, a significant amount of cocaine, other unidentified pills and crystals, packaging materials consistent with drug distribution and a significant amount of cash. Huang is charged with Attempted Murder, Possession of a Weapon for an Unlawful Purpose, Unlawful Possession of a Weapon, and a series of narcotic-related offenses including possession, distribution and distribution in a school zone. This investigation continues as detectives investigate the events which led up to the assault and the scope of the narcotic activity. Anyone with information is asked to contact Detective Drew Weiss at 732-745-5217. Read or Share this story: http://mycj.co/1bEXM3j ||||| NEW BRUNSWICK — A Rutgers University student allegedly stabbed a fellow student in the neck after they both took LSD, police said. Kevin Huang, 22, allegedly stabbed a 23-year-old man at Huang's apartment on Sicard Street early Saturday morning. Police said they found a large quantity of drugs, including several pounds of marijuana, after they searched the apartment. Police said that Huang and the victim were both on LSD early this morning when Huang allegedly started to act "very strange," stripping his clothes off and destroying the apartment. A witness left the apartment to get help, and upon returning found the victim trying to flee the apartment and bleeding profusely from the neck. Officers who responded to the scene allegedly found Huang "naked and pacing back and forth," plus a bounty of drugs, including 15 pounds of marijuana, 500 bars of Xanax, a large quantity of cocaine, and materials consistent with distribution, police said. Huang, of New Brunswick, was charged with attempted murder, weapons charges, drug possession, distribution and distribution in a school zone. The victim, who has not been charged with a crime, was taken to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital and treated for his injuries, police said. Police said his injuries were not life threatening, and a hospital spokesman said he was in serious condition. The victim did not live at the Sicard Street home with Huang, according to police. Police said their investigation is continuing, and that anyone with information can contact Detective Drew Weiss at (732) 745-5217. Brian Amaral may be reached at bamaral@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @bamaral44. Find NJ.com on Facebook. |||||

– Talk about a bad trip: Police say two Rutgers University students dropped acid last night, and one got so aggressive that he stabbed the other in the throat, My Central Jersey reports. According to a witness, Andrew Kim, 23, and Kevin Huang, 22, took LSD inside a residence yesterday evening in New Brunswick, New Jersey. When Huang began acting weird, taking off his clothes and wrecking the apartment, the eyewitness fled—and says he returned to find Kim running out of the apartment with a bloody neck wound. Police arrived at roughly 1:20am this morning, found Kim bleeding badly outside, and Huang inside the residence, pacing around without a stitch on. Kim was taken to hospital, where police say he's in serious condition and should survive the attack, the Star-Ledger reports. Huang, of course, was arrested, and faces a slew of charges including attempted murder, possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose, and several drug-related charges. The latter probably stem from a search warrant police obtained for his apartment, which allegedly contained about 500 bars of Xanax, 15 pounds of marijuana, a large amount of cocaine, crystals, pills, a wad of cash, and packaging that seemed intended for drug distribution.

Getty Nothing funny about 'The Interview' Just when did assassination become a subject for American humor? This is a nation that still mourns Abraham Lincoln, John Kennedy and Martin Luther King — all assassinated. It is living through a period of renewed racial violence in which young black men have been killed by police and two New York City officers were assassinated in the past week. Story Continued Below But on Christmas Day no less, the big new movie release — “The Interview” — is a lampoon built around a plot to assassinate Kim Jong Un, the leader of North Korea. Kim is a real live person, mind you, portrayed as actually being the assassination subject in the movie. Nothing like “The Day of the Jackal,” the famous 1973 thriller that portrayed a failed assassination attempt against French President Charles de Gaulle — after de Gaulle had already died peacefully three years before. Nothing like the 1940 films of Charlie Chaplin or the Three Stooges mocking Adolf Hitler prior to the United States entering World War II. This is a distinction not lost on North Korea. The Pyongyang government is alleged by the U.S. to have mounted an unprecedented cyberattack that exposed hundreds of corporate documents within Sony Pictures, the maker of the movie. Unlike the real Korean War, no one is killed in this counteroffensive. Instead, the big revelations are: North Korea is more Internet-savvy than many thought and Hollywood more back-stabbing and even racist. President Barack Obama says Kim should lighten up and remember that the actors Seth Rogen and James Franco in “The Interview” pose no real danger. Respected critics cast the movie as one more about two aging American adolescent characters — the same Rogen and Franco — trapped in their own world just as the Korean dictator, played by Randall Park, is trapped in his. The pathos is really all about us Americans then, not Kim Jong Un after all? What a relief. But how about the killing? Suppose North Korea made a comedy about white racists plotting to assassinate Obama? They jump the fence and break into the White House only to find Obama drinking bourbon and listening to country music — whiter than they ever imagined. But they still kill him before the movie ends. Would America find that funny? No, killing makes a difference. All the more so in this period of madness where the U.S. faces enemies who slaughter children in Pakistan and then teach 8-year-olds in Syria how to behead their enemies. All the more so because this is North Korea, whose brutal record on human rights is so terrifying that even the United Nations is beginning to take notice. If America is to be a moral force, doesn’t it have to look inside itself as to what killing really is? Has it become so disconnected that it doesn’t understand how the rest of world might see our own penchant for violence? Killing is not a video game. Those killed are dead for a long time. Those who do the killing are never the same again. Just look at modern history. It used to be that there was a military draft in which American boys were regularly sent off to fight and kill for their country. World War II in the 1940s was followed by Korea in the 1950s and then Vietnam in the 1960s. By that point many young draftees in Vietnam, who had uncles or fathers in the earlier wars, felt this was almost part of growing up, becoming a man. This reporter lived through this period as an infantry medic in Vietnam in 1969. I had agreed to be drafted as a conscientious objector and carried no weapon. But there were no right answers in that war. I couldn’t escape being part of the fighting and killing any more than the rest of my platoon, boys like me whom I deeply loved. It’s a shadow on your soul that you carry forever. And one that came home again for many combat veterans in the debate in Congress over outlawing torture after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) took the lead in opposing torture as someone who had been a prisoner of war himself. For all their past tensions with McCain, veterans like Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) and Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) helped drive the bill through the House and Senate. A big part of this was an unstated code: You can ask me to kill for my country, but don’t ask me to be part of torture. In the years after Vietnam, the U.S. ended the draft and moved to a more professional, volunteer military. This worked well enough in the first Gulf War, the 1991 Desert Storm operation that was over in a matter of months. But the strain showed in prolonged engagements like Iraq and Afghanistan. The casualty rate never approached the losses in Vietnam. But the everyday American became more and more isolated from the killing, even as Army and Marine infantry were forced into repeated tours — something most draftees were spared during Vietnam. As if to punctuate this point, Clint Eastwood’s new film, “American Sniper,” about the late Navy SEAL veteran Chris Kyle, was released this past week almost alongside “The Interview.” Kyle, who served four tours in Iraq and was credited with 160 confirmed kills, was killed himself in February 2013, allegedly by a Marine veteran who is to go on trial this winter. Makes you wonder how Kyle would react to a Christmas Day comedy about assassination. Would Kyle think it was funny? ||||| The unplanned day-and-date release of The Interview raked in more than $15 million in online revenues through Saturday, Sony Pictures said in a release. The film, which just launched this morning on Apple’s huge iTunes Store, debuted Christmas Eve on YouTube Movies, the Google Play Store, Microsoft’s Xbox Live network and the stand-alone site SeeTheInterview.com. Sources said more than half the revenues came from the two Google-owned outlets, where the film was topping sales charts within a day of its online release. The film is not in the Top 30 on the iTunes store so far today. The initial offering was only in the United States, but was subsequently expanded to Canada. Sony said the $15 million in revenues comes from both sales and rentals for the first four days of the controversial comedy’s release. In all, Sony said the film had been rented or purchased 2 million times. The film cost $5.99 to stream as a rental, or $14.99 to download and own. Both versions were in HD. The film also was screened in 331 theaters, bringing in another $2.8 million beginning Christmas Day. The substantial online revenues for the film may fuel additional conversation and even controversy about day-and-date debuts for films online and in theaters. Most larger chains and some smaller ones refuse as a matter of policy to screen films that simultaneously are available online. That was one reason why the reinstated Interview ended up mostly in art houses, which already have been dealing with such day-and-date releases for some time now. Indeed, in the case of many specialty releases from indie distributors such as The Weinstein Company’s Radius unit, the VOD offering may arrive a month ahead of the theatrical debut. Having a big-budget film (The Interview cost a reported $44 million to create) get the day-and-date treatment, even in the extraordinary circumstances of the film, may encourage larger distributors to consider such an approach to maximize marketing dollars on the front end of a film’s release. |||||

– In four days, The Interview pulled in $15 million, Sony Pictures says in a press release. That's in the period through Saturday, during which, Sony says, the film was rented or bought two million times online, deadline.com reports. But its success so far isn't something to be proud of, writes David Rogers at Politico. It's all about "a real live person" being assassinated, and that's not funny. "When did assassination become a subject for American humor?" Rogers wonders. "This is a nation that still mourns Abraham Lincoln, John Kennedy, and Martin Luther King." "If America is to be a moral force, doesn’t it have to look inside itself as to what killing really is?" he asks, questioning how we'd react if, for instance, "North Korea made a comedy about white racists plotting to assassinate Obama." As for the president's own comments on the movie: Obama may make light of the Seth Rogen effort, but killing, Rogers writes, is "a shadow on your soul that you carry forever." He compares the silly film to another recent movie, Clint Eastwood's American Sniper, which tells the story of former Navy SEAL Chris Kyle. Kyle was killed last year: Would he find The Interview funny? Rogers asks. Click for the full piece, or read another stance from a critic who calls the film "an insult to satire."

Emergency responders work at the scene of a crash between an Amtrak passenger train and a CSX freight train Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018 in Cayce, S.C. The crash left multiple people dead and dozens of people... (Associated Press) Emergency responders work at the scene of a crash between an Amtrak passenger train and a CSX freight train Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018 in Cayce, S.C. The crash left multiple people dead and dozens of people injured. (Lexington County Sheriff's Department via AP) (Associated Press) CAYCE, S.C. (AP) — An Amtrak passenger train slammed into a freight train parked on a side track in South Carolina in the early morning darkness Sunday, killing two Amtrak crew members and injuring more than 110 people, authorities said. It was the third deadly wreck involving Amtrak in less than two months. The Silver Star was en route from New York to Miami with nearly 150 people aboard around 2:45 a.m. when it plowed into the CSX train at an estimated 59 mph, Gov. Henry McMaster said. The crash happened around a switchyard about 10 miles (16 kilometers) south of Columbia. The governor said investigators have yet to determine how the Amtrak train ended up on that stretch of track. "The CSX was on the track it was supposed to be on," McMaster said. The National Transportation Safety Board sent investigators to the scene. In an emailed statement, Amtrak said that it was "deeply saddened" by the deaths and that it was cooperating fully with the NTSB. It did not address the cause of the crash but said CSX maintains all the tracks and signal systems where the accident happened and controls access to the sidings and yards. CSX did not immediately return an email and telephone call. The force of the crash dislodged a seat and knocked it onto passenger Tronia Dorsey's legs, said her son, Andre Neblett, who spoke with her. The 43-year-old woman, who escaped with minor scratches and bruises, described a terrifying scene inside the dark compartment, with people screaming and babies wailing, he said. "It was chaos," Andre Neblett said after driving in from North Carolina to retrieve his mother's suitcase from a Red Cross shelter. "She said she was just waiting on somebody to get to her." The conductor and engineer aboard the Amtrak locomotive were killed, the coroner's office said. And 116 people were taken to four hospitals, according to the governor. At least three patients were hospitalized in critical or serious condition, with nearly all the rest treated for minor injuries such as cuts, bruises and whiplash, authorities said. Palmetto Health emergency room doctor Eric Brown said so many passengers were hurt that they were brought in on two buses, and a tent that had been set up as a waiting room to keep people separate from flu patients was turned into a triage area. The locomotives of both trains were left crumpled, the Amtrak engine on its side. One car in the middle of the Amtrak train was snapped in half, forming a V off to one side of the tracks. "It's a horrible thing to see, to understand the force involved," the governor said after touring the scene. Many passengers were asleep with the train began shaking violently and then slammed to a halt, passenger Derek Pettaway told CBS. "You knew we'd hit something or we'd derailed," he said. Elliot Smith told The State newspaper of Columbia that he was staying with a friend when they heard what sounded like a propane tank exploding. "The sound was so loud, you instantly knew it was bad," he said. Smith said he and his friend saw passengers limping along the tracks, while others tried to get everyone out of the cars. Amtrak officials gathered up luggage and other belongings and within hours put passengers aboard buses to their destinations. Before being sent on their way, those who were not hurt were taken to a shelter set up at a middle school, and local businesses provided coffee and breakfast. "We know they are shaken up quite a bit. We know this is like nothing else they have ever been through. So we wanted to get them out of the cold, get them out of the weather — get them to a warm place," sheriff's spokesman Adam Myrick said. The dead were identified as engineer Michael Kempf, 54, of Savannah, Georgia, and conductor Michael Cella, 36, of Orange Park, Florida. Lexington County Coroner Margaret Fisher's voice caught as she released the names of the dead. "Any time you have anything that happens like that, you expect more fatalities. But God blessed us, and we only had the two," Fisher said. On Wednesday, a chartered Amtrak train carrying Republican members of Congress to a strategy retreat slammed into a garbage truck at a crossing in rural Virginia, killing one person in the truck and injuring six others. And on Dec. 18, an Amtrak train ran off the rails along a curve during its inaugural run on a route south of Tacoma, Washington, killing three people and injuring dozens. It was going nearly 80 mph, more than twice the speed limit. After the latest crash, Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said the nation's railroads must be made safer, declaring, "Business as usual must end." He said proven technology, including positive train control, cannot continue to be delayed. Positive train control is GPS-based technology that can automatically slow or stop speeding trains. Regulators have been pressing for years for such equipment, and some railroads have installed it, but the deadline has been pushed back repeatedly at the industry's request. The latest wreck again raised criticism about the safety culture of the nation's passenger railway. With the string of crashes "it's becoming almost like an epidemic for Amtrak," said Najmedin Meshkati, a University of Southern California engineering professor who has studied positive train control. The worst rail tragedy in recent South Carolina history took place in 2005 when a freight engineer parked a train on a side track near a textile mill in Graniteville and forgot to flip the switch back to the main track. A freight train passing through went barreling down the side track and slammed into the parked train, killing nine people, most of them millworkers choked by chorine gas that leaked from a damaged tanker car. ___ Associated Press writer Jeffrey Collins in Columbia, South Carolina, contributed to this report. ||||| The engineer of the Amtrak train, Michael Kempf, 54, of Savannah, Georgia, and the conductor, Michael Cella, 36, of Orange Park, Florida, were killed, Lexington County Coroner Margaret Fisher said. A friend of Cella’s, Michael Callanan, told NBC affiliate WIS of Columbia that the conductor had two young children and had recently purchased a home. “When he got done with work, he put his stuff in his bag and went home,” said Callanan, a former conductor who met Cella in 2008 while working for Amtrak in Jacksonville. On his Facebook profile, which was confirmed by a relative to NBC News, Kempf posted often about politics and military veterans. He also wrote to his wife, “my Best Friend, Soul Mate and at last, my Lovely Wife Thank You for your support and putting up with Me.” Authorities investigate the scene of a fatal Amtrak train crash in Cayce, South Carolina on Feb. 4, 2018. Tim Dominick / The State via AP Robert Sumwalt, chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, or NTSB, said that the Amtrak train was diverted from the main track, where it was supposed to have been, onto a side track where the CSX freight train was. The freight train had been at a loading and unloading facility for automobiles before being parked on the side track, he said. Sumwalt said a rail switch that changes the direction of the track was lined in a way that diverted the Amtrak train from the main line onto the side track. "For whatever reason, that switch was, as they say in the railroad industry, 'lined and locked,' which means it was aligned for the train coming down this way to be diverted into the siding," he said. "Of course, key to this investigation is learning why that switch was lined that way, because the expectation, of course, is that the Amtrak would be cleared and operating straight down like this," he added, pointing to a whiteboard drawing of the tracks. The CSX train was stationary and appeared to be empty at the time of the crash, officials said. McMaster said there were several train tracks at the location of the collision. The NTSB sent an investigative team, and Amtrak and CSX said in statements that they were fully cooperating with the safety board. Amtrak said that CSX maintains all of the tracks and signal systems in the area. Richard Anderson, Amtrak's president and chief executive, said in a phone call with reporters that "our understanding is that the signal system was down and that we were being managed by the dispatchers and by CSX controlling the switches on this bypass." Anderson added that the Amtrak train was supposed to be on the main line "just east of the collision." CSX did not provide details about the collision. In a statement, the company said it was focused on assisting victims and working with NTSB investigators. The statement added that the company “hosts more passenger trains on its network than any other major railroad in the United States, and passenger rail remains one of the safest ways to travel.” The collision was yet another crash highlighting Positive Train Control, a system that among other things is designed to prevent trains from speeding. "A fully operational Positive Train Control system could've avoided this accident — that’s what it's designed to do," Sumwalt said Sunday afternoon. An Amtrak train, bottom right, and a CSX freight train, top left, crashed in Cayce, South Carolina on Feb. 4, 2018. Jeff Blake / AP Dr. Steve Shelton, director for emergency preparedness at Palmetto Health System, said that it received 62 patients across its three facilities. Shelton added that the "majority" of patients did not sustain life-threatening injuries. Hospital officials said later Sunday that six patients had been admitted. Lexington Medical Center said it received 27 patients, most with minor injuries. Many were treated for cuts and bruises and were released, while two were admitted, spokeswoman Jennifer Wilson said. Jaclyn Kinney, 22, from of Pinehurst, North Carolina, was in the sleeper car with her boyfriend on their way to Orlando. "We basically woke up to the train crash," she told NBC News. "It knocked us around, and we got bumped into the wall from the impact, and the train derailed. The cafe car that was right in front of us was in much worse shape, so we were lucky," she said. "The staff members came by and made sure people were OK before we left the car. We were waiting for a few minutes before they evacuated us." "There were a few people with noticeably bad injuries, but most people didn't seem super injured," Kinney added. ||||| The Amtrak train that collided Sunday morning with a freight train and killed two people appeared to be on the wrong track, possibly because a switch was in the wrong position, S.C. Gov. Henry McMaster and state officials said Sunday. Investigators now are trying to determine if the switch was misaligned, causing the passenger train to run off the main line and collide with the parked freight train, according to the S.C. Office of Regulatory Staff. The CSX freight train was empty, stationary and on a loading track when the collision occurred, McMaster said. The Amtrak train was traveling about 50 mph, within the posted 59 mph speed limit, according to the regulatory staff agency. “It appears to me that the CSX train was on the track it was supposed to be on,” McMaster said. “It appears Amtrak was on the wrong track.” SIGN UP Tom Allen, a transportation safety director with the state ORS, said “it was probably a switching issue’’ that caused the Amtrak train to run onto the side track. The National Transportation Safety Board will be looking into the matter as the lead investigative agency, Allen said. Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board will be arriving on site all day, and that includes NTSB chairman Robert Sumwalt, a Columbia native. “Part of the preliminary indications are that it would have to be a switching issue,’’ Allen told The State. “It was no derailment caused by a flaw in the track. The Amtrak was on the wrong track.’’ CSX, which owns the track, would be responsible for maintaining the switch on the track, Allen said. The federal government has been moving to institute what is known as “positive train control,’’ a system that would warn speeding trains of upcoming dangers. But Allen said indications are that positive train controls had not yet been implemented. “At this time, to my knowledge, this train did not have the PTC,’’ or positive train control, Allen said. According to the Federal Railroad Administration, Congress required some railroad mainlines, including those with commuter rail passenger service, to fully implement positive train control by the end of 2015. But Congress extended the deadline by at least three years to December 31, 2018, according to the FRA. Such technology acts similar to a breaking system, to prevent crashes. The two people who died were Amtrak workers, McMaster said. More than 100 were treated at local hospitals for various injuries. “It’s a horrible thing to see to understand the force that is involved,” McMaster said after viewing scene. “The first engine of the freight train was torn up and the single engine of the Amtrak train was barely recognizable. It was quite a crash.” Sunday’s crash brought back memories for many people of a disastrous train wreck that occurred in Graniteville 13 years ago, when a freight train ran off a main line and collided with a parked train on a side track. In that case, a switch was determined to be in the wrong position. The difference between the Graniteville wreck and the Cayce crash is that chemicals were not involved with the Cayce wreck, according to preliminary reports. The Graniteville wreck killed nine people when chlorine was released over the small mill town in Aiken County. On Sunday, McMaster visited with the Cayce passengers who were taken to a Red Cross shelter set up at nearby Pine Ridge Middle School. He said he counted 32 people being taken care of at the school. “The spirits, under the circumstances, were very good,” he said. This is the second fatal Amtrak crash nationally in a week and the third in the last few months. Three people were killed in Washington State in December when an Amtrak train crashed there. Other key news and developments from Sunday’s crash. ▪ The crash occurred near Charleston Highway and Pine Ridge Road around 2:35 a.m. Sunday. The lead Amtrak car and a few passenger cars derailed. ▪ There were eight crew members and approximately 139 passengers on board. Anyone seeking info about passengers on Train 91 should call the Amtrak info line at 1-800-523-9101. ▪ All the passengers have been removed from Amtrak 91, which was operating from New York to Miami. ▪ 116 people were taken to local hospitals with various injuries. ▪ The White House released this statement: “The President has been briefed on the train accident in South Carolina and is receiving regular updates. Our thoughts and prayers are with everyone that has been affected by this incident.” |||||

– The cause of Sunday morning's deadly train crash in South Carolina appears to be the most basic one imaginable: The Amtrak train that plowed into a parked freight train was on the wrong track, say state officials. Now the big question is how that happened. Two people are dead—the conductor and engineer aboard the Amtrak train—and more than 110 people injured, per the latest count from the AP. At least three of the injured were in serious or critical condition, and almost everyone else had relatively minor cuts or bruises. The Amtrak Silver Star from New York to Miami had been traveling about 50mph when it crashed into the empty CSX train, well within the 59mph speed limit for that stretch of tracks in Cayce, South Carolina, reports the State. The best guess at this point is that a switch in the wrong position sent the Amtrak train onto the wrong path. “Part of the preliminary indications are that it would have to be a switching issue,’’ says a state transportation official. "It was no derailment caused by a flaw in the track. The Amtrak was on the wrong track.’’ He adds that CSX owns the track and would be the one responsible for maintaining the switches. Amtrak emphasized that point in its own statement, which also said it was "saddened" at the death of its two employees. NBC News reports that the Amtrak train received verbal permission to use the set of tracks because the CSX signals were offline for maintenance. The crash might have been avoided if the tracks had a safety system known as the Positive Train Control system, which sends warnings to trains ahead of a possible collision. PTC is being phased in around the country, but it's not up and running yet on these tracks.

Law enforcement officers gather near where a body was found north of Laredo, Tex. (Danny Zaragoza/Laredo Morning Times/AP) The woman in the white pickup was feeling increasingly uneasy about the driver, whom she knew only as “David.” Two fellow sex workers in Laredo, Tex., had been recently killed, and one was her friend Melissa. The man and the woman had already been at his house, where she had discussed Melissa. He had reacted strangely, she later told authorities, and the situation had grown so tense that she vomited in the front yard before they left for a gas station. The woman’s mind lingered on Melissa. She wanted to keep talking about her. He produced a gun in response and grabbed hold of her shirt. She managed to jump out of the truck and into the night, her shirt torn from her body. He fled, and she found a state trooper fueling up nearby. She told the trooper where the man lived. That information led officers to Juan David Ortiz, a supervisory Border Patrol agent. He had been hiding in a hotel parking lot after fleeing from officers and was arrested at 2:30 a.m., according to an affidavit provided to The Washington Post by county prosecutors. Ortiz, 35, confessed to the two September murders, according to the document. But he had other confessions to make. He had killed two more women early Saturday morning in the five hours between the assault on the escaped woman and his capture. Juan David Ortiz is accused in the killing of at least four sex workers in Laredo, Tex., where he is a supervisor with Border Patrol. (Webb County Sheriff’s Office/AP) “We consider this man to be a serial killer who was preying on one victim after another,” Webb County Sheriff Martin Cuellar said. Webb County-Zapata County District Attorney Isidro Alaniz said he believed Ortiz acted alone in the murders while off duty. He is a 10-year veteran of the agency and worked in intelligence, authorities said. He is being held on $2.5 million bond. Ortiz was charged with four counts of murder, aggravated assault and unlawful restraint, Alaniz told The Post on Sunday. All the women involved were sex workers, including the woman who escaped, the district attorney said, and there are signs that at least some of them were not chosen at random. “Evidence points to him having knowledge and contacts within the [sex worker] community,” Alaniz said, including Melissa Ramirez, the first woman Ortiz said he killed. But Ortiz does not appear to have known the last two victims, he said. Alaniz is also overseeing another case involving a Border Patrol agent in Laredo, a man accused of killing his lover and their 1-year-old son. The victims in the Ortiz case were killed or left for dead in rural parts of Webb County, which borders the Rio Grande. Laredo is about 150 miles southwest of San Antonio. The first two were U.S. citizens, but Alaniz said authorities have not released details on the last two. The Post is withholding the name of the woman who escaped. The Texas Rangers and the Webb County Sheriff’s Office are investigating the murders, authorities said. In a statement, Customs and Border Protection said it was cooperating with investigators. “While it is CBP policy to not comment on the details of an ongoing investigation, criminal action by our employees is not, and will not be tolerated,” said Andrew Meehan, a spokesman for the agency. “Our sincerest condolences go out to the victims’ family and friends.” [Shark attacks and kills a man who was boogie-boarding at a Cape Cod beach] The National Border Patrol Council did not return a request for comment about hiring and screening standards for agents. The arrest record recounts the brutal symmetry of the execution-style killings, along with the alarm that spread within the seemingly tightknit community of sex workers after the first two slayings. Ortiz told investigators that he picked up Ramirez on Sept. 3. They drove about 30 miles from town, and she got out of his vehicle to urinate off a country road cutting through dense shrub land. Then he shot her in the head multiple times, the affidavit says. She was later found dead. Ramirez was a mother of two young children, the Laredo Morning Times reported. “I hurt a lot. All I want is justice. I want that guy to die in jail for taking the life of my daughter,” her mother, Maria Cristina Benavides, told the paper. Ten days later, investigators said, Ortiz drove Claudine Ann Luera outside the city a few miles from where he said he killed Ramirez. He told investigators that she accused him of being the last person to see Ramirez alive. Ortiz said that she got out and that he shot her in the head, the document says. Luera was found alive and died of her wounds at a hospital. The next two killings occurred in the hours after the woman escaped early Saturday, authorities said. Ortiz told investigators that he picked up an unknown woman whom the document identifies only as “Jane Doe.” He told her to exit the vehicle along Highway 35 outside Laredo, then shot her multiple times in the head, according to the document. He then went back to the city. While in Laredo, he picked up another person — whom Alaniz described as a transgender woman — and took her five miles from the site of the earlier killing. Ortiz said he shot her once in the back of the head and told investigators where they could find the body. They discovered it behind gravel pits, near a single shell casing, the document says. Alaniz lauded the woman who escaped and said perhaps Ortiz would have killed more people had she not demonstrated such bravery. He declined to discuss any potential motives, citing the investigation. Purported Facebook messages by Juan David Ortiz. (Webb County-Zapata County District Attorney's Office) At some point after the woman escaped, prosecutors say, Ortiz left cryptic messages on Facebook for his family, according to images provided to The Post. “To my wife and kids, I love u,” one reads. The other: “Doc Ortiz checks out. Farewell.” Ortiz served as a Navy corpsman, Alaniz said. They commonly go by “Doc” in the service. Ortiz was defiant and uncooperative under questioning, at least at the start. Detectives asked him to do “the right thing,” Alaniz said. Ortiz asked for the handcuffs to come off, and the circumstances behind the murders began to trickle out, the district attorney said. One woman shot in the face. Another shot from his vehicle. There were no tears. “This guy is cold,” Alaniz said. Read more: In horrifying detail, women accuse U.S. customs officers of invasive body searches U.S. is denying passports to Americans along the border, throwing their citizenship into question The Border Patrol tries to win over Hispanic communities — by singing love songs in Spanish California professor, writer of confidential Brett Kavanaugh letter, speaks out about her allegation of sexual assault ||||| CLOSE Here are the top stories for Sunday, September 16th: U.S. Coast Guard members rescue flood victims; U.S. Border Patrol supervisor charged in killing four women; Typhoon barrels into southern China; Jane Austen fans gather in Bath, England. AP Juan David Ortiz (Photo: Webb County Sheriff's Office) The arrest of a veteran Border Patrol agent as a serial murder suspect in the shooting deaths of four people has rocked the border community of Laredo, Texas. Laredo is often seen as a relatively small community, but its population has surged over the past 27 years, from 125,787 in the 1990 U.S. Census to 260,654 in 2017. Webb County District Attorney Isidro R. “Chilo” Alaniz sought to drive that point home during an impromptu press conference Saturday following the arrest of 35-year-old Juan David Ortiz on multiple counts of murder and other charges. "Laredo's not the sleepy town that we all grew up in," Alaniz said. "These are crimes that are consistent with bigger cities – Laredo is a big city. We're seeing more and more serious crimes, (so) it can happen. People need to be careful. We need to look out for each other." More: Updated: Border Patrol agent charged with murder Ortiz, a 10-year veteran of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, is being held on four counts of murder, as well as one count each of evading arrest or detention, unlawful restraint – expose to serious bodily injury, and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, according to online jail records. His bond is set at $2.5 million. Webb County Sheriff Martin Cuellar, during Saturday's press conference, said an attempted kidnapping Friday is what led authorities to Ortiz. His arrest capped what had been a 10-day period during which authorities found the bodies of four people who each had been shot to death. Law enforcement officers gather near the scene where the body of a woman was found near Interstate 35 north of Laredo, Texas on Saturday, Sept. 15, 2018. (Photo: AP) A fifth person – a woman named Erika Pena – was nearly kidnapped on Friday but was able to run from Ortiz and flag down a state trooper at a nearby gas station, according to an affidavit provided by the Webb County District Attorney's Office. "Apparently, the suspect pulled out a gun on her, and she was able to escape," Cuellar said during Saturday's press conference. The affidavit identified two of the deceased as 42-year-old Claudine Ann Luera and 29-year-old Melissa Ramirez. Ramirez's body was the first found, discovered on Sept. 4. She had been shot multiple times in the head, according to the affidavit. Ortiz reportedly told investigators that he picked Ramirez up in the area of San Bernardo Avenue on Sept. 3, then drove outside the city limits, according to the affidavit. When they arrived at the location, Ramirez got out of the vehicle to urinate, at which point Ortiz used a handgun to shoot her multiple times in the head before driving away, according to the affidavit. A motive for the killing was not given. Ramirez is survived by her two children, her mother and two siblings. According to the affidavit, Pena said Ortiz had picked her up on San Bernardo Avenue and took her to his home. Pena said that when she mentioned Ramirez's murder the week before, Ortiz "began to act weird," according to the affidavit. The Laredo, Texas, home of 35-year-old Juan David Ortiz, center. Ortiz, a 10-year-veteran of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, was arrested Sept. 15 for the murder of four women. (Photo: Eleanor Dearman/Caller-Times) When the two went to a nearby gas station, they began talking again about Ramirez's murder when Ortiz pulled a black pistol on Pena and pointed it at her, according to the affidavit. When she tried to get out of the pickup, Ortiz grabbed her shirt – but Pena was able to pull it off and run away, fleeing toward a state trooper who was refueling his patrol vehicle, according to the affidavit. Luera was found Sept. 13 shot and left on the side of a road but still alive. She died at a hospital later in the day, according to the affidavit. Ortiz reportedly told police that after picking up Luera on San Bernardo Avenue, they drove outside the city limits. Ortiz stated that he pulled over after Luera "became nervous" and began accusing Ortiz of being the last person seen with Ramirez. When Luera got out of the vehicle, according to the affidavit, Ortiz also exited and used a handgun to shoot Luera multiple times in the head before leaving the area. A truck driver later found Luera's body, and she was transported to a local hospital where she died. . According to the affidavit, after Pena escaped Ortiz's vehicle at the gas station, he went on to kill two more people that same evening. The identities of the other two victims have not been released by law enforcement officials. Those two individuals were only identified in the affidavit as "Jane Doe" and "John Doe," but both had been shot to death. The Texas Tribune reported that one of the victims was a transgender woman. A single spent casing was found near the body, according to the affidavit. Texas Rangers and investigators with the sheriff's department went to Ortiz's home and searched it, but Ortiz was not home. He was found just after 1 a.m. at a gas station near San Bernardo Avenue and Jefferson Street but fled on foot when approached by state troopers, according to the affidavit. He was found at about 2:30 a.m. Saturday hiding in a pickup at a hotel parking garage, according to the affidavit. Ortiz provided a "voluntary verbal confession" to all four murders and Pena's attempted kidnapping and aggravated assault, according to the affidavit. "The county and city can rest assured that we have a serial killer in custody," Cuellar said. Christina Ayala, 29, was at H-E-B grocery store shopping on Sunday night in Laredo, and said she and her family had heard about the killings. The news was especially shocking to her because a Border Patrol agent is the one accused. "That's somebody that you would actually go to for help or something," she said. Ayala has lived in the South Texas city her entire life, and said she didn't expect something like the serial murders to happen there. "It's not a big city like San Antonio, Houston, where you see that a lot," she said. Laredo population growth 1990: 125,787 2010: 236,057 2017: 260,654 Source: U.S. Census Bureau Read or Share this story: https://usat.ly/2xlUT3X |||||

– Police say a woman who escaped from an accused serial killer in Laredo, Texas, likely saved lives. Authorities were still piecing together the details of the case of veteran Border Patrol agent Juan David Ortiz, who allegedly killed four people and attempted to kidnap a fifth before his arrest over the weekend. The woman who escaped, a sex worker, told police that Ortiz, 35, picked her up on the street and took her to his home, reports the Corpus Christi Caller Times. She said he began acting "weird" when she kept talking about the recent murder of two other sex workers, one of them a friend. They left his home, and the woman, by now afraid for her life, made a break for it at a gas station, according to the police affidavit. Ortiz allegedly pulled a gun on her in his pickup truck, and she leaped out of the vehicle as he tried to grab her shirt. She then ran to a trooper at the gas station. Police arrested Ortiz hours later, at 2:30am, in a hotel parking lot, but they say he had killed two more women, also sex workers, in the interim, reports the Washington Post. One of the latter victims was transgender. Ortiz reportedly told investigators that he shot his first victim by the side of the road on Sept. 3 after a sexual encounter and the second after she accused him of being the last person to see the first victim alive. "This guy is cold," says Webb County-Zapata County District Attorney Isidro Alaniz. Ortiz is a 10-year veteran of the US Customs and Border Protection, and authorities say he committed the murders while off duty. He is being held on $2.5 million bond. "It's not a big city like San Antonio, Houston, where you see that a lot," says one Laredo resident of the killing spree.

Sponsored Links Weeks after Egypt's vibrant, youth-led revolution, disturbing details are emerging about the treatment of some young female protesters briefly detained by Egyptian soldiers. Some of the women say they were strip-searched, photographed naked, beaten and forced to undergo "virginity tests" on threat of prostitution charges.At least 18 women were captured and held in military detention after army officers violently cleared Cairo's Tahrir Square on March 9, nearly a month after pro-democracy protesters ousted President Hosni Mubarak from power. After their release days later, several of them complained to Amnesty International about their treatment. The human rights group issued a public report on the allegations Wednesday, calling on the Egyptian government to investigate such claims of torture.One of the women is Salwa Hosseini, 20, who said she was arrested and taken to a military prison where she and other women were forced to take off all their clothes. They were searched by a female prison guard, she said, but male soldiers were able to look inside through two open doors and a window -- and snap photos of the degraded prisoners. In a different room, she said, a man in a white lab coat subjected them to "virginity tests" and threatened that those who didn't "pass" would be charged with prostitution.For one of the girls who claimed to be a virgin, the test purportedly declared otherwise -- and she was then tortured with beatings and electric shocks."Forcing women to have 'virginity tests' is utterly unacceptable," Amnesty International said. "Its purpose is to degrade women because they are women. All members of the medical profession must refuse to take part in such so-called 'tests.'"Amnesty continued: "Women and girls must be able to express their views on the future of Egypt and protest against the government without being detained, tortured or subjected to profoundly degrading and discriminatory treatment."Some of the alleged beatings outlined by Amnesty International even took place inside an annex of the famed Egyptian Museum, where thousands of the country's most precious antiquities are housed. An Egyptian journalist detained along with some of the victims, Rasha Azeb, said she heard the screams of women being tortured and given electric shocks inside the museum. The building was also looted during violent clashes between protesters and Egyptian security forces in February.On Monday, 16 Arab and Egyptian rights groups sent a letter to Egypt's Health Ministry urging an investigation into the alleged conduct by Egyptian doctors, soldiers and officers. The letter, excerpted by the Abu Dhabi-based newspaper The National , accused them of "violating the sanctity of the human self and human body."One of the signatories, Aida Saif el Dawla, who co-founded the El Nadim Center for Rehabilitation of Victims of Violence , laughed off the idea that the Egyptian government might actually do something about the abuse. "Of course not," she told the newspaper. "But there is always somebody who knows somebody on the military council, and from that we hear them say they don't have any idea of what was happening in the military prison."El Dawla's group said it too gathered testimony similar to the complaints published by Amnesty International.In Egypt, many women face diminished chances of getting married if their "honor" is not intact. Surgical procedures to "restore" a woman's virginity are common in Egypt and across the Muslim world, as are products that claim to help women fake their virginity and make it seem as if they are having sexual intercourse for the first time.Serious crime is relatively scant in Cairo, a city of 20 million that has a fraction of the number of rapes and violent attacks of other big world capitals. But sexual harassment has long been a problem in Egypt, where poverty and sexual repression amid conservative Muslim norms have been blamed for misconduct by mostly young, uneducated Egyptian men.Many foreign tourists and workers also complain of harassment, but attacks rarely reach the severity of that suffered by CBS News correspondent Lara Logan , whose network said she was brutally sexually assaulted in Tahrir Square in February.The women interviewed by Amnesty International appeared before a military court on March 11 and were released two days later. Hosseini was convicted of disorderly conduct, destroying private and public property, obstructing traffic and carrying unspecified weapons. Several were given suspended, one-year prison sentences.Civilians are often tried before military tribunals in Egypt, where defendants are denied adequate access to a lawyer and also the right to appeal. Pro-democracy protesters who managed to push Mubarak from power Feb. 11 have also called for an end to such trials -- a move Amnesty International has supported. ||||| Columbia University LibrariesArchive-It Partner Since: May, 2008Organization Type: Colleges & UniversitiesOrganization URL: http://library.columbia.edu The Columbia University Libraries (CUL) web resources collection program archives selected websites in thematic areas corresponding to existing CUL collection strengths, websites produced by affiliates of Columbia University, and websites from organizations or individuals whose papers or records are held in CUL's physical archives. |||||

– A group of female protesters detained by Egyptian soldiers say they were beaten, stripped, given electric shocks, and humiliated with so-called "virginity tests" while male soldiers were allowed to watch and take photos, reports AOL News. The women complained to Amnesty International, which found the allegations credible and demanded that the new government investigate. (Amnesty's report is here.) The 18 women were arrested in Tahrir Square not during the protests to oust Hosni Mubarak, but in a rally weeks after he left office. They were told they'd be charged with prostitution if they failed the virginity tests. “Forcing women to have 'virginity tests' is utterly unacceptable," Amnesty says. "Its purpose is to degrade women because they are women." For more, click here.

Two sources said the rollout would occur once locations deplete the supply of liquid margarine. McDonald's did not respond to CNBC's requests for comment. Read MoreMcDonald's quietly changes its Quarter Pounder size One sign at a Manhattan location says, "We're proud to cook breakfast items on the grill with real butter and we toast our English Muffins, biscuits and bagels with real butter too." The signs are meant to both highlight the "real dairy" addition and warn those who are not able to eat items made with milk products. The move is just the latest in a series by the fast food giant aimed at tweaking the way it makes its food as it continues trying to turn around its struggling U.S. business. As part of the overhaul, McDonald's has said it would toast its buns longer, change how it sears and grills its beef, and increase the Quarter Pounder patty size. ||||| Denny’s wants in on the Burger King-McDonald’s mashup burger After McDonald's rejected Burger King's proposal for a mashup burger , Denny's recognized a potential business opportunity. Burger King very publicly suggested that it "end the beef" with McDonald's by collaborating on a burger in honor of Peace Day on September 21. They took out full-page ads and even set up a website explaining that all " McWhopper " proceeds would benefit a non-profit organization called Peace One Day. McDonald's CEO Steve Easterbrook responded the offer on Facebook , rejecting the idea and ending with "A simple phone call will do next time." After seeing this, Denny's took to Twitter with a proposal of its own. It wants to combine its own Bacon Slamburger with Burger King's Whopper to make a "Slopper," or something else that sounds a bit more appetizing: Denny's isn't the only one trying to get in on Burger King's Peace Day deal. Krystal, an Atlanta-based fast food restaurant that specializes in sliders, also extended an offer to the royal fast food giant via Facebook : We'd be honored to join y'all (Burger King and Peace One Day) in continuing your day of peace in Atlanta. We propose working together to create the first tiny square Whopper. (We're partial to the Kropper, the Whystal, or the Tiny King.) Burger King has not responded to either offer. |||||

– More change at McDonald's: The chain has made a big change to how it cooks items, including McMuffins and biscuits, ditching liquid margarine for real butter, reports CNBC. Sources say the change is happening at restaurants nationwide once they exhaust their supplies of liquid margarine, and signs are being posted saying the chain is "proud to cook breakfast items on the grill with real butter," which should also warn the lactose-intolerant. Meanwhile, McDonald's has rejected Burger King's offer to team up and make a McWhopper for a day, but Denny's has offered to team up for a "Slopper," and slider specialist Krystal says it's up for making a "Kropper," Fortune reports. (A few weeks ago, McDonald's quietly made its burgers beefier.)

This article is over 3 months old Officials say ‘training error’ to blame for email featuring cat in pyjamas holding a plate of choc-chip biscuits The US embassy in Canberra has apologised for a “training error” after distributing a fake meeting invitation, complete with a photo of a pyjama-wearing cat. The email, titled “meeting”, featured a photo of a tabby cat wearing a blue Cookie Monster outfit and holding a plate of choc-chip biscuits, beneath the title “cat pyjama-jam”. In the clear case of misdirected correspondence last week, the email also contained a section of Latin and recipients were given the option to hit an RSVP tab. It is unknown how widely the email, sent by the US Department of State, was distributed. US Mission to Australia public affairs counsellor Gavin Sundwall kept his apology lighthearted. “Sorry to disappoint those of you who were hoping to attend this ‘cat pyjama-jam’ party, but such an event falls well outside our area of expertise,” he wrote in a follow-up email two days after the original. “It was a training error made by one of our new staff testing out our email newsletter platform.” Sundwall said “strong new management controls” would be added to prevent a repeat of the mistake. ||||| Focused crawls are collections of frequently-updated webcrawl data from narrow (as opposed to broad or wide) web crawls, often focused on a single domain or subdomain. ||||| We'd never get you to say sorry for sending an adorable cat picture. But the U.S. Embassy in Canberra, Australia has apologised on behalf of the Department of State who did just that, accidentally sending a test email featuring a photo of a cat dressed in a Cookie Monster costume. According to the Australian Associated Press, the photo was was titled "cat pajama-jam" and was sent within an email titled "meeting," as part of a fake meeting invitation sent by the Department of State to recipients. It's been described as a "training error," and at least the U.S. Embassy saw the humour in it. "Sorry to disappoint those of you who were hoping to attend this 'cat pajama-jam' party, but such an event falls well outside our area of expertise," U.S. Mission to Australia public affairs counsellor Gavin Sundwall wrote in a subsequent email two days later. "It was a training error made by one of our new staff testing out our email newsletter platform." Perhaps they needn't have apologised, 'cos it's a cute cat. The US embassy in Australia accidentally sent out a cat photo instead of a meeting invite. https://t.co/NOHLA8RbjJ pic.twitter.com/NfqebepiIE — Josh Taylor (@joshgnosis) October 15, 2018 The cat appears to belong to a Melbourne woman, Jennifer Stewart, who dresses up her cats in onesies for her Instagram account that's actually called @my_furry_babies. Sundwall said "strong management controls" would be implemented to ensure such an incident wouldn't happen again. But let's face it, don't we all want to go to the cat pajama-jam party? UPDATE: Oct. 15, 2018, 3:49 p.m. AEDT This article originally held the headline suggesting the U.S. Embassy had sent the email, when it was actually sent by the Department of State. The article has been updated to reflect this. |||||

– The US hasn't had an ambassador to Australia in place for two years, the longest stretch since WWII—which may explain why things are getting low-key chaotic Down Under at the American embassy. The BBC reports that an apology has been issued after a "training error" resulted in a rather odd email, subject line "meeting," blasted out to an unknown number of people. Included in the now-viral message from the US State Department: a picture of a cat in a Cookie Monster-style outfit, grasping a plate of cookies, and an invitation to attend an upcoming "cat pyjama-jam." (See the image here.) The message also included words in Latin and an RSVP button for the "jam." "It was a training error made by one of our new staff testing out our email newsletter platform," State Dept. rep Gavin Sundwall tells the Aussie AP, acknowledging many will be disappointed by the rescinding of the invite, but that "such an event falls well outside our area of expertise." Sundwall promises "strong new management controls" are being looked at to make sure Cookie Monster Cat and other non-governmental mascots don't go viral via email again, per the Guardian. Mashable adds that the photo was likely taken by Jennifer Stewart of Melbourne; her photos of onesie-clad cats post to the Instagram account @my_furry_babies. (Read about another email goof, this one in Utah.)

We've detected that JavaScript is disabled in your browser. Would you like to proceed to legacy Twitter? Yes ||||| Replying to @CityofOwensboro Thank you Mayor. We loved that man from Owensboro, and grieve for his family. I miss his smile and can't wait to ride there and honor him. ||||| Nicky Hayden won the 2006 Moto GP championship in Valencia Former MotoGP champion Nicky Hayden has died aged 35, five days after being involved in a crash while cycling. The American suffered "serious cerebral damage" after colliding with a car on the Rimini coastline in Italy on Wednesday, 17 May. The 2006 MotoGP championship winner had been in the intensive care unit of Cesena's Maurizio Bufalini Hospital. "We would like everyone to remember Nicky at his happiest - riding a motorcycle," his brother Tommy said. A hospital statement issued on Thursday said Hayden had suffered "a serious polytrauma", which is a medical term to describe the condition of a person who has multiple traumatic injuries. Hayden, who was nicknamed the Kentucky Kid, had competed for Red Bull Honda in the World Superbike Championship in Italy on 14 May. Older brother Tommy, who was also a motorcycle racer, said the family had many "great and happy memories" of Hayden. "He dreamed as a kid of being a pro-rider and not only achieved that but also managed to reach the pinnacle of his chosen sport," he said. "We are all so proud of that. We will all miss him terribly." Sister Kathleen added: "Today I not only lost my big brother, but I lost a best friend." Red Bull Honda World Superbike said that the racing world had said goodbye to "one of its dearest sons." "The 'Kentucky Kid' will be sorely missed by all that ever had the pleasure of meeting him or the privilege to see him race a motorcycle around a track, be it dirt or asphalt," a statement read. Hayden's title triumph The Kentucky-born racer first competed in MotoGP in 2003 and finished third in the standings two years later. He ended Valentino Rossi's five-year winning streak in 2006 following a dramatic final race in Valencia. Hayden had been eight points adrift of Rossi heading into the decider, but saw the Italian slide out on lap five and eventually finish in 13th place. Hayden's third-place finish allowed him to take the title by five points. He remains the last American to win the premier class of motorcycle road racing. At the time, BBC commentator Steve Parrish described the season as "the most entertaining I have ever seen". 'A champion and a gentleman' This content will not work on your device, please check Javascript and cookies are enabled or update your browser 'His family were such a huge part of who he was' BBC's Azi Farni Nicky was a real gentleman. He came from a wonderful family, a big racing family. His two brothers raced, his two sisters raced when they were younger, his father raced. This was a dirt track family. They come from Kentucky and had a race track at their house. Racing was something that they all did together. His family were such a huge part of who he was. If you look at his Twitter handle it says "bikes and family". He was so loving and this is going to be such a great loss for them. ||||| CESENA, Italy -- Former MotoGP world champion Nicky Hayden died in hospital on Monday, five days after he was hit by a car while training on his bicycle. Hayden was 35. Maurizio Bufalini Hospital in Cesena, where Hayden had been since the collision last Wednesday, made the announcement. Hayden had severe cerebral damage and multiple traumatic injuries. "The medical team has verified the death of the patient Nicholas Patrick Hayden, who has been undergoing care since last Wednesday May 17 in the intensive care unit of the Bufalini Hospital in Cesena following a very serious polytrauma which occurred the same day," the hospital statement said. American motorcycle racer Nicky Hayden, who won the MotoGP title in 2006, died five days after being hit by a car while training on his bicycle in Italy. He was 35. Mirco Lazzari gp/Getty Images Hayden was training on the Rimini coast following a motorcycle race at nearby Imola. The Peugeot that hit Hayden had its windshield smashed. Judicial authorities have opened an investigation into the crash and questioned the 30-year-old driver of the Peugeot. According to The Guardian, the driver was given a Breathalyzer test and was not over the limit. Hayden won the MotoGP title in 2006, finishing narrowly ahead of Italian great Valentino Rossi. In a MotoGP career spanning 2003 to '16 with Honda and Ducati, Hayden posted three victories and 28 podium finishes in 218 races. After switching to the World Superbike championship last year, Hayden finished fifth overall. Hayden was 13th in Superbike this season, riding for the Red Bull Honda team. Fellow motorcycle racers reacted to Hayden's death on Twitter. Destrozado tras la noticia. Nunca te olvidaremos! / I'm shattered after the news. We will never forget you! #DEPNickyHayden #RIPNickyHayden pic.twitter.com/qF5wNnFM6o — Marc Márquez (@marcmarquez93) May 22, 2017 Always in my heart, champ. RIP Nicky. #69 pic.twitter.com/ML35Qm7f1g — Dani Pedrosa (@26_DaniPedrosa) May 22, 2017 Hayden was born in Owensboro, Kentucky. Several family members had flown in from the United States, including Hayden's mother and brother. Information from The Associated Press was used in this report. |||||

– The motorcycle racing world is mourning the loss of former world champion Nicky Hayden, who died Monday after sustaining severe injuries during a training collision. Hayden, 35, was struck by a vehicle while bicycling along the Rimini coastline in Italy Wednesday, reports the BBC. Over five days, he was treated in an intensive care unit for multiple traumatic injuries, including cerebral damage. According to ESPN, the 30-year-old driver of the Peugeot that struck Hayden was brought in for questioning and passed a breathalyzer test. "We would like everyone to remember Nicky at his happiest—riding a motorcycle," says brother Tommy Hayden, who is also a professional racer. Hayden was in Italy riding for the Red Bull Honda team at the World Superbike Championship in nearby Imola, where he came in 13th days before the accident occurred. He is best known for winning the coveted 2006 MotoGP world champion title, for which he bested legendary Italian racer Valentino Rossi. Athletes and friends took to Twitter to remember Hayden for his professionalism and friendly demeanor, including British racer Danny Kent, who shared a sweet personal message from Hayden congratulating him on his own world championship in 2015. The city of Owensboro in Kentucky, where Hayden was born, commemorated Hayden—known as the “Kentucky Kid"—by flying its flags at half-staff.

Image copyright PA Image caption Mr Trump's interview comes as protesters - both anti and pro-Trump - prepare to march on Friday Theresa May and Donald Trump are holding talks at her country retreat Chequers, following his controversial comments on the PM's Brexit plan. In an interview with the Sun, Mr Trump said the PM's plan would "probably kill" any trade deal with the US. But on Friday, he said he and Mrs May had "probably never developed a better relationship" than during this trip - his first to the UK as president. Meanwhile, a giant blimp of Mr Trump as a baby is floating in central London. It is part of a demonstration in Parliament Square, one of many due to take place across the UK on Friday. In his interview with the Sun, Mr Trump also said that former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson - who disagrees with the PM on Brexit and resigned this week - would make a "great prime minister", adding "I think he's got what it takes". He also renewed his criticism of London Mayor Sadiq Khan over last year's terror attacks in London, saying he had done "a terrible job". Downing Street has not yet reacted to Mr Trump's remarks, but Chancellor Philip Hammond said the talks will be "very positive". Theresa May has been making the case for a US free trade deal, and says Brexit is an "unprecedented opportunity" to create jobs in the UK and US. The US president and his wife, Melania, were given a red carpet reception at Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire on Thursday evening. Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Mays greet Trumps for UK black-tie dinner They were at a black-tie dinner with Mrs May as news broke of his interview with the newspaper, which said it was conducted while he was in Brussels. After it was published, White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said the president "likes and respects Prime Minister May very much", adding that he had "never said anything bad about her". Image copyright Reuters Image caption Protesters near Blenheim Palace making their feelings known on Thursday Mr Trump - who has been a long-time supporter of Brexit - told The Sun that the UK's blueprint for its post-Brexit relations with the EU was "a much different deal than the people voted on". He said the Brexit proposals Mrs May and her cabinet thrashed out at the PM's country house Chequers last week "would probably end a major trade relationship with the United States." "We have enough difficulty with the European Union," he said, saying the EU has "not treated the United States fairly on trading". 'I told May how to do it' He also said Mrs May had not listened to his advice on how to do a Brexit deal, saying: "I would have done it much differently. "I actually told Theresa May how to do it but she didn't agree, she didn't listen to me. She wanted to go a different route," he said. Tom Newton Dunn, the Sun journalist who interviewed Mr Trump, said the US president seemed "sensitive" and knew about the "Trump baby" inflatable. "He's really quite stung by the criticism he's been getting," said Mr Newton Dunn. "He knew all about the baby blimp. I think it hurt him." Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption The Sun journalist who interviewed Donald Trump says the president "really cares" what people in Britain think of him. The BBC's political editor, Laura Kuenssberg, said Mr Trump's interview had "driven a bulldozer" through Mrs May's claim that the UK would be able to get decent trade deals with the wider world, while sticking to the EU rules. But Foreign Office minister Sir Alan Duncan said things had "moved on" since Mr Trump's interview - which was carried out before he arrived in the UK - and the mood at Thursday night's dinner was "fantastically positive and did focus a lot on trade". The government does not see Mr Trump's behaviour as "rude", said Sir Alan, adding: "Donald Trump is a controversialist. That's his style." Mayor of London Sadiq Khan defended his decision to allow the giant Trump baby inflatable to fly over London, saying: "The idea that we limit the right to protest because it might cause offence to a foreign leader is a slippery slope." And, responding to Mr Trump's criticism of his response to terrorism, Mr Khan said it was "interesting" that he "is not criticising the mayors of other cities" which have also experienced terror attacks. Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London: "It's not for me to be the censor" Meanwhile, Shadow Foreign Secretary Emily Thornberry said the PM "should be standing up to [Mr Trump]" after he "slagged her off", instead of holding his hand. Image copyright EPA Image caption Mr Trump briefly held Mrs May's hand as they went up the stairs Mr Trump's comments came on the same day the UK government published its proposal for its long-term relationship with the EU. The plan is aimed at ensuring trade co-operation, with no hard border for Northern Ireland, and global trade deals for the UK. Mrs May said the plan "absolutely delivers on the Brexit we voted for". But after ministers reached an agreement on the plan at Chequers a week ago, leading Brexiteers Boris Johnson and David Davis resigned from the cabinet. Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Some of Mr Trump's supporters and protesters have been explaining their motivation Mrs May and Mr Trump are watching a joint counter-terrorism exercise by British and US special forces at a military base. The pair will then travel to Chequers - the PM's country residence in Buckinghamshire - for talks also being attended by Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt. Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Seven things President Trump could learn from the Queen Extra security is in place to police protests planned for the second day of Mr Trump's visit. The president and first lady will travel to Windsor on Friday afternoon to meet the Queen, before flying to Scotland to spend the weekend at Mr Trump's Turnberry golf resort. This part of the visit is being considered private. ||||| A helicopter leaves the grounds of the US ambassador residence in Regent's Park, London, while demonstrators protest against the visit of US President Donald Trump Thursday July 12, 2018. (Gareth Fuller/PA... (Associated Press) A helicopter leaves the grounds of the US ambassador residence in Regent's Park, London, while demonstrators protest against the visit of US President Donald Trump Thursday July 12, 2018. (Gareth Fuller/PA via AP) (Associated Press) LONDON (AP) — The Latest on protests in Britain against U.S. President Donald Trump's visit (all times local): 11:20 a.m. Hundreds of people in London have crowded under a balloon depicting Donald Trump as a screaming baby as protests across the U.K. accompanying the U.S. president's arrival got underway. Some 16 balloon minders in yellow vests identifying themselves as "babysitters" minded lead lines to the 6-meter (20-foot) inflatable as the curious gawked and took pictures. Dominique Blum, 31, and Mia Parker, 50, from Pensacola Florida, were overjoyed with the spectacle. Parker says she hopes the protest will encourage more people to get creative and organized in protesting Trump's policies. She says "it's brilliant. I just want to party with these people forever." ___ 9:30 a.m. Demonstrators plan to mock U.S. President Donald Trump with a giant balloon depicting him as a screaming orange baby as tens of thousands march through the streets of London to protest the American leader's visit to the U.K. The diaper-clad balloon infant, with a quiff of hair and a mobile phone for tweeting, is to soar Friday over the Houses of Parliament in London. It's the centerpiece of demonstrations across the country protesting Trump's policies on issues ranging from immigration and race relations to women and climate change. Kevin Smith, one of the 16 people behind the balloon, says "this is what people need to be doing — to come together in their communities to organize and work out how to stand against right wing populism and xenophobia that we're seeing not just in the U.S. but in Europe." Protest organizers say they plan to stage demonstrations in some 50 cities around the U.K. ___ 9 a.m. President Donald Trump's visit to Britain is one of the biggest operations for police in recent years, requiring similar resources to the 2014 NATO summit in Wales. Protests are planned Friday in some 50 U.K. cities. In London, a screaming orange baby balloon will be featured in the anti-Trump protest. The 20-foot (6-meter) tall balloon's creators, who call themselves babysitters, admit they borrowed the idea from comedian Jon Stewart, who in 2016 called Trump a "man-baby." A crowd-funding campaign raised 20,000 pounds ($26,400) to make it a reality. Matthew Bonner, one of the organizers, says "depicting Trump as a baby is a great way of targeting his fragile ego, and mocking him is our main motivation." He says Trump "doesn't seem to be affected by the moral outrage that comes from his behavior and his policies. You can't reason with him but you can ridicule him." ||||| Sadiq Khan has hit back at “preposterous” claims by Donald Trump after the US president criticised the London mayor for doing a “a bad job” on terrorism and crime in the capital. In an interview in the Sun, Trump lashed out at Khan, who has allowed a Trump protest balloon to float above Westminster during his visit. The US president reignited his feud with Khan, who criticised the US president as “ill-informed” over a tweet following the London Bridge attack in June 2017. Trump protests: baby blimp takes off as Foreign Office hits back over trade threat – live updates Read more “I think allowing millions and millions of people to come into Europe is very, very sad ... You have a mayor who has done a terrible job in London,” Trump said. “He has done a terrible job. Take a look at the terrorism that is taking place. Look at what is going on in London. I think he has done a very bad job on terrorism. “I think he has done a bad job on crime, if you look, all of the horrible things going on there, with all of the crime that is being brought in.” Khan responded on Friday morning, saying terrorism was a global problem, with people dying all over Europe. “What is interesting is Trump is not criticising mayors of those cities, but he is criticising me,” he said in an interview on the BBC’s Today programme. Trump’s comments blaming immigration for crime in England were “preposterous”, he added. “There has been an increase in violent crime across England and Wales … it’s gone up by more than 20% … and by 4% in London ... We must deal with the causes, but also enforcement and where we have lost £7m in our budget in London I have invested £4m ... [but] the idea to blame immigration from Africa is preposterous, and we should call him out when does,” Khan said. Play Video 0:46 The moment Trump baby blimp lifts off - video Trump’s verbal attack on Khan came after the London mayor refused to block a plan to fly a giant inflatable “Trump baby” near parliament to coincide with the president’s visit to the UK. The 20ft-high blimp depicts the US leader as an angry infant wearing a nappy and clutching a mobile phone. Khan defended the decision, saying to have blocked the inflatable would have been to inhibit freedom of speech. “The UK, like the USA, has a long and rich history of rights and the freedom to protest and freedom of speech. The US ambassador himself commented that one thing [the] USA and the UK have in common is freedom of speech, and the idea of restricting that and [the] right to assemble because someone is offended by something is [a] slippery slope,” he said. “When determining these things [it should be about] ... whether it is safe and peaceful. As a politician I should not be the arbiter of what is good or bad taste.” Khan said there would be far-right and pro-Trump demonstrations taking place on Saturday. “I disagree with their views as well, but letting them protest should not mean endorsing their views ... I am not banning the pro-Trump demo either,” he added. |||||

– London has seen countless strange sights over the centuries—but a blimp depicting President Trump as an angry orange baby rising outside the Houses of Parliament is a new one. The blimp—part of protests against Trump's visit that are planned in dozens of British cities—went up Friday morning, held with lead lines by 16 people calling themselves "babysitters," the AP reports. Tens of thousands of people are expected to march in London against Trump amid the UK's biggest police mobilization since riots in 2011. But the president will be elsewhere: His plans for the day include meetings with Prime Minister Theresa May at Chequers, her country retreat, and tea with Queen Elizabeth II at Windsor Castle. Trump's meeting with May is likely to be an awkward one: In an interview published late Thursday, he accused of her wrecking Brexit and praised leadership rival Boris Johnson. Tom Newton Dunn, the journalist who interviewed him, says Trump is "really quite stung by the criticism he's been getting," the BBC reports. "He knew all about the baby blimp. I think it hurt him," Newton Dunn says. London Mayor Sadiq Khan has hit back against claims Trump made in the interview, the Guardian reports. Khan slammed Trump's "preposterous" claims blaming immigration for crime. The mayor, accused by Trump of doing a "bad job," said he had authorized the blimp because he didn't want to restrict freedom of speech.

More than 300 mourners gathered in Manhattan’s Riverside Park last night to memorialize two “beautiful and sweet” Upper West Side children slain on Oct. 25, allegedly by their nanny. The candlelight procession included Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer and the youngsters’ aunts, Katie and Sarah Krim, who represented the devastated family. “They played with my kids in this park,” said a family friend, Talia Etra. “They were both so beautiful and sweet. There’s not a mom who isn’t devastated by this.” “We will always miss Leo and Lulu and think of them everyday,” Sarah Krim said. “Thank you for sharing in our heartache.” Leo, 2, and Lulu, 6, were stabbed to death by their longtime nanny Yoselyn Ortega, 50, according to police. She has been charged with their murders. ||||| The nanny charged with stabbing to death two children she cared for on the Upper West Side of Manhattan told detectives that she had resentment toward the family, who she complained were always telling her what to do, a law enforcement official said this week. The nanny, Yoselyn Ortega, 50, was interviewed in her hospital bed on Saturday by detectives at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center, the police have said. Ms. Ortega was charged hours later with fatally stabbing the children, Lucia Krim, 6, and Leo Krim, 2, in a bathroom in the family’s apartment last month shortly before their mother, Marina Krim, returned from a swimming lesson with her other young daughter. Ms. Ortega waived her right to have a lawyer present during questioning, the official said, although she did not confess to the killings. She told the detectives, “Marina knows what happened,” the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the case, said Sunday. Advertisement Continue reading the main story The police have said that Ms. Krim walked into the bathroom to find Ms. Ortega stabbing herself in the throat, with the dying children bleeding in the bathtub. The official said that Ms. Ortega was not medicated but that she seemed “spacey.” The official said that while the Krim family did not have problems with Ms. Ortega and seemed to live an idyllic life, Ms. Ortega, based on what she told the investigators, had a different view. Photo “She had resentment towards the parents” and said “they were always telling her what to do,” the official said. Ms. Ortega was charged with first-degree murder in the killings. It was not clear when she would be arraigned or whether she had a lawyer. The killings of the two young children sent a chill through New York City because they took place in a luxury apartment building a block from Central Park in a neighborhood where nannies are woven into the fabric of family life. In the days afterward, investigators and those closest to Ms. Ortega and the Krim family were at a loss to provide an explanation for the violence. Please verify you're not a robot by clicking the box. Invalid email address. Please re-enter. You must select a newsletter to subscribe to. Sign Up Receive occasional updates and special offers for The New York Times's products and services. Thank you for subscribing. An error has occurred. Please try again later. View all New York Times newsletters. That was in part because investigators could not question Ms. Ortega because of the serious nature of her self-inflicted injuries. But also the relationship between Ms. Ortega and the family that had employed her for about two years gave no hint of the kind of discord or anger that would precipitate the violence that the police say Ms. Ortega inflicted on the children who had been in her care. Relatives of the Krims said they had treated Ms. Ortega as a member of their own family and would even pay for her to travel to the Dominican Republic so Ms. Ortega could visit her family while the Krims went on vacation. And a friend of Ms. Ortega recalled how fondly that she would speak of the Krims, saying she was well paid and treated decently. Ms. Ortega said she happily put in extra hours to help Ms. Krim whenever she needed it. Still, Ms. Ortega had had some financial difficulties recently, and she had been forced to move out of an apartment in the Bronx and back in with her sister in Harlem. She had appeared harried and under stress, those who know her said. On the day of the killings, the police said, Ms. Ortega was supposed to meet Ms. Krim at a dance studio. She never showed up, so Ms. Krim went back home to see what had happened. |||||

– The New York City nanny charged with killing two children in her care was fed up with being bossed around, she reportedly told detectives from her hospital bed. "She had resentment towards the parents," because "they were always telling her what to do," says a police official. Earlier reports said Yoselyn Ortega was frustrated with extra housework. She also told detectives that the children's mother, Marina, "knows what happened," the official says, adding that Ortega seemed "spacy." Ortega has not admitted to the killings, but did acknowledge being in the bathroom where they allegedly occurred, the New York Times reports. A memorial for the children last night drew some 300 to Riverside Park in Manhattan, the New York Post adds. Manhattan's borough president and two of the children's aunts took part in a candlelight procession. "We will always miss Leo and Lulu and think of them every day," said an aunt. "Thank you for sharing in our heartache." Added a family friend: "There’s not a mom who isn’t devastated by this."

Microscopic organisms found in dirt collected from a hike through Nova Scotia mean we're going to have to add another branch to the tree of life. The strange organisms simply don't fit into the plant kingdom, the animal kingdom, or any other kingdom we've classified up until now. The tiny critters in question represent two species of the group of microbes called hemimastigotes, and based on a detailed genetic analysis, one of them has never been spotted before. According to the team of researchers from Dalhousie University in Canada, the two species are eukaryotes (with complex cells, like humans), and protists (outside the animal, plant, and fungi kingdoms). But they don't fit the patterns of the existing 10 kingdoms that make up the Eukaryota domain. (Yana Eglit) "This discovery literally redraws our branch of the tree of life at one of its deepest points," says one of the researchers, Alastair Simpson. "It opens a new door to understanding the evolution of complex cells – and their ancient origins – back well before animals and plants emerged on Earth." The first hemimastigote species to be identified was Spironema, which has only ever been spotted a handful of times. A second completely new species was then discovered – the scientists named it Hemimastix kukwesjijk, after the Kukwes ogre in the folklore of the local Mi'kmaq people. This microbe looks and acts like a miniature ogre, the researchers say, in the way it traps and eats food. "It's an unusual looking group of organisms," says one of the team, Yana Eglit. "The way they behave under the microscope, you won't immediately spot them." The first hemimastigote was identified in the 19th century, but before now scientists haven't been able to do a detailed genetic analysis on these microbes. They have always been something of a mystery when it comes to classification. With the help of a relatively new gene sequencing technique called single-cell transcriptonomics – which can glean the same amount of data from a handful of cells as other techniques can from millions – the team was able to confirm that these organisms don't fall into the tree of life branches already identified by scientists. In fact they're more different from other organisms as animals and fungi are from each other. To find a common ancestor between hemimastigotes and any other living creature you would have to go back about a billion years, the researchers suggest. "They represent a major branch... that we didn't know we were missing," Simpson told Emily Chung at CBC News. "There's nothing we know that's closely related to them." What makes the discovery all the more remarkable is that Yana Eglit only collected the crucial samples on a whim during a spring hike with other students along the Bluff Wilderness Trail outside Halifax. When studying the microbes under a microscope, Eglit noticed that the flagella (or tiny hairs) on the organisms appeared to be moving in a random rather than a coordinated fashion – that's unusual, and one of the signs of a rare hemimastigote. The researchers were even able to feed and breed captive Hemimastix kukwesjijk microbes, which means we won't have to rely on fortunate woodland hikes to have more opportunities to study them. Further research might give us more insight into the very earliest history of the evolution of life. And despite playing such a major role in the discovery, Yana Eglit is keen to emphasise the work behind this fascinating development in the tree of life was a team effort. "We would have not been able to do this work alone as one lab," says Eglit. "Everyone involved in this was essential." The research has been published in Nature. ||||| Almost all eukaryote life forms have now been placed within one of five to eight supra-kingdom-level groups using molecular phylogenetics1,2,3,4. The ‘phylum’ Hemimastigophora is probably the most distinctive morphologically defined lineage that still awaits such a phylogenetic assignment. First observed in the nineteenth century, hemimastigotes are free-living predatory protists with two rows of flagella and a unique cell architecture5,6,7; to our knowledge, no molecular sequence data or cultures are currently available for this group. Here we report phylogenomic analyses based on high-coverage, cultivation-independent transcriptomics that place Hemimastigophora outside of all established eukaryote supergroups. They instead comprise an independent supra-kingdom-level lineage that most likely forms a sister clade to the ‘Diaphoretickes’ half of eukaryote diversity (that is, the ‘stramenopiles, alveolates and Rhizaria’ supergroup (Sar), Archaeplastida and Cryptista, as well as other major groups). The previous ranking of Hemimastigophora as a phylum understates the evolutionary distinctiveness of this group, which has considerable importance for investigations into the deep-level evolutionary history of eukaryotic life—ranging from understanding the origins of fundamental cell systems to placing the root of the tree. We have also established the first culture of a hemimastigote (Hemimastix kukwesjijk sp. nov.), which will facilitate future genomic and cell-biological investigations into eukaryote evolution and the last eukaryotic common ancestor. ||||| Canadian researchers have discovered a new kind of organism that's so different from other living things that it doesn't fit into the plant kingdom, the animal kingdom, or any other kingdom used to classify known organisms. Two species of the microscopic organisms, called hemimastigotes, were found in dirt collected on a whim during a hike in Nova Scotia by Dalhousie University graduate student Yana Eglit. A genetic analysis shows they're more different from other organisms than animals and fungi (which are in different kingdoms) are from each other, representing a completely new part of the tree of life, Eglit and her colleagues report this week in the journal Nature. "They represent a major branch… that we didn't know we were missing," said Dalhousie biology professor Alastair Simpson, Eglit's supervisor and co-author of the new study. "There's nothing we know that's closely related to them." In fact, he estimates you'd have to go back a billion years — about 500 million years before the first animals arose — before you could find a common ancestor of hemimastigotes and any other known living things. This is the part of the Bluff Wilderness Trail in Nova Scotia where graduate student Yana Eglit collected some dirt that ended up containing two species of rare hemimastigotes. (Submitted by Yana Eglit) The hemimastigotes analyzed by the Dalhousie team were found by Eglit during a spring hike with some other students along the Bluff Wilderness Trail outside Halifax a couple of years ago. She often has empty sample vials in her pockets or bags, and scooped a few tablespoons of dirt into one of them from the side of the trail. Back at the lab, she soaked the soil in water, which often revives microbes that have gone dormant, waiting for the next big rainstorm. Over the next few weeks, she checked on the dish through a microscope to see what might be swimming around. Strange movements Then, one day, about three weeks later, she saw something that caught her eye — something shaped like the partially opened shell of a pistachio. It had lots of hairs, called flagella, sticking out. Most known microbes with lots of flagella move them in co-ordinated waves, but not this one, which waved them in a more random fashion. "It's as if these cells never really learned that they have many flagella," Eglit said with a laugh. She had seen something with that strange motion once before, a few years ago, and recognized it as a rare hemimastigote. Hemimastigotes were first seen and described in the 19th century. But at that time, no one could figure out how they fit into the evolutionary tree of life. Consequently, they've been "a tantalizing mystery" to microbiologists for quite a long time, Eglit said. Light microscopes show the two hemimastigotes, Spironema, left, and Hemimastix kukwesjijk, found in the same dish. (Yana Eglit/Nature) Like animals, plants, fungi and amoebas — but unlike bacteria — hemimastigotes have complex cells that have mini-organs called organelles including a nucleus that holds chromosomes of DNA, making them part of the "domain" of organisms called eukaryotes rather than bacteria or archaea. About 10 species of hemimastigotes have been described over more than 100 years. But up until now, no one had been able to do a genetic analysis to see how they were related to other living things. Realizing that she had something very rare and special, Eglit flagged another graduate student Gordon Lax, who specializes in genetic analyses of individual microbes — a new and tricky technique — to see where they fit in the evolutionary tree. The pair dropped everything to analyze the new microbe. The co-authors of the new study include, left to right, Dalhousie University postdoctoral researcher Laura Eme, Eglit and fellow graduate student Gordon Lax. (Michelle Léger) New species Eglit wanted to see if she could find more of the creatures in the dish, and, as she was looking, she spotted another kind of hemimastigote. "To our tremendous surprise, two of these extremely rarely seen organisms ended up in one dish." There were more of the second kind, which turned out to be a new species. The researchers named itHemimastix kukwesjijk after Kukwes, a greedy, hairy ogre from the mythology of the local Mi'kmaq people. (The suffix "jijk" means "little.") Eglit watched carefully as it hunted. Hemimastix shoots little harpoons called extrusomes to attack prey such as Spumella, a relative of aquatic microbes called diatoms. It grasps its prey by curling its flagella around it, bringing it to a "mouth" on one end of the cell called a capitulum "as it presumably sucks its cytoplasm out," Eglit said. Hemimastix kukwesjijk feeds on its prey in this microscope image. It attacks the prey with harpoon-like organs, then uses its flagella to bring the prey to its mouth, called a capitulum, and sucks out the juices or cytoplasm. (Yana Eglit/Nature) Once she knew what it ate, she reared its prey in captivity so she could also feed and breed captive Hemimastix: "We were able to domesticate it, in a way." That means scientists can now give captive specimens to other scientists to study, and their rarity is not the issue it was before. Based on the genetic analysis they've done so far, the Dalhousie team has determined that hemimastigotes are unique and different enough from other organisms to form their own "supra-kingdom" — a grouping so big that animals and fungi, which have their own kingdoms, are considered similar enough to be part of the same supra-kingdom. They are now doing a more complete genetic analysis of Hemimastix. That's expected to turn up new data that will help scientists piece together the evolutionary history of life on Earth with more detail and more accuracy. Eglit says it's "extremely exciting" that it's still possible to discover something so different from all known life on Earth. "It really shows how much more there is out there." But Simpson noted that discoveries like this one are pretty rare: "It'll be the one time in my lifetime that we find this sort of thing." |||||

– Scoop up some dirt, and what do you get—a whole new branch on the tree of life. We can thank Canadian grad student Yana Eglit, who took a dirt sample while hiking and found two microscopic species that have long proved impossible to classify, the CBC reports. "They represent a major branch ... that we didn't know we were missing," says Alastair Simpson, a professor at Dalhousie University in Halifax. "There's nothing we know that's closely related to them." In analyzing her sample, Eglit spotted two kinds of minuscule organism called hemimastigotes—one of which had never been seen before. Scientists already know of roughly 10 hemimastigote species but haven't been able to classify them. And no hemimastigote had ever undergone genetic analysis before. So Dalhousie researchers sequenced their genes using a new technique that gathers useful data from just a few cells, per Science Alert. The upshot: These organisms are as unlike other living things as fungi and animals are from one another. Technically they're eukaryotes (possessing complex cells, like human beings) and protists (not within the fungi, plant, and animal kingdoms), but don't fit patterns in the Eukaryota domain—so the Dalhousie team assigned them their own "supra-kingdom." They also named the newly discovered hemimastigote Hemimastix kukwesjijk after an ogre from indigenous Canadian lore. After all, the tiny being has hairs and ruthlessly grabs its prey. The local Mi'kmaq people "have an ogre-like creature [named Kukwes] who is also hairy and terrifying and eats other creatures," says Eglit. (Meanwhile, science has solved how to make a great pizza at home.)

(CNN) The suspect in Friday's knife attack at Amsterdam's central railway station had a "terrorist motive" and is believed to have acted alone, police in the Netherlands said Saturday. Police said the suspect is a 19-year-old Afghan man who lives in Germany. Police would only identify him as Jawed S. Two US citizens were stabbed, US and Dutch authorities said Saturday. The victims were seriously injured but are not in critical condition, the Amsterdam mayor's office said. Police shot the suspect after the stabbings. A police spokesman told CNN the teenage suspect remains in a hospital, where he will be questioned later Saturday with the help of a translator. Police in Amsterdam said they are in "intensive contact" with their German counterparts on the case. German authorities did a search of the suspect's house, where they found and seized data storage items that will be analyzed, police said. Read More ||||| Image copyright AFP Image caption Amsterdam Central Station is used by an estimated 250,000 travellers every day An Afghan man accused of injuring two people in a stabbing at Amsterdam's central railway station on Friday had a terrorist motive, officials say. The man, who has been named in Dutch media as Jawed S, was shot and wounded by police during the incident. Earlier the US ambassador said the two victims were American tourists. "We are aware that both victims were US citizens and have been in touch with them and their families," Pete Hoekstra said in a statement on Saturday. The authorities said: "Following an initial statement it has emerged the man had a terrorist motive." German police have conducted a search of the suspect's home in Germany. A police spokesman quoted by Agence France-Presse said the arrested Afghan man did not know the victims and had not singled them out specifically as targets. The attacker and victims were all taken to hospital for treatment. Some train services in and out of the station were suspended during the incident and two platforms closed. The Central Station is used by an estimated 250,000 travellers every day. |||||

– Two people who were stabbed in Amsterdam's main railway station Friday have been identified as US tourists. The pair, who have not been named, suffered serious but not life-threatening injuries, reports CNN. "We are aware that both victims were US citizens visiting the Netherlands and have been in touch with them or their families," said the US ambassador to the Netherlands, Pete Hoekstra. Police have identified the suspect as a 19-year-old Afghan man and continue to investigate a motive. "All scenarios are taken into consideration, including a terrorist motive," says a police statement, per the BBC. Officers shot and wounded the suspect inside the railway station. He has not been named, but authorities say he is an Afghan citizen who lives in Germany, and Dutch police were working with German authorities to track down his background. Authorities say they don't think he deliberately singled out his victims but struck randomly.

Donald Trump on Thursday repeated a claim that he's seen a video showing a plane delivering $400 million in cash from the United States to Iran, even after his own campaign acknowledged such an assertion is incorrect. "A tape was made, you saw that? With the airplane coming in … and the money coming off, I guess,” he said while addressing supporters in Portland, Maine. At a campaign rally in Florida a day earlier, Trump for the first time said he had seen a video shot by Iran, “taking that money off that airplane.” But campaign officials later told CBS News that the video in question was actually footage of the released American hostages landing at Geneva, which had been aired on Fox News. Even so, Trump repeated the claim in Maine, insisting that the video was made public by the Iranians to embarrass the United States. "They want to embarrass our country. And they want to embarrass our president," he said. Trump's campaign in recent days has been fueling allegations that the Obama administration paid $400 million in cash ransom to win the release of four Americans as part of the agreement implemented in January to restrict Iran's efforts to develop a nuclear weapon. The administration has denied any ransom was paid, noting that it publicly disclosed the $400-million payment in January and that it was widely reported at the time. The administration says the money was being returned to Iran after being frozen following the 1979 Iranian revolution. The payment was to partly settle Iran's legal claims arising from a weapons purchase from the U.S. that never took place. Republicans and the Trump campaign have said the timing of the payment and use of cash give the appearance that the U.S. was paying ransom. At his rally on Thursday, Trump speculated that the money would be used by Iran to fund terrorism. "I wonder where that money really goes, by the way.... Well, it went either in their pockets, which I actually think more so, or toward terrorism -- probably a combination of both,” he said. ||||| Washington (CNN) Donald Trump backed off a false claim Friday morning, admitting he had not seen a video of a $400 million payment being unloaded from a US plane in Iran. The Republican nominee had claimed at rallies twice this week that such a video existed, saying in Maine on Thursday that it was provided by Iranians "to embarrass our president because we have a president who's incompetent." What Trump had actually seen in news reports was video of three American prisoners who Iran had released arriving in Geneva, Switzerland. Trump admitted his error in an early-morning tweet Friday, without actually saying he was wrong. "The plane I saw on television was the hostage plane in Geneva, Switzerland, not the plane carrying $400 million in cash going to Iran!" he tweeted. The plane I saw on television was the hostage plane in Geneva, Switzerland, not the plane carrying $400 million in cash going to Iran! It was a rare reversal for Trump, who has stood by inaccurate or unproven claims previously -- insisting he'd seen videos of Muslim Americans in New Jersey cheering the September 11, 2001, attacks. His political rise began during the 2012 campaign, when he insisted that Obama release his birth certificate, questioning the President's American citizenship. Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Kaine hit Trump on Friday for the video claim, saying he seems "confused" on CBS' "This Morning," in an interview taped before Trump backtracked. "I have no idea what he's talking about. It (the video) doesn't exist. He might be thinking about Iran Contra from like 35 years ago or something like this," Kaine said. He pointed to Trump's recent criticism of Kaine, who Trump said in a late-July news conference "did a terrible job in New Jersey" -- despite Kaine being a governor and senator from Virginia, not New Jersey. Kaine said Trump must have confused him with Tom Kean, who was New Jersey's governor until 1990. "He was confusing it with a situation from two or three decades ago. Maybe that's what he's doing with this bogus video claim," Kaine said. Asked if he thinks Trump is confused, Kaine said: "I absolutely think he's confused." Paul Manafort, Trump's campaign chairman, responded to Kaine on Fox News Friday morning, saying he's "not sure there was confusion" on Trump's part. "The point that he was making is the cash-transfer took place and it was taking place consistent with the transfer of hostages," Manafort said. "Again, what the Obama administration wants to do is get off of the point. The point is, $400 million in cash that most likely ended up in terrorist camps used against the west was given in exchange for hostages and the President of the United States lied to the American people, that's the point." Trump has made criticism of the US delivery of $400 million in cash via a plane to Iran -- the first installment of $1.7 billion in payments related to a decades-old dispute over an unfulfilled us arms purchase before the Iranian revolution cut relations between the two countries and settled at the same time Iran released four American prisoners -- a staple this week on the campaign trail. But Wednesday in Florida and Thursday in Maine, he went a step further, claiming he'd seen video of the cash actually being delivered in Iran. "It was interesting because a tape was made. Right? You saw that? With the airplane coming in -- nice plane -- and the airplane coming in, and the money coming off, I guess. Right? That was given to us, has to be, by the Iranians," Trump said in Portland, Maine. "And you know why the tape was given to us? Because they want to embarrass our country. They want to embarrass our country. And they want to embarrass our president because we have a president who's incompetent. They want to embarrass our president," Trump said. "I mean, who would ever think they would be taking all of this money off the plane and then providing us with a tape? It's only for one reason. And it's very, very sad." ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. ||||| WASHINGTON — President Obama on Thursday flatly denied that a $400 million pallet of cash delivered to the Iranian government in January, on the same day that four American citizens who had been detained by Iran were released, was a ransom payment, calling the latest uproar over the landmark nuclear pact with Tehran “the manufacturing of outrage.” Mr. Obama said the payment was part of a decades-old dispute with Iran that had been litigated before an international tribunal, adding that his administration publicly disclosed the agreement in January. “We do not pay ransom for hostages,” Mr. Obama said during a news conference at the Pentagon. In a forceful rebuttal to accusations from critics who said that the payment could put more Americans in danger of being held, he called “the notion that we would start now, in this high profile way,” one that “defies logic.” On Jan. 17, the United States and European nations lifted oil and financial sanctions on Iran and released roughly $100 billion of its assets as part of the terms of the nuclear accord reached between Iran and six world powers. ||||| Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump told supporters at an August 3 rally in Daytona Beach, Fla., that he had watched a video of Iranian officials unloading cash from an airplane. (Reuters) As Fox News reported on the controversial transfer of $400 million in cash to Iran in January, it repeatedly played dark, grainy footage of shadowy figures walking off a small private plane with bags in hand. The video is often labeled as being from Jan. 17 in Geneva where three Americans first landed after being released from prison in Tehran. Republican nominee Donald Trump watched this sort of footage, according to his spokeswoman, and concluded that it showed the controversial money transfer that was described in detail for the first time this week by the Wall Street Journal. At a rally in Daytona Beach, Fla., on Wednesday afternoon, Trump announced that the months-old video had been recorded by the Iranian government and released to embarrass the United States. "Remember this: Iran — I don't think you heard this anywhere but here — Iran provided all of that footage, the tape of taking that money off the airplane," Trump said at the rally. "Right?" Trump provided no source for this exclusive information but described in detail what he saw in the video. "Now, here's the amazing thing: Over there, where that plane landed, top secret, you don't have a lot of paparazzi. You know, the paparazzi doesn't do so well over there, right?" Trump said, seeming to refer to Iran and not Switzerland, where the footage was recorded. "And they have a perfect tape, done by obviously a government camera, and the tape is of the people taking the money off the plane. Right? That means that in order to embarrass us further, Iran sent us the tapes. Right? It's a military tape; it's a tape that was a perfect angle, nice and steady, nobody getting nervous because they're gonna be shot because they're shooting a picture of money pouring off a plane." Twitter quickly filled with confusion and this central question: What is Trump talking about? Several senior U.S. officials involved in the Iran negotiations told the Associated Press on Wednesday they weren't aware of any such footage. There was speculation that perhaps Trump saw the footage during one of the classified security briefings provided to presidential nominees, but Trump's campaign chairman Paul Manafort said in an interview on Fox News earlier in the day that those briefings have not yet begun. The Washington Post asked Trump's staff to explain what Trump was talking about and emailed a link to a Fox News clip that showed the January footage from Geneva, asking if that was the video the nominee saw. "Yes," spokeswoman Hope Hicks responded in an email. "Merely the b-roll footage included in every broadcast." Hicks has yet to respond to a follow-up email asking why Trump thought the footage showed a money transfer and not the widely watched prisoner swap, and why Trump said it was recorded by the Iranian government. (Note: This wasn't the only questionable thing Trump said about Iran on Wednesday. Post fact-checker Glenn Kessler dug into Trump's assertion that Hillary Clinton "started talks to give 400 million dollars, in cash, to Iran," evaluating the untrue statement as worthy of four Pinocchios.) ||||| MYTH: “The Administration Did Not Reveal This To The Public” MYTH: Clinton Improperly Dismissed The Report As “Old News” MYTH: Sending Cash To Iran Was Essentially “Money Laundering” Resolution Of 35-Year-Old Dispute Coincided With Iran Nuclear Agreement And Prisoner Exchange Wash. Post: Nuclear Agreement Between U.S. And Iran “Helped Accelerate The Talks” About Freeing Prisoners. On January 16, after years of negotiations, the United States government secured the release of five Americans held prisoner in Iran, including Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian, who had been held in captivity for nearly two years. Their release was secured on the same day that the two nations agreed to an historic nuclear nonproliferation agreement, which President Obama heralded as “smart, patient and disciplined” diplomacy. According to the Obama administration, the prisoner release was “negotiated separately” from the nuclear accord “to ensure that the detainees were not used as leverage,” but the administration did concede that fruitful nuclear negotiations “helped accelerate the talks.” From a January 17 Washington Post article: The nuclear agreement and the release of the American prisoners were negotiated separately to ensure that the detainees were not used as leverage, U.S. officials said. But the completion of the nuclear deal last summer helped accelerate the talks about the prisoners, which loomed in the background of the negotiations. The Americans were freed in exchange for U.S. clemency in the cases of seven Iranians charged or imprisoned over sanctions violations, and the dismissal of outstanding charges against 14 Iranians outside the United States. At least five of the Iranians granted pardons or sentence commutations intend to stay in the United States, their attorneys said. [The Washington Post, 1/17/16] AFP: U.S. Agreed To Repay $400 Million Plus Interest To Iranian Government Over Disputed Arms Sale. On January 17, the United States government agreed to repay $400 million plus approximately $1.3 billion in accumulated interest to the Iranian government to resolve a disputed arms sale between the two nations that occurred “prior to the break in diplomatic ties” during the 1979 Iranian revolution. According to reporting from Agence France-Presse (AFP) and other news agencies, the payment resolved a deadlock at the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal that had stood since the tribunal’s inception in 1981, and represented “a broader clearing of the decks between the old foes” just one day after the signing of an historic nuclear agreement. AFP reported at the time that the Obama administration’s political opponents were already attempting to scandalize the arrangement: The repayment, which settles a suit brought under an international legal tribunal, is separate from the tens of billions of dollars in frozen foreign accounts that Iran can now access after the end of nuclear sanctions. But the timing of the announcement, one day after the implementation of the Iran nuclear accord, will be seen as pointing to a broader clearing of the decks between the old foes. US President Barack Obama defended the settlement in a televised statement from the White House, saying it was for "much less than the amount Iran sought." [...] [Secretary of State John] Kerry described Sunday's payment of the 35-year-old trust as a "fair settlement." But the debt deal immediately drew the ire of those in Washington who think the Obama administration had already made too many concessions to secure the nuclear deal. [Agence France-Press, 1/17/16] The Wall Street Journal Reports U.S. “Secretly Organized” Cash Transfer To Iran WSJ: U.S. “Secretly Organized An Airlift Of $400 Million Worth Of Cash To Iran.” On August 3, The Wall Street Journal reported that the United States “secretly organized an airlift of $400 million worth of cash to Iran that coincided with the January release of four Americans detained in Tehran.” The Journal noted that “[t]he money represented the first installment of a $1.7 billion settlement the Obama administration reached with Iran to resolve a decades-old dispute over a failed arms deal signed just before the 1979 fall of Iran’s last monarch,” adding that “senior U.S. officials denied any link between the payment” and a prisoner exchange that resulted in five Americans being freed. From the August 3 article: The Obama administration secretly organized an airlift of $400 million worth of cash to Iran that coincided with the January release of four Americans detained in Tehran, according to U.S. and European officials and congressional staff briefed on the operation afterward. Wooden pallets stacked with euros, Swiss francs and other currencies were flown into Iran on an unmarked cargo plane, according to these officials. The U.S. procured the money from the central banks of the Netherlands and Switzerland, they said. The money represented the first installment of a $1.7 billion settlement the Obama administration reached with Iran to resolve a decades-old dispute over a failed arms deal signed just before the 1979 fall of Iran’s last monarch, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. [...] Senior U.S. officials denied any link between the payment and the prisoner exchange. They say the way the various strands came together simultaneously was coincidental, not the result of any quid pro quo. [...] Meanwhile, U.S. officials have said they were certain Washington was going to lose the arbitration in The Hague, where Iran was seeking more than $10 billion, and described the settlement as a bargain for taxpayers. [...] The $400 million was paid in foreign currency because any transaction with Iran in U.S. dollars is illegal under U.S. law. Sanctions also complicate Tehran’s access to global banks. [...] The Iranians were demanding the return of $400 million the Shah’s regime deposited into a Pentagon trust fund in 1979 to purchase U.S. fighter jets, U.S. officials said. They also wanted billions of dollars as interest accrued since then. [The Wall Street Journal, 8/3/16] Right-Wing Media Distort WSJ Report To Renew Attacks On Iran Negotiations Fox’s John Bolton: “Of Course It’s Ransom. I Don’t Think There’s Any Way Of Getting Around It.” Reacting to the Journal article, Fox News contributor John Bolton said “of course” the payment to Iran was “ransom,” adding, “I don’t think there’s any way of getting around it.” From the August 4 edition of Fox News’ America’s Newsroom: JOHN BOLTON: Well, of course, it's ransom. I don't think there's any way of getting around it. It's not a question what the administration says it is or what Iran says it is, it's the reality that the money paid was -- got -- helped get the hostages released as part of the overall nuclear deal. But I think there may have been other questions that [the] Justice [Department] was asking here, because the way this transaction was handled, without more information, it looks to me to be in serious jeopardy of violating the prohibitions on using dollars for transactions with Iran. I don't think it should make any difference whether some government agency converted U.S. dollars into Swiss francs or euros. You could give the Iranians $400 million worth of pizzas, it would be exactly the same thing. It would be a transmission of resources to them. So I think -- I encourage all those investigative reporters at The Washington Post and The New York Times to get the scoop on what else Justice said. And importantly, who overruled them. I don't think the State Department could overrule the Justice Department on its own. [Fox News, America's Newsroom, 8/4/16] Fox’s Ralph Peters: “This Was Definitely A Ransom, Or A Bribe If You Prefer To Call It That.” Fox News strategic analyst Ralph Peters stated that the payment “was definitely ransom” and that “the rest of the world” would look at the arrangement and conclude “we did pay ransom.” From the August 3 edition of Fox News’ America’s Newsroom: RALPH PETERS: This was definitely a ransom, or a bribe if you’d prefer to call it that. And I can even tell you how it happened. It's the same thing as when you walk into a car dealership and you haggle with the car dealer. And finally you think the salesman -- you've agreed on a price, and the salesman disappears into the back room, and you're excited about that car, and the contract comes out, and it's $800 higher than you agreed on. And he says, "oh, that's a dealer prep charge." And, if you're a fool, as John Kerry was of the Iranians, you agree to the higher charge. It was clearly a sweetener to get the deal through and to get the Iranian-Americans released. And the problem is, Elizabeth, that we did pay ransom. That's how it looks to the rest of the world. [Fox News, America's Newsroom, 8/3/16] FACT: “No Concrete Evidence” That Payment Was A Ransom AP: “There Is No Concrete Evidence That The Cash Payment Was, In Fact, A Ransom.” According to an Associated Press (AP) fact-check of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s reaction to the WSJ article, “There is no concrete evidence that the cash payment was, in fact, a ransom.” The AP reported that “The Obama administration has flatly denied it has ever paid ransoms, including in this case,” and “officials acknowledge that progress in the nuclear negotiations contributed to progress on the settlement of the claim as well as progress in talks on the release of the Americans.” From the August 3 fact-check: THE FACTS: There is no concrete evidence that the cash payment was, in fact, a ransom. Critics of the Iran deal, including many senior Republican lawmakers, maintain that the $400 million settlement was a ransom for the release of four private American citizens jailed in Tehran and freed a day after the Iran deal was implemented. Some Iranian officials have suggested the same thing. The Obama administration has flatly denied it has ever paid ransoms, including in this case. The timing of the prisoner release and the arrival of the payment has given weight to GOP claims. U.S. officials acknowledge that progress in the nuclear negotiations contributed to progress on the settlement of the claim as well as progress in talks on the release of the Americans. [Associated Press, 8/3/16] Vox: $400 Million “Wasn’t A Ransom Payment,” Trump Is Wrong To Characterize It That Way. An August 3 Vox post explaining the controversy over the payment stated “it wasn’t a ransom payment. It was a settlement.” The post further explained that Trump “is wrong” to go with the “‘secret ransom payment’ line.” [Vox, 8/3/16] CNN: Prisoner Release Was Part Of A “Separate [Negotiating] Session” That “Opened After The Iranian Nuclear Deal.” In January, CNN.com reported that the United States “insisted there had to be a separate session between the U.S. and Iran” to discuss the “prisoner exchange.” According to CNN.com, “A senior administration official who briefed reporters said a ‘window’ opened after the Iranian nuclear deal ‘and we wanted to take advantage of that window.’” From the January 16 report: The prisoner exchange between the U.S. and Iran capped 14 months of secret diplomacy and talks between Washington and Tehran as the U.S. and world powers negotiated the pact to curb Iran's nuclear program, reflecting a thaw in relations between the sworn enemies. The negotiation over the prisoners began on the sideline of the nuclear talks, intensified after the deal was completed last April and heated up even further in recent months, senior administration officials told CNN. The secret talks were led by Brett McGurk, the U.S. special envoy tapped by President Barack Obama to coordinate the global fight against ISIS, the officials said [...] The Iranians told the U.S. during the talks they wanted a "goodwill gesture" and gave the U.S. a list of Iranians they wanted released. The U.S. officials excluded any names of anyone charged with terrorism or violence, insisting that they would only consider those who had been convicted of sanctions violations or violations of the trade embargo. After every meeting on the nuclear deal between world powers and Iran, the U.S. insisted there had to be a separate session between the U.S. and Iran on the American prisoners, the officials said. [CNN.com, 1/16/16] State Department: “Any Suggestion That It Had Anything To Do With Ransom Is Absolutely And Utterly False.” In an interview on Fox News, State Department spokesman John Kirby explained that the prisoner exchange was negotiated by “a completely separate team than was working in The Hague tribunal to negotiate this claim.” After co-host Bill Hemmer said the payment “looks like it’s ransom,” Kirby reiterated the U.S. government’s policy that “We don't pay ransom. We just don't pay ransom. It is our policy. This was not ransom.” From the August 3 edition of Fox News’ America’s Newsroom: JOHN KIRBY: The teams that were negotiating the release of our Americans was a completely separate team than was working in The Hague tribunal to negotiate this claim. Completely separate processes, though simultaneously done. The timing is all coincidental. Again, we can -- BILL HEMMER (HOST): This is from The Wall Street Journal report, this is very important now, OK? Because, in its story today, it talks about Iranian press reports. And, straight out of Tehran, they've quoted senior Iranian defense officials saying, "it was a ransom payment." Now, are they wrong? JOHN KIRBY: Yes, they are. They're absolutely wrong, Bill. Completely wrong. Look, you can believe us, who've talked about this on camera and on the record since January, or you can believe an unnamed, anonymous defense official from Iran. You choose who you are going to believe to be more credible. HEMMER: Well, 1.3 billion to go, correct?So, that means what, is that more pallets of euros headed for Tehran? [...] HEMMER: And, you know, the series [of] events last January, it looks like it's ransom. It looks like Tehran said, "we'll go ahead and do this, but you have to give us the money, and you have to do it in cash." KIRBY: We don't pay ransom. We just don't pay ransom. It is our policy. This was not ransom. Any suggestion that it had anything to do with ransom is absolutely and utterly false. These were two separate processes run by two separate teams. Now, yes, they were done simultaneously, and so I understand the coincidental nature here of the timing. But, absolutely had nothing to do with ransom. We do not, and will not, pay ransom. [Fox News, America's Newsroom, 8/3/16] Fox’s Steve Doocy: “We Didn’t Know About This.” Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy hyped The Wall Street Journal’ article, saying of the $400 million cash payment was “ransom money” and that the American public “didn’t know about this.” Co-host Anna Kooiman also cited Trump’s misleading tweet about the article, which blamed Hillary Clinton for the so-called “scandal.” From the August 3 edition of Fox News’ Fox & Friends: STEVE DOOCY (CO-HOST): All right, The Wall Street Journal had an exclusive report yesterday late in the day and now everybody's got it. The same day that four American hostages were released by the country of Iran, earlier that day, under the cover of darkness we believe, the United States sent an unmarked cargo jet. There you've got the hostages landing in Geneva. They've been loaded up in Tehran. Earlier, an unmarked white cargo plane with $400 million on wooden pallets in Swiss francs was delivered to the country of Iran, and right now, people are saying, “wait, that’s hostage money, right? That’s ransom money.” No, the administration says it's not. It might look like it, but indeed what that was was part of $1.7 billion we owed to the country of Iran after that 1979 arms deal and the fall of the Shah of Iran. ANNA KOOIMAN (CO-HOST): Yeah, they say that it's -- that the settlement actually is resolving a decades-old dispute. But others others are going, "this looks a whole lot like ransom money." DOOCY: Do you think? KOOIMAN: And Donald Trump tweeted this earlier, and he has reason behind it. He says, “Our incompetent Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, was the one who started talks to give 400 million dollars, in cash, to Iran. Scandal!” [...] DOOCY: So you’ve got four Americans released who had been held hostage, and then there's $400 million in that airplane. Remember the American sailors who were taken hostage and, of course, we were told that no money was paid regarding that. But we didn't know about this, what apparently was ransom money either. You got to wonder whether or not there was a secret deal regarding that, too. [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 8/3/16] Fox’s Tucker Carlson: “The Truth Remains That The Administration Did Not Reveal This To The Public.” Fox host Tucker Carlson stated that the payment “was ransom,” and that “the administration did not reveal this to the public.” While Carlson insisted that “any reasonable person looking at this is going to reach that conclusion,” he admitted that the claim is “[h]ard to prove” and “[m]aybe it’ll never be proved.” From the August 3 edition of Fox News’ America’s Newsroom: BILL HEMMER (CO-HOST): What do you make now with the administration pushing back, suggesting that John Kerry made this public months ago? Yet there does not appear to be a record of Kerry talking about money. TUCKER CARLSON: No, there doesn't, and of course the administration has talked about this deal in some great detail a lot over the last several months, and never mentioned this. It was done secretly in an unmarked aircraft, as you know. Not in U.S. dollars, in euros and francs. Pallets of them. And it was done that way because it would have been illegal to conduct it in U.S. dollars, which tells you everything right there. If you and I did this in American currency, we'd be charged with a felony. And so, there is a secretive component to this. Why would the administration keep this from the American people? It seems to me that’s a pretty obvious question for Admiral Kirby. But it has an odor to it. [...] This component of the deal was known that Iran was expecting payment of frozen funds, et cetera, et cetera. But the truth remains that the administration did not reveal this to the public, and that American hostages were released at the same time, and it's impossible not to draw the conclusion that this was, at least in part, ransom money. And boy, that's of a piece, by the way. For all the talk about how we never pay for ransom for hostages, we don't negotiate, the truth is that news organizations and governments very often pay ransom and negotiate, and everyone in Washington, for example, knows that. And the lying and the sanctimony around this subject is hard to take once you know that. [Fox News, America’s Newsroom, 8/3/16] Rush Limbaugh: “Obama Secretly Paid $400 Million To The Iranians For The Release Of Four American-Iranian Hostages.” Rush Limbaugh asserted that “Barack Hussein Obama secretly paid $400 million to the Iranians for the release of four Iranian American hostages.” From the August 3 edition of Premiere Radio Networks’ The Rush Limbaugh Show: RUSH LIMBAUGH (HOST): We were talking about Barack Hussein Obama’s excoriating Donald Trump for being “unfit” for office. For being unsuitable. Or maybe even being mentally unfit to hold the office of president of the United States. What have we learned since yesterday? We have learned that Barack Hussein Obama secretly paid $400 million to the Iranians for the release of four American-Iranian hostages. [Premiere Radio Networks, The Rush Limbaugh Show, 8/3/16] FACT: Most Details Of The WSJ Article Were Announced By The Obama Administration In January President Obama In January: “The United States And Iran Are Now Settling A Longstanding Iranian Government Claim Against The United States Government.” In a January 17 statement on the implementation of the Iran nuclear deal, President Obama explained that “engaging directly with the Iranian government on a sustained basis … has created a unique opportunity -- a window -- to try to resolve important issues.” Among those issues, Obama said, was the resolution of a “financial dispute that dated back more than three decades”: So, nuclear deal implemented. American families reunited. The third piece of this work that we got done this weekend involved the United States and Iran resolving a financial dispute that dated back more than three decades. Since 1981, after our nations severed diplomatic relations, we’ve worked through a international tribunal to resolve various claims between our countries. The United States and Iran are now settling a longstanding Iranian government claim against the United States government. Iran will be returned its own funds, including appropriate interest, but much less than the amount Iran sought. For the United States, this settlement could save us billions of dollars that could have been pursued by Iran. So there was no benefit to the United States in dragging this out. With the nuclear deal done, prisoners released, the time was right to resolve this dispute as well. [The Washington Post, 1/17/16] Secretary Of State John Kerry Issued Press Release Announcing Settlement Of Iranian Government’s Claims, Beginning With $400 Million Payment. On January 17, Secretary of State John Kerry issued a press release explaining that Iran will be paid $400 million, to be followed by $1.3 billion more to settle “a long outstanding claim at the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal in the Hague”: The United States and Iran today have settled a long outstanding claim at the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal in the Hague. This specific claim was in the amount of a $400 million Trust Fund used by Iran to purchase military equipment from the United States prior to the break in diplomatic ties. In 1981, with the reaching of the Algiers Accords and the creation of the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal, Iran filed a claim for these funds, tying them up in litigation at the Tribunal. This is the latest of a series of important settlements reached over the past 35 years at the Hague Tribunal. In constructive bilateral discussions, we arrived at a fair settlement to this claim, which due to litigation risk, remains in the best interests of the United States. Iran will receive the balance of $400 million in the Trust Fund, as well as a roughly $1.3 billion compromise on the interest. Iran’s recovery was fixed at a reasonable rate of interest and therefore Iran is unable to pursue a bigger Tribunal award against us, preventing U.S. taxpayers from being obligated to a larger amount of money. [U.S. Department of State, 1/17/16] NY Times: $400 Million Transfer Was “For Military Equipment … Sold To The Shah Of Iran And Never Delivered When He Was Overthrown.” The New York Times reported on January 17 that the president announced the return of “over $400 million in payments for military equipment that the United States sold to the shah of Iran and never delivered when he was overthrown”: Mr. Obama also announced the resolution of another argument between Tehran and Washington that dates to the Iranian revolution, this one over $400 million in payments for military equipment that the United States sold to the shah of Iran and never delivered when he was overthrown. The Iranians got their money back, with $1.3 billion in interest that had accumulated over 37 years. [The New York Times, 1/17/16] Hillary Clinton Responds To Questions About WSJ Article: “Actually This Is Kind Of Old News. It Was First Reported About Seven Or Eight Months Ago, As I Recall.” In an interview with Denver-based NBC affiliate 9 News, Hillary Clinton was asked if she “knew” the payment to Iran “was coming” and whether she “approve[d] of it,” to which Clinton responded by saying “I think actually this is kind of old news. It was first reported about seven or eight months ago, as I recall.” Clinton added that the payment “had nothing to do with any kind of hostage swap or any other tit for tat. It was something that was intended to, as I am told, pay back Iran for contracts that were canceled when the Shah fell.” [KUSA, 9News.com, 8/3/16] Fox & Friends Hosts Object To Clinton’s Response To WSJ Report. Fox & Friends co-host Anna Kooiman took issue with Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s reaction to the Journal’s report. From the August 4 edition of Fox News’ Fox & Friends: BRIAN KILMEADE (CO-HOST): If you think the tone and tenor of that explanation from Hillary Clinton kind of saying, "where does that come" from sounds familiar, it's exactly what -- it sounds familiar [sic]. It's about Benghazi, it's about when she talks about her emails. She said, "where does this come from? I don’t know where you" -- it makes you feel ridiculous for asking the question. ANNA KOOIMAN (CO-HOST): Yeah, nothing to see here. Nothing to see here. But those are two stories that she hasn't been able to shake either. [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 8/4/16] Laura Ingraham: “When She’s Asked A Question About An Uncomfortable Topic” Clinton “Always Kind Of Has The Same Answer” That “It’s Always Old News.” Radio host Laura Ingraham said Clinton “always kind of has the same answer” when responding to “a question about an uncomfortable topic,” saying Clinton’s response is to say “it’s always old news.” From the August 4 edition of Courtside Entertainment Group’s The Laura Ingraham Show: LAURA INGRAHAM (HOST): [Hillary Clinton] was instrumental in initiating the talks that led to the Iran deal, and was supportive of the Iran deal, we have to remember that. But as far as the actual pallets moving on the cargo plane and being dropped off in Iran, she was already out of office by then. But do you know what? When she's asked a question about an uncomfortable topic, I get a sense she always kind of has the same answer. [BEGIN CLIP] HILLARY CLINTON: This is kind of old news. [END CLIP] INGRAHAM: Oh. It's always old news. It just broke yesterday in The Wall Street Journal, it's old news. [Courtside Entertainment Group, The Laura Ingraham Show, 8/4/16] FACT: Clinton Was Correct: Media Outlets Including Fox News And WSJ Reported On Payment To Iran In January Fox News On January 18: “The United States Has To Repay Iran A $400 Million Debt … Dating Back To The Islamic Revolution.” On January 18, Fox News correspondent Kevin Corke reported that along with the prisoner exchange and the nuclear deal with Iran, “the United States has to repay Iran a $400 million debt and $1.3 billion in interest dating back to the Islamic revolution.” Corke further explained, “[t]hat $400 million was actually set aside in a trust that Iranians hoped to use to buy U.S. military equipment back in 1979. But, of course, after the break down of diplomatic ties that money was held up so the U.S. has to give back that money; plus as I pointed out in the piece -- $1.3 billion on top of it.” [Fox News, Special Report with Bret Baier, 1/18/16, via Nexis] WSJ Reported On The Payment On January 21. The Wall Street Journal reported on January 21 that a “$1.7 billion financial settlement ended a 35-year legal saga that centered on a purchase of U.S. arms by Iran’s last monarch, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, that were never delivered because of the Iranian revolution in 1979.” [The Wall Street Journal, 1/21/16] Fox’s Charles Krauthammer: “This Is Called Money Laundering.” Despite acknowledging that “there is a statute that prohibits” the United States “from engaging in Iran dealing with dollars,” Fox News contributor Charles Krauthammer still falsely claimed that the $400 million cash transfer, is “money laundering.” From the August 8 edition of Fox News’ Special Report with Bret Baier: CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER: Well of course the Justice Department objected. It was illegal. It isn't only the optics. It isn't only that they are just looking ridiculous in denying that it was a quid pro quo. Obviously it wasn't a coincidence. The reason that it was objected to by Justice, there is a statute that prohibits us from engaging in Iran dealing with dollars. So they had to -- they had to print the money here, ship it over to Switzerland, turn it into Swiss francs and euros, and ship it over to Iran. If a private company had done this, this is called money laundering, the CEO would be in jail right now. [Fox News, Special Report with Bret Baier, 8/3/16] Wash. Post’s Jennifer Rubin Alleges “Shady” Payment “Launder[ed] The Money Through European Central Banks.” Conservative Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin cited “foreign policy gurus” who described the “shady” payment as “bulk cash smuggling” and “laundering the money” through Europe. From an August 3 post on Rubin’s Right Turn blog: [A] number of foreign policy gurus have remarked on how shady the arrangement was. Michael Makovsky, CEO of JINSA, observes that “the president has gone rather rogue by circumventing sanctions restrictions on banks by laundering the money through European central banks, which is not only wrong but sends a dangerous signal to other countries and companies.” He further notes, “This payment coincided with not just the release of civilian hostages from Iran but also followed by a few days the release of American sailors who were abducted the prior week.” [...] Experts emphasize just how peculiar this arrangement was. “The White House sent pallets of cash in an unmarked plane to pay off a state sponsor of terrorism. This is what we call ‘bulk cash smuggling’ in the terrorism finance business,” Jonathan Schanzer of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies remarks. “Until recently, this kind of activity could result in punitive sanctions. Now, the Obama administration is trying to tell us that this is statecraft.” [The Washington Post, 8/3/16] FACT: “Due To International Sanctions Against Iran, The Payment, Made In Euros, Swiss Francs And Other Currencies, Had To Be Made In Cash” Reuters: “Due To International Sanctions Against Iran, The Payment … Had To be Made In Cash.” According to an August 4 report by Reuters, which detailed the Obama administration’s responses to claims that the cash settlement sent to Iran was a “ransom” payment, “international sanctions against Iran meant that the settlement had to be paid “in cash”: While there have long been questions about the timing of the payment, one Iranian concern was that the Obama administration could face too much domestic political criticism if it delayed acting on the tribunal's decision. Due to international sanctions against Iran, the payment, made in euros, Swiss francs and other currencies, had to be made in cash, U.S. officials argue. [Reuters, 8/4/16] CNN: Payment Could Not Be Made In American Dollars Because Of U.S. Sanctions. A CNN.com report explained that the payment to Iran had to be made in foreign currency because “existing US sanctions ban American dollars from being used in a transaction with Iran.” [CNN.com, 8/4/16] The Atlantic’s Steve Clemons Explains That America Doesn’t Have Banking Relationships With Iran, “So The Cash Payment Makes Total Sense.” MSNBC contributor and The Atlantic editor-at-large Steve Clemons explained that because of international sanctions, the United States “just simply [does not] have financial arrangements with Iranian financial institutions” to facilitate money transfers between the two governments, “so the cash payment makes total sense.” From the August 3 edition of MSNBC Live: |||||

– As the White House continued to deflect accusations from conservatives that a $400 million payment to Iran was ransom for four American detainees released earlier this year, Donald Trump twice this week claimed he had seen video of a "top secret" transaction in which the huge supposed payout was unloaded from a US airplane in Iran, per the Washington Post. At a rally Wednesday in Daytona Beach, Fla., Trump claimed the "military tape" purportedly showing "money pouring off a plane" had been released by Iran to "embarrass" the US. He again voiced the claim about the video during a Thursday rally in Portland, Maine, adding that Iran hoped to personally embarrass an "incompetent" President Obama with the video, the Los Angeles Times and CNN report. His remarks caused a temporary hubbub, as some speculated that perhaps he had seen a classified video during security briefings afforded to presidential nominees. But what Trump had actually seen soon came to light: "b-roll footage," his spokeswoman emailed the Post, that had been playing behind news reports. It showed not a money swap but an AP clip of three US prisoners released by Iran and arriving in Geneva on Jan. 17. That led Trump to point out his own error on Twitter on Friday morning (though CNN notes he did so "without actually saying he was wrong"): "The plane I saw on television was the hostage plane in Geneva, Switzerland, not the plane carrying $400 million in cash going to Iran!" he tweeted.

A huge wildfire in Fort McMurray, Alta., destroyed an entire neighbourhood and burned homes and businesses in several others Tuesday, and continues to rage out of control. CBC Radio presents live coverage As CBC Edmonton is the only radio station currently on the air in Fort McMurray, we will continue with live fire coverage throughout the night. You can find CBC Edmonton at 93.9 FM and 740 AM By late afternoon, the entire city of 60,000 had been ordered evacuated. Residents by the thousands fled the fire and for hours caused gridlock on Highway 63, even overwhelming oilsands work camps, where beds and meals were offered. Police were patrolling the highway with cans of gas, after fuel supplies ran out in Fort McMurray, Wandering River and Grasslands. Fire chief Darby Allen said the entire neighbourhood of Beacon Hill "appears to have been lost" and the fire burned many homes in other parts of the city. No buildings were lost in the city's downtown area, Allen said. Despite the devastation, there were no reports of deaths or serious injuries. As of 10:30 p.m. MT, officials reported the neighbourhoods of Abasand, Wood Buffalo, Dickensfield, and Waterways saw only some damage. No estimates were available on the number of homes and businesses that were destroyed. Witnesses reported the Flying-J gas station exploded, while the Super 8 Motel and a Denny's restaurant were gutted. Officials said about 17,000 residents escaped the city to the north, while another 35,000 drove south, at least half that number headed for Edmonton, 430 kilometres away. 'We've had a devastating day,' Chief Darby Allen told CBC's Briar Stewart. 'It's been the worst day of my career' 1:13 Gas stations were emptied of fuel along the way leaving many motorists stranded on the highway. Fire officials said they expect Wednesday could be just as bad, with the wind expected to pick up and the hot, dry weather to continue. Allen called Tuesday "a devastating day," and said fire crews were simply overwhelmed by the speed and power of the wildfire. "Everybody has given everything today to do the very best they could," Allen said. "I can categorically state that everything that was absolutely possible to protect the community was done." Taken in the afternoon on Tuesday, the fire threatens the city of Fort McMurray. 1:21 Conditions changed quickly Conditions on the ground changed quickly as the day progressed. Allen said firefighters were "a little worried" earlier in the day, but with the 30 C heat and dry conditions, once the wind came up the fire became an inferno. "It's been the worst day of my career," Allen said earlier. "It's a nasty, ugly fire and it hasn't shown any forgiveness." By 6:30 p.m., the entire city was under a mandatory evacuation order, making it the largest wildfire evacuation in the province's history, far surpassing the Slave Lake fire that made international headlines five years ago. Previous Next Fort McMurray's only hospital, the Northern Lights Regional Health Centre, was evacuated as flames approached from the Waterways neighbourhood. The province closed Highway 63 and Highway 881 to Fort McMurray to all non-essential travel. "All Albertans are watching this," said Premier Rachel Notley. "All Albertans are with the people of Fort McMurray." Notley said she hopes to get up to the city on Wednesday depending on the status of the fire. CBC has confirmed that senior military officials are preparing for a request to come from Notley on Wednesday for help to fight the wildfires. The Department of National Defence may offer airlift and other transportation support for firefighting as well as logistical help. Alberta's opposition Leader Brian Jean, a Fort McMurray MLA, was trying to get back to the city. He believes his Fort McMurray home may have fallen to the flames. 'It's probably all blown away now' The fire had barely hit the Centennial Trailer Park before John Davidson and his girlfriend, Joanne Bates, had lost everything. "It was the second one to go," said Davidson. "It's probably all blown away now." Behind him, the flames consumed what was left of the trailer park where his former home sat. Follow our live blog for up-to-the-minute news updates on the Fort McMurray wildfires: Can't see the live blog? Click here. Davidson and Bates had lived there for more than a year and kept their vehicles and two snowmobiles there. "Everything I worked for the last two years, it's all gone," said Davidson. While the two commend the RCMP and the fire department, they are upset that they weren't able to get into the trailer park to get their belongings. "It's a disaster," said Bates. "I think it's not fair. They didn't even let us take our things, so we lost everything." Many evacuation facilities full Finding a bed for the Fort McMurray evacuees became a problem as the evening progressed. The evacuees who fled north from the town seeking shelter at oilsands camps arrived at facilities already full. "Realistically, we are seeing camps fill up. The camps closer to town have been filled," said Robin Smith, spokesman for the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo around 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday night. "People are pushing on toward Syncrude." A pic of what trying to leave Fort McMurray looks like right now <a href="https://t.co/ESE7bzPkx1">pic.twitter.com/ESE7bzPkx1</a> —@ccccrystal__ The municipality is working with Syncrude to co-ordinate for the arrival of evacuees, Smith said. The camp is about an hour-long drive from town, he said. "We are asking them to take as many as they can." Shell Canada said it will open its Albian Village, about 85 kilometres north of Fort McMurray, to all resident evacuees. The Fort McKay First Nation, about 50 kilometres north of Fort McMurray, also opened camps to evacuees. Fire fight to be worse tomorrow The news won't get any better any time soon, Bruce Mayer with Alberta Forestry said in a mid-afternoon news conference. "This fire today with the temperature, the relative humidity … the fuel is very explosive out there right now," he said. Mayer said the province has nine air tankers, a dozen helicopters, and more than 100 firefighters, with more on the way. Firefighters are expecting a cold front to move into the area by mid-afternoon Wednesday, with winds gusting up to 50 km/h. "So tomorrow is expected to be a more intense burning day than today is," Mayer said. ||||| This photo provided by Tyler Burgett shows flames from a wildfire along Highway 63 in Fort McMurray, Alberta, Tuesday, May 3, 2016. At least half of the northern Alberta city was ordered evacuated Tuesday... (Associated Press) FORT MCMURRAY, Alberta (AP) — The entire population of the Canadian oil sands city of Fort McMurray, Alberta, has been ordered to evacuate from a wildfire that officials said destroyed whole neighborhoods. More than 80,000 residents have been ordered to flee as flames continued to make their way into the city Tuesday. Residents were panicked. Highway 63 is the only road out of the city and flames jumped the road. Emergency officials said whole neighborhoods have been destroyed but did not have an estimate of the number of homes affected. They said the fire is burning in several areas in the city's south and said there have been no reports of serious injuries. The wildfire, whipped by unpredictable winds on a day of high temperatures, worsened dramatically in a short time and many residents had little notice to flee. Alberta Premier Rachel Notley called it the biggest evacuation in the history of the province and said officials were doing all they could to ensure everyone's safety. She said they were looking into the possibility of an airlift for residents with medical issues. Brian Jean, the leader of Alberta's opposition party and a resident of the city, said much of downtown Fort McMurray is being destroyed by fire, but the fire chief said there had mostly been spot fires which have been extinguished "My home of the last 10 years and the home I had for 15 years before that are both destroyed," Jean said. Scott Long of Alberta Emergency Management said the flames had burned a number of structures, but couldn't say how many. Carol Christian's home was in one of the neighborhoods under the order to leave. She said it was scary as she drove to an evacuation center with her son and cat. "When you leave ... it's an overwhelming feeling to think that you'll never see your house again," she said, her voice breaking. "It was absolutely horrifying when we were sitting there in traffic. You look up and then you watch all the trees candle-topping ... up the hills where you live and you're thinking, 'Oh my God. We got out just in time.'" The main road into Fort McMurray, was closed at the southern entrance to the city after flames jumped the road. Pictures posted on Twitter showed long lines of traffic and skies darkened by thick smoke as flames licked the edges of roads. Fort McMurray is the capital of Alberta's oil sands region. The Alberta oil sands are the third largest reserves of oil in the world behind Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted that he spoke with Notley and said the federal government stands ready to help. He urged residents to follow evacuation orders. Oil sands work camps were being pressed into service to house evacuees as the raging wildfire emptied the city. Most oil sands projects are well north of the community, while the worst of the flames were on the city's south side. Officials were also evacuating non-essential staff at Suncor's base plant. It is 30 kilometers (18 miles) away and one of the closest facilities to the city. Spokesman Paul Newmarch said evacuees were moving into the plant's work camps. Will Gibson, a spokesman for Syncrude, which also has a plant north of the town, was himself one of the evacuees heading north away from the flames. Gibson said he had to flee his neighborhood via a grass embankment because the fire had already cut off the road at both ends. "I left my neighborhood and there were houses on fire," he said. "I don't know if and when I'll be going back." The large work camps can normally accommodate thousands of workers. A local radio reporter said a trailer park that had been evacuated on Monday was on fire and flames were advancing toward businesses. "It's chaos on the roads. People are panicking. It's gridlock on the roads. Flames are right next to a gas station," said Carina Van Heerde with radio station KAOS. Unseasonably hot temperatures combined with dry conditions have transformed the boreal forest in much of Alberta into a tinder box. The wildfire threat ranged from very high to extreme in different areas. The Alberta government banned all open fires except in designated camping sites in forested areas due to the threat. There were about 30 fires burning in the province. The province was calling in more reinforcements to Fort McMurray, including 100 more firefighters and a giant helicopter that can dump more than 2,000 liters (500 gallons) of water at a time. |||||

– The entire population of the Canadian oil sands city of Fort McMurray, Alberta, has been ordered to evacuate from a wildfire that officials say destroyed whole neighborhoods. More than 80,000 residents were ordered to flee as flames continued to make their way into the city Tuesday, the AP reports. Highway 63 is the only road out of the city and flames jumped the road, panicking residents. Emergency officials say whole neighborhoods have been destroyed, but they don't have an estimate of the number of homes affected. There have been no reports of serious injuries. The wildfire, whipped by unpredictable winds on a day of high temperatures, worsened dramatically in a short time and many residents had little notice to flee. "It was absolutely horrifying when we were sitting there in traffic," a woman who drove to an evacuation center with her son and cat says. "You look up and then you watch all the trees candle-topping ... and you're thinking, 'Oh my God. We got out just in time.'" Alberta Premier Rachel Notley says it's the biggest evacuation in the history of the province and said officials are doing all they can to ensure everyone's safety. Oil sands work camps north of the city are being pressed into service to house evacuees. "We've had a devastating day" and the city has been "overrun by wildfire," fire Chief Darby Allen tells the CBC. "It's been the worst day of my career. It's a nasty, ugly fire and it hasn't shown any forgiveness."

These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| Mount Huashan Photograph by Vivian Lee Huashan National Park, China Best for: Pilgrims and daredevils Distance: 7.5 miles from the gate to the top of South Peak The path along rickety planks hanging out over the void on China’s Mount Huashan have become a viral video sensation, showing up on "Craziest Hikes" lists everywhere. But that moniker is a bit of a misconception. The perilous, die-if-you-fall hike that looks like it was built by Spanky and the Little Rascals is just one small path on the massive Huashan, which is the westernmost of China’s Five Great Mountains (each of which is named for the cardinal directions and a center peak), ancient imperial pilgrimage sites sacred to Taoists and still drawing spiritual travelers and tourists to the temples perched on them. Huashan is not a single summit but a complex of five major peaks, the highest of which is the 7,087-foot South Peak. The Chang Kong Zhan Dao (or Sky Plank Road) is the boldest way access to the South Peak (which itself consists of three subpeaks). It’s a loony, fun ride of ladders, foot-wide wooden boards, cables, and steps hacked into the cliff—all hanging in the sky. You can rent via ferrata-type gear to protect yourself as you navigate it. Ascending Huashan is a walk into the spiritual history of the mountain and China itself. For millennia—before the cable cars and hordes of tourists who swarm here now along many different paths—the way up Huashan was supposed to be difficult, testing the pilgrim who wished to find the way (or the Tao). Each of the granitic peaks can be accessed by a different hike (and two of them by cable car) or by a new loop trail at the top. Now, just because the Chang Kong Zhan Dao is not necessary to get to the top of all the summits doesn't mean that the other ways up are cozy. The hikes often require ridiculously steep stairs (some of which have been chained off) and holding on to chain railings, on which you may notice hundred of locks attached. These are charms left by couples and families as wishes for love and good luck. Thrill Factor: The Chang Kong Zhan Dao is truly dangerous, even with safety gear. The rest of the mountain is accessed by thousands of tourists (a record 47,000 visited the site in one day in 2013) in varying states of fitness, so you should be able to reach the top even if you don’t want to scare yourself. As of 2014, the Chinese government has also opened a new trail on the top of the peak to make it easier to visit all the peaks and just implemented an $8.3 million-command center so it can monitor the trails through video cameras and keep them from becoming over-congested. Take It Easy: Many visitors hike to the top of the East Peak in the dark to catch the sunrise. It’s not easy but nowhere near as crazy as the Chang Kong Zhan Dao. And of course, the easiest way to the top is to ride the cable car to the North Peak (Yuntai Feng or Cloud Terrace Peak) or, as of 2013, West Peak (Lian Hua Feng or Lotus Peak), from which you can access trails to explore the others, if you wish. ||||| El Caminito del Rey is opening next Saturday, on March 28th, after it went through refurbishment process funded by the County Council of Málaga that gave €5.5m for the boardwalks and its surroundings. County Council President Elías Bendodo have announced today that tomorrow, on February 24th, tickets will be available for booking. They are free, but compulsory to obtain at www.caminitodelrey.info. This web page is available in Spanish, English, French and German. You can choose date and hour of the visit, as well as, the access route, which can be from Ardales or Álora. Each user can obtain maximum 5 passes that will be valid for two months. Visits will be free while the county Council manages the trail, which will probably last for six months, and definitely not more than a year, Mr Bendodo assured. Together with the Mayors of Álora and Ardales, José Sánchez and Juan Calderón, the County Council President explained the regulations which are to be followed during the visit and the booking. The County Council agreed with Antonio Pascual, president of the electric power company Fundación Sevillana Endesa who was also present, on ornamental lightening with led lights of this natural beauty spot. Mr Bendodo said: ‘We have finally finished the project that had seemed impossible to carry out for more than twenty years. It has already become real thanks to the County Council sponsorship and the collaboration of other involved institutions’. The web page is going to be available for booking from tomorrow, 24th February, at 12 o’clock on. Active Tourism There is 6 kilometres distance between two control cabins at the end of each boardwalk in Álora and Ardales. It we take into account the distance between El Chorro Train Station and the King’s Chair, this distance is 8.5 kilometres. Mr Bendodo recommended visitors to come by train. As for the public space and safety regulations, visitors will receive a helmet at the entrance to the path. This hiking route is part of active tourism and certain physical effort is required as it takes few hours to get to the aim. The County Council president emphasized: ‘El Caminito del Rey is not dangerous at all, but it is necessary to be careful due to the characteristics of the spot.’ Adults and children under supervision, older than eight, can access the spot. They must come half an hour before the booked entrance time to the selected access point (Ardales or Álora). It is forbidden to carry children, big bags or backpacks; to light a fire, or to use umbrellas when it rains because the boardwalks are narrow and there is to occupy as less space as possible. As for the timetable, there are timetables for two different seasons. In winter time, from November 1st to March 31st, El Caminito del Rey Path opens from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., while, in summer time, from April 1st to October 31st, it is opened until 5 p.m. It closes on Mondays, on December 24th, 25th and 31st, and January 1st, as well as on days with winds of more than 35 km/h. Apart from individual tickets, from next week on, group visits with no more than 50 people can be planned thanks to the operators specialized in active tourism that co-operate with the County Council. Maximum 600 people a day The path will be able to hold 600 people a day. Fifty people will be able to access the path every half an hour. There will never be more than 400 people on the boardwalks at the same time. All these conditions are written in a Regulation Document that has been approved at a plenary meeting and will be controlled by a Monitoring Committee, which has two members from the County Council, two from Ardales and two from Álora. The Mayor of Ardales highlighted the importance of ‘generosity’ of all the involved institutions when it was about creating this project, and he thanked to the County Council for ‘its effort, dedication and efficiency.’ Mr Calderón believes that the path ‘will stimulate the area’s development, above all, in the case of Álora and Ardales, and the whole province will have benefits out of it.’ The mayor of Álora stressed that all the institutions involved in the project: ‘have done well. They have refurbished a spectacular area, so that companies can create employment inside the area.’ Mr Sánchez added that all of them ‘will help small and medium-sized enterprises to increase their profit’, and he informed in advance that his municipality will invest €300,000 for refurbishing El Chorro Train Station. Decoration with Lightening On the other hand, the Málaga County Council and the company Endesa are going to collaborate in the ornamental lightening of El Caminito del Rey Path. Mr Bendodo praised this agreement, and he pointed out that it ‘will make stronger this initiative which is meant to restore one part of the history of the province’, and it will stimulate economic activity in the Guadalhorce Valley area, and especially in the Towns of Ardales and Álora. Antonio Pascual reminded everybody that the company Fundación Sevillana Endesa is ‘closely connected to El Caminito del Rey’, considering that its property had once been owned by Hydroelectric Power Station, built at the beginning of the 20th century, which joined power stations, waterfalls of Gaitanejo and el Chorro Dam. These Málaga factories were obtained by Endesa Group, which was formerly Sevillana de Electricidad. Advanced techniques and materials are going to be used for ornamental illumination of the path and the tunnel in Ardales. Likewise, Fundación Sevillana Endesa company will place two bronze walls at each entrance point of the path where its refurbishment will be explained. |||||

– The stunning cliffside walkway in Spain once known as one of the world's most dangerous is a lot safer now, authorities say—but still no place for the fainthearted. The recently reopened Caminito del Rey trail includes 2 miles of thin boardwalks that hang 300 feet over the Guadalhorce River gorge, reports the New York Daily News. The famous pathway was officially closed in 2000 after four people fell to their deaths, but authorities launched a major renovation project after daredevils continued to traverse the path, even though parts of it were completely gone and they had to get over big gaps, reports National Geographic, which lists it among the world's most thrilling trails. The trail's website says that after the $6 million renovation project, visitors "aren't risking their lives," but the boardwalks and hanging footbridge, "as well as steep walls, make many visitors feel inevitably dizzy," ABC News reports. It will be free to walk the renovated trail, which started out as a path for hydroelectric workers in 1921, the Daily News reports, but hiker numbers will be limited to 600 per day—and they'll be required to don helmets. (For those with a longer hike in mind, officials are making progress on the 1,000-mile Mountains-to-Sea Trail in North Carolina.)

Play Facebook Twitter Embed Police: Fugitive killed veteran cop in Florida 0:23 autoplay autoplay Copy this code to your website or blog A veteran police officer was shot and killed — and even run over — early Sunday in Florida by a wanted man who felt like a "caged rat" and didn't want to go back to prison, officials said. Tarpon Springs Officer Charles "Charlie K" Kondek, a father of five children and a former New York City police officer, was killed after responding to a noise complaint at about 2 a.m. ET in Pinellas County, some 30 miles from Tampa, Sheriff Bob Gualtieri told a press conference. The noise was music blasting from the car of the alleged shooter, Marco Antonio Parilla Jr., 23. When Parilla, who was wanted on a probation violation, saw Kondek, he allegedly fired seven rounds at the officer from a .40-caliber gun — striking Kondek in the neck just above his bullet-resistant vest. Parilla then ran over the officer as he fled the scene, Gualtieri said, adding he was arrested after a brief pursuit ending with the suspect crashing into a truck. Kondek, 45, had requested back-up before encountering Parilla, but it's not clear why. Responders performed CPR, but Kondek was pronounced dead at a local hospital. An autopsy revealed he died from the gunshot, Gualtieri said. Parilla was arrested on one count of first-degree murder. "His reason for shooting the officer was he 'felt like a caged rat.' Well, he's going back to prison and he can be a caged rat in prison because that's where he belongs," Gualtieri said. Kondek had more than 17 years with the Tarpon Springs force and five with the NYPD, said Police Chief Bob Kochen. Kondek mostly worked patrol. "It is heart-wrenching to know that we have lost our brother, but we know that he served and gave his life with honor and dignity as a hero to this community," Kochen said. "He served most of his career on the midnight shift, away from his family, allowing citizens to sleep peacefully in their bed because he faced the danger for them." Parilla was wanted for violating his probation on two counts of possession of amphetamines. He'd gone to the address where he shot Kondek to try to confront an individual he believed who had turned him in on the probation violation, Gualtieri said. Tarpon Springs Police Officer Charles Kondek. Tarpon Springs Police Dept. IN-DEPTH — Cassandra Vinograd and Elisha Fieldstadt contributed to this report. ||||| TARPON SPRINGS — A Tarpon Springs police officer with a wife and six children was shot and killed early Sunday while responding to a nuisance noise call, police said. Officer Charles “Charlie” Kondek, 45, was shot around 2 a.m. near Glen’s Eureka Apartments by Marco Antonio Parilla Jr., 23, who was released from prison in March, said Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri. Parilla, who was wanted for a probation violation, had been knocking on doors in the apartment complex at 199 Grand Blvd., looking for a person who he believed got him into recent trouble with law enforcement, Gualtieri said. A woman who Parilla arrived with in a Hyundai Elantra stayed in the car with the stereo turned up. When a resident asked her to turn down the volume, she refused and the resident called police. When Kondek arrived, he approached the Hyundai. When Parilla saw Kondek he started firing at him with a 40-caliber handgun, Gualtieri said. Kondek was able to return two shots, investigators said. As Parilla drove away from the scene, he backed over Kondek, investigators said. Gualtieri said Kondek, a former New York City police officer, was killed by a gunshot that struck his neck area, just above his protective vest. Tarpon Springs police and fire rescue tried to resuscitate Kondek but he died later at Florida Hospital North Pinellas. As Parilla fled, a man stepped out of an apartment and fired a 9 mm gun five times at the Hyundai, investigators said. That man, who thought Parilla was there to confront him, was not charged with a crime Sunday. Parilla, who partied in Pasco County before heading south to Tarpon Springs, was arrested after he crashed the car into a pole at Athens and Cross streets and fled, deputies said. He faces first-degree murder charges. The woman who was with Parilla has cooperated with investigators, Gualtieri said. Parilla was not injured. Tarpon Springs Police Chief Robert Kochen condemned Parilla on Sunday, calling him a coward. Gualtieri didn’t hide his disgust, either. “He knew he was a convicted felon with warrants,” Gualtieri said. “He said he felt like a caged rat. He’s going back to prison, but he didn’t have to take a cop’s life.” During interviews with investigators, Parilla admitted shooting Kondek, according to a release from the sheriff’s office. As he was led into the Pinellas County Jail Sunday, Parilla said that killing Kondek “was not my intention.” The incident, from the first shot until Parilla was apprehended, took eight to 10 minutes, Gualtieri said. Rachel Delk, a resident at Glen’s Eureka Apartments, said she was questioned by investigators for several hours after the shooting. Delk said she heard the suspect banging on doors, including hers, in an attempt to find a person who called the police on him. “He was mad that someone called the cops on him because he has a criminal history,” Delk said. Parilla had lived at the apartment complex and Delk remembered him from that time, she said. “He didn’t seem dangerous but he was unpredictable,” Delk said. After police arrived, Delk said she heard gunshots. When they stopped, she waited a few minutes before venturing outside, she said. A group was huddled around Kondek, who was unresponsive, Delk said. “It’s sad,” she said. The crime scene area overlooks Spring Bayou in what is considered an affluent area of Tarpon Springs. Evelyn Bilirakis, wife of former congressman Mike Bilirakis, lives on Springs Boulevard, across Orange Street from the scene. She said she heard the gunshots early Sunday. “I went out on our porch upstairs but I didn’t see anything” Bilirakis said. “This is terrible. We’ve been here 15 years and there’s never been anything like this. This is a very good neighborhood.” Kondek was the son of a retired New York City police officer and his wife works for the Pasco County Clerk of Courts, deputies said. His family lived in the Spring Hill area, Gualtieri said. Kondek “was a wonderful man, very fair and just,” said Mary Fiouris, who owns Zorbas Nightclub with her husband Telly and has known Kondek for a few years. The nightclub on Athens Street will hold a fundraiser for the fallen officer, she said. “This is too terrible, and right before Christmas too,” she said wiping away tears. “He was just protecting us. Why do people do these things?” As she was closing the nightclub early Sunday, Fiouris said she saw Parilla’s white car barrel down Athens, before hitting a power pole and a white truck. Tom Mahinis, a Tarpon Springs artist, was outside Zorbas with about 20 people and also witnessed the crash. “He must have been doing 70 mph,” Mahinis said. “He got out of the car and I started chasing him. I didn’t know what he had done.” At the intersection of Athens and Cross streets, police asked Mahinis where the driver was. “I told them and then they tackled him and apprehended the man,” Mahinis said. As the man was being led off by police, he shot “a facial expression” at Mahinis. “I said, ‘You just bought an $80,000 truck,’” Mahinis said. Parilla has a lengthy criminal history in Hillsborough County, including arrests for selling and possessing cocaine and marijuana, trafficking in stolen property and leaving the scene of a crash, according to arrest records. In March, he was released from state prison after serving more than two years on a three year sentence for an array of drug charges. Sunday’s shooting marked the first fatal shooting of a Tarpon Springs police officer in the line of duty since 1926, and the first officer killed in the line of duty since 1969, when an officer died in a traffic accident, according to Joe Voskerichian, executive director of the Gold Shield Foundation, which provides funds to families of officers killed on duty. Another Tarpon Springs officer was shot and killed in 1921, Voskerichian said. The Gold Shield Foundation will present Kondek’s family with a check for $5,000 immediately after arrangements are made with the sheriff’s office, said Voskerichian. If Kondek’s children are in school, the foundation will help with their education, he said. A police cruiser wrapped in a black ribbon and covered with flowers served as a memorial parked in front of the Tarpon Springs Police Department on Sunday evening. Rick O’Connell, a homeless man, stopped and knelt in front of the squad car. “He was a human being,” O’Connell said. “I don’t always get along with cops, but nobody deserves to die like that.” As O’Connell pedaled away on a bicycle, Pattie Snell, who works at a nearby Publix, draped a bouquet of flowers over the hood of the police cruiser. Snell said two of her sons are in law enforcement, and her eldest son survived an on-the-job shooting. She said Kondek was a regular customer at Publix. “He was very pleasant, a good guy. He would come in for subs and stuff,” Snell said. “You try and put (dangers faced by police) out of your mind. They do their jobs and protect the community.” Her eyes began to water. “It’s unfortunate,” she said. Nick Ryder, a 13-year-old skateboarder, went to the police department with father Jim Ryder on Sunday to offer condolences to police. “He was always nice to us,” Nick said of Kondek. “He said he remembered what it was like to be a kid.” haltman@tampatrib.com (813) 259-7629 gfox@tampatrib.com (813) 371-1860 Editor’s note: The name of Joe Voskerichian, executive director of the Gold Shield Foundation, was spelled incorrectly in an earlier version of this story. ||||| MIAMI (AP) — A fugitive trying to evade an arrest warrant shot a Tampa-area police officer and then ran him over early Sunday, killing the officer, police said. Flowers are placed on a police car near the scene of the shooting of Officer Charles Kondek in Tarpon Springs, Fla. on Sunday, Dec. 21, 2014. Kondek, a 17-year veteran of the local police department and... (Associated Press) This photo provided by the Tarpon Springs Police Department shows Officer Charles Kondek. Ofc. Kondek, a 17-year veteran of the local police department and originally from New York, was shot and killed... (Associated Press) A forensic science investigator with the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office investigates the scene where 45-year-old Tarpon Springs police officer Charles Kondek was shot and killed, Sunday, Dec. 21, 2014,... (Associated Press) Flowers are placed on a police car near the scene of the shooting of Officer Charles Kondek in Tarpon Springs, Fla. on Sunday, Dec. 21, 2014. Kondek, a 17-year veteran of the local police department and... (Associated Press) Marco Antonio Parilla Jr., 23, center, is escorted into the Pinellas County Jail after being arrested on suspicion of first-degree murder after a police officer was shot and killed while on duty, Sunday,... (Associated Press) Cynthia Martinez, 23 of Tarpon Springs, leaves flowers at a memorial for a slain Tarpon Springs police officer in Tarpon Springs, Fla. on Sunday, Dec. 21, 2014. The Tarpon Springs Police Department identified... (Associated Press) Tarpon Springs Police Department Chief Robert Kochen speaks during a news conference regarding the police shooting in Tarpon Springs, Fla. on Sunday, Dec. 21, 2014. The Tarpon Springs Police Department... (Associated Press) Marco Antonio Parilla Jr., 23, crashed his car into a pole and another vehicle after running over Tarpon Springs officer Charles Kondek. Parilla was arrested on suspicion of first-degree murder. The shooting did not appear to have any connection to the ambush killings of two New York police officers a day earlier. Authorities said Kondek responded to a noise call around 2 a.m. at an apartment complex. Parilla was pounding on doors, looking for a neighbor who "dimed him out" to police, authorities said. When Parilla saw Kondek, he fired multiple rounds at the officer, striking him once above his bullet-proof vest. "We know we have the right guy in custody," Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri said. "This guy knew what he was doing, he killed a cop and he needs to be held accountable for that." According to the Florida Department of Corrections, Parilla served more than two years in prison for several offenses, including drug charges, and was released in March. He was listed as a fugitive for violating his probation. It wasn't immediately clear what the violation was. The sheriff said Parilla told investigators that when he saw the officer he "felt like a caged rat" and didn't want to return to prison. "I apologize to the family" of the officer, Parilla told media outlets while being escorted to jail. "That was not my intention." Condek, 45, had been with the local force for 17 years. Originally from New York, Kondek previously served on the New York City Police Department for more than five years, authorities said. Kondek was the father of six children. |||||

– A Florida man who allegedly told investigators he killed an officer because he felt like a "caged rat" and didn't want to go back to jail now has little hope of ever leaving prison alive. Authorities say Marco Antonio Parilla Jr., 23, who was wanted on a probation violation, was searching an apartment complex in Tarpon Springs early yesterday morning for the person who reported the violation when Officer Charles Kondek arrived to investigate a noise complaint, NBC reports. Parilla allegedly fired seven shots at the officer, hitting him once above his bulletproof vest, and then ran him over as he fled the scene. He was arrested after crashing his car and now faces first-degree murder charges. Officials in Florida say Parilla got out of prison in March after serving more than two years for various offenses, including drug charges, the AP reports. "His reason for shooting the officer was he 'felt like a caged rat,'" the local sheriff says. "Well, he's going back to prison and he can be a caged rat in prison because that's where he belongs." Kondek, 45, was married with six children and had served five years with the NYPD before joining the Tarpon Springs force 17 years ago. He spent most of his career on the midnight shift, where people he dealt with describe him as pleasant and fair-minded. "I don't always get along with cops, but nobody deserves to die like that," a homeless man who stopped in front of a flower-covered squad car that served as a memorial told the Tampa Tribune.

Photograph courtesy Universal Pictures/Tippett Studio. David Haglund David Haglund is the literary editor of NewYorker.com. Now MacFarlane’s branched out from his insular Sunday-night-on-Fox empire and made a movie, Ted, starring Mark Wahlberg and Mila Kunis (who does one of the main voices on Family Guy). It also stars MacFarlane himself—or rather his voice, which he lends to the movie’s title character, a teddy bear brought to life when a young boy makes a wish. That young boy is the Wahlberg character, John Bennett, who grew up just outside Boston in the 1980s. John makes his wish at Christmas, that “special time of year,” a comically old-fashioned narrator tells us, when little boys and girls all around New England “beat up the Jewish kids.” That punchline is the first indication (apart from the opening credits) that this is indeed a Seth MacFarlane comedy. It’s not the last: Ted, we soon learn, is one of the pint-sized balls of pure id that populate his work. Ted was briefly famous when the world learned of his existence—we even see him on Carson, where, Ted says, Ed McMahon kept muttering anti-Semitic remarks, thinking that he was Alf (and that Alf was Jewish). But he has long since faded into obscurity, living in the Back Bay with his best friend John, who works at a car rental place, where all he’s got to do, in the words of his boss, “is not fuck up.” Advertisement He does, of course: John has a penchant for ditching work so he can do bong hits with Ted and watch the 1980 live-action film version of Flash Gordon. These man-child habits have begun to tax the patience of his girlfriend Lori, played by Kunis, who works at a PR firm with several similarly attractive and well-dressed young women and a sleazy male supervisor played by Joel McHale. Thus are the familiar rom-com parameters established: John is an immature dude with a heart of gold who must outgrow his loutish friend—who happens to be plush—and hold onto his gorgeous and super put-together girlfriend, keeping her from the clutches of a more successful but obviously evil rival. Get Slate in your inbox. In many ways, Ted hews to this tired outline. John kicks Ted out, and, after an incident at a party, decides they can’t be friends at all. Kunis, meanwhile, who helped carry Forgetting Sarah Marshall and was charismatic and sexy in Black Swan, is wasted here, getting no real story of her own: Lori wants a ring and she’s settled on John. Her resolution is at least made slightly more plausible by John’s incarnation in the form of Mark Wahlberg; dim-witted and unambitious he may be, but the man can certainly fill out a car-rental employee uniform. And Wahlberg is charming, as always, in what is arguably his first straightforwardly comic leading role (not counting The Happening). He also does a perfectly natural Boston accent, an essential skill given how heavily MacFarlane, a Connecticut native, relies on local color.* Ted even has a big scene at the Hatch Shell—with an odd, extended cameo by Norah Jones—and, like Ben Affleck’s The Town, a climactic showdown at Fenway Park. A rom-com with a climactic showdown at Fenway Park? Why yes. MacFarlane is not terribly interested in emotional epiphanies. Instead, he gives us a second villain: a disturbed, mustachioed man (Giovanni Ribisi) who has been obsessed with Ted since childhood, and who, late in the film, kidnaps the bear and gives him to his equally troubled son to play with. We shift into action-comedy mode, and any question of the bear being abandoned is dropped completely. There are some laughs along the way, but this problem with story is typical of MacFarlane. (Many of Family Guy’s jokes are dropped into random cutaways from the main action.) Also typical: the sour mean-spiritedness at the heart of so much of his humor. The Jewish jokes cited above work because they’re really jokes about anti-Semitism. But when an Asian man bursts through the wall at a party brandishing a duck and a meat cleaver and says things like “This is my home long time” and “I try to make duck dinner,” it’s not a joke about racism. It’s just racism. (Earlier, Ted had noted that his new neighbors were an “Asian family, but they don’t have a gong or nothing, so it’s not that bad.”) Similarly, a bunch of gay-panic jokes throughout the film—the Ribisi villain is unsurprisingly played as effeminate—undermine the fun of an obviously homoerotic fantasy John has about Sam Jones’ Flash Gordon. (And no, MacFarlane doesn’t get a pass just because he’s an outspoken advocate for equal marriage rights.) There’s a cruel edge to so much of MacFarlane’s comedy—the quintessential MacFarlane joke may be a punch in the face. Of which we get many in Ted: The movie’s version of the meet-cute comes when John accidentally decks Lori on a dance floor, and the show-stopping set piece is a knock-down drag-out between John and Ted in a hotel room. The latter scene bears more than a passing resemblance to the naked fight from Borat—but where the Sacha Baron-Cohen bit was done with almost unimaginable comic gusto, the MacFarlane equivalent relies on really good CGI. It is funny to watch a teddy bear wail on Mark Wahlberg. But afterward, I mostly felt beat up. ||||| The Lady or the Teddy? Review: ‘Ted,’ by Seth MacFarlane, With Mark Wahlberg There is really only one joke in “Ted” — a toy bear comes to life and turns out to have a filthy mouth and a taste for weed — but the movie’s attempts at humor can nonetheless be sorted into a few distinct categories. There are jokes that are funny only because a stuffed bear says them, jokes that are not funny even though a stuffed bear says them and jokes that may or may not be funny because of Mark Wahlberg . Mila Kunis is also in the movie, but she can’t be funny because she’s a girl, and her job is to be amused, tolerant and pretty. Tolerant amusement is pretty much the best this harmless little picture, directed by Seth MacFarlane from a script he wrote with Alec Sulkin and Wellesley Wild, is able to manage, even though it strives for obnoxious hilarity. The cleverly animated ursine title character, voiced in an exaggerated Boston bray by Mr. MacFarlane himself, is a fire hose of vulgarity, ethnic insult, homophobia and misogyny. In the modern, meta manner he (that is, Mr. MacFarlane) wants both to indulge and to deny the offensiveness of this material, to wallow in ugliness and make fun of it too. It’s a wasted effort though. The sin of “Ted” is not that it is offensive but that it is boring, lazy and wildly unoriginal. If Triumph the Insult Comic Dog ever got a hold of Ted, there would be nothing left but a pile of fluff and a few scraps of fur. Mr. MacFarlane is best known as the creator of “Family Guy,” an animated television series that has hung around in the company of “The Simpsons” and “South Park” like an annoying younger cousin, bullying and whining its way into a measure of public acceptance. The show shares with “Ted” a devotion to laughter based on incongruity: the baby who sounds like an English aristocrat; the dog who talks like a bored intellectual; the teddy bear with the voice of the guy who spilled beer down the back of your shirt at the Bruins game. Balancing these inventions are sturdy stereotypes. In other words, the guy at the Bruins game is in the movie too, in the person of Mr. Wahlberg, who settles amiably into the role of an affable underachiever memorably named John. A cute opening sequence chronicles the granting of John’s childhood wish that his beloved bear come to life and the flurry of media attention that followed. In the present John is 35, employed at a Boston car-rental office and romantically attached to Lori (Ms. Kunis). She is a good enough sport to accept her boyfriend’s underachieving ways and his devotion to his fluffy best bud, in spite of the skepticism of her friends and the amorous attention of her boss (Joel McHale). But circumstances and John’s own passivity conspire to force him to make a painful choice: the lady or the bear. Meanwhile, to pad out the meager plot, Ted is menaced by a creepy guy (Giovanni Ribisi) with a creepy mustache and a creepy son (Aedin Mincks). Sexual and flatulence-based gags are accompanied by the usual side dishes: warmed-over pop-cultural references and cheap-shot jabs at celebrities and ethnic minorities. Fans of “Flash Gordon,” a kitschy early-’80s attempt to ride the coattails of the “Star Wars” movies, will be especially tickled. Admirers of Norah Jones, who shows up briefly, may on the other hand, be puzzled. But not offended. There are some genuinely, wildly funny bits in the movie — a brutal motel-room fistfight between Ted and John; a cocaine-fueled talking binge; a few choice insults and smutty riffs — but the feature film is not a hospitable form for Mr. MacFarlane. He has no particular visual knack, little interest in storytelling and nothing better to do with his naughty bear besides stuff him into a soft, sentimental comedy that seems almost proud of its lack of wit or conviction. “Ted” is rated R (Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian). It swears like a 13-year-old boy with unlimited access to premium cable. Ted Opens on Friday nationwide. Directed by Seth MacFarlane; written by Mr. MacFarlane, Alec Sulkin and Wellesley Wild, based on a story by Mr. MacFarlane; director of photography, Michael Barrett; edited by Jeff Freeman; music by Walter Murphy; production design by Stephen Lineweaver; costumes by Debra McGuire; produced by Mr. MacFarlane, Scott Stuber, John Jacobs and Jason Clark; released by Universal Pictures. Running time: 1 hour 46 minutes. WITH: Mark Wahlberg (John Bennett), Mila Kunis (Lori Collins), Joel McHale (Rex), Giovanni Ribisi (Donny), Norah Jones (herself), Aedin Mincks (Robert) and Seth MacFarlane (Ted). |||||

– Seth MacFarlane's first feature film is, well, pretty much what you'd expect from the Family Guy guy: a lot of bathroom humor and not a lot of story. So is it worth seeing? That depends on your tastes: "Tolerant amusement is pretty much the best this harmless little picture is able to manage, even though it strives for obnoxious hilarity," writes AO Scott in the New York Times. MacFarlane "has no particular visual knack, little interest in storytelling, and nothing better to do with his naughty bear besides stuff him into a soft, sentimental comedy that seems almost proud of its lack of wit or conviction." The Globe and Mail is more forgiving: "As unabashedly idiotic movie comedies go, Ted goes fairly well," the paper notes. "It’s rude, crude, lewd, and often funny. In other words, it’s a lot like MacFarlane’s animated show transferred to the big screen in a live-action story." At Newsday, Rafer Guzman sees "a very real heart" to the film. "This may sound silly, but the two humans and one bear make a pretty convincing dramatic triangle." Heart? David Haglund firmly disagrees. "There’s a cruel edge to so much of MacFarlane’s comedy—the quintessential MacFarlane joke may be a punch in the face," he writes in Slate.

(CNN) Volunteers and law enforcement combed the side of a highway on Thursday looking for evidence in the disappearance of a missing Wisconsin teenager whose parents were found dead in their home this week. But the search along Highway 8 in Barron County, Wisconsin, didn't turn up anything of value, according to Barron County Sheriff Chris Fitzgerald. Hours earlier, Fitzgerald asked for 100 volunteers to help in the routine search for evidence that could be related to the case as the search for Jayme Closs entered its fourth day. The 13-year-old was likely at her family's Barron home, located on Highway 8, when her parents were shot dead, and she vanished moments later, investigators believe. Her whereabouts and safety are still in question. "We believe Jayme was in the home at the time of the homicides and we believe she's still in danger," Fitzgerald said this week. Thursday's search took place about 3 miles from the family's home, according to CNN affiliate WCCO Since authorities received a cryptic 911 call and discovered the bodies of Jayme's parents in their home near the town of Barron early Monday, investigators have received more than 800 tips and have not confirmed any credible sightings of the girl. But the sheriff said he has a "100% expectation that she's alive." #FBIMilwaukee needs your help, as the search continues to bring home 13 year old Jayme Closs, now missing & endangered after her parents were found dead in their home in Barron, WI early this week. Call the tip line 1-855-744-3879.#FindJayme pic.twitter.com/rNELlQKJb6 — FBI Milwaukee (@FBIMilwaukee) October 17, 2018 An Amber Alert was issued Monday for Jayme and several law enforcement agencies have joined the search. Motive in parents' death is unclear Deputies are also trying to solve the killings of Jayme's parents, James Closs, 56, and Denise Closs, 46, in the small city of Barron. During a 911 call shortly before 1 a.m. Monday, the dispatcher heard a disturbance in the background. But no one spoke directly to the dispatcher, Fitzgerald said. When deputes arrived to the home less than four minutes later, Fitzgerald said, no one was in sight and no vehicles were in the immediate area. Closs' parents were shot and their deaths have been ruled homicides, Fitzgerald said Wednesday. No gun was found at the scene, he said. It's not clear how long James and Denise Closs had been dead when their bodies were discovered Monday. On HLN's "Crime & Justice" Wednesday night, Fitzgerald told host Ashleigh Banfield that deputies had recovered the cell phone from which the 911 call was made. Fitzgerald said additional agencies, including the FBI, are involved. "They are the experts in breaking down 911 tapes, looking at our phones, and taking care of all evidence in that manner," he said. Authorities said they have determined whose cell phone the call came from, but declined to identify the owner. Investigators also believe Jayme was at home during the shooting based on details from the 911 call and evidence from the home. "Is it a random attack or a targeted attack? I don't know that answer," Fitzgerald told reporters. "That's why those leads are so important." Joan Smrekar, who lives next door to the Closs home, told Banfield she heard two shots a couple of seconds apart just after 12:30 a.m. Monday. "It was just, 'bang' and 'bang,'" Smrekar said. Relatives wait in agony Seara Closs said she wishes she were the one endangered, not her cousin Jayme. Seara wrote an open letter to Jayme on Facebook. "I'm going thru our family pictures, worrying sick about you :( wishing we could trade places just to get you home and out of harms way," Seara Closs posted In her post, Seara reminded her cousin that her family -- including her slain parents -- love her dearly. "Grandpa Jim (James) Closs, your Momma Bear, Denise Closs and your very own night [in] shinning armor, your Daddyo Jim JR Closs ... love all of you!" Seara Closs wrote. Authorities said they don't believe Jayme Closs ran away. Barron Area School District administrator Diane Tremblay said Jayme, a member of her school's cross-country team, is a "sweet girl who is a loyal friend and loves to dance." During a recent school assignment, Jayme was asked what she would do with $1 million, Tremblay said. Jayme wrote that she would "feed the hungry and give the rest to the poor." Both James and Denise Closs were long-time employees of the Jennie-O Turkey Store in Barron, Jennie-O's parent company Hormel said. "Our thoughts are with the Closs family and the entire Barron community," said a statement from Jennie-O Turkey Store officials. "This is a difficult time for our entire team and we are mourning this loss and are still processing this terrible tragedy. We are also hopeful for the safe return of their daughter, Jayme, and are keeping her and the Closs family in our thoughts." Jayme Closs is 5 feet tall, weighs 100 pounds and has green eyes and blond or strawberry blond hair, the sheriff's department said. Anyone with information can call the tip line at 1-855-744-3879. Correction: A prior version of this story incorrectly spelled the missing girl's last name. ||||| Jayme Closs (Photo: Barron County Sheriff's Department) BARRON - A 100-person search party and some 800 tips still have not led Barron County authorities to Jayme Closs, a 13-year-old girl missing since her parents were found shot to death in their home early Monday. Meanwhile, police from Wausau sent a school resource officer and therapy dog Thursday to help Barron students cope with the mysterious disappearance of a schoolmate and double murder in their community. The state justice department's Office of School Safety also plans to send a team of counselors by the end of the week. Barron residents James Closs, 56, and Denise Closs, 46, were found dead about 1 a.m. Monday after police responded to a cellphone call to 911 from inside the home. Their daughter Jayme, a student at Riverview Middle School, was nowhere to be found. The incident, and the fact that authorities still don't know what transpired in the Closs home Sunday night, has rattled the quiet town of fewer than 3,500 people. “We don’t know anything and that’s hard,” said Cyndi Bragg, who owns InFocus Eyewear in Barron and has lived in the area for 25 years. She said the whole community is on edge and “stuck in limbo” as they await more information. Meanwhile, she’s told her children to be aware of their surroundings, and her family is taking extra care to lock their door. Buy Photo Volunteers search a ditch near Barron, Wisconsin, on Thursday, Oct. 18, 2018, looking for any evidence related to missing 13-year-old Jayme Closs. The girl hasn't been seen since before her parents were discovered shot to death early Monday in the family home. (Photo: Haley BeMiller/USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin) On Thursday afternoon, Barron County Sheriff Chris Fitzgerald posted a plea on Facebook for 100 "able-bodied volunteers" to help in the search for evidence related to her disappearance. The volunteers then spread out to search specific areas near the community. The sheriff called it a "routine search for articles of evidentiary value." Two hours after the search began he posted a Facebook update that said nothing had been found related to Jayme's disappearance. One of the volunteers out in the field was Ashley Vandenvrink, who lives roughly 30 minutes from Barron in Clayton. Volunteers were looking for just about anything that might seem suspicious, she said. Vandenvrink is a mother of four, which inspired her to help with the search. “It’s heartbreaking,” she said. “That could’ve been my daughter. That could’ve been anybody’s kid.” Fitzgerald also wrote that the sheriff's office had received more than 800 tips since Monday morning and asked that people with information continue to report it by calling 855-744-3879. Buy Photo Badge, the Wausau Police Department's trained therapy dog, awaits her chance to help students in Barron cope with the disappearance of 13-year-old schoolmate Jayme Closs. (Photo: Haley BeMiller/USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin) Wausau Police Chief Ben Bliven, whose department was affected by a mass shooting in March 2017 that drew national attention, said he was eager to help Barron — though the communities are more than two hours apart. "There comes a time in every community when help is needed; we have certainly experienced that need for help,” Bliven said in a statement. RELATED: Barron parents shot to death, Wisconsin teen still missing RELATED: Here's what we know about the Jayme Closs disappearance Wausau School Resource Officer Nick Stetzer visited the Barron schools with his therapy dog, Badge. Stetzer said students and staff enjoyed seeing the dog and one girl even asked if she could take Badge home with her. Trauma is difficult for everyone to handle, Stetzer said, but the therapy dog can provide love to anyone without judgment. “A couple seconds of relief of petting the dog and not thinking about stuff definitely helps when it comes to trauma,” he said. Buy Photo Wausau School Resource Officer Nick Stetzer works with his therapy dog, Badge, outside Barron schools on Thursday, Oct. 18. Stetzer and Badge visited with students and staff reeling from the disappearance of schoolmate Jayme Closs and the shooting deaths of her parents, James and Denise Closs. (Photo: Haley BeMiller/USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin) Kristen Devitt, director of the state's Office of School Safety, said the additional counseling and therapy resources can help the community now and going forward. The office is working with Barron County Human Services on crisis response so the county can eventually take on that role full time. Trying to cope with the traumatic losses in Barron is frightening and anxiety-producing for local residents, Devitt said. “There isn’t anyone in this community that this hasn’t touched,” she said. The Wisconsin Safe and Healthy Schools Training & Technical Assistance Center will also provide training to school staff and counselors on trauma-informed practices and PREPaRE, which outlines how school professionals can provide mental health support in a crisis. All services will be funded through an emergency grant from the state justice department, according to Attorney General Brad Schimel. Buy Photo Investigators use a canine Tuesday to help search the grounds near the Closs home in Barron. (Photo: TZ Kha/USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin) Read or Share this story: https://www.wausaudailyherald.com/story/news/2018/10/18/jayme-closs-wausau-police-department-send-aid-barron-schools/1682096002/ ||||| ... for the Wisconsin Home Energy Assistance Program (WHEAP)? This is a one-time heat and electric benefit. Whether you use wood, propane, natural gas, electricity or fuel oil to heat your home, you may be eligible. When you receive benefits from the Wisconsin Home Energy Assistance Program, you are automatically placed on a referral list for possible weatherization services for your home, such as insulation and sealing air leaks, at no cost to you. If you qualify for WHEAP, own your home, and your primary heating system no longer provides heat, is inoperable or becomes unsafe, you may be potentially eligible for emergency heating system assistance. If you would like to find out more about WHEAP, please call 715-537-6340. With the cold weather upon us, did you know that you may be eligible |||||

– Plenty of people answered the call when Barron County Sheriff Chris Fitzgerald asked for 100 able-bodied volunteers to search for "missing and endangered" teen Jayme Closs on Thursday—but the search along a 14-mile stretch of Highway 8 near Barron, Wis., didn't find anything that could provide a breakthrough. The sheriff's office said in a Facebook post that "nothing of evidentiary value" was found, though they have received more than 800 tips, CNN reports. Closs, 13, has been the focus of an intensive search since early Monday, when her parents were found shot to death in their home minutes after a cryptic 911 call was placed. The town of Barron, which has fewer than 3,500 people, has been deeply shaken by the murders and the disappearance, reports the Wausau Daily Herald. Police have said they don't know whether it was a random attack or a targeted one. "We don’t know anything and that’s hard," says Barron resident Cyndi Bragg. She says the community is "stuck in limbo" while the search continues—and she has told her own children to be extremely cautious. Fitzgerald has said he has a "100% expectation that she's alive," though there have been no credible sightings confirmed since her disappearance. The sheriff's office says Jaymee is 5 feet tall and 100 pounds, with strawberry-blond hair and green eyes. (The sheriff believes Jaymee was home when her parents were killed.)

DETROIT A Satanic organization unveiled a controversial bronze Baphomet sculpture in Detroit just before midnight on Saturday, after trying in vain to have it installed near a 10 Commandments monument in Oklahoma. Due to planned demonstrations, the group, which is opposed to Bible-themed displays on government land, kept the location of the unveiling of its 9-foot-tall monument secret until the last moment, when it emailed the information to ticket holders. The Satanic Temple unveiled the one-ton statue at an industrial building near the Detroit River just before 11:30 p.m. local time as supporters cheered, "Hail Satan." Some of the hundreds in attendance rushed to pose for photos. The statue of a winged Baphomet with a human body and a goat's head resembled a design the group previously released. Statues of a boy and a girl stood in poses of adoration on either side. Jex Blackmore, director of the Satanic Temple Detroit chapter, said temple members planned to transport the sculpture to Arkansas, where earlier this year the governor signed a bill authorizing a 10 Commandments monument on the State Capitol's grounds. The Temple had unsuccessfully applied to have the statue placed near a 10 Commandments monument installed in 2012 on the Oklahoma State Capitol grounds. The Oklahoma Supreme Court recently ruled the 10 Commandments monument violates a section of the state constitution that bans the use of state property for the benefit of a religion. Lawmakers in the socially conservative state responded with threats to seek the impeachment of the court's justices and pledged to push for changes to the constitution. Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin, a Republican, said she will keep the monument in place as the state appeals the decision. On Saturday, the presentation of Baphomet in Detroit drew protest from local Christians. About 50 people prayed for the city and denounced the monument outside a business where the Satanic Temple previously tried to display the statue before fears of a backlash scuttled the plan. "The last thing we need in Detroit is having a welcome home party for evil," said Reverend Dave Bullock, a pastor at Greater St. Matthew Baptist Church in Highland Park, Michigan. (Editing by Alex Dobuzinskis) ||||| The Satanic Temple is a non-theistic religious organization dedicated to Satanic practice and the promotion of Satanic rights. We understand the Satanic figure as a symbol of man’s inherent nature, representative of the eternal rebel, enlightened inquiry and personal freedom rather than a supernatural deity or being. It is our mission to facilitate communication and mobilization of politically aware Satanists, secularists, and advocates for individual liberty. We actively provide outreach and participate in public affairs where the issues might benefit from rational, Satanic insights. The Detroit Chapter is officially affiliated with the national Satanic Temple organization, we are a self-organized, volunteer-led group that seeks to organize and empower like-minded individuals who are passionate about supporting The Satanic Temple’s mission. We promote awareness of the Satanic cause, educate our peers and encourage critical thinking, activism and justice within the Detroit community. Our Mission The Satanic Temple (TST) facilitates the communication and mobilization of politically aware Satanists, secularists, and advocates for individual liberty. The mission of The Satanic Temple is to encourage benevolence and empathy among all people. In addition, we embrace practical common sense and justice. As an organized religion, we feel it is our function to actively provide outreach, to lead by example, and to participate in public affairs wheresoever the issues might benefit from rational, Satanic insights. As Satanists, we all should be guided by our consciences to undertake noble pursuits guided by our individual wills. We believe that this is the hope of all mankind and the highest aspiration of humanity. What we Believe The Satanic Temple practices non-theistic Satanism, we believe that religion can, and should, be divorced from superstition. As such, we do not believe in either God or the Devil as supernatural forces. We bow to no god or gods and celebrate our outsider status. To embrace the name Satan is to embrace rational inquiry removed from supernaturalism and archaic tradition-based superstitions. The Satanist should actively work to hone critical thinking and exercise reasonable inquiry in all things. Our beliefs must be malleable to the best current scientific understandings of the material world — never the reverse. What does Satan mean to The Satanic Temple? Satan is symbolic of the Eternal Rebel in opposition to arbitrary authority, forever defending personal sovereignty even in the face of insurmountable odds. Satan is an icon for the unbowed will of the relentless inquirer… the heretic who questions sacred laws and rejects all tyrannical impositions. This concept provides us with an exemplar by which we live our lives; he is a symbol of defiance, of independence, of wisdom and self-empowerment. Satanism does not provide some artificial framework for coping with the world, but rather, it serves as an affirmation of natural existence. Ours is the historical and literary Satan, akin to western literary traditions expressed in texts such as Milton’s Paradise Lost and France’s The Revolt of the Angels, the roots of which lie in a metaphorical construct of the adversary which pre-dates even Judeo-Christian faith. On Non-Theistic Religions The idea that religion belongs to supernaturalists is backwards, and offensive. There are several other recognized Religions that are largely considered to be atheistic (Buddism for example). The metaphorical Satanic construct is no more arbitrary to us than are the deeply held beliefs that we actively advocate for. Are we supposed to believe that those who pledge submission to an ethereal supernatural deity hold to their values more deeply than we? Are we supposed to concede that only the superstitious are proper recipients of religious exemption and privilege? In fact, Satanism provides us all that a religion should, without a compulsory attachment to untenable items of faith-based belief: It provides a narrative structure by which we contextualize our lives and works. It provides a body of symbolism and religious practice — a sense of identity, culture, community, and shared values. How we differ from Secular Philosophies A unifying attribute of all Satanists is our embrace of our outsider status. Satanists adhere to the principles of individual sovereignty and rejection of tyrannical authority. Additionally, Satanism is deeply rooted within a rich historical and literary framework, which spans thousands of years in cultures across the globe. We embrace our philosophic roots as part of our religion. These histories and concerns are of tantamount importance to us, but are not fundamental components of Humanism or other secular philosophies. What sets us apart from other Satanic organizations Modern Satanic organizations have typically concentrated almost solely on pointless and misguided efforts to define, and establish a monopoly upon, a model of the “one true Satanism”. This obsession with ownership has fomented an unfortunate culture in which Satanism’s most vitriolic critics are often self- identified Satanists themselves. The Satanic Temple is not only uninterested in establishing itself as the sole arbiter of Satanic practice, but has always been open to working with other self-identified Satanic organizations to promote general recognition of Satanic legitimacy. While many Satanic organizations seem to take pleasure in needless hierarchies while isolating themselves in petty organizational autocracy, The Satanic Temple disdains rigid, centralized authority and focuses its efforts in effecting tangible change — to our benefit — in the real world. The time for a politically active, relevant Satanic movement is now. ACTIVISM AND THE SATANIC PHILOSOPHY Satanism is a philosophy of Action. The Satanic Temple often serves as a “poison pill” in the Church/State debate. Satanists, asserting their religious rights and privileges where religious agendas have been successful in imposing themselves upon public affairs, can serve as a poignant reminder that such privileges are for everyone. We understand that self-identified Satanists deserve just as much consideration as any other religions group. We are a sincere movement that stands in defiance of the unopposed, dogmatic moral legislation from a singular powerful religious voice. We refuse to be enslaved by a theocratic system, which openly seeks to control and destroy sexuality, individual autonomy and critical thinking. As the Eternal Rebel once defied the tyrant god, we too will rebel. Download a PDF of The Satanic Temple Introductory Primer Our Tenents ||||| The Satanic Temple of Detroit unveiled an enormous bronze Baphomet statue Saturday night despite protests from the local community. A group of Satanists in in Detroit unveiled a 1.5-ton, 8.5-foot bronze statue of Baphomet flanked by two young children, shown here in New York, on Saturday night. In an effort to make a statement against religious monuments on government property, members of the Satanic Temple of Detroit unveiled a statue of a goat-headed winged statue in Detroit on Saturday night. The 9-foot-tall bronze statue of Baphomet made its public debut at a ticketed event in an industrial building near the Detroit River. The monument was revealed shortly before midnight as hundreds of supporters cheered and chanted “Hail Satan.” Members of the Satanic Temple of Detroit viewed the unveiling as a victory; “a celebration of a group effort” that has taken several years to complete. Not all Detroit residents were as pleased. The statue has been a point of contention in the Motor City for months, and demonstrations against it continued up until the last minute. Around 100 protesters turned out Saturday afternoon to pray and denounce the monument, calling it “disrespectful” to other religions. Jex Blackmore, the director of the Satanic Temple of Detroit, says this backlash is the product of years of “deep misunderstanding” about Satanism. “Satanism and the term ‘Satanic’ has been used a political tool to demonize individuals who have rebelled against systems of authority and power,” Blackmore said in a heated segment of WJBK-TV’s “Let it Rip.” The Satanic Temple of Detroit is non-theistic and does not celebrate the Judeo-Christian representation of Satan, Blackmore said. The group’s website defines Satan as “a symbol of man’s inherent nature, representative of the eternal rebel, enlightened inquiry and personal freedom rather than a supernatural deity or being.” The Temple originally applied for the statue to be installed in 2012 near a Ten Commandments monument on the Oklahoma State Capitol grounds. After that application was denied, the Temple decided on Detroit, where the Satanic Temple is said to have a stronger-than-average congregation. Blackmore said Saturday that temple members planned to transport the sculpture to Arkansas, where the governor recently signed a bill authorizing a Ten Commandments monument on the State Capitol's grounds. This isn’t the Satanic Temple of Detroit’s first controversial demonstration. Last Christmas, the organization set up a “Snaketivity” scene outside the Michigan State Capitol in support of LGBT rights. Blackmore said in an interview with MLive that these efforts are often seen as “trolling” for shock value. But she insists this is not the case. “We are interested in positive and effective change,” Blackmore said. “And we're interested in positive conversation.” Rev. David Bullock of the Greater St. Matthew Baptist Church expressed skepticism of Blackmore's stated intentions, instead saying that the statue makes a mockery of other religions. “The statue is supposed to create a dialogue. Well, statues don’t talk. If you want to have a dialogue with other faiths, why not send an email in advance or knock on the door?” Rev. Bullock argued on “Let it Rip.” “It’s not creating a dialogue at all. It’s actually polarizing a large number of folks in the city of Detroit." A large number of folks, maybe – but not all. Minister Todd Sanders of Strictly Biblical Bible Teaching Ministries says he believes the situation could be a great educational experience. “The church can benefit from this because we can view this as an opportunity to get at the truth in terms of what the Satanic Temple believes,” Sanders told WWJ-TV. “I don’t think it’s anything we should be afraid of at all.” The monument is the handiwork of Mark Porter, a New York City-based sculptor. He admitted to finding the task creepy at first, but growing more comfortable as time went on. "I started thinking about it: Why don't I like it?" Porter said to the Detroit Free Press. "And then after looking at that every day for a year, it's just whatever. It could be Mickey Mouse.” ||||| In this July 25, 2015, photo Alter boys Joseph Follbaum, left, and John Paul Sebastian, both 9 and of Livonia, Mich., kneel as they pray during Mass at Saint Joseph Catholic Church in Detroit. The Detroit... (Associated Press) DETROIT (AP) — Several hundred people attended a Mass at a Detroit Catholic church to protest an 8½-foot-tall bronze statue of Satan that crowds of people also lined up to see. Satanic Temple had said it would unveil the statue Saturday at a Detroit location that only people with tickets would know. Hundreds lined up Saturday evening to get the tickets as Christian protesters rallied nearby. Earlier Saturday, The Detroit News says 200-250 people attended Mass at St. Joseph Church in a protest against the Satanic event. The group had hoped to place the statue at the state Capitol in Oklahoma City until Oklahoma's Supreme Court banned religious displays on Capitol grounds. The Satanic Temple now says it wants to erect it outside Arkansas' statehouse, where a Ten Commandments monument also is planned. |||||

– A good day for the devil's disciples? The statue that Satanists wanted to erect outside Oklahoma's Capitol building has found a more welcoming, but apparently temporary, home in Detroit. The 9-foot, 2,000-pound statue of winged, goat-headed idol Baphomet was unveiled just before midnight on Saturday at a private ceremony in a Detroit industrial building, where some of the crowd of hundreds shouted "Hail Satan," reports Reuters. The Satanic Temple had sought to erect the statue in Oklahoma to protest the presence of a Ten Commandments monument and give the state a chance to show it espouses "the basic freedoms spelled out in the Constitution." Detroit has more Satanists than most American cities, according to the Christian Science Monitor, though the director of the local chapter of the Satanic Temple says there's a lot of confusion about what Satanism is, and the group's website defines Satan not as a supernatural being but as "a symbol of man's inherent nature, representative of the eternal rebel." Hundreds of people attended a Catholic mass to protest the statue's presence in the city. It's expected to stay in Detroit while the Satanic Temple tries to get it erected in Arkansas, where another Ten Commandments monument is planned at the statehouse, the AP reports. (Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin has rejected a state Supreme Court ruling ordering the removal of the monument.)

A 16-year-old has made £48,000 from a website she made to give Chinese babies English names. Beau Jessup, a British A-level student from Gloucestershire, came up with the idea after a family visit to China. They were out for a meal with friends when she was asked to give an English name to a newborn baby. In China it is considered important to have an English name for future study or business with the UK. 'Special Name' requires the user to pick five of the 12 personality traits they hope their baby will grow into In China they name their child based on the elements and Beau wanted a similarity between how they pick their Chinese name and how they pick their English name. And she does this by assigning personality traits to each English name. They also select the gender of the baby and pay the equivalent of 60p. The three chosen names are then shared with family and friends on We-Chat, China's WhatsApp equivalent, to help make the final decision. Each suggestion is printed on a certificate with its meaning and an example of a famous person with that name. Beau says that when she was first asked to name her father's friend's baby, she was surprised. "I'm not really qualified or relevant enough in that baby's life to be the person to give it a name." But after hearing of some of the "embarrassing" names, Beau decided she needed to act. There was someone called Rolex "There are quite a few examples where people have gotten the names wrong." Beau explains that the Chinese are fascinated by western culture but their access to it is restricted by the government in China. There isn't open access to the internet so they can't use standard baby naming websites that people may use in the UK. "Being exposed to luxury items and things like Harry Potter, Disney films and Lord of the Rings means they use those for reference. "I once heard of someone called Gandalf and another called Cinderella." Amelia and Oliver were the most popular baby names in England and Wales in 2015 That's according to the Office for National Statistics which released the complete set of data last week. But Beau doesn't know which names are the most popular on her website, and she's "happy about that". "It is called 'special name' and it's based on individual preference and what they personally want their child to be." Beau says it's quite strange to know she's named more than 200,000 babies "It's nice to be a part of such a happy experience and be a part of those young stages in a baby's life." The site's success has been a pleasant surprise. "I wanted to do it just to see if an idea could turn into more than just simply an idea. "And I never expected it to become more than just a small project because I never really considered myself very academic. "It is obviously a nice surprise, but it is definitely a surprise." The website doesn't make a feature of Beau's age. In fact it shows an older woman in the "about us" section. "It is a photo of a lady from [stock photo site] Stockshare which I purchased as I wanted people to take the service seriously - and I was aware they may not take it seriously if they knew my age," she explains. Find us on Instagram at BBCNewsbeat and follow us on Snapchat, search for bbc_newsbeat ||||| A growing number of Chinese parents have taken to choosing an English name for their offspring in the hope of helping them gain a future foothold in Britain and the West. Unfortunately that has led to mixed results, with some Chinese children now blessed with names such as Cinderella, Gandalf and even Rolex. Step forward Beau Jessup - a 16-year-old schoolgirl who has earned more than £48,000 offering advice to Chinese families on how to choose rather more suitable English names. Beau, a pupil at Cheltenham Ladies College, hit on the idea during a family visit to China, when she was asked by friends during a meal out to suggest an English name for their newborn baby. ||||| A British school girl has amassed a small fortune after building a website to help Chinese parents choose English names for their children. Beau Jessup, a 16-year-old A-level student from Gloucestershire, came up with the idea during a trip to China during which she was asked to help choose a name by friends expecting a child. After initially believing herself unqualified to choose names for babies, she discovered the surge in demand for English names for Chinese children over the last 20 years has resulted in some fairly avant-garde names for children whose parents have not been fully aware of the cultural significance of the monikers they have chosen. These include children named Gandalf, Cinderalla and Rolex. In addition to traditional Chinese names, it is seen as important for Chinese children to be given English names to use for emails, and for future study or business with Britain. In response, Ms Jessup, who attends Cheltenham Ladies College, founded SpecialName.cn, a website which helps parents to choose appropriate names for their child based on various positive personality traits. Most popular UK baby names of 2015 After choosing their child’s gender, the site invites parents to select five traits to best describe their aspirations for their child and then suggests a shortlist of three names. The list is presented along with the names’ meanings and a famous person with the same name. Users are charged around 60p to use the service, and the site has racked up 27,000 visitors a month with a total of 221,000 parents using the service since it launched. This has seen the site take around £16,000 in sales each month which has netted Ms Jessup £48,000 so far. She said: “I have a target to reach which will allow me to pay for my University fees and writing the text for the site was really good practice for my Mandarin GCSE. “I spend two hours a day talking to my customers asking how I can make the service better and about an hour making improvements.” Baby names 'at risk of dying out' in 2016 - In pictures 10 show all Baby names 'at risk of dying out' in 2016 - In pictures 1/10 1) Angela Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor Axel Schmidt/Getty Images 2/10 2) Beverley Actress and singer Beverly Knight Tim P. Whitby/Getty Images 3/10 3) Carol Former 'Countdown' presenter Carol Vorderman Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images 4/10 4) Debra Former 'Will & Grace' actress Debra Messing Jason Merritt/Getty Images 5/10 5) Diane Fashion designer and inventor of the wrap dress Diane Von Furstenberg Michael Buckner/Getty Images for Diane Von Furstenberg 6/10 1) Bertrand The late philosopher Bertrand Russell Hulton Archive/Getty Images 7/10 2) Cecil The late artist Cecil Beaton Hulton Archive/Getty Images 8/10 3) Clarence American actor Henry Fonda pictured in 1975 rehearsing at the Piccadilly Theatre in London for his one man play about the famous trial lawyer Clarence Darrow Getty Images 9/10 4) Clive Actor Clive Owen Andrew H. Walker/Getty Images 10/10 5) Cyril Cyril Rioli, an Australian rules footballer Matt King/Getty Images She added: “Since parents love sharing photos of their babies, I have recently added a gallery, so I’m gradually building a SpecialName community.” |||||

– A 16-year-old British girl came up with an odd, but apparently very good, idea: Start a website designed to help Chinese parents choose an English name for their babies. Her specialname.cn asks parents to pay a small fee, input their baby's gender, and choose five personality traits, out of a dozen options, they hope their child will have. Teen entrepreneur Beau Jessup has assigned those personality traits to English names, and three are chosen, shared with the family, and printed on a certificate along with their meanings and a famous person who shares the name. Jessup has offered up more than 200,000 names and has made nearly $64,000 from the venture so far, the BBC reports. The website also offers a photo gallery where parents can add pictures of their babies, the Independent reports. She came up with the idea while on a family vacation in China, when she learned that Chinese parents make sure to give their babies English names in case they later study or work in the UK or the US, the Telegraph reports. Jessup was asked to pick an English name for the newborn baby of a family friend while on the trip, and after hearing some "embarrassing" English names that had been given to other Chinese babies, she stepped in and later came up with her website idea. "Being exposed to luxury items and things like Harry Potter, Disney films, and Lord of the Rings means [Chinese parents] use those for reference," she explains. "I once heard of someone called Gandalf and another called Cinderella." Jessup, who is studying Mandarin, is saving the money she earns for college tuition. (Here's why a 61-year-old just became China's second-oldest mom.)

When Fox News host Laura Ingraham taunted a Parkland shooting survivor in a Wednesday- ­morning tweet about his college applications being rejected, Twitter users hit back where it hurt most: among her advertisers. David Hogg, the 17-year-old high school senior who has become a gun-control activist, mustered the collective power of social media — and his more than 630,000 Twitter followers — and urged them to “tweet away” at her top sponsors to call on them to boycott her TV show, “The Ingraham Angle.” Soooo @IngrahamAngle what are your biggest advertisers ... Asking for a friend. #BoycottIngramAdverts — David Hogg (@davidhogg111) March 29, 2018 Within 24 hours, several companies responded — among them the pet food brand Nutrish and the home goods retailer Wayfair — announcing over Twitter and in media interviews that they would pull their ads from Ingraham’s show. By Thursday afternoon, Ingraham apologized. “On reflection, in the spirit of Holy Week, I apologize for any upset or hurt my tweet caused him or any of the brave victims of Parkland,” she tweeted. Any student should be proud of a 4.2 GPA —incl. @DavidHogg111. On reflection, in the spirit of Holy Week, I apologize for any upset or hurt my tweet caused him or any of the brave victims of Parkland. For the record, I believe my show was the first to feature David...(1/2) — Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) March 29, 2018 ... immediately after that horrific shooting and even noted how "poised" he was given the tragedy. As always, he’s welcome to return to the show anytime for a productive discussion. WATCH: https://t.co/5wcd00wWpd (2/2) — Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) March 29, 2018 In the era of boycotts as a byproduct of outrage, with figures such as President Trump threatening the NFL over player protests and airline customers employing the tactic to force change, Hogg’s push for Ingraham’s advertisers to respond to her comments worked remarkably quickly. The swift results showcase the power that the Parkland survivors have, not just in organizing rallies but in spurring corporate America to act. Brands, too, have become quicker to distance themselves from controversy, whether by denouncing white supremacy after neo-Nazis praise their products or by pulling their sponsorship after another Fox News personality, Bill O’Reilly, was accused of sexual harassment. Since the 2016 election, calls to boycott retailers have become frequent: The #GrabYourWallet campaign began as a way to protest Trump, and it identified companies that carried merchandise bearing the Trump name. Those calls have been met with equally passionate responses by Trump supporters who say they are determined to use their buying power to stand with the president and his family. [What happens when neo-Nazis hijack your brand] On Thursday, #GrabYourWallet co-founder Shannon Coulter called Ingraham’s mocking of Hogg’s college rejections “really egregious violations of basic human decency.” “Corporate America has a really positive role to play in preventing that kind of targeted harassment,” Coulter said. “It’s not just that one tweet. It’s that [Ingraham is] signaling to her large audience that it’s okay to do that. Particularly when minors are concerned, I think there’s a line that corporations can draw that apparently Laura Ingraham’s parents didn’t draw.” Ingraham, in addition to apologizing, tried to curtail the damage by noting that Hogg had appeared on her show after the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on Feb. 14. Hogg said he felt the apology was merely an effort to save her advertisers. “I will only accept your apology only if you denounce the way your network has treated my friends and I in this fight,” Hogg tweeted. “It’s time to love thy neighbor, not mudsling at children.” I 100% agree an apology in an effort just to save your advertisers is not enough. I will only accept your apology only if you denounce the way your network has treated my friends and I️ in this fight. It’s time to love thy neighbor, not mudsling at children. https://t.co/H0yWs4zMGk — David Hogg (@davidhogg111) March 29, 2018 Ingraham had faced immediate backlash over her original tweet Wednesday from those shocked by her attack on a teenager who had survived the mass shooting in Parkland, Fla. Some of them reminded Ingraham, simply, that she was a mother. Hogg’s 14-year-old sister accused the Fox News host of stooping to a “real low” to boost her ratings. The shooting in Florida — one of several school attacks in 2018 — left 17 students and staff members dead, and it galvanized a new generation of activists, including many teenagers from Parkland. Hogg has been one of the most vocal, speaking at the March for Our Lives rally against gun violence in Washington. Since the shooting, the teen has appeared frequently on television and rallied his growing number of Twitter followers to become civically engaged if they are frustrated with the status quo. [A Trump voter’s message to retailers: ‘Keep your mouths shut about our president’] In an interview with TMZ on Tuesday, Hogg spoke about receiving rejection letters from California colleges. Hogg, who has a 4.2 GPA and an SAT score of 1270, was accepted to Florida Atlantic University, California Polytechnic State University and California State University at San Marcos, TMZ reported. On Wednesday morning, Ingraham tweeted a story from a conservative news site that described Hogg as a “Gun Rights Provocateur” who had not gained acceptance to four University of California schools. “David Hogg Rejected By Four Colleges To Which He Applied and whines about it,” Ingraham tweeted. “(Dinged by UCLA with a 4.1 GPA…totally predictable given acceptance rates.)” David Hogg Rejected By Four Colleges To Which He Applied and whines about it. (Dinged by UCLA with a 4.1 GPA...totally predictable given acceptance rates.) https://t.co/wflA4hWHXY — Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) March 28, 2018 Hours later, Hogg wondered, on Twitter, who Ingraham’s biggest advertisers were and soon compiled a list of 12 companies that his followers could contact. Before long, Hogg’s tweet was flooded with replies from his supporters, some of whom pasted images of their messages to the companies mentioned. Also responding were people accusing Hogg of “bullying” Ingraham. At least half a dozen companies have responded to the boycott call. “We are in the process of removing our ads from Laura Ingraham’s program,” Nutrish tweeted Thursday morning. TripAdvisor pointed to one of its company values — “We are better together” — in its decision to stop advertising on Ingraham’s show. “We do not . . . condone the inappropriate comments made by this broadcaster,” TripAdvisor said in a statement. “In our view, these statements focused on a high school student cross the line of decency.” Online home goods retailer Wayfair told CNBC that Ingraham’s personal criticism of Hogg was “not consistent with our values.” Nestlé told ThinkProgress it had no plans to buy future ads on the show. Johnson & Johnson, Stitch Fix and Hulu have also joined the boycott. [The extraordinary number of kids who have endured school shootings since Columbine] It was unclear whether any of the brands would change their minds after Ingraham apologized. “We’ve seen corporations years ago pull out from O’Reilly, only to go back and have to pull out again,” said Rashad Robinson, executive director of Color Of Change, a nonprofit advocacy group pushing corporations on issues of racial justice. “The question is, if the corporations do go back, what are they sponsoring? They are sponsoring someone who will use the next tragedy to attack the most vulnerable,” Robinson said. “Laura Ingraham would not exist without corporations enabling her to exist on the air.” Ingraham was previously criticized for telling professional basketball players to “shut up and dribble” after Cleveland Cavalier LeBron James criticized Trump in an interview. While Ingraham has been the most recent target of criticism, she is not the only prominent figure who has faced backlash for attacking the high school students. Just days ago, Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) and his campaign team were sharply criticized for posting a meme on Facebook about Emma González, another Parkland student and activist. The meme was decried as attacking González’s Cuban heritage. And CNN contributor and former U.S. senator Rick Santorum had to backtrack after saying students would be better off learning CPR than demonstrating for tighter gun laws. Read more: Family of 8 that’s feared dead after SUV plunged off cliff had troubled home life, neighbors say The Parkland shooting suspect has fans, and they’re sending him letters and money The vegans came to protest his restaurant. So this chef carved a deer leg in the window. ||||| Nutrish, a pet food brand owned by Rachael Ray, said it was “in the process of removing our ads from Laura Ingraham’s program.” “The comments she has made are not consistent with how we feel people should be treated,” the company said. Wayfair, an e-commerce company, said in a statement that it supports “open dialogue and debate on issues,” but that it would stop advertising on Ms. Ingraham’s show. “The decision of an adult to personally criticize a high school student who has lost his classmates in an unspeakable tragedy is not consistent with our values,” the company said. Nestle said it had “no plans to buy ads on the show in the future,” while Stitch Fix, a clothing box subscription service, said it had pulled its advertisements. Johnson & Johnson said it had done so as well, while Hulu said on Twitter, “We are no longer advertising on Laura Ingraham’s show and are monitoring all of our ad placements carefully.” Expedia said it had “recently pulled the advertising” from Ms. Ingraham’s show, but it did not elaborate on timing or whether the decision was related to her comments. Consumers have increasingly used social media to demand that advertisers respond to a series of controversies, particularly those involving Fox News hosts. Last year, more than 50 brands pulled ads from “The O’Reilly Factor” after The New York Times reported on settlements that the show’s host, Bill O’Reilly, had made with women who accused him of sexual harassment or other inappropriate behavior, which contributed to his ouster. ||||| Stitch Fix is the latest advertiser to pull support from Fox News host Laura Ingraham’s show. The online personal shopping service confirmed to The Hill that it would be pulling its ads from Ingraham’s show. HuffPost first reported the development. At least nine advertisers have pulled support from the show since Ingraham mocked Parkland, Fla., school shooting survivor David Hogg for being rejected by colleges. ADVERTISEMENT David Hogg Rejected By Four Colleges To Which He Applied and whines about it. (Dinged by UCLA with a 4.1 GPA...totally predictable given acceptance rates.) https://t.co/wflA4hWHXY — Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) March 28, 2018 Hogg fired back by targeting Ingraham’s advertisers. Companies and brands began to pull their support from the show on Thursday. The Fox News host apologized for her comments on Thursday. However, Hogg rejected the apology, noting that it came after Ingraham began to lose advertisers. Any student should be proud of a 4.2 GPA —incl. @DavidHogg111. On reflection, in the spirit of Holy Week, I apologize for any upset or hurt my tweet caused him or any of the brave victims of Parkland. For the record, I believe my show was the first to feature David...(1/2) — Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) March 29, 2018 ... immediately after that horrific shooting and even noted how "poised" he was given the tragedy. As always, he’s welcome to return to the show anytime for a productive discussion. WATCH: https://t.co/5wcd00wWpd (2/2) — Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) March 29, 2018 ||||| Fred Guttenberg सत्यापित खाते @fred_guttenberg An apology to save your advertisers is not enough. What you did was disgusting. Our message for common sense gun reforms has won, and the those in opposition have gone negative. They need to pay a price for that. These kids have suffered enough. https://www. msn.com/en-us/news/us/ ingraham-apologizes-amid-backlash-over-parkland-student-criticism/ar-AAvfWU8?li=BBnb7Kz … ||||| Any student should be proud of a 4.2 GPA —incl. @ DavidHogg111. On reflection, in the spirit of Holy Week, I apologize for any upset or hurt my tweet caused him or any of the brave victims of Parkland. For the record, I believe my show was the first to feature David...(1/2) |||||

– Laura Ingraham offered an apology to Parkland school shooting survivor David Hogg Thursday—after multiple major advertisers heeded his call to pull their ads from her Fox News show. Hogg, who has become a prominent gun-control advocate since the mass shooting, called for the boycott after Ingraham taunted him for "whining" about being rejected from colleges, the New York Times reports. "On reflection, in the spirit of Holy Week, I apologize for any upset or hurt my tweet caused him or any of the brave victims of Parkland," Ingraham tweeted Thursday, inviting the 17-year-old to appear on her show. At least nine advertisers have announced their intention to boycott Ingraham's show, including TripAdvisor, Nestle, Hulu, Wayfair, Nutrish, and Stitch Fix, reports the Hill. "In our view, these statements focused on a high school student cross the line of decency," TripAdvisor said. Hogg rejected Ingraham's apology, noting that it was only issued after advertisers started pulling out. "I will only accept your apology only if you denounce the way your network has treated my friends and I in this fight," he tweeted. "It's time to love thy neighbor, not mudsling at children." The Washington Post notes that the episode shows the Parkland survivors have power "not just in organizing rallies but in spurring corporate America to act."

The superstar with multiple Oscar nominations has everything: a brilliant career, a partner he wants to marry and, in "Moneyball," a seeming disaster he turned into a masterpiece. Still, Hollywood's producer-actor confesses to earlier bouts of depression and a relentless need to question just about everything (himself included): "This idea of perpetual happiness is crazy and overrated." Try to set up an interview with Brad Pitt, and you instantly plunge into his almost Dada-esque world. After all, where do you go? A restaurant rendez­vous would devolve into a scrum of gawkers and gapers; his suggestion that we meet at this reporter's office creates such a stir among jaded journalists, it is rapidly nixed; and Pitt's house in the Hollywood Hills is apparently out of bounds, reserved for his partner, Angelina Jolie, and their six kids -- and those inquiring minds eager to know about a decapitated head found nearby only days before. PHOTOS: Brad Pitt's THR Cover Shoot: The Outtakes So it is, like participants in the witness protection program, that we find ourselves ensconced in a 14th-floor suite at Hollywood's W Hotel this Jan. 20 -- chosen because Pitt's Cadillac Escalade can make a quick in-and-out to avoid the paparazzi thirsting to behold him. Pitt doesn't blame them. Media reports surfaced hours earlier that police had interviewed his bodyguard about human limbs scattered near the Hollywood sign. Still, he can't help being bemused. "I was watching CNN, and they said, 'Brad Pitt's home!' and, 'Brad Pitt's bodyguard!' " he laughs in disbelief. "I'm like: 'Why? Why?' " The report is nonsense, of course: His security chief happened to pass a policeman who asked if Pitt's surveillance cameras had recorded anything strange, which led to CNN's proclamation: "Police interview Brad Pitt's bodyguard, search Hollywood Hills for more body parts." PHOTOS: Brad Pitt's Most Memorable Movies Such is the life of a megawatt star, though Pitt has learned to handle it. Rarely ruffled and polite to a fault, he shrugs it all off, leaning casually against a window and revealing a previously unnoticed tattoo on the inside of his forearm. It's an outline of Otzi the Iceman, found frozen in the Alps in 1991, some 5,300 years after his death. Next to him, a series of numerals specify the height of the General Sherman Tree, a giant sequoia in Central California. Beside that, there's an inscription in French: absurdité de l'existence -- the absurdity of life. Pitt knows something about this. He's a man, after all, who can make $10 million to $15 million a film and has starred in such pictures as The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Fight Club and Legends of the Fall -- work vastly enhanced by his growing stature as a producer, which flowered in 2011 with Palme d'Or winner The Tree of Life and the near-masterpiece Moneyball, a movie he saved from the clutches of death. PHOTOS: The Hollywood Reporter Cover Stories But he's also Pitt the Celebrity, not once but twice half of the most famous couple alive -- first through his marriage to Jennifer Aniston, then through his relationship with Jolie. Despite a quarter-century as an actor, this Pitt has overshadowed the actor-producer and perhaps factors into his never having won an Oscar, which might change this year thanks to his multiple nominations -- two for acting in and producing Moneyball and probably a third as a producer of Tree of Life (the Academy has yet to determine which producers qualify). "It's a great honor," he says later. "And Tree of Life! I'm doubly excited because we felt we were all but forgotten." (On Jan. 27, the Academy did not give producing credit to Pitt on The Tree of Life for the film's best picture nomination.) This is the glory, but fame and its consequences have left him conflicted, he acknowledges -- though conflict runs through Pitt like a river, to adopt the title of one of his acclaimed films. STORY: Pitt as Producer: When the Oscar Nominated Actor Goes Off Camera "I've always been at war with myself, for right or wrong," he admits. "I don't know how to explain it more. There's that constant argument going on in your head about this or that. It's universal. Some people are better at dealing with it, and they sleep with no pain -- not pain, arguments. I've grown quite comfortable with being at war." His words are symptomatic of the thoughtfulness Pitt brings to everything he embraces. He's a man far deeper than most people know -- more intelligent, curious and intellectually restless. PHOTOS: 2012 Academy Awards: The Nominees He talks about the books he's reading, Charles Bracelen Flood's Grant and Sherman: The Friendship That Won the Civil War and A.J. Baime's Go Like Hell: Ford, Ferrari, and Their Battle for Speed and Glory at Le Mans. He discusses the architects he has worked with to develop low-income housing in New Orleans; the marvel of Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove; his struggle to learn French (which he speaks "comme ci, comme ça"); and his love for Egon Schiele, an Austrian artist deemed "decadent" by the Nazis, whose style came to mind when he first saw that image of Otzi. Even when we broach the subject of Jodi Kantor's new book The Obamas, which describes Pitt as "awkward" in a meeting with the president ("I probably was -- you don't want to impose on a busy man," he says), he's more interested in Obama than himself, particularly whether the commander in chief has stopped smoking, as Pitt would dearly like to do. While backing Obama, he nonetheless was glued to the Republican debate Jan. 19. "I'm an Obama supporter, no question," he says. "But it doesn't mean there's nothing to learn from the other side." All his life, Pitt has learned from the other side. That's what led him to make a leap of non-faith when he rejected his Southern Baptist upbringing. "I grew up very religious, and I don't have a great relationship with religion," he reflects. "I oscillate between agnosticism and atheism." He oscillates, too, on the subject of whether he'll get married, and it's clear Pitt has shifted from his promise that this won't happen until gay marriage is legalized. "We'd actually like to," he says of his seven-year partner, Jolie, "and it seems to mean more and more to our kids. We made this declaration some time ago that we weren't going to do it till everyone can. But I don't think we'll be able to hold out. It means so much to my kids, and they ask a lot. And it means something to me, too, to make that kind of commitment." Has he asked Jolie to marry him? "I'm not going to go any further," says Pitt. "But to be in love with someone and be raising a family with someone and want to make that commitment and not be able to is ludicrous, just ludicrous." It's an unexpected confession for a man generally rather private. Indeed, throughout our conversation I'm surprised by his willingness to discuss almost anything -- from religion to relationships to Republicans -- always in a manner that seems temperate and respectful, possibly shadowed by the awareness of how far he's moved away from the thinking of his youth. "If you look at where Brad came from and charted the transformations he has realized, you'd recognize this is a person who's staged multiple revolutions in his life and career," says Moneyball director Bennett Miller. "There's a revolutionary spirit there." Pitt resists that notion at first. Then the next day he calls to say he has lain awake late into the night, mulling Miller's words. "There were many revolutions," he agrees. [pagebreak] ♦♦♦♦♦ The idea of making a movie about math, as Pitt jokingly describes Moneyball, is one of them. PHOTOS: Behind the Scenes of 'Moneyball' With Brad Pitt The project began its long journey five years ago, when Sony Pictures co-chairman Amy Pascal showed Pitt Michael Lewis' 2003 nonfiction book about baseball team GM Billy Beane and the statistics wunderkind who helped him transform the Oakland Athletics. At the time, writer Stan Chervin and director David Frankel (The Devil Wears Prada) were developing it with a decidedly comedic touch. Pitt looked at the screenplay, and at Beane himself, and wanted to go in a different direction: "I read the book, and this idea of second chances and how we sometimes let ourselves be rated too much by others -- we put so much emphasis on a paycheck or what a magazine says -- made me think, 'Oh my God, there's something much bigger here.' " He offered to leave the film with Frankel, but the director graciously departed, allowing Pitt to develop the story as he saw fit. Not a baseball fan (though he says he loves sports, especially football and soccer), it was the nuances of Beane's character that intrigued him. And so, working with producers Michael De Luca and Rachael Horovitz, he brought on Steven Zaillian (Schindler's List) to script and asked his friend Steven Soderbergh (Ocean's Eleven) to direct. Pitt comes alive recollecting the enthusiasm he felt at getting them all on board, literally rubbing his hands with glee, but after Soderbergh reworked Zaillian's screenplay, Sony had second thoughts. "We were supposed to leave on a Sunday to start shooting, and Steven handed it in on a Wednesday or Thursday, and the studio was not feeling good," says Pitt. "It's not that they didn't like the idea; they did not like the price" -- about $60 million. PHOTOS: 'Moneyball' Premiere in Oakland What happened next has been amply recounted: how Pascal pulled the plug; how she gave Soderbergh and Pitt several days to shop the project; how everybody passed. "Nobody wanted to buy disgraced goods," he adds. "It was dead." But Pitt refused to let it die, calling Pascal and urging her to stick with the movie. "There would be no Moneyball without him," says producer Scott Rudin. "He saved it single-handedly, and he deserves the credit for its existing at all." Pitt now approached Miller, the relatively untested director who had made only one feature, 2005's Capote (along with the 1998 documentary The Cruise), and who flew from New York to meet him, sitting with the star in a modernist house on his compound, surrounded by tools and models and outlines for his architectural ventures. VIDEO: Q&A with 'Moneyball' actors Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill Pitt was cautious, given that Miller had made nothing since Capote. "It's usually a warning sign when a director doesn't work for many years," he explains, "but it's because he's so choosy. The fact he had such an investment in the material -- which was apparent in our first meeting -- was a big green light for me." Now he had to persuade the studio. "There was a lot of disagreement about where this should go," he admits. With Aaron Sorkin brought in to rewrite while Zaillian moved on to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, and with Rudin added as overseer, Pitt and Miller reworked every element during the following nine months. "We talked a lot about documentarians and 1970s films and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest -- and how the character in that movie is the same beast at the end. That was relevant, because some people involved wanted to have a big epiphany and change, which wasn't true to life." The filmmakers resisted attempts to reduce Beane's journey to the "arc" of a conventional Hollywood script. "I had some sleepless nights," says Pitt. "It was not without its pressure." His determination to buck tradition continued even when he began preparing to shoot the film, having long conversations with Beane and hanging out to talk ball with the players. It carried into the shoot, when Pitt backed Miller's decision to use long shots rather than close-ups, letting them play without quick-cutting, an "elegance" Pitt admires. None of this was accidental; none of it would have been possible without Pitt's willingness to challenge authority. "I do have a kind of knee-jerk reaction to go the other way than I'm supposed to," he notes slyly. The result is a best picture nomination, along with the one for Tree of Life, which Pitt also made through Plan B Entertainment, the companyhe runs with Dede Gardner. Together, they showPitt the producer and Pitt the star workingspectacularly in tandem, with a boldness and depth nobody could have imagined when he started acting some 25 years ago. Says one friend, "He's fully matured into a man." [pagebreak] ♦♦♦♦♦ Born in Oklahoma, Pitt grew up in Springfield, Mo., the son of a trucking company worker and an educator, with two younger siblings. "This was Huckleberry Finn country, Mason-Dixon Line, where televangelism was born," he recalls. It gave him a certain mistrust of "government and any power that may be above us and could oppress us; but that mistrust transcends into anything not like us -- that's the flip side, the not so nice side" he's proud to have overcome. Pitt's father, William, rose from the bottom of his company to the very top. "My dad came from nothing, an outhouse in the middle of winter, walking to school, and was really determined to give us what he didn't have." As for his mother, Jane, "She's very, very loving -- very open, genuine, and it's hilarious because she always gets painted in the tabloids as a she-devil. There's not an ounce of malice in her. She wants everyone to be happy." Pitt says he has aspects of both: "I can be naive like my mom sometimes, but I'm like my father. Every film I do, there's some connection to my dad, though my father's got a toughness. He's probably tougher than I am." Growing up, despite his fondness for them, he started to question his parents' religion and the environment he had known. "I always knew I was leaving," he says. "I didn't know where I was going, but I knew there was so much more to see and learn. I was always looking out and beyond -- and movies were a big part of that for me. Film shows you other [paths]." He remembers going to the local drive-in with his family, sitting on the hood of the car on "really humid, hot summer nights," eating homemade popcorn because they couldn't afford the concessions, then sneaking into 1977's Saturday Night Fever and "howling" when he saw the family gathered around the table. Pitt also describes being overwhelmed by 1969's Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. "This idea of loss, when they get killed at the end and they're gone, just shattered me" -- an awareness of death that lingers and influenced his choice of tattoo. But film was not a career option, so he majored in journalism at the University of Missouri. Then, right before graduation, "it just struck me: I was done." Two weeks before earning his degree, with $325 he'd made from working on his father's loading dock, he drove to California in a beat-up car and stayed in the Burbank home of a family friend. He didn't even tell his parents he was planning to act; he said he was going to investigate Pasadena's Art Center College of Design. He remained in the Burbank apartment for a month. "It was me and a Thai maid who couldn't speak English," he says. "I stopped immediately and went to McDonald's, had a meal, got the trades, and by the end of the week I was doing extra work and pretty excited about it." Soon, he was acting, with a four-episode stint on Dallas. But Pitt truly galvanized the public in his role as the abs-gifted grifter who seduces Geena Davis in 1991's Thelma & Louise. With that simple sequence, every agent and executive knew a major star was born. The course he took, however, was never predictable. Rather than follow the safe route of appearing in evident blockbusters, he opted for a wide range of projects, largely driven by their helmers. "Look at those directors he's worked with -- Terrence Malick, Soderbergh, Robert Redford, David Fincher, Quentin Tarantino and the Coen brothers. They all know just how good he really is," says Pascal. "People think of him as an actor, and he's so much more." While Pitt's star ascended with 1992's A River Runs Through It, 1994's Legends of the Fall and 1995's Seven, his personal life declined, even following his 2000 marriage to Aniston. "I got really sick of myself at the end of the 1990s: I was hiding out from the celebrity thing; I was smoking way too much dope; I was sitting on the couch and just turning into a doughnut; and I really got irritated with myself," he says. "I got to: 'What's the point? I know better than this.' " Pitt wrestled with dark thoughts: "I used to deal with depression, but I don't now, not this decade -- maybe last decade. But that's also figuring out who you are. I see it as a great education, as one of the seasons or a semester: 'This semester I was majoring in depression.' I was doing the same thing every night and numbing myself to sleep -- the same routine: Couldn't wait to get home and hide out. But that feeling of unease was growing and one night I just said, 'This is a waste.' " His comfort level already had been shaken during a prolonged trip to Yugoslavia for the filming of 1988's The Dark Side of the Sun, before "ethnic cleansing" (the subject of Jolie's In the Land of Blood and Honey). Even then, "They were talking about it and you could see the hatred. It was like the Hatfields and McCoys -- as soon as they heard a name, it put them on the other side of the fence, and that left an indelible mark on me." So did a trip to Casablanca, Morocco, in the mid-to-late 1990s, "where I saw poverty to an extreme I had never witnessed before, and we talked about inequality and health care, and I saw just what I felt was so unnecessary, that people should have to survive in these circumstances -- and the children were inflicted with a lot of deformities, and things that could have been avoided had become their sentence. It stuck with me." Almost overnight, he decided something had to give. "I just quit. I stopped grass then -- I mean, pretty much -- and decided to get off the couch." Not one readily to discuss such intimate things -- "probably one of my faults is that I don't go to this wealth of knowledgeable people I have around me; I don't do that enough, and it's part of the Southern thing of not wanting to show weakness" -- he nonetheless reached beyond his inner circle. "I sought out Bono and sat down with him a few times and got involved in some of the stuff he was doing. But it all started before that. It started with private acts," which he doesn't define. Inevitably this led him to Jolie, with whom he starred in 2005's Mr. & Mrs. Smith. While the tabloids gloat about her effect on Pitt, the two were drawn to each other by corresponding concerns. "That may have been one of the things that brought us together," Pitt reasons. "Certainly, I've met very few people more dedicated than she is. She is always studying issues, daily. She has such compassion for the people she works with." He found the same compassion growing within himself, especially in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, which hit him hard as he'd grown to love New Orleans, where he'd spent three months filming 1994's Interview with the Vampire. "The first thing that rang wrong to me was when it was being called an act of God," he says with an unusual flare of rage. "And it wasn't an act of God. It was an act of human failure and marginalizing people and the areas that contain these people." Despite being told, "Don't go near it" -- particularly the devastated Ninth Ward -- Pitt felt "there was a responsibility to make it right, which was not being answered wholly, so I decided to make that a focal point and help families return home -- and in the process we started discovering the inadequacies in low-income housing, that it actually keeps a family trapped at a low-income level. There are a lot of shoddy appliances that drive up utility bills to hundreds and hundreds of dollars, and that can make or break a family." Through his Make It Right Foundation, created in 2007, Pitt began building environmentally friendly homes at a competitive price. He organized 21 architectural firms to construct 150 single-family houses and duplexes in New Orleans and gave millions in donations. He marvels at the result, having seen poor families living healthy lives with manageable bills. "It's remarkable," he says, "and now we want to take what we've learned and expand to other parts of the U.S. and abroad." Pitt is currently developing projects in Newark, N.J., and a tuberculosis clinic in Ethiopia -- and that's just a fraction of what he and Jolie do. The Jolie-Pitt Foundation has given millions to charities including SOS Children's Villages, Community Foundation of the Ozarks and Naankuse Wildlife Sanctuary in Namibia, among others. The Chronicle of Philanthropy estimates Jolie and Pitt donated more than$8.5 million in 2006 alone. As one executive familiar with their nonprofit work notes, "You have no idea how much money they give away. It's millions and millions and most people never even hear about it." [pagebreak] ♦♦♦♦♦ What they hear about instead is the Jolie-Pitt brood, and Pitt is at his most passionate when speaking of his kids. Having children, he says, has been "the most grounding thing." Would he have more? "We haven't closed the book on it. There's a really nice balance in the house right now, but if we see the need and get that lightning bolt that says, 'We can help this person; we could do something here,' then absolutely." It was while carrying Vivienne -- one of his children, many adopted, whose ages range from 3 to 10 -- that Pitt fell and hurt his knee, causing him to walk with the cane his friend George Clooney spoofed during the Golden Globes. It wasn't a skiing accident, contrary to reports. "I think George went down the line, making things up," Pitt laughs. "I was just walking in our backyard, on a hill, carrying my daughter, and I slipped -- and it was those parental instincts: me or her. And she's fine." The cane is nowhere to be seen today, and he jokes about how his children kept stealing it until he gave them canes of their own. He still wears a leg brace, its outline visible under his gray pants, and can talk in great detail about how "I just tweaked this MCL [medial collateral ligament] -- I got a whole tutorial. I know all about the knee." He'll wear the brace another month before commencing physical therapy. As for the children, they're home-schooled because "we travel a lot. We were with a program that we could plug in internationally. But it wasn't the same standard everywhere, and we wanted to be able to tailor something to our kids; they're such individuals." It's partly because of them that he's learning French, and also because of that need he has to keep reaching for more. "I'm frustrated going to other countries and not being able to converse with everyone, and we're trying to spend some time in Europe and use that as a hub," he says. "I want my kids to have the gift of other languages; it wasn't an emphasis where I grew up. But those synapses close down -- they're fused shut and I'm trying like mad to open them again." [pagebreak] ♦♦♦♦♦ These interests and passions can pull him in a million directions, and he admits to occasional indecisiveness, an area where he points out Jolie's influence. "She's very quick, she's very decisive -- and that's had a great effect on me. It's her decisiveness that I have so much respect for." Jolie's unseen presence makes itself felt throughout our conversation, and his love for her is unmistakable. But the notion that she's somehow reshaped this highly thoughtful man is a myth -- at least, any more than he's reshaped her. Like her, he wants to do work that survives; like her, he is committed to the world at large. Unlike her, he claims to have no gift for the gab. "My great frustration is, I can't explain what I'm trying to explain!" he sighs, throwing up his hands. "I've got the vocabulary of a public school education and the grammar of an eighth-grader." It's not true, not the tiniest bit, but just one aspect of a man constantly questioning himself, only "satisfied in not being satisfied." In his life and in his work, he is forever stretching boundaries -- as he will in his upcoming films World War Z and Twelve Years a Slave. The former, based on the Max Brooks book about a global zombie war -- and the first of a planned franchise -- drew him because "I thought it was an interesting experiment. I thought, 'Can we take this genre movie and use it as a Trojan horse for social-political problems?' " The latter, to be filmed by Shame helmer Steve McQueen, tells the story of "a free black man in the north who is kidnapped and sold into slavery in the South. I'm only doing a small cameo, but it stars Michael Fassbender and Chiwetel Ejiofor and there've been very few movies about slavery, certainly that had the impact of Roots." Having such an impact is at the heart of everything he does, and it's much more important to him than conventional happiness. "This idea of perpetual happiness is crazy and overrated, because those dark moments fuel you for the next bright moments; each one helps you appreciate the other," he says. "We are all searching for meaning in our lives, love and betterment for ourselves and those around us." PITT'S FAVORITE FILMS: Pitt can cite shot by shot from Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove, but it's the films of the 1970s that most influenced his Moneyball. ||||| The new issue of Hollywood Reporter features the double (maybe triple) Oscar threat as he opens up about his career (the brutal fight to save "Moneyball"), fame (and his depression in the '90s), President Obama, and plans to make partner Angelina Jolie his wife. Try to set up an interview with Brad Pitt, and you instantly plunge into his almost Dada-esque world. After all, where do you go? A restaurant rendez-vous would devolve into a scrum of gawkers and gapers; his suggestion that we meet at this publication’s office creates such a stir among jaded journalists, it is rapidly nixed; and Pitt’s house in the Hollywood Hills is apparently out of bounds, reserved for his partner, Angelina Jolie, and their six kids. So, The Hollywood Reporter executive editor, features, Steven Galloway found himself feeling like a participant in the witness protection program, ensconced in a 14th-floor-suite at Hollywood's W Hotel Jan. 20, because Pitt’s Cadillac Escalade can make a quick in-and-out to avoid the paparazzi thirsting to behold him.On this particular morning media reports surfaced revealing that police had interviewed his bodyguard about human limbs scattered near the Hollywood sign. And, he can’t help being bemused. “I was watching CNN, and they said, ‘Brad Pitt’s home!’ and, ‘Brad Pitt’s bodyguard!’ ” he laughs in disbelief. “I’m like: ‘Why? Why?’ ”The report is nonsense, of course: His security chief happened to pass a policeman who asked if Pitt’s surveillance cameras had recorded anything strange, which led to CNN’s proclamation: “Police interview Brad Pitt’s bodyguard, search Hollywood Hills for more body parts.” PHOTOS: Outtakes from Brad Pitt's THR Cover Shoot Still Pitt remains unfazed. During an afternoon together, Pitt was thoughtful, pensive and discussed everything from his politics (supports President Obama) and religion (he veers between agnosticism and atheism), to his relationship with parter of over six years, Angelina Jolie and their six kids. As for his two (maybe three depending on what the Academy decides his producer status is for Tree of Life) Oscar nominations for Moneyball (both for acting and producing), "It's a great honor," Pitt tells THR. (On Jan. 27, the Academy did not give producing credit to Pitt on The Tree of Life for the film's best picture nomination.) Some of the other personal details he shared in THR's cover story: PHOTOS: The Hollywood Reporter Cover Stories WHY SCOTT RUDIN CREDITS HIM AS MONEYBALL'S SAVIOR The project began its long journey five years ago, when Sony Pictures co-chairman Amy Pascal showed Pitt Michael Lewis' 2003 nonfiction book about baseball team GM Billy Beane and the statistics wunderkind who helped him transform the Oakland Athletics. At the time, writer Stan Chervin and director David Frankel (The Devil Wears Prada) were developing it with a decidedly comedic touch. Pitt looked at the screenplay, and at Beane himself, and wanted to go in a different direction: "I read the book, and this idea of second chances and how we sometimes let ourselves be rated too much by others -- we put so much emphasis on a paycheck or what a magazine says -- made me think, 'Oh my God, there's something much bigger here.' " He offered to leave the film with Frankel, but the director graciously departed, allowing Pitt to develop the story as he saw fit. Not a baseball fan (though he says he loves sports, especially football and soccer), it was the nuances of Beane's character that intrigued him. And so, working with producers Michael De Luca and Rachael Horovitz, he brought on Steven Zaillian (Schindler's List) to script and asked his friend Steven Soderbergh (Ocean's Eleven) to direct. PHOTOS: Brad Pitt's Most Memorable Movies Sony had second thoughts. "We were supposed to leave on a Sunday to start shooting, and Steven handed it in on a Wednesday or Thursday, and the studio was not feeling good," says Pitt. "It's not that they didn't like the idea; they did not like the price" -- about $60 million. What happened next has been amply recounted: how Pascal pulled the plug; how she gave Soderbergh and Pitt several days to shop the project; how everybody passed. "Nobody wanted to buy disgraced goods," he adds. "It was dead." But Pitt refused to let it die, calling Pascal and urging her to stick with the movie. "There would be noMoneyball without him," says producer Scott Rudin. "He saved it single-handedly, and he deserves the credit for its existing at all." PITT ON POLITICS Jodi Kantor’s new book The Obamas describes Pitt as “awkward” in a meeting with the president. “I probably was — you don’t want to impose on a busy man,” he says. But, he’s more interested in Obama himself, particularly whether the commander in chief has stopped smoking, as Pitt would dearly like to do. While backing Obama, he nonetheless was glued to the Republican debate Jan. 19. “I’m an Obama supporter, no question,” he says. “But it doesn’t mean there’s nothing to learn from the other side.” PITT ON RELIGION All his life, Pitt has learned from the other side. That’s what led him to make a leap of non-faith when he rejected his Southern Baptist upbringing. “I grew up very religious, and I don’t have a great relationship with religion,” he reflects. “I oscillate between agnosticism and atheism.” Pitt says differences over religion make his parents, William and Jane, "sad, but I have parents that love me unconditionally." PHOTOS: Behind the Scenes of 'Moneyball' With Brad Pitt DEPRESSION, POT AND HOW HE GOT THROUGH IT While Pitt’s star ascended with 1992’s A River Runs Through It, 1994’s Legends of the Fall and 1995’s Seven, his personal life declined.“I got really sick of myself at the end of the 1990s: I was hiding out from the celebrity thing; I was smoking way too much dope; I was sitting on the couch and just turning into a doughnut; and I really got irritated with myself,” he says. “I got to: ‘What’s the point? I know better than this.’ ” Pitt wrestled with dark thoughts: “I used to deal with depression, but I don’t now, not this decade — maybe last decade. But that’s also figuring out who you are. I see it as a great education, as one of the seasons or a semester: ‘This semester I was majoring in depression.’ I was doing the same thing every night and numbing myself to sleep — the same routine: Couldn’t wait to get home and hide out. But that feeling of unease was growing and one night I just said, ‘This is a waste.’ PHOTOS: 'Moneyball' Premiere in Oakland A trip to Casablanca, Morocco, in the mid-to-late 1990s, “where I saw poverty to an extreme I had never witnessed before, and we talked about inequality and health care, and I saw just what I felt was so unnecessary, that people should have to survive in these circumstances — and the children were inflicted with a lot of deformities, and things that could have been avoided had become their sentence. It stuck with me.” Almost overnight, he decided something had to give. “I just quit. I stopped grass then — I mean, pretty much — and decided to get off the couch.” GETTING MARRIED: "WE'D LIKE TO" He oscillates, too, on the subject of whether he’ll get married, and it’s clear Pitt has shifted from his promise that this won’t happen until gay marriage is legalized. “We’d actually like to,” he says of his seven-year partner, Jolie, “and it seems to mean more and more to our kids. We made this declaration some time ago that we weren’t going to do it till everyone can. But I don’t think we’ll be able to hold out. It means so much to my kids, and they ask a lot. And it means something to me, too, to make that kind of commitment.” Has he asked Jolie to marry him? “I’m not going to go any further,” says Pitt. “But to be in love with someone and be raising a family with someone and want to make that commitment and not be able to is ludicrous, just ludicrous.” VIDEO: Q&A with 'Moneyball' actors Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill MAYBE MORE KIDS -- EVEN IF THEY STEAL HIS CANE Having children, he says, has been “the most grounding thing.” Would he have more? “We haven’t closed the book on it. There’s a really nice balance in the house right now, but if we see the need and get that lightning bolt that says, ‘We can help this person; we could do something here,’ then absolutely.” It was while carrying Vivienne — one of his children, many adopted, whose ages range from 3 to 10 — that Pitt fell and hurt his knee, causing him to walk with the cane his friend George Clooney spoofed during the Golden Globes. It wasn’t a skiing accident, contrary to reports. “I think George went down the line, making things up,” Pitt laughs. “I was just walking in our backyard, on a hill, carrying my daughter, and I slipped — and it was those parental instincts: me or her. And she’s fine.” The cane is nowhere to be seen today, and he jokes about how his children kept stealing it until he gave them canes of their own. STORY: Pitt as Producer: When the Oscar Nominated Actor Goes Off Camera HIS NEXT BIG PROJECTS World War Z, based on the Max Brooks book about a global zombie war — and the first of a planned franchise — drew him because “I thought it was an interesting experiment. I thought, ‘Can we take this genre movie and use it as a Trojan horse for social-political problems?’ ” Twelve Years a Slave, to be filmed by Shame helmer Steve McQueen, tells the story of “a free black man in the north who is kidnapped and sold into slavery in the South. I’m only doing a small cameo, but it stars Michael Fassbender and Chiwetel Ejiofor and there’ve been very few movies about slavery, certainly that had the impact of Roots.” Read the cover story in full here |||||

– Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie seem to spend most of their time telling magazines that no, they're still not married, but in a new interview in the Hollywood Reporter, Pitt sings a slightly different tune. "We’d actually like to" get married, Pitt admits, "and it seems to mean more and more to our kids. We made this declaration some time ago that we weren’t going to do it 'til everyone can. But I don’t think we’ll be able to hold out. It means so much to my kids, and they ask a lot. And it means something to me, too, to make that kind of commitment." He also, of course, addresses the topic of having more children. "We haven’t closed the book on it," he says. "There’s a really nice balance in the house right now, but if we see the need and get that lightning bolt that says, 'We can help this person; we could do something here,' then absolutely." (Recent tabloid reports claim Jolie is pregnant again.) And, as he already did so controversially last year, Pitt once again slammed his life in the 1990s. "I got really sick of myself," he says. "I was hiding out from the celebrity thing; I was smoking way too much dope; I was sitting on the couch and just turning into a doughnut; and I really got irritated with myself." Read the full interview here.

After more than four decades on the airwaves in Atlanta, Neal Boortz this morning announced that he is ending his syndicated talk show on January 21, 2013, replaced by former presidential candidate Herman Cain. Cain will cohost the day the president elect is officially inaugurated and then takes over solo on Tuesday, January 22. “I’m going to miss everything associated with doing a talk show,” Boortz said on air as his producer Belinda Skelton teared up. He said he is not doing this for health reasons. “I am not doing this because I’m fixing to die,” he said. “I have absolutely no health problems period.” Rather, he wants to travel with his wife Donna, something he said is difficult to do as a full-time talk-show host. He even purchased a tour bus to rove the country. “We’re going to call this Neal’s happy ending,” he added later with a glint in his eye. After his first break, post announcement, associate producer Christina Gonzalez popped the champagne. Cain ambled in a few minutes later and grabbed a glass. “Mr. Boortz,” he said. “Your announcement was pure Boortz.” Boortz, 67, has been the longest running talk show host on Atlanta radio. He is now heard locally on 95.5FM and AM750 News/Talk WSB from 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. weekdays. On December 5, 2012, he said he’s going to take the month off. After New Year’s, he will work until January 21. “Neal is my brother from another mother,” Cain said on air. “Congratulations on the retirement. Congratulations on 42 years in this business.” Boortz said he will do daily commentaries for Cain and will be a fill in for Cain and Erick Erickson, who is heard on WSB from 6 to 8 p.m. weeknights. Currently, Cain has been the primary fill in for Boortz. Boortz estimated since he started in radio, he has taken 280,000 phone calls. “And 260,000 got cut off,” he said. During a break, Skelton said Boortz intimated to her two years ago that he wanted to retired in early 2013. “It always seemed so far away,” she said. “For the past year, my stomach has been in absolute knots. It was hard for him. He loves what he does.” Program Director Pete Spriggs said he was aware of Boortz’s intentions but they agreed to make this announcement relatively early. “He wanted it off his chest,” Spriggs said. At the same time, Spriggs wanted to have a successor ready to go so he was glad to convince Cain to take over. “I feel great,” Boortz said on air at 11:18 a.m. when fellow syndicated host Clark Howard stopped by. “Last week, I felt really down. Right now, I’m feeling great. I don’t know how I will feel tomorrow. But I have no doubt I made the right decision.” In 1970, on what was then called 680/WRNG-AM in Atlanta, Boortz took over for a morning host who had just committed suicide – a story he loves to tell. He earned a law degree and juggled radio and a private practice from 1977 to 1992. Boortz joined WSB in 1993 when it was just on the AM side. He’s a workaholic who spends four and a half hours on air every day, longer than most hosts, and Tweets several times a day. A self-proclaimed Libertarian, Boortz usually supports Republican policies and candidates but isn’t always in line with them on social issues such as abortion, gay marriage and drug enforcement. He espouses smaller government but has been more hawkish about terrorism after 9/11 than many Libertarians. He portrays himself as an entertainer and castigates people who merely echo what he says and don’t think for themselves. His daily line about himself: “Home of the high priest of the Church of the Painful Truth.” Boortz has written four books. The most impactful was 2005’s “The Fair Tax Book,” which advocates dropping the federal income tax in favor of a national sales tax. In a press conference early Monday afternoon, Boortz said he is working on another book about stories as a radio host and plans to release it as an e-book. He demurred when asked about a future in politics after he retires but didn’t say no. He did acknowledge his wife Donna is highly active in the Mitt Romney campaign. Although Boortz still has a home in Atlanta, he now spends most of his time in Naples, Fla. He grew up in several different places, including Florida, attended Texas A&M and spent several years in various professions before radio such as jewelry and carpet buyer, insurance salesman and a speech writer. He has been lauded by radio groups across the nation over the years, entering the national Radio Hall of Fame in 2009. Cain, a 66-year-old former CEO of Godfather’s Pizza, joined WSB in 2008 as an evening talk show host until early 2011, when he decided to run for president. His bid ended in December. Since January, he has provided daily commentaries on Boortz’s show and has continued to sub in for Boortz. Cain’s radio footprint will now be national. Boortz is heard on about 240 radio stations. Talkers magazine, which tracks talk radio, estimates Boortz draws more than six million listeners a week, tied with Laura Ingraham for seventh. “For all practical purposes,” Cain said on the air, “I am done with politics. Essentially, I wanted to continue to express my views and help educate people on what’s going on in this country.” Cain will do his show each day from 9 a.m. to noon. “That is still a significant commitment a day,” he said during a press conference Monday afternoon. “When I subbed in for his four and a half hours, it was exhausting!” Dan Kearney, market manager for Cox Radio Atlanta, said WSB will decide later what it will do with the noon to 1 p.m. slot, as well as 8:30 a.m. to 9 a.m. He also noted that Cain has huge name recognition, even better than Boortz, thanks to his presidential run. Cain said he had other offers, including TV and radio gigs. But this syndication deal was the most enticing. It will allow him to make TV appearances and do speeches across the country. He declined to say how long his deal will last. Want more photos from the day? John Spink of the AJC posted a photo gallery. Join my Facebook fan page and Twitter. Tweet By Rodney Ho, Radio & TV Talk ||||| Allison Shelley/Getty Images. William Temple put on the classic militia outfit, grabbed the Gadsden flag, and headed to Herman Cain’s Sunday night reception. He has 12 different get-ups to re-enact different military eras, but this one—tan sailcloth, black leather gaiters, tricorner hat—goes over the best at Tea Party events. David Weigel David Weigel is a reporter for the Washington Post. Reporters love this. Temple is probably the most-photographed soldier of the Tea Party movement. Alas, it’s Sunday night at a hotel in a particularly anonymous quadrant of the Washington, D.C. suburbs. Barely 150 people have shown up. So Temple grabs appetizers. There are four nearby tables piled high with grape leaves, various cheeses, pita bread tips, and charcuteries. “I’m here to support Mr. Cain in whatever he does,” says Temple. “What the media did to force him out of the race—that was one of the worst things ever done in this country. I emailed [Fox News reporter] Carl Cameron on it, and said it was a high-tech lynching. He emailed back, and said ‘I’m not an investigative reporter.’ This was Fox News! Fox News carried this story with no proof.” Advertisement A waiter walks by, cradling a tray of crabcakes, each approximately the size of a gummy eraser. “Ah, yes!” says Temple, affecting his revolutionary-era accent. (Think of an extra from the John Adams mini-series.) “I’ll have a full regiment.” The waiter moves over to Judson Phillips, the founder of Tea Party Nation and mastermind of the February 2010 National Tea Party Convention. That event cost up to $549 per ticket. This event is free. Phillips passes on the crab cake anyway, as he scans the crowd for networking opportunities. Look, there are leaders from Tea Party Patriots! Over there—that’s the editor of Tea Party Review magazine! “Herman Cain is becoming the man of the moment, as far as the Tea Party’s concerned,” says Phillips. “What’s his role in the movement now? I’d call him a strategic planner without a portfolio.” You can chortle at the empty chairs and uneaten catering at the Renaissance Hotel, but put it in perspective: The inspiration is a guy who dropped out of the presidential race before any of the primaries. He had to drop out because middle-aged women kept materializing in TV studios and describing grabby encounters with the former National Restaurant Association boss. As he was quitting, he spent more than $300,000 on legal bills. And yet here he is, still beloved by the movement that briefly made him a legit threat to Mitt Romney. Here’s Mark Block, Cain’s chief of staff, still Internet-famous for the campaign video that featured him free-associating about Cain’s “campaign like no other” and smoking a cigarette in front of a brick wall. “How many candidates dropped out of the race?” he asks, rhetorically. “Herman didn’t go away. Here’s a joke among staff that we love. He took ‘three days of vacation’ after the announcement, okay? Two and a half days of that, he was working, setting up Cain Solutions.” Quitting the presidential race worked out brilliantly for Cain. Contrast his life with that of Newt Gingrich, still technically running for president. Cain now heads three organizations, with loosely defined goals—Cain Connections, Cain Solutions, and the Herman Cain Foundation. At this reception, he will announce a video channel called CTV. Its flagship show, confusingly enough will be called Cain TV. A short preview shows the host, a beefy joke writer named Rodney Lee Conover, mocking the life and loves of Sandra Fluke as a cartoon of the birth-control advocate sprawls lazily and lustily on a dorm room bed. It compares awfully well to the no-end-in-sight tragedy that is Newt 2012. When he left Congress, Gingrich started founding think tanks and holding conferences that people actually showed up to—the strategy that Cain is Xeroxing. Those think tanks, now Newt-less, are shutting down. Running for president doesn’t give Gingrich space in the media to share his grand ideas. It gets him headlines about being bit by penguins. The life of the professional has-been is sweeter than the life of the has-been candidate. ||||| Herman Cain is going back on the air. The pizza entrepreneur turned talk-show host turned presidential candidate turned unlikely tax policy advocate is turning back into a talk-show host. Cain is set to replace Neal Boortz on Atlanta's News/Talk WSB. Boortz announced Monday that after 20 years of hosting “The Neal Boortz Show," he's giving up the microphone in January. The libertarian-leaning host has more than 6 million weekly listeners, according to WSB, and is known as the "the high priest of the church of the painful truth." Cain is known to many as the high point of weirdness in the 2012 GOP presidential primary season. His bid shot out of nowhere last year, as restless Republican voters seemed to be looking for something different. He was that -- a conservative with a boastful style, a catchy tax plan and his own gospel album. Many conservatives knew that deep voice from back when. Cain hosted a radio show in Atlanta for three years before launching his candidacy. Since dropping his pursuit of the presidency amid sexual-harassment allegations, he has been delivering weekly commentary and chat on Boortz nationally syndicated show. "I promise the torch Boortz is handing off to me will blaze as bright, as bold, and as loud as ever," Cain said in a statement. "He may be 'The TalkMaster,' but Neal's listeners know I'm the 'The Dean of the University of Common Sense.'" Cain is scheduled to take over on Jan. 21, Inauguration Day. kathleen.hennessey@latimes.com |||||

– Herman Cain may not be a professional has-been after all. The former pizza entrepreneur, talk show host, and GOP presidential candidate is returning to the airwaves on Atlanta's News-Talk WSB radio, the Los Angeles Times reports. The man with the "9-9-9" tax plan will take over from libertarian-leaning Neal Boortz, who has hosted his own show for 20 years. Cain will grab the reins full-time after inauguration day, January 21, 2013. “I promise the torch Boortz is handing off to me will blaze as bright, as bold, and as loud as ever,” said Cain, calling himself "The Dean of the University of Common Sense." Cain appeared on air with Boortz to toast his announcement with champagne, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports. “For all practical purposes, I am done with politics," Cain said. "Essentially, I wanted to continue to express my views and help educate what’s going on in this country.” (If you happen to miss Cain's gospel singing, click here.)

CLOSE The latest comedian accused of joke theft is Conan O'Brien and his writing team. Conan’s team says that they were unaware of Alex Kaseberg's jokes until after they’d written their own. USA TODAY Conan O'Brien at City Hall in Oslo, Norway, Dec. 10, 2016. (Photo: VEGARD WIVESTAD, EPA) It could be the next big celebrity trial: Conan O'Brien defending himself and his writers in federal civil court against accusations of "joke-stealing" — the worst thing you could say about a comedian, according to O'Brien. But don't go signing up for courtroom tickets just yet. Experts in copyright law say the 2-year-old copyright infringement lawsuit filed against O'Brien, his writers for his late-night show, Conan, and Time Warner over a handful of topical jokes may never get before a jury, despite a ruling by a judge that the case can proceed. The stakes are high, not just in time and litigation costs but in "reputational" costs: No comedian wants to be known as a joke thief. "Accusing a comedian of stealing a joke is the worst thing you can accuse them of, in my opinion, short of murder," O'Brien said in a deposition in the case. "I think it's absolutely terrible." Thus, O'Brien and the plaintiff in the case, a freelance joke writer in San Diego named Robert "Alex" Kaseberg, have to weigh the risks and benefits of going to trial and possibly losing, or negotiating a settlement that could leave a whiff of suspected thievery in the Conan writers' room. "Comics rarely sue one another, and to some degree this case illustrates why," says New York University law professor Christopher Sprigman , a leading expert in intellectual property law involving comedy. "The judge (in the O'Brien case) ruled the case could go forward but the ruling makes it difficult" for the plaintiff to prevail. New York intellectual property lawyer and mediator Arnie Herz says the ruling showed the judge "did not say that anyone did anything wrong, she was saying there was enough to go to a jury." But will it? It's impossible to predict, Sprigman says, but settling could be tricky for O'Brien. "Among comics, joke stealing is really, really bad behavior — no one wants to go down as a joke thief, so the settlement has to make absolutely clear that no one is admitting any wrongdoing," Sprigman says. "(O'Brien) has got to worry about how his fellow comedians would react to that." "It's no joking matter," cracks Herz, who says most IP cases are settled before trial. If a "reasonable settlement" can be achieved, it behooves all involved to resolve the case, he says. "There are strong economic reasons to resolve this (before trial) because these are not easy cases to prevail, there are high standards plaintiffs have to prove," says Herz. "At a trial, it depends on how a jury views the plaintiff and Conan O'Brien. The plaintiff and his lawyers could end up with nothing, so they don't want to put in a ton of time and money and end up losing." O'Brien's legal woes were on display Monday after U.S. District Court Judge Janis Sammartino ruled Friday that a jury can decide whether O'Brien and his writers stole three jokes dealing with Tom Brady, Caitlyn Jenner and the Washington Monument from Kaseberg's social media feed and blog between December 2014 and June 2015. (Two other jokes were dropped from the case.) The Brady joke had Brady giving his MVP truck "to the man who won the game for Patriots" — Pete Carroll. The Jenner joke involved Caitlyn's gender transition and towns with streets named after Bruce Jenner. And the Washington Monument jibe was a penis joke based on news that the obelisk is actually 10 inches shorter than previously thought and maybe it was due to cold weather. But the judge warned that jokes based on current events and news are entitled only to "thin" copyright protection — meaning the jokes in question have to be virtually identical in order to find a defendant guilty of copyright infringement, says Sprigman. Also, a jury would have to conclude that the defendant had access to the jokes and willfully copied them, Herz adds. Conan O'Brien during the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Oslo, Norway, Dec. 11, 2016. (Photo: JON OLAV, EPA) Unlike patents, creators can't get ownership of ideas or facts or events on which jokes are based, only the manner in which they are expressed, Herz says. Plus, the allegedly stolen joke has to be "fixed" in a tangible means of expression, either recorded or published. "If it turns out the jokes copied from a Twitter feed were virtually identical to the jokes as told (by O'Brien), then maybe he wants to take the reputational hit and settle," Sprigman says."If there's doubt about whether they were copied or are identical, he could go to trial and roll the dice. It’s a pickle no matter what." Intellectual property lawsuits involving comedy are exceedingly rare; it's been "decades and decades" since the last one, says Sprigman, co-author of a 2008 paper, There's No Free Laugh (Anymore): The Emergence of Intellectual Property Norms and the Transformation of Stand-Up Comedy, that explored how comedians protect their jokes against thieves by enforcing their own comedy-community norms, and not through intellectual property law. He and his co-author, Dotan Oliar, interviewed comedians, their lawyers and their agents, and found that comics have long employed out-of-court means of addressing accusations of theft. "They typically handle it through community policing, they have a set of norms on joke thievery and they enforce them through various means," Sprigman says. "Copyright lawsuits typically don’t work that well (in these cases) — they're expensive and often they don't have good results for plaintiffs." Neither O'Brien nor his lawyers returned messages from USA TODAY. Same for Kaseberg and his lawyer. But on Wednesday, O'Brien's publicists at 42 West in New York issued a statement on his behalf in an email to USA TODAY from Amanda Nesbitt: "We are very pleased that the court has granted summary judgment and dismissed two of the jokes at issue. We can't comment further on pending litigation, but we are extremely confident that once the facts are presented to a jury, we will be fully vindicated." Kaseberg said on his blog he's a comedy writer who's contributed hundreds of jokes to The Tonight Show with Jay Leno for 20 years. In a February 2015 post, he describes his version of how his jokes allegedly were stolen by O'Brien's writers. "The only consolation I can take from this horrifying violation is I wrote three jokes that were good enough to be on the monologue on Conan. And they all got good laughs," he said. "Since I cannot watch the show again – it is too painful – and I have lost respect for one of my comedy idols, that consolation will have to be enough." Read or Share this story: https://usat.ly/2rjBrAh ||||| Conan O’Brien makes an appearance at Harvard University on Feb. 12, 2016. (Charles Krupa/AP) U.S. District Court Judge Janis Sammartino recently refused to toss out an unusual lawsuit accusing late-night host Conan O’Brien and his writing staff of stealing jokes from a professional joke writer’s blog and Twitter feed, claiming some were entitled to “thin copyright protection.” Robert “Alex” Kaseberg, a writer who has penned more than 1,000 jokes for Jay Leno, accused O’Brien of telling five of his jokes in his monologue on “Conan.” Kaseberg said he wrote and posted the jokes online between Dec. 2, 2014, and June 9, 2015. Kaseberg wrote on his blog he was convinced O’Brien’s team was stealing his material after the third time he heard the comedian tell a joke he had recently posted. “Two times there is an impossibly slight possibility of a joke-writing coincidence, three times there is no possibility of a coincidence,” he wrote. “And always used on the monologue one day or, in the case of the third time, six hours after it appeared on my blog and or Twitter.” Kaseberg said he reached out to O’Brien’s writing team but was rebuked. He then filed suit against O’Brien, his writing staff, Turner Broadcasting and Time Warner in July 2015. O’Brien and the other parties denied any joke theft and requested that the case be dismissed. In her opinion issued Friday, the judge allowed the suit to proceed to trial but threw out two jokes. The suit will proceed on the other three. The judge noted the difficulty of proving that a joke was stolen. “Facts, of course, are not protected by copyright,” she wrote. “And although the punchlines of the jokes are creative, they are nonetheless constrained by the limited number of variations that would (1) be humorous (2) as applied to the specific facts articulated in each joke’s previous sentence and (3) provide mass appeal. This merits only thin protection.” Because of such “thin protection,” there has not been an intellectual property lawsuit concerning comedy in “decades and decades,” New York University law professor Christopher Sprigman told USA Today. “Comics rarely sue one another, and to some degree this case illustrates why,” he added. “The judge ruled the case could go forward but the ruling makes it difficult” for Kaseberg to win. Even so, Kaseberg’s lawyer, Jayson Lorenzo, called the ruling “a victory for comedy writers, especially lesser known writers,” in a statement to the New York Times. The three jokes in question, according to court documents: The Tom Brady joke Kaseberg: “Tom Brady said he wants to give his MVP truck to the man who won the game for the Patriots. So enjoy that truck, Pete Carroll.” O’Brien: “Tom Brady said he wants to give the truck that he was given as Super Bowl MVP … to the guy who won the Super Bowl for the Patriots. Which is very nice. I think that’s nice. I do. Yes. So Brady’s giving his truck to Seahawks coach Pete Carroll.” The Caitlyn Jenner joke Kaseberg: “Three towns, two in Texas, one in Tennessee, have streets named after Bruce Jenner and now they have to consider changing them to Caitlyn. And one will have to change from a Cul-De-Sac to a Cul-De-Sackless.” O’Brien: “Some cities that have streets named after Bruce Jenner are trying to change the streets’ names to Caitlyn Jenner. If you live on Bruce Jenner Cul-de-sac it will now be Cul-de-no-sack.” The Washington Monument joke Kaseberg: “The Washington Monument is ten inches shorter than previously thought. You know the winter has been cold when a monument suffers from shrinkage.” O’Brien: “Yesterday surveyors announced that the Washington Monument is ten inches shorter than what’s been previously recorded. Yeah. Of course, the monument is blaming the shrinkage on the cold weather.” “The only consolation I can take from this horrifying violation is I wrote three jokes that were good enough to be on the monologue on ‘Conan.’ And they all got good laughs,” Kaseberg wrote on his blog in 2015. “Since I cannot watch the show again — it is too painful — and I have lost respect for one of my comedy idols, that consolation will have to be enough.” O’Brien also appeared to be emotionally affected by the situation. “Accusing a comedian of stealing a joke is the worst thing you can accuse them of, in my opinion, short of murder,” O’Brien said during a deposition in the case, according to the Hollywood Reporter. “I think it’s absolutely terrible.” The trial is on pace to take place in August, CBS reported. More from Morning Mix Mom saves her daughter’s life before being fatally struck by car on Mother’s Day ‘I was in total shock’: Ohio police officer accidentally overdoses after traffic stop Mass. school punishes twins for hair braid extensions. Their parents say it’s racial discrimination. ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. |||||

– Conan O'Brien might soon find himself in court over allegations that are nightmarish for any comedian: He's accused of stealing jokes. As USA Today reports, a judge has allowed a federal civil suit to go forward in which Robert "Alex" Kaseberg accuses O'Brien and his writers of stealing jokes he posted online in 2014 and 2015. It's possible, perhaps even likely, the case will be settled before it goes to trial, given how tricky intellectual property cases can be. "Accusing a comedian of stealing a joke is the worst thing you can accuse them of, in my opinion, short of murder," said O'Brien himself in a deposition. Kaseberg makes his case in a blog post here. The judge said three jokes in particular are in question. Here they are, via the Washington Post: Kaseberg: "Tom Brady said he wants to give his MVP truck to the man who won the game for the Patriots. So enjoy that truck, Pete Carroll." O’Brien: "Tom Brady said he wants to give the truck that he was given as Super Bowl MVP … to the guy who won the Super Bowl for the Patriots. Which is very nice. I think that’s nice. I do. Yes. So Brady’s giving his truck to Seahawks coach Pete Carroll." Kaseberg: "Three towns, two in Texas, one in Tennessee, have streets named after Bruce Jenner and now they have to consider changing them to Caitlyn. And one will have to change from a Cul-De-Sac to a Cul-De-Sackless." O’Brien: "Some cities that have streets named after Bruce Jenner are trying to change the streets’ names to Caitlyn Jenner. If you live on Bruce Jenner Cul-de-sac it will now be Cul-de-no-sack." Kaseberg: "The Washington Monument is ten inches shorter than previously thought. You know the winter has been cold when a monument suffers from shrinkage." O’Brien: "Yesterday surveyors announced that the Washington Monument is ten inches shorter than what’s been previously recorded. Yeah. Of course, the monument is blaming the shrinkage on the cold weather."

Robin Thicke Blurred Sonogram Lines April's Pregnant with a Girl!!! Robin Thicke's Girlfriend April Love Geary Pregnant with Girl Exclusive Details Robin Thicke is about to be a father again, with a girlfriend who is barely able to legally drink. 22-year-old April Love Geary is 3 months pregnant with a girl ... the baby is due March 1. 40-year-old Robin has been dating April for 3 years ... shortly after his wife, Paula Patton, filed for divorce. Robin and Paula are still not divorced, and they have had an on-and-off custody war over their 7-year-old son, Julian. By the way, we're told Robin and April told Julian this week and he's "super excited for a little sister." March 1 would have been Alan Thicke's 70th birthday. ||||| Robin Thicke and April Love Geary are expecting! The model announced her pregnancy on Instagram Thursday, writing: “Robin and I are very excited to share with you all that we’re having a baby! The due date is March 1st, [Robin’s late father] Alan’s birthday!” In addition Geary, 22, shared a photo of her sonogram, which was dated Aug. 14. TMZ reports that the baby is a girl. Thicke, 40, is already dad to 7-year-old Julian Fuego, his son with ex-wife Paula Patton. The parents-to-be started dating in the months following his separation from the actress in February 2014. Patton filed for divorce in October 2014 and in March 2015, their divorce was finalized. Earlier this year, the former couple were embroiled in a lengthy custody dispute, which now appears to be resolved. Dave M. Benett/amfAR15/WireImage Thicke and Geary made their first public appearance together at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2015 after dating for over a year. On Wednesday, Geary shared a bikini photo and first look at her baby bump during her vacation in Hawaii. Both Thicke and Geary frequently post about their romance on social media and she has previously joked about the couple’s 18-year-age gap in April. Put your celeb and pop culture knowledge to the test and download PEOPLE and Zynga’s Crosswords with Friends! |||||

– Robin Thicke is expecting his second child, his first baby with girlfriend April Geary. Geary announced the pregnancy with an ultrasound photo on Instagram, noting that the little one is due March 1—the birth date of Thicke's late father, Alan. Thicke, 40, has a 7-year-old son with ex-wife Paula Patton. The singer started dating Geary, 22, soon after his 2014 split with Patton, People reports. According to TMZ, their baby is a girl.

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Two U.S. soldiers were killed Saturday when an Afghan army solider opened fire on them in eastern Afghanistan, an Afghan official said. Attahullah Khogyani, spokesman for the provincial governor in Nangarhar province, said that two other U.S. soldiers are wounded in the attack, which took place in the Achin district. He said the Afghan soldier was killed after the attack. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement that a Taliban loyalist had infiltrated the Afghan army "just to attack foreign forces." A statement from the U.S. military said merely that the military was "aware of an incident in eastern Afghanistan." White House spokesman Raj Shah told reporters traveling with the President Donald Trump in New Jersey that Trump was "following the emerging situation in Afghanistan." Such insider attacks have happened before in Afghanistan. In March, another Afghan soldier was killed after he opened fire on foreign forces at a base in Helmand province, wounding three U.S. soldiers. ||||| (CNN) Three US soldiers were killed and another wounded during a joint US-Afghan military operation Saturday in Nangarhar province, US officials told CNN. The Pentagon named the three soldiers Monday as Sgt. Eric M. Houck, 25, of Baltimore; Sgt. William M. Bays, 29, of Barstow, California; and Cpl. Dillon C. Baldridge, 22, of Youngsville, North Carolina. On Monday evening Vice President Pence was at Dover Air Force Base to attend the dignified transfer of the three soldiers. Pence stood with his hand over his heart as the flag draped caskets were brought off the plane. An American official said the soldiers were shot in an apparent insider attack, also known as a " green-on-blue " incident because of the color-coding system used by NATO. During such assaults, members of the Afghan security forces are known to target US and other NATO soldiers. The shooter in Saturday's incident was an Afghan army commando, Nangarhar provincial spokesman Attaullah Khogyani said. He said the assailant was killed by Afghan forces. Three US troops were killed Saturday in Achin District. The shootings occurred in the Achin District, where US and Afghan troops have been carrying out a monthslong offensive against a local affiliate of ISIS, officials said. Taliban claim responsibility Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said the militants claimed responsibility for the attack. "A Mujahid (freedom fighter) infiltrator of the Islamic Emirate who had enrolled himself in the Kabul government's army attacked American soldiers in Lata Band area of Achin District in Nangarhar province today in the afternoon," said a written statement in Pashto obtained by CNN. "The American invaders were there to support their Afghan slaves." Cpl. Dillon C. Baldridge Sgt. William M. Bays Sgt. Eric M. Houck US President Donald Trump was briefed on the shootings, and Vice President Mike Pence said Saturday that details of the attack would be forthcoming. "When heroes fall, Americans grieve," Pence said Saturday. "Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of these American heroes." White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer acknowledged the deaths in his Monday briefing. "The incident is currently under investigation, but our thoughts and our prayers are with the families of these American heroes who lost their lives in this tragic event," Spicer said. A US military spokesman in Afghanistan said the military "will release more information when appropriate." Soldiers' families mourn Houck had two children, 5 and 3, and was due to come home next month, his father, Mike, told CNN affiliate WBAL "He is a hero," Mike Houck told the station. "You realize that important person you love is never coming back into your life," he added. "He'll always be in my heart. He'll always be in my thoughts." Baldridge was also supposed to return home this summer. Family members told CNN affiliate WRAL he went to Afghanistan in October and was due back in August. Russell Holloman, the principal of Franklinton High School, said Baldridge, who graduated in 2012, was a kindhearted and giving person. "He made an early commitment to the military during his high school career and maintained that focus and selfless dedication after graduation," Holloman said in a statement. "Our community has truly lost a hero." Afghan police killed in another incident In Kabul, meanwhile, the US military command said an unspecified number of Afghan police were killed and wounded in a "friendly fire" incident during a joint Afghan-US operation overnight Saturday. JUST WATCHED What is going on in Afghanistan? Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH What is going on in Afghanistan? 01:48 US Forces Afghanistan said members of the Afghan Border Police in Helmand province were killed and wounded during an operation involving US and Afghan defense and security forces. The deaths occurred when a US aircraft fired on Afghan police, said Omar Zawak, spokesman for the governor of Helmand. US Forces Afghanistan was investigating the incident. Two US service members killed in April JUST WATCHED Taliban attack kills, injures more than 100 Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Taliban attack kills, injures more than 100 01:55 US and coalition casualties in Afghanistan have become rarer in recent years, falling dramatically since the Afghan government assumed responsibility for combat operations in 2014. But in late April, two US service members were killed and another wounded while conducting a joint raid in the Achin District, a Pentagon spokesman said. The operation was targeting ISIS-K, the terrorist group's Afghanistan affiliate. Achin District is the primary base of operations for ISIS in Afghanistan and has been the site of multiple joint US-Afghan counterterrorism missions. A US Army Special Forces soldier was killed fighting the terrorist group there in early April. The district is also where the United States dropped one of its most powerful bombs , killing close to 100 ISIS fighters, according to Afghan officials. Beginning in 2016, Afghan security forces backed by US military advisers launched a major offensive against ISIS. Gen. John W. Nicholson, commander of US Forces Afghanistan, has said the terrorist group has lost about half its fighters and been ejected from two-thirds of its territory. The latest counter-ISIS push began in March of this year. US officials estimate ISIS has 600 to 800 fighters in the country, mostly former members of other regional terrorist groups, such as the Pakistani Taliban and Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. ISIS is believed to be behind a series of terrorist attacks, including the recent fatal attack on a hospital in Kabul. There are about 8,400 US troops in Afghanistan. The US counterterrorism mission is separate from the NATO-led effort to train, advise and assist the Afghan army and police force in the fight against the Taliban. |||||

– Three US soldiers were killed Saturday when an Afghan army solider opened fire on them in eastern Afghanistan, US officials tell CNN. One other US soldier was wounded in the attack, which took place in the Achin district. An Afghan official said the Afghan soldier was killed after the attack. The AP reports the Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack. Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement that a Taliban loyalist had infiltrated the Afghan army "just to attack foreign forces." A statement from the US military said merely that the military was "aware of an incident in eastern Afghanistan." White House spokesperson Raj Shah told reporters traveling with President Trump in New Jersey that Trump was "following the emerging situation in Afghanistan." Such insider attacks have happened before in Afghanistan. In March, another Afghan soldier was killed after he opened fire on foreign forces at a base in Helmand province, wounding three US soldiers.

Officials in New London, Connecticut, turned off the water at the city's new waterfront fountain over the weekend, because people have been using it as a toilet. The fountain was activated last month and features a sculpture of a whale's tail with water spilling over it, which visitors are encouraged to run through. City Councilor Michael Buscetto III tells The Day of New London that since the fountain opened, police have responded to calls of people urinating, defecating and showering in the fountain water. He said some people who have cut themselves have also used the fountain to rinse off blood. City Manager Denise Rose says police are developing a plan to better keep an eye on the area. ||||| Three children pushed mock buttons in front of the Whale’s Tail fountain on Parade Plaza on Saturday, as the city electrician activated the sculpture to send streams of water from the sculpture’s fins. The event drew a crowd of onlookers, who had been watching or participating in the Hope Week Parade, to the plaza’s steps. The students chosen to push the button were Adeliz Cordero, a fifth grader at Jennings School; Malik Faulkner, a fourth grader at Nathan Hale School; Lashya Lapoint, a first-grader at Winthrop School; and Tian Richardson, a pre-school student at Harbor School who was absent. Mayor Martin Olsen said the plaza opened a year ago, and the Custom House Maritime Museum held a raffle to see who would turn on the fountain. Bruce Hyde, who had been closely associated with the Parade project, won the raffle but said he wanted to have some students in the city do the honors. “This is New London at its best,” Olsen said of the gathering. The event was preceded by the Hope Week Parade, which took dozens of organizations and schools on a march down Broad Street and State Street. The honorary grand marshal of the procession was Sgt. Edwin Rivera, a New London native and Waterford resident who died of wounds sustained in Afghanistan last year. Rivera’s family and friends marched near the head of the parade, followed by several military groups. Yesenia Rivera, Edward’s widow, said he would be honored with the recognition the parade gave him. “I’m very grateful that they’re doing that for him,” she said. Rivera’s friends, Denise Williams and Betzaida Rosario, said they were glad to see the community coming out for the event. “To see everybody together for this is tremendous,” said Rosario. Hope Week continues today with the Chowda Fest at the Custom House, which runs until 2:30 p.m., and a plant sale at the FRESH New London garden behind the Senior Center, which will go until 3 p.m. On Sunday, a noon memorial service at Fort Trumbull State Park will honor the Merchant Marine. On the same day, a candlelight service in memory and support of veterans runs from 7:45 p.m. to 8:15 p.m. at Parade Plaza, with luminaries on sale for $1 apiece starting at 7 p.m. |||||

– The people of New London, Connecticut, have been letting city officials know exactly what they think of their very, very expensive whale tail fountain … and it’s not pretty. The city was forced to shut off water flowing out of the public fountain—an 8,000-pound bronze sculpture built as part of an $11 million project—after receiving calls that people had been urinating, defecating, and showering in it; some people reportedly used the water to rinse off blood after cutting themselves, reports the Day of New London. "It's an $11 million bathroom," complains one New London resident. "I'm concerned with the sanitary aspect of the water," says the city councilor, who notes that the offenders are regulars. "Let's call them frequent fliers,'' he says. The city manager says police are developing a plan to better keep an eye on the area, reports the AP. The fountain features a sculpture of a whale's tail with water spilling over it, which visitors were actually encouraged to run through. Click here to see the fountain for yourself.

Jenny Sanford wants us to know she's doing fine after divorcing her cheating hubby, South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, and that she might trust a man enough to fall in love again."I just have to make sure I pick someone who maybe loves me back," she tells Dr. Phil, the TV therapist, in a show airing Thursday.Actually, the former first lady has already found a new beau, and went very public with him in Washington on May 1. Meanwhile, her ex spent the May 8 weekend in the Florida Keys with his "Argentine Soulmate" mistress , reports the Associated Press. It was that affair, including Mark Sanford's secret tryst with Maria Belen Chapur in Buenos Aires last summer, his subsequent declarations of love and refusal to give her up, that wrecked the Sanfords' 20-year marriage.Jenny Sanford became something of a heroine when the affair became public, and she chose not to appear with him at his too-much-information news conference. She moved out of the governor's mansion with their four sons and worked to save the marriage. "I did the best I could in the marriage and he didn't really pull his part," she told Dr. Phil.And might she be able to trust another man in the future? asked the shrink. "I can't predict anything, but I think you have to choose to be open to it again. I've chosen to move on, and I've chosen to be happy about it. I loved, and I gave fully in that marriage. There's no reason in the world why I can't do it again. I just have to make sure I pick someone who maybe loves me back."Perhaps she's already found him, because it's clear she's dipped her toes into the bay of bliss with Georgia businessman Clay Boardman, whom she met at a speech she gave in Charleston two months ago. They were much in evidence at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner and at the exclusive Bloomberg/Vanity Fair after-party at the French ambassador's home."We're happy to be here, and we're happy to be together," Sanford, in a slinky blue frock with a plunging neckline, told The Washington Post, which reported in detail on their body language: "His arms were around her waist as they talked with another couple. And then they were holding hands. And then his arm was draped the length of her back, his hand gently grazing her behind... If you assumed this sudden relationship was a rebound/revenge charade -- well, half of the professional thespians in that room would not be capable of such a good acting job. We're totally buying it."Sanford, who achieved a measure of fame, fortune and revenge writing and promoting "Staying True," her post-separation memoir, appears on Dr. Phil with another betrayed wife, Cindy Shackelford. In March, Shackelford won a $9 million alienation of affection judgment against her husband's lover in North Carolina, after 33 years of marriage and two children.When Dr. Phil asked Sanford if she still loved her ex, she said, "I love the Mark Sanford I knew, the one I fell in love with when we married. Can I ever be married to him again? Absolutely not." But she concedes he's a much better father to their sons, now 17, 16, 14 and 11. "He sees the children more now than he ever, ever has."And what about his relationship to Chapur, the Argentine mistress?"Frankly, I make a point of not asking. I have no idea," said Sanford, who may have taped the Dr. Phil show before the recent reunion with his lover. "I've not heard that he's with her. And like I said, he's with the boys almost every weekend.""Almost" may be the operative word here. The Associated Press is reporting that the governor revealed during a press conference on an unrelated matter that he spent last weekend with Maria Belen Chapur, leading to speculation that their private time in the Florida Keys may be evidence of rekindled romance now that he's single.Both Shackelford and Sanford tell Dr. Phil they would have preferred the truth from their philandering husbands."I would have respected him more if he had just said, 'I don't love you any more, and I want a divorce,'" said Shackelford, who earlier in the show joked, "I would much rather he buy a red Corvette or something."Added Sanford: "Listening to the press conference, and the stuff he said, I think he might have been respected more if he had come home and said, 'Well, I fell in love with a lady over here,' but he never said that." ||||| By FITSNews || When S.C. First Lady Jenny Sanford struck a pose for Vogue last August (less than two months after her husband’s rambling confession of infidelity), it was obvious to anyone reading between the stems … err lines … that she was “single and looking to mingle.” And as you read first here on FITS, it didn’t take long after her divorce from the governor this March to land a new man – Augusta, Georgia businessman Clay Boardman. Apparently, Sanford and Boardman have been “making the scene” too, first at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner last week (where sources say they “needed to get a room”) and more recently at a concert where we’re told Jenny had more than her fair share of adult beverages. In fact, Jenny and Boardman have been much more public about their canoodling than the governor has been about his ongoing romance with Maria Belen Chapur, although things are obviously starting to even out on that front. Anyway, Jenny will be taking a break from all the “hot and heaviness” over the next few days to campaign with S.C. Rep. Nikki Haley, who she has already endorsed in the 2010 GOP gubernatorial primary in South Carolina. “Jenny and Nikki will make stops along the South Carolina coast – Charleston, Beaufort County, and Myrtle Beach – and (will) hold free, open-to-the-public town hall events in both Charleston and Myrtle Beach,” says Haley spokesman Tim Pearson. The pair will also hold two “private” (translation: $$$) events in Charleston and Beaufort, Pearson says. For details on where you can catch up with the Jenny-Nikki Tour, click here. |||||

– Jenny Sanford is open to dating again. “I just have to make sure I pick someone who maybe loves me back,” she told Dr. Phil in an interview airing today, reports Politics Daily. “I've chosen to move on, and I've chosen to be happy about it.” But gossip has it that she's already found someone. She's been spotted at least twice now canoodling with new boyfriend Clay Boardman, a businessman, Fitsnews.com reports. The two made quite a show in particular at the White House Correspondents Dinner, where one observer said they “needed a room.” As for the ex-hubby, Jenny told Phil that Mark was now a better father than he'd been pre-divorce, and that she had “no idea” if he was still seeing Maria Belen Chapur. Hint: He is. He's admitted that he'd spent last weekend with Chapur in the Florida Keys.

(CNN) "We do not need tears or sympathy or even prayers," said Aleppo's last remaining doctors in an open letter to US President Barack Obama. "We need action." The 15 doctors serving the 300,000 people still living in eastern Aleppo urged the President to create a permanent lifeline to bring in urgently needed medical supplies. "We do not need tears" -- Last doctors in Aleppo write letter to Obama pleading for help https://t.co/95zYed2B5N https://t.co/OeUM2XavX8 "We have seen no effort on behalf of the United States to lift the siege or even use its influence to push the parties to protect civilians," said the letter. And while there were rare celebrations in the streets, the battered enclave is still far from peaceful, with tens of thousands of families trapped by fighting, basic infrastructure severely damaged, and access to humanitarian aid limited. The eastern part of the city has been held by rebel groups since 2012 with the recent government siege, backed by Russian air power, cutting off many supply routes. More than 6,000 people, mainly civilians, were killed or injured in 80 consecutive days of fighting in Aleppo, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. What pains us most, as doctors, is choosing who will live and who will die Aleppo doctors "What pains us most, as doctors, is choosing who will live and who will die," said the letter, which was first released with the signatures of 29 doctors, and later revised to 15. "Young children are sometimes brought into our emergency rooms so badly injured that we have to prioritize those with better chances, or simply don't have the equipment to help them." But despite these horrors, the doctors added: "We choose to be here. We took a pledge to help those in need. " The White House has received the letter, a senior administration official told CNN on Thursday. "The US has repeatedly condemned indiscriminate bombing of medical facilities by the Assad regime in Aleppo and elsewhere in Syria. "These attacks are appalling and must cease," the official continued. "We commend the bravery of medical professionals across Syria who are working every day in perilous circumstances with minimal supplies to save lives." The official said the US government is working with the United Nations and engaging with Russia to find a diplomatic approach to reducing the violence and allowing humanitarian assistance into the city. Dr. Hamza, a Syrian doctor in Aleppo who signed the letter and did not provide a first name, said he was shocked at the response from the White House. "Speaking about humanitarian assistance and speaking about negotiation and diplomatic solution is very ironic while the Russian air forces are right above our heads and striking us with every weapon that any man can imagine" said Hamza. "The White House knows exactly what is happening," he said. Hamza said the response from the Obama administration felt particularly tone deaf, given what he suspects was a chemical attack in Aleppo late Wednesday. Supplies dangerously low The doctors say there is an attack on a medical facility every 17 hours, meaning services in the area could be annihilated within one month if no action is taken soon. "Unless a permanent lifeline to Aleppo is opened it will be only a matter of time until we are again surrounded by regime troops, hunger takes hold, and hospitals' supplies run completely dry," the letter said. "Death has seemed increasingly inescapable." Newborns in incubators are evacuated to a hospital basement following reported government bombardment within a few hundred metres of the medical facility, in eastern Aleppo. Across the city, more than 2 million people are without access to electricity, said United Nations spokesman Stephen O'Brien at a press briefing. The little water that is available through wells and tanks is not nearly enough to sustain the population through the scorching Syrian summer, with children particularly at risk of waterborne disease, he added. Doctors pushed to breaking point Despite the daily atrocities, the Syrian doctors spoke of their overwhelming duty to help others -- and urged the United States to assume a similar sense of responsibility. Some of the doctors had been visiting their families when they heard Aleppo was being besieged and rushed back to help, several on foot because the roads were too dangerous. "Because without us even more of our friends and neighbors will die. We have a duty to remain and help," said the letter. ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Doctors in Aleppo are calling on the US president to come to the aid of civilians The last doctors in the rebel-held east of the Syrian city of Aleppo have urged US President Barack Obama to come to the aid of the 250,000 civilians there. A letter signed by 15 physicians warns that if attacks on medical facilities continue at their present rate, there could be none left within a month. US inaction against crimes by Syria's government and its ally Russia means it bears equal responsibility, it argues. Russian forces, meanwhile, were due to halt actions in Aleppo to allow in aid. All military activity, air and artillery strikes would be suspended between 10:00 (07:00 GMT) and 13:00 (10:00 GMT) each day from Thursday, a defence ministry official said. However, the United Nations said three hours would be insufficient to help the millions in need and appealed for 48-hour pauses. Fighting has escalated in recent days, with rebels severing the government's main route to the west of the city. The offensive sought to break a siege by pro-government forces, who encircled the east in July with the support of Russian aircraft. Image copyright Reuters Image caption Countless civilians have been killed or injured over the past few weeks in Aleppo The letter, signed by 15 of the doctors remaining in eastern Aleppo, says that five years into the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad, doctors have "borne witness as countless patients, friends and colleagues suffered violent, tormented deaths". "The world has stood by and remarked how 'complicated' Syria is, while doing little to protect us. Recent offers of evacuation from the regime and Russia have sounded like thinly veiled threats to residents - flee now or face what fate?" They say that in the past month there have been 42 attacks on medical facilities in Syria, 15 of them on hospitals where they work. "Two weeks ago, four newborn babies gasping for air suffocated to death after a blast cut the oxygen supply to their incubators. Gasping for air, their lives ended before they had really begun," they recall. The doctors warn President Obama: "Continued US inaction to protect the civilians of Syria means that our plight is being wilfully tolerated by those in the international corridors of power. The burden of responsibility for the crimes of the Syrian government and its Russian ally must therefore be shared by those, including the United States, who allow them to continue." Unless a permanent lifeline to rebel-held Aleppo is opened, they add, "it will be only a matter of time until we are again surrounded by regime troops, hunger takes hold and hospitals' supplies run completely dry." "We do not need tears or sympathy or even prayers, we need your action. Prove that you are the friend of Syrians." Image copyright AFP Image caption The UN said the targeting of hospitals and clinics had continued unabated An earlier statement sent to the media had said there were 29 signatories to the letter, and also quoted it as calling on Mr Obama to impose a no-fly zone over Aleppo. On Monday, the UN said countless civilians had been killed or injured over the past few weeks in the city, and that the targeting of hospitals and clinics had continued unabated. Moreover, attacks on civilian infrastructure had left more than two million people without electricity or access to the public water network for several days, it added. ||||| Fifteen of the last 35 doctors in rebel-held eastern Aleppo have written a letter to Barack Obama with an urgent plea for intervention to stop the bombardment of hospitals in the besieged city by the Russian-backed Syrian air force. “We do not need tears or sympathy or even prayers: we desperately need a zone free from bombing over eastern Aleppo to stop the attacks, and international action to ensure Aleppo is never besieged again,” the doctors wrote. Their letter came as the Russians said they would suspend aerial action over Aleppo for three hours a day – starting on Thursday from 10am and 1pm (7am to 10am GMT) – and the UK circulated plans at the UN in New York for a ceasefire in which humanitarian relief was implemented by impartial actors, rather than the Syrian and Russian military. There has been little respite from the fighting despite the Russian announcement, with battles ongoing in the city and its surroundings. The Syrian government acknowledged that it had launched a counter-offensive “in cooperation with its allies” against the rebels who broke the siege of opposition-controlled eastern Aleppo, and did not indicate there would be a halt for humanitarian reasons. “It’s a lie,” said Osama Aboul Ezz, a doctor in the city. “During the time of the ceasefire there were air raids in the city and there are a lot of wounded in Aleppo today, and other doctors have told us that they received wounded during the time the Russians declared the ceasefire.” Some factions of the Free Syrian Army who took part in the operation to break the siege had said that they were ready to negotiate with the UN to allow humanitarian convoys in to both western and eastern Aleppo. The western, government-controlled side has been cut off since the weekend after the rebels seized Ramouseh, a key artery into the area, which houses 1.5 million civilians. The regime imposed a siege last month on the eastern side, which has a quarter of a million civilians, and few supplies have made it across amidst the fighting. The latest violence came on the heels of yet another suspected chlorine attack, this time on the rebel-held Zubdiya district in the city, which killed three people and left others suffering respiratory injuries, according to local medics. Just last week local doctors in the neighbouring province of Idlib said they had treated more than two dozen patients in a suspected chlorine attack on the town of Saraqeb. Facebook Twitter Pinterest A man breathes through an oxygen mask after a hospital and a civil defence group said suspected chlorine was dropped on Aleppo, Syria. Photograph: Abdalrhman Ismail/Reuters The UN’s Syria envoy, Staffan de Mistura, said that reports of a gas, believed to be chlorine, being dropped on Aleppo are being investigated. “There is a lot of evidence that it actually did take place,” he told reporters, adding that if confirmed the attack would amount to a war crime. He also said the UN was attempting to find a “workable” solution to deliver humanitarian aid with Moscow to Aleppo’s struggling civilians. Few observers believe the three-hour windows proposed by Russia on Wednesday are sufficient to deliver useful quantities of supplies. Aleppo 'hell' prevents Syria peace talks, say diplomats Read more The UN humanitarian chief, Stephen O’Brien, said he was willing to consider the Russian plan, but added that getting sufficient aid into Aleppo would require a 48-hour pause in the fighting and an open single-carriageway road. “When we’re offered three hours, then you have to ask: what could be achieved in those three hours?” he said. “Is it to meet the need or will it only just meet a very small part of the need? Islam Alloush, a spokesman for Jaysh al-Islam, one of the most powerful rebel groups in Syria and a key faction in the Aleppo offensive, said the proposal was a propaganda ploy but that the group would cooperate with any plan to deliver humanitarian aid to Aleppo. “We welcome anything that would preserve the blood of the Syrian people and reduce their suffering,” Alloush said. “But the reality is that this announcement is for media consumption and has not been implemented on the ground, and the regime and its allies continue to wreak destruction on Syrians during the allotted time window and outside it.” The US ambassador to the UN, Samantha Power, has made repeated pleas for 48-hour ceasefires to allow aid into the bombarded city, and for some of the most seriously injured to be removed. A meeting of the UN security council on Tuesday failed to produce an immediate agreement on a ceasefire. The joint letter written by the doctors urged the US president “to act now to stop the bombs that continue to fall on the city and ensure they are never held under siege again”. It has been claimed that one medical facility is being attacked every 17 hours, and doctors are being forced to make appalling decisions to let children die due to a shortage of blood, medical supplies and more complex scanners. Some doctors refused to sign the letter because they had no wish to make any more appeals to the west. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Sandbags protect the entrance of a children’s hospital in Aleppo. Photograph: Abdalrhman Ismail / Reuters/Reuters There seems little doubt in the minds of western diplomats that the Syrian forces have decided to target the remaining medical facilities in the eastern part of the city in an attempt to terrorise the remaining 250,000-300,000 citizens into submission, starvation or exodus. The six facilities hit in and around Aleppo included a paediatric clinic inside the city where four infants died after their oxygen supply was cut. It has not been possible to verify the names of all the doctors listed in the letter, but their account tallies with evidence given by US doctors to the UN after a working visit to Aleppo’s hospitals in the past fortnight. Aleppo is a such a prize for both sides that its suffering just goes on Read more Aleppo is the second-largest city in Syria and has a symbolic importance to the revolution; its fall would confirm the extent to which the president, Bashar al-Assad, had gained the military upper hand thanks to Russian air support. In their letter, the Syrian doctors write: “For five years, we have faced death from above on a daily basis. But we now face death from all around. For five years, we have borne witness as countless patients, friends and colleagues suffered violent, tormented deaths. For five years, the world has stood by and remarked how ‘complicated’ Syria is, while doing little to protect us. Recent offers of evacuation from the regime and Russia have sounded like thinly veiled threats to residents – flee now or face what fate? “Last month, there were 42 attacks on medical facilities in Syria, 15 of which were hospitals in which we work. Right now, there is an attack on a medical facility every 17 hours. At this rate, our medical services in Aleppo could be completely destroyed in a month, leaving 300,000 people to die. “What pains us most, as doctors, is choosing who will live and who will die. Young children are sometimes brought into our emergency rooms so badly injured that we have to prioritise those with better chances, or simply don’t have the equipment to help them. Two weeks ago, four newborn babies gasping for air suffocated to death after a blast cut the oxygen supply to their incubators. Gasping for air, their lives ended before they had really begun.” They warn Obama that “unless a permanent lifeline to Aleppo is opened, it will be only a matter of time until we are again surrounded by regime troops, hunger takes hold and hospitals’ supplies run completely dry. “We do not need to tell you that the systematic targeting of hospitals by Syrian regime and Russian warplanes is a war crime. We do not need to tell you that they are committing atrocities in Aleppo,” the letter states. The UK has circulated a draft UN resolution on the Aleppo crisis making it clear that any humanitarian solution cannot be run by the Russians or Syrians alone, but must instead be led by impartial humanitarian actors. The draft resolution states: “Any proposed humanitarian initiatives for civilians to escape the fighting must be guaranteed by all sides and independently implemented and monitored, and all civilians should be guaranteed voluntary, free movement, including the right to choose their route and destination, if they choose to leave. Humanitarian aid must be delivered to the population wherever they may be, irrespective of whether they chose to leave or remain in Aleppo.” The former Liberal Democrat leader Lord Ashdown urged UK ministers to end their summer silence and speak out against the carnage in Syria. He said: “The UK must act quickly and decisively to establish humanitarian access to Aleppo, and if necessary provide RAF plans to aid in air drops to the desperate, besieged citizens.” |||||

– The last 15 doctors in war-ravaged Aleppo in eastern Syria are calling on President Obama to help bring an end to the bombardment of hospitals there, the BBC reports. If no action is taken, the doctors warned, there won’t be any medical facilities left within a month. "We do not need tears or sympathy or even prayers: we desperately need a zone free from bombing over eastern Aleppo to stop the attacks, and international action to ensure Aleppo is never besieged again," the doctors write. A medical facility in the rebel-held enclave is attacked every 17 hours, forcing the diminishing number of doctors to make horrifying choices such as which children will be provided with life-saving resources, they write, per the Guardian. The plea for help came as the Russians said they would suspend their air campaign over Aleppo for three hours each day to allow humanitarian aid to be delivered. The UN, however, said a 48-hour halt is needed, along with safe access to a two-lane road. Fighting in Aleppo has intensified recently as rebels have cut off the government’s main route to the west. "We have seen no effort on behalf of the United States to lift the siege or even use its influence to push the parties to protect civilians," say the doctors, whose full letter is at CNN. A US official tells the network that the White House is working with the UN and Russia on a way to allow in humanitarian aid.

FILE - In this Dec. 4, 2012, file photo, software company founder John McAfee listens to a question during an interview at a local restaurant in Guatemala City. McAfee said Sunday, Dec. 9, 2012, a live-stream... (Associated Press) A lawyer for John McAfee said Tuesday that a judge has ordered the software company founder released from a Guatemalan detention center where he has been fighting being returned to Belize. Attorney Telesforo Guerra said the judge notified him verbally of the ruling, but added that it might take a day for formal written notification to win McAfee's release, possibly as soon as Wednesday. Judge Judith Secaida did not immediately return phone calls seeking to confirm the ruling. Guerra said Secaida ruled that McAfee's detention was illegal, ordered him released, and gave him 10 days to put his immigration situation in order. It was not immediately clear if McAfee could get some kind of temporary or transit visa to allow him to leave Guatemala. McAfee has said he wants to return to the United States with his 20-year-old Belizean girlfriend. Guerra said that would be his client's best option. "For me, it's best that McAfee go to the United States, that's definitely the country where he will be safest," Guerra said. "In Guatemala, he runs the risk that anything could happen to him." McAfee was detained last week for immigration violations after he sneaked into Guatemala from neighboring Belize. He had been on the lam for weeks before that, saying he donned disguises to avoid Belizean police who want to question him in the fatal shooting in November of another U.S. expatriate, Gregory Viant Faull. The victim lived a couple of houses down from McAfee's compound on Ambergris Caye, an island off Belize's Caribbean coast. McAfee acknowledges that his dogs were bothersome and that Faull had complained about them, but denies killing Faull. McAfee has said corrupt Belizean authorities are persecuting him, something officials in Belize deny. McAfee says he fears for his safety in Belize because he has sensitive information about official corruption and refused to donate to local politicians. In a live-stream Internet broadcast Sunday from the Guatemalan detention center where he was put under the government order that he be returned to Belize, the 67-year-old McAfee said he wants to return to the United States and "settle down to whatever normal life" he can. "I simply would like to live comfortably day by day, fish, swim, enjoy my declining years," he said. McAfee is an acknowledged practical joker who has dabbled in yoga, ultra-light aircraft and the production of herbal medications. He has led an eccentric life since he sold his stake in the software company named after him in the early 1990s and moved to Belize about three years ago to lower his taxes. He told The New York Times in 2009 that he had lost all but $4 million of his $100 million fortune in the U.S. financial crisis. However, a story on the Gizmodo website quoted him as describing that claim as "not very accurate at all." Faull's family has said through a representative that McAfee's skillful courting of the media, including blog posts, email messages clandestine interviews, has obscured the point that McAfee should submit to police questioning. ||||| A Guatemalan judge has ordered software mogul John McAfee released from a detention center there, McAfee's lawyer said Tuesday. Judge Judith Secaida ruled that McAfee’s detention was illegal, attorney Telesforo Guerra said, adding that the judge also said McAfee should be given 10 days to straighten out his immigration status. The ruling, which Guerra said the judge informed him of verbally, could not be immediately confirmed. Guerra said he expects his client to be released by Thursday or Friday, and believes he will seek to return to the United States immediately. McAfee had expressed a desire to return to the U.S. in a live video stream over the weekend, saying he wished to spend his “declining years” in peace. “It’s a victory because the government wanted to send him back to Belize,” said Guerra in a phone interview. “With this kind of resolution, they cannot do it.” Guerra said that according to Guatemalan law, someone entering illegally has the right to 10 days to establish immigration status. “There is no crime in coming without any visa. If there’s not any crime, the immigration office has to release him.” He was arrested last week after officials said he’d entered the country illegally, in an attempt to dodge Belize police who named him a “person of interest” in the fatal shooting of his neighbor, American businessman Gregory Faull. McAfee has become something of a self-styled fugitive (no warrant has been issued against him in Belize) ever since Faull was found face-up in a pool of blood in November. Belize police maintain they merely want to question McAfee, who lived near Faull on an exotic island off the coast of Belize. But McAfee, who founded the antivirus company that still bears his name, has said he believes he will be killed if captured by Belize officials. McAfee, never far from an Internet connection, has blogged his progress along the way, describing his elaborate disguises and complaints about the corruption of Belize officials even from the immigration detention center where he’s being held. “He has all the things that he needs,” said Guerra. “He has his computer, a nice bed and a desk.” McAfee told Sky News on Tuesday that he was “100 percent certain” he would be released within 24 hours. If McAfee’s predictions hold true, his move to the U.S. could end a weeks-long saga that included McAfee’s disappearance, resurfacing in Guatemala, detention and hospitalization for chest pains. In the latest development McAfee sold the rights to his story to a Montreal-based TV producer. Meanwhile, Raphael Martinez, a spokesman for the Belize police department, said it is waiting to see what happens. "Personally," said Martinez in a phone interview, "I'd say if he's not returned to Belize by Thursday or Friday, the chances of him coming back here are very slim." Martinez added that he hopes the "good working relationship" Belize has with the United States might assist the police department in its ongoing murder investigation, even if McAfee flies back to the U.S. "If he goes back to America ... it would be totally on the onus of the American people whether they want to bring a closure to what has been happening in Belize," Martinez said. ALSO: John McAfee hospitalized in Guatemala, delaying his deportation McAfee founder surfaces in Guatemala after giving Belize the slip John McAfee denied asylum in Guatemala, could be deported to Belize |||||

– Looks like there may not be a trial in McAfee's future: A judge has ordered John McAfee freed from a Guatemalan detention center, a lawyer for the colorful antivirus tycoon says. The lawyer says that the judge has declared McAfee's detention illegal and given him 10 days to resolve his immigration issues, the AP reports. McAfee has been fighting deportation to Belize, where he is wanted for questioning over the murder of a neighbor. McAfee has said he wants to return to the US with his Belizean girlfriend and "settle down to whatever normal life" he can and his lawyer says that would be his best option. "For me, it's best that McAfee go to the United States, that's definitely the country where he will be safest," the lawyer says. "In Guatemala, he runs the risk that anything could happen to him." A spokesman for police in Belize, however, says he hopes the "good working relationship" his country has with the US will help them close the murder case even if McAfee makes it back to America, the Los Angeles Times reports. Click here for more on the McAfee saga.

Abstract Recent research has begun to distinguish two aspects of subjective well-being. Emotional well-being refers to the emotional quality of an individual's everyday experience—the frequency and intensity of experiences of joy, stress, sadness, anger, and affection that make one's life pleasant or unpleasant. Life evaluation refers to the thoughts that people have about their life when they think about it. We raise the question of whether money buys happiness, separately for these two aspects of well-being. We report an analysis of more than 450,000 responses to the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, a daily survey of 1,000 US residents conducted by the Gallup Organization. We find that emotional well-being (measured by questions about emotional experiences yesterday) and life evaluation (measured by Cantril's Self-Anchoring Scale) have different correlates. Income and education are more closely related to life evaluation, but health, care giving, loneliness, and smoking are relatively stronger predictors of daily emotions. When plotted against log income, life evaluation rises steadily. Emotional well-being also rises with log income, but there is no further progress beyond an annual income of ~$75,000. Low income exacerbates the emotional pain associated with such misfortunes as divorce, ill health, and being alone. We conclude that high income buys life satisfaction but not happiness, and that low income is associated both with low life evaluation and low emotional well-being. The question of whether “money buys happiness” comes up frequently in discussions of subjective well-being in both scholarly debates and casual conversation. The topic has been addressed in a vast and inconclusive research literature (for a selection of recent reviews, see refs. 1–4). No single article can settle this complex question definitively, but data recently collected by the Gallup Organization in the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index (GHWBI) provide a rich source of observations, as well as an unusually detailed measurement of well-being. We analyze the responses of more than 450,000 US residents surveyed in 2008 and 2009 to several questions about their subjective well-being. The results suggest a rather complex answer to our opening question. A discussion of subjective well-being must recognize a distinction between two concepts that are often confounded (5–8). Emotional well-being (sometimes called hedonic well-being or experienced happiness) refers to the emotional quality of an individual's everyday experience—the frequency and intensity of experiences of joy, fascination, anxiety, sadness, anger, and affection that make one's life pleasant or unpleasant. Life evaluation refers to a person's thoughts about his or her life. Surveys of subjective well-being have traditionally emphasized life evaluation. The most commonly asked question in these surveys is the life satisfaction question: “How satisfied are you with your life as a whole these days?” The GHWBI survey is unusual in its attempt to distinguish and capture both aspects of subjective well-being. Emotional well-being is assessed by questions about the presence of various emotions in the experience of yesterday (e.g., enjoyment, happiness, anger, sadness, stress, worry). Life evaluation is measured using Cantril's Self-Anchoring Scale, which has the respondent rate his or her current life on a ladder scale in which 0 is “the worst possible life for you” and 10 is “the best possible life for you.” We find that emotional well-being and life evaluation have different correlates in the circumstances of people's lives. In particular, we observe striking differences in the relationship of these aspects of well-being to income. (For related observations in the Gallup World Poll, see ref. 9.) Confusion abounds in discussions of our question. For an example, consider the statement that “a lasting marriage…is estimated to be worth $100,000 a year” (10). This correct statement of a research finding is likely to be misunderstood, because many readers will interpret it by imagining the pleasure of a change of this magnitude in their income. The pleasure of a raise is likely to be transient, however, due to a phenomenon known as adaptation. Because of adaptation, the difference in well-being between two random individuals whose income differs by $100,000 is far less impressive than the joy and misery that these individuals would immediately experience were they to trade places. Because the observed effects of long-established income differences are much smaller than intuitively expected, they are sometimes described as inconsequential, but this too is misleading. When entered in multiple regression model to predict well-being along with other aspects of life circumstances (marital status, age, education), the effects of household income are almost invariably both statistically significant and quantitatively important. We report that household income matters for both emotional well-being and life evaluation, and that there are circumstances under which it matters for the latter when it does not matter for the former. Some of the confusion regarding the effects of income on well-being can be traced to incorrect analysis. Psychologists and sociologists often plot measures of subjective well-being against income in dollars, but a strong argument can be made for the logarithm of income as the preferred scale. The logarithmic transformation represents a basic fact of perception known as Weber's Law, which applies generally to quantitative dimensions of perception and judgment (e.g., the intensity of sounds and lights). The rule is that the effective stimulus for the detection and evaluation of changes or differences in such dimensions is the percentage change, not its absolute amount. In the context of income, a $100 raise does not have the same significance for a financial services executive as for an individual earning the minimum wage, but a doubling of their respective incomes might have a similar impact on both. The logarithmic transformation reveals an important regularity of judgment that risks being masked when a dollar scale is used. Plots of subjective well-being against income in dollars invariably yield a strongly concave function. Although concavity is entailed by the psychophysics of quantitative dimensions, it often has been cited as evidence that people derive little or no psychological benefit from income beyond some threshold. Although this conclusion has been widely accepted in discussions of the relationship between life evaluation and gross domestic product (GDP) across nations (11–14), it is false, at least for this aspect of subjective well-being. In accordance with Weber's Law, average national life evaluation is linear when appropriately plotted against log GDP (15); a doubling of income provides similar increments of life evaluation for countries rich and poor. As this example illustrates, the statement that “money does not buy happiness” may be inferred from a careless reading of a plot of life evaluation against raw income—an error avoided by using the logarithm of income. In the present study, we confirm the contribution of higher income to improving individuals’ life evaluation, even among those who are already well off. However, we also find that the effects of income on the emotional dimension of well-being satiate fully at an annual income of ~$75,000, a result that is, of course, independent of whether dollars or log dollars are used as a measure of income. The aims of our analysis of the GHWBI were to examine possible differences between the correlates of emotional well-being and of life evaluation, focusing in particular on the relationship between these measures and household income. Results Some observations were deleted to eliminate likely errors in the reports of income. The GHWBI asks individuals to report their monthly family income in 11 categories. The three lowest categories—0, <$60, and $60–$499—cannot be treated as serious estimates of household income. We deleted these three categories (a total of 14,425 observations out of 709,183), as well as those respondents for whom income is missing (172,677 observations). We then regressed log income on indicators for the congressional district in which the respondent lived, educational categories, sex, age, age squared, race categories, marital status categories, and height. Thus, we predict the log of each individual's income by the mean of log incomes in his or her congressional district, modified by personal characteristics. This regression explains 37% of the variance, with a root mean square error (RMSE) of 0.67852. To eliminate outliers and implausible income reports, we dropped observations in which the absolute value of the difference between log income and its prediction exceeded 2.5 times the RMSE. This trimming lost 14,510 observations out of 450,417, or 3.22%. In all, we lost 28.4% of the original sample. In comparison, the US Census Bureau imputed income for 27.5% of households in the 2008 wave of the American Community Survey (ACS). As a check that our exclusions do not systematically bias income estimates compared with Census Bureau procedures, we compared the mean of the logarithm of income in each congressional district from the GHWBI with the logarithm of median income from the ACS. If income is approximately lognormal, then these should be close. The correlation was 0.961, with the GHWBI estimates about 6% lower, possibly attributable to the fact that the GHWBI data cover both 2008 and 2009. We defined positive affect by the average of three dichotomous items (reports of happiness, enjoyment, and frequent smiling and laughter) and what we refer to as “blue affect”—the average of worry and sadness. Reports of stress (also dichotomous) were analyzed separately (as was anger, for which the results were similar but not shown) and life evaluation was measured using the Cantril ladder. The correlations between the emotional well-being measures and the ladder values had the expected sign but were modest in size (all <0.31). Positive affect, blue affect, and stress also were weakly correlated (positive and blue affect correlated –0.38, and –0.28, and 0.52 with stress.) The results shown here are similar when the constituents of positive and blue affect are analyzed separately. As in other studies of well-being, we found that most people were quite happy and satisfied with their lives. About 85% of respondents experienced much positive affect (the average of smiling, enjoyment, and happiness) each day. Blue affect (sadness and worry) was reported by 24%, and stress was reported by 39%. The average of the Cantril ladder score was 6.76. Compared with about 150 other countries for which we have corresponding data from the Gallup World Poll, these results indicate that the US population ranks high on the ladder (ninth after the Scandinavian countries, Canada, The Netherlands, Switzerland, and New Zealand), and also does well in terms of happiness (fifth), smiling (33rd), and enjoyment (10th), but much less well on worry (89th from best), sadness (69th from best), and anger (75th). Americans report very high levels of stress (fifth among 151 countries). Table 1 presents regressions of the four well-being measures on a set of demographic variables, which provide context for interpreting these measures. All of the predictors are dichotomous. The first row of the table shows the regression coefficient for an indicator of high income, defined as reporting a monthly income of at least $4,000, which corresponds to the top 58% of the population. These coefficients cannot be compared across the row, because the outcomes have different scales. The entries in other rows are ratios normalized by the coefficient on the high-income indicator, thus representing the estimated effect relative to the effect of increasing income by approximately 4-fold. The sign of each ratio is positive if its regression coefficient has the same sign as the coefficient for income (positive for positive affect, negative for blue affect, etc.). A coefficient >1 indicates an effect larger than that of the income dichotomy. Because higher incomes are always associated with better outcomes, positive ratios indicate that the predictor is associated with better outcomes, and negative ratios indicate the opposite. Table 1. Life evaluation, emotional well-being, income, and the income-normalized effects of other correlates With few exceptions, the various predictors have the same sign for all four well-being measures, but their relative sizes vary considerably. As might be expected, weekends are associated with improved affect, especially with reduced stress. Physical illness, headaches, spending a day alone, and caring for an adult all have relatively larger adverse effects on emotional well-being than on life evaluation. Headaches and being alone, like emotional well-being, are measured for yesterday, which may enhance their importance in the regressions. At the other extreme, being a college graduate is associated with high life evaluation but has only a small association with positive and blue affect and a (perhaps) counterintuitive relation with stress; all other factors being equal, college graduates report more stress than nongraduates. The Gallup World Poll found high levels of stress in high-GDP countries (16). Religion has a substantial influence on improving positive affect and reducing reports of stress, but no effect on reducing sadness or worry. Females report slightly higher positive affect and life evaluation, but also more blue affect and much more stress. The presence of children at home is associated with significant increases in stress, sadness, and worry (6). As reported recently, older people enjoy greater emotional well-being, most notably a pronounced reduction in the experience of stress and anger (17). Smoking is an impressively strong predictor of low well-being—especially its emotional dimensions—even when income and education are controlled for. A propensity to smoke is in part genetically determined (18) and is a known indicator of a tense personality (19, 20). Fig. 1 and Table 2 characterize the relationship between the dimensions of subjective well-being and household income. Fig. 1 presents averages over eight income groups for the three aspects of emotional well-being and for the Cantril ladder measure of life evaluation. Here blue affect and stress are converted to their complements, not blue and stress-free, so that higher values in the figure always refer to better psychological outcomes. Income is converted to an annual basis and plotted on a log scale. (The midpoints of each income range, used only in the figure, are imputed assuming that the underlying distribution of income is lognormal; the figure shows vertical lines for the top three interval limits.) Stress is the average of a yes/no response to the question: “Did you experience a lot of stress yesterday?” Thus, Fig. 1 shows the percentage of the population in each income group who did not report experiencing this emotion on the previous day. Not blue is 1 minus the average of the percentage reporting sadness and worry. The right-hand axis shows the average score on the ladder, with values ranging from 0 to 11. Table 2. Tests for income satiation of life evaluation and emotional well-being Fig. 1. Positive affect, blue affect, stress, and life evaluation in relation to household income. Positive affect is the average of the fractions of the population reporting happiness, smiling, and enjoyment. “Not blue” is 1 minus the average of the fractions of the population reporting worry and sadness. “Stress free” is the fraction of the population who did not report stress for the previous day. These three hedonic measures are marked on the left-hand scale. The ladder is the average reported number on a scale of 0–10, marked on the right-hand scale. Fig. 1 shows that for all measures of experienced well-being, individuals in the lower- income groups do worse on average than those above them, but that those in the top two groups do not differ. For the two top categories to be equal, the entire range of the second category must lie above the satiation point. This observation implies that emotional well-being satiates somewhere in the third category of income from the top. We infer that beyond about $75,000/y, there is no improvement whatever in any of the three measures of emotional well-being. In contrast, the figure shows a fairly steady rise in life evaluation with log income over the entire range; the effects of income on individuals’ life evaluations show no satiation, at least to an amount well over $120,000. Table 2 reports a formal test of satiation for the four measures, showing how the second-to-top income group (annual income $90,000–$120,000) differs from the group immediately below it ($60,000–$90,000) and from the group immediately above it (> $120,000). Positive affect, blue affect, and Cantril ladder score are all significantly improved in the first comparison with the exception of stress, which appears to satiate at a lower income level, roughly $60,000. In comparisons of the top two categories, only the ladder score shows a significant improvement with higher income. The small t values are remarkable in these very large samples. We conclude that lack of money brings both emotional misery and low life evaluation; similar results were found for anger. Beyond ~$75,000 in the contemporary United States, however, higher income is neither the road to experienced happiness nor the road to the relief of unhappiness or stress, although higher income continues to improve individuals’ life evaluations. Below $75,000, many factors become gradually worse, at least on average. For example, the emotional pain associated with ill health depends on income; for those reporting a monthly income of at least $3,000 (about two-thirds of households), the fractions reporting blue affect with and without headaches are 38% and 19%, respectively, a difference of 19 percentage points. The corresponding values for those with a monthly income of <$1,000 (about 10% of households) are 70% and 38%, a difference of 32%. Table 3 shows that the pain of some of life's misfortunes, including asthma, divorce, and being alone, is significantly exacerbated by poverty; even the benefits of the weekend are less for the poor. Similar results apply to stress and positive affect. Table 3. Poverty exacerbates the effect of adverse circumstances: Average percentage of people reporting a lot of sadness and worry yesterday, by income group and condition Discussion The data for positive and blue affect provide an unexpectedly sharp answer to our original question. More money does not necessarily buy more happiness, but less money is associated with emotional pain. Perhaps $75,000 is a threshold beyond which further increases in income no longer improve individuals’ ability to do what matters most to their emotional well-being, such as spending time with people they like, avoiding pain and disease, and enjoying leisure. According to the ACS, mean (median) US household income was $71,500 ($52,000) in 2008, and about a third of households were above the $75,000 threshold. It also is likely that when income rises beyond this value, the increased ability to purchase positive experiences is balanced, on average, by some negative effects. A recent psychological study using priming methods provided suggestive evidence of a possible association between high income and a reduced ability to savor small pleasures (21). When interpreting our findings, it is essential to distinguish changes from differences. Our data speak only to differences; they do not imply that people will not be happy with a raise from $100,000 to $150,000, or that they will be indifferent to an equivalent drop in income. Changes of income in the high range certainly have emotional consequences. What the data suggest is that above a certain level of stable income, individuals’ emotional well-being is constrained by other factors in their temperament and life circumstances. We observe a qualitative difference between our measures of emotional well-being and of life evaluation—the former satiates with high income, whereas the latter does not. This observation underscores the importance of the distinction between the judgments individuals make when they think about their life and the feelings that they experience as they live it. As might be expected, the former is sensitive to socioeconomic status, whereas the latter is sensitive to circumstances that evoke positive and negative emotions, such as spending time with others and caring for a sick relative. Several authors have commented on a related difference between two questions that are often used in surveys of subjective well-being: “How satisfied are you with your life?” and “How happy are you these days?” (8, 22, 23). The common conclusion is that income is more strongly related to satisfaction than to happiness, but the difference that we found in the present study is unusually sharp. We speculate that the Cantril ladder of life is a purer measure of life evaluation than the life satisfaction question, which has an emotional aspect, and that the reports of the emotions of yesterday provide a purer measure of emotional well-being than the standard happiness question. If both aspects of subjective well-being are considered important, then the separation of the measures is an advantage. The relevance of subjective well-being as a guide to policy is a contentious issue, on which we do not take a position. If measures of well-being are to be used to assess human welfare and to guide policy, the present findings raise the question of whether life evaluation or emotional well-being is better suited to these aims. The Cantril ladder is a serious contender for the best tool for measuring the degree to which individuals view themselves as achieving their goals, both material and other. But emotional well-being also is clearly important for individuals and for policy, and here there are choices as well. Not everyone will agree that enhancing the happiness experienced by those who are already quite happy is a legitimate policy objective. The policy goal of reducing suffering is likely to raise fewer objections, and measures of emotional pain may be useful for that purpose. This topic merits serious debate. Materials and Methods The survey involved a telephone interview using a dual-frame random-digit dial methodology that included cell phone numbers from all 50 US states. Interviews were conducted between 9:00 AM and 10:00 PM (local time), with most done in the evening. Up to five callbacks were made in the case of no answer. Spanish language interviews were conducted when appropriate. Approximately 1,000 interviews were completed daily from January 2 through December 30, 2009. The questionnaire covered many topics of interest to the Gallup Organization and Healthways Corporation, including basic demographic information, participants’ opinions about the current economic climate and their personal financial situation, information about past diseases, and other topics. Life evaluation was assessed using Cantril's Self-Anchoring Scale (the ladder), worded as follows: “Please imagine a ladder with steps numbered from 0 at the bottom to 10 at the top. The top of the ladder represents the best possible life for you, and the bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life for you. On which step of the ladder would you say you personally feel you stand at this time?” (15). Questions about emotional well-being had yes/no response options and were worded as follows: “Did you experience the following feelings during a lot of the day yesterday? How about _____?” Each of several emotions (e.g., enjoyment, stress) was reported separately. The positive affect score was the average of the reports of enjoyment and happiness and of a dichotomous question about the frequency of smiling: “Did you smile or laugh a lot yesterday?” The blue affect score was the average of worry and sadness. To broaden coverage and representativeness, cell phones were part of the sampling design. Relative to land lines, the response rate for cell phones was typically lower. Of all calls that resulted in contacts with an eligible candidate, 31% of the candidates agreed to be interviewed; of these, 90% completed the entire interview. Despite the sampling limitations, available evidence suggests that the estimates of population parameters were not compromised; for example, the survey predicted recent election results within an acceptable margin of error. Acknowledgments We thank Carol Graham, Richard Nisbett, Norbert Schwarz, and Arthur Stone for their comments. Special thanks to James Harter, one of the authors of the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, for his contribution to the research and for his comments on this report. We thank the Gallup Organization and Healthways Corporation for access to the survey results. This work was supported by the Gallup Organization and by National Institute on Aging Grant AG024928-06. Footnotes 1 To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: kahneman{at}princeton.edu . To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: . Author contributions: D.K. and A.D. designed research; performed research; analyzed data; and wrote the paper. The authors declare no conflict of interest. Freely available online through the PNAS open access option. ||||| A rooftop deck is seen in Washington in this file photo. (Benjamin C. Tankersley for The Washington Post) Another week, another breathless report showing how darn expensive and wealthy D.C. is. Last week, we reported that D.C. ranked 10th in the most millionaires in the country per capita category when compared with states. (Maryland had the most, and Virginia came in at No. 6.) This week, a report from Cheat Sheet says D.C. has the third-highest percentage of households earning at least $150,000 a year among cities with at least 500,000 people. San Francisco and San Jose ranked first and second, respectively. Cheat Sheet then determined how much a household would need to earn a year in order to live “comfortably.” The report used $75,000 as the “magic salary number” based on a 2010 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences study indicating that someone’s day-to-day emotional well-being doesn’t increase after a household income hits the $75,000 threshold. Cheat Sheet then adjusted that income level up or down using a cost-of-living calculator and comparing each city to Phoenix — “a city with a moderate cost of living and a median income that’s close to the national average.” From there, it concluded a person would need $108,092 to live comfortably in D.C. (Note: The report indicates an individual would need this amount to live comfortably, while the 2010 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences study determined that $75,000 was the amount of money a household needs to hit the happiness threshold.) Here’s how the cost of comfortable living in D.C. compares with the other most expensive locations. |||||

– To live comfortably in America's richest city, you'll need $124,561 a year. That's according to a CheatSheet analysis, which defines the wealthiest cities as those with the highest percentage of people making more than $150,000 per year, the Washington Post reports. The analysis also reveals how much you need to make to live comfortably in those cities. The findings are based in part on a 2010 study that says daily "emotional well-being" doesn't climb with income once a household makes at least $75,000; CheatSheet tweaked that figure based on the idea that Phoenix is a fairly "average" city when it comes to income and cost of living. Here are the cities ranked by richness, plus the salaries needed for comfort (which don't necessarily follow the same order): San Francisco: $124,561 San Jose: $115,515 Washington, DC: $108,092 Seattle: $93,634 San Diego: $101,984. Boston: $106,082 Click for the full list.

The Trump administration may delay a military parade slated for this fall, the Pentagon said Thursday, amid questions about the event’s increasing cost. Col. Rob Manning, a Pentagon spokesman, said in a statement that the parade, which President Trump ordered this year as a tribute to American military might, could take place next year. “The Department of Defense and White House have been planning a parade to honor America’s military veterans and commemorate the centennial of World War I,” Manning said. “We originally targeted November 10, 2018 for this event but have now agreed to explore opportunities in 2019.” Manning provided no reason for the apparent postponement, which came amid a spate of news reports that the event, which is expected to include aircraft, vehicles, period uniforms and symbols of U.S. power, could cost up to $92 million, far more than originally estimated. The decision to announce a possible postponement appeared to come together in the space of hours Thursday afternoon and evening. It was not clear who made the decision to explore delaying the event, which had been a priority for Trump. Officials have been planning the event since earlier this year, when the president, apparently inspired by a similar display he observed last year in France, discussed the parade in a meeting with senior officials at the Pentagon. The cost and the symbolism of the parade — reminiscent, critics say, of shows of force by authoritarian governments — have generated criticism from Democrats and, privately, consternation among military officials at a time when the Pentagon is trying to demonstrate its might against competitors including Russia and China. Such large parades have been rare in recent U.S. history, though the George H.W. Bush administration staged a military parade in Washington in 1991 after the conclusion of the Persian Gulf War. Earlier this year, a senior official said the parade would probably cost between $10 million and $30 million. Some share of the higher cost of close to $100 million is expected to be paid by other government agencies that would take part in organizing or securing the event. Planning for the parade comes at a time when Trump has boasted of saving money by suspending joint military exercises with South Korea, part of his outreach to North Korea. The affected exercise would have cost about $14 million, far less than the parade’s current expected cost. The American Legion, a veterans organization, said earlier Thursday that while it appreciated that Trump wanted to show support for U.S. troops, other priorities should win out. ||||| Image copyright AFP/Getty Images Image caption The US put on a grand military spectacle back in 1991, when troops were celebrating victory in the first Gulf War President Trump's plans for a Veterans Day military parade through the streets of Washington DC have been delayed until at least 2019. Mr Trump was impressed by France's Bastille Day parade on a visit in 2017 and said the US could "top it". But figures released on Thursday suggested the event could cost about $90 million (£71m) - more than three times the original estimate. Critics had also made comparisons to parades in countries led by autocrats. The parade was originally conceived to mark the centenary of the end of World War One, on 11 November. A Pentagon spokesperson, Colonel Rob Manning, said in a statement that the Department of Defense and the White House "have now agreed to explore opportunities in 2019". Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption President Trump at Bastille Day parade The parade's budget director had offered an estimate of between $10m (£7.8m) and $30m (£23.6m) when the White House announced its request in February. But a US official gave a new estimate of $92m. A memo when the plan was first mooted said no tanks would be used so as not to damage the roads of the nation's capital. The city's governing District of Columbia Council was critical of the plan when announced, voicing its displeasure on Twitter. Members of the Democratic party were similarly sceptical, with congressman Jim McGovern declaring it "an absurd waste of money" on Twitter and saying Mr Trump "acts more like dictator than president". The Pentagon said the military would march from the White House to the Capitol, and the parade would feature a "heavy air component at the end". The focus was to be on the work of US military veterans through the ages, starting with the American Revolutionary War. US media pointed out that Donald Trump cancelled planned military exercises with South Korea in June after his meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on the grounds it would "save a fortune". Skip Twitter post by @realDonaldTrump We save a fortune by not doing war games, as long as we are negotiating in good faith - which both sides are! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 13, 2018 Report The US had a military parade in 1991 following the end of its successful campaign to force Saddam Hussein's troops out of Kuwait. Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption What makes a military parade? Here's how other countries do it. Some social media users questioned the purpose of the parade at all, and said instead the money should be used to directly help veterans. ||||| FILE - In this Jan. 20, 2017, file photo, military units participate in the inaugural parade from the Capitol to the White House in Washington, Friday, Jan. 20, 2017. A U.S. official says the 2018 Veterans... (Associated Press) FILE - In this Jan. 20, 2017, file photo, military units participate in the inaugural parade from the Capitol to the White House in Washington, Friday, Jan. 20, 2017. A U.S. official says the 2018 Veterans Day military parade ordered up by President Donald Trump would cost about $92 million _ more than... (Associated Press) FILE - In this Jan. 20, 2017, file photo, military units participate in the inaugural parade from the Capitol to the White House in Washington, Friday, Jan. 20, 2017. A U.S. official says the 2018 Veterans Day military parade ordered up by President Donald Trump would cost about $92 million _ more than... (Associated Press) FILE - In this Jan. 20, 2017, file photo, military units participate in the inaugural parade from the Capitol to the White House in Washington, Friday, Jan. 20, 2017. A U.S. official says the 2018 Veterans... (Associated Press) WASHINGTON (AP) — The Defense Department says the Veterans Day military parade ordered up by President Donald Trump won't happen in 2018. Col. Rob Manning, a Pentagon spokesman, said Thursday that the military and the White House "have now agreed to explore opportunities in 2019." The announcement came several hours after The Associated Press reported that the parade would cost about $92 million, according to U.S. officials citing preliminary estimates more than three times the price first suggested by the White House. According to the officials, roughly $50 million would cover Pentagon costs for aircraft, equipment, personnel and other support for the November parade in Washington. The remainder would be borne by other agencies and largely involve security costs. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss early planning estimates that have not yet been finalized or released publicly. Officials said the parade plans had not yet been approved by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis. Mattis himself said late Thursday that he had seen no such estimate and questioned the media reports. The Pentagon chief told reporters traveling with him to Bogota, Colombia, that whoever leaked the number to the press was "probably smoking something that is legal in my state but not in most" — a reference to his home state of Washington, where marijuana use is legal. He added: "I'm not dignifying that number ($92 million) with a reply. I would discount that, and anybody who said (that number), I'll almost guarantee you one thing: They probably said, 'I need to stay anonymous.' No kidding, because you look like an idiot. And No. 2, whoever wrote it needs to get better sources. I'll just leave it at that." The parade's cost has become a politically charged issue, particularly after the Pentagon canceled a major military exercise planned for August with South Korea, in the wake of Trump's summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Trump said the drills were provocative and that dumping them would save the U.S. "a tremendous amount of money." The Pentagon later said the Korea drills would have cost $14 million. Lt. Col. Jamie Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, said earlier Thursday that Defense Department planning for the parade "continues and final details are still being developed. Any cost estimates are pre-decisional." The parade was expected to include troops from all five armed services — the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Coast Guard — as well as units in period uniforms representing earlier times in the nation's history. It also was expected to involve a number of military aircraft flyovers. A Pentagon planning memo released in March said the parade would feature a "heavy air component," likely including older, vintage aircraft. It also said there would be "wheeled vehicles only, no tanks — consideration must be given to minimize damage to local infrastructure." Big, heavy tanks could tear up streets in the District of Columbia. The memo from Mattis' office provided initial planning guidance to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. His staff is planning the parade along a route from the White House to the Capitol and would integrate it with the city's annual veterans' parade. U.S. Northern Command, which oversees U.S. troops in North America, is responsible for the actual execution of the parade. Earlier this year, the White House budget director told Congress that the cost to taxpayers could be $10 million to $30 million. Those estimates were likely based on the cost of previous military parades, such as the one in the nation's capital in 1991 celebrating the end of the first Gulf War, and factored in some additional increase for inflation. One veterans group weighed in Thursday against the parade. "The American Legion appreciates that our President wants to show in a dramatic fashion our nation's support for our troops," National Commander Denise Rohan said. "However, until such time as we can celebrate victory in the War on Terrorism and bring our military home, we think the parade money would be better spent fully funding the Department of Veteran Affairs and giving our troops and their families the best care possible." Trump decided he wanted a military parade in Washington after he attended France's Bastille Day celebration in the center of Paris last year. As the invited guest of French President Emmanuel Macron, Trump watched enthusiastically from a reviewing stand as the French military showcased its tanks and fighter jets, including many U.S.-made planes, along the famed Champs-Elysees. Several months later Trump praised the French parade, saying, "We're going to have to try and top it." |||||

– Cost estimates of up to $80 million over initial predictions appear to have rained on President Trump's parade. Pentagon spokesman Col. Rob Manning says Trump's plan for a military parade in Washington, DC, this fall have been postponed until next year at the earliest, the BBC reports. "The Department of Defense and White House have been planning a parade to honor America’s military veterans and commemorate the centennial of World War I," Manning said Thursday, per the Washington Post. "We originally targeted November 10, 2018, for this event but have now agreed to explore opportunities in 2019." Manning gave no reason for the postponement of the parade, which Trump called for after being impressed by Bastille Day celebrations in France last year. The parade would have been the first of its kind in the US since a Gulf War victory parade in 1991. Critics, however, said it would have been reminiscent of authoritarian regimes and even some veterans' groups spoke out against it, the AP reports. American Legion National Commander Denise Rohan said they appreciate Trump's desire to show support for the troops, but until "we can celebrate victory in the War on Terrorism and bring our military home, we think the parade money would be better spent fully funding the Department of Veteran Affairs and giving our troops and their families the best care possible."

Crawl of outlinks from wikipedia.org started March, 2016. These files are currently not publicly accessible. Properties of this collection. It has been several years since the last time we did this. For this collection, several things were done: 1. Turned off duplicate detection. This collection will be complete, as there is a good chance we will share the data, and sharing data with pointers to random other collections, is a complex problem. 2. For the first time, did all the different wikis. The original runs were just against the enwiki. This one, the seed list was built from all 865 collections. ||||| On May 15, the WNBA suspended Brittney Griner and Glory Johnson—two married all-stars for the Phoenix Mercury and Tulsa Shock, respectively—for seven games apiece, calling the behavior of both parties equally “unacceptable” in a statement. However, contrary to what was originally reported, evidence provided by Johnson's attorney, Howard Snader, suggests that Johnson was the target rather than the perpetrator of the incident. On April 22, Griner and Johnson were arrested in Goodyear, Ariz., after police were called to a residence for a domestic dispute. Many of the details of the incident remain murky, but in a medical evaluation conducted two days after Johnson was arrested—according to records provided by Johnson’s lawyer—Phoenix-based orthopedic doctor Thomas C. Fiel noted that Johnson had been struck twice “on the back of her head by a hard carrying case.” A CT scan corroborated that Johnson had experienced head trauma and suffered a concussion. The CT scan also found evidence of spinal trauma. Griner, according to the police report, suffered only minor scratches. Attorney Jane Bambauer, who is a professor at Arizona’s James E. Rogers College of Law and teaches and writes about criminal procedure, wrote in an email to SI.com that the police report and Johnson’s medical reports clearly indicate to her that Griner “was the aggressor” even though each woman was referred to as "The Victim" in separate probable cause statements taken at the time of their arrests. “If I’m being fought,” Johnson said during an exclusive interview with SI.com last Thursday. “I’m not just gonna sit back … there’s probably a better way to handle it. But at the time … you’re just thinking of protecting yourself and doing what you need to do to stand up for yourself.” Despite having access to all of the legal and medical information, the WNBA still decided to punish both spouses equally. Photo: Maricopa County Sheriff's Office via AP “[The WNBA] definitely knew about it,” Johnson said, referring to her injuries and how they occurred. “And that’s another reason it surprised me that they came up with the same conclusion. I’m not going to throw Brittney under the bus … and she’s not going to throw me under the bus … [but] what the [ ] did not say in the statements they released was that I pled not guilty … So for them to release a statement saying that we were both guilty in the situation, it’s not right. It’s not correct … Brittney pled guilty … Brittney understands why I pled not guilty, and I understand why she pled guilty … she was even willing to speak to whoever she needed to, to get the point across.” WNBA Johnson, who is 6'4" said police officers told her she was being arrested along with the 6'8" Griner (despite the fact that neither wanted to press charges) due to official policy. When domestic disputes occur between a man and a woman, the officers said, it's not automatic to arrest either party, but that “when it’s two women … they take both.” Lieutenant Scott Benson of the Goodyear police department says that the same-sex policies conveyed to Johnson were either "misunderstood or misrepresented. There's not anything with male or female in domestic violence laws," he says. "When there's a dual arrest made, [it's because] we can't determine who the aggressor is." According to Stacey Long Simmons, director of public policy and government affairs at the National LGBTQ Task Force, the dual arrest policy Benson describes is part of a larger problem in police protocol. "While we are unable to comment on the facts of [Johnson's] case, we find that local police departments still lack sufficient knowledge and cultural competency of LGBTQ couples and their families," Simmons wrote in an email to SI.com. "For example, in cases related to intimate partner violence involving same-sex couples, local officers still continue to arrest both parties." Bambauer agreed that dual arrests create problems for victims like Johnson. “After looking at these [documents],” Bambauer wrote, “I suspect the ‘primary aggressor’ issue is pretty relevant and important. If police (or the WNBA, for that matter) do not put in the work to figure out who the first, or most dominating, aggressor is, victims are doubly punished—first by their partner, and then by the state.” From a legal standpoint, Bambauer wrote, “the treatment of Johnson is a real source of liability for the Goodyear prosecutors. They, and the WNBA, deserve some criticism over their handling of this sad incident." Photo: Shane Bevel/NBAE via Getty Images Tulsa Shock issued a statement agreeing with the A popular player among fans, Tulsa’s Facebook, and Twitter pages featured photos of Johnson up until her arrest. Images of Johnson are noticeably absent from these pages now. ​TheWNBA’sWhen asked whether his position on the suspensions had changed in light of the circumstances surrounding Johnson's concussion, Steve Swetoha, president of the Shock, said that he stood by the statement he made after the WNBA's decision was released. Meanwhile, a representative from the Mercury told SI.com, "We're a little bit confused about it because [this new information] wasn't in the findings of the police report. It wasn't in the findings of the WNBA investigation." Griner's agency did not return calls seeking a comment.Instagram Although Johnson admits to being confused and disappointed by the league’s decision, her feelings about Griner haven’t changed. Throughout last Thursday’s phone conversation, she laughed whenever Griner’s name came up—there was a lightness in her voice, even when she was describing something difficult between them. She remains committed to her spouse, and said that one of the stressors leading to their altercation—on top of the strain of moving, buying a house, planning a wedding, and dealing with health crises in both of their families—was that the two were also meeting with fertility doctors to begin planning their own family. “A lot of people know we were considering the process—a lot of friends, anyway. But with two women, you know, it’s not like you can get somebody pregnant overnight. It’s a very huge process. "A lot of people were telling us that we rushed the wedding," she continued. "But if we had done it Brittney's way, we would have gone somewhere without telling anybody, and we would have done it way before anybody knew—which is something that I really like about her. She doesn't care what people think." In spite of the media storm surrounding her arrest, Johnson said she is enjoying being a newlywed and looking forward to playing against her spouse this season. "Our schedules are really hectic, and we might meet up maybe four times the entire season. It's tough at times, so [I need to] take advantage of each time [I] see her." ||||| WNBA's Brittney Griner OUR MARRIAGE IS OVER Files for Annulment (Update) Brittney Griner -- OUR MARRIAGE IS OVER ... Files for Annulment (Update) EXCLUSIVE 4:31 PM PT -- In court docs obtained by TMZ Sports, Griner says she has NO biological connection to the baby ... and she doesn't know any of the key details about Johnson's pregnancy. In short, it seems like Griner is suggesting they were not on the same page when it came to the pregnancy. Griner also says the marriage to Johnson is based on "fraud and duress" -- because Griner was "pressured into marriage under duress by [Johnson's] threatening statements." Griner does not specify the nature of the threats. Griner also says there was fraud -- but does not say why. It seems to be related to the pregnancy. As for the fetus, Griner does not say if she wants to have any type of parenting arrangement with the child. IT'S OVER -- WNBA superstar Brittney Griner has officially filed papers seeking to annul her 28 day marriage to her pregnant new wife Glory Johnson ... TMZ Sports has learned. Griner and Johnson tied the knot on May 8th in a small ceremony in Arizona ... just weeks after they were both arrested in a domestic violence incident at their home. The move is especially shocking considering Johnson just announced she's pregnant. Johnson and Griner have been together for a while -- and even appeared on an episode of "Say Yes to the Dress: Atlanta" together back in January. As we previously reported, Griner and Johnson were taken into custody for domestic violence on April 22nd. Both women say it was mutual combat after a heated argument got physical. Griner later pled guilty to disorderly conduct and was ordered to complete a 26 week domestic violence counseling program. Johnson's case is still pending. Both women were hit with 7 game suspensions from the WNBA ... though it's unclear how the league will handle the situation with Johnson, considering she's missing the entire 2015 season due to pregnancy. ||||| Glory Johnson Brittney Griner Is a Liar ... She Blindsided Me Glory Johnson -- Brittney Griner Is a Liar ... She Blindsided Me EXCLUSIVE Glory Johnson says she was "blindsided" by Brittney Griner's decision to file for an annulment today -- telling TMZ Sports she's "extremely hurt" by Brittney's actions. We spoke with Johnson's sports marketing agent, D.J. Fisher, who tells us "Glory was unaware of the filing and still loves and cares for Brittney." TMZ Sports broke the story ... Griner filed the court docs Friday -- saying Johnson essentially threatened her into getting married ... and claims the whole thing was a fraud. Griner issued a statement saying, "Last Wednesday, Glory and I agreed to either legally separate, get divorced, or annul our marriage. In the week prior to the wedding, I attempted to postpone the wedding several times until I completed counseling, but I still went through with it. I now realize that was a mistake." But Johnson's camp says Brittney's full of crap -- saying they NEVER agreed to annul the marriage. Johnson's rep adds, "Glory loves Brittney and made a huge sacrifice to carry a child, put her career on hold, to invest in their relationship and their future. As a result she won't be playing this season." "Glory wouldn't intentionally do anything to hurt Brittney and has tried her best to protect her and their marriage. Obviously this marriage was about them starting their life together. Glory is the sweetest thing in the world and she was dedicated to their partnership." "She knows how important marriage is and made a lifetime commitment and decision to spend the rest of her life with Brittney." |||||

– This looks messy: WNBA players Brittney Griner and Glory Johnson seem headed for a breakup just 28 days into their budding marriage, People reports. The move comes right after Johnson announced her pregnancy, and six weeks after the 24-year-olds were arrested and got league suspensions for getting in a fight at home. "Last Wednesday, Glory and I agreed to either legally separate, get divorced, or annul our marriage," Griner says in a statement; she filed papers to annul their marriage on Friday, TMZ reports. Hours later, Johnson posted an Internet meme about "unperfect people refusing to give up on each other," but deleted it soon after and said Griner's move blindsided her. Johnson revealed her pregnancy Thursday in an Instagram photo of a bun going into a cake shaped like an oven, but Griner says the pair agreed to call it quits Wednesday. She also claims to know very little about the pregnancy. On Friday, Johnson posted on Instagram, "One day until I'm reunited with my wife @brittneygriner. . . This is about to be one CRAZY SUMMER!!!" All of this follows a Sports Illustrated interview with Johnson published Tuesday, in which she claims Griner targeted her in their Goodyear, Arizona, domestic dispute. Medical records say Johnson was hit twice "on the back of her head by a hard carrying case," giving Johnson spinal trauma and a concussion, while Griner escaped with minor injuries. Adding to the mix, Griner now says Johnson threatened her into getting married in the first place, but doesn't dish on details, notes TMZ.

Last Week Tonight is getting the last laugh in its (perhaps one-sided) feud with Mike Pence. On Sunday, John Oliver announced that staff writer _Jill Twiss and illustrator E.G. Keller had penned a picture book that purposefully apes the Pence family’s own children’s book about their bunny, Marlon Bundo. In a twist of expert trolling, Oliver just revealed that his team’s book not only beat the Pence family book on the charts, but has also sold 180,000 copies already—just days after its publication was announced. What’s more, the book isn’t even available in bookstores yet—only Amazon. Oliver joked about those amazing results in a Tuesday night interview with Seth Meyers. The Last Week book (titled Last Week Tonight with John Oliver Presents a Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo) is a direct send-up of the Pence family’s own book, titled Marlon Bundo’s Day in the Life of the Vice President. While the Pence book is about Bundo following Vice President Mike Pence around for a day, the Oliver book is about Bundo falling in love with a boy bunny and getting married—a direct response to Pence’s anti-L.G.B.T.Q. reputation. In addition, all proceeds of the Last Week Tonight book go to non-profit organizations the Trevor Project and AIDs United. While Oliver and his team probably hoped that their creation would beat the Pence book in sales, they couldn’t have predicted the book shooting all the way up the Amazon charts, beating out heavy titles like James Comey’s not-yet published A Higher Loyalty. “At that point, it’s getting ridiculous,” Oliver told Meyers with a laugh. “It sold 180,000 copies so far, which is definitely more than we were prepared for.” “You made the terrible mistake of giving the money away,” Meyers replied. “I’m sure HBO will find it absolutely hilarious they’re getting no money out of this,” Oliver agreed. Though the first printing has already sold out, Oliver assured viewers that more are being printed, and that the book will soon be physically available in bookstores as well. In the interview, Meyers also informed Oliver that fans of the book have found yet another way to troll Pence and anyone else who might not be fond of the book: via Amazon reviews. Fans are apparently pre-emptively leaving one-star reviews, in an attempt to head off haters who are purposefully looking for negative remarks about the book. “I don’t actually dislike this book at all,” one review reads, “I just wanted the upset homophobes to read my comment as they scour the one-star section for appeasement.” “One star because I fear the writing is above President Trump’s reading level,” another review reads. “Apart from that, I’m glad I bought it, and I hope it becomes a best-seller.” The fates heard that fan’s request loud and clear. Get Vanity Fair’s HWD Newsletter Sign up for essential industry and award news from Hollywood. E-mail Address Subscribe ||||| March 21, 2018, 2:34 PM GMT / Updated March 21, 2018, 2:34 PM GMT / Source: Associated Press HBO host John Oliver has trolled his way to the top. Oliver's spoof of a new picture book by the wife and daughter of Vice President Mike Pence was No. 1 on Amazon.com and out of stock as of midday Monday. “Marlon Bundo’s Day in the Life of a Vice President” is a tribute to the Pence family’s beloved rabbit. It was written by the vice president’s daughter, Charlotte Pence, and illustrated by his wife, Karen Pence. Oliver’s book, which he announced over the weekend, is called “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver Presents a Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo.” The story is the same, almost: This Marlon Bundo has fallen for a male bunny. “There are a few small differences between the two books,” Oliver said on his show, noting Pence’s opposition to gay marriage and other LGBTQ rights. “This is a sweet story about Marlon Bundo falling in love.” Vice President Mike Pence and his wife Karen Pence let children pet their family rabbit "Marlon Bundo" during and event with military families on May 9, 2017 in Washington, DC. Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images Published by Chronicle Books, the parody was written by “Last Week” contributor Jill Twiss and illustrated by EG Keller. Proceeds are being donated to The Trevor Project, a suicide hotline for LGBTQ youth, and AIDS United. "We couldn't be more excited to see #BetterBundoBook at the top of the @amazon best-seller list," The Trevor Project tweeted on Monday. "Thank you to everyone who is supporting our vital crisis services with this adorable children's book." Oliver's book is not the only current best-seller inspired by the Trump administration. No. 2 on Amazon was James Comey’s “A Higher Loyalty,” the upcoming memoir by the FBI director fired last year by President Donald Trump. At No. 3 on Monday was “Russian Roulette,” in which Michael Isikoff and David Corn investigate Trump’s alleged ties to Russia. The Pence book, meanwhile is a best-seller, too, ranked No. 11 on Amazon. FOLLOW NBC OUT ON TWITTER, FACEBOOK AND INSTAGRAM |||||

– One book about Marlon Bundo is the top-seller on Amazon, and it's not the one written by the family that actually owns the pet bunny. NBC News reports A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo, John Oliver's parody of children's book Marlon Bundo's Day in the Life of a Vice President, has risen to No. 1 on Amazon. It sold over 180,000 copies after being announced on Last Week Tonight on Sunday, according to Variety. The latter book—which was written and illustrated by Vice President Mike Pence's daughter and wife—was only at No. 11. Oliver released his book, in which the Pence family pet falls in love with a male rabbit, to draw attention to Pence's anti-LGBTQ beliefs and raise money for LGBTQ causes. There doesn't seem to be any hard feelings with the Pence family, as the Hill reports daughter Charlotte was one of the thousands who bought a copy of Oliver's book.

NASA needs volunteers to stay in bed for 15 weeks straight window._taboola = window._taboola || []; _taboola.push({ mode: 'thumbnails-c', container: 'taboola-interstitial-gallery-thumbnails-5', placement: 'Interstitial Gallery Thumbnails 5', target_type: 'mix' }); _taboola.push({flush: true}); window._taboola = window._taboola || []; _taboola.push({ mode: 'thumbnails-c', container: 'taboola-interstitial-gallery-thumbnails-7', placement: 'Interstitial Gallery Thumbnails 7', target_type: 'mix' }); _taboola.push({flush: true}); Photo: NASA Image 1 of / 7 Caption Close Image 1 of 7 Test subjects run on a vertical treadmill to simiulate exercise done in a microgravity environment. Test subjects run on a vertical treadmill to simiulate exercise done in a microgravity environment. Photo: NASA Image 2 of 7 Two test subejcts participate in a bed rest research project at a facility in Galveston. Two test subejcts participate in a bed rest research project at a facility in Galveston. Photo: Johnson Space Center Image 3 of 7 Two test subejcts participate in a bed rest research project at a facility in Galveston. Two test subejcts participate in a bed rest research project at a facility in Galveston. Photo: Johnson Space Center Image 4 of 7 Two test subejcts participate in a bed rest research project at a facility in Galveston. Two test subejcts participate in a bed rest research project at a facility in Galveston. Photo: Johnson Space Center Image 5 of 7 Image 6 of 7 Look back at the posters from past NASA missions. Look back at the posters from past NASA missions. Photo: NASA Image 7 of 7 NASA needs volunteers to stay in bed for 15 weeks straight 1 / 7 Back to Gallery NASA is offering you the chance to help assist in the future of manned spaceflight, and all you have to do is confine yourself to a hospital bed for three months or so. The space agency has an ongoing bed-rest study and they need test subjects. Who wouldn't want to lie in bed for a 15 weeks and paid for doing it? But there are plenty of catches, according to researchers Ronita Cromwell and John Neigut with the Flight Analogs Project, based out of the Johnson Space Center. This long-term bed rest study calls for participants who are non-smokers in healthy physical condition and who match the makeup of astronauts to help NASA document how the human body reacts to 70 days in a bed rest position. "We don't want couch potatoes for this study," says Cromwell. The study, based out of NASA’s Human Test Subject Facility at Galveston's UTMB medical center. You must also pass the Modified Air Force Class III Physical, which includes vision and hearing screenings, blood and urine work, an electrocardiogram, screening for drugs and alcohol, and infectious disease testing. Here is the application. "It's a little customized for our use," says Neigut. Right now, researchers would like people between the ages of 24 and 55 for their study, preferably male. Those who are selected should come into the study with something to occupy their free time. "We encourage them to come in with a goal," Neigut says. Some people write books or try to learn foreign languages, and some even continue to work if they have Internet-based occupations. Some musicians and artists continue to create while lying in bed too, though they haven't had any rock drummers come around. "Each subject is participating in seven research investigations," says Neigut. A UTMB investigator usually works with each subject on another project, too. For example, there are testosterone studies and cardiovascular studies also going on that help the general public. The subjects also undergo MRIs while performing simple tasks to see how the brain reacts. Sitting up or standing is off limits for participants in the study. Without an anti-gravity chamber, this is the best way to simulate on Earth what going without gravity does to humans in outer space on long-term missions, according to NASA. Subjects must also lie with their feet slightly above their head, so gravity pulls your bodily fluids toward your head. You have to exercise six days a week while at UTMB. Cromwell and Neigut characterized the exercises as high-intensity, with strength and cycling training involved, all while laying in a hospital bed. Subjects aren't total sloths. You can go outside, but you must stay in that head-down position. Also, you won't be out there long as you cannot overdose on sunlight. They supply that necessary vitamin for you. "They experience the same physical changes that astronauts go through on long missions," says Cromwell. Still sound like a blast? In the past subjects have been called "pillownauts" seeing as their craft is not a billion-dollar capsule but a hospital bed. Blogger Heather Archuletta documented her experience on her own blog a few years back and kept a Flickr account of her stay in Galveston. Oh, and there are no conjugal visits, so you will going without -- you know -- for a while. "We encourage family and friends to come visit as much as possible," says Neigut. This helps with passing the time, and with morale during the 15-week duration. Before subjects enter the study they go through physchological testing to make sure they have the mental tools to be confined for such a period of time. They also tour the grounds to see what is in store, including the bed pans and the roommate situation. There is a two-week rehab process for particpants to literally get back on their feet. Neigut says in the spring they are looking at conducting shorter studies, maybe around two weeks or a few days, depending on what they need to research. They may also have an isolation chamber study too. A few people take a liking to the study and come back for more. Former military do well in study. "Some people are really interested in the science return and love helping NASA," says Neigut. "We have numerous repeat requests for people to come back to the study." ||||| Share this article with Google Plus Guitar hero: Nasa volunteers will spend 70 days in bed (Picture: NASA) Does staying in bed sound like your dream job? Nasa is currently recruiting a number of willing volunteers to spend 70 days doing very little at its Houston headquarters. The couch potatoes will get paid around £3,000 a month as part of the US space agency’s research into the effects of microgravity on the human body. ‘Of all the potential challenges crew members encounter in the space environment, microgravity has proven to be one of the most difficult to mimic in an experimental setting,’ explains Nasa.gov. ‘Researchers and engineers are studying bed rest as an experimental analog for space flight because extended exposure to a head-down tilt position can duplicate many of the effects of a low-gravity environment.’ Two test subjects participate in the bed rest research project (Picture: Nasa) Successful candidates will stay in a tilted bed 24 hours a day as part of the 70-day project, where they can play computer games, surf the internet or watch TV. Researchers will then monitor how long-term confinement to a reduced gravity environment effects muscle and bone strength, cardiovascular function and mental health. The ‘pillownauts’ will undergo a two-week rehabilitation period once the study is complete. ||||| The seed for this crawl was a list of every host in the Wayback Machine This crawl was run at a level 1 (URLs including their embeds, plus the URLs of all outbound links including their embeds) The WARC files associated with this crawl are not currently available to the general public. |||||

– Best job ever? NASA wants test subjects to spend 15 weeks in bed and get paid about $5,000 a month for doing it, the Metro reports. Sounds like a dream job (literally), until you realize that you'd be prohibited from sitting or standing up, the Houston Chronicle notes. In the meantime, you'll be a subject for seven different research projects. And even though you'll be lying down, you'll still have to be active, doing exercises in bed in the Galveston center. You can't be exposed to much sunlight, either; you'll get a vitamin instead. Subjects "experience the same physical changes that astronauts go through on long missions," says a researcher. The project investigates "the musculoskeletal and psychological effects of long-term confinement to a reduced gravity environment," NASA says, per Gizmodo UK. Subjects are encouraged to work on something in the meantime, whether it's a personal project or Internet-based work. At the end, there's a two-week rehab session. (In other NASA-themed news, this NASA photo has been making waves.)

The interactive transcript could not be loaded. Rating is available when the video has been rented. This feature is not available right now. Please try again later. ||||| For all the daredevils out there, there's a new thrill perched 1,000 feet above downtown Los Angeles: A 45-foot-long glass slide that propels you down from the 70th to the 69th floor of the U.S. Bank Tower. The Skyslide opened on Saturday, and offers unparalleled views of the entire city. It's not for the faint of heart — the only things separating sliders from plummeting down to the concrete jungle below are pieces of glass just one-and one-quarter inch thick. |||||

– Thursday's Brexit vote is over and done, and John Oliver, who last week tried to give America (and his fellow Brits) an education on why Brexit would be a "huge destabilizing decision," took to Last Week Tonight on Sunday to discuss Britain's defection—and his reaction was neither patient nor SFW, the Week reports. Oliver first blasted the United Kingdom's name ("after this week's events, [the name] is beginning to sound a bit sarcastic"), then took to task some prominent "Leave" pioneers' remarks that June 23 should now be known as Britain's "independence day." "The sequel to the movie they're quoting actually opened this week and features the wholesale destruction of London, which is beginning to feel pretty f---ing appropriate right now," Oliver noted. He added that the resignation of PM David Cameron "should make me happy, but … it's like catching an ice cream cone out of the air because a child was hit by a car." But it was British citizens who hadn't done their homework and were experiencing "Regrexit" that he reserved the most ire for—and who should serve as an example for the US. "You might think, well, that is not going to happen to us in America—we're not going to listen to some ridiculously haired buffoon peddling lies and nativism in the hopes of riding a protest vote into power," he said. "Well, let Britain tell you, it can happen, and when it does, there are no f---ing do-overs." (Other strong Brexit reactions here.)

CLOSE Bru Burger general manager Kayla Morrison explains why the Cunningham Group restaurant switched from plastic to environment-friendly paper straws. Jenna Watson, jenna.watson@indystar.com Buy Photo Some Bru Burger customers choose to drink their water without straws, seen during lunchtime at the restaurant on Massachusetts Avenue in Indianapolis, Thursday, June 21, 2018. The restaurant recently switched to paper straws, but only gives them to customers who request one. Bru Burger is the first Cunningham Group location to use paper straws but they hope to make the change at all of their restaurants soon. (Photo: Jenna Watson/IndyStar)Buy Photo As cities across the country and companies across the globe move away from plastic straws, Indiana-based Aardvark Straws — a leading paper straw manufacturer and sole U.S. producer — has struggled to keep up. That said, a new acquisition finalized and announced this morning will help the Fort Wayne company meet the unprecedented demand. Hoffmaster Group, Inc., a leading U.S. manufacturer of premium disposable tableware, acquired Aardvark Straws, owned by Precision Products Group, Inc., Monday morning. Though based in Wisconsin, Hoffmaster will keep manufacturing operations for Aardvark at its Northeast Indiana facility along with its employees. It is unclear at this time the monetary amount for which Aardvark was acquired. "In the coming months, we will aggressively ramp up Aardvark's manufacturing capacity to meet the rapidly accelerating demand for paper straws..." President of Hoffmaster's foodservice division Andy Romjue said in a release. "We are committed to being a reliable supply source for paper drinking straws in the foodservice market." Within the last year, cities such as San Francisco, Seattle, Fort Myers, Fla, Malibu, Calif. and Vancouver have banned the use of plastic straws as others — such as New York — are moving in that direction. Many notable brands, including Starbucks, American Airlines and Disney, have also announced that they will eliminate plastic straws from their establishments in the coming years. Aardvark came onto the scene in 2007 as the anti-plastic movement began to emerge. In the 10 years since reintroduction, the company has seen year-over-year growth, according to David Rhodes, the company's global business director. This last year's growth, however, is beyond anything the company could have expected: 5,000 percent. Although no specifics could be provided, a spokeswoman for Aardvark told IndyStar that the company is talking to and potentially working with all major players and brands that are moving away from plastic straws and looking for alternatives. Buy Photo Bur Burger recently made the switch to paper straws, which are more environmentally friendly than traditional plastic straws, seen here on the restaurant's bar, on Massachusetts Avenue in Indianapolis, Thursday, June 21, 2018. Bru Burger is the first Cunningham Group location to use the straws but they hope to make the change at all of their restaurants soon. (Photo: Jenna Watson/IndyStar) This acquisition, according to Hoffmaster, will provide Aardvark with the necessary resources to fulfill orders and meet that demand. There currently is a several month lead time for orders depending on their size. Hoffmaster has a 6- to 9-month plan for expansion and ramping up Aardvark's production, according to Sammi Coppedge with Dittoe Public Relations, representing the paper straw company. That said, Hoffmaster will keep the product as it is — as the straw's unique formula is what sets it apart from competitors and a large part of what caught Hoffmaster's eye. Aardvark's paper straws do not disintegrate or get soggy when in drinks and are naturally degradable, compostable and FDA compliant. Recent reports have suggested that there will be more plastic than fish in the ocean, by volume, by 2050, making plastic pollution one of the most daunting environmental challenges of our time. In the US alone, we use 500 million plastic straws. (Photo: Stephen_Beard_Indy_Star) "[Hoffmaster's] knowledge of the foodservice market paired with their resources will aid the company in providing billions of quality paper straws to restaurants and businesses looking to implement necessary changes to protect our environment," said Dave Hooe, CEO and president of Precision Products Group. "We're proud of how far Aardvark has come and look forward to continued success with Hoffmaster." Call IndyStar reporter Sarah Bowman at 317-444-6129. Follow her on Twitter and Facebook: @IndyStarSarah. Connect with IndyStar’s environmental reporters, join The Scrub on Facebook. IndyStar's environmental reporting project is made possible through the generous support of the nonprofit Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust. Read or Share this story: https://indy.st/2OO3V1n ||||| It’s not just in your head: paper straws are taking over. With more and more cities across the U.S. banning the use of plastic straws and numerous companies following suit, demand is skyrocketing for Aardvark, the only maker of paper straws in the U.S. To better keep up, the Fort Wayne, Indiana-based company announced Monday that it has been acquired by Hoffmaster Group, a Wisconsin-based firm that makes premium disposable paper napkins and other tableware. The details of the deal have not been released. However, it is intended to provide the paper straw maker with adequate resources to fill orders, which can currently take several months depending on the size of the order. According to USA Today, Hoffmaster has a six to nine month plan for expanding and increasing Aardvark’s production. But at least one thing will stay the same—the composition of the straw itself, which Aardvark claims is distinct from the cheap imports that get soggy and disintegrate. |||||

– The sole US producer of paper straws has been bought up in the latest sign that plastic straws are becoming a thing of the past. In a deal announced Monday, disposable tableware manufacturer Hoffmaster Group will acquire Indiana-based Aardvark Straws, whose degradable and compostable paper straws have been in high demand and short supply, reports the Indianapolis Star. Indeed, the company founded in 2007 saw 5,000% year-over-year growth last year with straws it claims don't get soggy the way cheap imports do, per Fortune. Hoffmaster plans to "aggressively ramp up Aardvark's manufacturing capacity to meet the rapidly accelerating demand for paper straws." Financial terms remain under wraps.

NICE, France (Reuters) - French authorities were trying to determine on Friday whether a Tunisian who killed at least 84 people by plowing a truck into Bastille Day crowds had acted alone or with accomplices, but said the attack bore the hallmarks of Islamist militants. Thursday night’s attack in the Riviera city of Nice plunged France into new grief and fear just eight months after gunmen killed 130 people in Paris. Those attacks, and one in Brussels four months ago, shocked Western Europe, already anxious over security challenges from mass immigration, open borders and pockets of Islamist radicalism. The truck zigzagged along the city’s seafront Promenade des Anglais as a fireworks display marking the French national day ended. It careered into families and friends listening to an orchestra or strolling above the Mediterranean beach towards the century-old grand Hotel Negresco. At least 10 children were among the dead. Of the scores of injured, 25 were on life support, authorities said on Friday. Witness Franck Sidoli said he had watched people mown down before the truck finally stopped just five meters away from him. “A woman was there, she lost her son. Her son was on the ground, bleeding,” he told Reuters at the scene. The driver, 31-year-old Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, was shot dead by officers at the scene. He was known to police for petty crimes but was not on a watch list of suspected militants. He had one criminal conviction, for road rage, and was sentenced to probation three months ago for throwing a wooden pallet at another driver. The investigation “will try to determine whether he benefited from accomplices,” Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said. “It will also try to find out whether Mohamed Laouaiej Bouhlel had ties to Islamist terrorist organizations.” “Although yesterday’s attack has not been claimed, this sort of thing fits in perfectly with calls for murder from such terrorist organizations,” Molins added. Bouhlel’s ex-wife was in police custody, Molins said. He had three children. Police found one pistol and various fake weapons in his truck. French Prime Minister Manuel Valls told the evening news that Bouhlel was “one way or another” linked to radical Islam. “Yes, it is a terrorist act and we shall see what links there are with terrorist organizations.” Yet despite numerous French officials from President Francois Hollande down describing it as a terrorist attack, by nightfall on Friday officials still had not disclosed any direct evidence linking Bouhlel with extremists. Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve, asked if he could confirm the attacker’s motives were linked to jihadism, said: “No. ... We have an individual who was not known to intelligence services for activities linked to jihadism.” A U.S. official familiar with Washington’s assessment said the attack was thought to have been carried out by a “lone wolf” inspired but not directed by Islamic State. The former top terrorism investigator for the French judicial system said that while the attack fits the profile of the kind undertaken by militant groups, the available evidence suggests the attacker had no evident connection with militant organizations or ideology. Jean-Louis Bruguiere, formerly the top Paris-based investigative magistrate handling terrorism-related cases, told Reuters no French or European intelligence or security agency had any trace on the suspect and no evidence has surfaced to connect him to any militant group or other suspects or even to casual contact with militant literature or propaganda. He said so far there is no evidence Bouhlel had any association with any religious group or faction but that there was evidence he was estranged from his family and going through some kind of divorce. DRIED BLOOD, SMASHED STROLLERS Dawn broke on Friday with pavements smeared with dried blood. Smashed strollers, an uneaten baguette and other debris were strewn about. Small areas were screened off and what appeared to be bodies covered in blankets were visible. The truck was still where it had come to rest, its windscreen riddled with bullets. “I saw this enormous white truck go past at top speed,” said Suzy Wargniez, 65, who had watched from a cafe on the promenade. At Nice’s Pasteur hospital, medical staff were treating large numbers of injured. Waiting for friends being operated on was 20-year-old Fanny. “The truck pushed me to the side. When I opened my eyes I saw faces I didn’t know and started asking for help,” she told Reuters. “Some of my friends were not so lucky. They are having operations as we speak.” Neighbors in the neighborhood in northern Nice where Bouhlel lived described him as handsome but an unsettling presence. “I would say he was someone who was pleasing to women,” said neighbor Hanan, standing in the lobby of the apartment building where Bouhlel lived. “But he was frightening. He didn’t have a frightening face, but ... a look. He would stare at the children a lot.” Bouhlel’s Tunisian home town Msaken is about 10 km (six miles) outside the coastal city of Sousse, where a gunman killed 38 people, mostly British holidaymakers, on a beach a year ago. Many people from the area have moved to France, including Nice, and money they send back has made it comparatively prosperous. A former neighbor in Msaken told Reuters Bouhlel had left for France in 2005 after getting married, and had worked as a driver. Relatives and neighbors in Msaken said Bouhlel was sporty and had shown no sign of being radicalized, including when he last returned for the wedding of a sister four years ago. A nephew, Ibrahim, said he had called three days ago saying he was preparing a trip back for a family party. Bouhlel’s brother, Jabeur, said he doubted his sibling was the attacker. “Why would my brother do something like this?” he told Reuters, adding: “We’ve been calling him since yesterday evening but he’s not responding.” Investigators continue to work at the scene near the heavy truck that ran into a crowd at high speed killing scores who were celebrating the Bastille Day July 14 national holiday on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice, France, July 15, 2016. REUTERS/Eric Gaillard GRITTY METROPOLIS Nice, a city of 350,000, has a history as a flamboyant aristocratic resort but is also a gritty metropolis, where Islamist radicalism has brewed, away from the scenic streets of its old town. It and the surrounding Alpes-Maritimes region, with a population of just over a million, are thought to have produced as many as 10 percent of the French citizens who have traveled to wage jihad in the Middle East. After Thursday’s attack, a state of emergency imposed across France after the November attacks in Paris was extended by three months and military and police reservists were to be called up. “France is filled with sadness by this new tragedy,” Hollande said in a dawn address that called it an act of terrorism. Nice-Matin journalist Damien Allemand had been watching the firework display when the truck tore by. After taking cover in a cafe, he wrote on his paper’s website of what he saw: “Bodies every five meters, limbs ... Blood. Groans.” “The beach attendants were first on the scene. They brought water for the injured and towels, which they placed on those for whom there was no more hope.” Police carried out a controlled explosion on a white van near the home, blowing the doors open and leaving shattered glass all around. It was not clear what they found. CRITICISM With presidential and parliamentary elections less than a year away, French opposition politicians seized on what they described as security failings that made it possible for the truck to career 2 km (1.5 miles) through large crowds before it was finally halted. Christian Estrosi, a security hardliner who was mayor of Nice until last month and is now president of the wider Riviera region, had written on the eve of the attack to Hollande to demand more funding for police. “As far as I’m concerned, I demand answers, and not the usual stuff,” Estrosi told BFM TV hours after the attack, questioning whether the government had provided enough national police officers for the fireworks display. France is a major part of a U.S.-led mission conducting air strikes and special forces operations against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, and has also sent troops to West Africa to battle Islamist insurgents. “We will further strengthen our actions in Syria and Iraq,” Hollande said, calling the tragedy - on the day France marks the 1789 revolutionary storming of the Bastille prison in Paris - an attack on liberty by fanatics who despised human rights. “We are facing a battle that will be long because facing us is an enemy that wants to continue to strike all people and all countries that have values like ours,” he said. France is home to the European Union’s biggest Muslim population, mostly descended from immigrants from North African former colonies. It maintains a secular culture that allows no place for religion in schools and civic life, which supporters say encourages a common French identity but critics say contributes to alienation in some communities. The Paris attack in November was the bloodiest among a number in France and Belgium in the past two years. On Sunday, a weary nation had breathed a sigh of relief that the month-long Euro 2016 soccer tournament had ended without serious incident. Slideshow (25 Images) Four months ago, Belgian Islamists linked to the Paris attackers killed 32 people in Brussels. Recent weeks have also seen major attacks in Bangladesh, Turkey and Iraq. U.S. President Barack Obama condemned what he said “appears to be a horrific terrorist attack”. In televised remarks he later said the United States would stand with France and keep up the fight against Islamic State: “We will not be deterred. We will not relent.” On social media, Islamic State supporters celebrated the high death toll and posted a series of images, one showing a beach purporting to be that of Nice with white stones arranged to read “IS is here to stay” in Arabic. ||||| In this video grab taken Thursday July 14, 2016, a policeman chase people out of the cordoned-off area after a truck drove on to the sidewalk and plowed through a crowd of revelers who’d gathered to watch... (Associated Press) NICE, France (AP) — A truck loaded with weapons and hand grenades drove onto a sidewalk for more than a mile, plowing through Bastille Day revelers who'd gathered to watch fireworks in the French resort city of Nice late Thursday. At least 77 people were killed before police killed the driver, authorities said. Nice prosecutor Jean-Michel Pretre described a horrific scene, with bodies strewn about along the roadway and Sylvie Toffin, a press officer with the local prefecture, said the truck ran over people on a "long trip" down the sidewalk near Nice's Palais de la Mediterranee, a building that fronts the beach. Wassim Bouhlel, a Nice native who spoke to the AP nearby, said that he saw a truck drive into the crowd. "There was carnage on the road," he said. "Bodies everywhere." The Paris prosecutor's office opened an investigation for "murder, attempted murder in an organized group linked to a terrorist enterprise." The ranking politician of the Alpes-Maritime department that includes Nice said the truck plowed into the crowd over a distance of 2 kilometers (1.2 miles), killing 77 people and wounding 50. Many of those on the ground were in shorts and other summer clothing. Eric Ciotti said on BFM TV that police killed the driver "apparently after an exchange of gunfire." The president of the Provence Alpes Côte d'Azur regional council, which includes Nice, said the truck was loaded with arms and grenades. Christian Estrosi told BFM TV that "the driver fired on the crowd, according to the police who killed him." Bouhlel said he witnessed the man emerge with a gun and start shooting. Images being broadcast across French media showed revelers running for their lives down Nice's palm tree-lined Promenade des Anglais, the famous seaside boulevard named for the English aristocrats who proposed its construction in the 19th century. Video footage showed men and women — one or two pushing strollers — racing to get away from the scenes. And, in what appeared to be evidence of a gun battle, photos showed a truck with at least half a dozen bullet holes punched through its windshield. It was not immediately clear who would have been behind an attack, but France has recently seen a spate of dramatic assaults from by jihadist groups, including the Islamic State group which straddles Iraq and Syria. President Barack Obama condemned what he said "appears to be a horrific terrorist attack." "Our thoughts and prayers are with the families and other loved ones of those killed," he said. European Council president Donald Tusk said it was a "tragic paradox" that the victims of the attack in Nice were celebrating "liberty, equality and fraternity" — France's motto — on the country's national day. France's ambassador to the United States, Gerard Araud, characterized the events as a "terrorist attack." Writing online, Nice Matin journalist Damien Allemand who was at the waterside said the fireworks display had finished and the crowd had got up to leave when they heard a noise and cries. "A fraction of a second later, an enormous white truck came along at a crazy speed, turning the wheel to mow down the maximum number of people," he said. "I saw bodies flying like bowling pins along its route. Heard noises, cries that I will never forget." Graphic footage showed a scene of horror up and down the Promenade, with broken bodies splayed out on the asphalt, some of them piled near one another, others bleeding out onto the roadway or twisted into unnatural shapes. "Help my mother, please!" one person yells out amid a cacophony of screaming and crying. A pink girl's bicycle is briefly seen overturned by the side of the road. The origin and authenticity of the footage could not immediately be verified. Kayla Repan, of Boca Raton, Florida, was among the hundreds gathered on the promenade to watch fireworks. "The whole city was running. I got extremely frightened and ran away from the promenade," she said. "It was chaos." ___ Satter reported from Paris. ___ Associated Press writers Elaine Ganley in Paris and Naomi Koppel in London contributed to this report. ||||| (CNN) Scores of people were killed Thursday night when a large truck plowed through a Bastille Day crowd in Nice, France, in what President Francois Hollande called a terror attack. The death toll grew through the night, with Hollande saying 77 people died. Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said 80 people were killed. The driver first shot a gun into the crowd before driving two kilometers along the Promenade des Anglais, the main street in Nice, mowing down people who had gathered to watch fireworks, regional President Christian Estrosi told CNN affiliate BFM-TV. Police shot and killed the driver, said Pierre-Henry Brandet, a spokesman for the French Interior Ministry. Police found firearms, explosives and grenades in the truck, Estrosi said. "We cannot deny that it was a terror attack," Hollande said in a national television address. He added that the choice of the day -- Bastille Day, when France celebrates its post-French Revolution republic -- was particularly poignant. He said that the day is a "symbol of liberty," and that "human rights are denied by fanatics and France is quite clearly their target." Hollande recommended that an existing state of emergency, put in place in the wake of the Paris attacks in November 2015 and due to expire later this month, be extended for three further months. So far, no group has claimed responsibility. Anti-terror prosecutors have taken over the investigation, according to BFMTV, citing the prosecutor's office. Leaders around the world have denounced the brutal incident. U.S. President Barack Obama issued a statement saying, "We stand in solidarity and partnership with France, our oldest ally, as they respond to and recover from this attack." Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted: "Canadians are shocked by tonight's attack in Nice. Our sympathy is with the victims, and our solidarity with the French people." Brazilian President Michel Temer tweeted: "It is regrettable that on the day [that] eternalized fraternity as the motto of the French people, an attack destroyed the lives of so many citizens." The United Nations condemned what it termed a "barbaric and cowardly" terror attack in Nice. As Asia woke up to the horrific news, India, China and South Korea's leaders added their voices to the chorus of condemnation. "India shares the pain (and) stands firmly with our French sisters (and) brothers in this hour of immense sadness," Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted. Here are the latest developments: • Hospitals in the city have launched an urgent appeal for blood donors. • The presumptive nominees for the U.S. presidential election have reacted to the attack, again taking strikingly different tones with Trump saying he'd ask for a declaration of war against ISIS while Clinton called for greater intelligence gathering to fight terror groups. • Authorities are attempting to determine whether the identity card of a 31-year-old French-Tunisian found in the truck cab matches the body of the driver in the attack, according to a police source cited by AFP. The driver was a Nice resident, according to the Nice Matin newspaper. • Hollande said security measures will be increased and an existing state of emergency, which was scheduled to end later this month, will be extended three months. "France is afflicted, but she is strong, and she will always be stronger than the fanatics who want to strike her today," he said. • The streets were dense with people when the attack happened. About 100 people were injured, officials said. Witness Tony Molina said he saw bodies of the dead lying in the street, covered in blue tarps and marked so emergency vehicles didn't run over them. • Preliminary information from French officials was that there was one individual in the truck, according to a U.S. law enforcement official briefed on the attack. CNN Map • American Dominique Molina, who was watching from a balcony, said the fireworks had just ended and a crowd on the beach was disbanding. "People were flooding the streets, just walking away from the show, and I heard a lot of loud noises and people were screaming and so to the west, a big moving truck was driving on the promenade, just barreling over people and hitting -- running people over." She estimated the truck moved at 20-25 mph. Molina said her teenage son witnessed the carnage. "It's something you're not supposed to see," she said. "I grabbed my son, I felt like shielding him, protecting him from seeing that. It happened so fast, it was like in slow-motion." • Paul Delane, an American, described the chaos. "All of a sudden, just people, thousands of people, started running in one direction. Well, my partner took my hand immediately and we started running with everybody and honestly in my head I had no idea what was going on and the music was so loud and I didn't really see a truck, but just people running and screaming and crying and people carrying their children, and it was just very frightening." • The U.S. Consulate in Marseille advised U.S. citizens in Nice to call family and friends to notify them that they are safe . The Consulate said it was working with authorities to determine whether any U.S. citizens were injured. Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Baby strollers are seen on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice, France, on Friday, July 15. A 31-year-old native of Tunisia and resident of Nice drove into a crowd during the southern French city's Bastille Day celebrations around 10:45 p.m. on Thursday, July 14, killing at least 84 people and leaving around 202 injured. Hide Caption 1 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice A woman cries, asking for her son, as she walks near the scene of the attack. Hide Caption 2 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice A forensics team inspects the scene of the attack. Hide Caption 3 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice A man looks at the scene of the attack on the Promenade des Anglais. Hide Caption 4 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Forensics investigators examine a truck at the scene of the attack. Hide Caption 5 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Hide Caption 6 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Bodies of victims covered by sheets remained at the scene of the attack early Friday. Hide Caption 7 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice A man sits next to the body of a victim following the attack. Hide Caption 8 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Authorities confirmed that the driver of the truck was killed by police. Hide Caption 9 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice The truck plowed into a crowd leaving a Bastille Day fireworks display in the French resort city of Nice. One witness, an American who was about 15 feet from the truck, said the driver accelerated and pointed his tractor-trailer into the crowd, mowing people over. Hide Caption 10 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice A man lies near a covered body at the scene of the attack on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice. Hide Caption 11 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Emergency teams assist wounded people at the scene. Hide Caption 12 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice A photo from the Twitter account of a reporter for CNN affiliate France 2 shows witnesses being interviewed inside the Hotel Negresco after the attack. According to Alban Mikoczy, these people are not injured. Hide Caption 13 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Wounded people are evacuated from the scene where the truck drove into the crowd during the Bastille Day celebrations. Hide Caption 14 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Armed French police move people away from the Promenade des Anglais in Nice in the aftermath of Thursday's attack. Hide Caption 15 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Medical workers attend to an injured woman. Hide Caption 16 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Police security forces deployed in the center of Nice. Hide Caption 17 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Tony Molina, a U.S. police officer on vacation in Nice, witnessed the terrible scene from his hotel room. He told CNN he thought he heard between 30 and 40 gunshots. "I saw the truck right below us and it had already driven down the boardwalk for a half a mile." Hide Caption 18 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice BFM-TV, a CNN affiliate in France, reported that police shot at the truck to try to stop it. Hide Caption 19 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Rescue workers move a victim from the scene. Hide Caption 20 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Soldiers, police officers and firefighters walk among bodies covered with blue sheets on the seafront Promenade des Anglais. Hide Caption 21 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice Police seal off the area around the scene. A witness said at first it seemed like an accident, but then it became obvious it was a deliberate act. Hide Caption 22 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice "I wasn't sure what to do, in that situation. No one knew what was going on. We just knew we had to run for our lives," said Paul Delane, an American who witnessed the attack. Hide Caption 23 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice French President François Hollande said the country would now extend its state of emergency for three months. Hide Caption 24 of 25 Photos: Bastille Day terror: Harrowing images of truck attack in Nice A doll is seen at the scene of the attack on the Promenade des Anglais. Hide Caption 25 of 25 • Hollande returned to Paris from Avignon for emergency talks at the Interior Ministry after the incident, according to French national radio. • France had put intense security in place for Euro 2016 , the international soccer tournament that just ended. No major attacks occurred during the event. • Facebook activated the Safety Check feature for people in and around the area of the attack. • An American witness at the scene said the driver of the truck was mowing bodies over, and that he appeared to accelerate as he hit those bodies. The witness said he saw only the driver. He heard gunfire as he ran away, but did not know its source. It seemed like an accident at first, but it became apparent very quickly that it was deliberate, the witness told CNN. • Maryam Violet, a witness, said she was walking along the beach and saw "a ton of people on the ground and on the sidewalk. You could see someone with a bike or a wheelchair and someone with a bag full of flowers, innocent and normal people on the beach." • Eric Dartell was eating at a restaurant on the street where the incident happened. "You can see wreckage all along the way, a body, bicycles, street lamps and debris everywhere," he said. • In the United States, New York Gov. Anthony Cuomo ordered stepped-up security at high-profile locations, including airports, bridges, tunnels and mass transit systems. • Nice is on the Mediterranean, about 930 kilometers (580 miles) from Paris. • Estrosi said a Rihanna concert has been canceled and that flags will fly at half-mast. |||||

– Authorities say at least 77 people are dead and dozens more injured after a truck plowed into a Bastille Day celebration Thursday in Nice, France. Reuters reports the crowd was leaving holiday festivities at the Promenade des Anglais seaside walk when the truck hit it. The truck drove for more than a mile through the crowd, according to CNN. A witness tells the Guardian the truck was going between 25mph and 30mph. “I was walking for nearly a mile, and there were dead bodies all over the place,” a journalist at the scene says. “We saw people hit and bits of debris flying around,” another reporter says. “It was absolute chaos." The Paris prosecutor's office opened an investigation for "murder, attempted murder in an organized group linked to a terrorist enterprise," reports AP. There are reports the driver of the truck, who was believed to be the only person inside, fired on the crowd. The driver was shot and killed by police, and authorities say they found weapons, including guns and grenades, inside the truck. Authorities are asking people to stay inside their homes. CBS News reports French anti-terror police are now investigating the attack. President Obama condemned what "appears to be a horrific terrorist attack," adding, "Our thoughts and prayers are with the families and other loved ones of those killed."

A well-done movie musical is a great equalizer: It can make audiences feel like they’re in the front row at a Broadway show without the sticker shock. Bill Condon’s lavish live-action “Beauty and the Beast” pulls this off, sticking closely enough to the original that it should satisfy its legions of fans — among which, I confess, I’ve never really counted myself. The 1991 “Beauty” always felt like minor Disney to me, a step down for the “Little Mermaid” team Howard Ashman and Alan Menken. But, devotees, let’s agree to disagree because this version of the tale about a cursed prince and the plucky bookworm whose love redeems him has something for everyone. Emma Watson fleshes out the heroine, Belle, courtesy of screenwriters Stephen Chbosky and Evan Spiliotopoulos. She’s a fledgling inventor (instead of her dad, Maurice, played by Kevin Kline), a mentor to girls in her 18th-century village who want to read, and is unafraid to tell her boorish suitor, Gaston (a perfect, preening Luke Evans) that she’s too young have kids. Watson carries a passable tune, and her eyes have the sparkle of a damsel who’s prepared to come to her own rescue. Dan Stevens (“Downton Abbey”), as the Beast, has the heaviest lift. He’s emoting through a CGI veil that never quite feels real. But his cranky character is more engaging this time around. He’s a fellow reader who doesn’t treat Belle with chivalrous kid gloves. In their snowball fight, he actually goes through with lobbing a gigantic one at her, knocking her to the ground. It’s a weirdly slapstick moment, but I liked it. When has a Disney princess ever been treated like the love interest in a Farrelly brothers movie? The castle’s animated inanimate objects — a candlestick (Ewan McGregor), clock (Ian McKellen), teapot (Emma Thompson), wardrobe (Audra McDonald) and feather duster (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), plus Stanley Tucci as a piano — stump along pretty much like they did in the cartoon. McGregor’s rendition of “Be Our Guest” is a retro-styled showstopper, though I can’t say the same of the three new songs, which just increase the soundtrack’s clunkers-to-classics ratio. And about that gay subplot? Yup, it’s obvious LeFou (Josh Gad, every musical’s secret weapon) has a thing for his buddy — the tavern singalong “Gaston,” the film’s best number, all but spells it out. There’s a brief shot of two men dancing, and a scene in which one redneck villager, magicked into a dress and makeup, responds with delight instead of horror. It’s also worth noting that Ashman, who died of complications from AIDS in 1991, saw the cursed Beast as a metaphor for the disease. So if you loved the original, you’ve already embraced a gay subtext. Other (light) modernist touches abound. The witch, who initially curses the prince, pops up throughout the film: “Do you know what happens to spinsters whose fathers die?” Gaston growls at Belle, gesturing at a beggar woman. She’ll later be the one who saves Belle’s dad. When Gaston fearmongers villagers into storming the Beast’s castle, it hums with a certain topicality; likewise the flock of books fighting back against an illiterate mob. Really, everybody wins. If you want your old favorite dressed in sumptuous new clothes, that’s what you’ll get. Those who always desired a little more depth from “Beauty and the Beast” will be happy, too: There’s something there that wasn’t there before. ||||| Video (01:59) : The fantastic journey of Belle, a bright, beautiful and independent young woman who is taken prisoner by a beast in his castle. In 1991, Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” became the first animated film nominated for the best picture Oscar. The studio’s live action and computer-graphic remake likely won’t have to worry about the Academy Awards. Don’t misunderstand: It is a visually sumptuous, highly watchable extravaganza. It musically honors its earlier version, providing greatest-hits cover versions of the classic songs by Alan Menken, plus four originals. It welcomes a new generation of viewers with the “Harry Potter” audience appeal of Emma Watson in the progressive, quasi-feminist leading role. In short, the movie, directed by Bill Condon (of “Chicago,” “Dreamgirls” and two “Twilight Saga” entries), is fine. Beauty and the Beast ★★½ out of 4 stars Rating: PG, some action, violence, peril and frightening images. But it’s also less magical than what the studio achieved with two-dimensional illustrations a quarter-century ago. Watching it puts one in the mind of Belle’s obligatory marriage to the formerly brooding Beast once he returns to well-mannered human form. Wasn’t the relationship more interesting the way it was before? The story remains faithful to the original narrative, a search for love balancing chaste purity and brutish effrontery in various forms. As Belle, Watson gives a revisionist dose of girl power clout to the role, making her as bookish and quick-witted as Hermione Granger. She is the inventive daughter of Maurice (Kevin Kline, his lengthy hair and beard a frenzy of 18th-century frizzies), who tinkers at windup music boxes. With her mother passed on, he protects their child carefully, perhaps a bit too cautiously for a plucky mademoiselle. She’s clearly prepared to venture into the world beyond her provincial village, but lovingly confined by her controlling cher papa. When a sales trip puts Maurice in conflict with a onetime prince mysteriously turned enchanted Beast, he’s imprisoned inside its gothic castle. Belle sets out to free him, first confronting the Beast, then taking her father’s place as its captive. Before you can say “Stockholm syndrome,” she sees the decency beneath his animalistic exterior and begins to warm his icy heart. They even have a giggly snowball fight on the castle’s outdoor walkways. Can their cross-species romance bloom before the last petal falls from a bewitched rose, the countdown clock for the curse that turned him feral (and his servants into a talking clock, candelabra and teapot)? Relax. They’re updating the tale, not rewriting it. The emotional pull of old-school romantic fantasy is remarkably effective, and it’s improved by the subplot of egotistical Gaston, a wartime veteran intent to become Belle’s mate by any means necessary. This blustering, increasingly menacing macho beast of his own type is played by Luke Evans in entertaining numskull fashion. A pompous narcissist, he’s seemingly clueless about why his oh-so-warm helper, Le Fou (Josh Gad), wants to go from being Gaston’s faithful sidekick to his best friend forever and ever. When Le Fou’s not-very-surprising motivation is revealed, it’s much ado about nothing, as it should be. As if to amp up the animated film’s handsome design, the photorealist computer imagery is a surreal swirl of rococo detail befitting a shop selling lavish French provincial clothing and housewares. More of that attention should have been directed to the acting. Watson, a skilled performer, brings little fire to her role, developing apparent affection for the big animal rather than life-changing love. Her singing, a key to defining the character, is good but far from great. And as the Beast, Dan Stevens is a virtual invisible man, remaining hidden beneath a part wolf, part water buffalo false face. He adds considerably less value than Emma Thompson’s performance as a chatty maternal teapot. I’m not suggesting they should have had more screen time to develop their characters. Running at a pokey two hours plus, it’s a full 45 minutes longer than the nimble earlier version. The new version is an underperforming example of more being considerably less. ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| Published on Jan 30, 2017 The final trailer for Beauty and the Beast is here 🌹 On March 17, rediscover a tale as old as time. Get your tickets now at BeOurGuest.com -- Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” is a live-action re-telling of the studio’s animated classic which refashions the classic characters from the tale as old as time for a contemporary audience, staying true to the original music while updating the score with several new songs. “Beauty and the Beast” is the fantastic journey of Belle, a bright, beautiful and independent young woman who is taken prisoner by a beast in his castle. Despite her fears, she befriends the castle’s enchanted staff and learns to look beyond the Beast’s hideous exterior and realize the kind heart and soul of the true Prince within. The film stars: Emma Watson as Belle; Dan Stevens as the Beast; Luke Evans as Gaston, the handsome, but shallow villager who woos Belle; Oscar® winner Kevin Kline as Maurice, Belle’s eccentric, but lovable father; Josh Gad as Lefou, Gaston’s long-suffering aide-de-camp; Golden Globe® nominee Ewan McGregor as Lumiere, the candelabra; Oscar nominee Stanley Tucci as Maestro Cadenza, the harpsichord; Oscar nominee Ian McKellen as Cogsworth, the mantel clock; and two-time Academy Award® winner Emma Thompson as the teapot, Mrs. Potts. |||||

– Disney's original Beauty and the Beast was the first animated film nominated for Best Picture at the Oscars. In other words, its live-action remake starring Emma Watson and Dan Stevens has a tough act to follow. According to critics, it's good—but doesn't quite measure up to the original. The general reaction: "If you thought it was a bad idea to mess with a classic, Beauty and the Beast will persuade you that a tale as old as time is worth retelling," writes Calvin Wilson at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. While it's "not quite as good as its predecessor," it's still "a vastly entertaining film that combines old-school charm with technological wizardry," he adds, giving props to both Watson and Stevens. Colin Covert agrees this retelling is "less magical" than the 1991 original, "an underperforming example of more being considerably less," he writes at the Minneapolis Star Tribune. But he also finds much to enjoy, from "the subplot of egotistical Gaston" to the impressive detail in the computer imagery. In short, "it is a visually sumptuous, highly watchable extravaganza." Sara Stewart actually thinks this new version is better than the original, partly because the Beast is "more engaging." But the film as a whole "has something for everyone," she writes at the New York Post. "If you want your old favorite dressed in sumptuous new clothes, that's what you'll get. Those who always desired a little more depth from Beauty and the Beast will be happy, too." One who was not happy: Joe Morgenstern. He argues the film "betrays the essence of what made the 1991 animated feature a beloved classic" through "a succession of disjunctures, missed moments and dubious deviations from the earlier script." It feels "crazily cluttered" and Watson's Belle is bland to boot, he writes at the Wall Street Journal. He does, however, praise the "huge jolts of visual energy." The film features Disney's first "exclusively gay moment," even if the reference is subtle.

A man selling paper handkerchiefs passes next to a bus stop advertising a state lottery, in Athens, Wednesday, Sept. 19, 2012. Debt-strapped Greece is negotiating a major new austerity package worth... (Associated Press) A man selling paper handkerchiefs passes next to a bus stop advertising a state lottery, in Athens, Wednesday, Sept. 19, 2012. Debt-strapped Greece is negotiating a major new austerity package worth... (Associated Press) Europe appears headed for a deepening economic recession despite a recent easing in market concerns over the three-year debt crisis, a closely-watched survey found Thursday. Financial data company Markit said its purchasing managers' index _ a gauge of business activity _ for the 17-country eurozone fell to 45.9 in September from 46.3 the previous month. The decline was a surprise as the consensus in the markets was for a modest improvement. Anything below 50 indicates a contraction in economic activity. September's rate was the lowest in over three years and came despite an easing in the rate of economic contraction in Germany, the eurozone's largest economy. The decline also highlights the scale of the challenge facing European policymakers as they seek to get a grip on the debt crisis and may fuel hopes that the European Central Bank will cut its main interest rate further from the record low of 0.75 percent. Over recent weeks, stocks in Europe have pushed up to multi-month highs, while the euro has reversed course and headed above $1.30 for the first time since the spring. Markets were driven by a series of apparent breakthroughs in European leaders' efforts to solve the debt crisis. Most importantly, the ECB announced a new bond-buying plan that would keep a lid on the borrowing costs of countries like Spain and Italy. Expectations that countries would sign up for the plan, which comes with terms attached, have helped bring down bond yields. But while markets may have improved, economic activity is still on the wane. "The fall in the PMI in September is another reminder that the ECB's new asset purchase programme is not an answer to all of the region's problems," said Ben May, European economist at Capital Economics. The euro was down 0.8 percent at $1.2940 an hour after the survey's release. Analysts said the figures suggest the eurozone economy is contracting at a sharper rate than the 0.2 percent quarterly decline recorded in the second quarter of 2012. Conditions in both the manufacturing and services sector worsened. "The latest readings not only suggest that the euro area has been in recession over the past six months, but also augur ill for the final quarter of the year," said James Ashley, senior European economist at RBC Capital Markets. Ashley said the PMI readings suggest economic output may have fallen by 0.5 percent in the third quarter, equivalent to an annualized decline of just over 2 percent. He said, however, that he remains "comfortable" with his existing forecast of a 0.3 percent quarterly decline. ||||| The income of the typical U.S. family fell or was flat in almost every state last year, with the drop particularly steep in places where the economy has been hit hard by the housing bust. The median annual household income—the point on the income scale at which half earn more and half earn less—fell in 18 states in 2011 from a year earlier after adjusting for inflation, according to a Census Bureau report to be released Thursday. The... ||||| America While Poverty Rose Again, Data Hint Economy May Have Found Its Feet (We retopped this post at 8 a.m. ET.) Though fresh data from the Census Bureau show that the number of Americans living in poverty edged higher in 2011, its latest American Community Survey also signals that after a Great Recession and a painfully slow recovery the U.S. economy may finally be bottoming out. The Associated Press leads its report on the news this way: "The U.S. economy is showing signs of finally bottoming out: Americans are on the move again after record numbers had stayed put, more young adults are leaving their parents' homes to take a chance with college or the job market, once-sharp declines in births are leveling off and poverty is slowing." Reuters focuses on this news: "Fewer U.S. states show income drop, Vermont's up." As it points out, "Vermont's 4 percent rise in median household income last year was the first shown by a state since 2009, the Census Bureau said." Our original post — "Census: In 2011, Number Of Poor Americans Increased" — and an earlier update: The United States Census has released its yearly American Community Survey, which uses a sample of the U.S. population to provide information on everything from disability to race and ethnicity. It's a lot of data, so analysis of will trickle in throughout the day. We'll share with you highlights on three important facets: — The number of Americans living in poverty grew to 15.9 percent in 2011. It was 15.3 in 2010. That means that 48.5 million Americans had an income below the poverty level. The Census reports: "This was the fourth consecutive increase in the poverty rate, but the percentage point increase between 2010 and 2011 was smaller than the change between 2008 and 2009, and between 2009 and 2010." — Young Americans are one of the first to feel the effects of the Affordable Care Act, which is known colloquially as Obamacare. According to the Census, once young Americans aged 19 to 25 could be added to their parents' plans, there was a 3.5 percent increase in the number insured. The Census compared that number to to those aged 26 to 29, who saw a decline of almost 1 percent in the number of those insured during the same period. — Household incomes continue to fall. "Real median household income in the United States fell between the 2010 ACS and the 2011 ACS, decreasing by 1.3 percent from $51,144 to $50,502," the Census reports. Update at 6:45 a.m. ET, Sept. 20. On Morning Edition: William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution think tank in Washington, D.C., tells NPR's Richard Gonzales that even though the poverty rate edged higher and incomes edged lower, "there's at least a hint that we've hit bottom in this post-recession malaise." Frey says that because "we're going down at a slower pace." ||||| The U.S. economy is showing signs of finally bottoming out: Americans are on the move again after record numbers had stayed put, more young adults are leaving their parents' homes to take a chance with college or the job market, once-sharp declines in births are leveling off and poverty is slowing. FILE - In this June 13, 2012, file photo, a job seeker talks to a recruiter at a job fair expo in Anaheim, Calif. The U.S. economy is showing signs of finally bottoming out: Americans are on the move... (Associated Press) New 2011 census data being released Thursday offer glimmers of hope in an economic recovery that technically began in mid-2009. The annual survey, supplemented with unpublished government figures as of March 2012, covers a year in which unemployment fell modestly from 9.6 percent to 8.9 percent. Not all is well. The jobless rate remains high at 8.1 percent. Home ownership dropped for a fifth straight year to 64.6 percent, the lowest in more than a decade, hurt by more stringent financing rules and a shift to renting. More Americans than ever are turning to food stamps, while residents in housing that is considered "crowded" held steady at 1 percent, tied for the highest since 2003. Taken as a whole, however, analysts say the latest census data provide wide-ranging evidence of a stabilizing U.S. economy. Coming five years after the housing bust, such a leveling off would mark an end to the longest and most pernicious economic decline since World War II. "We may be seeing the beginning of the American family's recovery from the Great Recession," said Andrew Cherlin, a professor of sociology and public policy at Johns Hopkins University. He pointed in particular to the upswing in mobility and to young men moving out of their parents' homes, both signs that more young adults were testing out job prospects. "It could be the modest number of new jobs or simply the belief that the worst is over," Cherlin said. Richard Freeman, an economist at Harvard University, said the data point to a "fragile recovery," with the economy still at risk of falling back into recession, depending in part on who is president and whether Congress averts a "fiscal cliff" of deep government spending cuts and higher taxes in January. "Given the situation in the world economy, we are doing better than many other countries," he said. "Government policies remain critical." The census figures also show slowing growth in the foreign-born population, which increased to 40.4 million, or 13 percent of the U.S. population. Last year's immigration increase of 400,000 people was the lowest in a decade, reflecting a minimal gain of Latinos after many Mexicans already in the U.S. opted to return home. Some 11 million people are estimated to be in the U.S. illegally. The bulk of new immigrants are now higher-skilled workers from Asian countries such as China and India, contributing to increases in the foreign-born population in California, New York, Illinois and New Jersey. Income inequality varied widely by region. The gap between rich and poor was most evident in the District of Columbia, New York, Connecticut, Louisiana and New Mexico, where immigrant or minority groups were more numerous. By county, Berkeley in West Virginia had the biggest jump in household income inequality over the past year, a result of fast suburban growth just outside the Washington-Baltimore region, where pockets of poor residents and newly arrived, affluent commuters live side by side. As a whole, Americans were slowly finding ways to get back on the move. About 12 percent of the nation's population, or 36.5 million, moved to a new home, up from a record low of 11.6 percent in 2011. Among young adults 25 to 29, the most mobile age group, moves also increased to 24.6 percent from a low of 24.1 percent in the previous year. Longer-distance moves, typically for those seeking new careers in other regions of the country, rose modestly from 3.4 percent to 3.8 percent. Less willing to rely on parents, roughly 5.6 million Americans ages 25-34, or 13.6 percent, lived with Mom and Dad, a decrease from 14.2 percent in the previous year. Young men were less likely than before to live with parents, down from 18.6 percent to 16.9 percent; young women living with parents edged higher to 10.4 percent, up from 9.7percent. The increases in mobility coincide with modest improvements in the job market as well as increased school enrollment, especially in college and at advanced-degree levels. Marriages dipped to a low of just 50.8 percent among adults 18 and over, compared with 57 percent in 2000. Among young adults 25-34, marriage was at 43.1 percent, also a new low, part of a longer-term cultural trend in which people are opting to marry at later ages and often cohabitate with a partner first. Births, on the other hand, appeared to be coming back after years of steep declines. In 2011, the number of births dipped by 55,000, or 1 percent, to 4.1 million, the smallest drop since the pre-recession peak in 2008, according to Kenneth Johnson, a sociology professor and senior demographer at the University of New Hampshire. More recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also show that once-precipitous drops in births are slowing. "There are signs that young adults have turned a corner," said Mark Mather, associate vice president at the Population Reference Bureau. "More young adults are staying in school, which will increase their potential earnings when the job market bounces back. It's going to take some time, but we should see more young adults entering the labor force, buying homes and starting families as economic conditions improve." While poverty slowed, food stamp use continued to climb. Roughly 14.9 million, or 13 percent of U.S. households, received food stamps, the highest level on record, meaning that 1 in 8 families was receiving the government aid. Oregon led the nation at 18.9 percent, or nearly 1 in 5, due in part to generous state provisions that expand food stamp eligibility to families making 185 percent of the poverty level _ roughly $3,400 a month for a family of four. Oregon was followed by more rural or more economically hard-hit states, including Michigan, Tennessee, Maine, Kentucky and Mississippi. Wyoming had the fewest households on food stamps, at 5.9 percent. Government programs did much to stave off higher rates of poverty. While the official poverty rate for 2011 remained stuck at 15 percent, or a record 46.2 million people, the government formula did not take into account noncash aid such as food stamps, which the Census Bureau estimates would have lifted 3.9 million people above the poverty line. If counted, that safety net would have lowered the poverty rate to 13.7 percent. And without expanded unemployment benefits, which began expiring in 2011, roughly 2.3 million people would have fallen into poverty. Some 17 states showed statistically significant increases in the poverty rate, led by Louisiana, Oregon, Arizona, Georgia and Hawaii. Among large metropolitan areas, McAllen, Texas, led the nation in poverty, at 38 percent, followed by Fresno, Calif., El Paso, Texas, and Bakersfield, Calif. In contrast, the Washington, D.C., metro area had the lowest level of poverty, about 8 percent, followed by Bridgeport, Conn., and Ogden, Utah. "There are signs among all these measures that the multiple downsides of the Great Recession have bottomed out, which is good news especially for young people who have seen their lives put on hold," said William H. Frey, a demographer at Brookings Institution. "There is some light at the end of the tunnel." ___ Online: www.census.gov |||||

– Are you a glass-half-full or a glass-half-empty type? Because that will have a lot to do with how you read the American Community Survey, a compilation of 2011 Census data and unofficial figures from the first quarter of 2012 giving us a glimpse at the US economy. With that much data you're bound to find both positive and negative signs. For instance: Half empty: Poverty increased for the fourth consecutive year, NPR observes. Half full: But it rose at a slower rate than it has in any of the previous three reports. "There's at least a hint that we've hit bottom in this post-recession malaise," one demographer says, because "we're going down at a slower pace." Half empty: The national median income fell 1.3%, and it fell a lot more than that in states that saw big hits in home values, the Wall Street Journal reports. Half full: "These are also the states that boomed the most, so we're talking about a higher peak to fall from," one economist says. Half empty: Homeownership is down for a fifth straight year to 64.6%, the AP reports. Half full: But Americans are on the move again, with about 12% moving, up from a record low of 11.6%, which is generally a positive sign. Even better: More young adults are moving out of their parents' homes. Half full: More good news for young adults: Many are benefiting from ObamaCare's provision allowing them to stay on their parents' health insurance. That provision alone sent the number of insured up 3.5%. Half empty: This one has nothing to do with the Census, but with two half-fulls in a row we thought you might be getting cocky. A new European Union survey that gauges business activity came in drastically lower than expected, pointing to a possible deepening of the economic recession there, the AP reports.

ROME — Rudy Guede, the only person serving time for the 2007 Perugia murder of British Erasmus student Meredith Kercher, has spoken publicly outside a court of law for the first time, giving his version of the story. In a pre-taped, multi-camera interview in the tailoring classroom of the Viterbo Prison in central Italy, Guede, 29, wearing a gray sweater and glasses, spoke about his life and the murder for which he is now serving 16 years. The Ivory Coast native was a far cry from the scruffy man the press described as a drug pusher and ex-con. In fact, he said he had never tried hard drugs, and his record shows that despite reports to the contrary, he had no previous convictions for any crimes. He maintained his innocence, pointed the finger at Seattle native Amanda Knox, and refused to name her Italian boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito. Knox and Sollecito were convicted, acquitted, reconvicted, and definitively acquitted of Kercher’s murder over the course of the last eight years. The interview aired on Italy’s prime time Maledette Storie (“Cursed Stories”), which chronicles the country’s most controversial stories to a wide audience on Thursday nights. Guede, speaking polished Italian and presenting an extremely cultured, if not intellectual, image, spoke clearly and concisely about his life, including how, at the age of 5, he was taken from his mother’s arms in the Ivory Coast after his father “reclaimed” him in Italy. Images of his prison art projects and the crime scene were interspersed among the long takes of his candid interview. But it would take a true Kercher murder junkie to really separate the wheat from the chaff. There are many inconsistencies in his story and what he said during the interrogations that led to his conviction. Guede, who was arrested more than a week after the murder—after he escaped to Germany and after Knox fingered her Congolese nightclub boss, Patrick Lumumba—maintains his innocence. Guede described in blushing detail how he had met Kercher a few months before her murder and how, on Halloween, the two shared a kiss on the dance floor of a local nightclub, saying it “isn’t that difficult to get a kiss on the dance floor in a college scene.” He brushed off reports that Kercher’s friends denied such a kiss with what amounted to a wink and a nod, and talked about how dark a nightclub really is. He stood by his original story that after that dance-floor kiss, Kercher had invited him over the next night, Nov. 1, 2007, and he happily obliged, arriving at her house after dark. He said she opened the door for him and that they sat in her living room, he drank a juice, and then they engaged in “petting” but stopped short of sex because neither of them had a condom. And, he added, because she had been in other relationships, he wouldn’t go further unprotected. When Franca Leosini, the show’s interviewer, pressed him about why, if he had gone there to continue the romance from the night before, he hadn’t taken a prophylactic “just in case,” he shrugged it off. Guede then described how Kercher complained to him about her roommate Knox, saying she had stolen her money and how she was a slob. Then, feeling the effects of a spicy kebab he had eaten earlier, he had excused himself to one of the bathrooms in the apartment, where he spent “around 10 or 11 minutes” and listened to two and a half songs, before a scream “louder than the music from my headphones” startled him. That scream, he said, came after Knox, whose voice he recognized—somehow despite his loud music—had come home to confront her roommate. Then, he said, he hurried to finish his business and ran out of the bathroom, leaving the toilet famously un-flushed as he raced out to see what happened. There he saw a man, he said. A random man, it would seem, at that. Someone he didn’t know. Someone foreign to him. Someone who, after all these years, he has come to know as part of his own theory, but who remained nameless. He then quoted the court documents that named that man as Raffaele Sollecito, though he refused to do so himself. Sollecito, it might be noted, had spent the week prior to the airing of the highly anticipated interview threatening to sue Guede if he was named, in an attempt to stop the show from being broadcast. As it turns out, Sollecito needn’t have worried, since Guede didn’t name him. Get The Beast In Your Inbox! Daily Digest Start and finish your day with the top stories from The Daily Beast. Cheat Sheet A speedy, smart summary of all the news you need to know (and nothing you don't). By clicking “Subscribe,” you agree to have read the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy Subscribe Thank You! You are now subscribed to the Daily Digest and Cheat Sheet. We will not share your email with anyone for any reason. But Knox, Guede said more than once, was there. “I am 101 percent certain Amanda Knox was there,” he said, before describing how the unnamed man warned Knox that they had “been discovered” and ran out of the building, but not before saying, “black man found, guilty found.” Guede said he knew Knox from flirting with her at the bar where she worked, and he described in detail how they found a connection when he told her he also had a friend from Seattle. Then Guede said two things that even the most seasoned Kercher murder watchers may have found surprising. He admitted to going into Kercher’s room after Knox and the unnamed man left with fluffy towels to try to stop the flow of blood from the stab wounds to Kercher’s neck. Then he said he fled the scene out of a combination of fear and paranoia that he conveniently regrets. He went to Germany, he said, but only because that was where the next train was going, adding that he might have just as easily ended up in Russia. Then he told Leosini that when he fled, Kercher was completely clothed in “the same clothes she was wearing when she opened the door for me.” But the facts beg an explanation, since Kercher was found semi-nude, with her jeans and underwear in a heap on the floor. Her bra—which was covered with blood splatters, implying she was wearing it when she was stabbed—had been cut from her body and lay in shreds on the floor. Sollecito’s DNA was originally found on the tiny metal hook of the clasp of that bra, but that evidence was largely discounted because the cut clasp had been collected some six weeks after the murder took place. “She was dressed when I left,” Guede said, undoubtedly knowing very well the accusation such a statement would imply. Guede also said that when he ran out of the house, he left Kercher’s bedroom door open, which, of course, is not how it was found. The morning after the murder, Knox and Sollecito were alone in the house and say Kercher’s door was locked from the inside and had to be broken down. One of the few places where Guede’s DNA and fingerprints were not present in the murder room was on the outside of the door, which was absent of any usable forensic evidence except the fingerprints of Sollecito, who said he tried in vain to open the door. Curious indeed. Guede and his interviewer said no money was exchanged for his exclusive interview, and, indeed, it will have no impact whatsoever on the case, which is now officially closed after Knox and Sollecito’s case was thrown out by Italy’s high court in 2015. Guede, who was convicted definitively as one of three assassins, chose not to pursue a retrial after his presumed co-conspirators were let go, as it could have resulted in a new conviction and a longer sentence. But no matter, since Guede will be free soon, as well. He has been eligible for work release for almost two years but has chosen to work on his studies in prison instead. Considering he had no prior criminal convictions before his murder conviction and his apparent good behavior in prison, he will most certainly be eligible for parole by 2018. The forgotten protagonist in the story, as Leonisi so poignantly pointed out in her interview with Guede, is Kercher, who would have turned 30 on Dec. 28 and whose version of the story, which would clearly be the definitive one, has sadly gone with her to her grave. ||||| The man convicted of murdering the British student Meredith Kercher in Italy has said she was trying to tell him something in the moments before she died and that he is "101 per cent convinced" Amanda Knox was there. Rudy Guede - who is currently serving 16 years in jail for the murder of the British student - said he had attempted to write on the walls with her blood to "understand" what she was saying. Ms Kercher was found dead in the flat she shared with Amanda Knox in Perugia, Italy in November 2007 having been sexually assaulted and stabbed in the throat. Speaking from prison in Viterbo, Italy, the 30-year-old told the Italian broadcaster Rai that the bedroom had been staged to look as a burglar had broken in and a rock had been used to break a window. He said he and Ms Kercher had met the following evening at a college nightclub where they had shared a kiss. He said he had accepted an invitation to come to her house the following evening but they did not have sex because neither had a condom. He claims he left the room to go to the bathroom where he heard a scream and saw a man - who he described as "foreign" - in the house. Meredith Kercher was murdered in 2007 He said: "I am 101 per cent certain Amanda Knox was there". Guede then described how the unnamed man had warned Knox they had been "discovered" and ran out of the building before saying "black man found, guilty found". He said he then went into Ms Kercher's bedroom and saw "an abundance of blood". He said he got a towel from the bathroom to staunch the bleeding from a wound on Ms Kercher’s neck. Rudy Guede was convicted of Meredith Kercher's murder in 2008 He described finding her lying there as a "heartbreaking moment" and said "she was trying to tell me something". He said: "I wrote in blood on the wall to understand... fear overwhelmed me." Guede - who is originally from the Ivory Coast - said he had then attempted to flee to Germany because he "was afraid they would not believe me". In pictures: The trial of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito 14 show all In pictures: The trial of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito 1/14 Amanda Knox 's lawyer arriving for the final verdict Amanda Knox 's lawyer Carlo Dalla Vedova arrives at the Italy's Supreme Court in Rome on March 27, 2015, the day that Knox's verdict was overturned Getty Images 2/14 Raffaele Sollecito's lawyer before the final verdict Giulia Bongiorno, lawyer of Raffaele Sollecito, delivers comments at the Palazzo di Giustizia courthouse before the last session for the final verdict of the Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito murder retrial Getty Images 3/14 Amanda Knox on 'Good Morning America' Amanda Knox sits alone before being interviewed on the set of ABC's 'Good Morning America' in New York, 2014 4/14 Amanda Knox on 'Good Morning America' Amanda Knox wipes her nose with a tissue while making a television appearance in New York, 2014 5/14 Amanda Knox on 'Good Morning America' Robin Roberts interviews Amanda Knox on ABC's 'Good Morning America' in New York, 2014 6/14 Raffaele Sollecito leaves the court Raffaele Sollecito leaves the court in Florence, 2014 7/14 Raffaele Sollecito leaves the court Raffaele Sollecito leaves the court in Florence. Judges in a Florence court gathered to decide whether US Amanda Knox and her Italian ex-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito are guilty of the 2007 murder of British exchange student Meredith Kercher in Perugia, 2014 8/14 Kercher's sister, Stephanie Kercher and brother Lyle Kercher Kercher's sister, Stephanie Kercher (L) and brother Lyle Kercher speak during a press conference in Florence, 2014 9/14 Appeals Court Judge Alessandro Nencini reads out the verdict Appeals Court Judge Alessandro Nencini (C) reads out the verdict for the murder of British student Meredith Kercher in Florence, 2014 10/14 Layers of Raffaele Sollecito Luca Maori, Giulia Bongiorno and Amanda Knox's lawyer Carlo Della Vedova (L-R) Layers of Raffaele Sollecito Luca Maori, Giulia Bongiorno and Amanda Knox's lawyer Carlo Della Vedova attend the final verdict of the Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito retrial at the Courthouse of Florence of Nuovo Palazzo di Giustizia in Florence, 2014 11/14 Amanda Knox on NBC News' 'Today' show Amanda Knox speaks to Matt Lauer (L) as she appears on NBC News' 'Today' show in New York, 2013 12/14 Amanda Knox at a news conference at Sea-Tac International Airport Amanda Knox cries and gestures to friends while her mother Edda Mellas sits next to her during a news conference at Sea-Tac International Airport, Washington after Knox landed there on a flight from Italy, 2011 13/14 Amanda Knox leaves the court Amanda Knox breaking in tears as she leaves the court after the announce of the verdict of her appeal trial in the Meredith Kercher' murder at Perugia's court, 2011 14/14 Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito stand outside the rented house where 21-year-old British student Meredith Kercher was found dead in Perugia, 2007 He said: "When I was found in the house of the crime I fled because I was afraid. "No one would believe me. I thought: Negro found guilty. The subsequent investigations, conducted ​​badly, have shown that I was right." Police have always maintained that Guede did not act alone and Ms Kercher was killed in a "sex game gone wrong" which also involved Ms Knox and her then boyfriend Rafaelle Sollecito. Amanda Knox and her former boyfriend Raffaelle Sollecito (not pictured) were finally acquitted in March 2015 Ms Knox and Mr Sollecito were initially also convicted of Mr Kercher’s murder in 2009 before being acquitted two years later. The acquittal was then dismissed by the Italian Supreme Court in 2013 who ordered a retrial where they were subsequently convicted again. A final appeal acquitted them once more in March last year. ||||| ROME — The man convicted of killing a British student in the Amanda Knox case broke his silence Thursday, insisting the American was at the scene of the crime on the night of the murder. Rudy Guede, who is serving a 16-year sentence for killing Knox's roommate Meredith Kercher, protested his innocence from an Italian jail in his first television interview. Play Facebook Twitter Embed FROM MARCH 27, 2015: I'm Grateful to Have My Life Back, Knox Says 1:02 autoplay autoplay Copy this code to your website or blog He recounted the events surrounding Kercher’s death in a Perugia apartment in 2007, repeating his claim that he was in the bathroom when the 21-year-old was fatally attacked. The 30-year-old insisted he saw Knox, now 28, and another man in the apartment when he rushed to investigate Kercher’s screams. Knox, from Seattle, and her then boyfriend Rafaelle Sollecito were put on trial four times for the murder, serving four years in prison through convictions and appeals until they were exonerated last March. Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito FILIPPO MONTEFORTE / TIZIANA FAB / AFP - Getty Images Prosecutors argued that the pair went to Kercher's apartment and killed her in what began as a sex game, but Knox insists she was at Sollecito’s apartment. Guede was convicted after his DNA was found on Kercher’s body and his footprints were in her blood. He fled to Germany in the days after the killing. In his interview, which aired Thursday night on Italian television channel RAI 3, he explained in detail how he was making out with Kercher in the apartment when he suddenly had to use the bathroom. Rudy Guede gave his first interview to RAI 3. RAI 3 “While I was doing that I heard the bell ring,” Guede said. “Meredith opened the door, and I heard the voice of Amanda Knox coming into the house. They started arguing. Earlier on Meredith complained about her stealing money, so I didn’t worry too much, and remained in the bathroom.” The interviewer asked Guede to confirm that he believed Knox was in the apartment. “Yes, I clearly recognized her voice,” he said, adding: “101 percent.” He said he remained in the bathroom until he heard “a scream so loud” that it was audible over the music on his iPod. “When I got out the lights were all off apart from Meredith’s bedroom,” he said. “I saw the silhouette of a man in front of her door.” He said the man and Knox ran off after they realized there was someone else in the apartment. Italian authorities were not immediately available for comment. Sollecito said he had no comment to make. "As I have said many times, I do not watch TV. I do not know Guede, nor have I ever met him aside from in court." |||||

– Rudy Guede, the man currently serving a 16-year sentence for the 2007 murder of Meredith Kercher in Italy, gave his first television interview on Thursday, NBC News reports. In the interview with an Italian news program, he asserts he's "101%" sure Amanda Knox was in the apartment when Kercher was murdered and says that Kercher tried to give him a message in her final moments of life, according to the Independent. The Daily Beast reports Guede says he was making out with Kercher at her apartment when he went into the bathroom for "10 or 11 minutes" because of a spicy kebab he had eaten earlier. While in the bathroom, he says he heard Knox, Kercher's roommate, enter the apartment and start arguing with Kercher, according to NBC. Then he heard a scream. Guede says he left the bathroom to see Knox and a man he didn't identify fleeing the apartment, NBC reports. According to the Independent, Guede says the bedroom had been "staged" to look like a burglary, and Kercher was bleeding heavily from a stab wound in her neck. He says he grabbed some towels to stop the bleeding. "She was trying to tell me something," he says. "I wrote in blood on the wall to understand." Guede was convicted after his DNA was found on Kercher's body and his footprints in her blood, NBC reports. According to the Independent, police believe Kercher was killed by Guede, Knox, and Knox's boyfriend Rafaelle Sollecito during a "sex game." Knox and Sollecito were exonerated in March after being tried four times, NBC reports. According to the Daily Beast, Guede will likely be eligible for parole in 2018.

Why Approving Emergency Funding For Harvey Might Not Be Easy For Congress Enlarge this image toggle caption Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images When the floodwaters in Texas eventually recede, the cleanup and rebuilding will begin. The cleanup bill will likely be hefty — possibly topping $100 billion — and the vast majority of those efforts will be funded by the federal government. President Trump doesn't seem worried about Congress footing the bill. "You're going to see very rapid action from Congress," he told reporters Monday. "You're going to get your funding." In a visit to Austin on Tuesday, Trump met with the state's two Republican senators and again alluded to the price tag for federal help. "We'll be working with these characters over there and think we'll come through with a really, you know the right solution," the president said, adding recovery from Harvey is "going to be a costly proposition." But emergency response legislation has become increasingly partisan in recent years, and Congress is already facing a daunting stretch of must-pass bills when it returns next week. Funding for cleanup and rebuilding will likely pass — but it probably won't be easy. "I sort of see it as everyone holding their breath," Sarah Binder, a congressional expert at the Brookings Institution, said about the coming stretch of deadlines. Funding for the government expires Sept. 30. The deadline for raising the debt ceiling hits next month, too. It has been increasingly hard to round up conservative support for both measures in recent years. "It's not yet clear how exactly they're going to proceed," Binder said. "And there's the wild card of the president who has threatened to shut down the government if they don't fund a border wall." Several popular government programs expire at the end of September, too, and need reauthorization votes beforehand. That is the backdrop that urgent Harvey funding will be added to. "The federal funds are absolutely essential to recovery," says Edward Richards, director of Louisiana State University's Climate Change Law and Policy Project. Over the past six decades, the federal government has become the prime funder and driver of recovery efforts after major storms. On Tuesday night, Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao announced that her department would make $25 million "immediately available to help Texas with repairs on flood-damaged roads and bridges," following a request by the state. A statement from the secretary said the funding "represents the beginning of our commitment to help repair Texas' affected infrastructure." Richards describes federal funding as coming in three waves: first, initial grants doled out to individuals and businesses by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. After that, the National Flood Insurance Program issues billions in claims for flooded-out homes and businesses. "That is fairly swift and fairly certain money. It's the most reliable relief after a flood," Richards says. Except for this: The National Flood Insurance Program happens to be one of those federal programs that expires on Sept. 30. A spokeswoman for House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., insists that won't be a problem. "Details are still being worked through, but the flood insurance program will be reauthorized," said Ryan spokeswoman AshLee Strong in a statement. But the program has its share of critics and is still in debt because of major claims payments from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The third wave of federal funding is even more politically precarious: It's the individual relief bills Congress passes after major disasters. After Superstorm Sandy in 2012, 179 House Republicans voted against relief for the New York-New Jersey area, including several members of the Texas delegation. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz did as well, in one of his first votes after joining the Senate. Cruz has found himself defending that vote all week. "The problem with that particular bill is it became a $50 billion bill that was filled with unrelated pork," he said on MSNBC. "Two-thirds of that bill had nothing to do with Sandy. Fact-checkers disagree — and many lawmakers still remember that vote. "Ted Cruz was one of the leaders who was trying to keep New York and New Jersey and Long Island from getting the funding we needed, and now he's the first one in asking for aid to Texas," New York Rep. Peter King, a fellow Republican, told Long Island's News 12. "But as bad as I feel toward Ted Cruz — what a hypocrite he is — I'm not going to take that out on Texas." Another quote being resuscitated this week: a 2005 floor speech delivered by then-Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., warning against funding Katrina relief without cutting funding elsewhere. "Congress must ensure that a catastrophe of nature does not become a catastrophe of debt," Pence said at the time. Binder says both Cruz and Pence are good examples of a longtime legislative adage: "Where you stand depends on where you sit." In other words, changing circumstances can lead to changing opinions. To wit, the recent caveat-free promise Pence made to Houston station KTRH: "I think what you're going to see is the national government — and we anticipate the Congress — are going to make the resources available to see Texas through the rescue operation, through the recovery." House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., says Democrats are ready and willing to vote for a relief bill. And House Appropriations Chairman Rodney Frelinghuysen, R-N.J., said in a statement that "my committee stands at the ready to provide any necessary additional funding for relief and recovery." So, the measure will likely pass. The big questions are how much it will ultimately cost and how much it affects all of Congress' other must-pass bills. ||||| Thousands of people likely remain stranded, and an estimated 30,000 to 40,000 homes have been destroyed in the Houston area as Hurricane Harvey, now a tropical depression, continues to batter the Gulf Coast with torrential rains, flooding and strong winds, Harris County Judge Ed Emmett said. Interested in Hurricane Harvey? Add Hurricane Harvey as an interest to stay up to date on the latest Hurricane Harvey news, video, and analysis from ABC News. Add Interest Harvey made its third landfall, just west of Cameron, Louisiana, Wednesday at 4 a.m. CDT, with maximum sustained winds of 35 mph, according to the National Weather Service. As of 11 p.m. EDT, the slow-moving storm had picked up some speed, moving northeast at 9 mph, with its center was about 30 miles northeast of Alexandria, Louisiana. The storm was starting to fall apart overnight, with rain scattered in nature and falling over Mississippi and Arkansas. Residents in western Tennessee, around Memphis, should expect heavy rains on Thursday morning and possible flash flooding as up to 8 inches of rain are possible locally. Before that, it battered the Beaumont-Port Arthur area in southeastern Texas, dumping more than 2 feet of rain in some parts. By Wednesday evening, the storm had weakened from a tropical storm to a tropical depression. "We have people who are on the second floor of their homes. They're riding it out, and they're waiting for the waters to go down," Emmett, who is also the director of Texas' Harris County Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, said in an interview Wednesday with ABC News Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos on "Good Morning America." "We've got probably [30,000] to 40,000 homes that have been destroyed," Emmett added. Power outages in the Houston area are down to 75,000, but 32,000 of those outages are inaccessible to crews, officials said Wednesday. The brunt of the storm's impact has begun to shift to western and northern Louisiana. Now, for Harris County, "the biggest challenge is going to get people back in their homes," Emmett said. "We've got to get those people back into their normal lives as soon as possible." The Houston Airport System announced that it has lifted restrictions on commercial operations. On Saturday, Southwest Airlines will ramp up the number of flights, according to the airport system. A curfew from midnight to 5 a.m. will take effect in Houston for the second night in a row, Mayor Sylvester Turner said in a press conference. No arrests were made during Tuesday night's curfew, a spokesperson for the Houston Police Department said at the press conference. The Houston Fire Department has received about 15,000 calls for assistance, a spokesperson said Wednesday evening. The fire department will begin recovery operations in certain areas and conduct door-to-door checks of accessible homes that got more than 3 feet of water, the spokesperson said. Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo said 911 calls for water rescues were down to about 40 an hour as of this morning. Still, the Coast Guard is taking more than 1,000 calls per hour from people needing rescue. The Navy is sending two ships -- the USS Kearsarge and the USS Oak Hill -- to the Gulf of Mexico to held with storm relief efforts, it announced Wednesday. Vice President Mike Pence said on Wednesday that he will travel to Texas Thursday. "@POTUS asked me to travel to Texas tomorrow with his message: 'We will be with you every single day to restore, recover, and rebuild,'" the vice president tweeted. .@POTUS asked me to travel to Texas tomorrow with his message: "We will be with you every single day to restore, recover, and rebuild." pic.twitter.com/jQ0A9BGnPK — Vice President Pence (@VP) August 31, 2017 Harris County Flood Control District meteorologist Jeff Lidner told reporters this morning that the lowest homes near the Addicks and Barker reservoirs have 3 to 6 feet of water. Harvey, which first came ashore last Friday in Texas as a category 4 hurricane, dumped more than 51 inches of rain on some parts of the state, according to preliminary reports from the National Weather Service. The storm led to at least 31 deaths over the past five days, according to The Associated Press. Harris County officials, where Houston is located, confirmed six new deaths late Wednesday. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott -- who spoke by phone Wednesday with the president while the commander in chief was on board Air Force One, returning from Missouri -- said most of the deaths were due to people driving vehicles into high water. .@POTUS @realDonaldTrump speaks w/ Texas @GovAbbott on Air Force One - returning to Washington, D.C. from Missouri w/COS General John Kelly. pic.twitter.com/oTwxwM4VMU — Dan Scavino Jr. (@Scavino45) August 30, 2017 An undetermined number of people are missing. The Coast Guard is leading a search for two volunteer rescuers missing after their boat crashed and capsized on Cypress Creek near the North Freeway early Wednesday. Authorities found a third rescuer clinging to a tree, according to the Harris County Sheriff's Office. The Harris County Sheriff's Office urged people awaiting rescue to "hang a towel or sheet prominently" for rescuers to see because addresses are difficult to spot. Harvey is expected to weaken and continue moving to the north and east across the Lower Mississippi Valley and Tennessee Valley through Thursday. But the National Weather Service said Harvey still has the potential to cause "life-threatening flooding." "Catastrophic and life-threatening flooding continues in southeastern Texas and portions of southwestern Louisiana," the service said in an advisory this morning. "Excessive runoff from heavy rainfall will cause flooding of small creeks and streams, urban areas, highways, streets and underpasses, as well as other drainage areas and low-lying spots." The situation became serious in eastern Texas Wednesday. The National Weather Service issued a flash-flood warning for parts of southeastern Texas, including the cities of Beaumont and Port Arthur, which received more than 26 inches of rain in some areas on Tuesday alone. Port Arthur Mayor Derrick Freeman urged residents to get to higher ground in a Facebook post early Wednesday. "Our whole city is underwater right now but we are coming!" Freeman wrote in one post. "Please get to higher ground if you can, but please try stay out of attics." The largest oil refinery in the United States is shutting down because of the devastating floods. Its owner, Motiva Enterprises, announced in a statement early Wednesday that it began a "controlled shutdown of the Port Arthur refinery in response to increasing local flood conditions." The refinery won't reopen until floodwaters recede, the company said. Officials were forced to evacuate the shelter at the Bob Bower Civic Center in Port Arthur this morning after it began to fill with water. One witness, who was forced to relocate, said some areas of the center had almost 4 feet of water inside. Displaced residents were taken to a secondary evacuation site at the Carl Parker Center, according to ABC Texas affiliate KBMT-TV. The disastrous rainfall Wednesday led the National Weather Service to further extend a flash-flood emergency for the cities of Beaumont and Port Arthur until 4:30 p.m. CT in anticipation of additional rain that morning. The worst is not over for Texas, Abbott warned Wednesday. He said 24,000 National Guard troops, including all of Texas' force, have been deployed in the state and will be crucial in the weeks and months to come to help restore order. The National Guard has made 8,500 rescues, evacuated 26,000 people and done 1,400 shelter-in-place welfare checks in Texas so far. Meanwhile, there are 32,000 people in shelters throughout the state, Abbott said. Five days after Harvey first made landfall, FEMA said it's still in "life-saving, life-sustaining" mode, with recovering survivors being the top priority. FEMA Administrator Brock Long said at a news conference Wednesday that there are more than 12,000 emergency staffers on the ground in Texas and Louisiana, spread across 50 counties. The agency is operating more than 230 shelters in Texas, housing more than 30,000 people. The George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston is no longer accepting evacuees, Turner said. About 8,000 people are currently at the convention center, down from 10,000 people on Tuesday night. The city had opened up the Toyota Center as an additional shelter to ease the overcrowding at the convention center. Long said the FEMA travel trailers used after Hurricane Katrina are a "last resort" and the agency will first try to move displaced residents into local hotels before helping them clear out their inundated houses so they can return to them. FEMA has already placed more than 1,800 flood survivors in hotels, he said. The Air Force said it was providing aircraft assistance in response to Harvey, including two HC-130J Combat King IIs, three HH-60G Pave Hawks, air crews and other support personnel to College Station, Texas. Two C-17 Globemaster IIIs are carrying more than 30 tons of relief supplies to Louisiana's Alexandria International Airport. Help is also coming from overseas. Gov. Abbott said on Wednesday that Texas is accepting resources from Mexico, including boats, food and other supplies. And Israel's embassy in Washington tweeted, "A team from the Israeli Rescue Coalition will arrive in #Houston on Thursday to help victims of #HurricaneHarvey." A team from the Israeli Rescue Coalition will arrive in #Houston on Thursday to help victims of #HurricaneHarveyhttps://t.co/Wd7Kl3fs7B pic.twitter.com/rbBL0NNHWX — Embassy of Israel (@IsraelinUSA) August 30, 2017 ABC News' Max Golembo, Serena Marshall, Whitney Lloyd, Luis Martinez and Zunaira Zaki contributed to this report. Take part in Disney's Day of Giving: To support people impacted by Hurricane Harvey, call 1-855-999-GIVE, donate at www.RedCross.org/ABC or text "HARVEY" to 90999 to make a $10 donation. ||||| HOUSTON — Five days after the pummeling began — a time when big storms have usually blown through, the sun has come out, and evacuees have returned home — Tropical Storm Harvey refused to go away, battering southeast Texas even more on Tuesday, spreading the destruction into Louisiana and shattering records for rainfall and flooding. Along 300 miles of Gulf Coast, people poured into shelters by the thousands, straining their capacity; as heavy rain kept falling, some rivers were still rising and floodwater in some areas had not crested yet; and with whole neighborhoods flooded, others were covered in water for the first time. Officials cautioned that the full-fledged rescue-and-escape phase of the crisis, usually finished by now, would continue, and that they still had no way to gauge the scale of the catastrophe — how many dead, how many survivors taking shelter inland or still hunkered down in flooded communities, and how many homes destroyed. For everybody, it was another head-shaking 24 hours: • The storm made its second landfall early Wednesday morning in Louisiana, just west of the town of Cameron, the National Hurricane Center announced at 4 a.m. As Harvey moves northeast through the state scarred by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, forecasters expect it to gradually weaken and become a tropical depression by Wednesday night. • Local officials in Texas said at least 30 deaths were believed to have been caused by the storm through Tuesday, up from eight a day earlier. The dead included a Houston police officer, Sgt. Steve Perez, 60, who was caught in flooding on Sunday while trying to report for duty. “I expect that number to be significantly higher once the roads become passable,” said Erin Barnhart, the chief medical examiner for Galveston County. • The city of Houston imposed a curfew from midnight to 5 a.m., starting Tuesday night and continuing until further notice. The curfew was requested by the Houston Police Department, partly in response to reports of “small-scale looting” and other crimes, Chief Art Acevedo said at a news conference Tuesday evening. He added that the curfew would help search and rescue teams get around without interference. • Parts of the Houston area broke the record for rainfall from a single storm anywhere in the continental United States, with a top reading on Tuesday afternoon, since the storm began, of 51.88 inches in Cedar Bayou, east of Houston, the National Weather Service reported. The previous record was 48 inches in Medina, Tex., from Tropical Storm Amelia in 1978, and with the rain still falling along the Gulf Coast, Harvey could top the 52 inches recorded in Kauai, Hawaii in 1950 from Hurricane Hiki. • Houston officials had at first limited the city’s main shelter, the George R. Brown Convention Center, to 5,000 evacuees, but by Tuesday morning it had swelled to more than 9,000, with more arriving by the hour, Mayor Sylvester Turner said. By the evening, evacuated residents were setting up cots in corridors because they said the main dormitories were uncomfortably crowded. One of the people bunking at the convention center, Keimaine Percel, a mechanic, had not seen his home since it flooded, but he was trying not to think about it. “I heard it was real bad,” said Mr. Percel, 35. “I don’t know unless I get back.” The Red Cross said that in Houston alone, 17,000 people began their day Tuesday in shelters, and the numbers were rising there and in inland cities that had taken evacuees such as Dallas, San Antonio and Austin. Mr. Turner said Houston would create new shelters, Dallas opened its convention center on Tuesday as a shelter for 5,000 people, and Fort Worth said it would open shelters, as well. In the Kingwood neighborhood of Houston, people waved towels from apartment windows and yelled “we’re here” and “family of three needs help,” hoping to draw one of the volunteers piloting fishing boats, inflatable rafts and kayaks. ||||| (CNN) With countless Houstonians still awaiting rescue, Tropical Depression Harvey devoured another Texas city. The unrelenting storm unleashed its wrath on a wide swath east of Houston, leaving thousands stranded in flooded homes and forcing the evacuation of a nursing facility and even an emergency shelter where residents had sought refuge. "Our whole city is underwater right now but we are coming!" Port Arthur Mayor Derrick Freeman posted Wednesday on Facebook. "If you called, we are coming. Please get to higher ground if you can, but please try (to) stay out of attics." My uncles have been rescuing people in Port Arthur for 24hrs! So blessed to have such a helpful family who help others in times like this! pic.twitter.com/O2qIVGHqxR At least 37 deaths related to Hurricane Harvey and its aftermath have been reported in Texas. One of them, Houston police Sgt. Steve Perez , drowned while trying to get to work. "To those Americans who have lost loved ones, all of America is grieving with you and our hearts are joined with yours forever," President Donald Trump said in Springfield, Missouri. The storm left record-setting rain in Harris County -- which saw 19 deaths -- before unleashing 15 inches in the Beaumont area, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said. "While there may still be flooding, the good news is there shouldn't be any rain in the region for the next several days," said CNN Meteorologist Taylor Ward. Evacuees at the Bob Bowers Civic Center in Port Arthur face flooding again as waters rise at the shelter. Misery in Houston While heavy rains have ended in the Houston area, more danger looms. Emergency workers and throngs of volunteers went door to door for a fifth day Wednesday, trying to rescue victims of the flood. Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo said authorities have received 60,000 to 70,000 calls for help. "We just pray that the body count ... won't rise significantly." Acevedo said. The US Coast Guard is searching for two civilian rescuers who were swept away after their boat capsized Tuesday night, the Harris County Sheriff's Office tweeted Wednesday. Three volunteers were trying to cross Cypress Creek when their boat crashed and capsized, sending all three under a bridge. One of the volunteers was found clinging to a tree. JUST WATCHED Torrential downpour submerges parts of Houston Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Torrential downpour submerges parts of Houston 01:06 About one-third of the Houston area is covered in water. And it's unclear exactly how many people still need to be rescued, Texas Military Department spokesman Lt. Col. Travis Walters said. For the first time since the weekend, authorities said, the flooding in Houston is slowly receding in some areas. The Houston Astros announced they will play a doubleheader at home on Saturday against the New York Mets. The team played the Texas Rangers in St. Petersburg, Florida, earlier this week because of the hurricane. Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner said the home game will provide "a much needed boost for our city" and offer residents "some aspect of normal life." But dangerous flooding will continue from Houston all the way into southwestern Louisiana for the rest of the week, the National Weather Service said. Houses built 'inside a lake' could degrade Controversy has surrounded the placement of houses near Houston's Barker and Addicks reservoirs, especially since floodwater overflowed the latter. Residents evacuate their homes Tuesday near the Addicks Reservoir in Houston. "They allowed them to build homes inside the reservoir. And these homes are flooded -- 2,500 homes are flooded, some of them up to 5 feet deep," CNN meteorologist Chad Myers said Wednesday. "They built homes inside a lake." And those homes "will be inundated for several weeks," said Jeff Lindner with Harris County Flood Control. "The closest comparison that I can draw to those homes ... is Hurricane Katrina," Lindner said. "When water sits in a house for several weeks, the house begins to degrade." Lindner said those residents will be able to return after several weeks, but "we are not sure what the condition of those homes are going to be." He also said it's unclear whether rebuilding homes in the same area will be allowed. Louisiana weathers Harvey, Texas 'taking it on the chin' Louisiana was largely spared from Harvey's wrath on Wednesday. "While things are still serious and there is a long way to go, we ... have fared much better than we'd feared might be the case, but our neighbors are still taking it on the chin," Gov. John Bel Edwards said. "In Texas, we're going to do everything we can do to be good neighbors to them." Edwards requested a federal disaster declaration be extended to seven additional Louisiana parishes. Harvey is still threatening to dump an additional 3 to 6 inches of rain from northern Louisiana into western Kentucky, forecasters said. It weakened over land and fizzled to a tropical depression Wednesday night, with winds of 35 mph. New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu said volunteers helped New Orleans recover after Katrina and they will do the same for Texas residents affected by Harvey. New Orleans officials announced a fundraiser to help the residents of Houston and other flooded Texas cities recover from Harvey. "No city was more welcoming for the citizens of New Orleans than the people of Houston," Landrieu said. "And our heart breaks for them as they go through their trying to times." More rescues, mother dies In Beaumont, rescuers Tuesday afternoon came upon a toddler in a pink backpack clinging to her mother's body in floodwaters about a half mile from their car. The mother was getting out of her car when she stepped into a canal, Mayor Becky Ames said. The girl was in stable condition with hypothermia. "Had we been a few moments later, they would have been swept underneath (a trestle) and our boats wouldn't have been able to get them," Haley Morrow, spokeswoman for the Beaumont Emergency Management Office, told CNN on Wednesday. "A true testament of a mother who put her own life at risk and sacrificed her life to save her child. That was devastating." In Port Arthur, about 90 miles east of the devastated Houston area, the deluge was so severe that floodwaters overwhelmed the Bob Bowers Civic Center, which was serving as a shelter. It was evacuated Wednesday after taking on water overnight, according to volunteer Ana Platero. Cots where people slept the night before floated on 2 feet of water on Wednesday as people waited on tables or sat on elevated bleachers to be evacuated to a nearby middle school. At Lake Arthur Place, a nursing home in Port Arthur, rescue workers evacuated up to 74 bedridden patients after an altercation involving relatives who tried to take out loved ones on their own, CNN affiliate KTRK reported. All residents were taken to local hospitals in Beaumont, the nursing home operator said. Some Port Arthur residents sought shelter in a bowling alley. Cynthia Harmon told CNN by phone that she was trapped with her two sons and two grandsons in the attic of her Port Arthur home. They began waiting for rescuers at midnight Tuesday and had run out of food and water by Wednesday afternoon. "I didn't think the water was going to rise like that," she said. "I've never been in anything like this." The family was rescued later on Wednesday. Police made an appeal for volunteers to bring boats and help. "Rescue boats welcome in Port Arthur to assist emergency personnel," the police department posted on Facebook. The city asked anyone trapped to hang a white towel, sheet or shirt outside to alert rescuers. Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Downtown Houston is reflected in the flooded Buffalo Bayou on Wednesday, August 30, five days after Hurricane Harvey made landfall in Texas. The Category 4 storm came ashore late Friday, August 25, just north of Port Aransas, and has caused historic flooding. Correction: Previous versions of this gallery incorrectly reported that Hurricane Harvey is the strongest storm to make landfall in the United States since Wilma in 2005. Harvey is actually the strongest storm to make landfall in the United States since Charley in 2004. Hide Caption 1 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Members of the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and the Louisiana National Guard help rescue elderly people from a flooded assisted living home in Orange, Texas, on August 30. Hide Caption 2 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A baby sits with family belongings at a Gallery Furniture store in Houston being used as a temporary shelter on August 30. Hide Caption 3 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Floodwaters engulf homes in Port Arthur on August 30. Hide Caption 4 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Janice Forse cries at an emergency shelter in Beaumont on August 30. Her home in Beaumont was flooded Wednesday morning. "Even Katrina wasn't this bad," Forse told the Austin American-Statesman. Hide Caption 5 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Tammy Dominguez, left, and her husband, Christopher Dominguez, sleep on cots at the George R. Brown Convention Center, where nearly 10,000 people are taking shelter in Houston, on August 30. Hide Caption 6 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A cat tries to find dry ground around a flooded apartment complex on August 30 in Houston. Hide Caption 7 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Volunteer rescue workers help a woman from her flooded home in Port Arthur on August 30. Hide Caption 8 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas The Florida Air Force Reserve Pararescue team from the 308th Rescue Squadron helps evacuees board a helicopter in Port Arthur on August 30. Hide Caption 9 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Water from the Addicks Reservoir flows into neighborhoods in Houston as floodwaters rise Tuesday, August 29. Hide Caption 10 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Chris Gutierrez, second from right, helps his grandmother, Edelmira Gutierrez, down the stairs of their flooded house and into a waiting firetruck in the Concord Bridge neighborhood of Houston on August 29. Hide Caption 11 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Members of the National Guard rest at a furniture store in Richmond, Texas, on August 29. Hide Caption 12 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Alexis Hernandez holds her daughter Faith at the George R. Brown Convention Center, which is serving as a shelter in Houston. Hide Caption 13 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Evacuees make their way though floodwaters in Houston on August 29. Hide Caption 14 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas President Donald Trump takes part in a briefing on Harvey as he visits Corpus Christi on August 29. In a stop in Austin, Trump spoke of the long-term effort and stiff costs that will be needed to rebuild the region. "Nobody's seen this kind of water," he said. "Probably, there's never been something so expensive in our country's history." While talking about recovery and relief efforts, Trump said, "We want to do it better than ever before." Hide Caption 15 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Civilian rescuers put a boat into a flooded road to search for people in Cypress on August 29. Hide Caption 16 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Volunteers organize items donated for Hurricane Harvey victims in Dallas on August 29. Hide Caption 17 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas An overview of downtown Houston on August 29 shows the scale of the catastrophic flooding. Hide Caption 18 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Matthew Koser searches for important papers and heirlooms inside his grandfather's house in Houston's Bear Creek neighborhood on August 29. The neighborhood flooded after water was released from nearby Addicks Reservoir. Hide Caption 19 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Shane Johnson removes items from a family home in Rockport, Texas, on August 29. Hide Caption 20 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Airplanes sit at a flooded airport in Houston on August 29. Hide Caption 21 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas People set up a shelter for volunteer rescue workers at Fairfield Baptist Church in Cypress, Texas, on August 29. Hide Caption 22 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Shardea Harrison looks at her 3-week-old baby, Sarai, as Dean Mize, right, and Jason Legnon use an airboat to rescue them from their home in Houston on Monday, August 28. Hide Caption 23 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Thousands take shelter at the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston on August 28. Hide Caption 24 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Rescue boats fill Tidwell Road in Houston as they help flood victims evacuate the area on August 28. Hide Caption 25 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas People wait to be rescued from their flooded home in Houston on August 28. Hide Caption 26 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A firefighter helps Sara Golden and her daughters Paisley, Poppy and Piper board a Texas Air National Guard C-130 at Scholes International Airport in Galveston, Texas, on August 28. Hide Caption 27 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas People make their way out of a flooded neighborhood in Houston on August 28. Hide Caption 28 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Sam Speights removes possessions from his damaged home in Rockport on August 28. Hide Caption 29 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Flood victims wait to unload from the back of a heavy-duty truck after being evacuated from their homes in Houston on August 28. Hide Caption 30 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas People leave a flooded area of Houston on August 28. Hide Caption 31 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas People are rescued in Houston on August 28. Hide Caption 32 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Bridget Brundrett presents an American flag to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott while he was in Rockport on August 28. The flag had been recovered from city hall after flying during the hurricane. Hide Caption 33 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A Coast Guard helicopter hoists a wheelchair on board after lifting a person to safety from a flooded area of Houston on August 28. Hide Caption 34 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Houston flood victims eat and rest at the George R. Brown Convention Center on August 28. Hide Caption 35 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Belinda Penn holds her dogs Winston and Baxter after being rescued from their home in Spring, Texas, on August 28. Hide Caption 36 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A firefighter is wheeled to a waiting ambulance after he became fatigued while fighting an office-building fire in downtown Houston on August 28. Hide Caption 37 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas People evacuate a neighborhood in west Houston on August 28. Hide Caption 38 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Julie Martinez, right, hugs her daughter, Gabrielle Jackson, in front of a relative's damaged apartment in Rockport on August 28. Hide Caption 39 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Cattle are stranded in a flooded pasture in La Grange, Texas, on August 28. Hide Caption 40 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Volunteer rescue boats make their way into a flooded subdivision in Spring, Texas, on August 28. Hide Caption 41 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Houston police officer Daryl Hudeck carries Catherine Pham and her 13-month-old son, Aiden, after rescuing them from floodwaters on Sunday, August 27. Hide Caption 42 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas People push a stalled pickup through a flooded street in Houston on August 27. Hide Caption 43 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Residents of Rockport return to their destroyed home on August 27. Hide Caption 44 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas The Buffalo Bayou floods parts of Houston on August 27. Hide Caption 45 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Two men try to beat the current that was pushing them down an overflowing Brays Bayou in Houston on August 27. Hide Caption 46 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Jane Rhodes is rescued by neighbors in Friendswood, Texas, on August 27. Hide Caption 47 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Volunteers at Sacred Heart Catholic Church prepare cots for evacuees in Elgin, Texas, on August 27. Hide Caption 48 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Damage to a home is seen in the Key Allegro neighborhood of Rockport on August 27. Hide Caption 49 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Melani Zurawski cries while inspecting her home in Port Aransas on August 27. Hide Caption 50 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Wilford Martinez, right, is rescued from his flooded car along Interstate 610 in Houston on August 27. Assisting him here is Richard Wagner of the Harris County Sheriff's Department. Hide Caption 51 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A car is submerged by floodwaters on a freeway near downtown Houston on August 27. Hide Caption 52 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A resident of the Bayou on the Bend apartment complex watches its first floor flood in Houston on August 27. Hide Caption 53 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A city flag, tattered by the effects of Hurricane Harvey, flaps in the wind over the police station in Rockport on August 27. Hide Caption 54 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Fort Bend County Sheriff Troy Nehls and Lucas Wu lift Ethan Wu into an airboat as they evacuate the Orchard Lakes subdivision in Fort Bend County, Texas, on August 27. Hide Caption 55 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Damage is seen at a boat storage building in Rockport on August 27. Hide Caption 56 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Water rushes from a large sinkhole along a highway in Rosenberg, Texas, on August 27. Hide Caption 57 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Evacuees wade through a flooded section of Interstate 610 in Houston on August 27. Hide Caption 58 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Evacuees are loaded onto a truck on an Interstate 610 overpass in Houston on August 27. Hide Caption 59 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A graveyard is flooded in Pearland, Texas, on August 27. Hide Caption 60 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A driver works his way through a maze of fallen utility poles in Taft, Texas, on Saturday, August 26. Hide Caption 61 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Steve Culver comforts his dog Otis on August 26 as he talks about what he said was the "most terrifying event in his life." Hurricane Harvey destroyed most of his home in Rockport while he and his wife were there. Hide Caption 62 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas People walk through flooded streets in Galveston on August 26. Hide Caption 63 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Aaron Tobias stands in what is left of his Rockport home on August 26. Tobias said he was able to get his wife and kids out before the storm arrived, but he stayed there and rode it out. Hide Caption 64 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Brad Matheney offers help to a man in a wheelchair in Galveston on August 26. Hide Caption 65 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Jessica Campbell hugs Jonathan Fitzgerald after riding out Hurricane Harvey in an apartment in Rockport. Hide Caption 66 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Boats are damaged in Rockport on August 26. Hide Caption 67 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A damaged home in Rockport on August 26. Hide Caption 68 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Donna Raney makes her way out of the wreckage of her home as Daisy Graham assists her in Rockport on August 26. Raney was hiding in the shower after the roof blew off and the walls of her home caved in. Hide Caption 69 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A laundromat's machines are exposed to the elements in Rockport on August 26. Hide Caption 70 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas A semi-truck is overturned on a highway south of Houston on August 26. Hide Caption 71 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas An American flag flies in front of a damaged mobile-home park in Rockport on August 26. Hide Caption 72 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas NASA astronaut Jack Fischer photographed Hurricane Harvey from the International Space Station on Friday, August 25. Hide Caption 73 of 74 Photos: Hurricane Harvey slams Texas Waves pound the shore as Harvey approaches Corpus Christi, Texas, on August 25. Hide Caption 74 of 74 The disaster in Port Arthur is part of Tropical Storm Harvey's devastating encore. Harvey made landfall once again Wednesday morning, slamming into the Louisiana coast near the Texas border. 26 inches in 24 hours Harvey has broken the US record for rainfall from a single storm, CNN senior meteorologist Dave Hennen said. It has dumped almost 52 inches of rain in parts of Texas. The coastal cities of Beaumont and Port Arthur got pummeled with 26 inches of rain in 24 hours. "Life-threatening flash flooding continues in far east Texas around Beaumont and Port Arthur," Hennen said. Port Arthur, a city of about 55,000, is in exceptional danger because water from Beaumont is expected to flow toward it. In Beaumont, a man who accidentally drove a truck into a flooded ravine that looked like a street was rescued by CNN correspondent Drew Griffin, producer Brian Rokus and photographer Scott Pisczek on Wednesday. "I want to thank these guys for saving my life," said the driver, Jerry Sumrall. In Woodville, a town north of Beaumont, US Rep. Brian Babin was trapped for part of Wednesday at home with members of his family after a creek overflowed. "I'm in my home in Tyler County, and we could not get out unless a helicopter plucks me out or I get my boat and launch it," the Texas Republican told CNN by phone early in the day. "We're fine. These waters are going to recede hopefully sometime this evening." On Wednesday afternoon, a US Navy helicopter plucked seven people from floodwaters. 'We help each other out' Strangers from across the country descended on Texas and braved treacherous floodwater to evacuate victims. JUST WATCHED CNN crew helps rescue man from truck Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH CNN crew helps rescue man from truck 02:05 Tom Dickers is among those who came hauling boats from Dallas and San Antonio. "This is what Texans would do. We help each other out," Dickers said. At least 9,000 to 10,000 people have been rescued in the Houston region by first responders. Volunteers said they have helped as many as 400 in one day. Some would just "come crying, just wanting help," volunteer Bobba Bedri said. "I just felt like I had to get more people out, keep going and keep going." CLARIFICATION: Harvey made its first landfall at 10 p.m. local time Friday, initially striking a barrier island near Port Aransas, Texas, before moving onto the US mainland two hours later near Copano Bay, Texas. After re-emerging into the Gulf of Mexico on Monday, it made another landfall Wednesday in Louisiana. ||||| The catastrophic flooding from Hurricane Harvey is not limited to Texas, it's also affecting parts of southwest Louisiana where preparations are underway to evacuate some areas. Interested in Hurricane Harvey? Add Hurricane Harvey as an interest to stay up to date on the latest Hurricane Harvey news, video, and analysis from ABC News. Add Interest As the heavy band of rain stretches over southwest Louisiana, residents in the Lake Charles region are once again bracing for impact like they did for Hurricane Katrina 12 years ago. According to the National Weather Service, Harvey will make landfall again later early Wednesday morning as a tropical storm. Dick Gremillion, director of homeland security and preparedness, said Tuesday, "We are not going to escape this, we are going to get more rain." Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards said 671 members of the National Guard have been activated. The 15 soldiers who are stationed in New Orleans are reporting on the status of the city's drainage pumps, Edwards said. First responders have rescued about 500 people so far, and there are currently 269 people in shelters in southwest Louisiana, 200 of whom were rescued, Edwards said. While the department is not enforcing mandatory evacuations, "we strongly suggest it," especially for areas "prone to flooding," Gremillion said. Surrounding areas in southwest Louisiana have already received 10 to 20 inches of rain and another 10 to 15 inches of rain is still possible. The NWS expects major flooding in Calcasieu River, winds of 45 miles-per-hour and falling trees due to heavy rain and tornadoes. Lake Charles Mayor Nic Hunter warned residents on Tuesday that if they were concerned about homes flooding last night they should "pull the trigger today and let us help you get out." The storm could leave the area as early as Wednesday night, but extended rain bands may continue into Thursday. On Monday night, water rose to chest-high in some areas, flooding homes and forcing hundreds of evacuations in one neighborhood, according to Lake Charles Fire Department Division Chief Lennie LaFleur. Among the nearly 500 rescued, one family displaced by the rising water said they were forced to move quickly in the middle of the night to flee their flooded home. When the water rose to four feet high, a single father's four children began to blow up inflatable boats using their own breath to help their dad and grandma. The father pulled his family atop the inflatables for nearly half a mile from their home to an evacuation center. Local authorities are concerned the floodwater surrounding the shelter could continue to rise as the rain picks back up Tuesday evening. As storm forecasts show further movement into the state, Louisiana's governor is warning that "the worst is likely to come for us here." Heavy rain is developing along the south LA coast & expected to expand inland through predawn hours. Flash Flood Watch continues #LAwx #MSwx pic.twitter.com/6SJcuhqyQO — NWS New Orleans (@NWSNewOrleans) August 29, 2017 Harvey "does remain a named tropical storm and it's going to drop an awful lot of rain," Edwards said at a news conference Monday. "We do have a long way to go with this particular storm." Flash flood warnings and watches are in effect as the outer bands that have done the most damage in Houston are expected to move further inland into Louisiana by Wednesday, ABC News meteorologists said. Officials are monitoring storm surge and high tides, which could increase flooding. The storm will make landfall again the day after the 12-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. In a press conference, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu said the memories from Hurricane Katrina are "flashing back to us as the images from Houston rain down on us." "If that storm came our way, we would likely experience the same thing as Houston, if not worse," Landrieu said. Landrieu said the city of New Orleans will "never forget the incredible compassion" it received from the people of Houston. On Monday, he reactivated the NOLA Pay It Forward Fund, which raised $250,000 last year when the city of Baton Rouge was affected by widespread flooding. New Orleans public schools will be open Thursday, Landrieu said, but he asked residents to "stay alert and stay vigilant tonight" in case the storm deviates. City workers are continuing to man pump stations to get all pumps and power back, Landrieu said. The mayor asked residents to prepare to stay off the streets in the event of flash flooding. ||||| Lauren Durst holds onto her ten-month-old son, Wyatt Durst, as they evacuate from the Savannah Estates neighborhood as Addicks Reservoir nears capacity during Tropical Storm Harvey, Tuesday, Aug. 29,... (Associated Press) HOUSTON (AP) — The latest weather forecast delivered hope to Houston after five days of torrential rain submerged the nation's fourth-largest city: Less than an inch of rain and perhaps even sunshine. But the dangers remain far from over Wednesday. With at least 18 dead and 13,000 people rescued in the Houston area and surrounding cities and counties in Southeast Texas, others were still trying to escape from their inundated homes. Weakened levees were in danger of failing and a less-ferocious but still potent Harvey returned to shore, making landfall in southwestern Louisiana. The situation was dire early Wednesday in Port Arthur, Texas, near the Louisiana border, where homes were starting to fill with rising floodwaters and residents were unsure of how to evacuate the city, KFDM-TV reported. Jefferson County Sheriff Zena Stephens said county resources could not get to Port Arthur because of the flooding. Port Arthur Mayor Derrick Freeman said on his Facebook page that the "city is underwater right now but we are coming!" He also urged residents to get to higher ground and to avoid becoming trapped in attics. Authorities expected the human toll to continue to mount, both in deaths and in the tens of thousands of people made homeless by the catastrophic storm that is now the heaviest tropical downpour in U.S. history. In all, more than 17,000 people have sought refuge in Texas shelters, and that number seemed certain to increase, the American Red Cross said. Houston's largest shelter housed 10,000 of the displaced — twice its initial intended capacity — as two additional mega-shelters opened Tuesday for the overflow. Louisiana's governor offered to take in Harvey victims from Texas, and televangelist Joel Osteen opened his Houston megachurch, a 16,000-seat former arena, after critics blasted him on social media for not acting to help families displaced by the storm. In an apparent response to scattered reports of looting, a curfew was put into effect from midnight to 5 a.m., with police saying violators would be questioned, searched and arrested. A much-weakened Tropical Storm Harvey steered into new territory, coming ashore again early Wednesday just west of Cameron, Louisiana, with maximum sustained winds of 45 mph (72 kph), the National Hurricane Center said. Harvey is expected to weaken, but will slog through Louisiana for much of the day before taking its downpours north. Arkansas, Tennessee and parts of Missouri are on alert for Harvey flooding in the next couple of days. "Once we get this thing inland during the day, it's the end of the beginning," said National Hurricane Center meteorologist Dennis Feltgen. "Texas is going to get a chance to finally dry out as this system pulls out." But Feltgen cautioned: "We're not done with this. There's still an awful lot of real estate and a lot of people who are going to feel the impacts of the storm." Still, the reprieve from the rain in Houston was welcome. Eugene Rideaux, a 42-year-old mechanic who showed up at Osteen's Lakewood Church to sort donations for evacuees, said he had not been able to work or do much since the storm first hit, so he was eager to get out of his dark house and help. "It's been so dark for days now, I'm just ready to see some light. Some sunshine. I'm tired of the darkness," Rideaux said. "But it's a tough city, and we're going to make this into a positive and come together." The city has asked the Federal Emergency Management Agency for more supplies, including cots and food, for an additional 10,000 people, said Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner, who hoped to get the supplies no later than Wednesday. Four days after the storm ravaged the Texas coastline as a Category 4 hurricane, authorities and family members reported at least 18 deaths from Harvey. They include a former football and track coach in suburban Houston and a woman who died after she and her young daughter were swept into a rain-swollen drainage canal. Two Beaumont, Texas, police officers and two fire-rescue divers spotted the woman floating with the child, who was holding onto her mother. Authorities acknowledge that fatalities from Harvey could soar once the floodwaters start to recede from one of America's largest metropolitan centers. A pair of 70-year-old reservoir dams that protect downtown Houston and a levee in a suburban subdivision began overflowing Tuesday, adding to the rising floodwaters. Engineers began releasing water from the Addicks and Barker reservoirs Monday to ease the strain on the dams. But the releases were not enough to relieve the pressure after the relentless downpours, Army Corps of Engineers officials said. Both reservoirs are at record highs. The release of the water means that more homes and streets will flood, and some homes will be inundated for up to a month, said Jeff Linder of the Harris County Flood Control District. Officials in Houston were also keeping an eye on infrastructure such as bridges, roads and pipelines that are in the path of the floodwaters. Water in the Houston Ship Channel, which serves the Port of Houston and Houston's petrochemical complex, is at levels never seen before, Linder said. The San Jacinto River, which empties into the channel, has pipelines, roads and bridges not designed for the current deluge, Linder said, and the chance of infrastructure failures will increase the "longer we keep the water in place." Among the worries is debris coming down the river and crashing into structures and the possibility that pipelines in the riverbed will be scoured by swift currents. In 1994, a pipeline ruptured on the river near Interstate 10 and caught fire. After five consecutive days of rain, Harvey set a new continental U.S. record for rainfall for a tropical system. The rains in Cedar Bayou, near Mont Belvieu, Texas, totaled 51.88 inches (132 centimeters) as of Tuesday afternoon. That's a record for both Texas and the continental United States, but it does not quite surpass the 52 inches (133 centimeters) from Tropical Cyclone Hiki in Kauai, Hawaii, in 1950, before Hawaii became a state. ___ Associated Press writers Frank Bajak and Michael Graczyk in Houston, Diana Heidgerd and David Warren in Dallas, Seth Borenstein in Washington and Tammy Webber in Chicago contributed to this report. ___ Sign up for AP's daily newsletter showcasing our best all-formats reporting on Harvey and its aftermath: http://apne.ws/ahYQGtb . ||||| The ExxonMobil refinery in Baytown, Tex., in 2008. (Jessica Rinaldi/Reuters) ExxonMobil acknowledged Tuesday that Hurricane Harvey damaged two of its refineries, causing the release of hazardous pollutants. The acknowledgment, in a regulatory filing with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, follows repeated complaints on Twitter of an “unbearable” chemical smell over parts of Houston. However, it was not immediately clear what caused the smell. ExxonMobil said in the filings that a floating roof covering a tank at the company’s Baytown oil refinery sank in heavy rains, dipping below the surface of oil or other material stored there and causing unusually high emissions, especially of volatile organic compounds, a category of regulated chemicals. [Houston dam spills over while police say more than 3,500 rescued during Harvey flooding] The Baytown refinery is the second-largest in the country. The company said in its filing that it would need to empty the tank to make repairs, though it wasn’t clear when the weather would permit that. An ExxonMobil spokeswoman said the company would “conduct an assessment to determine the impact of the storm once it is safe to do so.” It would not say what was in the tank. At the company’s Beaumont petrochemical refinery, Harvey damaged a sulfur thermal oxidizer, a piece of equipment that captures and burns sulfur dioxide. As a result, the plant released 1,312.84 pounds of sulfur dioxide, well in excess of the amounts allowed by the company’s permits. “The unit was stabilized. No impact to the community has been reported,” the company said in its filing. “Actions were taken to minimize emissions and to restore the refinery to normal operations.” A variety of other chemicals was emitted during the shutdown of the plants. Amy Graham, a spokeswoman for the Environmental Protection Agency, said that ExxonMobil had filed a report at the National Response Center operated by the U.S. Coast Guard saying the Baytown refinery would release about 15 pounds of benzene into the air. “Most of the unauthorized emissions come from the process of shutting down, and then starting up, the various units of the plant, when pollution control devices can’t be operated properly and there’s lots of flaring,” said Luke Metzger, director of the group Environment Texas. Flaring is generally done when releasing chemicals without burning them is more hazardous for people and the environment. ExxonMobil said it had flared hazardous materials at its Baytown refinery Sunday and Monday. Most of the other facilities belonging to major companies also filed notices with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. Chevron Phillips, for example, said that it expected its Cedar Bayou chemical plant to exceed permitted limits for several hazardous pollutants, such as 1,3-butadiene, benzene and ethylene, during shutdown procedures. Environment Texas and the Sierra Club sued ExxonMobil in 2010 alleging that the company’s Baytown complex had emitted 8 million pounds of hazardous chemicals over a five-year period. A federal judge imposed a $20 million penalty on the company. “Any release of carcinogens (like benzene, 1,3-butadiene) adds to the increased cancer risk for those living near these plants,” Metzger said in an email. He said that large releases of nitrogen oxides or sulfur dioxide “and other respiratory irritants adds to the respiratory problems people in the area suffer from at high rates.” Separately, the Houston Chronicle reported that there was a chemical leak from a pipeline that ruptured in La Porte, Texas on Monday. Local authorities urged residents to stay inside. The warning applied to people living as far away as Shoreacres and Baytown. The warning was later lifted. The Energy Department said that all six oil refineries in the Corpus Christi area, seven oil refineries in the Houston and Galveston area, and one refinery in the Beaumont/Port Arthur area were shut down or in the process of shutting down. The idle refineries have a capacity of 3.2 million barrels a day, equal to a third of Gulf coast capacity and 17.6 percent of total U.S. refining capacity. Further closures are likely as the storm moves east into Louisiana, where there is another 1.65 million barrels a day of oil refining capacity. The logjam of tankers and trucks was adding to woes. Valero, which had closed its two refineries in the Corpus Christi area, said it was looking to reopen the facilities but that damaged pipeline, port and transportation infrastructure could delay re-openings. Bloomberg News reported that Marathon said it was closing its Galveston Bay refinery because it was running out of crude, which could not be delivered because of port closures. Gasoline prices for September delivery also rose amid signs that the Gulf’s woes could spread. The Colonial Pipeline, the main link between the heart of the nation’s oil and gas industry and consumers in the northeast, said that supplies of refined petroleum products from the Houston area had been disrupted. Read more about Hurricane Harvey: Where Harvey is hitting hardest, 80 percent lack flood insurance Houston is experiencing its third ‘500-year’ flood in 3 years. How is that possible? Hurricane Harvey shows how we underestimate flooding risks in coastal cities, scientists say |||||

– Harvey has made landfall again, this time as a tropical storm near the Louisiana-Texas border on the day after the 12th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. ABC News reports the storm came ashore just west of Cameron, La., around 5am ET, with CNN noting that winds of roughly 40mph and a storm surge of 2 to 4 feet are expected. NOAA's public advisory now predicts another 3 to 6 inches of rain in southwestern Louisiana, the eastern Texas border area, and western Kentucky through Friday, with some areas getting as many as 10 inches. But as one National Hurricane Center meteorologist puts it, it's not the end, but the "end of the beginning": Per NOAA, "While the threat of heavy rains has ended in the Houston/Galveston area, catastrophic and life-threatening flooding will continue in and around Houston eastward into southwest Louisiana for the rest of the week." More: The AP describes things as "dire" in Port Arthur, Texas, near the Louisiana border, on Wednesday morning, as rising floodwaters inundated homes. Port Arthur Mayor Derrick Freeman said on his Facebook page that the "city is underwater right now but we are coming!" The AP also suggests some potential relief, at least from the rain, for Houston, with expected rainfall for Wednesday at less than an inch. People reports on one of Harvey's victims: a 41-year-old mother from Beaumont, Texas, who police say "absolutely" saved the life of her 3-year-old daughter; the child was found floating in a canal with her mother after the two became stuck while driving. "The baby also had a backpack that was helping her float on her back and she was holding on to her mom," says an officer. Add this to Harvey's toll: two ExxonMobil refineries, which sustained storm-related damage that facilitated the release of pollutants. The Washington Post has the details on the damage at the Baytown oil refinery, America's second-biggest, and the Beaumont petrochemical refinery. NPR explains that the cleanup bill for Harvey could be as much as $100 billion, and while Congress will likely approve the funding needed, "it probably won't be easy." It explains why, and the waves in which the funding would be issued. The New York Times reports that a 12am to 5am curfew is now in place in Houston, and came partly in response to reports of "small-scale looting." The Times puts the death toll at no less than 30. A longtime Houston cop is among the dead.

A City Council Attendee Just Rushed Mayor Ted Wheeler With A Pepsi This was probably unavoidable. It was also super uncomfortable. Toward the end of this morning's City Council meeting, as the body was taking up an ordinance that would allow Portland Parks and Recreation to more easily tow boats left on city docks, a man rushed Ted Wheeler and handed him a Pepsi. The man identified himself as Carlos Enrique (spelling unclear), and said he was a former journalist for the Boston Herald (the Herald says he's not, according to OPB, which isn't much of a surprise). He described being new to town, and struck by the abuse that city council members face. "I'm very surprised how there's so many people who show up to city council and just kind of like get angry at you and yell at you and stuff like that," he said. "It made me kind of wonder how could someone just endure people coming and berating you every week.... What I realized is that the language of resistance has not been properly translated to you. So this is for you." In a tense moment, Enrique got up, approached Wheeler, reached into his black jacket, and pulled out a Pepsi. Council members appeared thoroughly freaked out—even after the joke became apparent. "Whoa whoa whoa, not a good move," said Wheeler, who eventually laughed when he realized what had happened. "Don't do that again. Not a smart move. I do appreciate it but don't do that again. For your own safety don't do that... If this were the Boston City Council that would have ended differently." Here's the video. Safety and order, of course, have been a theme at City Council of late. Security guards now check people's bags before they come into meetings, and last week Wheeler's office even printed out tickets people were handed to attend. Prior to the Pepsi incident, the meeting had been largely free of disruption (though not without tributes to Quanice Hayes, the 17-year-old killed by Portland police in February). There's no way you don't get what Enrique was up to at this point, but just in case, here's yesterday's infamous Pepsi ad, featuring Kendall Jenner spontaneously joining a cheesy fake protest and handing an officer a soda. Wheeler is the city's police commissioner, and has taken the brunt of citizen anger for the Portland Police Bureau's forceful response to protests lately. ||||| Story highlights Man approaches Portland, Oregon, mayor with a Pepsi at a City Council meeting Move comes as Pepsi yanks controversial ad featuring Kendall Jenner as protester (CNN) Turns out Pepsi isn't a panacea for everything. Taking a page out of Kendall Jenner's book, a protester approached the mayor of Portland, Oregon, on Wednesday night, hand in pocket, before eventually pulling out a can of Pepsi. The move came the same day that Pepsi pulled a controversial ad in which Jenner ditches a photo shoot to join a street protest and then gives a Pepsi to a police officer. "Woah, woah, woah, not a good move, not a good move," Mayor Ted Wheeler said as the man stood up during a City Council meeting and approached the bench where Wheeler and other officials sat. The man was quickly approached by security and ushered out of the meeting. Read More ||||| A man walked up to Mayor Ted Wheeler and handed him a can of Pepsi at Wednesday's City Council meeting. (Photo: YouTube, KGW) PORTLAND, Ore. – In a very topical gesture, a man attending Wednesday’s Portland City Council meeting approached the commissioners and handed Mayor Ted Wheeler a Pepsi. It didn’t end like the commercial. Watch the video (starts at the 2:51 mark) The man identified himself as Carlos Enrique, a former journalist for the Boston Herald. He said he had just recently moved to Portland and was surprised at the number of angry people at Portland City Council meetings. In recent months, several city council meetings were delayed or shut down by protesters. Some commissioners voiced concerns about safety. “It made me kind of wonder, how could someone just endure people coming and berating you every week?” He said to Mayor Wheeler. “The language of the resistance has not been properly translated to you. So this is for you.” That’s when Enrique stood up, walked up to the commissioners, reached into his pocket, and handed Wheeler a can of Pepsi. The man was quickly escorted away. “Not a smart move. Thank you. I do appreciate it, but don’t do that again,” Wheeler said, chuckling. "If this were the Boston City Council that would have ended differently." The gifted can of soda was a reference to the same gesture at the end of a universally panned Pepsi ad released by the soda giant Tuesday. The ad stars model Kendall Jenner and shows her leaving a photo shoot to join a protest march, where she gives a police officer a Pepsi and seemingly creates a truce between protesters and police. Critics the world over said the ad was extremely insensitive and tone-deaf. Pepsi apologized Wednesday and announced it was pulling the ad after widespread criticism. © 2017 KGW-TV ||||| The interactive transcript could not be loaded. Rating is available when the video has been rented. This feature is not available right now. Please try again later. |||||

– A man has proved just how ridiculous it is to think that a can of soda can defuse a tense situation, as Pepsi's ridiculed ad would suggest. At a city council meeting in Portland, Ore., on Wednesday, a man identifying himself as Carlos Enrique addressed Mayor Ted Wheeler, who is also the city's police commissioner and has instituted new safety measures in response to angry protesters appearing at recent meetings, per KGW. Enrique told Wheeler he was amazed he could "endure people coming and berating you every week," per the Portland Mercury. "What I realized is that the language of resistance has not been properly translated to you. So this is for you," Enrique said, before walking up to Wheeler with a hand in his jacket. Rather than crack a smile like the officer in Pepsi's yanked ad, Wheeler appeared alarmed as Enrique reached inside and pulled out a can of Pepsi. After setting the Pepsi in front of Wheeler, Enrique pulled out a second soda for himself, though he didn't have time to take a sip before security officers approached him. "Whoa whoa whoa, not a good move," Wheeler said. Once it was clear that no one's safety was at risk, Wheeler did have a good laugh at the joke. But he also warned others in attendance not to approach the dais "for your own safety," the Mercury reports. "If this were the Boston City Council that would have ended differently," he added. "Turns out Pepsi isn't a panacea for everything," quips CNN.

My name is Julie, I'm 28, female, and live in Clearwater, Florida, USA. And Cholinergic Urticaria has destroyed my life completely. I developed it exactly 3 years ago, in March 2013. After 3 years of physical and mental torture, pain, stress, anguish, heartache, no income, no help, no support, and no cure, I'm not sure how much more a person is expected to suffer daily like this. I've lost everything. I can't take it anymore and I'm begging for help. I've lost everything. Please. I've lived in Florida for eight and a half years now. Three years ago, in March 2013, I was working at a gymnastics gym for my fourth year in a row, and I was also a dance teacher. And I loved my life. And out of nowhere, I developed a rare skin condition called Cholinergic Urticaria. I am allergic to my own sweat. (And tears.) Me, out of all people. Someone who was so physically active everyday. And loved being out in the sun. I had to quit my jobs; my passions. And having my passions just stripped from me out of the blue one day, along with my whole life as I knew it, I cannot describe to you the depths of depression that exist when your life is just, taken from you. And you may think, 'oh big deal' but you dont realize how much your body sweats until you become allergic to it. I would say its one step shy of being allergic to breathing or blinking! Bodily functions you have no control over. And to add insult to injury, when you get sick, you find out who your true friends are. And that turned out to be nobody, sadly. People tell me to move up North, hah! As if that would make a difference. I get hives trying to shower. I break out if I even try to vacuum, in air conditioning! And the hives have gotten worse with each passing year. I've had times where 100% of my body is covered in painful itchy hives. It is very hard to find any doctor who has even heard of CU. And I have no medical insurance, so it's usually anywhere from $200 to $350 (US dollars) to make a new patient appointment. And every medication, lotion, or remedy I've found online, does absolutely nothing to treat it. When I try to find answers online it usually just says, "there has been very little research on CU since it is such a rare condition." And for two and a half years now, I have applied for government, social security disability benefits/assistance, and I have been denied each time. Justice for all, right? I guess not. The judge stated that, "This does not affect my daily life." Are you kidding me? This has DESTROYED my life! It has destroyed me too. I stopped living three years ago. Our judicial system in the US is so blind if they cannot see how obvious it is, that someone with CU is unable to perform daily tasks like a healthy person can, or work a normal job. Though I continue to be denied for my legal right for help? Isn't this why the Americans with Disabilities Act was established? To help people like me, who have worked hard my entire life since the day I was legally able to? That's ten years of my life that I have put in hard work wherever I was employed. And I'm a perfectionist so I really did work myself to the bone at every job I ever had, even though I received such little in return for my efforts. I know ten years is not a very long time, but I have no control over when I developed my disabilities. Yes, I have more illnesses than just CU and it's an everyday struggle. Especially because nobody has ever reached out a hand to help me. Even though I am now facing homelessness. I am outraged at our legal system here in the US, which is why I have turned to the internet now for help. When I went to trial to fight for my disability income rights, I was forced to go without representation, and was denied. I didn't know that I had any other option at the time because the judge said that they will not reschedule a new trial. So I feel I was taken advantage, because I was told I could either proceed without a lawyer, or simply be denied. And I had been waiting years for this court date, and both my lawyers didn't bother to show up. Not a single person in that courtroom told me there was any other option other than waiving my right to an attorney in order to proceed with the trial. But, now that I spoke to a real, legit lawyer, I am well aware how unfairly I was treated in my trial process. Because in the US, it is a Constitutional right that you are guaranteed representation for any trial. I also wasn't allowed to submit pictures. In fact, I couldn't even go up to the judge and show him my arms covered in hives, because he wasn't even in the room! He was on a screen via skype! And the only medical records they obtained were from the free clinic, (which is a joke) that contained so much false information that it sent me into a panic attack! (For example, it said I went back to work, I never went back to work!) I have not worked in three years because it is physically impossible for me. I wake up covered in hives everyday, even though I have the air conditioner on. I have layed in bed for the last three years straight to avoid sweating, and it breaks my heart every single day. I miss my old life so much. One without itching and without pain. I even dream about it. But when I wake up, only then does it turn into a nightmare. To know that my life will never be rhe same again. These everyday hives are so unbearable that I scratch my skin open and still continue to scratch because it just itches so bad. And after laying in bed all day everyday for 3 years now, I can barely stand or walk for more than a minute or two. My back has just given out. Especially since I went from being 100lbs to 200lbs from being almost completely immobile, unable to exercise, and so severely depressed that I cope with food. There is also added anxiety due to a number of things, one being that an allergist believes I can go into anaphylactic shock at any moment and die. But I can't afford an epi-pen. It saddens me so much to think about my life 3 years ago, compared to what Ive become now. Im unrecognizable. So I also developed Agoraphobia. Which means I almost never leave my apartment. Only for doctor appointments. Because when I see myself in store glass windows or doors, I can't even believe it's me. And people can be so cruel. People have made horrible comments about my weight gain, and it makes me feel worthless. And people have physically moved away from me in the store because they think I have some kind of contagious rash. It makes me feel like I'm some kind of monster. I went from being an outgoing, friendly, happy person, to someone who, has cried everyday for three years, has no friends or family, and never leaves my apartment. No man wants me once I tell them about my CU. It's like I'm damaged goods. I went from being a gymnast and a dancer, to not being able to walk through the grocery store, during the day, without receiving hurtful stares. It is just as emotionally painful as it is physically. I am a great person, and in this shallow, media infused society that we live in, we are judged by our looks. No matter how amazing of a person we might be. I am screaming out for help and no one even bats an eyelash. At least if I was approved for disability assistance I could stop eating free meals at the churches and wouldn't be facing homelessness. I am scared to death of what is going to happen to me because of that fact that I cannot work and therefore cannot afford the cost of living. And the thought of living on the streets of Florida in 100+F temperatures, just makes me start to panick. Just imagining how severe my hives would get, I would probably die. But which one sounds better to you? Death or living in Hell everyday? Im not suicidal, but just how much is a person supposed to take living like this everyday? I'm at my three year mark, and I'm at my breaking point both mentally and physically. Can anyone help me? ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. ||||| A Florida woman is speaking out about her rare condition, which has left her unable to leave the house during the day. Julie Reid said she developed a devastating immunological condition called cholinergic urticaria, which causes her skin to become hypersensitive to emotional stress and exercise. If she sweats, cries or simply takes a hot shower. "It's torture living like this, it's torture," Reid said in an interview with ABC's Tampa Bay affiliate WFTS. "I just feel like a monster now." She said she developed the immunological condition three years ago when she was working at a gymnastics gym. On a website to draw attention to her case, Reid said she has gained significant amount of weight and had to quit her job because the sweat would cause her to break out in massive hives for hours or days. She told WFTS she doesn't leave the house during the day over fear she could sweat and break out into hives. "I went from being a gymnast and a dancer, to not being able to walk through the grocery store, during the day, without receiving hurtful stares," Reid said on her website. "It is just as emotionally painful as it is physically." Reid could not be immediately reached by ABC News for further comment. The disease often comes on spontaneously, according to the National Organization for Rare Diseases, and doctors can only offer supporting medications such as antihistamines to patients. The disease will usually stop just as suddenly as it started, though there is no timeline for when it might end, according to the organization. "I cannot describe to you the depths of depression that exist when your life is just, taken from you," Reid said on her website. You don't "realize how much your body sweats until you become allergic to it. I would say it's one step shy of being allergic to breathing or blinking!" Reid said without a job she has had difficulty paying for doctors appointments and has become depressed about her inability to return to her old life. "I'm allergic to myself," she said. ||||| CLEARWATER, Fla - Julie Reid doesn't recognize her face in the mirror. "It's torture living like this, torture," Reid said. The 28-year-old Clearwater transplant suffers from Cholinergic Urticaria, a rare hypersensitive skin condition that causes her to break out in hives all over her body because she is allergic to her own sweat and tears. The hives can last anywhere from an hour to several days. It is a condition that came on suddenly two years ago. "It itches like crazy, I scratch my skin open," Reid said. Her condition came on without warning. Now Reid, who made a living as a gymnastics and dance instructor, can now longer follow her passion. Being outside is not possible either. The Florida heat and sun are just too much for her. "Any physical activity I do, I develop hives everywhere," she said. Reid told ABC Action News she slipped into a deep depression and struggles to get out of bed. Over the past three years, she has put on more than 100 pounds. She admits she's turned to eating food to cope with her condition. "I used to be so beautiful, now I look like a monster," she added. Reid has not left her apartment during the daytime hours in the past three years. She claims she has developed agoraphobia and fears to leave the house and deal with public scrutiny. "I just stay in bed and cry and cry," she said. Unable to work, she's lost her health insurance. She says she's also been denied disability. "It's destroyed my life. I have no, I have nothing, I have nothing, no friends, no furniture, no help, no family here," she said. She spends hours online searching for a cure but her condition is not curable. According to Reid, one doctor who previously treated her told her she could go into anaphylactic shock and requires an Epipen. She can't get it because she cannot afford it. Reid has no furniture in her apartment. She's sold it all to try and make ends meet and to pay for doctor visits. Fearful of her mental condition and emotional state, Reid reached out to ABC Action News for help. She is hoping someone out there will see her story and help her. She has documented her journey with a personal website, click here to view it. |||||

– A 28-year-old Florida woman says her life has been destroyed by horrible allergies. But it's not pollen, cats, or peanuts she's allergic to; it's her own sweat and tears. "You don't realize how much your body sweats until you become allergic to it," Julie Reid writes on her blog. "I would say it's one step shy of being allergic to breathing or blinking." Reid, a gymnastics and dance instructor, was diagnosed with a rare condition called cholinergic urticaria three years ago, ABC News reports. People with the condition, which comes on for seemingly no reason, have overly sensitive skin that reacts to sweat, tears, and even hot showers. According to WFTS, the painfully itchy hives Reid breaks out in can last for days on end; her blog features graphic pictures. Since developing cholinergic urticaria, Reid has lost her job and gained more than 100 pounds. She says she can't go the store without getting horrible looks due to her hives. "I used to be so beautiful; now I look like a monster," she tells WFTS. "I just stay in bed and cry and cry." Reid says the Florida heat makes going out during the day impossible anyway. She says she's depressed and barely bothers to get out of bed anymore. "It's torture living like this," she says. The condition is known to disappear as spontaneously as it comes, though there is no timeline. Doctors can provide antihistamines, but without a job or health insurance, Reid has a hard time paying for appointments. She's hoping her plight will bring more attention—and hopefully a cure—to cholinergic urticaria. (Some people are allergic to vibrations, and scientists now think they know why.)

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– Ever done something you wished you could take back? Like accidentally sent an email to 33,000 Thomson Reuters employees? That's what some guy named Vince apparently did yesterday, flooding inboxes and setting off a "reply all" chain that some say slowed down Reuters email and provided the Internet with Twitter gold, the Wall Street Journal reports. Some tweets using the #ReutersReplyAllGate hashtag expressed frustration at the hundreds of reply-all emails asking people to stop replying to all, while others used the chaos to grab their 15 minutes of fame (being listed in the "to" field) and laugh at the inherent inanity of it all. "Should I just start live tweeting every single reply?" one recipient wondered, while another called for extraordinary assistance, imploring, "Any Super Hero currently in the U.S. Your help is needed to stop this email chain." But as the debacle continues to generate fresh reply-all emails this morning, what's happened to poor Vince? One Reuters worker remains concerned, tweeting, "Where is Vince? Hope he's ok! #ReutersReplyAllGate #prayforvince." (Gmail users need not make Vince's mistake.)

Former lottery computer programmer Eddie Tipton, center, speaks during his sentencing hearing, Tuesday, Aug. 22, 2017, at the Polk County Courthouse in Des Moines, Iowa. Judge Brad McCall sentenced Tipton... (Associated Press) DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A former lottery computer programmer who admitted to rigging computers to enable him to pick winning numbers and cheat four states out of $2.2 million in several lottery games over six years was sentenced to up to 25 years in prison in Iowa on Tuesday. "I regret my actions and I'm sorry for the people I hurt," said Eddie Tipton, 54, the former information technology manager for the Multi-State Lottery Association, a central Iowa organization that provides number-picking computers for lotteries in 33 states the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Tipton's voice quivered when asked by Judge Brad McCall to speak during the sentencing hearing. After McCall issued the sentence, Tipton was handcuffed and taken away by sheriff's deputies. Under Iowa law, Tipton is likely to serve far less than 25 years — probably between three and five years, said Iowa Assistant Attorney General Rob Sand, who prosecuted the case. The Iowa Board of Parole will ultimately determine how long he's behind bars. "I think when you're an insider who abuses your position of trust and privilege you should expect to see the inside of a jail cell," Sand said. Tipton's attorney asked McCall to give Tipton probation in Iowa, arguing his client was unfairly being treated far more harshly than other people involved in the scheme. As part of his plea deal, Tipton also admitted to committing theft by fraud and a computer crime in Wisconsin, where he'll be sentenced Sept. 18. The agreement allows him to serve his Wisconsin sentence — likely to be three to four years — at the same time he serves the Iowa prison sentence. Tipton also agreed to repay the $2.2 million to the four states from which he rigged games and jackpots were paid, but he told McCall it's unclear how he will get the money. He said he hopes to study ministry and get a job in that field after prison. "Hopefully you're going to get rid of that greed and gain a little common sense during your prison stay," McCall said. Tipton helped write the computer code behind several U.S. lottery games, including some of its biggest including Powerball, Mega Millions and Hot Lotto. He worked for the lottery association from 2003 until 2015 and was its computer information security director for his last two years there. Tipton admitted in June to installing code that prompted the computers to produce predictable numbers only on certain days. Tipton said he gave the numbers to his brother, Tommy Tipton, and longtime friend Robert Rhodes and others to play and often split the winnings with them. Tommy Tipton is serving a 75-day jail sentence in Texas after pleading guilty to a theft charge. Rhodes is expected to get probation when he's sentenced on Aug. 25 for a computer crime charge. The games Eddie Tipton fixed included Colorado Lotto in November 2005, Megabucks in Wisconsin in December 2007, 2by2 in Kansas and Hot Lotto in Iowa in December 2010, and Hot Lotto in Oklahoma in November 2011. Iowa Lottery officials became suspicious and never paid the jackpot when Tipton and Rhodes tried to cash a $14 million Iowa Hot Lotto ticket bought in 2010. "Eddie Tipton had the keys to the kingdom and those are the things we changed immediately to make sure any equipment he touched was removed and we continue to look ahead and make sure we have those checks and balances as we proceed," Iowa Lottery CEO Terry Rich said. ___ Follow David Pitt on Twitter at https://twitter.com/davepitt ___ Sign up for the AP's weekly newsletter showcasing our best reporting from the Midwest and Texas: http://apne.ws/2u1RMfv ||||| CLOSE Eddie Tipton apologizes for his role in an Iowa Lottery scam before being sentenced to 25 years in prison. Michael Zamora/The Register Buy Photo Eddie Tipton at his sentencing Aug. 22, 2017 in Polk County on charges of lottery fraud. (Photo: Michael Zamora/The Register)Buy Photo Eddie Tipton, the Iowa security chief who masterminded a multi-state lottery fraud that shook the industry, will spend up to 25 years in prison for rigging “random” drawing jackpots. "I certainly regret" what happened, Tipton said in Polk County District Court before his sentencing, where some of his former coworkers sat in the courtroom. "It’s difficult even saying that with all the people I know behind me that I hurt, and I regret it. I’m sorry." It's uncertain how many years Tipton will actually spend in prison. He could be paroled within three or four years, his attorneys noted. District Court Judge Brad McCall told Tipton before handing down the sentence that he has no doubt about the former Iowa Lottery employee's intelligence. He advised Tipton to use his prison time to reflect on his actions. “It is indeed unfortunate that you did not use that intelligence to prosper by legal means," District Court Judge Brad McCall said. "Instead you chose an illegal path." Tipton, 54, was a longtime computer programmer in the Iowa offices of the Multi-State Lottery Association who installed software that allowed him to manipulate winning numbers in some of the nation’s most popular lottery drawings. His scam began to unravel following unsuccessful attempts to anonymously collect a $16.5 million Hot Lotto ticket that was purchased at a Des Moines convenience store in 2010. In addition to Iowa, Tipton admitted to fixing games in Colorado, Wisconsin, Kansas and Oklahoma with the help of his brother and former Texas judge Tommy Tipton and Texas businessman Robert Rhodes. Register investigation: Iowa Lottery takes a pass on fixes to stop cheaters. Blame the money, critics say After years of investigation, Eddie Tipton was arrested in 2015 and ultimately pleaded guilty in June to three felony charges related to the crimes. As part of a plea deal, the Tipton brothers are to pay back $3 million in restitution. After his first illegal win in 2005, Tipton launched construction on a 4,800-square-foot home outside of Des Moines that contained a movie theater and gym, overlooked a pond and sat on 22 acres, court documents show. The scam spread to at least six more games across five states, netting more than $2 million, investigators alleged. Tipton admitted his role as part of a plea deal to resolve charges in all the states. CLOSE Since 1985, the Iowa Lottery has generated more than $1.7 billion in profits. Here's a look at some key statistics and how it works in Iowa. Wochit His attorney, Dean Stowers, argued his Iowa sentence should be suspended because Eddie Tipton still stands to be sentenced in Wisconsin under an agreement in which he will spend three or four years in prison. In the end, the Iowa sentence was inconsequential since the terms will be served concurrently, Stowers said. Tommy Tipton is serving a 75-day jail sentence in Texas after he pleaded guilty in June to conspiracy to commit theft by deception. Rhodes, of Sugar Land, Texas, pleaded guilty to a computer crime and will be sentenced Friday. Stowers said he doesn't believe sufficient safeguards have been put into place to prevent similar types of lottery fraud. He blamed lottery investigators for going years without identifying the fraud committed by his client. "… the lack of interest in actually examining the program being used to pick these numbers is kind of alarming, really," Stowers said. Police and prosecution will always be criticized, Assistant Iowa Attorney General Rob Sand, the prosecutor on the case said following Tuesday's sentencing. "The criticism is fine," Sand said. "…We kept working. We didn't get discouraged when we hit roadblocks. Right now we're at the end of the day and we got our man." A Register investigation of the Iowa Lottery earlier this year found that some of the system's most frequent winners are retail employees who sell tickets, with one winning prizes of $600 or more at least 53 times since 2012. The Register also documented multiple cases where people convicted of lottery fraud were allowed to keep their winnings, sometimes amounting to tens of thousands of dollars. While the Iowa Lottery has taken steps to make fixes recommended by the Iowa Ombudsman, some key issues remain. That includes a recommended ban against retail lottery employees playing the lottery in stores where they work and prohibiting those convicted of fraud from winning in the future. As the law stands now, Eddie Tipton could claim future Iowa Lottery prizes, even though the winnings would be highly scrutinized by investigators, lottery officials acknowledged Tuesday. Iowa Lottery CEO Terry Rich credits his staff for calling the alert to the Hot Lotto scam when they refused to pay the $16.5 million ticket won in 2010. Players recognize the Iowa Lottery's commitment to player integrity, he said. "Our sales have continued to grow and be record breaking across the board, and part of that I think is the transparency," Rich said. Read or Share this story: http://dmreg.co/2xpH1Eh ||||| A former lottery worker was sentenced to 25 years in prison on Tuesday for rigging the system in several states so he could collect the jackpots. Eddie Tipton, former security director of the Multistate Lottery Association, received the maximum sentence from an Iowa judge, who mentioned Tipton's "greed" in his sentencing. "I certainly regret my actions," Tipton told the court. "It's difficult even saying that with all the people that I know behind me that I hurt." Tipton pleaded guilty in June to a charge of ongoing criminal conduct for a scheme involving seven lottery tickets in five states, according to court documents. He admitted to rigging computer codes to produce winning numbers -- netting Tipton and his accomplices millions of dollars. Tipton has agreed to pay about $2.2 million in restitution, including $1.1 million to the Colorado lottery, $644,000 to the Oklahoma lottery, $391,000 to the Wisconsin lottery and $30,000 to the Kansas lottery. Related: Powerball jackpot hits $700 million When Judge Brad McCall asked him on Tuesday how he intended to repay the money, Tipton said, "Initially, I really don't know." Tipton's lawyer said he expects his client will serve three to four years before being released. "Mr. Tipton is pleased get this chapter behind him and to move on with his life," Dean Stowers said in an email to CNNMoney. He had asked the judge for a suspended sentence. Tipton was formerly a programmer with the Multistate Lottery Association, the agency that administers state lotteries. He designed and maintained software "for computerized random number generators used to select winning lottery numbers in many states across the country," according to the office of Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller. Tipton, who lives in Texas, is accused of buying lottery tickets in various states, including Iowa, and selecting numbers that he knew would win, since he designed the program that generated the winning numbers. Tipton then gave these tickets to third parties who agreed to cash them and split the money with him. Related: Biggest lottery jackpots in U.S. history One of these accomplices was his brother, Tommy Tipton, authorities said. The investigation against the Tipton brothers began in 2010, with a suspicious claim for a $14.3 million Hot Lotto jackpot in Iowa that lottery officials refused to pay. The Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation traced Tipton's scheme to other states as well. Eddie Tipton made a deal with prosecutors in June, in which he pleaded guilty to the Iowa charge of ongoing criminal conduct. Prosecutors dropped a charge of money laundering. He will be allowed to serve the Iowa sentence concurrently with a sentence of up to five-and-a-half years in Wisconsin, where he pleaded guilty to theft by fraud and computer crime. Iowa Assistant Attorney General Robert Sand said in a news conference after the sentencing that investigators were certain they had uncovered all Tipton's rigged jackpots. "The fact that he's going to spend years of his life in prison is appropriate," he said. Tipton's brother Tommy Tipton, a former judge in Texas, is currently serving a 75-day sentence in Texas for a misdemeanor theft charge and deferred judgment on a felony charge of conspiracy to commit theft. The Tiptons' friend Robert Rhodes, who also lives in Texas, was the one who attempted to redeem the $14.3 million jackpot. He has pleaded guilty to fraud and will be sentenced on Friday. |||||

– An ex-lottery computer programmer who rigged the system in several states to enable himself to win $2.2 million in jackpots is going to prison. An Iowa judge sentenced Eddie Tipton, 54, to up to 25 years in prison on Tuesday, though the Des Moines Register reports he could be paroled in as few as three due to Iowa law. "I certainly regret" what happened, Tipton told Judge Brad McCall, who cited Tipton's "greed" in handing down the maximum sentence. As part of the deal, Tipton agreed to pay $2.2 million in restitution to state lotteries in Colorado, Oklahoma, Wisconsin, and Kansas; he was also accused of fixing games in Iowa, where he tried and failed to cash in a $16.5 million Hot Lotto ticket in 2010. When the judge asked him how he intended to pay the money back, Tipton said, per CNN, "Initially, I really don't know." As the information technology manager of the Multi-State Lottery Association, Tipton had access to computers that picked winning numbers in lotteries such as Powerball and Mega Millions in more than 30 states and US territories. He pleaded guilty in June to writing computer code that produced winning numbers on certain days; he then fed those numbers to accomplices, including his brother, who bought lottery tickets. The team then split the winnings. Tipton "had the keys to the kingdom," the Iowa lottery CEO tells the AP, noting that "checks and balances" have been added to secure the drawings. (This man traveled 1,000 miles to claim winnings in a lottery scam.)

Darrow Montgomery Recent comments by an up-and-coming District pol have some observers asking: What was he thinking? Last Friday morning, as light snow fell on D.C., Ward 8 Councilmember Trayon White posted a video on his personal Facebook page in which he promoted a conspiracy theory that accuses a prominent Jewish family of manipulating the climate. White, 33, was driving on a District highway while recording the video. “Man, it just started snowing out of nowhere this morning, man," he said. "Y’all better pay attention to this climate control, man, this climate manipulation. And D.C. keep talking about, ‘We a resilient city.’ And that’s a model based off the Rothschilds controlling the climate to create natural disasters they can pay for to own the cities, man. Be careful.” The very affluent family has long been the target of conspiracies. It is unclear what White, currently the youngest representative on the 13-member D.C. Council, meant by "climate control," or where he picked up this narrative. But as the Washington Post, which was the first to report the video, points out, fringe Internet users have falsely linked the Rothschilds to weather changes. Established by another dynastic family, the Rockefeller Foundation runs an initiative called 100 Resilient Cities to help cities adapt to major challenges. Conspiracies have also centered around the Rockefellers. White has reportedly mused aloud about supposed connections between the Rothschilds and climate change before. At a February working breakfast between the D.C. Council and Mayor Muriel Bowser, he asked the Bowser administration about links between the Rothschilds, the Rockefellers, the World Bank, and D.C.'s recently created Office of Resilience, according to a District official who was present. Following the Post story and fierce criticism on Twitter, White removed the video from his Facebook page on Sunday evening and issued a written apology on social media. He texted a version of it to City Paper: In response to my social media post on Friday, as I leader I work hard everyday to combat racism and prejudices of all kinds. I want to apologize to the Jewish Community and anyone I have offended. The Jewish community have been allies with me in my journey to help people. I did not intend to be Anti-Semitic, and I see I should not have said that after learning from my colleagues. I have spoke to leaders and my friends at Jews United for Justice and they are helping me to understand the history of comments made against Jews and I am committed to figuring out ways to continue to be allies with them and others. He did not answer specific questions about what he meant by his comments in the video and where he had heard about the Rothschilds controlling the climate. "I have to be the example," he added on Twitter. A former state education board member, White represents the District's poorest ward—once the base of Marion Barry, his mentor. He was elected in 2016 after losing a 2015 special election to fill Barry's seat. He has distinguished himself as a loyal Ward 8 advocate. Jews United for Justice, a progressive advocacy group based in D.C., wrote in a tweet that it spoke with White "about how his comments played into the long history of antisemitism." "We look forward to working with him toward deeper understanding of antisemitism and toward our collective liberation," JUFJ wrote. Ward 1 Councilmember Brianne Nadeau said in a statement that she also spoke with White, who'd reached out to her. "He reiterated, 'that's not who I am, and that's not what I'm about,'" Nadeau said in a post on her official Facebook page. "I believe he is being truthful when he says he didn't realize what his statement implied." She chairs the human services committee, on which White sits. "That said," Nadeau continued, "as a Jewish leader I know how scary these times are, with anti-semitism and white supremacy on the rise across our country, stoked by the hateful words and actions of our own President. It's all the more important that our leaders across the country focus on eradicating hate and bigotry in all forms, and not make them worse, purposefully or unwittingly." The Anti-Defamation League found that Anti-Semitic incidents in the United States rose 57 percent from 2016 to 2017—to about 2,000. In D.C., reported hate crimes increased from 2015 to 2016, to more than 100, with a significant jump in those motivated by religious bias. On Tuesday, At-Large Councilmember Elissa Silverman, who is also Jewish, said she discussed White's comments with him. Calling his remarks "disturbing," she said in a statement that she told White she was concerned both that "he had been exposed to anti-Semitic beliefs akin to what had been used in Nazi Germany either through materials he had read or people he trusts" and that "he subscribed to a conspiracy theory." "We both agreed that hate speech of any kind has no place at the D.C. Council or in our city," Silverman said. "I believe that Trayon is remorseful about what he said, and I believe he is taking steps to understand why these comments were so offensive—not only to Jewish residents but to all who want an inclusive, welcoming city." White has 5,000 friends on Facebook, the maximum number that the social network allows per account. This post has been updated with comment from Silverman. ||||| A D.C. lawmaker responded to a brief snowfall Friday by publishing a video in which he espoused a conspiracy theory that Jewish financiers control the weather. D.C. Council member Trayon White Sr. (D-Ward 8) posted the video to his official Facebook page at 7:21 a.m. as snow flurries were hitting the nation’s capital. The video, shot through the windshield of a car driving west on Interstate 695 through downtown Washington, shows snowy skies while White narrates. “Man, it just started snowing out of nowhere this morning, man. Y’all better pay attention to this climate control, man, this climate manipulation,” he says. “And D.C. keep talking about, ‘We a resilient city.’ And that’s a model based off the Rothschilds controlling the climate to create natural disasters they can pay for to own the cities, man. Be careful.” The Rothschilds are a famous European business dynasty descended from Mayer Amschel Rothschild, an 18th-century Jewish banker who lived in what is today Frankfurt, Germany. The family has repeatedly been subject over the years to anti-Semitic conspiracy theories alleging that they and other Jews clandestinely manipulate world events for their advantage. [The Rothschilds, a pamphlet by ‘Satan’ and conspiracy theories tied to a battle 200 years ago] Rabbi Daniel Zemel of Temple Micah in Northwest Washington denounced White’s remarks, saying they contribute to a growing mood of intolerance in the United States. “This kind of anti-Semitism is unacceptable in any public official. This so diminishes what America is about and adds to the oppressive feeling going on in the country right now,” Zemel said. “We all have to be better. Public officials have to learn not to say the first ignorant thing that comes into their head.” The Anti-Defamation League reported last month that ­anti-Semitic incidents in the District more than doubled in 2017, compared with 2015. That follows a similar escalation nationwide. White did not return calls for comment. In a series of text messages, he confirmed the voice in the video is his but expressed surprise that his remarks might be construed as anti-Semitic. Asked to clarify what he meant, he wrote, “The video says what it says.” However, about four hours after The Washington Post published this story online Sunday, White sent a statement of apology via text message. “I work hard everyday to combat racism and prejudices of all kinds. I want to apologize to the Jewish Community and anyone I have offended,” he said. “The Jewish community have been allies with me in my journey to help people. I did not intend to be anti-Semitic, and I see I should not have said that after learning from my colleagues.” White said his “friends” at Jews United for Justice, a group that advocates for progressive causes and endorsed him in 2016, were “helping me to understand the history of comments made against Jews and I am committed to figuring out ways continue to be allies with them and others.” D.C. Council member Brianne K. Nadeau (D-Ward 1), who is Jewish, released a statement Sunday night saying White had apologized and “expressed his sincere regret . . . for having offended members of the Jewish community.” She added: “It is my sincere hope that my colleague has learned from this experience, and that together we can serve the diverse people of the District of Columbia with a focus on lifting each other up, rather than tearing one another down.” White’s video statements appear to echo beliefs, found lurking in corners of the Internet, that the Rockefeller Foundation’s Resilient Cities initiative — which provides grants to cities, including the District, to address environmental and economic problems — is actually part of a secret scheme to control and reduce the population of North America. [What are resilient cities?] Some conspiracy theorists also think the Rothschilds, acting in conjunction with the Rockefeller family, have technology to manipulate the weather — for example, by causing freak storms that wreak havoc on people, farms and livestock. In a video posted to YouTube this year titled “Kill Cities — Designed by Rothschild and Rockefeller: Resilient Cities Are Human Death Zones,” Internet commentator Deborah Tavares — a Northern California resident who argues, among other things, that climate change and wireless electricity meters are tools in a plot of global domination — calls the Resilient Cities program a “diabolical” effort to manipulate people. “This a genocide program,” she says. “We are being moved now into what they call ‘resilient cities.’ And it’s important to get this word out, start looking it up: Resilient cities. Understand what this is: This is a plan brought in by Rothschild and Rockefeller.” She adds, “We’re being categorized as lunatics, but we know that the weather is massively and completely, artificially controlled.” Conspiracy theories alleging nefarious plots by elites such as the Rothschilds and Rockefellers — as well as other boogeymen such as the illuminati and Freemasons — have increasingly bobbed to the surface of American politics in recent years. The Republican Party’s 2012 platform embraced what had previously been fringe fears of a 1992 United Nations environmental accord known as Agenda 21, stating that it was “erosive of American sovereignty.” Assertions that the pact was cover for a global plot had become popular among tea party groups battling local, state and federal environmental regulations. Speculation that high-ranking Democratic Party officials, including former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, were involved in a child sex-trafficking ring run out of a D.C. restaurant led to the infamous “Pizzagate” episode in December 2016. A North Carolina man showed up with a Colt AR-15 military-style rifle and a .38-caliber Colt revolver at Comet Ping Pong, a pizza joint in Northwest Washington, saying he planned to investigate the allegations. [Pizzagate, from hashtag to gunfire] He fired multiple shots inside the restaurant before police arrested him. No one was harmed. |||||

– A DC council member is apologizing after he pushed a conspiracy theory that a wealthy Jewish family controlled the weather. In a story first reported by the Washington Post, Trayon White posted a video to Facebook Friday with the following narration: "Man, it just started snowing out of nowhere this morning, man. Y'all better pay attention to this climate control, man, this climate manipulation. And DC keep talking about, 'We a resilient city.' And that's a model based off the Rothschilds controlling the climate to create natural disasters they can pay for to own the cities, man. Be careful." The criticism began quickly, and White eventually offered a mea culpa: "I work hard everyday to combat racism and prejudices of all kinds," said the African-American lawmaker, before apologizing "to the Jewish community" and adding, "I did not intend to be anti-Semitic." The Washington City Paper describes the 33-year-old as an "up-and-coming District pol" but says observers were wondering, "What was he thinking?" White declined to comment on the source of his original comments, but the Post notes that the Rothschilds "are a famous European business dynasty" and the subject of numerous conspiracy theories in the nether regions of the internet. The "resilient city" remark apparently refers to an initiative by another prominent family, the Rockefellers, about which similar conspiracy theories abound. Fellow council member Brianne Nadeau, who's Jewish, took note of White's apology and sounded forgiving about the mess: "It is my sincere hope that my colleague has learned from this experience."

Vanessa Hudgens delivered a stand-out performance during Fox's amazing production of Grease: Live! on Sunday, hours after revealing the news that her father had died. The 27-year-old High School Musical alum brought the house down with her stunning, sassy performance as Betty Rizzo, which she dedicated to her late father, who died Saturday after a long battle with cancer. WATCH: Vanessa Hudgens' Father Greg Dies of Cancer Hudgens, who was part of a star-studded cast that included Julianne Hough, Aaron Tveit, Carly Rae Jepsen, Carlos PenaVega and Keke Palmer, showed off her acting chops yet again by perfectly embodying the spirit of the beloved character. FOX Additionally, her powerful and captivating performance of "There Are Worse Things I Could Do" set the bar for solo numbers in the entire production. Even in the face of personal tragedy, Hudgens' smile, her laugh and her delivery never faltered for even a moment, and she added some extra spark to the already dazzling display. WATCH: Find Out Everything That Is Going Into Making 'Grease: Live' In the final moments of the broadcast, the show honored her father in the credits with a special chyron reading, "In loving memory of Greg Hudgens." FOX Even in the hours leading up to her father's passing, Hudgens was the epitome of a performance professional. ETonline was in the live studio audience during Saturday's Grease: Live! dress rehearsal, and you would never know that Hudgens was dealing with a personal tragedy. In between takes, the former Disney darling stayed in character as the sharp-tongued Rizzo, and she was all smiles even when the cameras weren't rolling. WATCH: Celebs Tweet Condolences to Vanessa Hudgens Following Father's Death Hudgens revealed the news of her dad's death on Twitter hours before the show was set to kick off. "I am so sad to say that last night my daddy, Greg passed away from stage 4 cancer," she wrote, which was retweeted by her 20-year-old sister, Stella Hudgens. "Thank you to everyone who kept him in your prayers." I am so sad to say that last night my daddy, Greg passed away from stage 4 cancer. Thank you to everyone who kept him in your prayers. — Vanessa Hudgens (@VanessaHudgens) January 31, 2016 For more on Hudgen's late father, who had been battling cancer for months, watch the video below. ||||| CLOSE VANESSA HUDGENS and her boyfriend AUSTIN BUTLER are facing allegations they defaced a rock face in Arizona. , she showed off a photo on social media of a red rock, in which the lovebirds had carved a Actress Vanessa Hudgens and her boyfriend, actor Austin Butler, may face fines or jail time after possibly carving their names and a heart into Sedona's precious red rocks. A photo Vanessa Hudgens posted of a possible carving into Sedona red rock. (Photo: Twitter) Actress Vanessa Hudgens and her boyfriend, actor Austin Butler, are in trouble after she posted a photo on Instagram that appears to show they carved their names into one of Sedona's precious red rocks. After posting multiple photos of her romantic Valentine's Day getaway with Butler in Sedona, many with the hashtag #sedonadreams, she posted the incriminating evidence. The photo: "Austin + Vanessa" with a heart around it on the red rock. The problem: It's illegal to damage Sedona's rocks. "Happy Valentine's Day boo boo bears," she wrote as the photo's caption before later removing it. ❤️❤️ @austinbutler #sedonadreams A photo posted by Vanessa Hudgens (@vanessahudgens) on Feb 14, 2016 at 1:12pm PST The remnants of their tryst in the Red Rock Ranger District of the Coconino National Forest is punishable by a minimum $100 fine and/or three months in jail and a maximum $5,000 fine and/or six months in jail. The incident is "currently under investigation," said Brady Smith, a Coconino National Forest spokesman, though he couldn't reveal any other details. "It’s a common occurrence in that area that we have a challenge with and we try to education people on," he said. #sedonadreams A photo posted by Vanessa Hudgens (@vanessahudgens) on Feb 14, 2016 at 1:11pm PST Read or Share this story: http://azc.cc/1XwgXhY |||||

– It's one thing to carve your initials into a tree trunk. It's another thing entirely to carve your names into the protected red rocks of Sedona, Arizona, which is what Vanessa Hudgens and her boyfriend, Austin Butler, appear to have done over Valentine's Day weekend. Hudgens, who was posting quite a few photos of the couple's Sedona trip over the weekend, tweeted one photo of a rock with "Austin + Vanessa" inside a heart carved into it, the Arizona Republic reports. The tweet has since been deleted. It's illegal to damage the iconic rocks, with a maximum punishment of six months in jail and/or a $5,000 fine. A Coconino National Forest spokesperson says the incident is being investigated. (Hudgens recently performed in Grease Live the day after her dad died.)

A top South Korean official said Monday he misspoke earlier in the day when he told lawmakers there is an "indication" that North Korea is preparing for a nuclear test. But that doesn't change what Seoul has been saying for months: that Pyongyang has already prepared a tunnel for a nuclear blast and can use it whenever it wants. A South Korean man uses his mobile phone in front of empty lockers which are used for worker's belongings before leaving for the North Korean city of Kaesong, at the customs, immigration and quarantine... (Associated Press) An unidentified elementary school teacher, center, orders her students to leave as they watch South Korean housewives stage a press conference denouncing the annual joint military exercise known as Foal... (Associated Press) South Koreans wait for a chance to enter the North Korean city of Kaesong at the customs, immigration and quarantine office near the border village of Panmunjom, which has separated the two Koreas since... (Associated Press) A man walks at the customs, immigration and quarantine office near the border village of Panmunjom, which has separated the two Koreas since the Korean War, in Paju, north of Seoul, South Korea, Monday,... (Associated Press) South Koreans read newspapers reporting on North Korea's threat of war on a street in Seoul, South Korea, Monday, April 8, 2013. South Korea’s top security official said Sunday that North Korea may be... (Associated Press) South Korean army soldiers patrol along a barbed-wire fence near the border village of Panmunjom in Paju, South Korea, Monday, April 8, 2013. South Korea’s top security official said Sunday that North... (Associated Press) When a lawmaker asked whether there was an indication of increased personnel and vehicles at the North's nuclear test site, Unification Minister Ryoo Kihl-jae said "there is such an indication." He said he couldn't say more because it involved confidential intelligence. The comments in a parliamentary session were recorded on video, but Ryoo later told lawmakers he couldn't remember making them and didn't mean to say them. He said he was "startled" by reports carrying his earlier comments. A Unification Ministry official said that Ryoo had intended to say that North Korea has long been ready to conduct a nuclear test. She spoke on condition of anonymity because she wasn't authorized to speak publicly about the matter. After Ryoo's initial comments, South Korean Defense Ministry spokesman Kim Min-seok said there are vehicle and personnel activities at the northeastern test site but they are seen as "usual" activities, not an "indication for a nuclear test." Kim said North Korea can conduct a nuclear test anytime if decides to do so. South Korea has said the North prepared two tunnels for a nuclear test, but used only one Feb. 12. The confusion over a possible nuclear test came a day after another top South Korean official said a North Korean missile test may be in the works around Wednesday. Either a nuclear test or a missile test would escalate tensions that have been rising for weeks on the Korean Peninsula, and would likely invite a new round of U.N. Security Council sanctions over North Korea's nuclear and rocket activity. The U.S. and South Korea have been raising their defense posture, and foreign diplomats were considering a warning from Pyongyang that their safety in North Korea could not be guaranteed beginning Wednesday. After Ryoo's initial comment, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged North Korea on Monday not to carry out a new nuclear test, saying it would be a "provocative" act amid soaring tensions. "I have repeatedly expressed my great concern about the continued inflammatory rhetoric from Pyongyang," Ban told reporters in the Netherlands after meeting Dutch Foreign Minister Frans Timmermans. "Making any threat relating to nuclear weapons is not a game." North Korea has unleashed a flurry of war threats and provocations over U.N. sanctions for its last nuclear test, and over ongoing U.S.-South Korean military drills, which the allies say are routine but Pyongyang says is a preparation for a northward invasion. Last week, North Korea warned nations with embassies in Pyongyang that it would not be able to guarantee the safety of their staffs as of Wednesday. The warning prompted South Korean President Park Geun-hye's national security director to say that Pyongyang may be planning a missile launch or another provocation around Wednesday, according to presidential spokeswoman Kim Haing. During a meeting with other South Korean officials, the official, Kim Jang-Soo, also said the notice to diplomats and other recent North Korean actions are an attempt to stoke security concerns and to force South Korea and the U.S. to offer a dialogue. Washington and Seoul want North Korea to resume the six-party nuclear talks _ which also include China, Russia and Japan _ that it abandoned in 2009. The roughly two dozen countries with embassies in Pyongyang appeared to be staying put, for now at least. Sweden, which looks after U.S. interests in North Korea because Washington and North Korea lack diplomatic relations, and Brazil have no plans to withdraw any diplomats from Pyongyang at this stage, according to their foreign ministries Sunday. Brazil said it is keeping a close eye on the situation but at this time see no reason to change the decision. There has been no advisory that staff at the Egyptian Embassy will leave or suspend their work. The Pentagon has strengthened missile defenses and made other decisions to combat the potential threat, and postponed a missile test, scheduled for this week in California, to avoid raising tensions further. U.S. Gen. Martin Dempsey, the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, said Sunday that he doesn't believe North Korea will engage in military action soon, "but I can't take the chance that it won't." Dempsey said the U.S. has been preparing for further provocations or action, "considering the risk that they may choose to do something" on one of two nationally important anniversaries _ April 15, the birth of North Korean founder Kim Il Sung, and April 25, the creation of the North Korean army. Tensions between Seoul and Pyongyang led South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff to announce Sunday that its chairman had put off a visit to Washington. The U.S. military said its top commander in South Korea had also canceled a trip to Washington. The South Korean defense minister said Thursday that North Korea had moved a missile with "considerable range" to its east coast, possibly to conduct a test launch. His description suggests that the missile could be the Musudan missile, capable of striking American bases in Guam with its estimated range of up to 4,000 kilometers (2,490 miles). Amid North Korea's threats and warnings, it has blocked South Korean workers and cargo from entering its Kaesong industrial complex, where South Korean companies have employed thousands of North Korean workers for the past decade. North Korea is not forcing South Korean managers to leave the factory complex, and about 500 of them remained at Kaesong on Monday. But the entry ban at the park, the last remaining inter-Korean rapprochement project, is posing a serious challenge to many of the more than 120 South Korean firms there because they are running out of raw materials and are short on replacement workers. More than a dozen of the companies have stopped their operations in Kaesong. A high-level North Korean official visited the industrial zone on Monday, the official Korean Central News Agency reported. It said that Kim Yang Gon, secretary of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea, blamed South Korea for making it impossible to operate to zone as usual. South Korea's finance minister, Hyun Oh-seok, said Monday that it is "quite ridiculous" for North Korea to be closing the border at Kaesong. "North Korea has nothing to gain from this kind of things," he said at a news briefing. Hyun said the government is looking at ways to help Kaesong firms. Chinese President Xi Jinping said Sunday _ without specifically mentioning North Korea _ that no one country should be allowed to upset world peace. "The international community should advocate the vision of comprehensive security and cooperative security, so as to turn the global village into a big stage for common development rather than an arena where gladiators fight each other. And no one should be allowed to throw the region, or even the whole world, into chaos for selfish gains," Xi said Sunday at the Boao Forum for Asia, a China-sponsored talk shop for the global elite. He said China would work to reduce tensions over regional hotspots. Seoul and Washington are taking the threats seriously, though they say they have seen no signs that Pyongyang is preparing for a large-scale attack. Kim Jang-soo, the national security director, said the North would face "severalfold damages" for any hostilities. Since 2010, when attacks Seoul blames on North Korea killed 50 people, South Korea has vowed to aggressively respond to any future attack. In recent weeks, the U.S. has followed provocations from North Korea with shows of force connected to the joint exercises with South Korea. It has sent nuclear capable B-2 and B-52 bombers and stealth F-22 fighters to participate in the drills. In addition, the U.S. said last week that two of the Navy's missile-defense ships were moved closer to the Korean Peninsula, and a land-based missile-defense system is being deployed to the Pacific territory of Guam later this month. The Pentagon last month announced longer-term plans to strengthen its U.S.-based missile defenses. North Korea successfully shot a satellite into space in December and conducted its third nuclear test in February. It has threatened to launch a nuclear attack on the United States, though many analysts say the North hasn't achieved the technology to manufacture a miniaturized nuclear warhead that could fit on a long-range missile capable of hitting the U.S. ___ AP writers Youkyung Lee in Seoul, Mike Corder in The Hague, Lolita C. Baldor in Washington, Robert Burns in Bagram, Afghanistan and Charles Hutzler in Boao, China, contributed to this report. ||||| PAJU, South Korea North Korea suspended its sole remaining major project with the South on Monday, after weeks of threats against the United States and South Korea, as Russian President Vladimir Putin said any nuclear conflict could make Chernobyl look like a fairy tale. Reclusive North Korea's decision to all but close the Kaesong industrial park coincided with speculation that it will carry out some sort of provocative action - another nuclear weapons test or missile launch - in what has become one of the most serious crises on the peninsula since the end of the Korean War in 1953. Tension has been rising since the United Nations imposed new sanctions against the North in response to its third test of a nuclear weapon in February. Pyongyang has been further angered by weeks of joint military exercises by South Korean and U.S. forces and threatened both countries with nuclear attack. Putin said conflict on the peninsula could cause greater devastation than the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986. "I would make no secret about it, we are worried about the escalation on the Korean peninsula, because we are neighbors," he told a joint news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel during a visit to a trade fair in Germany. "And if, God forbid, something happens, Chernobyl which we all know a lot about, may seem like a child's fairy tale. Is there such a threat or not? I think there is... I would urge everyone to calm down... and start to resolve the problems that have piled up for many years there at the negotiating table." U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said North Korea could not go on "confronting" the authority of the Security Council and challenging the international community. "I sincerely hope that they will fully comply with the relevant Security Council resolutions. This is an urgent and earnest appeal from the international community, including myself." A senior North Korean official, quoted by the official KCNA news agency, said after a visit to Kaesong that authorities would withdraw North Korean workers and then decide on whether it would continue to operate. "It will temporarily suspend the operations in the zone and examine the issue of whether it will allow its (continued) existence or close it," KCNA quoted Kim Yang Gon, secretary of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea, as saying. KCNA said leaders in South Korea, a major U.S. ally, were "running the whole gamut of intrigues to find a pretext for igniting a war against (North Korea) after reducing the Kaesong Industrial zone to a theatre of confrontation". Seoul, it said, was trying to "turn the zone into a hotbed of war" against the North. The North last week barred South Koreans from entering the zone and South Koreans had been leaving the zone gradually in the past week as raw materials and food begin to run out. Analysts had suggested Pyongyang would continue to allow Kaesong to operate as it accounted for some $2 billion in annual trade, with 50,000 North Koreans working in the zone making household goods for 123 South Korean companies. It also generates more than $80 million a year in cash in wages - paid to the state rather than to workers. About 475 South Koreans workers remain in Kaesong. Thirteen factories have stopped operations due to lack of raw materials, according to the South's Unification Ministry. "North Korea's unilateral decision to push ahead with this measure cannot be justified in any way and North Korea will be held responsible for all the consequences," the ministry said in a statement. "The Korean government will calmly but firmly handle North Korea's indiscreet action and we will do our best to secure the safety of our people and the protection of our property." "PREENING, POSTURING" Bruce Cumings, a historian and author of "North Korea: Another Country", said in a report Pyongyang was behaving to a pattern. "Nothing is more characteristic of this regime than its preening, posturing, overweening desire for the world to pay it attention, while simultaneously threatening destruction in all directions and assuring through draconian repression that its people know next to nothing about that same world," he wrote. The zone was the last shared link between the two Koreas as the North cut off three telephone "hot lines" and declared it was tearing up the armistice that ended fighting in the 1950-53 Korean War. Earlier on Monday, the South's Defence Ministry denied suggestions that a nuclear arms test was imminent in North Korea, saying reported movements around the reclusive country's atomic site were routine, contradicting earlier government comments. China's Foreign Ministry said it wanted to see nuclear-free peace on the Korean peninsula. Ministry spokesman Hong Lei told a Beijing briefing that China "believes that the only way to realize denuclearization is dialogue among all the parties concerned". North Korean authorities told embassies in Pyongyang they could not guarantee their safety from Wednesday - after saying conflict was inevitable amid the joint U.S.-South Korean military exercises due to last until the end of the month. No diplomats appear to have left the North Korean capital. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry visits Seoul this week and the North holds celebrations and possibly military demonstrations next Monday to mark the birth date of its founder, Kim Il-Sung - grandfather of the current leader, 30-year-old Kim Jong-un. The turmoil has hit South Korean financial markets, long used to upsets over the North. Shares in Seoul dipped to near a four-month low as the rhetoric prompted selling by foreigners after substantial losses on Friday. Pyongyang has shown no sign of preparing its 1.2 million-strong army for war, indicating the threats are partly intended for domestic purposes to bolster Kim, the third in his family dynasty to rule North Korea. But it has moved what appears to be a mid-range Musudan missile to its east coast, according to media reports last week. Japanese public broadcaster NHK showed aerial footage of what it said were ballistic missile interceptors being deployed near Tokyo in response to North Korea's threats and actions. Japan in the past has deployed ground-based Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) interceptors, as well as Aegis radar-equipped destroyers carrying Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) interceptors in the run-up to North Korean missile launches. Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga declined to comment on the reports. "Unveiling specific actions by the Self-Defence Forces is tantamount to putting down our cards on the table," Suga told a news conference. "I would like to refrain from commenting." (Additional reporting by Jack Kim and Ju-min Park in Seoul, Terril Yue Jones in Beijing, David Morgan, Aruna Viswanatha and Mark Felsenthal in Washington, Kiyoshi Takenaka in Tokyo and Alexei Anishchuk in Hanover; Writing by Nick Macfie) ||||| Mr. Xi did not mention the American actions in his speech at the Boao Forum, but China has grown increasingly concerned about efforts by the United States to reassert itself in Asia. He said Asia’s stability faced new challenges as “hot spot issues keep emerging and both traditional and nontraditional security threats” surfaced. Obama administration officials say that Beijing faces a choice between cracking down on North Korea or facing a larger American military presence in East Asia. But it is unclear how much China can moderate the North’s behavior. North Korea ignored China’s wishes when it carried out a nuclear test in February. That test led to more United Nations economic sanctions — which China agreed to despite reservations about their effectiveness — and set the stage for the North’s latest conflict with the United States and South Korea. The South Korean government’s new warning came three days after its defense minister said that the North had moved a missile with a “considerable range” to its east coast, although it is not capable of reaching the mainland United States. Kim Jang-soo, director of national security for President Park Geun-hyeof South Korea, said during a meeting of security-related officials on Sunday that the North “may launch a provocation, such as missile launch,” around Wednesday. The missile that was moved is widely believed to be the Musudan, which the South Korean military and analysts say has the range to hit South Korea and Japan and perhaps American bases in Guam as well. “North Korea has been engaged in a so-called headline strategy,” Kim Jang-soo said, referring to an almost daily drumbeat of North Korean threats since early March and the news stories they have generated. North Korea is raising tensions in an effort to frighten and force the United States and South Korea into negotiations and concessions, he said. The pressure was also aimed at China and Russia in an effort to push them to mediate on North Korea’s behalf, he said. Newsletter Sign Up Continue reading the main story Please verify you're not a robot by clicking the box. Invalid email address. Please re-enter. You must select a newsletter to subscribe to. Sign Up You agree to receive occasional updates and special offers for The New York Times's products and services. Thank you for subscribing. An error has occurred. Please try again later. View all New York Times newsletters. “We see through their motive,” he said. “Although North Korea shows no signs of attempting a full-scale war, it will suffer damage many times more than we do if it launches even a localized provocation.” South Korea “has no intention of attempting premature dialogue just because of a crisis,” Mr. Kim said, urging the North to ease tensions so talks can start. Advertisement Continue reading the main story In an interview on the ABC News program “This Week” on Sunday,President Obama’s senior adviser,Dan Pfeiffer, declined to discuss what the United States would do if North Korea tested another missile, but said that it would not be a surprise if it did. “We have taken the steps we need to be able to protect our allies, protect the homeland,” Mr. Pfeiffer said. “The real focus and the onus is on North Korea to do the right thing.” Two senior senators also criticized China on Sunday for not doing more to press North Korea to tone down its confrontational stance. “The Chinese hold a lot of the cards here,” Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, said on the CBS News program “Face the Nation.” “They’re by nature cautious, but they’re carrying it to an extreme. It’s about time they stepped up to the plate and put a little pressure on this North Korean regime.” Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, appeared on the same program and said China could use its economic leverage over North Korea, cutting off support entirely “if they want to.” Mr. McCain said China’s failure to push North Korea was “very disappointing.” Mr. Xi’s remarks, which were primarily focused on economic and social issues in Asia, did not mention any specific dispute, but he promised a constructive approach to regional tensions and “unremitting efforts to properly handle relevant issues through dialogue and negotiations.” Obama administration officials say that China’s stance toward North Korea is “evolving.” In the past week, China’s Foreign Ministry has released several statements saying that it considers the North Korean situation to be of “grave concern.” On Sunday, the ministry repeated that phrase, saying that China had requested that North Korea protect foreign diplomats living in Pyongyang, the North’s capital. North Korean authorities have told foreign embassies to inform them by Wednesday whether they need assistance in evacuating because of rising tensions on the peninsula. “Currently, tensions on the Korean Peninsula continue to escalate, and China expresses grave concern about this,” according to the statement by the ministry spokesman, Hong Lei. “The Chinese government has already requested that North Korea abide by the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations and other international laws and practices and thoroughly ensure the safety of Chinese Embassy and consular personnel resident in North Korea.” The North gave similar warnings to some of the 123 South Korean factories in the joint industrial park in the North Korean city of Kaesong, said Mr. Kim, the South’s national security director. For a fifth consecutive day, North Korea blocked South Korean workers and supplies from entering the factory park, forcing 13 plants to stop production as of Sunday. |||||

– Tensions on the Korean peninsula eased marginally today after South Korean officials backed off earlier reports that Pyongyang was getting ready for another missile test. A top official told reporters that he had misspoken when he said there was an "indication" that another test was imminent, and had been "startled" to learn that his remarks had been widely reported, the AP reports. Defense officials in Seoul say there has been activity around the North's nuclear test site, but nothing out of the ordinary. A new nuclear test from the North would have raised tensions even higher after weeks of threats from Pyongyang, and Beijing appears to be becoming increasingly fed up with its neighbor's antics, Reuters reports. Leaders in China have said they will not tolerate any "chaos" or "trouble-making" over the border and Beijing wants to see a nuclear-free peace prevail, with all parties taking part in talks. Sens. Charles Schumer and John McCain sharply criticized China yesterday for not doing more to rein in its troublesome ally, the New York Times reports. "It’s about time they stepped up to the plate and put a little pressure on this North Korean regime," Schumer told Face the Nation.

A Bronx man is running for mayor of New York City 17 years after he hijacked a plane at JFK Airport with a handgun and a knife and ordered the pilots to fly to Antarctica. Aaron Commey is the Libertarian candidate for mayor and will be on the ballot in all five boroughs on Nov. 7. But on July 27, 2000, he was 22 years old and suffering from delusional disorder and paranoid schizophrenia when he walked onto a Boeing 757 bound for Las Vegas and rushed into the cockpit while brandishing a handgun. Commey told the pilots to clear out the plane’s 150 passengers and crew members, according to reports from the time. He then remained in the plane for five hours while law enforcement and the pilots tried to negotiate. Commey asked, at different times, to be flown to Argentina or Antarctica. He later explained that he had planned to parachute into Antarctica to destroy the “Cabal,” a secret organization that wanted to “take over the world through mass destruction.” In the end, the plane never took off and nobody was injured, while Commey was arrested and charged with five crimes, including attempt to commit aircraft piracy. RELATED: Who's who in the 2017 NYC mayoral race? In an interview with City & State this week, Commey admitted he didn’t have a typical candidate biography. “It’s definitely a valid question … ‘Well, how can we trust you, when you’re this guy who tried to hijack a plane?’” he said. “I am not the same person that I was. I was definitely severely mentally ill. And in addition to recovering from my mental illness without medication, I am a completely different person in terms of how I approach situations and I’m committed to nonviolence.” In September 2003, Commey was found not guilty on all counts by reason of insanity. But he would remain incarcerated in federal prison until his release in 2015. According to a legal filing, he was assigned to a medical center run by the Federal Bureau of Prisons for treatment. In 2004 he was transferred to Federal Medical Center, Devens in Ayer, Massachusetts, where former Rep. Anthony Weiner is scheduled to report next month to serve a 21-month sentence. “I spent about 15 years in prison, was never convicted,” Commey said. “And it shaped me into the person I am today.” Commey said that government officials and judges refused to let him go for years, despite having doctors say he had fully recovered. “Experiencing my own personal injustice, seeing injustice happen to other guys,” he said, “that’s one of the things that had driven me to wanting to get involved to try to change the system.” It also turned him into a Libertarian. “It showed me a side of government a lot of people think of in the abstract, but feeling it up close and personal made it all that more real to me,” he said. “And there was really only one party I saw that was tackling that aspect of government.” Commey is an extreme long shot in the mayor’s race. He has not been active on the campaign trail, and has raised almost no money, putting up about $2,300 of his own funds while getting just $495 from donors. He has not been included in any major polls. In 2013, Libertarian candidate Michael Sanchez got just 446 votes in the mayoral election, or 0.16 percent of the total. Commey’s website, which includes both scenes of New York and videos of the Philadelphia skyline, does not go into detail about his past, but mentions “experience overcoming his own trials and tribulations with the justice system and mental health issues.” The candidate’s unusual history has not been widely reported, but Commey had openly spoken about the hijacking attempt, his mental illness and incarceration in an interview with The Black Business School and Libertarian sources like Think Liberty TV and Lions of Liberty. But as a mayoral candidate, the one-time air pirate thought his past would get more attention. “I was shocked, because I expected this to be the first thing out the gate and like nobody said anything,” he said. “I’m like, wow, OK. I’ll tell the story when the opportunity arises, but I really thought people were going to have much more of a reaction to it.” ||||| NEW YORK (AP) — A New York City mayoral candidate says he's "shocked" that so little attention has been paid to his arrest for trying to hijack an airliner at gunpoint 17 years ago. In July 2000, Aaron Commey (KOH'-may) boarded a National Airlines plane in New York and ordered the pilots to fly to Argentina or Antarctica. It never took off and nobody was injured. He was acquitted by reason of insanity in 2003 and was released from a prison medical facility in 2015. The Libertarian candidate tells the news magazine City & State New York that it's reasonable for voters to wonder if he's suited for office. He says he has fully recovered and is "committed to nonviolence." Commey says he has experienced and witnessed injustice and wants to change the system. |||||

– A New York City mayoral candidate says he's "shocked" that so little attention has been paid to his arrest for trying to hijack an airliner at gunpoint 17 years ago. In July 2000, Aaron Commey (it's pronounced KOH-may) boarded a National Airlines plane in New York and ordered the pilots to fly to Argentina or Antarctica, per the AP. It never took off and nobody was injured. He was acquitted by reason of insanity in 2003 and was released from a prison medical facility in 2015. The Libertarian candidate tells the news magazine City & State New York that it's reasonable for voters to wonder if he's suited for office and that he's surprised the issue has gotten so little attention. "I was shocked, because I expected this to be the first thing out the gate and like nobody said anything." Commey, who was 22 at the time and suffering from delusional disorder and paranoid schizophrenia, says he has fully recovered and is "committed to nonviolence." Commey says he has experienced and witnessed injustice and wants to change the system.

Photo An offer to take BlackBerry private does not end the uncertainty surrounding the ailing smartphone maker. BlackBerry said on Monday that it had signed a letter of intent from a group led by Fairfax Financial Holdings, a Canadian insurance and investment company, to pay shareholders $9 a share in cash, pending a variety of conditions, taking the company private. Related Links Document: BlackBerry press release The $4.7 billion offer from Fairfax, which already owns about 10 percent of BlackBerry, is a powerful symbol of the phone maker’s decline. In June 2008 — a time when BlackBerrys defined smartphones — the company had a stock market value of $83 billion. Any deal is far from done. Fairfax did not identify the other investors in its consortium, which is seeking financing. And while the offer could flush out potential rival suitors, it is unclear who might be tempted to come forward, given the company’s uncertain prospects. Investors gave a muted endorsement on Monday, with BlackBerry shares rising 1 percent, to $8.82, but failing to reach the $9 bid price. The offer came after the company announced on Friday that it expected to report a quarterly loss of nearly $1 billion, stemming largely from the failure of the BlackBerry 10 line of phones that were supposed to revive the company. BlackBerry also outlined plans to lay off about 40 percent of its already reduced work force, or around 4,500 people. Photo Sensing the opportunity to halt the fall in company’s stock prompted by that announcement, and the potential to kick off an auction, BlackBerry’s board seized on the offer, quickly signing a letter of intent. The particulars of the deal’s announcement came together in a matter of hours Monday morning. V. Prem Watsa, Fairfax’s chairman and chief executive, told shareholders in March that the company paid an average price of $17 for its BlackBerry shares, giving him an obvious interest in at least stalling the slide in BlackBerry’s shares. Yet not only are there questions about the offer, several analysts say it is not clear how the Fairfax group could stem BlackBerry’s rapid decline or stabilize the company. “Last week was essentially an announcement that they are leaving the handset business,” said Jan Dawson, a telecommunications analyst with Ovum. “But pick any market they’re trying to go into and there are strong, entrenched competitors.” Given the high risk involved in investing in BlackBerry, one of the most pressing questions surrounding the deal is the identity of anyone prepared to invest in the company alongside Fairfax. One possible clue came from the fact that Byron D. Trott, the banker used by Warren E. Buffett, was advising Fairfax. Mr. Trott and his firm, BDT & Company, often work with wealthy private investors. Mike Lazaridis, the co-founder of BlackBerry who stepped down as co-chief executive in 2012, has been interested in making an offer with private equity investors, people familiar with the situation said. That led to speculation on Monday that he might join the Fairfax group. Through a spokesman, Mr. Lazaridis declined to comment. Neither Fairfax nor Mr. Watsa responded to requests for comment. Just as unclear is how a buyout would be financed. Fairfax did not say how much cash it was prepared to put toward the deal, or how much debt it might expect BlackBerry to take on in a buyout. BlackBerry is largely debt-free and had about $2.6 billion in cash at the end of the last quarter, leaving just a couple of billion dollars needed to conceivably strike an acquisition. But any bank that provides financing could be taking a risk. The company consumed about $500 million of its cash during the last quarter, while the coming layoffs and sluggish sales raise the possibility that even more than that may vanish in the current quarter. By signing the letter of intent, BlackBerry effectively opened the door to other bidders. It now has six weeks to shop itself around as Fairfax conducts due diligence, or scrutinizes its books. If BlackBerry accepts another deal or walks away from Fairfax’s offer before a definitive agreement is signed, it will owe Fairfax about $157 million. If it walks away after a formal deal is signed, it will owe Fairfax about $262 million. Neither does the agreement appear to bind Fairfax to its $9 a share bid; after due diligence, Fairfax may decide to lower its offer. The offer establishes a timeline and a price floor for other potential bidders. But with the company in free fall, there is little certainty of another bid emerging in the coming weeks. Brian Colello, an analyst with Morningstar, said that other buyers, if there are any, were unlikely to be interested in BlackBerry’s phone business. “There is no value for the BlackBerry 10 ecosystem,” he said. “The value of this company is cash and patents.” Analysts’ estimates put the value of the patents at about $2 billion. But not only has the market for patents cooled, BlackBerry does not directly control many of its most important patents, which it owns in common with other technology companies like Apple and Microsoft. Still, BlackBerry continues to have a strong booster in Mr. Watsa. He resigned from BlackBerry’s board in August to avoid any conflicts of interest after the company announced that it was engaged in a strategic review that might include a sale. Mr. Watsa’s involvement in a buyout would ensure Canadian control of the company, which is based in Waterloo, Ontario, removing a major hurdle for a deal. While a number of Chinese companies, particularly ones with little market presence in the West, might bid for BlackBerry, the Canadian government would most likely block any such takeover on national security grounds. Historically, Mr. Watsa has favored buying distressed companies and then guiding turnarounds. While the strategy has generally been successful, the company’s recent history includes some prominent failures. CanWest Global Communications, once a large Canadian television broadcaster and newspaper publisher, and AbitibiBowater, a paper maker, both collapsed and ultimately were delisted. Fairfax also began buying heavily in Torstar, the parent company of The Toronto Star and the romance book publisher Harlequin, in 2007. Since then, Torstar’s share price has steadily declined. Fairfax uses hedging and large cash holdings to protect its investors from failed investments. Even without quitting the handset business, BlackBerry’s management has said it plans to expand the company’s software business. BlackBerry has ambitious plans for its relatively new software that allows corporations to control and manage employees’ mobile devices, including iPhones and Android-based phones. It has also made efforts to turn the BlackBerry Messenger instant-messaging service into a social media service. But in those areas, as in the phone business, BlackBerry has come up against large, well-financed competitors like Microsoft and Facebook. If BlackBerry does go private, it would be the second large technology company with outdated products to go that route this year. Dell, the personal computer maker, was bought out by its founder, Michael S. Dell, and Silver Lake Partners this month for $24.9 billion. Yet Dell is a veritable tech powerhouse compared to BlackBerry, whose North American market share has slid to 3.4 percent from 51 percent in just four years. In Dell’s case, revenues are down and demand for its products has weakened because of the growth of tablets, but Dell remains a major provider of commodity PCs and servers, and owns business and government software assets that may provide it with a more certain path forward. ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| Article Excerpt A guy says he will buy your falling-down house for millions of dollars, but not until he gets it inspected. And, by the way, he might not have the cash to buy it. Nor is it certain he can get a mortgage. That seems to be the essence of a "letter of intent agreement" that Fairfax Financial Holdings has signed to buy ailing ... |||||

– If you're a BlackBerry shareholder, Rolfe Winkler at the Wall Street Journal thinks you should sell while the selling's good. Fairfax Financial Holdings struck a deal yesterday with BlackBerry that, Winkler writes, is a little like a guy saying "he will buy your falling-down house for millions of dollars, but not until he gets it inspected. And, by the way, he might not have the cash to buy it." All yesterday's "letter of intent" said was that Fairfax would buy BlackBerry after looking at its books. What's more, even if BlackBerry used all of its $2.6 billion in cash to finance the sale, Fairfax will have to find another $1.6 billion, and lenders might be leery given BlackBerry's shaky prospects. Analysts tell the New York Times that they're skeptical Fairfax could turn BlackBerry around, and unsure other, competing bidders will emerge. "There is no value for the BlackBerry 10 ecosystems," one analyst said. "The value of this company is cash and patents." Employees are even more gloomy following the company's announcement that it would lay off 40% of them. "It's not low morale. It's no morale," one employee tells the Journal. "It's like working at a hospice center. It's not a matter of if, but when."