- LATimes.com President Trump is warning North Korea not to conduct another nuclear test, saying “we’ll see” if such a step would trigger a U.S. military response.
Trump, in an interview aired Sunday on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” also said he believes China’s President Xi Jinping, with whom he met weeks ago in Florida, has been using Beijing’s leverage to restrain North Korea’s mercurial leader, Kim Jong Un.
In the interview, Trump said neither he nor Xi would be happy if Kim were to conduct a nuclear test, which would be North Korea’s sixth. There were some expectations earlier this month that the hermit kingdom might conduct such a test in connection with patriotic holiday observances.
The test did not take place, but North Korea has continued with other actions the U.S. and its regional allies regard as provocations, including a failed test on Saturday of a mid-range ballistic missile. Kim’s government is known to be working to develop an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of striking the United States.
Asked in the CBS interview if a North Korea nuclear test would prompt U.S. military action, Trump replied: “I don’t know. I mean, we’ll see.”
Trump appeared to offer grudging praise for Kim, noting that he took over North Korea when he was 26 or 27 after his father died and has consolidated power despite challenges from the military and members of his family.
"A lot of people, I'm sure, tried to take that power away, whether it was his uncle or anybody else," he said. "And he was able to do it. So obviously, he's a pretty smart cookie."
In a separate interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) was asked if Trump was considering a pre-emptive strike against North Korea, especially if there were indications that it had developed a delivery system capable of carrying a nuclear weapon. “I don’t think so,” he said.
“I think we have to consider that option as the very last option,” said McCain, who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee. He cited an array of dangers associated with any outbreak of hostilities on the Korean peninsula, including North Korea’s ability to strike Seoul with conventional artillery.
“The major lever on North Korea, maybe the only lever, is China,” he said.
Amid rising tensions with North Korea, the Trump administration has been sending mixed signals about its dealings with South Korea, long a bedrock regional ally.
Trump rattled many in South Korea last week when he said in at least two interviews that Seoul should pay $1 billion for a sophisticated missile defense system that the U.S. and South Korea have begun installing. The Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense system, or THAAD, is intended to become operational within a matter of days.
South Korea’s presidential office said Sunday that Trump’s national security advisor, H.R. McMaster, had offered reassurances that Washington would not try to make Seoul bear the cost. In an interview aired Sunday, McMaster confirmed that was the case — for now.
“What I told our South Korean counterpart is that until any re-negotiation, that the deal’s in place, we’ll adhere to our word,” McMaster said on “Fox News Sunday.”
Senior Trump administration officials are often put in the position of walking back Trump’s comments, including many on foreign affairs, without seeming to directly contradict the president.
In this instance, McMaster sought to put Trump’s comments in the context of looking at “appropriate burden-sharing” across all U.S. alliances.
“The question of what is the relationship on THAAD, on our defense relationship going forward, will be renegotiated, as it’s going to be with all our allies,” McMaster said. “Because what the president has said is, he will prioritize American citizens’ security and interests.” (ontinueReading
Sunday, April 30, 2017
Saturday, April 29, 2017
Former envoy warns nationalists in Macedonia-Skopje 'playing with fire'
rte.ie - Nationalists in Macedonia are "playing with fire" in refusing to relinquish power, said the former envoy who helped avert civil war in the Balkan country.
Pieter Feith also said the European Union should consider halting Macedonia's accession process in order to break a dangerous deadlock, said the former envoy who helped avert civil war in the Balkan country.
A long-running political crisis in the former Yugoslav republic turned violent on Thursday when supporters of the ruling VMRO-DPMNE party, some in balaclavas, stormed parliament after a new majority in the assembly elected an ethnic Albanian as speaker, a first step towards replacing the nationalist-led government.
The events, in which one ethnic Albanian MP was badly beaten and several other deputies left bloodied, raised fears that the political crisis was spiralling out of control and may plunge the country back into ethnic conflict 16 years after Western diplomacy averted full-blown civil war.
The nationalists of former Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski are blocking the formation of a new government led by the opposition Social Democrats, accusing them of doing a deal with the country's ethnic Albanian minority that risked tearing the country apart by allowing wider official use of the Albanian language.
Mr Feith, who as NATO's Balkans troubleshooter at the turn of the century helped negotiate a peace deal to end months of clashes between Macedonian security forces and ethnic Albanian guerrillas in 2001, warned of further escalation.
The nationalists, he said, "are playing with fire. The next step I could imagine, but God forbid, if arms are going to be handed out and circulated as they were in 2001, you are quickly on the abyss of civil war,"
Pieter Feith also said the European Union should consider halting Macedonia's accession process in order to break a dangerous deadlock, said the former envoy who helped avert civil war in the Balkan country.
A long-running political crisis in the former Yugoslav republic turned violent on Thursday when supporters of the ruling VMRO-DPMNE party, some in balaclavas, stormed parliament after a new majority in the assembly elected an ethnic Albanian as speaker, a first step towards replacing the nationalist-led government.
The events, in which one ethnic Albanian MP was badly beaten and several other deputies left bloodied, raised fears that the political crisis was spiralling out of control and may plunge the country back into ethnic conflict 16 years after Western diplomacy averted full-blown civil war.
The nationalists of former Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski are blocking the formation of a new government led by the opposition Social Democrats, accusing them of doing a deal with the country's ethnic Albanian minority that risked tearing the country apart by allowing wider official use of the Albanian language.
Mr Feith, who as NATO's Balkans troubleshooter at the turn of the century helped negotiate a peace deal to end months of clashes between Macedonian security forces and ethnic Albanian guerrillas in 2001, warned of further escalation.
The nationalists, he said, "are playing with fire. The next step I could imagine, but God forbid, if arms are going to be handed out and circulated as they were in 2001, you are quickly on the abyss of civil war,"
Friday, April 28, 2017
Venezuela to withdraw from OAS, denounces campaign by Washington
CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuela said on Wednesday it was withdrawing from the Organization of American States, deepening the diplomatic isolation of the socialist-run nation that is already out of step with Latin America's steady shift to the right.
Critics of President Nicolas Maduro have said Venezuela could be expelled from the group, accusing his government of eroding the country's democracy by delaying elections and refusing to respect the opposition-led Congress.
Venezuela said the move was a response to a Washington-backed campaign against the ruling Socialist Party that is meant to trample on the sovereignty of Venezuela, the United States' principal ideological adversary in the region.
"Tomorrow, as ordered by President Nicolas Maduro, we will present a letter of resignation from the Organization of American States, and we will begin a procedure that will take 24 months," Foreign Minister Delcy Rodriguez said in a televised statement.
The announcement came after the OAS agreed on Wednesday to hold a meeting of foreign ministers to discuss the situation in Venezuela. Maduro had warned on Tuesday that Venezuela would quit the group if the meeting were called.
The decision extends Venezuela's drift toward the fringes of international diplomacy. But the limited influence of the OAS means its exit will have few economic implications for the OPEC nation that is already struggling under triple-digit inflation, chronic product shortages and a crippling recession.
More than 15 years of diplomatic tensions between Caracas and Washington have done little to disrupt the flow of oil and fuel toward U.S. shores.
The OAS, once dominated by influential leftist governments from countries such as Argentina and Brazil, has clashed for months with Venezuela. Recent changes in governments in both countries brought in leaders openly hostile toward Maduro.
OAS chief Luis Almagro has said Venezuela should be suspended if it does not hold general elections "as quickly as possible."
Maduro's government calls the OAS a pawn of U.S. policy and dismisses Almagro, a former Uruguayan foreign minister once friendly with Venezuela's socialists, as a turncoat working for Washington.
Maduro's adversaries accuse him of delaying elections to avoid suffering ballot-box defeats, disregarding the country's opposition-led Congress and overseeing an economic crisis that has left the many in the country unable to eat properly. (ontinueReading
Thursday, April 27, 2017
Archaeology shocker: Study claims humans reached the Americas 130,000 years ago
WashingtonPost.com - Some 130,000 years ago, scientists say, a mysterious group of ancient people visited the coastline of what is now Southern California. More than 100,000 years before they were supposed to have arrived in the Americas, these unknown people used five heavy stones to break the bones of a mastodon. They cracked open femurs to suck out the marrow and, using the rocks as hammers, scored deep notches in the bone. When finished, they abandoned the materials in the soft, fine soil; one tusk planted upright in the ground like a single flag in the archaeological record. Then the people vanished.
This is the bold claim put forward by paleontologist Thomas Deméré and his colleagues in a paper published Wednesday in the journal Nature. The researchers say that the scratched-up mastodon fossils and large, chipped stones uncovered during excavation for a San Diego highway more than 20 years ago are evidence of an unknown hominin species, perhaps Homo erectus, Neanderthals, maybe even Homo sapiens.
If Deméré's analysis is accurate, it would set back the arrival date for hominins in the Americas and suggest that modern humans might not have been the first species to arrive. But the paper has raised skepticism among many researchers who study American prehistory. Several said this is a classic case of an extraordinary claim requiring extraordinary evidence — which they argue the Nature paper doesn’t provide.
“You can’t push human activity in the New World back 100,000 years based on evidence as inherently ambiguous as broken bones and nondescript stones,” said David Meltzer, an archaeologist at Southern Methodist University. “They need to do a better job showing nature could not be responsible for those bones and stones.”
For decades, discussion of early settlement of the Americas has focused on the tail end of the Ice Age. Most archaeologists agree that humans crossed a land bridge from Asia into Alaska sometime after 25,000 years ago, then either walked between ice sheets or took boats down the Pacific coastline to reach the wide open plains of Pleistocene America roughly 15,000 years before present. Though scientists debated the exact timing of this journey, their estimates differed by hundreds or a few thousand years, not tens of thousands. (ontinueReading
This is the bold claim put forward by paleontologist Thomas Deméré and his colleagues in a paper published Wednesday in the journal Nature. The researchers say that the scratched-up mastodon fossils and large, chipped stones uncovered during excavation for a San Diego highway more than 20 years ago are evidence of an unknown hominin species, perhaps Homo erectus, Neanderthals, maybe even Homo sapiens.
If Deméré's analysis is accurate, it would set back the arrival date for hominins in the Americas and suggest that modern humans might not have been the first species to arrive. But the paper has raised skepticism among many researchers who study American prehistory. Several said this is a classic case of an extraordinary claim requiring extraordinary evidence — which they argue the Nature paper doesn’t provide.
“You can’t push human activity in the New World back 100,000 years based on evidence as inherently ambiguous as broken bones and nondescript stones,” said David Meltzer, an archaeologist at Southern Methodist University. “They need to do a better job showing nature could not be responsible for those bones and stones.”
For decades, discussion of early settlement of the Americas has focused on the tail end of the Ice Age. Most archaeologists agree that humans crossed a land bridge from Asia into Alaska sometime after 25,000 years ago, then either walked between ice sheets or took boats down the Pacific coastline to reach the wide open plains of Pleistocene America roughly 15,000 years before present. Though scientists debated the exact timing of this journey, their estimates differed by hundreds or a few thousand years, not tens of thousands. (ontinueReading
Wednesday, April 26, 2017
'Plastic bag' womb could help keep premature babies alive
(CNN) - An artificial womb resembling a plastic bag has been used to keep premature lambs alive for four weeks outside of their own mother's womb and could one day be applied to premature babies.
The sealed bag, made of polythene, contains amniotic fluid to provide all the nutrients and protection needed for growth, an interface delivering oxygen just as an umbilical cord would, and exchanging gases just like a placenta.
The system works to mimic the environment of a natural womb and the team hopes to one day adapt the technology for use on premature babies.
"We've developed a system that, as closely as possible, reproduces the environment of the womb and replaces the function of the placenta," said Dr. Alan Flake, a fetal surgeon and director of the Center for Fetal Research in the Center for Fetal Diagnosis and Treatment at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) who led the research, published Tuesday.
"This, in theory, should allow support of premature infants," he said, adding that his team's goal is to "meet the unmet need of extreme prematurity."
One in ten US births are premature (younger than 37 weeks gestational age), according to the team. And about 30,000 per year are critically preterm, meaning they are born younger than 26 weeks. The average human gestation period is 40 weeks.
Flake adds this level of extreme prematurity is the leading cause of infant mortality and morbidity in the US, accounting for one-third of all infant deaths and one-half of all cases of cerebral palsy attributed to prematurity.
The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists in the UK also report poor survival of babies born at gestations below 24 weeks, despite great progress in neonatal care.
Globally, more than one in 10 pregnancies will end in preterm birth. In babies born preterm, the chance of survival at less than 23 weeks is almost zero, while at 23 weeks it is 15%, at 24 weeks 55% and at 25 weeks this increases to about 80%, according to UK maternal and fetal research charity, Tommy's.
Flake's team hope their new system may improve survival rates among this group of babies in the future, but acknowledge it will take at least a decade. (ontinueReading
The sealed bag, made of polythene, contains amniotic fluid to provide all the nutrients and protection needed for growth, an interface delivering oxygen just as an umbilical cord would, and exchanging gases just like a placenta.
The system works to mimic the environment of a natural womb and the team hopes to one day adapt the technology for use on premature babies.
"We've developed a system that, as closely as possible, reproduces the environment of the womb and replaces the function of the placenta," said Dr. Alan Flake, a fetal surgeon and director of the Center for Fetal Research in the Center for Fetal Diagnosis and Treatment at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) who led the research, published Tuesday.
"This, in theory, should allow support of premature infants," he said, adding that his team's goal is to "meet the unmet need of extreme prematurity."
One in ten US births are premature (younger than 37 weeks gestational age), according to the team. And about 30,000 per year are critically preterm, meaning they are born younger than 26 weeks. The average human gestation period is 40 weeks.
Flake adds this level of extreme prematurity is the leading cause of infant mortality and morbidity in the US, accounting for one-third of all infant deaths and one-half of all cases of cerebral palsy attributed to prematurity.
The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists in the UK also report poor survival of babies born at gestations below 24 weeks, despite great progress in neonatal care.
Globally, more than one in 10 pregnancies will end in preterm birth. In babies born preterm, the chance of survival at less than 23 weeks is almost zero, while at 23 weeks it is 15%, at 24 weeks 55% and at 25 weeks this increases to about 80%, according to UK maternal and fetal research charity, Tommy's.
Flake's team hope their new system may improve survival rates among this group of babies in the future, but acknowledge it will take at least a decade. (ontinueReading
Tuesday, April 25, 2017
Has the US started a lumber trade war with Canada?
BBC - The United States is slapping hefty new tariffs on the import of Canadian softwood lumber.
The US Commerce Department says that Canada is improperly subsidising its exports of the forestry product.
This is just the latest volley in the long-running lumber trade dispute between the two countries.
It also comes during a sensitive time in US-Canada trade relations, with North American Free Trade Agreement talks on the horizon.
US President Donald Trump has been sending Canada mixed messages on trade, initially offering assurances that Nafta will only need "tweaks" but recently singling out Canada's softwood lumber and dairy industries for criticism.
As US Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said in a statement: "It has been a bad week for US-Canada trade relations".
On Monday, the US imposed an overall 20% tariff on Canadian softwood lumber.
Five exporters each face specific countervailing duties, which are meant to level the playing field between domestic producers and government-subsidised foreign producers of a product, ranging from 3.2% to 24.12%.
The US has long claimed that Canada is unfairly and illegally subsidising its lumber industry by charging minimal fees to log public lands.
Canada vows it will "vigorously defend" the interests of Canada's softwood lumber industry, including through litigation. (ontinueReading
Monday, April 24, 2017
Jittery EU relieved, for now, after French vote
Brussels (AFP) - Brussels heaved a sigh of relief Monday after pro-EU Emmanuel Macron led far-right Marine Le Pen in France's presidential vote, hoping for some respite after the Brexit shock and the rise of eurosceptics across the bloc.
Relieved Brussels officials broke with protocol on not intervening in national elections and swiftly congratulated Macron despite the fact he still has to beat Le Pen in a run-off.
"Last night, there was one choice between what Europe actually represents and a choice that represents the destruction of Europe," said a spokesman for Jean-Claude Juncker, defending the European Commission chief's decision to call Macron to offer his congratulations.
EU diplomatic chief Federica Mogherini also defended her unabashed congratulations for Macron, who spoke against a backdrop of the European Union's blue-and-gold starred flag on Sunday night.
"Putting together the two flags sends exactly the right message both to the French people and the European Union," Mogherini said on a visit to Russia, which has been accused of meddling in the French election.
- 'Brussels was worried' -
The French vote was being closely watched in Brussels as a bellwether following the election of Donald Trump as US President in November, and Britain's shock vote to leave the EU in June.
"Brussels was worried. There is relief," said EU Economic Affairs Commissioner Pierre Moscovici, a former French socialist finance minister.
But despite the relief, there were still warnings that far-right leader Le Pen remained a contender, a prospect that European Union bigwigs warned was a step towards the tearing apart of the crisis-ridden bloc.
Moscovici was one of many voices to warn that it was too early to celebrate, saying it is "frightening that she still got 7.6 million votes."
Polls show that Macron should beat Le Pen decisively, but analysts warned that the far right still reached historic levels in a sign that anti-Brussels populism was still alive and well in the EU.
Macron's good showing came a month after the Netherlands also fought off a populist insurgency in an election that put the party of anti-Islam MP Geert Wilders in a still strong second place.
The Wilders result "was still 500,000 voters more (than five years ago) when there is low unemployment and the (Dutch) economy is doing well," said Catherine Fieschi, director of the Counterpoint political science consultancy.
But other analysts said the Le Pen and Wilders results were disappointments for the far right and that populism may have reached its peak with the victory for Brexit in the UK last June.
"Although right-wing and left-wing radicals advanced in France, the worst of the tide of populist anger could soon be over in Europe," said Holger Schmieding, an analyst at Berenberg Bank in Germany.
- 'Europe should save its breath' -
Across the EU, there was support for Macron, whose campaign manifesto is profoundly pro-Brussels when all of the other ten candidates running in the first round opposed giving the EU more power.
A spokesman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the EU's most powerful leader, wished Macron "all the best for the next two weeks".
But worryingly for Brussels, the anti-EU vote in France still added up to around 46 percent, with far leftist Jean-Luc Melenchon coming in a close fourth with 19.2 percent of the tally.
"We must not underestimate the Le Pen vote as it indicates an anger that exists not only in France but in several countries," said European Parliament head Antonio Tajani.
Macron, a former banker and French economy minister, wants to accelerate EU integration, including by giving the eurozone a central parliament, finance minister and budget.
This is in stark contrast to Le Pen who backs an exit from the European single currency and a Brexit-style referendum to pave the way for a French exit from the bloc.
She has predicted the EU "will die."
"If she wins, it will obviously be an anti-Europe, protectionist, exclusionist line that wins," said far-right expert Nonna Mayer at Sciences Po university in Paris.
Also looming for France after the presidential election are legislative polls in June.
"Europe should still save its breath until 18 June and the second round of the legislatives" said Martin Michelot of the German Marshall fund.
Former Finnish premier Alexander Stubb said Sunday's result was "a step in the right direction, but experience shows that anything can happen."
Relieved Brussels officials broke with protocol on not intervening in national elections and swiftly congratulated Macron despite the fact he still has to beat Le Pen in a run-off.
"Last night, there was one choice between what Europe actually represents and a choice that represents the destruction of Europe," said a spokesman for Jean-Claude Juncker, defending the European Commission chief's decision to call Macron to offer his congratulations.
EU diplomatic chief Federica Mogherini also defended her unabashed congratulations for Macron, who spoke against a backdrop of the European Union's blue-and-gold starred flag on Sunday night.
"Putting together the two flags sends exactly the right message both to the French people and the European Union," Mogherini said on a visit to Russia, which has been accused of meddling in the French election.
- 'Brussels was worried' -
The French vote was being closely watched in Brussels as a bellwether following the election of Donald Trump as US President in November, and Britain's shock vote to leave the EU in June.
"Brussels was worried. There is relief," said EU Economic Affairs Commissioner Pierre Moscovici, a former French socialist finance minister.
But despite the relief, there were still warnings that far-right leader Le Pen remained a contender, a prospect that European Union bigwigs warned was a step towards the tearing apart of the crisis-ridden bloc.
Moscovici was one of many voices to warn that it was too early to celebrate, saying it is "frightening that she still got 7.6 million votes."
Polls show that Macron should beat Le Pen decisively, but analysts warned that the far right still reached historic levels in a sign that anti-Brussels populism was still alive and well in the EU.
Macron's good showing came a month after the Netherlands also fought off a populist insurgency in an election that put the party of anti-Islam MP Geert Wilders in a still strong second place.
The Wilders result "was still 500,000 voters more (than five years ago) when there is low unemployment and the (Dutch) economy is doing well," said Catherine Fieschi, director of the Counterpoint political science consultancy.
But other analysts said the Le Pen and Wilders results were disappointments for the far right and that populism may have reached its peak with the victory for Brexit in the UK last June.
"Although right-wing and left-wing radicals advanced in France, the worst of the tide of populist anger could soon be over in Europe," said Holger Schmieding, an analyst at Berenberg Bank in Germany.
- 'Europe should save its breath' -
Across the EU, there was support for Macron, whose campaign manifesto is profoundly pro-Brussels when all of the other ten candidates running in the first round opposed giving the EU more power.
A spokesman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the EU's most powerful leader, wished Macron "all the best for the next two weeks".
But worryingly for Brussels, the anti-EU vote in France still added up to around 46 percent, with far leftist Jean-Luc Melenchon coming in a close fourth with 19.2 percent of the tally.
"We must not underestimate the Le Pen vote as it indicates an anger that exists not only in France but in several countries," said European Parliament head Antonio Tajani.
Macron, a former banker and French economy minister, wants to accelerate EU integration, including by giving the eurozone a central parliament, finance minister and budget.
This is in stark contrast to Le Pen who backs an exit from the European single currency and a Brexit-style referendum to pave the way for a French exit from the bloc.
She has predicted the EU "will die."
"If she wins, it will obviously be an anti-Europe, protectionist, exclusionist line that wins," said far-right expert Nonna Mayer at Sciences Po university in Paris.
Also looming for France after the presidential election are legislative polls in June.
"Europe should still save its breath until 18 June and the second round of the legislatives" said Martin Michelot of the German Marshall fund.
Former Finnish premier Alexander Stubb said Sunday's result was "a step in the right direction, but experience shows that anything can happen."
Sunday, April 23, 2017
France Votes for Presidential Finalists After Tight Campaign
Bloomberg.com - French voters headed to the polls Sunday to select two candidates for the presidential runoff, an election that will determine how far the populist wave can go in Europe.
After a campaign that has remade the nation’s political landscape, four candidates with radically different visions are in a position to qualify for the next round. They are Marine Le Pen, the National Front leader who wants to pull France out of Europe’s single currency; Communist-backed Jean-Luc Melenchon, who wants to remake the rules governing monetary union; Francois Fillon, the Republican former prime minister who proposes tough economic reforms; and Emmanuel Macron, a centrist pro-European contesting his first-ever election.
“For weeks, the French have been stating their frustration with an unsatisfactory campaign,” pollster Bruno Jeanbart said in a note for the Fondation Jean Jaures. “Ultimately they have to choose between four drastically different candidates with almost identical chances of success.”
The campaign has been long by French standards, kicking off in earnest last September as the Republicans held their first-ever primary contest, and has overturned traditional French politics. Of the two parties that have run France for the past half-century, the governing Socialists have been reduced to an also-ran; their candidate, Benoit Hamon, was polling in the single digits. The Republicans, led by Fillon, trailed in third place for much of the race.
Polls opened at 8 a.m. Paris time and will close at 7 p.m. in rural areas and 8 p.m. in big cities. Results will be released starting at 8 p.m. Sunday and the top two finishers of the 11 candidates will go into a runoff that will be decided on May 7. The weather is largely sunny across the country.
Macron voted along with his wife Brigitte in the northern resort of Le Touquet around 10.30 a.m., while Hamon cast his ballot in Trappes, in the western suburbs of Paris. Le Pen voted in Henin-Beaumont, her stronghold in northern France. Fillon and Melenchon voted in Paris.
By 5 p.m., 69.4 percent of registered French voters had cast their ballot, according to the Interior Ministry. That’s just shy of the 70.6 percent at the same point in 2012. The final turnout rate could reach 81 percent, pollster Ifop estimated. In 2012, the participation rate in the first round was 79.48 percent. (ontinueReading
Saturday, April 22, 2017
Diet soda can increase risk of dementia and stroke, study finds
usatoday.com - The quest to trim waistlines using artificial sweeteners could be backfiring, as researchers found artificially sweetened drinks like diet soda can increase a person's likelihood of stroke and dementia.
A study published in the American Heart Association journal Stroke found a daily diet soda puts a person at three times the risk of dementia and stroke compared to someone who drinks less than one a week.
It's another blow to diet soda, which has been the subject of recent unflattering studies. Purdue University found in 2013 it doesn't actually help us lose weight. Another 2007 study discovered those who drink diet soda are no less at risk of heart disease than those who drink regular soda.
In fact, the Stroke study found drinking sugary drinks such as soda and fruit juice, doesn’t increase a person's risk of stroke and dementia. Researchers caution that's not a call to go buy sugary drinks, which Harvard has linked to type 2 diabetes and heart disease.
"Although we did not find an association between stroke or dementia and the consumption of sugary drinks, this certainly does not mean they are a healthy option," explained Dr. Matthew Pase, study author and a senior fellow at the Boston University School of Medicine. "We recommend that people drink water on a regular basis instead of sugary or artificially sweetened beverages."
Over seven years, researchers studied thousands of people over the age of 45 from the area of Framingham, Mass., on their drinking and eating habits. Researchers followed-up a decade later to see who had experienced a stroke or dementia. The data was adjusted for a number of factors, including age, sex and caloric intake.
The study only tracked the trend between artificial sweetener consumers, dementia and stroke, but was unable to prove that drinking artificial drinks was the cause of the diseases.
Pase added the overall risk for dementia and stroke isn't staggering.
"Even if someone is three times as likely to develop stroke or dementia, it is by no means a certain fate," he said. "In our study, 3% of the people had a new stroke and 5% developed dementia, so we're still talking about a small number of people developing stroke or dementia."
The American Beverage Association, which represents soda makers such as Pepsi and Coca-Cola, defended low-calorie sweeteners, saying they can be tools for weight loss. In statement, the ABA said various other factors contribute to stroke and dementia.
“Low-calorie sweeteners have been proven safe by worldwide government safety authorities as well as hundreds of scientific studies and there is nothing in this research that counters this well-established fact," the statement said. "The (U.S. Food and Drug Administration), World Health Organization, European Food Safety Authority and others have extensively reviewed low-calorie sweeteners and have all reached the same conclusion – they are safe for consumption." (ontinueReading
A study published in the American Heart Association journal Stroke found a daily diet soda puts a person at three times the risk of dementia and stroke compared to someone who drinks less than one a week.
It's another blow to diet soda, which has been the subject of recent unflattering studies. Purdue University found in 2013 it doesn't actually help us lose weight. Another 2007 study discovered those who drink diet soda are no less at risk of heart disease than those who drink regular soda.
In fact, the Stroke study found drinking sugary drinks such as soda and fruit juice, doesn’t increase a person's risk of stroke and dementia. Researchers caution that's not a call to go buy sugary drinks, which Harvard has linked to type 2 diabetes and heart disease.
"Although we did not find an association between stroke or dementia and the consumption of sugary drinks, this certainly does not mean they are a healthy option," explained Dr. Matthew Pase, study author and a senior fellow at the Boston University School of Medicine. "We recommend that people drink water on a regular basis instead of sugary or artificially sweetened beverages."
Over seven years, researchers studied thousands of people over the age of 45 from the area of Framingham, Mass., on their drinking and eating habits. Researchers followed-up a decade later to see who had experienced a stroke or dementia. The data was adjusted for a number of factors, including age, sex and caloric intake.
The study only tracked the trend between artificial sweetener consumers, dementia and stroke, but was unable to prove that drinking artificial drinks was the cause of the diseases.
Pase added the overall risk for dementia and stroke isn't staggering.
"Even if someone is three times as likely to develop stroke or dementia, it is by no means a certain fate," he said. "In our study, 3% of the people had a new stroke and 5% developed dementia, so we're still talking about a small number of people developing stroke or dementia."
The American Beverage Association, which represents soda makers such as Pepsi and Coca-Cola, defended low-calorie sweeteners, saying they can be tools for weight loss. In statement, the ABA said various other factors contribute to stroke and dementia.
“Low-calorie sweeteners have been proven safe by worldwide government safety authorities as well as hundreds of scientific studies and there is nothing in this research that counters this well-established fact," the statement said. "The (U.S. Food and Drug Administration), World Health Organization, European Food Safety Authority and others have extensively reviewed low-calorie sweeteners and have all reached the same conclusion – they are safe for consumption." (ontinueReading
Friday, April 21, 2017
Struggling over priced apparel retailer Bebe Stores to shut all stores
Reuters - Struggling apparel retailer Bebe Stores Inc (BEBE.O) said on Friday it would close all its stores by the end of May, barely a month after announcing it was exploring strategic alternatives following four years of losses.
The company, which had 180 stores at the end of 2016, also plans to liquidate all merchandise and fixtures within the stores, it said in a regulatory filing. (bit.ly/2obl8s3)
Shares of the company hit a 14-month low of $3.02 in morning trading.
Bloomberg reported last month that Bebe was planning to shut stores and seek a turnaround as an online brand to avoid filing for bankruptcy.
A number of apparel retailers have gone bankrupt in the last couple of years, including Aeropostale and The Limited, due to lackluster demand as they battle stiff competition from Amazon.com Inc (AMZN.O) and fast-fashion retailers such as H&M (HMb.ST) and Zara.
Bebe expects to recognize an impairment charge of about $20 million from the store closures, which will be recorded in the third and fourth quarters.
The Brisbane, California-based retailer, known for its form-fitting dresses and other apparel, did not say what its future plans were.
The company will also pay advisers B. Riley & Co and Tiger Capital Group LLC $550,000 and 15 percent of the gross proceeds from the sale of store fixtures. (ontinueReading
Thursday, April 20, 2017
North Korea: Our 'super-mighty' preemptive strike will reduce America's military to ashes
Politico.com - The North Korean government, via a state-run newspaper, warned of a “super-mighty preemptive strike” against the U.S. that would reduce both its military forces in South Korea and the American mainland “to ashes,” according to a Reuters report published Thursday.
"In the case of our super-mighty preemptive strike being launched, it will completely and immediately wipe out not only U.S. imperialists' invasion forces in South Korea and its surrounding areas but the U.S. mainland and reduce them to ashes," The Rodong Sinmun, the officials newspaper of North Korea’s Workers’ Party, said.
Such a threat is in line with past bellicose threats made by the North Korean government, which relies on bellicose rhetoric in part to maintain support among its own people. In recent weeks, North Korea has stepped up its military activity, attempting two missile tests, only one of which was successful, and ramping up its tough talk towards the U.S., South Korea and Japan.
The timing of North Korea’s saber-rattling, which has coincided with the birthday of its founder Kim Il Sung, also falls in line with past behavior.
Seeking to corral North Korea and its nuclear weapon program, U.S. President Donald Trump has turned to China, the North Korean government’s chief international benefactor. Trump, who campaigned on taking a hard line with China on economic issues, has expressed a willingness to offer more favorable terms on trade if the Chinese government is able to rein in North Korea.
Should China refuse or prove unable to do so, Trump has said the U.S. will deal with North Korea with the help of its allies. Vice President Mike Pence, currently on a multi-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region, has warned that “the era of strategic patience is over” when it comes to North Korea.
As a more tangible signal of the Trump administration’s approach to North Korea, U.S. Pacific Command and the White House announced earlier this month that the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson and its battle group had been deployed to the waters off the Korean Peninsula. That statement turned out to be untrue and the Carl Vinson was photographed last weekend heading south near Indonesia, away from North Korea and towards planned military exercises with the Australian navy.
Those exercises completed, the Carl Vinson is now headed towards the Korean Peninsula, the U.S. military and the White House have said. (ontinueReading
"In the case of our super-mighty preemptive strike being launched, it will completely and immediately wipe out not only U.S. imperialists' invasion forces in South Korea and its surrounding areas but the U.S. mainland and reduce them to ashes," The Rodong Sinmun, the officials newspaper of North Korea’s Workers’ Party, said.
Such a threat is in line with past bellicose threats made by the North Korean government, which relies on bellicose rhetoric in part to maintain support among its own people. In recent weeks, North Korea has stepped up its military activity, attempting two missile tests, only one of which was successful, and ramping up its tough talk towards the U.S., South Korea and Japan.
Seeking to corral North Korea and its nuclear weapon program, U.S. President Donald Trump has turned to China, the North Korean government’s chief international benefactor. Trump, who campaigned on taking a hard line with China on economic issues, has expressed a willingness to offer more favorable terms on trade if the Chinese government is able to rein in North Korea.
Should China refuse or prove unable to do so, Trump has said the U.S. will deal with North Korea with the help of its allies. Vice President Mike Pence, currently on a multi-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region, has warned that “the era of strategic patience is over” when it comes to North Korea.
As a more tangible signal of the Trump administration’s approach to North Korea, U.S. Pacific Command and the White House announced earlier this month that the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson and its battle group had been deployed to the waters off the Korean Peninsula. That statement turned out to be untrue and the Carl Vinson was photographed last weekend heading south near Indonesia, away from North Korea and towards planned military exercises with the Australian navy.
Those exercises completed, the Carl Vinson is now headed towards the Korean Peninsula, the U.S. military and the White House have said. (ontinueReading
Wednesday, April 19, 2017
Strength!: France is the weakest of Europe's big 3 economies
Europe's third biggest economy has suffered years of anemic growth, high unemployment and budget deficits, while neighbors such as Germany and the U.K. have enjoyed a stronger recovery from the global financial crisis.
The country's economic malaise is a major issue in presidential elections scheduled for Sunday.
The contest has become a four-way race between candidates from across the political spectrum. Two of the front runners -- far right politician Marine Le Pen and socialist Jean-Luc Melenchon -- have radical ideas on how to improve the economy.
Both candidates oppose free trade agreements and are highly critical of the euro.
"The lackluster growth and high unemployment of recent years are fertile ground for the populist and eurosceptic Marine Le Pen," said Jessica Hinds, European economist at Capital Economics.
The two candidates with the biggest share of Sunday's vote will advance to a runoff scheduled for May 7. But will they have the right prescription to cure France?
After years of slow growth, the country's GDP figures are finally turning higher. But they remain at very low levels.
The French economy expanded by 1.2% in 2016, according to the International Monetary Fund. The two larger economies in Europe -- Germany and the U.K. -- posted growth of 1.8% over the same period. (ontinueReading
Tuesday, April 18, 2017
Happy Tax Day! Here's How Corporations Plan to screw You Over
theintercept.com - FEW THINGS TRANSFORM us into frustrated baboons like navigating Turbotax each year. It’s incredible any computers physically survive April.
First there’s the maddening fact, when all is said and done, that the U.S. has something approaching a flat tax system. It’s true that, as right-wing think tanks constantly bleat, the top 1 percent pay a much higher rate than everyone else in federal income tax. But most people pay higher rates than the rich do in payroll and state and local taxes. Add everything together, and everyone from the middle class on up is paying about the same percentage in taxes overall.
Then there’s the grim reality that a big chunk of our money goes to buy things like 21,000-pound bombs, which we drop on, say, Afghanistan, a country with an economy one-one thousandth the size of ours.
And then there’s the process of paying taxes itself, which is mind-numbingly baroque — and for absolutely no reason. After all, the government already has copies of all of your tax forms. Countries like Denmark, Sweden and Spain use that information to fill out your return and send it to you. If it looks good, you sign it and you’re done (or if you think you see a mistake, you can change it). The sole reason we don’t have such a system is that the current disaster makes billions of dollars for tax software companies, which then use a slice of that to relentlessly lobby Congress to keep the status quo.
But if those are the only things turning you into a rage monkey this Tax Day, you’re not paying attention. As an extensive new report from Oxfam America explains, the biggest U.S. multinational corporations have positioned themselves for a political victory that will not just slash their taxes and leave regular people to pick up the bill, but also will set the stage for further corporate tax cuts in the future.
Corporate America has three main goals when it comes to taxes:
• Bring their “overseas” profits home. The top statutory tax rate for American corporations is 35 percent, on profits earned anywhere on earth. However, taxes aren’t assessed on profits from outside the U.S. until the money is brought back here.
This creates a huge incentive for companies to engage in complicated financial machinations to make it appear that as much of their profits as possible have been “earned” in other countries. They then leave the cash overseas in hopes of arranging a tax holiday allowing them to bring it back at a much lower rate. This already happened once, in 2004, when companies were assessed taxes at 5 percent on repatriated profits.
Oxfam determined that as of the 2015 tax year, the 50 largest U.S. multinational corporations have a gargantuan $1.6 trillion stashed in other countries. That’s about one-tenth the size of the entire U.S. economy.
Even more remarkably, Oxfam found the tally was up $200 billion from the year before. Tim Cook — CEO of Apple, which has more money overseas than any other company — said before last year’s election that he was “optimistic” there would be a new tax holiday no matter who was president. That jump in overseas profits suggests corporate lawyers and accountants throughout the business world were making a special effort to prepare for such an optimistic future.
Oxfam calculated that the top 50 companies spent $2.5 billion lobbying from 2009 to 2015, or about $46 million per member of Congress. The report also tracked the plethora of front groups set up by corporations to make the case for their kind of tax “reform.” The 50 companies belong to two such organizations on average, while eight of the 50 are members of four or more.
In public, the front groups claim that if big corporations can bring their money home at a special low tax rate, they’ll go on a hiring spree in the U.S. and pour money into investments here. In private, when discussing the subject with Wall Street analysts and investors, they explain that they’ll actually spend it on mergers and stock buybacks. An analysis by Goldman Sachs last November said the same thing, predicting that three-fourths of profits brought back to the U.S. would be used for buybacks.
• Bring down the corporate tax rate as far as possible. Read the Wall Street Journal op-ed page on any day or watch five minutes of CNBC, and you’ll learn that America’s 35 percent statutory corporate tax rate is one of the highest in the world.
Corporate America would dearly love to lower that as far as possible, and if that’s all you hear about the subject it sounds like it makes sense.
However, the effective U.S. corporate tax rate — what companies actually pay after taking advantage of every deduction and loophole — is much lower. A2014 Congressional Research Service report found the effective U.S. rate was 27.1 percent, slightly lower than the 27.7 percent weighted average of the rest of the Organization for Economic and Cooperative Development, made up of most of the world’s richest countries. The 2015 Economic Report of the President, covering a more recent period, calculated that the effective marginal tax rate in the U.S. was 23.9 percent, compared to a weighted average of 20.6 percent for Japan, France, Germany, Canada, Italy and the UK.
Looked at another way, in 2014 OECD members raised an average of 2.8 percent of their GDP in revenue from corporate taxes. That same year the U.S. raised significantly less, at 2.2 percent.
In other words, there’s little sign U.S. companies are overtaxed by world standards.
• Use lowered U.S. tax rates to ratchet down rates everywhere else – and then come back for more here. The most important thing to understand about this issue is that multinational corporations will not be satisfied with a one-time tax cut. Instead, their goal is to use any reduction in U.S. taxes to force taxes down in the rest of the world, and then start complaining again that U.S. rates are too high.
This process is already well underway around the globe. The Oxfam report points out that in 1990 the average corporate tax rate in the world’s 20 major countries was 40 percent; by 2015 it had fallen to 28.7 percent. Moreover, the average 2.8 percent of GDP that OECD companies raised via corporate taxes in 2014 was significantly down from the 3.6 percent they raised just seven years before in 2007.
Politicians acutely feel pressure to bring down rates to make their countries “competitive.” Speaking last September, Bill Clinton explained that he didn’t mind a 35 percent corporate rate when he was president because at that point “it was precisely in the middle of the OECD countries” — but “it isn’t anymore,” so “we should try to get it as close to the international average as we can.”
Likewise, soon after Donald Trump won the election while calling for a top corporate tax rate of 15 percent, British Prime Minister Theresa May declared that her goal was for the UK to reduce its corporate tax from 20 percent to “the lowest corporate tax rate in the G20.”
The logical endpoint of this beggar-thy-neighbor dynamic is that eventually corporations will pay nothing in taxes, at which point everyone will in fact be beggars. “Rather than competing to win a race to the bottom,” says Robert Silverman, the main author of the Oxfam report, “international tax reform needs to be built on a new framework of cross-border cooperation, transparency and accountability.”
AT THIS POINT, both the good news and the bad news on this subject is that Donald Trump is president. On the one hand, he animatedly vowed during last year’s debates that “I’ll be reducing taxes tremendously” on corporations and that “it’s going to be a beautiful thing to watch.” With a Republican Congress, the years of lobbying and payoffs by big business should be set to bear not just fruit but an entire orchard. But on the other hand, Trump is so lazy and incompetent he probably couldn’t get Congress to pass a resolution endorsing the American Revolution.
So as of now, Trump appears set to enjoy the same rousing success with taxes as he did with healthcare. He’s apparently thrown out the tax plan on which he campaigned and is starting over again from scratch.
Obamacare, however, was a subject of only tangential interest to corporate America. By contrast, a new and improved tax code could be worth trillions of dollars to them. With the stars so seemingly aligned, it’s unlikely that they’ll let their dream be deferred without a significant fight.
So as you sign your tax return, save some screeching and hooting for this infuriating topic. Regular people think about taxes as little as possible because we have no control over them, and the core unfairness of the U.S. system brings us nothing but vexation. But big corporations think about taxes every day — because they know that sooner or later, one way or another, they’ll get what they want.
First there’s the maddening fact, when all is said and done, that the U.S. has something approaching a flat tax system. It’s true that, as right-wing think tanks constantly bleat, the top 1 percent pay a much higher rate than everyone else in federal income tax. But most people pay higher rates than the rich do in payroll and state and local taxes. Add everything together, and everyone from the middle class on up is paying about the same percentage in taxes overall.
Then there’s the grim reality that a big chunk of our money goes to buy things like 21,000-pound bombs, which we drop on, say, Afghanistan, a country with an economy one-one thousandth the size of ours.
And then there’s the process of paying taxes itself, which is mind-numbingly baroque — and for absolutely no reason. After all, the government already has copies of all of your tax forms. Countries like Denmark, Sweden and Spain use that information to fill out your return and send it to you. If it looks good, you sign it and you’re done (or if you think you see a mistake, you can change it). The sole reason we don’t have such a system is that the current disaster makes billions of dollars for tax software companies, which then use a slice of that to relentlessly lobby Congress to keep the status quo.
But if those are the only things turning you into a rage monkey this Tax Day, you’re not paying attention. As an extensive new report from Oxfam America explains, the biggest U.S. multinational corporations have positioned themselves for a political victory that will not just slash their taxes and leave regular people to pick up the bill, but also will set the stage for further corporate tax cuts in the future.
Corporate America has three main goals when it comes to taxes:
• Bring their “overseas” profits home. The top statutory tax rate for American corporations is 35 percent, on profits earned anywhere on earth. However, taxes aren’t assessed on profits from outside the U.S. until the money is brought back here.
This creates a huge incentive for companies to engage in complicated financial machinations to make it appear that as much of their profits as possible have been “earned” in other countries. They then leave the cash overseas in hopes of arranging a tax holiday allowing them to bring it back at a much lower rate. This already happened once, in 2004, when companies were assessed taxes at 5 percent on repatriated profits.
Oxfam determined that as of the 2015 tax year, the 50 largest U.S. multinational corporations have a gargantuan $1.6 trillion stashed in other countries. That’s about one-tenth the size of the entire U.S. economy.
Even more remarkably, Oxfam found the tally was up $200 billion from the year before. Tim Cook — CEO of Apple, which has more money overseas than any other company — said before last year’s election that he was “optimistic” there would be a new tax holiday no matter who was president. That jump in overseas profits suggests corporate lawyers and accountants throughout the business world were making a special effort to prepare for such an optimistic future.
Oxfam calculated that the top 50 companies spent $2.5 billion lobbying from 2009 to 2015, or about $46 million per member of Congress. The report also tracked the plethora of front groups set up by corporations to make the case for their kind of tax “reform.” The 50 companies belong to two such organizations on average, while eight of the 50 are members of four or more.
In public, the front groups claim that if big corporations can bring their money home at a special low tax rate, they’ll go on a hiring spree in the U.S. and pour money into investments here. In private, when discussing the subject with Wall Street analysts and investors, they explain that they’ll actually spend it on mergers and stock buybacks. An analysis by Goldman Sachs last November said the same thing, predicting that three-fourths of profits brought back to the U.S. would be used for buybacks.
• Bring down the corporate tax rate as far as possible. Read the Wall Street Journal op-ed page on any day or watch five minutes of CNBC, and you’ll learn that America’s 35 percent statutory corporate tax rate is one of the highest in the world.
Corporate America would dearly love to lower that as far as possible, and if that’s all you hear about the subject it sounds like it makes sense.
However, the effective U.S. corporate tax rate — what companies actually pay after taking advantage of every deduction and loophole — is much lower. A2014 Congressional Research Service report found the effective U.S. rate was 27.1 percent, slightly lower than the 27.7 percent weighted average of the rest of the Organization for Economic and Cooperative Development, made up of most of the world’s richest countries. The 2015 Economic Report of the President, covering a more recent period, calculated that the effective marginal tax rate in the U.S. was 23.9 percent, compared to a weighted average of 20.6 percent for Japan, France, Germany, Canada, Italy and the UK.
Looked at another way, in 2014 OECD members raised an average of 2.8 percent of their GDP in revenue from corporate taxes. That same year the U.S. raised significantly less, at 2.2 percent.
In other words, there’s little sign U.S. companies are overtaxed by world standards.
• Use lowered U.S. tax rates to ratchet down rates everywhere else – and then come back for more here. The most important thing to understand about this issue is that multinational corporations will not be satisfied with a one-time tax cut. Instead, their goal is to use any reduction in U.S. taxes to force taxes down in the rest of the world, and then start complaining again that U.S. rates are too high.
This process is already well underway around the globe. The Oxfam report points out that in 1990 the average corporate tax rate in the world’s 20 major countries was 40 percent; by 2015 it had fallen to 28.7 percent. Moreover, the average 2.8 percent of GDP that OECD companies raised via corporate taxes in 2014 was significantly down from the 3.6 percent they raised just seven years before in 2007.
Politicians acutely feel pressure to bring down rates to make their countries “competitive.” Speaking last September, Bill Clinton explained that he didn’t mind a 35 percent corporate rate when he was president because at that point “it was precisely in the middle of the OECD countries” — but “it isn’t anymore,” so “we should try to get it as close to the international average as we can.”
Likewise, soon after Donald Trump won the election while calling for a top corporate tax rate of 15 percent, British Prime Minister Theresa May declared that her goal was for the UK to reduce its corporate tax from 20 percent to “the lowest corporate tax rate in the G20.”
The logical endpoint of this beggar-thy-neighbor dynamic is that eventually corporations will pay nothing in taxes, at which point everyone will in fact be beggars. “Rather than competing to win a race to the bottom,” says Robert Silverman, the main author of the Oxfam report, “international tax reform needs to be built on a new framework of cross-border cooperation, transparency and accountability.”
AT THIS POINT, both the good news and the bad news on this subject is that Donald Trump is president. On the one hand, he animatedly vowed during last year’s debates that “I’ll be reducing taxes tremendously” on corporations and that “it’s going to be a beautiful thing to watch.” With a Republican Congress, the years of lobbying and payoffs by big business should be set to bear not just fruit but an entire orchard. But on the other hand, Trump is so lazy and incompetent he probably couldn’t get Congress to pass a resolution endorsing the American Revolution.
So as of now, Trump appears set to enjoy the same rousing success with taxes as he did with healthcare. He’s apparently thrown out the tax plan on which he campaigned and is starting over again from scratch.
Obamacare, however, was a subject of only tangential interest to corporate America. By contrast, a new and improved tax code could be worth trillions of dollars to them. With the stars so seemingly aligned, it’s unlikely that they’ll let their dream be deferred without a significant fight.
So as you sign your tax return, save some screeching and hooting for this infuriating topic. Regular people think about taxes as little as possible because we have no control over them, and the core unfairness of the U.S. system brings us nothing but vexation. But big corporations think about taxes every day — because they know that sooner or later, one way or another, they’ll get what they want.
Monday, April 17, 2017
Alex Jones, the Infowars conspiracy guru, is just playing a part, his lawyer says
yahoonews.com - Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones is just playing a character on his popular Infowars broadcast, according to his lawyer.
The question of whether or not Jones believes the myriad conspiracy theories he espouses daily or is simply putting on a performance has become an issue in a custody hearing between Jones and his ex-wife. Kelly Jones, who has been divorced from Alex Jones since 2015, is suing in Texas court for partial or sole custody of their three children.
According to an Austin American-Statesman report on the pretrial hearing, Jones attorney Randall Wilhite said that inferring Jones’ character based on his Infowars broadcasts would make as much sense as judging Jack Nicholson based on his performance as the Joker.
“He’s playing a character,” Wilhite said of Jones. “He is a performance artist.”
The judge, Orlinda Naranjo, said the case would not be about Infowars, which she said she had never seen or listened to until last week.
Infowars is one of the most popular conspiracy websites on the Internet. Among other claims he has advanced, Jones has suggested that the 9/11 attacks were an inside job perpetrated by the American government, that aspects of the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre were faked, and that a Washington pizzeria was the headquarters of a pedophile ring involving Hillary Clinton’s campaign chief John Podesta. (Jones later apologized for his role in the “Pizzagate” theory after a frequent Infowars listener who said he was investigating the charges fired off shots inside the restaurant.)
Jones claims to have the ear of President Trump, and Trump the candidate did partake in a 30-minute interview with Jones in December 2015. Trump incorporated a few of Jones’ favorite theories into his campaign stops, including a riff on how the California drought was a hoax.
“Your reputation is amazing,” said Trump to Jones during the conversation. “I won’t let you down.”
Jones’ wife is saying there’s no difference between her former husband and the on-air personality who has threatened to beat up both actor Alec Baldwin and California Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff in recent months.
“I’m concerned that he is engaged in felonious behavior, threatening a member of Congress,” said Kelly Jones during the pretrial hearing, per the American-Statesman. “He broadcasts from home. The children are there, watching him broadcast.” Jones’ children are aged 14, 12 and 9.
Jones said his comments about Schiff — whom he called a “goddamn son of a bitch” earlier this month — were “clearly tongue-in-cheek and basically art performance.”
One of Jones’ latest theories actually involves children — the children of former President Barack Obama. On Friday’s edition of Infowars, he sat down with Mike Cernovich, the alt-right conspiracy theorist whom Donald Trump Jr. recently suggested should win the Pulitzer. Via Media Matters, Jones said, “The word is those aren’t even his kids,” in reference to Malia and Sasha Obama, to which Cernovich replied, “I’ve heard that too.”
Journalist Jon Ronson, who has known Jones for nearly two decades and chronicled him in Them and The Elephant in the Room, told Yahoo News that he didn’t think there was a difference between the performer and person.
“I’ve been talking to people close to Alex, and they have expressed surprise,” said Ronson in an interview with Yahoo News. “They’ve said to me, ‘That’s not the Alex I know; Alex is exactly the same off camera and on camera.’ When I went to visit him in the summer, I noticed he was exactly the same off camera to on camera.”
He added, “Even 20 years ago at Bohemian Grove, there wasn’t an ‘on Alex’ and an ‘off Alex.’ He was always the same. I honestly think the Alex you see on TV is Alex.”
Beginning Monday, a jury will be selected at the Travis County Courthouse to sort out whether there is a difference between the public Jones and private Jones, and whether, when it comes to his fitness as a parent, it matters.
Sunday, April 16, 2017
Nevada Will Provide Clean Needle Vending Machines for Drug Users
fusionnet.com - After decades of failed policy driven by the multibillion-dollar federal drug war that criminalizes drug use and addiction, some states are slowly coming around on their own with new health-based approaches.
In May, Nevada will become the first U.S. state to offer clean needle exchanges through no-charge, automated vending machines, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported this week. Clean needles and gear will first be made available in machines at three locations in Las Vegas.
Participants in the program, which is run by the Southern Nevada Health District, the Nevada AIDS Research and Education Society, and Trac-B Exchange, will be issued cards that they can then scan in the machines. Included in the kits are 10 syringes, a tourniquet, a disposal container for used syringes, alcohol swabs and adhesive bandages,” Huffington Post reported.
“This is like our heart and soul. Seeing this happen is actually like a dream come true,” Michele Jorge, HIV lab director at the Community Counseling Center, told the Review Journal.
The program’s primary goal is to reduce the transmission of communicable diseases such as hepatitis C and HIV, both risks for those who use dirty needles for intravenous drug use. Health officials have noted an increase in recent years in hepatitis C cases among young people in the U.S.
Harm reduction clinics have been offering some clean needle exchanges—common in other countries—for several years. And last year, Congress finally ended a ban on federal funding for needle exchange programs, NBC reported.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has warned that heroin use continues to increase across the U.S. Its most recent report, based on studies from 2002-2013, noted that the greatest increases in use occurred in demographic groups with historically low rates of heroin use, including women, the privately insured, and people with higher incomes.
Heroin-related overdose deaths also increased during the same period, nearly quadrupling to 8,200 deaths in 2013.
Liz Evans, executive director at New York Harm Reduction Educators, called needle exchanges, and harm reduction programs in general, a “philosophy of service at the front end…adjusting the way we look at drug users,” according to NBC. “Too often we fail to see drug users as human beings, and they become defined by that and get called all these names like junkies and addicts. It becomes harder as a society to respond to them with kindness. (ontinueReading
In May, Nevada will become the first U.S. state to offer clean needle exchanges through no-charge, automated vending machines, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported this week. Clean needles and gear will first be made available in machines at three locations in Las Vegas.
Participants in the program, which is run by the Southern Nevada Health District, the Nevada AIDS Research and Education Society, and Trac-B Exchange, will be issued cards that they can then scan in the machines. Included in the kits are 10 syringes, a tourniquet, a disposal container for used syringes, alcohol swabs and adhesive bandages,” Huffington Post reported.
“This is like our heart and soul. Seeing this happen is actually like a dream come true,” Michele Jorge, HIV lab director at the Community Counseling Center, told the Review Journal.
The program’s primary goal is to reduce the transmission of communicable diseases such as hepatitis C and HIV, both risks for those who use dirty needles for intravenous drug use. Health officials have noted an increase in recent years in hepatitis C cases among young people in the U.S.
Harm reduction clinics have been offering some clean needle exchanges—common in other countries—for several years. And last year, Congress finally ended a ban on federal funding for needle exchange programs, NBC reported.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has warned that heroin use continues to increase across the U.S. Its most recent report, based on studies from 2002-2013, noted that the greatest increases in use occurred in demographic groups with historically low rates of heroin use, including women, the privately insured, and people with higher incomes.
Heroin-related overdose deaths also increased during the same period, nearly quadrupling to 8,200 deaths in 2013.
Liz Evans, executive director at New York Harm Reduction Educators, called needle exchanges, and harm reduction programs in general, a “philosophy of service at the front end…adjusting the way we look at drug users,” according to NBC. “Too often we fail to see drug users as human beings, and they become defined by that and get called all these names like junkies and addicts. It becomes harder as a society to respond to them with kindness. (ontinueReading
Saturday, April 15, 2017
World's oldest person, last one of 19th century, dies in Italy at 117
Reuters - Emma Morano, who at 117 was believed to be the world's oldest person and the last surviving child of the 19th century, died on Saturday, swearing to the end on her diet of two raw eggs a day.
"She reached an incredible finish line," said Silvia Marchionini, mayor of the town of Verbania in northern Italy where Morano lived on the shores of Lake Maggiore.
Morano, who lived 117 years and 137 days, was born on Nov. 29, 1899, four years before the Wright brothers first took to the air. Her life spanned three centuries, two World Wars and more than 90 Italian governments.
"My life wasn't so nice," she told Reuters last November on her 117th birthday.
"I worked in a factory until I was 65, then that was that," she said as she sat in an armchair by her window, a white shawl over her shoulders.
In an interview with La Stampa newspaper five years ago she said her fiance had died in World War One and that she had then been forced to marry a man she did not love.
"'Either you agree to marry me or I will kill you'," Morano said, recalling his proposal. "I was 26. We got married."
It was not a happy marriage. They had a son in 1937, but the baby died after just six months and the following year Morano kicked out her abusive husband.
"I separated from him in 1938. I think I was one of the first in Italy to do that."
Morano outlived all her eight brothers and sisters, including one who died at 102. She thrived on an unorthodox, unbalanced diet.
"When I first knew her she used to eat three eggs a day. Two raw, and one fried. Today she has slowed down a bit, reducing the number to two some days because she says three can be too much," her doctor, Carlo Bava, said last year.
"She has never eaten much fruit or vegetables. Her characteristic is that she always eats the same thing, every day, every week, every month and every year."
Marchionini, the mayor of Verbania, told the Italian news agency AGI that her city has more than 20 people aged over 100. ContinueReading
Friday, April 14, 2017
Texas warns about biggest mumps outbreak in 22 years
(CNN) The Texas Department of State Health Services warned this week of multiple ongoing mumps outbreaks. The surge, which includes 221 cases this year, constitutes the highest incidence of mumps in the state in 22 years.
Mumps is a contagious disease caused by a virus that spreads from person to person through saliva and mucus.
"What we've seen -- as in other parts of the country, (it's) really just the same thing -- a pretty big resurgence in mumps cases over the last six or eight months," said Chris Van Deusen, spokesman for the state's health services department. In 2016, Texas experienced 192 mumps cases, he said, primarily in the last few months of the year.
Mumps typically begins with fever, headache, muscle aches, tiredness and loss of appetite lasting a few days, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Most people will have swelling of the salivary glands, causing puffy cheeks and a swollen jaw. Generally, symptoms last at least two days but no more than 10 days.
Because it is caused by a virus, mumps does not respond to antibiotics. Doctors generally recommend bed rest and over-the-counter pain relievers.
"We have largely seen outbreaks in North Texas, so the Dallas-Fort Worth area and some of the surrounding counties," Van Deusen said, adding that Dallas County has experienced two or three significant outbreaks.
"We've had quite a large one with, counting last year and this year, more than 150 cases in Johnson County, which is just south of Fort Worth," he said. "We've certainly seen cases in other areas of the state, but those have been where the largest outbreaks have been centered."
An outbreak in Johnson County, in particular, included 189 cases spanning last year and this year among children and a couple of college students, he said.
"There have been people who have traveled back and forth between (Johnson County) and Northwest Arkansas, where they've been seeing much of the activity, so it seems to be linked to that outbreak," Van Deusen said.
An outbreak of mumps began in Arkansas in August, explained Dr. Dirk Haselow, Arkansas' state epidemiologist. Between August and April 13, Arkansas reported 2,930 cases, he said. (Similarly, Washington state (PDF) has been hard hit by the mumps, reporting 611 confirmed and probable cases during 2017.)
"We've had less than 500 cases this year," said Haselow, who believes his state is at the tail end of its outbreak. "Thankfully, the number of cases we've had each week decreased recently. We've only added 14 cases in the last three weeks." At the height of the outbreak, nearly 50 cases a day were reported across 35 counties. Today, only four counties are experiencing infections.
As for a possible spread from his state to Texas, Haselow has no doubts.
"Mumps has a long incubation period, as long as 26 days between exposure and symptoms, so people could have been exposed, you know, a little over a month ago, and now you have new cases with that association," he said.
Across the nation, most mumps cases are occurring among people who have been vaccinated, according to the CDC, and these outbreaks are not due to low vaccination rates. For example, in Texas, 97.6% of kindergarten-age children have received two doses of the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine, Van Deusen said, while 98.7% of seventh-graders have.
The CDC recommends that children get two doses of the MMR vaccine. One dose is considered about 78% effective initially (PDF), and two doses are about 88% effective. So even if you are vaccinated, you need to practice primary prevention.
Mumps is a contagious disease caused by a virus that spreads from person to person through saliva and mucus.
"What we've seen -- as in other parts of the country, (it's) really just the same thing -- a pretty big resurgence in mumps cases over the last six or eight months," said Chris Van Deusen, spokesman for the state's health services department. In 2016, Texas experienced 192 mumps cases, he said, primarily in the last few months of the year.
Mumps typically begins with fever, headache, muscle aches, tiredness and loss of appetite lasting a few days, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Most people will have swelling of the salivary glands, causing puffy cheeks and a swollen jaw. Generally, symptoms last at least two days but no more than 10 days.
Because it is caused by a virus, mumps does not respond to antibiotics. Doctors generally recommend bed rest and over-the-counter pain relievers.
"We have largely seen outbreaks in North Texas, so the Dallas-Fort Worth area and some of the surrounding counties," Van Deusen said, adding that Dallas County has experienced two or three significant outbreaks.
"We've had quite a large one with, counting last year and this year, more than 150 cases in Johnson County, which is just south of Fort Worth," he said. "We've certainly seen cases in other areas of the state, but those have been where the largest outbreaks have been centered."
An outbreak in Johnson County, in particular, included 189 cases spanning last year and this year among children and a couple of college students, he said.
"There have been people who have traveled back and forth between (Johnson County) and Northwest Arkansas, where they've been seeing much of the activity, so it seems to be linked to that outbreak," Van Deusen said.
An outbreak of mumps began in Arkansas in August, explained Dr. Dirk Haselow, Arkansas' state epidemiologist. Between August and April 13, Arkansas reported 2,930 cases, he said. (Similarly, Washington state (PDF) has been hard hit by the mumps, reporting 611 confirmed and probable cases during 2017.)
"We've had less than 500 cases this year," said Haselow, who believes his state is at the tail end of its outbreak. "Thankfully, the number of cases we've had each week decreased recently. We've only added 14 cases in the last three weeks." At the height of the outbreak, nearly 50 cases a day were reported across 35 counties. Today, only four counties are experiencing infections.
As for a possible spread from his state to Texas, Haselow has no doubts.
"Mumps has a long incubation period, as long as 26 days between exposure and symptoms, so people could have been exposed, you know, a little over a month ago, and now you have new cases with that association," he said.
Across the nation, most mumps cases are occurring among people who have been vaccinated, according to the CDC, and these outbreaks are not due to low vaccination rates. For example, in Texas, 97.6% of kindergarten-age children have received two doses of the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine, Van Deusen said, while 98.7% of seventh-graders have.
The CDC recommends that children get two doses of the MMR vaccine. One dose is considered about 78% effective initially (PDF), and two doses are about 88% effective. So even if you are vaccinated, you need to practice primary prevention.
Thursday, April 13, 2017
OOPS: U.S.-led coalition accidentally bombs Syrian allies, killing 18
WashingtonPost.com - Aircraft from a U.S.-led coalition accidentally bombed friendly Syrian forces fighting the Islamic State in northern Syria on Tuesday, killing 18, the Pentagon said Thursday. The bombing marks the worst confirmed friendly-fire incident in the nearly three-year-old war against the terrorist group.
The coalition said in a statement that the airstrike was requested by “partnered forces” near the town of Tabqa who accidentally targeted a group of Kurdish and Arab fighters known as the Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF. The partnered forces believed that the SDF’s position belonged to the Islamic State, the statement said.
According to a U.S. official with knowledge of the accidental strike, an SDF unit in close proximity to the Islamic State defense lines reported its location incorrectly. When other SDF forces saw what they thought were Islamic State fighters, they ordered a strike–but it turned out to be on the SDF fighters who had provided the wrong location.
“The coalition has been working with the SDF for more than 2 years and have conducted thousands of strikes,” the official said in an email. “This was a very dynamic situation. ISIS was fighting to hold their position; they continue to lose ground. The ground units and Coalition Forces involved in this strike are well experienced and communicate often. Unfortunately, this dynamic situation resulted in loss of detailed location understanding.”
The incident highlights the inherent difficulties of using local ground forces in conjunction with Western air power on a battlefield with a small U.S. presence. There are roughly 500 U.S. Special Operations forces working with Syrian Democratic Forces spread throughout north eastern Syria.
The coalition said in a statement that the airstrike was requested by “partnered forces” near the town of Tabqa who accidentally targeted a group of Kurdish and Arab fighters known as the Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF. The partnered forces believed that the SDF’s position belonged to the Islamic State, the statement said.
According to a U.S. official with knowledge of the accidental strike, an SDF unit in close proximity to the Islamic State defense lines reported its location incorrectly. When other SDF forces saw what they thought were Islamic State fighters, they ordered a strike–but it turned out to be on the SDF fighters who had provided the wrong location.
“The coalition has been working with the SDF for more than 2 years and have conducted thousands of strikes,” the official said in an email. “This was a very dynamic situation. ISIS was fighting to hold their position; they continue to lose ground. The ground units and Coalition Forces involved in this strike are well experienced and communicate often. Unfortunately, this dynamic situation resulted in loss of detailed location understanding.”
The incident highlights the inherent difficulties of using local ground forces in conjunction with Western air power on a battlefield with a small U.S. presence. There are roughly 500 U.S. Special Operations forces working with Syrian Democratic Forces spread throughout north eastern Syria.
“The general leadership of SDF in coordination with international coalition will investigate the reasons behind the accident in order to prevent it happening again,” the Syrian Democratic Forces General Command said in a statement.
Wednesday, April 12, 2017
Putin says U.S.-Russia ties worse since Trump took office
Reuters - Levels of trust between Moscow and Washington have deteriorated since U.S. President Donald Trump took office, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in an interview broadcast on Wednesday.
Asked about relations since Trump became president, Putin said, according to a transcript of the interview released by the Kremlin: "One could say that the level of trust on a working level, especially on the military level, has not improved, but rather has deteriorated."
Asked about accusations that Syria's government launched a chemical weapons attack in Idlib province, Putin said that Damascus had given up its chemical weapons stocks.
He said he believed there were two main explanations for the incident in Idlib province: that Syrian government air strikes had hit rebel chemical weapons stocks, releasing poisonous gas, or that the incident was a set-up designed to discredit the Syrian government.
Asked about relations since Trump became president, Putin said, according to a transcript of the interview released by the Kremlin: "One could say that the level of trust on a working level, especially on the military level, has not improved, but rather has deteriorated."
Asked about accusations that Syria's government launched a chemical weapons attack in Idlib province, Putin said that Damascus had given up its chemical weapons stocks.
He said he believed there were two main explanations for the incident in Idlib province: that Syrian government air strikes had hit rebel chemical weapons stocks, releasing poisonous gas, or that the incident was a set-up designed to discredit the Syrian government.
Tuesday, April 11, 2017
Germany stops sending refugees to Hungary due to poor treatment
TheLocalde - Germany said Tuesday it is refraining from transferring asylum seekers to Hungary under EU rules until Budapest gives assurances that the migrants would not be systematically detained.
Under the so-called Dublin rules, asylum seekers are meant to be sent back to the first European country they registered in.
But the United Nations and rights groups have urged EU nations to suspend transfers to Hungary after Budapest introduced a law in March to detain all asylum seekers.
Germany's interior ministry said in a directive to the migration office that "in cases of Dublin transfers to Hungary, an assurance must be sought ensuring that the transferred person would be accommodated in accordance with EU norms".
"Without such a reassurance from the Hungarian authorities, the transfer should not take place," the ministry added, confirming a report published in German regional media group Funke.
Germany had initially waived Dublin rules for Syrian refugees at the height of the migrant influx in 2015.
But after the arrival of around one million people, public misgivings grew, forcing Chancellor Angela Merkel to take steps to limit the arrivals.
Last year, the figure dropped sharply to 280,000, largely due to the closure of the Balkan overland route and a fragile EU-Turkey deal to limit the mass influx.
Germany, along with other EU nations, also began sending back asylum seekers to Greece from mid-March as they assessed that conditions there have improved.
But concerns then turned to the situation in Hungary, after its parliament on March 7 approved plans to confine asylum seekers in camps.
Official figures show that Germany sent back 11,998 asylum seekers to their first port of call in the EU last year, including 294 who were returned to Hungary.
Monday, April 10, 2017
New York to make state college tuition free for middle class under new budget
abcnewyork - Albany, New York: New York will be the first state to make tuition at public colleges and universities free for middle-class students under a state budget approved by lawmakers Sunday.
The plan crafted by Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo will apply to any New York student whose family has an annual income of $125,000 or less. To qualify the student would have to meet certain class load and grade point average restrictions, and room and board would not be covered.
"College is today what high school was 50 years ago," Cuomo said on a radio interview Sunday on AM 970 in New York City. "If you're a young person who wants success and a career, a college education is necessary.
The initiative is included in a $153 billion state budget proposal that passed the state Senate late Sunday after being endorsed by the Assembly a day earlier. The budget was due by April 1, but difficult negotiations delayed passage.
The tuition plan will be phased in over three years, with families making $100,000 or less annually eligible in the fall of 2017, with the threshold rising to $125,000 in 2019. Cuomo's office says some 940,000 families will qualify. The initiative also includes $19 million for a new tuition award program for students at private colleges.
The governor's office estimates that the program will cost the state $163 million.
The budget approved Sunday also includes provisions allowing the ride-hailing apps Uber and Lyft to expand upstate and a juvenile justice reform known as 'raise the age' that would raise the age of adult criminal responsibility from 16 to 18.
Additionally, the spending plan increases funding for schools by $1.1 billion, holds the line on taxes, sets aside $200 million to fight heroin and opioid addiction and invests $2.5 billion for water quality and upgrades to the state's aging water and sewer systems.
"That's a really, really good thing for the people of the state of New York and we got it done," said Senate Leader John Flanagan, R-Long Island.
Raise the age emerged as a top priority for Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie and other Democrats and was one of the greatest sticking points for a budget. The agreement would raise the age slowly, to 17 in October 2018 and to 18 a year later, and would create new youth courts for felony offenses.
Under the deal, young offenders would no longer be incarcerated in adult prisons and jails but would go to juvenile facilities where they could receive additional rehabilitation and treatment. Non-violent offenders could apply to have their criminal records sealed after a 10-year waiting period.
Bronx Democratic Sen. Jamaal Bailey shot down opponents who have said the proposal gives teenagers a free pass and reiterated that it will instead allow youth who have made mistakes a chance at rehabilitation.
"Ever been to a high school cafeteria? You're going to tell me that those are adults? That their brain development is the same as ours? No," Bailey said.
Advocates say the measure will combat rampant recidivism in the youth criminal justice system because young people prosecuted as adults are 34 percent more likely to be re-arrested, often for crimes that are more serious than the initial offense.
"This legislation will improve the lives of our youth, our families and our communities. It is also the best way to maintain public safety in New York," said Schuyler Center for Analysis and Advocacy policy director Dorothy Hill in a statement.
Similar reforms have been proposed in North Carolina, the only other state with such a young age of criminal responsibility.
After years of failed attempts, Uber and Lyft finally would be able to move into upstate cities such as Buffalo, Syracuse, Rochester and Albany. The ride-hailing apps have been limited to the New York City area but are expected to begin service upstate 90 days after the budget is approved.
The expansion is a victory for many upstate leaders who said it was an embarrassment that the region was among the largest in the country without Uber and Lyft.
"I am elated," said Republican Sen. Chris Jacobs of Buffalo.
Tighter campaign finance laws, term limits for lawmakers and new rules restricting outside income were left out of the budget again this year. Following widespread complaints from last year's elections, Cuomo proposed changes, including early voting and automatic registration, but those weren't included in the final agreement either. (ontinueReading
The plan crafted by Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo will apply to any New York student whose family has an annual income of $125,000 or less. To qualify the student would have to meet certain class load and grade point average restrictions, and room and board would not be covered.
"College is today what high school was 50 years ago," Cuomo said on a radio interview Sunday on AM 970 in New York City. "If you're a young person who wants success and a career, a college education is necessary.
The initiative is included in a $153 billion state budget proposal that passed the state Senate late Sunday after being endorsed by the Assembly a day earlier. The budget was due by April 1, but difficult negotiations delayed passage.
The tuition plan will be phased in over three years, with families making $100,000 or less annually eligible in the fall of 2017, with the threshold rising to $125,000 in 2019. Cuomo's office says some 940,000 families will qualify. The initiative also includes $19 million for a new tuition award program for students at private colleges.
The governor's office estimates that the program will cost the state $163 million.
The budget approved Sunday also includes provisions allowing the ride-hailing apps Uber and Lyft to expand upstate and a juvenile justice reform known as 'raise the age' that would raise the age of adult criminal responsibility from 16 to 18.
Additionally, the spending plan increases funding for schools by $1.1 billion, holds the line on taxes, sets aside $200 million to fight heroin and opioid addiction and invests $2.5 billion for water quality and upgrades to the state's aging water and sewer systems.
"That's a really, really good thing for the people of the state of New York and we got it done," said Senate Leader John Flanagan, R-Long Island.
Raise the age emerged as a top priority for Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie and other Democrats and was one of the greatest sticking points for a budget. The agreement would raise the age slowly, to 17 in October 2018 and to 18 a year later, and would create new youth courts for felony offenses.
Under the deal, young offenders would no longer be incarcerated in adult prisons and jails but would go to juvenile facilities where they could receive additional rehabilitation and treatment. Non-violent offenders could apply to have their criminal records sealed after a 10-year waiting period.
Bronx Democratic Sen. Jamaal Bailey shot down opponents who have said the proposal gives teenagers a free pass and reiterated that it will instead allow youth who have made mistakes a chance at rehabilitation.
"Ever been to a high school cafeteria? You're going to tell me that those are adults? That their brain development is the same as ours? No," Bailey said.
Advocates say the measure will combat rampant recidivism in the youth criminal justice system because young people prosecuted as adults are 34 percent more likely to be re-arrested, often for crimes that are more serious than the initial offense.
"This legislation will improve the lives of our youth, our families and our communities. It is also the best way to maintain public safety in New York," said Schuyler Center for Analysis and Advocacy policy director Dorothy Hill in a statement.
Similar reforms have been proposed in North Carolina, the only other state with such a young age of criminal responsibility.
After years of failed attempts, Uber and Lyft finally would be able to move into upstate cities such as Buffalo, Syracuse, Rochester and Albany. The ride-hailing apps have been limited to the New York City area but are expected to begin service upstate 90 days after the budget is approved.
The expansion is a victory for many upstate leaders who said it was an embarrassment that the region was among the largest in the country without Uber and Lyft.
"I am elated," said Republican Sen. Chris Jacobs of Buffalo.
Tighter campaign finance laws, term limits for lawmakers and new rules restricting outside income were left out of the budget again this year. Following widespread complaints from last year's elections, Cuomo proposed changes, including early voting and automatic registration, but those weren't included in the final agreement either. (ontinueReading
Sunday, April 9, 2017
What Makes The Octopus Intelligent? Answer Could Be Cephalopod's Ability To Rewrite RNA
TechTimes.com - In 2016, workers at New Zealand's National Aquarium were surprised to find out that Inky the octopus managed to escape from its enclosure prior to heading to open water.
The cephalopod apparently broke out from its aquarium and walked across the facility's floor to a drainpipe, as suggested by a wet trail.
Marine biologists, however, are not surprised by Inky's escape. In response to news of the daring escape of Inky,
James Wood of The Cephalopod Page said that over the years of him working with octopuses, he has already seen many octopuses escape, including one in Bermuda that managed to escape several times from its closed aquarium to eat the inhabitants of another enclosure.
Octopuses are among the most intelligent animals in nature as evidenced by how they manage to cleverly escape from their aquariums. Besides being great escape artists, they are also known to have a knack for puzzles.
Ursula, an octopus housed at the Living Coasts zoo and aquarium in the United Kingdom, is good at puzzles, taking only several seconds to solve complex challenges. Octopuses can also develop unique personalities and recognize individual faces.
"The octopus appears to be utterly different from all other animals, even other molluscs, with its eight prehensile arms, its large brain and its clever problem-solving capabilities," said Clifton Ragsdale from the University of Chicago, who was part of a 2015 study that sequenced the genome of octopuses.
So what makes octopuses intelligent? Findings of a new study suggest their brilliance may lie in their ability to edit their own genes.
Researchers who have been studying how cephalopods edit their genome discovered that instead of relying on DNA mutations to adapt, squids, octopuses, and cuttlefish can make changes to their RNA, which is considered the genetic messenger that carries out the instructions from DNA.
Many of the RNA edits happen in the brain of the cephalopods, including an adaptation that allows the neurons of the animals to function in cold environments.
"Editing is enriched in the nervous system, affecting molecules pertinent for excitability and neuronal morphology. The genomic sequence flanking editing sites is highly conserved, suggesting that the process confers a selective advantage," researchers wrote in their study, which was published in the journal Cell.
Although they have not provided a definitive evidence for the association, researchers think that the cephalopods' ability to edit their RNA can shed light on the creature's intelligence. If this theory turns out correct, the ability to alter the RNA could mean it is a crucial factor in the intelligence of a species.
"Extensive recoding might have contributed to the exceptional intelligence," said study researcher Eli Eisenberg from Tel Aviv University. "Of course, at this point it's just an enticing idea to think about, and we would need much more evidence to say anything definitive in this direction." (Source)
The cephalopod apparently broke out from its aquarium and walked across the facility's floor to a drainpipe, as suggested by a wet trail.
Marine biologists, however, are not surprised by Inky's escape. In response to news of the daring escape of Inky,
James Wood of The Cephalopod Page said that over the years of him working with octopuses, he has already seen many octopuses escape, including one in Bermuda that managed to escape several times from its closed aquarium to eat the inhabitants of another enclosure.
Octopuses are among the most intelligent animals in nature as evidenced by how they manage to cleverly escape from their aquariums. Besides being great escape artists, they are also known to have a knack for puzzles.
Ursula, an octopus housed at the Living Coasts zoo and aquarium in the United Kingdom, is good at puzzles, taking only several seconds to solve complex challenges. Octopuses can also develop unique personalities and recognize individual faces.
"The octopus appears to be utterly different from all other animals, even other molluscs, with its eight prehensile arms, its large brain and its clever problem-solving capabilities," said Clifton Ragsdale from the University of Chicago, who was part of a 2015 study that sequenced the genome of octopuses.
So what makes octopuses intelligent? Findings of a new study suggest their brilliance may lie in their ability to edit their own genes.
Researchers who have been studying how cephalopods edit their genome discovered that instead of relying on DNA mutations to adapt, squids, octopuses, and cuttlefish can make changes to their RNA, which is considered the genetic messenger that carries out the instructions from DNA.
Many of the RNA edits happen in the brain of the cephalopods, including an adaptation that allows the neurons of the animals to function in cold environments.
"Editing is enriched in the nervous system, affecting molecules pertinent for excitability and neuronal morphology. The genomic sequence flanking editing sites is highly conserved, suggesting that the process confers a selective advantage," researchers wrote in their study, which was published in the journal Cell.
Although they have not provided a definitive evidence for the association, researchers think that the cephalopods' ability to edit their RNA can shed light on the creature's intelligence. If this theory turns out correct, the ability to alter the RNA could mean it is a crucial factor in the intelligence of a species.
"Extensive recoding might have contributed to the exceptional intelligence," said study researcher Eli Eisenberg from Tel Aviv University. "Of course, at this point it's just an enticing idea to think about, and we would need much more evidence to say anything definitive in this direction." (Source)
Saturday, April 8, 2017
Russia warns of 'negative consequences' if U.S. targets Syria
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Russia's deputy U.N. envoy, Vladimir Safronkov, warned on Thursday of "negative consequences" if the United States carries out military strikes on Syria over a deadly toxic gas attack.
"We have to think about negative consequences, negative consequences, and all the responsibility if military action occurred will be on shoulders of those who initiated such doubtful and tragic enterprise," Safronkov told reporters when asked about possible U.S. strikes.
When asked what those negative consequences could be, he said: "Look at Iraq, look at Libya." (Source)
Friday, April 7, 2017
Typically Harmless Virus May Trigger Celiac Disease
livescience.com - A usually harmless virus may play a role in triggering celiac disease, a new study in mice suggests.
The researchers found that, among mice that were genetically engineered predisposed to celiac disease, those that were infected with a virus called reovirus were more likely to have an immune response against gluten than mice not infected with a reovirus. This immune response is similar to what's seen in people with the condition.
Although human infections with reoviruses are common, the viruses don't cause symptoms in people. But the study also found that patients with celiac disease did have higher levels of antibodies against reovirus, compared to people without the condition.
The findings suggest that reovirus infection may leave a "permanent mark" on the immune system that sets the body up for developing celiac disease, the researchers said.
"A virus that is not clinically symptomatic can still do bad things to the immune system and set the stage for an autoimmune disorder," such as celiac disease, study co-author Dr. Bana Jabri, director of research at the University of Chicago Celiac Disease Center, said in a statement.
The researchers also found people with celiac disease who had high levels of reovirus antibodies also had increased expression of a gene that encodes a protein called IRF1. In the mouse studies, the researchers saw that IRF1 played a role in developing gluten intolerance after reovirus infection.
However, the researchers noted that only one particular strain of reovirus, called T1L, triggered the immune responses seen in the study. It's not clear if other types of reovirus have the same effect, they said. The other strain they tested, called T3D, is genetically different from T1L, and did not trigger the immune response.
In addition, other factors besides reovirus infection, such as a person's genes and their overall health, would likely play a role in whether the virus triggers celiac disease, the researchers said. [5 Ways Gut Bacteria Affect Your Health]
Celiac disease is an autoimmune disorder in which people's immune systems react abnormally to the protein gluten, which is found in wheat, rye and barely, and this reaction damages the lining of the small intestine. The condition affects about 1 out of every 100 people in the United States.
Previous studies have suggested a link between infections with certain viruses, including hepatitis C virus, and rotavirus (a virus in the same family as reovirus) and the development of celiac disease. However, evidence showing exactly how any virus might trigger the disease is lacking.
The study showed that T1L acted in two ways: It suppressed the formation of certain types of "regulatory" immune cells that usually allow the body to know that it shouldn't attack certain substances. And it also promoted an inflammatory response to gluten.
The researchers noted that although their study showed that reovirus infection led to an immune reaction against gluten, this reaction alone wouldn't damage to the small intestine. There are more steps that need to occur before the body experiences damage to the small intestine, and the study did not look at these steps.
More studies are also needed to determine if the timing of a reovirus infection with regard to initiation of gluten in the diet plays a role in the development of celiac disease, Dr. Elena F. Verdu, and Alberto Caminero, of McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada, wrote in a commentary accompany the study. (ontinueReading
The researchers found that, among mice that were genetically engineered predisposed to celiac disease, those that were infected with a virus called reovirus were more likely to have an immune response against gluten than mice not infected with a reovirus. This immune response is similar to what's seen in people with the condition.
Although human infections with reoviruses are common, the viruses don't cause symptoms in people. But the study also found that patients with celiac disease did have higher levels of antibodies against reovirus, compared to people without the condition.
The findings suggest that reovirus infection may leave a "permanent mark" on the immune system that sets the body up for developing celiac disease, the researchers said.
"A virus that is not clinically symptomatic can still do bad things to the immune system and set the stage for an autoimmune disorder," such as celiac disease, study co-author Dr. Bana Jabri, director of research at the University of Chicago Celiac Disease Center, said in a statement.
The researchers also found people with celiac disease who had high levels of reovirus antibodies also had increased expression of a gene that encodes a protein called IRF1. In the mouse studies, the researchers saw that IRF1 played a role in developing gluten intolerance after reovirus infection.
However, the researchers noted that only one particular strain of reovirus, called T1L, triggered the immune responses seen in the study. It's not clear if other types of reovirus have the same effect, they said. The other strain they tested, called T3D, is genetically different from T1L, and did not trigger the immune response.
In addition, other factors besides reovirus infection, such as a person's genes and their overall health, would likely play a role in whether the virus triggers celiac disease, the researchers said. [5 Ways Gut Bacteria Affect Your Health]
Celiac disease is an autoimmune disorder in which people's immune systems react abnormally to the protein gluten, which is found in wheat, rye and barely, and this reaction damages the lining of the small intestine. The condition affects about 1 out of every 100 people in the United States.
Previous studies have suggested a link between infections with certain viruses, including hepatitis C virus, and rotavirus (a virus in the same family as reovirus) and the development of celiac disease. However, evidence showing exactly how any virus might trigger the disease is lacking.
The study showed that T1L acted in two ways: It suppressed the formation of certain types of "regulatory" immune cells that usually allow the body to know that it shouldn't attack certain substances. And it also promoted an inflammatory response to gluten.
The researchers noted that although their study showed that reovirus infection led to an immune reaction against gluten, this reaction alone wouldn't damage to the small intestine. There are more steps that need to occur before the body experiences damage to the small intestine, and the study did not look at these steps.
More studies are also needed to determine if the timing of a reovirus infection with regard to initiation of gluten in the diet plays a role in the development of celiac disease, Dr. Elena F. Verdu, and Alberto Caminero, of McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada, wrote in a commentary accompany the study. (ontinueReading
Thursday, April 6, 2017
Scientists find evidence of flooding event that caused ‘Brexit 1.0’
DailySabah.com - Scientists have found evidence of how ancient Britain separated from Europe in what they are dubbing "Brexit 1.0" - a flooding event that happened in two stages thousands of years ago.
In research published in the journal Nature Communications on Tuesday, the scientists said they now have proof that the opening of the Dover Strait in the English Channel, severing the land between Britain and France, occurred in two episodes - an initial lake spill over, followed by catastrophic flooding.
"The breaching of this land bridge between Dover and Calais was undeniably one of the most important events in British history, helping to shape our island nation's identity," said Sanjeev Gupta, a professor at Imperial College London who co-led the work.
"When the ice age ended and sea levels rose, flooding the valley floor for good, Britain lost its physical connection to the mainland," he said. "This is Brexit 1.0 – the Brexit nobody voted for."
The first pieces of the puzzle came some 10 years ago, when researchers found geophysical evidence of giant valleys on the seafloor in the central part of English Channel. They believed these valley networks were evidence of a megaflood gouging out the land, probably caused by a breach in a chalk rock ridge joining Britain to France.
In the new study, new geophysical data collected by colleagues in Belgium and France has been combined with seafloor data from Britain showing evidence of huge holes and a valley system located on the seafloor. This help the team establish how the chalk ridge was breached.
The ridge acted like a huge dam and behind it was a proglacial lake, the researchers explained. The lake overflowed in giant waterfalls, eroding the rock escarpment, weakening it and eventually causing it to fail and release huge volumes of water onto the valley floor below.
"We still don't know for sure why the proglacial lake spilt over," said Jenny Collier, a co-author of the study from Imperial's department of earth science and engineering.
"Perhaps part of the ice sheet broke off, collapsing into the lake, causing a surge that carved a path for the water to cascade off the chalk ridge. Maybe an earth tremor... further weakened the ridge and caused (it) to collapse, releasing the megaflood that we have found evidence for in our studies."
Either way, the scientists said, if it was not for a set of chance geological circumstances, Britain may have remained connected to mainland Europe, jutting out into the sea like Denmark.
The researchers still have no exact timeline of events, but said they now want to take and analyze core samples of the in-filled sediments in the plunge pools to try and pinpoint the timing of erosion and the filling of the pools.
They cautioned, however, that this next step will be tricky, since getting samples in the Dover Strait means navigating huge tidal changes and the world's busiest shipping lane. (Source)
Wednesday, April 5, 2017
America is ‘over-stored’ and Payless ShoeSource is the latest victim
washingtonpost.com - Payless ShoeSource became the latest major retailer to declare financial distress when, on Tuesday, the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and announced a restructuring plan that includes the immediate closure of 400 stores in the United States and Puerto Rico.
Further closures are possible as the company works “to aggressively manage the remaining real estate lease portfolio.”
Meanwhile, Payless said in a statement it will reduce its debt load by almost half and increase its presence in the e-commerce space.
“This is a difficult, but necessary, decision driven by the continued challenges of the retail environment, which will only intensify,” Payless chief executive W. Paul Jones said in a statement. “We will build a stronger Payless for our customers, vendors and suppliers, associates, business partners and other stakeholders through this process.”
The shoe store was founded in Topeka, Kan., in 1956 during the postwar boom and eventually expanded to about 4,400 locations in more than 30 countries. The company, which focuses on “everyday and special occasion shoes … at affordable prices,” bills itself as the “largest specialty family footwear retailer in the Western Hemisphere.”
Recently, though, the footgear empire has struggled. According to Moody’s, Payless’s revenue fell 4 percent from October 2015 to October 2016.
Celebrities such as Tyra Banks, Sam Worthington and, for a time, Star Jones wore and hawked the company’s low-cost footwear, but such endorsements proved no match for market pressures that have affected many major retail giants that once seemed indomitable.
During the first three months of 2017, nine major retailers filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, CNBC reported, which “puts the industry on pace for the highest number of such filings since 2009, when 18 retailers resorted to that action.”
Moody’s, last month, listed 19 retailers as financially distressed, including Sears, J. Crew and Gymboree. Macy’s, J.C. Penney, RadioShack and The Limited are just a few of the companies that have announced closures this year.
“It’s been a downward spiral for traditional retailers,” Christian Magoon, CEO of Amplify ETFs, told CNN Money.
The rise of Amazon and online shopping are often cited as a cause for the troubles of brick and mortar retailers. (Amazon founder Jeffrey P. Bezos owns The Washington Post.)
“The model of online retailers is winning out,” Magoon said. “They are more competitive on pricing, they have better selection, and their convenience level is quite high.”
It doesn’t help, as Urban Outfitters CEO Richard Hayne pointed out, that compared to the housing market, the retail market is oversaturated.
“Retail square feet per capita in the United States is more than six times that of Europe or Japan. And this doesn’t count digital commerce,” Hayne said. “Our industry, not unlike the housing industry, saw too much square footage capacity added in the 1990s and early 2000s. Thousands of new doors opened and rents soared. This created a bubble, and like housing, that bubble has now burst.”
Added Hayne, “We are seeing the results: doors shuttering and rents retreating. This trend will continue for the foreseeable future and may even accelerate.” (ontinueReading
Further closures are possible as the company works “to aggressively manage the remaining real estate lease portfolio.”
Meanwhile, Payless said in a statement it will reduce its debt load by almost half and increase its presence in the e-commerce space.
“This is a difficult, but necessary, decision driven by the continued challenges of the retail environment, which will only intensify,” Payless chief executive W. Paul Jones said in a statement. “We will build a stronger Payless for our customers, vendors and suppliers, associates, business partners and other stakeholders through this process.”
The shoe store was founded in Topeka, Kan., in 1956 during the postwar boom and eventually expanded to about 4,400 locations in more than 30 countries. The company, which focuses on “everyday and special occasion shoes … at affordable prices,” bills itself as the “largest specialty family footwear retailer in the Western Hemisphere.”
Recently, though, the footgear empire has struggled. According to Moody’s, Payless’s revenue fell 4 percent from October 2015 to October 2016.
Celebrities such as Tyra Banks, Sam Worthington and, for a time, Star Jones wore and hawked the company’s low-cost footwear, but such endorsements proved no match for market pressures that have affected many major retail giants that once seemed indomitable.
During the first three months of 2017, nine major retailers filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, CNBC reported, which “puts the industry on pace for the highest number of such filings since 2009, when 18 retailers resorted to that action.”
Moody’s, last month, listed 19 retailers as financially distressed, including Sears, J. Crew and Gymboree. Macy’s, J.C. Penney, RadioShack and The Limited are just a few of the companies that have announced closures this year.
“It’s been a downward spiral for traditional retailers,” Christian Magoon, CEO of Amplify ETFs, told CNN Money.
The rise of Amazon and online shopping are often cited as a cause for the troubles of brick and mortar retailers. (Amazon founder Jeffrey P. Bezos owns The Washington Post.)
“The model of online retailers is winning out,” Magoon said. “They are more competitive on pricing, they have better selection, and their convenience level is quite high.”
It doesn’t help, as Urban Outfitters CEO Richard Hayne pointed out, that compared to the housing market, the retail market is oversaturated.
“Retail square feet per capita in the United States is more than six times that of Europe or Japan. And this doesn’t count digital commerce,” Hayne said. “Our industry, not unlike the housing industry, saw too much square footage capacity added in the 1990s and early 2000s. Thousands of new doors opened and rents soared. This created a bubble, and like housing, that bubble has now burst.”
Added Hayne, “We are seeing the results: doors shuttering and rents retreating. This trend will continue for the foreseeable future and may even accelerate.” (ontinueReading
Tuesday, April 4, 2017
Ecuador Election: New President Lenin Merino Claims Victory, Rival Guillermo Lasso Asks For Recount
ibtimes.com - Ecuador's ruling-party candidate Lenin Moreno claimed victory Monday night in the country's presidential election against conservative candidate Guillermo Lasso, who is yet to acknowledge defeat after several exit polls showed he was leading by a relatively safe margin.
After his victory, Moreno tweeted: "With my heart in my hand, I thank all those who in peace and harmony went to vote. I will be the President of all and you will help me."
According to the National Electoral Council, Moreno won 51 percent of the votes while his right-wing rival Lasso won 49 percent, with more than 94 percent of the votes counted. The head of the council, Juan Pablo Pozo, declared the results and reportedly said: "Ecuador deserves the ethical responsibility from its political actors to recognize the democratic decision made by the people at the ballot box."
However, Lasso called for a recount, claiming he won by six points according to three exit polls. "They've toyed with popular will," Lasso told an Ecuadorian television station Sunday, before the declaration of the winner, according to Reuters.
After Moreno won, Lasso posted on Twitter: "Let's not be provoked. We will act democratically and with respect for authorities but firmly to defend the people's will. We're not fools, nor are the Ecuadorian people."
The leftist government has been in power for the last three elections under President Rafael Correa whose policies helped improve access to healthcare and education, as well to reduce poverty. However, his government was also criticized for corruption, media censorship and also for not adhering to many of its environmental promises. On the other side, Lasso offered a pro-business program, which promised tax cuts and an increase in the number of jobs in the country of 15 million. But his alternative sounded contradictory to his own actions; Lasso is accused of tax avoidance through several offshore accounts, according to the Guardian.
President Rafael Correa, who supported Moreno in the election, celebrated the outcome and said "The moral fraud of the right-wing won't go unpunished," referring to Lasso's claims that he was winning based on three exit polls. (ontinueReading
Monday, April 3, 2017
Explosive device on subway train in St. Petersburg kills at least 9 people
washingtonpost.com MOSCOW — A large explosion tore apart a train as it traveled between two central St. Petersburg metro stations Monday, killing at least nine people and injuring at least 20, Russia’s federal anti-terrorism authority said.
Andrei Przhezdomsky, spokesman for the National Anti-Terrorism Committee, said the explosion was caused by “an unidentified explosive device” that was detonated in one of the cars as the train traveled from Sennaya Ploshchad station, one of the main interchanges of the city’s subway system, at about 2:30 p.m.
The train was able to make it to the next station, where authorities were able to reach the victims, Przhezdomsky said in remarks broadcast on state television. Amateur video shared on social media showed a train with a large, jagged blast hole in the side of one car.
Authorities have not given extensive reports on the direction of the investigation, but counterterrorism experts and others were part of the probe. One detail emerged: officials said the blast was not a suicide attack.
Shortly after the blast, the entire St. Petersburg subway system was shut down as a precaution, and security was boosted around the city, where Russian President Vladimir Putin was holding talks with Belarusan leader Alexander Lukashenko.
Earlier reports by Russian’s state-run news agency placed the death toll at 10, based on “preliminary” information. Russia’s health minister, Veronika Skvortsova, said seven people died at the scene, one died en route to the hospital and another while undergoing treatment.
Russia’s Investigative Committee also said that it opened a criminal investigation.
“I have already talked to the chiefs of special services, the [Federal Security Service] director,” Putin said in televised remarks at the meeting with Lukashenko, a key Russian ally. “The law enforcement agencies and special services are working, and they will do everything to find out the causes of the incident and make a full assessment of what has happened.”
Viktor Ozerov, a member of the defense and security committee of the upper house of the Russian parliament, told the Interfax news agency that the attack had “all the characteristics of a terrorist attack.”
The around the Sennaya Ploshchad station is famous as the setting of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s novel “Crime and Punishment.” (ontinueReading
Andrei Przhezdomsky, spokesman for the National Anti-Terrorism Committee, said the explosion was caused by “an unidentified explosive device” that was detonated in one of the cars as the train traveled from Sennaya Ploshchad station, one of the main interchanges of the city’s subway system, at about 2:30 p.m.
The train was able to make it to the next station, where authorities were able to reach the victims, Przhezdomsky said in remarks broadcast on state television. Amateur video shared on social media showed a train with a large, jagged blast hole in the side of one car.
Authorities have not given extensive reports on the direction of the investigation, but counterterrorism experts and others were part of the probe. One detail emerged: officials said the blast was not a suicide attack.
Shortly after the blast, the entire St. Petersburg subway system was shut down as a precaution, and security was boosted around the city, where Russian President Vladimir Putin was holding talks with Belarusan leader Alexander Lukashenko.
Earlier reports by Russian’s state-run news agency placed the death toll at 10, based on “preliminary” information. Russia’s health minister, Veronika Skvortsova, said seven people died at the scene, one died en route to the hospital and another while undergoing treatment.
Russia’s Investigative Committee also said that it opened a criminal investigation.
“I have already talked to the chiefs of special services, the [Federal Security Service] director,” Putin said in televised remarks at the meeting with Lukashenko, a key Russian ally. “The law enforcement agencies and special services are working, and they will do everything to find out the causes of the incident and make a full assessment of what has happened.”
Viktor Ozerov, a member of the defense and security committee of the upper house of the Russian parliament, told the Interfax news agency that the attack had “all the characteristics of a terrorist attack.”
The around the Sennaya Ploshchad station is famous as the setting of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s novel “Crime and Punishment.” (ontinueReading
Sunday, April 2, 2017
Manatee Reclassified from Endangered to Threatened as Habitat Improves and Population Expands
fws.gov - On the heels of Manatee Appreciation Day, the U.S. Department of the Interior announced the downlisting of the West Indian manatee from endangered to threatened. Notable increases in manatee populations and improvements in its habitat allowed the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) to change the species’ status under the Endangered Species Act (ESA).
The downlisting comes after diverse conservation efforts and collaborations by Florida and other manatee states, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Caribbean nations, public and private organizations and citizens, there have been notable increases in manatee populations and improvements in its habitat.
“The Fish and Wildlife Service has worked hand in hand with state and local governments, businesses, industry, and countless stakeholders over many years to protect and restore a mammal that is cherished by people around the world,” said U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke. “Without this type of collaboration and the commitment of state and local partners, this downlisting would not have been possible.”
In its review, FWS considered the status of the West Indian manatee throughout its range, which includes the Florida manatee subspecies, found primarily in the southeastern United States, and the Antillean manatee, found in Puerto Rico, Mexico, Central America, northern South America and the Greater and Lesser Antilles (see range map). The downlisting means that the manatee is no longer considered in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant portion of its range, but is likely to become so in the foreseeable future without continued ESA protections.
Although the downlisting represents a milestone for the manatee, the agency underscored that important challenges still remain to ensuring the species’ long-term future throughout its range. As such, FWS biologists emphasized that the downlisting will not diminish any existing federal protections that will continue to play a vital role in the recovery of the species. The manatee will also continue to be protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act.
“While there is still more work to be done to fully recover manatee populations, particularly in the Caribbean, manatee numbers are increasing and we are actively working with partners to address threats,” said Jim Kurth, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s acting director. “Today we both recognize the significant progress we have made in conserving manatee populations while reaffirming our commitment to continuing this species’ recovery and success throughout its range.”
Today’s estimated population of 6,620 Florida manatees is a dramatic turnaround from the 1970s, when just a few hundred individuals remained. Actions by the FWS, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC), local communities, and industry on behalf of the manatee include:
Retrofitting water control devices such as those found at locks and levees, resulting in significant decreases in manatee fatalities.
Power companies working cooperatively with federal and state conservation managers to address future loss of warm water outflows where manatees winter.
Florida counties implementing manatee protection plans and reducing boater impacts.
Increasing manatee access to several Florida natural springs while establishing sanctuaries for the wintering manatees in those areas during winter cold snaps.
FWS working with the U.S. Coast Guard and FWC to minimize manatee collisions with vessels during highspeed marine events and other activities.
Fishing gear cleanup and recycling programs reducing the threat from fishing gear entanglements.
Rescue, rehabilitation and release efforts that help save dozens of manatees annually.
Florida counties implementing manatee protection plans and reducing boater impacts.
Increasing manatee access to several Florida natural springs while establishing sanctuaries for the wintering manatees in those areas during winter cold snaps.
FWS working with the U.S. Coast Guard and FWC to minimize manatee collisions with vessels during highspeed marine events and other activities.
Fishing gear cleanup and recycling programs reducing the threat from fishing gear entanglements.
Rescue, rehabilitation and release efforts that help save dozens of manatees annually.
Outside the United States, manatee population and abundance estimates are less certain. There are likely as many as 6,300 Antillean manatees spread over a much broader range, from the Mexican Gulf coast to northern Brazil and the Caribbean. (Source)
Saturday, April 1, 2017
Paraguay Protesters Set Fire to Congress After Re-election Vote
ASUNCION, Paraguay — A protester was killed in Paraguay after a secret Senate vote for a constitutional amendment that would allow President Horacio Cartes to run for re-election sparked violent clashes and the country's Congress was stormed and set alight.
A 25-year-old was killed by a rubber bullet fired by police in the headquarters of the liberal youth activist group, the Paraguayan opposition said.
The interior ministry said in a statement an investigation into Rodrigo Quintana's death would be opened. His doctor said he had suffered a severe head injury.
On Saturday activists were arriving in Paraguay's capital Asuncion from the landlocked country's interior in a sign the violent protests that resulted in a fire in the first floor of Congress on Friday could continue.
Cartes called for calm and a rejection of violence in a statement released on Twitter. He promised the government would do its best to maintain order.
Firefighters managed to control the flames after protesters left the building late on Friday, although protests and riots continued in other parts of Asuncion and elsewhere in the country into the early hours of Saturday.
Around 200 protesters were detained, police said, and shops and government buildings were vandalized.
Several politicians and journalists were injured, local media reported, and Interior Minister Tadeo Rojas said several police were hurt. One member of the lower house of Congress, who had been participating in protests that afternoon, underwent surgery after being hit by rubber bullets.
Meetings for the Inter-American Development Bank's annual board of governors were beginning as scheduled on Saturday in a rare high-level international event in Paraguay.
While Paraguay has long suffered from political uncertainty, the soy and beef-exporting nation has been attracting investment in agriculture and manufacturing sectors in recent years as Cartes offered tax breaks to foreign investors.
Instability in the country of 6.8 million is a concern for its much larger neighbors Brazil and Argentina.
The Senate voted on Friday during a special session in a closed office rather than on the Senate floor. Twenty-five lawmakers voted for the measure, two more than the 23 required for passage in the 45-member upper chamber.
Opponents of the measure, who claim it would weaken Paraguay's democratic institutions, said the vote was illegal.
The proposal will also require approval by the House, where it appeared to have strong support. A vote which had been expected early on Saturday was called off until the situation calmed down, said the chamber's president, Hugo Velazquez (Source)
A 25-year-old was killed by a rubber bullet fired by police in the headquarters of the liberal youth activist group, the Paraguayan opposition said.
The interior ministry said in a statement an investigation into Rodrigo Quintana's death would be opened. His doctor said he had suffered a severe head injury.
On Saturday activists were arriving in Paraguay's capital Asuncion from the landlocked country's interior in a sign the violent protests that resulted in a fire in the first floor of Congress on Friday could continue.
Cartes called for calm and a rejection of violence in a statement released on Twitter. He promised the government would do its best to maintain order.
Firefighters managed to control the flames after protesters left the building late on Friday, although protests and riots continued in other parts of Asuncion and elsewhere in the country into the early hours of Saturday.
Around 200 protesters were detained, police said, and shops and government buildings were vandalized.
Several politicians and journalists were injured, local media reported, and Interior Minister Tadeo Rojas said several police were hurt. One member of the lower house of Congress, who had been participating in protests that afternoon, underwent surgery after being hit by rubber bullets.
Meetings for the Inter-American Development Bank's annual board of governors were beginning as scheduled on Saturday in a rare high-level international event in Paraguay.
While Paraguay has long suffered from political uncertainty, the soy and beef-exporting nation has been attracting investment in agriculture and manufacturing sectors in recent years as Cartes offered tax breaks to foreign investors.
Instability in the country of 6.8 million is a concern for its much larger neighbors Brazil and Argentina.
The Senate voted on Friday during a special session in a closed office rather than on the Senate floor. Twenty-five lawmakers voted for the measure, two more than the 23 required for passage in the 45-member upper chamber.
Opponents of the measure, who claim it would weaken Paraguay's democratic institutions, said the vote was illegal.
The proposal will also require approval by the House, where it appeared to have strong support. A vote which had been expected early on Saturday was called off until the situation calmed down, said the chamber's president, Hugo Velazquez (Source)
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