Extremely rare case in US as woman gets pregnant while already pregnant - ScienceAlert

Extremely rare case in US as woman gets pregnant while already pregnant - ScienceAlert: "An extremely rare case of a woman becoming pregnant while already pregnant has occurred in the US, with a mother unwittingly giving birth to 'twins' who were not conceived at the same time.

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����Ban PC-❌��to CA on Twitter: "@wslack @lifeandliberty3 Muslims are not compatible with the foundations that America was built on. Freedoms, Constitution & Christian principles. #10Commandments"

����Ban PC-❌��to CA on Twitter: "@wslack @lifeandliberty3 Muslims are not compatible with the foundations that America was built on. Freedoms, Constitution & Christian principles. #10Commandments": "Muslims are not compatible with the foundations that America was built on. Freedoms, Constitution & Christian principles. #10Commandments"



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Guyinapeacoat comments on [Image] It's not happening as fast as you'd like...

Guyinapeacoat comments on [Image] It's not happening as fast as you'd like...: "With the internet, we have the ability to witness every tragedy that is happening on a daily basis. We also can see the collective happiness, art and music of humanity as well.



We can choose people we loathe and scream out to them half a planet away, and then instantly surround ourselves with people who share our hate. We also can seek motivation and wisdom from the majority of great souls dead or alive.
This is a privilege given to no one else in the history of mankind.



We can either choose to focus on the destruction, or the happiness, or go our own way while ignoring it. But in the end, you choose what you want to focus on. And you can choose anywhere between nihilism or enlightenment. It's up to you."



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How to Be a C.E.O., From a Decade’s Worth of Them - The New York Times

How to Be a C.E.O., From a Decade’s Worth of Them - The New York Times:

First, they share a habit of mind that is best described as “applied curiosity.” They tend to question everything. They want to know how things work, and wonder how they can be made to work better. They’re curious about people and their back stories.

And rather than wondering if they are on the right career path, they make the most of whatever path they’re on, wringing lessons from all their experiences.

“I can find interest in a lot of different things and try to put that to work in a positive way, connecting the dots and considering how the pieces fit together,” said Gregory Maffei, whose background includes a college degree in religious studies, and is now the chief executive of Liberty Media, the giant company with interests in everything from SiriusXM to Formula One racing.

Second, C.E.O.s seem to love a challenge. Discomfort is their comfort zone.

“Usually, I really like whatever the problem is. I like to get close to the fire,” said Arkadi Kuhlmann, a veteran banking chief. “Some people have a desire for that, I’ve noticed, and some people don’t. I just naturally gravitate to the fire. So I think that’s a characteristic that you have, that’s in your DNA.”

The third theme is how they managed their own careers on their way to the top. They focus on doing their current job well, and that earns them promotions.

That may sound obvious. But many people can seem more concerned about the job they want than the job they’re doing.

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KEILLOR: A man walks into a bar in Oregon | Columnists | rockdalenewtoncitizen.com

KEILLOR: A man walks into a bar in Oregon | Columnists | rockdalenewtoncitizen.com:

I hung out in Eugene last week where it rains every day so the air is fresh and clean. Old people my age don’t care for rain so Eugene is not a retirement mecca — more of a youth mecca, a real Alt sort of town for hikers and bikers and vegans and people with multicolored hair. A lifestyle town, with not so many suit-and-tie guys like me. That’s fine. My former father-in-law was named Eugene and so the town feels friendly to me. And the university is there, so there’s plenty of ambition in the air.

Sat in a bar Friday night with Meiko, Christopher and Keely, talking about barred owls, aging, Ireland, limericks, everything other than what’s been in the news lately, and I asked Meiko about her Japanese ancestry, and out came a wonderful story.

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John Boehner Unchained - POLITICO Magazine

John Boehner Unchained - POLITICO Magazine: "After railing against the defund strategy, however, Boehner surveyed his conference and realized it was a fight many members wanted—and some needed. Yielding, he joined them in the trenches, abandoning his obligations of governance in hopes of strengthening his standing in the party. But the 17-day shutdown proved costly. Watching as Republicans got butchered in nationwide polling, the speaker finally called a meeting to inform members that they would vote to reopen the government and raise the debt ceiling. “I get a standing ovation,” Boehner says. “I’m thinking, ‘This place is irrational.’”

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Puerto Rico's Government Just Admitted 911 People Died After The Hurricane — Of "Natural Causes"

Puerto Rico's Government Just Admitted 911 People Died After The Hurricane — Of "Natural Causes": "The Puerto Rican government told BuzzFeed News Friday that it allowed 911 bodies to be cremated since Hurricane Maria made landfall, and that not one of them were physically examined by a government medical examiner to determine if it should be included in the official death toll.

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The war against Pope Francis | News | The Guardian

The war against Pope Francis | News | The Guardian:

To accuse a sitting pope of heresy is the nuclear option in Catholic arguments. Doctrine holds that the pope cannot be wrong when he speaks on the central questions of the faith; so if he is wrong, he can’t be pope. On the other hand, if this pope is right, all his predecessors must have been wrong.

The question is particularly poisonous because it is almost entirely theoretical. In practice, in most of the world, divorced and remarried couples are routinely offered communion. Pope Francis is not proposing a revolution, but the bureaucratic recognition of a system that already exists, and might even be essential to the survival of the church. If the rules were literally applied, no one whose marriage had failed could ever have sex again. This is not a practical way to ensure there are future generations of Catholics.

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David Schwimmer praised in wake of Harvey Weinstein scandal for offering female film critic a chaperone

David Schwimmer praised in wake of Harvey Weinstein scandal for offering female film critic a chaperone:

But Nell Minow, in response to the disgust felt at Hollywood behaviour, has spoken of her meeting with the Friends actor in 2011, when he was promoting Trust – the film he directed, telling the real life story of a young girl preyed upon by an online abuser.

The restaurant they were due to speak in proved noisy, and so the Friends star hesitantly broached the notion of going up to his room. Schwimmer said he could ask a third person to be present in the room.

"I haven’t thought of that since it happened but the Weinstein stories made me not just remember it but remember it in an entirely different context as an indicator of the prevalence of predatory behaviour and as an indicator of Schwimmer’s integrity and sensitivity," she said.

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Even Nazi prisoners of war in Texas were shocked at how black people were treated in the South

Even Nazi prisoners of war in Texas were shocked at how black people were treated in the South: "Erichsen also moved to the United States after the war, eventually becoming a citizen and settling in Texas. He’s lived here most of his life. Yet he can’t shake what he learned as a young person. He still remembers the songs he had to memorize as a young man in Nazi Germany. He offered a few lines to a reporter reluctantly, at his wife’s urging: “Sharpen the long knives on the lantern post. See the Jewish blood flow.” He doesn’t want to think about what he learned as a child, but he has acknowledged it is a part of him, and he can never relax his vigilance against the hateful indoctrination of his youth.
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Former Braves employee comes to defense of John Coppolella | Atlanta Braves blog

Former Braves employee comes to defense of John Coppolella | Atlanta Braves blog:

My name is (name omitted by request)…. Just something I wanted to get off my chest about Coppy that hasn’t been mentioned by anyone’s sources, as it doesn’t relate to his firing.

In all of the criticism he has received for his conduct, which I won’t try to defend or even address as I don’t know nearly enough about them to have an opinion, I thought people should know how good Coppy was to people like me. There are hundreds of people out there who have wanted to get into baseball operations and sent emails to Coppy asking for advice, and each one has a thorough reply from him, with specific suggestions tailored to that person’s background, along inspirational words of encouragement. He took the time to send me an email that was over two full pages long that addressed every little question I had. I’ve run into several other people with similar stories, and am sure there are plenty others who have had email exchanges similar to ours. When I was scouting for the Braves, we had to send an email report to (various Braves officials) after finishing our coverage of a given affiliate, with a one sentence blurb on each player from that team who we thought could play in the MLB. Without fail, within an hour of sending that email, Coppy sent an email back saying thanks, asking about your family, making the extra effort to know how appreciative he was of your hard work.

Fairly or unfairly, the coverage of the scandal has painted Coppy as this heartless cheater, but to kids like me who just loved the game and wanted more than anything to be a part of it, he was a godsend. I don’t know if this info has any utility to you whatsoever, but I just wanted someone in the media to know that as much turmoil there may have been in the front office, as much as he may have pissed off other GM’s, and as egregious as his violations may have been, there is not a doubt in my mind that he is a genuinely good person, and I am confident there are plenty of others out there who would say the same thing.

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FCC Eliminates Rule That Required Stations to Have a Main Studio in Local Coverage Area – Variety

FCC Eliminates Rule That Required Stations to Have a Main Studio in Local Coverage Area – Variety: "The FCC on Tuesday voted to eliminate a rule that required broadcast station groups to maintain a physical presence in the community of their primary local coverage area"



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Joseph McCarthy - Wikipedia

Joseph McCarthy - Wikipedia:

No one familiar with the history of this country can deny that congressional committees are useful. It is necessary to investigate before legislating, but the line between investigating and persecuting is a very fine one, and the junior Senator from Wisconsin has stepped over it repeatedly. His primary achievement has been in confusing the public mind, as between the internal and the external threats of Communism. We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. We must remember always that accusation is not proof and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law. We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember that we are not descended from fearful men—not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate and to defend causes that were, for the moment, unpopular.

This is no time for men who oppose Senator McCarthy's methods to keep silent, or for those who approve. We can deny our heritage and our history, but we cannot escape responsibility for the result. There is no way for a citizen of a republic to abdicate his responsibilities. As a nation we have come into our full inheritance at a tender age. We proclaim ourselves, as indeed we are, the defenders of freedom, wherever it continues to exist in the world, but we cannot defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home.

The actions of the junior Senator from Wisconsin have caused alarm and dismay amongst our allies abroad, and given considerable comfort to our enemies. And whose fault is that? Not really his. He didn't create this situation of fear; he merely exploited it—and rather successfully. Cassius was right: "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves."

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America Has a Monopoly Problem—and It’s Huge | The Nation

America Has a Monopoly Problem—and It’s Huge | The Nation: "There is a widespread sense of powerlessness, both in our economic and political life. We seem no longer to control our own destinies. If we don’t like our Internet company or our cable TV, we either have no place to turn, or the alternative is no better. Monopoly corporations are the primary reason that drug prices in the United States are higher than anywhere else in the world. Whether we like it or not, a company like Equifax can gather data about us, and then blithely take insufficient cybersecurity measures, exposing half the country to the risk of identity fraud, and then charge us for but a partial restoration of the security that we had before a major breach.

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Georgetown pro-marriage group faces sanctions after students complain :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)

Georgetown pro-marriage group faces sanctions after students complain :: Catholic News Agency (CNA):

Washington D.C., Oct 20, 2017 / 09:53 am (CNA).- A pro-marriage student group at Georgetown University is in danger of being defunded and barred from campus facilities, after fellow students have petitioned that it be recognized as a “hate group.”

The Hoya, Georgetown’s student newspaper, reported on Oct. 20 that Love Saxa, a student organization promoting Catholic doctrine regarding marriage, will undergo a Student Activities Commission hearing on Oct. 23, to defend itself against charges that the group fosters hatred and intolerance. The hearing is a response to a petition filed by a student-senator in the Georgetown University Student Association, and supported by leaders of gay pride student organizations at Georgetown.

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New Research by Common Sense Finds Major Spike in Mobile Media Use and Device Ownership by Children Age 0 to 842 Percent of Children Age 0 to 8 Have Their Own Tablet Device, Up from Less than 1 Percent in 2011 | Common Sense Media

New Research by Common Sense Finds Major Spike in Mobile Media Use and Device Ownership by Children Age 0 to 8<h4>42 Percent of Children Age 0 to 8 Have Their Own Tablet Device, Up from Less than 1 Percent in 2011</h4> | Common Sense Media: "SAN FRANCISCO—Common Sense today announced the release of The Common Sense Census: Media Use by Kids Age Zero to Eight, the third installment in an ongoing series of national surveys tracking the use of media and technology among U.S. children from birth to age 8. Among the key findings is the spike in the number of young children who have their own tablet device (now 42 percent, up from 1 percent in 2011) and the amount of time children age 0 to 8 are spending with mobile devices (48 minutes, up from just five minutes in 2011).

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On Safari in Trump's America - The Atlantic

On Safari in Trump's America - The Atlantic: "In Wisconsin, I had seen and heard everything the Third Way researchers did—and eaten at the same restaurants, and slept at the same Hampton Inn in Eau Claire, and watched the same landscape roll by the windows of the same SUV. I heard all the optimism they did, but I also heard its opposite: that one side was right and that the other was the enemy; that other Americans, not just the government, were to blame for the country’s problems. There’s plenty of fellow-feeling in the heartland for those who want to see it, but there’s plenty of division, too. And not every problem can be solved in a way that splits the difference.

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Florida private schools get nearly $1 billion in state scholarships with little oversight, Sentinel finds - Orlando Sentinel

Florida private schools get nearly $1 billion in state scholarships with little oversight, Sentinel finds - Orlando Sentinel:

Private schools in Florida will collect nearly $1 billion in state-backed scholarships this year through a system so weakly regulated that some schools hire teachers without college degrees, hold classes in aging strip malls and falsify fire-safety and health records.

The limited oversight of Florida’s scholarship programs allowed a principal under investigation for molesting a student at his Brevard County school to open another school under a new name and still receive the money, an Orlando Sentinel investigation found.

Another Central Florida school received millions of dollars in scholarships, sometimes called school vouchers, for nearly a decade even though it repeatedly violated program rules, including hiring staff with criminal convictions.

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Why do women still earn a lot less than men?

Why do women still earn a lot less than men?: "The main reason why women are less likely than men to reach higher-level positions is that they are their children’s primary carers. In eight countries polled by The Economist and YouGov earlier this year, 44-75% of women with children living at home said they had scaled back at work after becoming mothers—by working fewer hours or by switching to a less demanding job, such as one requiring less travel or overtime. Only 13-37% of fathers said they had done so, and more than half of those men said their partner had also scaled back. This pattern means that men get a better shot at a pay rise or a promotion than their female colleagues, and are less likely to be in jobs for which they are overqualified. A recent study estimated that in America women’s future wages fall, on average, by 4% per child, and by 10% per child in the case of the highest-earning, most skilled white women. In Britain, a mother’s wages fall by 2% for each year she is out of the workforce, and by twice as much if she has good school-leaving qualifications.
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Sworn Again America

Sworn Again America:

I pledge to be an active American

to show up for others

to govern my self

to help govern my community

I recommit myself to my country’s creed

to cherish liberty

as a responsibility

I pledge to serve

and to push my country:

when right, to be kept right;

when wrong, to be set right

Wherever my ancestors and I were born,

I claim America

and I pledge to live like a citizen

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How I Socially Engineer Myself Into High Security Facilities - Motherboard

How I Socially Engineer Myself Into High Security Facilities - Motherboard:

Hello! My name is Sophie and I break into buildings. I get paid to think like a criminal.

Organizations hire me to evaluate their security, which I do by seeing if I can bypass it. During tests I get to do some lockpicking, climb over walls or hop barbed wire fences. I get to go dumpster diving and play with all sorts of cool gadgets that Q would be proud of.

But usually, I use what is called social engineering to convince the employees to let me in. Sometimes I use email or phone calls to pretend to be someone I am not. Most often I get to approach people in-person and give them the confidence to let me in.

My frequently asked questions include:
What break-in are you most proud of? 
What have you done for a test that you were the most ashamed of?

What follows is the answer to both of these questions.

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I’m a Conservative Who Was Roofied By a Stranger. Here’s What I Think of the Me, Too Hashtag.

I’m a Conservative Who Was Roofied By a Stranger. Here’s What I Think of the Me, Too Hashtag.:

It will speak because this week I have seen too many ignorant comments, authored by too many people with too many opinions and too little compassion. People who, if they will listen at all, will only listen to a gun-owning, beer-drinking, God-fearing conservative woman whose disdain for modern militant feminism is well-known and unwavering.

Sometimes, we need to hear it from our own. Today, hear it from me.

There are a disconcerting number of people who, while ferociously and rightfully tearing apart the likes of Harvey Weinstein and his enablers, simultaneously denigrate the experiences of victims in the name of “confronting the lies of leftist feminism.”

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Dahhhkness comments on Donald Trump suggests Russia, FBI and Democrats colluded to pay for dossier on his Kremlin links - but provides no evidence

Dahhhkness comments on Donald Trump suggests Russia, FBI and Democrats colluded to pay for dossier on his Kremlin links - but provides no evidence: "A short list of some of the unforgivable things that dreadful black man did:
"



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Dollar General Hits a Gold Mine in Rural America - Bloomberg

Dollar General Hits a Gold Mine in Rural America - Bloomberg: "In the poorest towns, where even Wal-Mart failed, the little-box player is turning a profit.
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Cale Weatherly - I had some time to kill at work today, so I wrote...

Cale Weatherly - I had some time to kill at work today, so I wrote...:

My official title is Senior Research Chemist, Process Chemistry. I work for a company that partners with other pharmaceutical and biotech companies in bringing drugs to market. Discovering and testing drugs is a long and expensive process – 12-15 years, about a billion dollars.

Suppose a company want to develop a drug to treat a disease. Initially, they examine millions of molecules in basic biological tests. The results of these tests show whether a molecule affects part of a biological process involved in the disease. Building on these results, chemists design and make new molecules that may perform better in these initial tests. Several rounds of chemistry and biology provide more and more information about potential drug molecules. Eventually, a select few of these molecules are administered to animals. The animals are observed, then killed and autopsied. This informs more rounds of synthesis and testing go on.

It’s estimated that 90% of drug projects fail somewhere in these early stages. The 10% of successful projects will undergo clinical trials, the careful administration of drugs to humans and the observation of their effects. Three major phases of clinical trials are required to demonstrate the safety and efficacy of drugs before they can be considered for market. This is an expensive, risky, and highly regulated process, culminating in the submission of library-sized bodies of documentation to the FDA. The FDA reviews the material and provides a final verdict on whether or not a drug may be sold in the US. About 10% of drug candidates that enter the clinic will eventual be approved. Undertaking a drug discovery project means a 1% chance of success and lots of capital at risk.

In the early stages of drug research, where the focus is on basic biology, you can do most of the experimentation with 5-10 mg of the drug molecule. Figuring out how to make a molecule that’s never been made before is hard. This is the domain of a medicinal chemist. A medicinal chemist must first choose an appropriate starting material, a widely available molecule that usually bears some resemblance to the target product. The chemist will then design a series of chemical reactions that she anticipates will, step-by-step, turn the starting material into the target. A reaction is performed, the material is purified, the next reaction is tested. Medicinal chemists use general patterns of chemical reactivity to design a series of reactions – however, sometimes these reactions don’t work very well, or at all. Tweaks need to be made alternatives need to be tried. A skilled medicinal chemist may spend 30 minutes designing a way to make a molecule on paper, then take two months to make the planned chemistry work in the lab. Still, making 5-10 mg of a druglike molecule is usually achievable in that time frame. At this stage of things, how the molecule is made is not important. It is enough simply to make it.

Much further along in the discovery process, when doses of the compound are going to be administered to animals or humans (and maybe before), 5-10 mg of compound isn’t sufficient. You need grams of material, then kilograms. This is where a team of process chemists (like me!) comes in. The “how” of making the compound is now very important. Why not just do what the medicinal chemist did, only bigger? Many reasons. The medicinal chemist may have used ten reactions to make a molecule that could be made in five. These extra reactions generate lots of waste and cost money to run. Some of the reactions may have used expensive or toxic chemicals that we want to avoid. Sometimes chemical reactions that work well on small scales do not work as well with more material. Purifications that work well on a small scale may be impractical on large scales.

My goal as a process chemist is to figure out ways to make potential drug molecules with as little chemical material, time, effort, cost, and waste as possible. Often, this means designing and executing a scheme of chemical reactions completely different from what the medicinal chemist used. On a daily basis, my job centers on running and analyzing individual chemical reactions. I test different chemical reagents and their relative amounts, temperatures, concentrations, rates of addition, and many other variables. I use sophisticated instrumentation to analyze the individual components of a reaction. I strive to make individual reactions as high-yielding (yield = amount of material actually made/amount of material theoretically possible) as possible, with products as pure as possible. If I’m lucky, I get to think about how green and easy to perform a reaction is, but most of the time, it’s very hard even to get good yield and purity. Since the material from one reaction is used in the next, I typically work on two reactions at a time. Poor performance in one reaction can upset an overall scheme for making amolecule. Recently, my colleague and I have developed a route of making a molecule using four total reactions that previously required eight reactions to make. It is very satisfying to make large quantities of pure white powder!

The chemistry we develop may be passed along to engineers for further refinement. While I am an expert in what reactions to use and in what order, engineers are experts in chemical equipment and in the numerical details of, for example, heat transfer, filtration, and crystal growth. They work to develop chemical processes that can reliably be executed by medium-skilled technicians. Ultimately, the chemistry we develop may be used to manufacture pure drug products for market.

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Remarks by President George W. Bush and Mrs. Laura Bush at the “Spirit of Liberty: At Home, In The World” | Bush Center

Remarks by President George W. Bush and Mrs. Laura Bush at the “Spirit of Liberty: At Home, In The World” | Bush Center:

Our identity as a nation – unlike many other nations – is not determined by geography or ethnicity, by soil or blood. Being an American involves the embrace of high ideals and civic responsibility. We become the heirs of Thomas Jefferson by accepting the ideal of human dignity found in the Declaration of Independence. We become the heirs of James Madison by understanding the genius and values of the U.S. Constitution. We become the heirs of Martin Luther King, Jr., by recognizing one another not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.

This means that people of every race, religion, and ethnicity can be fully and equally American. It means that bigotry or white supremacy in any form is blasphemy against the American creed. (Applause.)

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My Interview With a Rohingya Refugee: What Do You Say to a Woman Whose Baby Was Thrown Into a Fire? - NYTimes.com

My Interview With a Rohingya Refugee: What Do You Say to a Woman Whose Baby Was Thrown Into a Fire? - NYTimes.com:

As I walked out of the refugee camp, my phone rang. The instant I said hello, my wife could hear it in my voice.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“I just finished the worst interview of my life,” I said.

I was standing near the border of Myanmar and Bangladesh, where half a million Rohingya people, probably one of the most unwanted ethnic groups on the planet, fled after government massacres in Myanmar. I had just said goodbye to a young woman named Rajuma and watched her — a frail figure in a red veil — disappear into a crowd with one of the most horrible stories I had ever heard.

I’ve covered genocide in Sudan and children being blown apart in Iraq. I’ve been dispatched to earthquakes, hurricanes, civil wars, international wars, insurgencies and famines. As foreign correspondents, this is what we do, rush into the world’s biggest disasters. In 20 years of doing this, I’ve become a specialist in despair.

But Rajuma’s story stopped me.

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Kelly Delivers Fervent Defense of Trump Call to Soldier’s Widow - The New York Times

Kelly Delivers Fervent Defense of Trump Call to Soldier’s Widow - The New York Times:

“It stuns me that a member of Congress would have listened in on that conversation — absolutely stuns me,” Mr. Kelly said during a somber, 18-minute appearance in the White House briefing room. He said that he was so upset by Ms. Wilson’s appearances on TV news shows that he had to collect his thoughts by walking through the graves at Arlington National Cemetery for more than an hour.

He also displayed scorn for a society that he said does not appreciate the sacrifice of those in the military. “Most of you as Americans don’t know them,” he said, bemoaning that “there’s nothing in our country anymore that seems to suggest that selfless service to the nation is not only appropriate but required.”

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Robert Scoble and Me – Quinn Norton – Medium

Robert Scoble and Me – Quinn Norton – Medium:

I learned when I was raped as a teenager that the complete demonization of the rapist is counterproductive. My rapist was my high school boyfriend, considered a better student and a boy with much better prospects than me. It was occasionally suggested that I’d be lucky to be raped by a boy of his stature, always with encouragement that I let the whole thing go. I never did. It was never said, but it was implied that I was trying to ruin a person whose life was, simply put, worth more than mine.

What we both were was fucked teenagers who needed help, and one had hurt the other. Not strange, not rare. Instead of addressing that, I was pushed out of school, and his emotional problems were ignored and neglected. In the end, my rapist and I were better allies to each other than our schools and families were.

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Exclusive: Neo-Nazi and National Front organiser quits movement, opens up about Jewish heritage, comes out as gay – Channel 4 News

Exclusive: Neo-Nazi and National Front organiser quits movement, opens up about Jewish heritage, comes out as gay – Channel 4 News:

Kevin Wilshaw also opens up about his Jewish mother.

“She was part Jewish, maiden name was Benjamin, we have Jewish blood on that side.

On an application form to join the National Front, he wrote about his hatred of “the Jews”.

“That term ‘the Jews’ is the global faceless mass of people you can’t personalise it, not individuals. That’s the generalisation that leads to 6 million people being deliberately murdered.

“I didn’t have many friends at school, I wanted to be a member of a group of people that had an aim, and I thought getting involved in that kind of thing would be comradeship. “

“Even though you end up being a group of people that through their own extreme views are cut off from society, you do have a sense of comradeship in that you’re a member of a group that’s being attacked by other people.”

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(1) 厦外官方音乐短片【Another Day of Sun】 Xiamen Foreign Language School - YouTube

(1) 厦外官方音乐短片【Another Day of Sun】 Xiamen Foreign Language School - YouTube:




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Mike Pence’s “Confessions of a Negative Campaigner” | Craig Fehrman

Mike Pence’s “Confessions of a Negative Campaigner” | Craig Fehrman: "Second, a campaign ought to be about the advancement of issues whose success or failure is more significant than that of the candidate. Whether on the left or the right, candidates ought to leave a legacy — a foundation of arguments — in favor of policies upon which their successors can build. William Buckley carries with him a purposeful malapropism. “Don’t just do something,” it says, “stand there.”

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You’ve Probably Never Heard of America’s Most Popular Playwright, Lauren Gunderson | The New Yorker

You’ve Probably Never Heard of America’s Most Popular Playwright, Lauren Gunderson | The New Yorker:

Increasingly, theatres are banking on Gunderson, who, at thirty-five, has already had more than twenty of her works produced: among them witty historical dramas about women in science (“Emilie,” “Silent Sky,” “Ada and the Engine”), giddy political comedies (“Exit, Pursued by a Bear,” “The Taming,” “The Revolutionists”), and wildly theatrical explorations of death and legacy (“I and You,” “The Book of Will”). According to American Theatre magazine’s annual survey, released last month, Gunderson will be the most produced playwright in the country for the 2017–18 season. Her plays are staged almost twice as often as anyone else’s on the list, far ahead of venerated figures like Eugene O’Neill and August Wilson, who edged her for the top spot last year. (The survey excludes Shakespeare, America’s perennial favorite.) Although men still write three-quarters of the plays that get produced, Gunderson has built a national reputation with works that center on women’s stories. And, though most playwrights also teach or work in television, she has managed to make a living, in San Francisco, by writing for the stage.



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Why I’ve Started to Fear My Fellow Social Justice Activists by Frances Lee — YES! Magazine

Why I’ve Started to Fear My Fellow Social Justice Activists by Frances Lee — YES! Magazine:

Callout culture. The quest for purity. Privilege theory taken to extremes. I’ve observed some of these questionable patterns in my activist communities over the past several years.

As an activist, I stand with others against white supremacy, anti-blackness, cisheteropatriarchy, capitalism, and imperialism. I am queer, trans, Chinese American, middle class, and able-bodied.

Holding these identities scattered across the spectrum of privilege, I have done my best to find my place in the movement, while educating myself on social justice issues to the best of my ability. But after witnessing countless people be ruthlessly torn apart in community for their mistakes and missteps, I started to fear my own comrades.

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What if the right-wing media wins? - Columbia Journalism Review

What if the right-wing media wins? - Columbia Journalism Review: "“Journalistic integrity is dead,” he declared. “There is no such thing anymore. So everything is about weaponization of information.” Standing behind a mahogany podium in a baggy dark suit, Boyle preached with the confidence of a true believer. In a stuttering staccato, he condemned the nation’s preeminent news outlets as “corrupted institutions,” “built on a lie,” and a criminal “syndicate that needs to be dismantled.” Boyle and his compatriots were laboring to usher in an imminent—and glorious—journalistic apocalypse. “We envision a day when CNN is no longer in business. We envision a day when The New York Times closes its doors. I think that day is possible.”

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Air quality on cruise ship deck 'worse than world's most polluted cities', investigation finds | The Independent

Air quality on cruise ship deck 'worse than world's most polluted cities', investigation finds | The Independent:

Directly next to the funnels on the deck, the numbers rocketed to 144,000 with a peak at 226,000. 

This is more than double the average found in central London's Piccadilly Circus, where using the same device, the Dispatches team recorded 38,400 ultra-fine particulates per cubic centimetre. 

While the deck is popular with sun-bathers, passengers are likely to be breathing some of these particulates, which are harmful for health and the environment. 

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(1) Wine Country Fire - Fire Engine response and firefight, Stopping the Flames (Firefighter view) - YouTube

(1) Wine Country Fire - Fire Engine response and firefight, Stopping the Flames (Firefighter view) - YouTube:





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Wallofwillow comments on Drivers who kill will now face life sentence - Dangerous drivers who cause death while using their mobile phones or speeding will face life in prison, ministers have confirmed. Drivers who kill while under the influence of drink or drugs will also face a life sentence.

Wallofwillow comments on Drivers who kill will now face life sentence - Dangerous drivers who cause death while using their mobile phones or speeding will face life in prison, ministers have confirmed. Drivers who kill while under the influence of drink or drugs will also face a life sentence.:

Time spent in prison simply isn't part of the equation of decision-making when committing a serious crime. What has a MUCH LARGER impact on how people behave is the certainty of arrest, the speed of the trial process (this one is key and always overlooked), and perceived feeling of a just system in combination with everything else. This generally means they were arrested, they went to court quickly, they went to jail/prison quickly, and got what they perceived was a fair punishment. The link between the crime and the consequence has to be rapid and direct. Short sentences generally work just as well and obviously cost way less money from the incarceration standpoint.



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As the 747 Begins Its Final Approach, a Pilot Takes a Flight Down Memory Lane - The New York Times

As the 747 Begins Its Final Approach, a Pilot Takes a Flight Down Memory Lane - The New York Times: "For pilots, crew members and passengers who love the 747, it’s easy to forget that the airliner was first of all a business proposition, one that aimed to harness economies of scale and a raft of new technologies to cut the seat-per-mile cost of air travel by about 30 percent. Yet on a planet that previously only the richest could cross at will, the 747’s most lasting impact may have been on everyday notions of distance and difference. Having inaugurated the “age of mass intercontinental travel,” wrote the scholar Vaclav Smil, the 747 “became a powerful symbol of global civilization.” The writer J.G. Ballard compared the jet to nothing less than the Parthenon — each the embodiment of “an entire geopolitical world-view.” Juan Trippe, Pan Am’s legendary founder, called the 747 “a great weapon for peace, competing with intercontinental missiles for mankind’s destiny.”

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Hurricane Ophelia: Ireland braces for worst Atlantic storm in almost 60 years | The Independent

Hurricane Ophelia: Ireland braces for worst Atlantic storm in almost 60 years | The Independent:

Ireland is bracing itself for what could be the worst storm since 1961, according to Met Éireann, the country’s national meteorological service.

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N.C.A.A.: North Carolina Will Not Be Punished for Academic Scandal - The New York Times

N.C.A.A.: North Carolina Will Not Be Punished for Academic Scandal - The New York Times:

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — The N.C.A.A. did not dispute that the University of North Carolina was guilty of running one of the worst academic fraud schemes in college sports history, involving fake classes that enabled dozens of athletes to gain and maintain their eligibility.

But there will be no penalties, the organization said, because no rules were broken.

In a ruling that caused head-scratching everywhere except Chapel Hill, the N.C.A.A. announced on Friday that it could not punish the university or its athletics program because the “paper” classes were not available exclusively to athletes. Other students at North Carolina had access to the fraudulent classes, too.

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20 of America's top political scientists gathered to discuss our democracy. They're scared. - Vox

20 of America's top political scientists gathered to discuss our democracy. They're scared. - Vox:\

Adam Przeworski, a democratic theorist at New York University, suggested that democratic erosion in America begins with a breakdown in what he calls the “class compromise.” His point is that democracies thrive so long as people believe they can improve their lot in life. This basic belief has been “an essential ingredient of Western civilization during the past 200 years,” he said.

But fewer and fewer Americans believe this is true. Due to wage stagnation, growing inequalities, automation, and a shrinking labor market, millions of Americans are deeply pessimistic about the future: 64 percent of people in Europe believe their children will be worse off than they were; the number is 60 percent in America.

That pessimism is grounded in economic reality. 

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Harvey Weinstein, Donald Trump, Hypocrisy & Mitt Romney’s “Binders Full of Women” | National Review

Harvey Weinstein, Donald Trump, Hypocrisy & Mitt Romney’s “Binders Full of Women” | National Review:

During the second presidential debate in 2012, Romney was asked about pay equity. In the course of his answer, he said: I had the chance to pull together a cabinet, and all the applicants seemed to be men . . . I went to a number of women’s groups and said, “Can you help us find folks?” and they brought us whole binders full of women. Now, I’ll happily grant that the phrase “binders full of women” is an awkward one. It sounds like the menus they bring out on Jeffrey Epstein’s plane when Bill Clinton and Harvey Weinstein settle in for a weekend getaway. 



But here’s the thing: What Romney did was exactly what feminist groups insist elected politicians should do. He saw that there were “too many” men in the applicant pool, so he reached out to some feminist groups and asked for help. Some feminist groups reached out to him — and he listened to them, too. And then he hired more women.
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School district pulls 'To Kill A Mockingbird' from reading list; 'makes people uncomfortable,' official says | AL.com

School district pulls 'To Kill A Mockingbird' from reading list; 'makes people uncomfortable,' official says | AL.com: "The Sun Herald reports that Biloxi administrators pulled the novel from the 8th-grade curriculum this week. School board vice president Kenny Holloway says the district received complaints that some of the book's language "makes people uncomfortable."

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(1) Take On Me - a-ha - Brooklyn Duo at Carnegie Hall - YouTube

(1) Take On Me - a-ha - Brooklyn Duo at Carnegie Hall - YouTube:




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The Airport Bomber From Last Week You Never Heard About

The Airport Bomber From Last Week You Never Heard About:

I bet you never heard about it. I keep an eye on these types of incidents closely and I didn’t hear about it. Someone who follows me online who happens to live in Asheville sent me the story this morning — shocked that it hadn’t gotten any play at all beyond a few mentions in the local paper and some isolated pickup by a few national outlets.

As soon as I clicked on the article, it all made perfect sense.

The story didn’t go viral and Trump didn’t tweet about it because the bomb was not placed by an immigrant, or a Muslim, or a Mexican. It was placed there by a good ol’ white man, Michael Christopher Estes. Unlike the Las Vegas shooter, Stephen Paddock, whose motive is still hard to discern, Estes wanted to be very clear that his ultimate goal was to accelerate a war on American soil.

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Lorpius_Prime comments on What if Afghanistan was never invaded by the United Front and the Taliban regime continued to conquer all of Afghanistan?

Lorpius_Prime comments on What if Afghanistan was never invaded by the United Front and the Taliban regime continued to conquer all of Afghanistan?: "Try to wrap your head around what something like a war seems like to people from places like that. Wars are when your distant cousins from two valleys over, whom you've seen maybe once every ten years, come and say they need help to fight foreign barbarians. A handful of young men from your village--because a handful is all who live there--leave with them to join the fight, because that's what young men do for family. It's what your village has always done all the way back to when it was the Mongols that threatened to loot your homes rather than the Russians or Americans, and you know so because your grandparents still tell stories about it that they heard their own grandparents tell. They don't go fight for any high ideals, the very concept of philosophy isn't something they'd be familiar with. They might have heard talk of things like "freedom" in news broadcasts from the village's one radio, but to them "freedom" simply means not having to worry about foreigners burning down your village.
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Facing Down the Network That Protected Harvey Weinstein - The New York Times

Facing Down the Network That Protected Harvey Weinstein - The New York Times:

It is far worse for the victims of those in power, who are all too aware that speaking up may lead to stalled careers and ruined reputations. Many women who have fought back against sleazy, powerful men by filing lawsuits against them often end up with the consolation prize of an out-of-court settlement that comes complete with a nondisclosure agreement dictating that they must remain silent on the matter forevermore or face a steep financial penalty.

In this climate, breaking a story that includes tough accusations against those in high places requires more than a scrappy reporter with a notebook. It means having the resources to work the story exclusively for months. It means withstanding any legal challenges that may come. It means coaxing understandably reluctant victims to speak out against those who have the means and motivation to crush them.

In the days since The New York Times first published an article on Mr. Weinstein that named names and included details of at least eight settlements, a number of reporters and editors have spoken of their own missed chances to write the story earlier. For many journalists, Mr. Weinstein was the white whale that got away.

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The American Alliance With Turkey Was Built On a Myth – Foreign Policy

The American Alliance With Turkey Was Built On a Myth – Foreign Policy: "So much analysis and commentary about Turkey over the last decade has emphasized Erdogan’s consolidation of his personal political power. Although this work has been generally accurate, it tends to obscure three important factors in Turkish politics and foreign policy. First, for all that Erdogan is the central decision-maker, his ideas about Turkish power and mistrust of the West have broad support among Turks — and with good historical reasons. Second, the United States and Turkey share neither values nor interests. Finally, the world has changed a lot since the heyday of the U.S.-Turkey alliance, over a quarter century ago."



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reefer-madness comments on Attacus atlas: The largest moth in the world

reefer-madness comments on Attacus atlas: The largest moth in the world: "Pandas breed just fine in the wild. Wild female pandas produce healthy, living cubs like clockwork every two years for their entire reproductive careers (typically over a decade). Pandas also do just fine on their diet of bamboo, since that question always comes up too. They have evolved many specializations for bamboo eating, including changes in their taste receptors, development of symbiosis with lignin-digesting gut bacteria (this is a new discovery), and an ingenious anatomical adaptation (a "thumb" made from a wrist bone) that is such a good example of evolutionary novelty that Stephen Jay Gould titled an entire book about it, The Panda's Thumb. They represent a branch of the ursid family that is in the middle of evolving some incredible adaptations (similar to the maned wolf, a canid that's also gone mostly herbivorous, rather like the panda). Far from being an evolutionary dead end, they are an incredible example of evolutionary innovation. Who knows what they might have evolved into if we hadn't ruined their home and destroyed what for millions of years had been a very reliable and abundant food source.
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Hollywood’s Most Decent Fella on Weinstein, Trump and History - The New York Times

Hollywood’s Most Decent Fella on Weinstein, Trump and History - The New York Times:

“Let me just read you one thing,” he says, getting up to go into the other room and coming back with “April 1865: The Month That Saved America,” a book by Jay Winik about the closing weeks of the Civil War: “‘And where abolitionists preached slavery as a violation against the higher law, Southerners angrily countered with their own version of the deity, that it was sanctioned by the Constitution. In the vortex of this debate, once the battle lines were sharply drawn, moderate ground everywhere became hostage to the passions of the two sides. Reason itself had become suspect; mutual tolerance was seen as treachery. Vitriol overcame accommodation. And the slavery issue would not just fade away.”’

He looks up. “Somehow, sometime in the last 20 years of our generation, that’s re-emerged. So, yes, this is the calm before the storm.”

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Three Chinese women stuck at South Korea airport unable to confirm identities after plastic surgery: Shanghaiist

Three Chinese women stuck at South Korea airport unable to confirm identities after plastic surgery: Shanghaiist:

Over the Golden Week holiday, three Chinese women flew to South Korea to go under the knife; however, they're having some trouble getting back home again after the operations went a bit too swell.

On Sunday, Jian Huahua, a Chinese TV anchor shared a photo on her Weibo account of the three women sitting at a South Korea airport, passports in hands, with their post-plastic surgery faces wrapped up in bandages and extremely swollen.

According to the Jian, the poor women looked so completely different from their passport photos that they were barred from taking their flight back home, detained and questioned by authorities.

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Gretchen Mol Breaks Silence on Harvey Weinstein and Misogynistic Rumors (Guest Column) | Hollywood Reporter

Gretchen Mol Breaks Silence on Harvey Weinstein and Misogynistic Rumors (Guest Column) | Hollywood Reporter:

For 10 years or so, I’ve been aware of rumors that I had some kind of transactional relationship with Harvey Weinstein. They seemed to start on a gossip website that made money by peddling ‘blind’ items. A few facts had been taken from my Wikipedia page, were combined with stories about a movie mogul who was known for harassing women, quotes from “reliable sources” were added and a malicious, viral rumor was born.

Over the years, it was gleefully embroidered, becoming increasingly bizarre and baroque — but the salacious, slut-shaming and misogynist message to the fable remained the same: In Hollywood, a young woman must build her career by humiliating herself and sleeping with powerful men. 

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Christopher Columbus - Wikipedia

Christopher Columbus - Wikipedia: "Because of their gross mismanagement of governance, Columbus and his brothers were arrested and imprisoned upon their return to Spain from the third voyage. They lingered in jail for six weeks before busy King Ferdinand ordered their release. Not long after, the king and queen summoned the Columbus brothers to the Alhambra palace in Granada. There, the royal couple heard the brothers' pleas; restored their freedom and wealth; and, after much persuasion, agreed to fund Columbus's fourth voyage. But the door was firmly shut on Columbus's role as governor. Henceforth Nicolás de Ovando y Cáceres was to be the new governor of the West Indies.

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Realizing it's real, from my time in base Honor Guard : MilitaryStories

Realizing it's real, from my time in base Honor Guard : MilitaryStories: "It was never just a job after that. It was a brother or sister I never met. Part of my damn family that the reaper dared take. It was real, and from then on, it's never stopped."



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Val_Hallen comments on Jerry Jones gives Cowboys players ultimatum: Stand for anthem or sit for game

Val_Hallen comments on Jerry Jones gives Cowboys players ultimatum: Stand for anthem or sit for game:

As a vet, I don't feel "disrespected".

I swore to defend all rights. Especially the unpopular ones that most people disagree with. Those ones need protected the most.

What does make me feel disrespected is when you drag MY service into YOUR argument and get offended on MYbehalf.

Veterans are fucking tired of being brought out like dancing poodles for the fucking GOP and conservatives of this nation to further their own selfish, backwards, and archaic ideas.

That's disrespectful to us.

We are living, breathing people with our own thoughts and ideologies.

We don't belong to your team. We don't belong to any team.

We swore to uphold the Constitution. Part of that Constitution is these players doing exactly what they are allowed to do - peacefully protest.

Showing 100% reverence to a nation or symbol of the nation is NOT patriotism, it's nationalism.

And history has shown that nationalism is a very dangerous idea.

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Is the United States one of seven countries that ‘allow elective abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy?’ - The Washington Post

Is the United States one of seven countries that ‘allow elective abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy?’ - The Washington Post:

This statistic seemed dubious at first, because it seemed extreme for just seven countries out of 198 to allow elective abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy. But upon further digging, the data back up the claim. We should note that some of the seven countries allow abortions after 20 weeks, but ban it after 24 weeks. And other countries have no federal limits, but legislate at the state or provincial level, similar to the United States.

Further, what is telling that research from both sides of the reproductive rights debate confirm this figure. It’s not easy to boil down complex abortion laws in a cross-comparative manner like this, and there are some minor caveats associated with this talking point. Still, we did not find the caveats rise to the level of One Pinocchio.

We award the elusive Geppetto Checkmark when a factoid surprisingly turns out to be true, as in this case.

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Every conversation between a parent and a child, in four conversations.

Every conversation between a parent and a child, in four conversations.:

Child: Can I have this?

Me: No.

Child: Ah, perhaps I’ve miscommunicated. I’m asking for it because I want it.

Me: I understood that, actually.

Child: I think maybe you’re not hearing me. I’d like it because I want it.

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