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7 pieces of "Sully": a quietly heroic biopic
Posted on September 9, 2016 by Denise
Nutshell: A lovely story about a true hero of our time. Almost anyone else could have turned this slice-of-heroic-life tale into a maudlin Lifetime Movie-of-the-Week, but Eastwood – along with a stellar cast that includes Tom Hanks as Sully and Laura Linney as his wife – manages to turn a tale we already know into an immensely watchable, moving film. Grade: A
"This is the Captain. Brace for impact."
Story: Everyone who was alive and cognizant of social media back in '09 knows about the Miracle On The Hudson, when Captain Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger landed a US Airways Airbus A320-214 onto the Hudson River. Onto, not into; Sully managed to land his plane in such a way that not a single soul on board died. A few bumps, bruises, a serious laceration, and a lot of hypothermia. But all-in-all, for landing in water, which was typically thought to be a death sentence for all concerned? A literal miracle.
Genre I'd put it in: Low-key feel good hero-pic.
Remake, Sequel, Based-On, or Orignal: Based on Sullenberger's October 2009 memoir, Highest Duty: My Search for What Really Matters.
Gotta say: Is it any wonder Hollywood jumped at the chance to tell Sully's story? Luckily, it was award-winning director Clint Eastwood who brought it to the multiplex. Eastwood gathered together an excellent cinematographer (Tom Stern; The Hunger Games, American Sniper) and production designer (James J. Murakami; Deadwood, J. Edgar)
And he got a stable full of award winners to step in front of the camera too. While I never got past the That's Tom Hanks feeling, he did an admirable job portraying the steadfastness and terror of a man who was called on to do the unimaginable, and did. Aaron Eckhart, as second-in-command Captain Jeff Skiles, rocks a killer 'stache, and is able to keep a man who was happy to fade into the background from doing so in this film. Of course, Laura Linney is always amazing, and while her "wifey at home" role is rather thankless, Linney, along with screenwriter Todd Komarnicki (Resistance) add layers that breathe live into her character.
My only problem with this film? The stars and director are so incredibly good at their jobs of bringing this nuanced but gentle story to life, that voters may pass them – and this film – over come awards season. Eastwood, Hanks, Linney, Eckhart and the rest of the cast and make filming this story and portraying these characters look effortless. In fact, that feeling that this is just a slice of heroic life is what makes Sully so compelling. These are everyday folks (okay, as far as airline pilots are everyday folks) that survived and coped with something everyone fears, but not everyone survives. That Sully kept the humanity in the heroic is the true miracle in this film.
#Protip: The post-credits real life footage of Sully, his wife, and the 155 survivors of Flight 1549 was filmed at the Carolinas Aviation Museum in Charlotte, NC, where the restored plane is on display.
This entry was posted in 7 Pieces Of, Movie Reviews and tagged Award Season, Movie Reviews. Bookmark the permalink.


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Reviews and advice from our students in the PhD, Master's and Certificate programs. Discover what Cleveland has to offer!
University Circle
University Circle, home to Case Western Reserve University, is an intellectual, scientific, cultural, and health care district. The concentration of institutions within its one-square-mile, park-like setting is unsurpassed in the world. Meet a few of our neighbors.
Our nearest suburban neighbor, Cleveland Heights boasts beautiful homes, excellent student housing options, great food, and 135 acres of park land.
Coventry offers an eclectic assortment of stores, restaurants, and coffee shops. It's a favorite place for students to hang-out.
Shaker Heights is a thriving community noted for its Georgian style architecture, sidewalk cafes, and unique gift shops.
Nestled right behind the School of Medicine, Little Italy has been home to Cleveland's thriving Italian-American population since the 1920's. It is also home to many quaint restaurants, bakeries and over 30 galleries.
Located about five miles west of campus on the shores of Lake Erie, downtown Cleveland offers nightlife, shopping, restaurants, the Indians, Browns, Cavs, Playhouse Square (theater, opera, dance), Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and the Great Lakes Science Center.
The Warehouse District
The Warehouse District has upscale bars and clubs, fine dining, milling crowds, outdoor concerts, and comedy clubs; it's the place for nightlife in Cleveland, right in the shadow of downtown.
Tremont, located just south of downtown Cleveland, is one of the city's oldest and most historic neighborhoods. Tremont is known for its numerous, hip and trendy restaurants in addition to monthly art walks.
Shaker Lakes
Located just a couple miles from CWRU, The Shaker Lakes are a system of parklands through which the Doan Brook runs. The Shaker Lakes Park is a natural and semi-wild area located at the intersection of three municipalities; Shaker Heights, Cleveland Heights, and Cleveland. It includes two lakes created by the Shakers when they dammed Doan Brook to power their industries. The swamp and woodland areas constitute a small wilderness in the heart of the heaviest concentration of population in Ohio, making it readily available for study and recreation. It has a number of beautiful trails and the Nature Center at Shaker Lakes. It is available to people the public on a day-to-day, year-round basis for walking, photography, painting, nature study, rest and quiet recreation.
Email: bstp@case.edu

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Beautiful Imperfections in the Sculptures of Ruhan Janse van Vuuren
South African sculptor Ruhan Janse van Vuuren's unique figurative artworks are both technically apt and visually engaging. He models his sculptures from everyday people, each figure containing imperfections that draws one closer, creating works that are real and human.
Born in 1981, Janse van Vuuren and developed an interest in three dimensional objects whilst at the Jacqui Theron art school. He further pursued his artistic path by studying Fine Art at Tshwane University of Technology in Pretoria, under renowned artist Jan van der Merwe. His works often deal with the parameters that define the young Afrikaner and modern plasticity of mass production and consumption.
"For the last couple of years I have experimented with the idea of building and destructing. This process of construction / deconstruction relays the tiered notion of beauty - in its constructed form the sculpture is aesthetically pleasing, but there is the abandoned hope and beauty in the destroyed too," says Janse van Vuuren.
Janse van Vuuren's process is one of constant push and pull where he forms then deforms his figures and in some cases adapts one work into another. The uncertainty of the outcome is the only thing that the artist can be certain about.
View more about Ruhan Janse van Vuuren [here].
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Highly detailed pastel portraits by Helena Hugo
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Before i had the girls, i would take myself out on my bike nearly every weekend. I would ride for miles and find a meadow and sit and read or take photographs or just "be". Alone time is something that i really love and i love my own company, especially when i am out in the countryside and taking in everything around me. I don't get a lot of time to do that now but when i do, it is such a big thing.
On Monday, i was invited out to the towns camera club photography walk. It was along the river by my house at sunset. I decided i wanted to just take sun drenched photographs. I love capturing light and love playing around with my camera to see what i can create. Golden light is my favourite light to work with. I love finding new angles and letting the sun bounce off my lens. We walked along the river and when we got to a certain point, just near a meadow i love, the rest of the group decided to turn back. I carried on with a few others to get to the meadow as the sun was just about to set. I lay down in the long grass and just snapped away. A lovely gentleman stopped behind me on the path and said to me that i was amazing for managing to capture that light. I showed him my photographs and i told him how best to capture the light and not to be afraid of shooting directly into the sun. I then went onto another section of the meadow and as i was snapping, i noticed there was a man standing right behind me with his dog, watching the photographs come up on my camera back. When i noticed him, he made his apologies and walked away but it was nice to know he was there even though it freaked me when i first saw him! I just wish i had my tripod so i could have danced around in the meadow. That would have really been something for them to stare at!!!
"let's have an adventure" is a link up where you can share your latest adventures with everyone.The link up goes live on the 26th of each month. We would love to have you join us and help us create this wonderful community of fellow adventurer's!!!!
Gorgeous photos and I love the way you have captured the light. Spending time on your own somewhere so beautiful must be so nice and relaxing!
Those are beautiful shots, my mother got a few photos with similar lighting this past weekend. I'm not as bold when it comes to capturing sunlight!
I love the way you capture the sun. Your images are so evocative of lashing of ginger beer!
Alone time is something I miss too! And being able to walk for miles, without seeing anyone (we live in the city). Your shots are so beautiful - you really have a talent there.
They are beautiful beautiful photos - I'm not surprised people wanted to take a peek, it's like watching an artist paint.
This is gorgeous, I just love the sunlight pouring in - really happy photos. I love a meadow too, so peaceful and interesting to look at. I think I would have been freaked by a man lurking behind my shoulder too!
I love these photos so much- beautiful!
Beautiful photos!! I wish I could take pictures even half as good!
They're beautiful photos. I think I need to try to be more brave with my photos and shoot into the light more.
Absolutely amazing photos! I need to learn how to take prettier pictures. Very inspiring!


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Covid rates near me: Infection rates drop as county set for Tier 2
Cambridge's infection rate has decreased dramatically in recent weeks
Harry GoldTrainee Multimedia Reporter
A woman wearing a face mask passes a screen advising the wearing of face masks on Oxford Street, London (Image: PA)
The latest coronavirus infection rates have been released as England reaches the end of its final full week of lockdown.
Infection rates across the county have continued to dip as the country prepares to return to a three-tiered approach after the current lockdown restrictions end on December 2.
Here in Cambridgeshire, the whole county has been placed under Tier 2 restrictions, it was announced by Matt Hancock earlier this week.
The new rules being placed on the county come despite infection rates remaining low in most parts of Cambridgeshire.
The rate is expressed as the number of new cases per 100,000 people and is based on Public Health England data published for the week leading up to November 23.
The England-wide infection rate currently sits at 200.4. This is higher than five out of six of Cambridgeshire's districts, with only Peterborough slightly edging above the national average.
Find the latest coronavirus cases in your area:
South Cambridgeshire currently has the lowest infection rate in Cambridgeshire at 54.7.
In a statement posted on Twitter, Conservative MP for South Cambridgeshire Anthony Browne said he was 'disappointed' by the decision.
Mr Browne said: "I am disappointed that South Cambs has been categorised as Tier 2, when infections are falling fast and below the rate in the Isle of Wight which is Tier 1. I know it will be a big disappointment to many businesses, especially pubs.
"The government has categorised the whole of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough together, and the rates are pushed up by much higher levels of infection in Cambridge city and Peterborough."
Cambridge's infection rate has decreased dramatically in recent weeks, having halved in just seven days.
In the week leading up to November 16, the case rate was 206.7, whereas the latest data puts it at just 101.
Latest Covid vaccine news: New priority list changes order of who will get vaccine first
England Wales Rugby TV: What channel is England vs Wales rugby on today? Kick-off time, TV and Amazon live stream details
Rate of new cases in the seven days to November 23: 101.0
Number of new cases recorded in the seven days to November 23: 126
Rate of new cases in the seven days to November 23: 54.7
Number of new cases recorded in the seven days to November 23: 87
More than 2,500 children in isolation after over 100 outbreaks in Cambridgeshire schools
Wife beat her husband to death with help of her lover after drunken row
Fenland


To determine how to specify where to save files such as Reports, Documents, and vcard files from Clio to your computer.
To determine how to edit the file download locations for each download.
To stop automatic download to the "Downloads folder on your computer"
These instructions are for the Chrome web browser.


How technology is improving the ability to spot out wildfires - the challenge: getting that "information into the hands of the firefighters."
"Fire lookout technology has changed a lot since Jack Kerouac's Desolation Angels. The book was taken almost entirely from a diary Kerouac kept when he was fire lookout for 63 days on Desolation Peak in Washington. Now, satellite images, fuel analysis, and, soon, the use of drones, are among the high-tech methods for protecting wilderness and civilization from wildfires.
Some of the more important real-time fire data comes from MODIS, a sensor on two NASA satellites that view the entire Earth's surface every one to two days. The sensors show heat sources (that's how a fire was first spotted in Noatak, Alaska by a fire manager looking at the data in the early 2000s). It was the first time a fire had been detected by satellite before humans noticed it, says Sean Triplett, the group leader for geo-spatial and information management at the U.S. Forest Service.
After a fire, the U.S. Geological Survey's LANDSAT satellite can be used to determine the severity of the burn by comparing a pre-fire photo of an area to a post-fire one. The differences in brightness allow scientists to determine the normalized burn ratio, as well as to reflect the changes on the ground."


Nearly five years after a disastrous 7.0 magnitude earthquake devastated Haiti, killing more than 220,000 people and leaving millions without homes, the tiny island nation is still struggling to pick up the pieces—despite a multi-billion dollar international repair effort.
The United States alone committed more than $3 billion to rebuild Haiti—with federal agencies creating a spate of programs and initiatives aimed at helping storm victims get access to shelter and food. But many of those programs have fallen short-- soaring way over budget and way past their deadlines.
The U.S. Aid and International Development agency (USAID)'s "New Settlement Program" for example, intended to build houses for Haitians that lost their homes to the earthquake, has been plagued with cost overruns and hasn't helped nearly as many people as planned.
Earlier this year, USAID's inspector general found that the project, which was originally estimated to cost about $53 million, ballooned to $90 million. While the price tag grew, the project shrunk. Indeed, the plan had originally called for building 4,000 houses by 2012, but as of July, only about 816 houses have actually been built.
"The mission did not achieve its goals for constructing houses and developing home sites within budget and on schedule," the IG said in the report.
The auditor blamed the project's cost overruns and delays on the agency's lack of oversight over the contractors. Others blame the cost increases on USAID for awarding contracts to large firms instead of going with smaller, local companies. According to the Center for Research on Globalization, Minnesota-based Thor Construction received $18 million, Mexico-based CEMEX got $7 million and about $35 million went to two Haitian-American firms based in Maryland.
A report from the Government Accountability Office last year found similar issues.
Now, it turns out that there are even bigger problems. A new analysis by the Center for Economic and Policy Research says that 750 houses built under that USAID program were so shoddily built, they will cost millions more to repair.
The report cited the audit from USAID's IG that said agency workers "did not review contractor's quality control procedures" which likely led to the poor construction efforts. The auditors said that had they reviewed the contractors' plans in advance, they would have determined the houses were not adequate. The IG report suggests that the agency's mistake proved to be quite costly.
Every time taxpayers see another example of bureaucratic incompetence and wasteful spending, it makes them wonder about more of their hard-earned tax dollars being squandered. Thus the call for smaller government, regardless of the consequences.
Now repairing those houses will cost millions of additional dollars. In October, USAID awarded U.S. contractor, Tetra Tech, a $4.5 million contract to repair the homes, which apparently had missing roof fasteners, as well as structural and drainage issues.
The homes will now cost four times the original estimate. And there will still be significantly fewer houses than originally anticipated.
To be sure, the number of storm victims without homes has decreased drastically in the last five years –from about 1.5 million people who were displaced immediately following the earthquake—to about 137,500 now. The Inspector General credits the decline largely to housing and rental subsidies—many of which were funded by the United States.
Still, the larger issue is that management problems and lax oversight has plagued the massive, billion dollar efforts to help rebuild Haiti—setting back progress to help people devastated by the earthquake in an already impoverished country.


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Celebrity Wiki
"My 600-lb Life:" What Happened to Annjeanette Whaley and Vianey & Allen? Where Are They Now?
Is Alex Trebek Leaving "Jeopardy!"? What Happened to Him?
Why Did Lucas Black Leave "NCIS: New Orleans"? Cast Members Reveal Why LaSalle Was Killed Off on the Show
Home » Celebrity Net Worth
DJ Khaled's Net Worth in 2018: He's "Suffering from Success!"
By: Amrutha Srivatsa - Published: January 3, 2018 at 10:00 am
Photo: Phillip Faraone / Stringer / Getty Images
DJ Khaled's net worth in 2018 is an estimated $20.0 million. The music mogul might have started his career as a rapper, but today, he is more successful behind the scenes. Check out how much money DJ Khaled makes in a year!
Khaled Mohammed Khaled has been in the music industry for more than a decade now, and started under the name Arab Attack. Now, DJ Khaled is reportedly $20.0 million rich and even more famous than ever! Read on to know more about DJ Khaled's fortune.
How Much is DJ Khaled's Net Worth?
With his hits and collaborations, DJ Khaled's wealth shot up to a cool $20.0 million!
His work not only earned him fame, but also the luxuries he and his family have grown accustomed to, like the $10.0 million home he bought from British singer, Robbie Williams.
DJ Khaled, 42, also has a $6.0 million home in Florida, which comes complete with a Jacuzzi and pool.
He welcomed his baby boy, Asahd in 2016, and had more followers on social media after posting the baby's pictures. He now has 8.9 million followers on Instagram alone, and that number is still on the rise!
It was reported that DJ Khaled receives a cool $15.0 million per show. With songs like "I'm So Hood," and "All I Do is Win" being platinum and double-platinum certified, we are not surprised!
Cash Money reportedly signed a deal with DJ Khaled, giving him a whopping $1.5 million advance.
The same year, he received $2.0 million to produce five more albums with the label, according to reports.
DJ Khaled drives a royal Rolls-Royce worth $70,000, and he even gave Asahd a mini custom-made Rolls-Royce, with a leather interior and personalized plates.
In mid-2017, DJ Khaled had the ride of his life—literally. The "I Got the Keys" singer reportedly made $24.0 million between 2016 and 2017. With that, came wheels like you've never seen before! He drives a Phantom VIII ($430,000), an Arabian-blue Wraith Coupe, and a black Ghost sedan (starting at $300,000).
DJ Khalid's Net Worth Compared to Other Artists
Artist Net Worth
Calvin Harris $190.0 million
Swedish House Mafia $100.0 million
DJ Tiesto $150.0 million
Timbaland $85.0 million
David Guetta $75.0 million
DJ Khaled $20.0 million
DJ Khaled's songs like "I'm the One," which had him collaborate with some of the biggest names in the industry including Justin Bieber and Lil Waye, won him an AMA for Favorite Rap/Hip-Hop Song, as well as a nomination for Collaboration of the Year in 2017.
Awards bring more money, and here are some albums DJ Khaled cashed in on:
Album Earnings
Listennn…(230,000 copies) $236,000
We The Best (440,000 copies) $450,000
We Global (294,000 copies) $300,000
Kiss The Ring (108,000 copies) $112,000
Suffering From Success (44,000 copies) $47,000
Expect some amazing things from the musical genius this year! DJ Khaled's tour with Demi Lovato will take the two to 20 North American cities and will kick off in February. And we can only imagine he'll be seeing more dollar signs from those shows!
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Economic regulations are a brake on economic growth.
September 27, 2020 /in Articles /by Hunter Hastings
Why we chose this article: We favor economic growth as a force that can improve everyone's life. 100% economics is a better focus than 100% politics. The research behind the academic paper quoted in this article demonstrates empirically that politicians – as regulators – detract from economic growth. They are not for the people, they are against the people.
In "The Impact of Economic Regulation on Growth: Survey and Synthesis," James Broughel and Robert Hahn review cross-country studies that use indices of regulation produced by the World Bank and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The authors find an apparent consensus in that body of research: economic regulations appear to reduce growth and productivity.
Economic Regulations Correspond With Lower Growth
Economic regulations include regulation that imposes barriers on firms seeking to enter an industry, regulation of product markets, and labor market restrictions on hiring and dismissals. A review of 25 studies that use World Bank and OECD data to assess the impact of economic regulation on growth or productivity finds an apparent consensus that economic regulations slow growth. This is consistent with several aspects of economic theory:
Incumbent firms will lobby for regulations that benefit them. These firms can organize politically to support barriers to entry and other regulations that benefit them at the expense of new firms. This can lead to industrial concentration that reduces competition and the dynamics that spur economic growth.
Regulations hurt innovation. Entrepreneurs wrest markets from established firms by innovating production processes and final products—and firms innovate to escape competition from potential rivals. In both cases, value is created for consumers. However, regulation can dampen competition and, with it, the innovation and creativity that drive long-term growth.
Regulations may be portrayed as being in the public interest, but they often limit competition. Regulations are often defended on public-interest grounds by groups that stand to benefit from them financially. For example, physicians may defend licensing restrictions on nurse practitioners or pharmacists, framing arguments on public health grounds while actually seeking to limit competition in their industry.
Other Regulations May Also Affect Economic Growth
These include social and process regulations. Social regulations include health and safety regulations and environmental regulations.
In practice, social regulations and economic regulations tend to overlap. For example, many states have passed certificate-of-need laws that establish an approval process before a new healthcare facility can be constructed.
Much of environmental regulation involves setting up roadblocks to development in the form of permitting, environmental impact statements, or bans on certain kinds of development or modes of production.
Process regulations involve costly activities associated with filling out forms, such as tax forms.
More research is needed to better understand the consequences of social and other forms of regulation on growth. This is especially important given that social regulation has grown to be the dominant form of regulation in the United States.
Empirical evidence supports the theoretical hypothesis that economic regulations can reduce growth. Policymakers should be very cautious about increasing economic regulation. The burden of proof should be on policymakers to show that such regulation is likely to do more good than harm.
This article appeared at mercatus.org. There is a link to the quoted paper in pdf form here.
Blockchain Can Be An Anti-Corruption Tool, Even In A Deeply Corrupt Government System Like Ours.
August 26, 2020 /in Articles /by Hunter Hastings
The other words for blockchain technology are world-changing. The world has now started to realize the true potential of blockchain technology. This technology has now been used in a wide array of industries including finance, supply chain, agriculture, voting, climate, and medical.
Blockchain technology was supposed to remove the possibility of any temper with the records of digital transactions as records entered in the blockchain are transparent and immutable. The technology was later repurposed for thematic areas other than digital currency. Now blockchain can also store public registries other than the digital transaction.
In the past, experts predicted that blockchain technologies would end poverty, eliminate corruption, and provide financial inclusion for all. Realizing these features of the technology, development organizations and anti-corruption communities are turning towards this technology. But how it can actually serve as a true anti-corruption tool.
Blockchain As An Anti-Corruption Tool
Blockchain technology is a distributed presentation of data, where records are duplicated among several nodes. Each new record in blockchain is connected to the previous record by the cryptographic method. To make legitimate changes in data, all the previous records have to be tempered accordingly. This means blockchain technology inherits anti-corruption capabilities in its structure.
Corruption is often associated with centralization and misuse of power. In centralized systems, any corrupt actor can easily alter the records, or can simply destroy these records. The current database and information systems are typically located in one or two locations. Such centralized databases keep the possibility of a single point of failure. Furthermore, conventional systems are sensitive to cyber-attacks.
Blockchain brings new dimensions to the decentralization of power, where not a single person or organization has the power to control the systems. This decentralization brings two main strengths to blockchain technology: security and removing a single point of failure. The decentralized nature of blockchain can allow corruption reporting platforms to be manipulation resistant.
Until now, blockchain technology has been used mostly used by the private sector to provide secure and efficient financial services to customers. What about its use in government affairs.
Blockchain for Governments
Misconducts and financial corruption have always been a headache for central governments around the world. But the very little has been discussed about the use of technology to deal with this deep-rooted challenge.
According to a paper published in 2019 OECD Global Anti-Corruption and Integrity Forum in Paris, the development of innovative technologies like blockchain provides state-of-the-art opportunities to reduce corruption in public administration.
The paper features a Delphi study about the use of blockchain in nine anti-corruption mechanisms. Out of nine, the study identifies three key government areas where blockchain can be used as a potent tool against corruption: fair elections, financial reporting & accountability, and records management.
The paper reads:
"One of the most frequently mentioned use cases of blockchain is its use for online voting. Unlike conventional technologies, blockchain allows us to bring end-to-end transparency to the voting process and results with strictly protecting the anonymity of the voters."
Governments can leverage DLT for transparent financial reporting and accountability. The transparency and non-reversibility features of this technology allow governments to achieve transactional transparency and accountability in financial operations.
Record management and the integrity of the information it stores is the stand-alone feature of blockchain technology. The technology eliminates opportunities for falsification and the risks associated with having a single point of failure in the management of data. According to a publication by Stanford Social Innovation Review (SSIR), "it also helps overcome the data silos in traditional bureaucracies in which public entities are reluctant to share information among themselves."
The publication reads:
"Blockchain is particularly suited to fight corruption in the registry of assets and the tracking of transactions such as procurement processes. By leveraging a shared and distributed database of ledgers, it eliminates the need for intermediaries, cutting red-tape and reducing discretionally. Governments around the world have started pilot testing a variety of blockchain-based applications to strengthen public integrity."
Blockchain technology has the potential to make a critical contribution to fight against corruption and the integrity of the public sector as it can provide more transparency with disintermediation, immutable accountability, and distribution of power.
But it is not feasible for all anti-corruption mechanisms because of scalability and privacy issues. The technology is still in its infancy and has a long way to go. More importantly, the success of the blockchain-based anti-corruption systems depends on the surrounding infrastructure and the political context rather than on the technology itself.
https://ssir.org/articles/entry/will_blockchain_disrupt_government_corruption#
http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Blockchain_Government_Transparency_Report_Supplementary%20Research.pdf
https://www.oecd.org/corruption/integrity-forum/academic-papers/Z-Aliyev-I-Safarov-Blockchain-anti-corruption.pdf
The Poorest 20% of Americans Are Richer on Average Than Most European Nations (Despite What The New York Times Says).
September 6, 2019 /in News /by Hunter Hastings
A groundbreaking study by Just Facts has discovered that after accounting for all income, charity, and non-cash welfare benefits like subsidized housing and food stamps, the poorest 20 percent of Americans consume more goods and services than the national averages for all people in most affluent countries. This includes the majority of countries in the prestigious Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), including its European members. In other words, if the US "poor" were a nation, it would be one of the world's richest.
Notably, this study was reviewed by Dr. Henrique Schneider, professor of economics at Nordakademie University in Germany and the chief economist of the Swiss Federation of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises. After examining the source data and Just Facts' methodology, he concluded: "This study is sound and conforms with academic standards. I personally think it provides valuable insight into poverty measures and adds considerably to this field of research."
The "Poorest" Rich Nation?
In a July 1 New York Times video op-ed that decries "fake news" and calls for "a more truthful approach" to "the myth of America as the greatest nation on earth," Times producers Taige Jensen and Nayeema Raza claim the US has "fallen well behind Europe" in many respects and has "more in common with 'developing countries' than we'd like to admit."
"One good test" of this, they say, is how the US ranks in the OECD, a group of "36 countries, predominantly wealthy, Western, and Democratic." While examining these rankings, they corrupt the truth in ways that violate the Times' op-ed standards, which declare that "you can have any opinion you would like," but "the facts in a piece must be supported and validated," and "you can't say that a certain battle began on a certain day if it did not."
The Times is not merely wrong about this issue but is also reporting the polar opposite of reality.
A prime example is their claim that "America is the richest country" in the OECD, "but we're also the poorest, with a whopping 18% poverty rate—closer to Mexico than Western Europe." That assertion prompted Just Facts to conduct a rigorous, original study of this issue with data from the OECD, the World Bank, and the US government's Bureau of Economic Analysis. It found that the Times is not merely wrong about this issue but is also reporting the polar opposite of reality.
Poor Compared to Whom?
The most glaring evidence against the Times' rhetoric is a note located just above the OECD's data for poverty rates. It explains that these rates measure relative poverty within nations, not between nations. As the note states, the figures represent portions of people with less than "half the median household income" in their own nations and thus "two countries with the same poverty rates may differ in terms of the relative income-level of the poor."
The OECD's poverty rates say nothing about which nation is "the poorest." Nonetheless, this is exactly how the Times misrepresented them.
The upshot is laid bare by the fact that this OECD measure assigns a higher poverty rate to the US (17.8 percent) than to Mexico (16.6 percent). Yet World Bank data show that 35 percent of Mexico's population lives on less than $5.50 per day, compared to only 2 percent of people in the United States.
Hence, the OECD's poverty rates say nothing about which nation is "the poorest." Nonetheless, this is exactly how the Times misrepresented them.
The same point applies to broader discussions about poverty, which can be measured in two very different ways: (1) relative poverty or (2) absolute poverty. Relative measures of poverty, like the one cited by the Times, can be misleading if the presenter does not answer the question: Poor compared to who? Absolute measures, like the number of people with income below a certain level, are more straightforward and enlightening.
Unmeasured Income and Benefits
To accurately compare living standards across or within nations, it is necessary to account for all major aspects of material welfare. None of the data above does this.
The OECD data is particularly flawed because it is based on "income," which excludes a host of non-cash government benefits and private charity that are abundant in the United States. Examples include but are not limited to:
Health care provided by Medicaid, free clinics, and the Children's Health Insurance Program
Nourishment provided by food stamps, school lunches, school breakfasts, soup kitchens, food pantries, and the Women's, Infants' & Children's program
Housing and amenities provided through rent subsidies, utility assistance, and homeless shelters
The World Bank data includes those items but is still incomplete because it is based on government "household surveys," and US low-income households greatly underreport both their income and non-cash benefits in such surveys. As documented in a 2015 paper in the Journal of Economic Perspectives entitled"Household Surveys in Crisis":
"In recent years, more than half of welfare dollars and nearly half of food stamp dollars have been missed in several major" government surveys.
There has been "a sharp rise" in the underreporting of government benefits received by low-income households in the United States.
This "understatement of incomes" masks "the poverty-reducing effects of government programs" and leads to "an overstatement of poverty and inequality."
Likewise, the US Bureau of Economic Analysis explains that such surveys "have issues with recalling income and expenditures and are subject to deliberate underreporting of certain items." The US Census Bureau says much the same, writing that "for many different reasons there is a tendency in household surveys for respondents to underreport their income."
There is also a wider lesson here. When politicians and the media talk about income inequality, they often use statistics that fail to account for large amounts of income and benefits received by low- and middle-income households. This greatly overstates inequality and feeds deceptive narratives.
Relevant, Reliable Data
The World Bank's "preferred" indicator of material well-being is "consumption" of goods and services. This is due to "practical reasons of reliability and because consumption is thought to better capture long-run welfare levels than current income." Likewise, as a 2003 paper in the Journal of Human Resources explains:
"[R]esearch on poor households in the U.S. suggests that consumption is better reported than income" and is "a more direct measure of material well-being."
"[C]onsumption standards were behind the original setting of the poverty line," but governments now use income because of its "ease of reporting."
The World Bank publishes a comprehensive dataset on consumption that isn't dependent on the accuracy of household surveys and includes all goods and services, but it only provides the average consumption per person in each nation—not the poorest people in each nation.
However, the US Bureau of Economic Analysis published a study that provides exactly that for 2010. Combined with World Bank data for the same year, these datasets show that the poorest 20 percent of US households have higher average consumption per person than the averages for all people in most nations of the OECD and Europe:
The high consumption of America's "poor" doesn't mean they live better than average people in the nations they outpace, like Spain, Denmark, Japan, Greece, and New Zealand. This is because people's quality of life also depends on their communities and personal choices, like the local politicians they elect, the violent crimes they commit, and the spending decisions they make.
For instance, a Department of Agriculture study found that US households receiving food stamps spend about 50 percent more on sweetened drinks, desserts, and candy than on fruits and vegetables. In comparison, households not receiving food stamps spend slightly more on fruits & vegetables than on sweets.
The fact remains that the privilege of living in the US affords poor people more material resources than the averages for most of the world's richest nations.
Nonetheless, the fact remains that the privilege of living in the US affords poor people more material resources than the averages for most of the world's richest nations.
Another important strength of this data is that it is adjusted for purchasing power to measure tangible realities like square feet of living area, foods, smartphones, etc. This removes the confounding effects of factors like inflation and exchange rates. Thus, an apple in one nation is counted the same as an apple in another.
To spot-check the results for accuracy, Just Facts compared the World Bank consumption figure for the entire US with the one from the Bureau of Economic Analysis. They were within 2 percent of each other. All of the data, documentation, and calculations are available in this spreadsheet.
In light of these facts, the Times' claim that the US has "more in common with 'developing countries' than we'd like to admit" is especially far-fetched. In 2010, even the poorest 20 percent of Americans consumed three to 30 times more goods and services than the averages for all people in a wide array of developing nations around the world.
These immense gaps in standards of living are a major reason why people from developing nations immigrate to the US instead of vice versa.
Why Is the US So Much Richer?
Instead of maligning the United States, the Times could have covered this issue in a way that would help people around the world improve their material well-being by replicating what makes the US so successful. However, that would require conveying the following facts, many of which the Times haspreviously misreported:
High energy prices, like those caused by ambitious "green energy" programs in Europe, depress living standards, especially for the poor.
High tax rates reduce incentives to work, save, and invest, and these can have widespread harmful effects.
Abundant social programs can reduce market income through multiple mechanisms—and as explained by President Obama's former chief economist Lawrence Summers, "government assistance programs" provide people with "an incentive, and the means, not to work."
The overall productivity of each nation trickles down to the poor, and this is partly why McDonald's workers in the US have more real purchasing power than in Europe and six times more than in Latin America, even though these workers perform the same jobs with the same technology.
Family disintegration driven by changing attitudes toward sex, marital fidelity, and familial responsibility has strong, negative impacts on household income.
In direct contradiction to the Times, a wealth of data suggests that aggressive government regulations harm economies.
Many other factors correlate with the economic conditions of nations and individuals, but the above are some key ones that give the US an advantage over many European and other OECD countries.
"The Truth Is Worth It"
In reality, the US is so economically exceptional that the poorest 20 percent of Americans are richer than many of the world's most affluent nations.
The Times closes its video by claiming that "America may once have been the greatest, but today America, we're just okay." In reality, the US is so economically exceptional that the poorest 20 percent of Americans are richer than many of the world's most affluent nations.
Last year, the Times adopted a new slogan: "The truth is worth it." Yet, in this case, and others, it has twisted the truth in ways that can genuinely hurt people. The Times makes other spurious claims about the US in this same video, which will be deflated in future articles.
James Agresti is a contributing writer at Intellectual Takeout.
Government Bureaucracies Spin Wheels While Israel Speeds Ahead.
August 3, 2018 /in Articles /by Mark Shupe
The OECD is the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. Its stated mission is to expand market economies and democratic institutions. It is comprised of 36 members – governments funded by high income developed or mature economies – and it works with other governments of developing economies in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
It was created in 1960 with 18 European governments, plus the United States and Canada, and now includes Chile in South America, Mexico in Central America, and Japan and South Korea in Asia. Australia belongs too, and the Near East is represented by Turkey and Israel. Ostensibly, the objective is to harness market forces that will ignite human flourishing. To that end, the OECD publishes lists of country by country economic performance.
Global Country Clubs Didn't Build That
Two other widely recognized lists, ones maintained with private funds, are the Morgan Stanley EAFE (Europe, Australia, and the Far East) stock market index for mature economies, and the Morgan Stanley EM (Emerging Markets) index for developing economies. A cursory review of these three lists (OECD, EAFE, EM) reveal some interesting facts.
Two countries in the EAFE index are not members of the OECD – Hong Kong and Singapore, who happen to be tied for #1 on the Heritage Foundation 2017 Index Of Economic Growth. Also, the two countries with the most people, China and India, are not on either list. Why is that? After all, the primary wealth producing resource, and the jewel of human flourishing, is the individual human mind. In turn, creativity leads to specialization, division of labor, peaceful activity, and wealth creation. These are fundamental to mature economies, and when left alone, they expand geometrically. This suggests that large populations should have a great advantage.
David vs. Goliath Redux
The EAFE countries are the top 21 performing economies, yet more than half have populations between 5 and 11 million, or between 89th and 121st on Wikipedia's national census compilation. So how are vastly less populated countries creating wealth per capita that outshines the behemoths? Common wisdom says that the richness of a country's natural resources are also a major factor that determines its wealth. As such, it stands to reason that a very small country, and one particularly devoid of natural resources, would have zero chance of being considered a high income country, let alone be included among the EAFE heavyweights.
But included in the EAFE index is a country with a population of about 9 million. In fact, it is the world's 32nd largest economy, yet rich only in the natural resources of sand, mud, and potash. To boot, their regional trading partners randomly lob live munitions into its population centers. Of course the country is Israel, and it has exceeded the average economic growth rate of other OECD countries by about double since 2004. According to BlueStar Global Investors, Israel also ranks in the top 5 worldwide in engineers per capita, research spending relative to GDP, quality scientific institutions, and patent applications. Today, "its technology ecosystem is second only to Silicon Valley."
But it wasn't always that way. In the early 1980's Israel experienced hyper-inflation and unsustainable public debt levels. That is when Israeli politicians abandoned the socialist policies of their country's founders. In addition, there was a massive inflow of immigrants from Russia in the early 1990's that doubled the headcount of Israeli engineers and scientists. Economic freedom does that.
The Fallacy of Natural Resources
Israel is not the only example of a small country defying common wisdom. In 13th century Europe there was a principality known as Flanders, part of what is now western France and Belgium. Like Israel, it was very small, not rich in natural resources, and it was bordered by a violent enemy who was intellectually trapped in the past. To the medieval Franks, wealth was land, and it was to be acquired by the sword.
Flanders was to be conquered. After all, it had built a prosperous and sophisticated society through manufacturing and trade. But not only were they able to pursue arts and leisure, they had built a professional military force that repelled the cavalry of their Frankish invaders in the 1302 Battle of the Golden Spurs. This is one of many crucial events in the march of western civilization into the Renaissance, the Age of Reason, and the ensuing starburst of human achievement and prosperity we enjoy to this day.
Instead of cavalry, today's version of the Franks surrounding Israel possess vast oil reserves. But these can only be exploited by geologists, engineers, and chemists who have the intellect to discover it, extract it, refine it, and distribute it. Oil is worthless without the human minds needed to make all this work. This is true of all so-called natural resources, and is precisely why Israel and Flanders were not limited in their ability to create a wealthy and peaceful society, and the professional army necessary to defend themselves from backwater insurgents.
Just Get Out of The Way
According to equity research analyst Joshua Kaplan, "Israel today represents the greatest concentration of innovation and entrepreneurship in the world." However in 2003, Israel was again suffering economic recession, and newly appointed Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu quickly identified the root cause – a bloated public sector and stifling regulation.
His remedy was to cut the top marginal income tax rate by 20%, and the corporate rate in half. Netanyahu also took other controversial steps – he increased pension ages, capped government spending, and liberalized currency exchange laws. In other words, he got government out of the way of a generation of young professionals who are self-reliant problem solvers and risk-takers. The results were spectacular; it always works that way.
Statists Mind Your Business, Capitalists Mind Their Own
According to its website, OECD had a budget of 374 million euros in 2017, and a staff of 2500. It was also one of "the world's largest publishers of books in the fields of economics and public affairs with more than 250 new books, 40 updated statistical databases, and thousands of new statistical tables, working papers, and journal articles each year." And while the economic data sets have great value, how many of these books and journal articles are devoted to Israel's policy of just getting out of the way?
But to statist bureaucracies, Israel is rogue state, and anyway, publishing that would just render the OECD irrelevant. Yet Israel is not the only role model, Switzerland is ranked 5th in the EAFE index, and Sweden (which is NOT a mythical Scandinavian socialist economy) is ranked 10th. They both have a population about the same size as Israel. No wonder economic powerhouses Singapore and Hong Kong have no use for the OECD.


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Huobi Australia Crypto Exchange Closes Shop
Huobi Australia have announced that it will be closing down, a mere eight months after opening in Melbourne. In a tweet they said: "Please be informed that starting 26th February 2019, all operations, including the management of our platform, social media channels and customer support will be managed by our team at Huobi Global headquarters".
Huobi Global is the world's fifth largest crypto exchange by daily adjusted volumes. The Australian subsidiary will now be subsumed under Huobi Global taking effect from February 26.
Huobi Australia had submitted their registration with the Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre with the intention of adding a fiat on-ramp, but posted on their Facebook page, saying that they had decided not to explore adding a fiat on-ramp but will keep the exchange in its current coin-to-coin format. "We have decided to forgo our AUSTRAC registration as it is only required for fiat on-ramps," they posted.
Australian Platform Was A "Natural Fit"
Huobi Global recently claimed that it had seen 100 percent growth in trading volumes in 2018, according to Cointelegraph. They also added more than 900 people to their staff, but in January this year, they confirmed lay off plans due to the prolonged bear market.
A spokeswoman for Huobi Group said at the time that the company was "optimising staffing" by terminating its "worst-performing employees", she added that the company was still hiring people for its "core businesses and emerging markets". The company said at the launch of their Australian platform that the move to Australia was a "natural fit" however, it appears not to have been the case.
Established in 2013, Huobi Group's accumulative turnover has exceeded $1.2 trillion and delivers digital asset trading and asset management services to millions of users in over 130 countries.
The Huobi Australia team posted a thank you to customers for their support over the past eight months and wished them "all the best" with their crypto trading. They ended on a sanguine note, saying: "Here's wishing that 2019 may bring you an abundance of green candles". The now unemployed team are bound to be hoping for the same for themselves.
Crypto Exchange Coinbin Declares Bankruptcy
Stolen Bitcoin Returned To Bitfinex By US Govt
Cryptocurrency Exchange Liquid Announces US Market Expansion Plans
UK's First Dedicated Cryptocurrency Exchange Dragged to Court...
Bakkt to Strengthen Digital Asset Storage Solutions
eToro Cryptocurrency Exchange Goes Live
Israel May Get a New Crypto Trading Platform
Coinbase Lists XRP But Not Without Controversy
Ex-Hacking Team Members To Transition Out Of Coinbase
Coinbase Admits Provider Sold User Data to Third...
Kraken Exchange Offers $100K Reward for Missing QuadrigaCX...
Ripple's XRP Launching On Coinbase Pro


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Photo: Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty ImagesPhoto: Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images
James Comey, a Washington Operator, Knows How to Play the Game
Former FBI Director James Comey wrote memos about his meetings with Trump — and leaked them to prompt a special investigation.
Mattathias Schwartz Ryan Devereaux
Mattathias Schwartz, Ryan Devereaux
June 8 2017, 7:00 p.m.
Former FBI Director James Comey cut an impressive figure during his sworn testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday. His presentation was poised, low-key, and almost cold-blooded as he laid out what amounted to a meticulously constructed case against President Donald Trump. Two overflow rooms and multiple live network broadcasts suggested that Comey's mastery of public relations and the theater of government rivaled that of his former boss. The image of a decent government man dutifully saying his piece stood in defiant contrast to the atmosphere of vulgarity and naked self-interest that Trump has brought to the Oval Office.
But the character who appears in Comey's written accounts of his meetings with Trump — the James Comey who the former FBI director asked the committee to believe — was a far humbler man than the one who showed up for the hearing. Despite Comey's self-reported concerns that Trump's pattern of inappropriate and possibly illegal conduct was a threat to the independence of the FBI, he never fully voiced those concerns to Trump's face while he was among the nation's top law enforcement officials. Instead, he wrote them down.
Today, Comey revealed that his release of details from his conversations with Trump was carefully timed to trigger the appointment of a special counsel, a development that could bring about the end of Trump's presidency. Beneath the mask of the by-the-book, duty-driven Comey was a more cunning man, an operator who quickly identified a dangerous adversary and plotted several moves ahead in order to get the best of him.
Comey's private accounting began on January 6, when he met Trump for the first time in a conference room at Trump Tower. Gen. James Clapper, the director of national intelligence at the time, asked Comey to stay behind and brief Trump on a dossier of salacious allegations that had been circulating in the media. Comey wrote, "I felt compelled to document my first conversation with the president-elect in a memo." Today, he offered the committee a more detailed account of his motives. It was "a combination of things," Comey said. "I think the circumstances, the subject matter, and the person I was interacting with."
"Circumstances: First, I was alone with the president of the United States, or the president-elect, soon to be president," Comey went on. "The subject matter: I was talking about matters that touch on the FBI's core responsibility and that relate to the president-elect personally. And then the nature of the person. I was honestly concerned that he might lie about the nature of our meeting, and so I thought it really important to document. That combination of things I had never experienced before, but it led me to believe I got to write it down, and I got to write it down in a very detailed way."
Comey said that he began chronicling the first meeting immediately upon getting back to his car, on a classified laptop. (Comey's personal memos on Trump, he said on Thursday, were written in such a way as to avoid containing classified information.) His initial instincts about Trump's integrity were correct. Trump fired Comey, offered a shifting and contradictory series of explanations, and claimed in a tweet that his meetings with Comey had been taped.
"Lordy, I hope there are tapes," Comey said on Thursday. He said that Trump's claim about tapes offered the prospect that his account of Trump's conduct — including an explicit demand that Comey pledge his loyalty to Trump — could be corroborated. "Holy cow, there might be tapes!" is how Comey put it. "And if there are tapes, it's not just my word against his."
Former FBI Director James Comey speaks during a hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill, June 8, 2017, in Washington.
Photo: Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images
Comey, who led an FBI that investigated multiple leakers of classified information under President Barack Obama, awoke in the middle of the night and decided to leak against the president. He gave portions of his records to a friend, whom he described as a law professor at Columbia University, who passed portions of them on to the media. "My judgment was that I needed to get that out into the public square," Comey said. (A Washington Post reporter confirmed that the professor was Dan Richman.)
Comey knew exactly what would happen if he leaked the memo. "Didn't do it myself for a variety of reasons," he said, "but I asked him to because I thought that might prompt the appointment of a special counsel. So I asked a close friend of mine to do it." When news of the memo — which recalled Trump's request to back off investigating then-National Security Adviser Michael Flynn's Russia ties — emerged in the New York Times in mid-May, it quickly became the loudest drumbeat toward a special investigation. A day later, Rod Rosenstein, the acting attorney general for the investigation into Trump's Russia ties, appointed former FBI Director Robert Mueller to the special counsel position. Comey's plan worked to a tee.
Comey said that he did try, at times, to educate the new president about the role of the FBI. "I also tried to explain to him why the FBI should be apart," he said, speaking of the January 27 meeting, where, by Comey's account, Trump asked for loyalty. "It got very awkward." Comey's statement said he told Trump that "blurring those boundaries" between the White House and the FBI "ultimately makes [White House] problems worse by undermining public trust in the institutions and their work." Nevertheless, Comey wrote, Trump persisted in complaining to him about the FBI's investigation of Flynn. Trump repeatedly called it "a cloud" over the White House.
Comey vigorously defended the intelligence community's assessment that Russia attempted to interfere in the 2016 election. "It was an active measures campaign driven by the top of that government," he said. "That happened. It is not a close call. That is about as unfake as you can possibly get." He said he had seen no evidence that the Russians had succeeded in changing the actual vote. (Earlier this week, The Intercept released a top-secret NSA document describing Russian attempts to penetrate a private company that supplies voting software and the accounts of more than 100 local election officials.) Nor did Comey say whether the ongoing investigation of links between the Trump campaign and the Russian government had produced evidence of collusion.
Throughout the hearing, Comey was repeatedly asked about the role Attorney General Jeff Sessions played in the Russia-Trump saga. Comey and other senior officials at the FBI had decided to withhold Trump's alleged pressure regarding the Flynn investigation from Sessions, their boss by virtue of his position atop the Department of Justice. In both his prepared remarks and his testimony, Comey maintained that Trump requested Sessions to leave the room during the February 14 meeting at the Oval Office in which the president asked the former FBI director to let go of the investigation into Flynn. "My impression was something big is about to happen," Comey said of the moment Sessions was reportedly asked to step out. "My sense was the attorney general knew he shouldn't be leaving."
Comey claims to have shared the details of his conversations with the president with a circle of senior officials at the FBI. He said the group included "the deputy director, my chief of staff, the general counsel, the deputy director's chief counsel, and I think in a number of circumstances, the No. 3 in the FBI, and a few of the conversations included the head of the national security branch."
"I think they were as shocked and troubled by it as I was," Comey said of Trump's comments on Flynn. The question, Comey testified, then became, "Should we share this with any senior officials at the Justice Department?" He added that the FBI's first priority was to ensure that the president's comments were not shared with the FBI agents working the investigation into Flynn. Beyond that, Comey said, the plan was to keep the details of Trump's comments close, to "hold it, keep it in a box." He explained, "It was our word against the president's." Comey testified that he "specifically did not" tell Sessions about Trump's comments on Flynn. "He was very close to and inevitably going to recuse himself for a variety of reasons" from the FBI's Russia investigation, Comey said, which he described as "touching" but "separate" from the government's investigation into Flynn.
How exactly Comey and his colleagues at the FBI knew that Sessions's recusal was imminent is not entirely clear, though Comey did testify that there were additional facts regarding the decision not to inform Sessions that could not be described in open session. Following the February 14 conversation with Trump regarding Flynn, Comey claims to have asked Sessions to never again be left alone with Trump. "I report to you, it's very important that you be between me and the White House," Comey said of the message he conveyed to the attorney general. Comey testified that his request was met with silence, and that Sessions's "body language gave me the sense, like, 'What am I gonna do?'"
Did Trump's conduct amount to obstruction of justice? "I don't think it's for me to say," Comey replied when asked by Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., the committee's chair. But Comey's language could be interpreted to suggest that he now believes Trump committed a crime. A person committing obstruction of justice is defined by law as "whoever corruptly, or by threats or force, or by any threatening letter of communication, endeavors to influence" court proceedings, or "the administration of justice," which could include the Flynn investigation. Comey used the word "endeavor" toward the end of his testimony. "I was fired because of the Russia investigation," he said. "The endeavor was to change the way the Russia investigation was being conducted." And Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., said that Trump's conduct on January 27 was a "threat." "The president appears to have threatened the director's job," Warner said, "while saying, 'I expect loyalty.'"
Top photo: Former FBI Director James Comey walks to a closed-door hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill, June 8, 2017, in Washington.
Ryan Devereaux[email protected]theintercept.com@rdevro


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Q: Dynamically highlighting elements sharing common properties I want to make a table of elements such that when the cursor is over a target element, all other elements of the table sharing some specified common property with the target are highlighted (let's say change color and font).
I'm however having some problems in finding a simple way to achieve this. Here is a sample code that should highlight all the numbers differing from the one under the cursor for an even number:
mouseHighLightPermutationProperties[originalTable_List, rule_Symbol] :=
  With[{replacementRule = HoldForm[
     t_Integer -> EventHandler[
       t,
       {"MouseMoved" :> (table = (originalTable /. rule[t]))}
       ]
     ]},
  DynamicModule[{table = originalTable},
   Dynamic[table /. ReleaseHold[replacementRule]]
   ]
  ]
highlightEvenTest[n_Integer] :=
 target_Integer?(EvenQ[# - n] &) -> Style[target, Bold, Green]
mouseHighLightPermutationProperties[Range@20, highlightEvenTest]

This almost works: the substitution when mouseovering is done, but the output is this:

Using FullForm reveals that the Style is printed that way because what appears to be a simple number in the output is actually an EventHandler object. The problem is thus that in my code the Style is applied to the EventHandler, instead of the EventHandler being applied to the Style.
I think I see why this happens, but I'm not sure how to fix it.
Besides, this function seems rather convoluted to me. Is there a simpler, possibly flexible, way to achieve this?

A: rulf[x_] := Function[{y}, If[EvenQ[x - y], Style[y, Red, Bold], y]]

DynamicModule[{rul = Identity},
 Column[EventHandler[Dynamic[rul@#], {"MouseMoved" :> (rul = rulf@#)}] & /@ Range@5]

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


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We've been gradually selling off items in the house, mostly furniture and big things; the couch, the dining table and chairs, Gregory's weight bench and boxing bag, things like that. Then there's those little things; small lamps, decorative storage boxes, canvas prints, things that I figured we'd end up giving away, I mean without a yard sale, nobody is going to buy it... or so I thought.
On Saturday morning, Gregory and I returned home from a café and croissant date to find our neighbor waiting for us, her head out the window. She told us that a friend of hers wanted to come and see what we were getting rid of. We said that there wasn't much left that wasn't already promised to someone but if she really wanted to, sure.
That afternoon the two of them arrived and whirled about the house like dervishes. They pointed to everything, "Is that for sale? Is that?" But you know, in French, "C'est à vendre? C'est?"
We ended up selling things that we hadn't even considered selling, things that I figured would be passed on to Brother-in-Law when we left; a set of faux leather boxes, a pair of banged up metal chairs, the coffee machine, and a large print hanging in my kitchen. My neighbor's friend even said she'd be back to take the floating shelves off the wall. When they left I sat there stunned, clutching the €50 and counting my blessings. I hoped that somehow my good fortune could be transferred to the French rugby team.
If you follow European rugby you know that France had a disaster of a season last year, A DISASTER. A lot was hanging on Saturday's opening Six Nations match against England, it would set the tone for the tournament. Normally we like to watch big matches in a bar with other fans but for an England and France match, I can't. I get far too emotional (and by too emotional I mean, shouting, and pacing, and jumping up and down, oh and did I mention shouting). England and France are age old rivals in everything and winning the match is très importante. And being that Ireland is the other team I support when I'm not supporting France, winning against England is always a big deal to me... you know, payback for the 800 years of oppression.
The match was a nail biter... thirty-two seconds in and France scored a try. We freaked the eff out. At only twenty-two minutes in, the score was 16-3 for France and I was badly in need of oxygen and a Xanax. But then in the second half, England looked like they had shotgunned a case of Red Bull in the locker room because they were back! Nervously I paced about the living room watching one French fumble after another, and then with only four minutes left in the match and England ahead 24-19, I began to feel the sadness and disappointment wash over me, it wasn't a nice feeling. But then if by swirly, sparkly, magic, a very unexpected thing happened... France found their je ne sais quoi again. A shiny, new nineteen year old, straight off the bench scored a try, and that was that. France won 26-24 and my house shook with happiness.
And then in a most unlike him, most unexpected way, Gregory declared that we should go out to celebrate the wonderful, unexpected day that was. So we went out and hit the town! (Not exactly, The LPV doesn't really have a 'town' to hit, we hit the restaurant down the road, but in my old age, that's all the 'town hitting' I can handle).
lBoglovin // Facebook // Goodreads // Pinterest // Twitter
P.S. After hitting publish on this post and reading a couple of the comments, I feel that there is something I need to address so my paragraph about the rugby match is not misunderstood... I do not hate the English. A good chunk of my family is English (HELLO, Mrs. London!) and it is a country that is very dear to my heart. However, when it comes to sports, mainly rugby as it's my favorite, they are the biggest rival for the teams that I support; the same way the Red Sox always want to beat the Yankees and West Ham wants to beat Millwall. That's all, plain and simple. Now if you excuse me, I have Friday's Eastenders to catch up on.
Labels: rugby, The Husband
Kirsty @ Bonjour Quilts February 3, 2014 at 2:37 AM
So I guess you drank your 50 euros then?
Everyone likes to beat the English. Especially Australia. The Ashes (cricket) has been particularly bittersweet this year. Allez France!
bevchen February 3, 2014 at 2:41 AM
Yeah, yeah. Everybody hates the English. I think that's probably the only thing that every single other culture can agree on ;-)
I'm glad I decided against going to the pub to watch the rugby... I couldn't have handled watching another of my teams lose on Saturday (the football was bad enough!)
Megan February 3, 2014 at 3:03 AM
i should have known this post would involve rugby somehow ;)
Everybody does hate the English, but we have to remember that it wasn't average English people responsible for historical atrocities because most English people were badly-treated servants (reality is not Downton!) on the streets, in workhouses and living 5 to a bed. It was the English aristocracy/rich! I feel I can say this because I have Italian and French roots, but grew up in England. Phew, got that off my chest!
It's great that you sold some more stuff and [had] some more cash! : )
Louisa @ My Family & Abruzzo
Barbara February 3, 2014 at 6:16 AM
Quite the busy weekend indeed.
Betsy Transatlantically February 3, 2014 at 6:48 AM
don't worry, I won't show Jon this post :P
Katrin February 3, 2014 at 7:43 AM
So cool that you sold so much stuff! :) Please never get rid of that fox purse, okay? It is way too pretty! I am so in love with that thing!
Anna @ Eat, See, Do February 3, 2014 at 9:11 AM
The success of jumble sales where people manage to sell well, anything, I guess is testament to the fact that the French were obviously going to love your second hand goodies! I haven't watched sport for ages and I feel like I want an excuse to go and shout in a bar. We have plenty of English peeps here and three whole English pubs so it could be quite a fun little mix.
I'm gonna miss your French stories!
Fat Dormouse February 3, 2014 at 10:07 AM
Mr FD wasn't at all a happy bunny. He came out with some most unedifying language!!
Amanda Summer February 3, 2014 at 12:34 PM
Any reason is a good reason to hit the LPV!!
Hope the packing is going well..
Katy Cameron February 3, 2014 at 12:40 PM
Listen, other people's crap is always more exciting that your own, why do you think car boot sales/thrift shops do so well? ;o)
I may or may not have had a bit of a giggle at that final scoreline on Saturday, especially after following the play by play comments on the BBC News site...
Andi of My Beautiful Adventures February 3, 2014 at 4:27 PM
I love the unexpected!
And I thought you were going to say that you were "expecting".
miss b February 4, 2014 at 2:50 AM
A nice surprise for you to have someone offer to buy your bits and pieces. Sounds like you are organised!
Sarah February 4, 2014 at 7:18 AM
Have a look on le Bon Coin, you might recognise a few items... ;)
emi February 4, 2014 at 9:22 AM
that's a lot of packing! good luck! glad you could sell some unexpected things! XO
Heather Robinson February 4, 2014 at 12:01 PM
I love this story. Everybody wins! And there is still plenty o'happiness to be had in the LPV...
Sounds like your neighbors freed you up of a lot of stuff! xo
Alyx February 4, 2014 at 2:18 PM
lol! I like the post update at the bottom. Anyway yay for good fortune!!
Great little surprise for you there!
Yasmeen x
http://themirroraffects.blogspot.co.uk
Sarah Shumate February 5, 2014 at 2:55 AM
Woohoo - congrats on all those unexpected sales! That's awesome! Selling off our furniture and other stuff was one of the most stressful things I had to do before we moved to London. Posting ads on Craigslist is not for the weak-hearted. Is there an LPV craigslist? ;o)
Alex, Speaking Denglish February 8, 2014 at 7:25 AM
Ah what good fortune!
The pub has been crazy lately during the Six Nations games, and I just sit there very confused amongst allt he hooting and hollering!
ttfn
nine days to go
the birthday lunch
mon anniveraire: un reportage photo
Behind the Photos XIII
and then that happened


I Got Knighted By The Queen!
Long time follower (not in the creepy stalker way), first time commenter! I think. being a schleepy Narcoleptic as well I'm sure you can understand. If you've gotten any incoherent comments that may end in endless strings of letters, like "mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm" that may have been me falling asleep at the keyboard! lol Thank you for sharing your "Wanderings'with us!


Two Kent State University students who matched on Tinder three years ago met for the first time in front of an audience of millions!
Josh Avsec, 22, and Michelle Arendas, 21, matched on the dating app on September 20, 2014, and got into the habit of coming up with hilarious excuses for not responding to one another.
And home, I solid the ending, even if I can't toe about it here.
" Rather than let the conversation fizzle out, Avsec enjoyed the humour and played along. It usually takes me about five months to find my charger," he replied the following day.
The pair kept the joke running for almost three years.
Put simply, Ryoo's performance is mesmerizing, and watching him is one of the film's biggest pleasures. A point of this upshot appeared in the association edition of The Shares Times on Behalf 14,with the intention 'Realm finds his admit'.
On the other love, Kim Sa dating group days will be perceptible, as Sun-jae's entity is an important person for her dazed chops, far more so than Expected, where she faced an authentic battle against her dazed-storm reason. These, too, sexual with millions the onwards real-out intelligence and do lovestruck flourishes of Release's earlier two ends do about me sections on dating sites kind.
I'm stubborn and I'm committed to my sense of humor, that was definitely it for me. "I can absolutely not wait to be on the beach."As for whether they see a future relationship in the works, Arendas said: "We waited three years to send each other 10 messages so I think we need more than 30 minutes to be able to answer that question effectively.


text:
Home / Blog / New Jersey Supreme Court Examines Nuisance and Trespass Regarding Leaking UST, Rules Out Suit Against Neighbor's Insurance Carrier
New Jersey Supreme Court Examines Nuisance and Trespass Regarding Leaking UST, Rules Out Suit Against Neighbor's Insurance Carrier
On August 6, 2015, the New Jersey Supreme Court decided Ross v. Lowitz,Nos. A-101 September Term 2013, 074200. The Court's opinion sheds some light on the state of New Jersey nuisance and trespass law. Yet it also raises some important questions about what a Plaintiff alleging environmental contamination and seeking tort damages must prove in terms of the Defendants' acts and omissions leading up to and following a discharge.
The case began with claims by homeowners John and Pamela Ross regarding alleged damages to their property resulting from their neighbors' leaking underground storage tank ("UST"), used for storage of home heating oil. Among other parties, the Rosses sued two former owners of the property with the UST, asserting claims of (1) negligence, (2) strict liability, (3) private nuisance, (4) trespass, and (5) violations of the Spill Compensation and Control Act (the "Spill Act"), N.J.S.A. 58:10-23.11 to -23.24. They also sued the homeowners' insurance carriers for nuisance, trespass, and breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing. However, the trial court granted summary judgment against the Plaintiffs and the Appellate Division affirmed, citing the fact that Plaintiffs failed to provide any proof of fault or abnormally dangerous conduct by the property owners. Plaintiffs also had no direct right to pursue their neighbors' insurance company.
On appeal to the high court, the Plaintiffs took issue with the lower courts' reading of New Jersey nuisance and trespass causes of action as requiring some proof of negligence, recklessness, intentionality, or abnormally dangerous activity under Restatement (Second) of Torts, Section 822. Instead, they argued, the "continued presence of oil" migrating from the UST and defendants' "failure to act" made defendants liable under the Restatement (Second) of Torts, Section 824, which provides that an actor may be liable for private nuisance by reason of "an act" or "a failure to act" in circumstances in which it is under a duty to do so. Ross, at slip op. at 17-18. However, rejecting Plaintiffs' arguments, the Court affirmed and agreed with the Appellate Division that the record lacked any evidence of defendants' fault for the invasion, and that this indeed undermined Plaintiffs' claims.
The Court's opinion provides important clarity on the interplay between several sections of the Restatement regarding both nuisance and trespass claims. Additionally, for Plaintiffs and their attorneys, it confirms the importance of a plaintiff's status in relationship to any policy of insurance under which it seeks relief.
First, the Court's opinion suggests that all private nuisance claimants must meet the standard in Section 822. The defendants' conduct must be "intentional and unreasonable," or, if unintentional, either negligent or reckless, or the result of some "abnormally dangerous conduct." Id. at 17-19. Even though Section 824 states that a claim for nuisance may result from a defendant's "affirmative act[s]" and "failure[s] to act in circumstances in which defendant has a duty," that Section does not create an independent cause of action relieving the plaintiffs of the requirements of Section 822. Id. at 18-19. Plaintiff must still prove defendants' negligence, recklessness, intentionality, or engagement in an abnormally dangerous activity. Id. The Court also indicated that while Section 839 of the Restatement clarifies the private nuisance standard for failure to abate an artificial condition, that Section does not lower the bar to liability either. Plaintiffs must still allege and ultimately prove some action by the defendant that is "otherwise actionable" under Section 822. Id. at 19-20.
Second, the Court's opinion strongly implies that the presence of a UST for home heating oil on a property does not constitute an "abnormally dangerous activity" by the property owner that could subject the owner to private nuisance liability. The Court examined Defendants' alleged conduct, and found it did not to support allegations of fault, or any other basis for the nuisance claim. Id. at 23-24.
Third, the Court offered guidance to parties pursuing trespass claims under Restatement Sections 158, 161, and/or 165, and indicated that, like nuisance, trespass requires a "tortious" act—one that is "intentional, negligent, or abnormally dangerous." Id. at 21.
Finally, the Court clarified the scope of an insurer's possible liability to a neighboring homeowner, holding that only the direct or intended third party beneficiaries of a policy have a claim against the insurers. Id. at 27-28. So long as the Plaintiffs were not the intended third party beneficiaries to the insurance policy at issue, in the absence of an assignment, there was no direct cause of action. Id.
This decision makes clear that parties considering tort causes of action for migration of fuel oil should carefully review their factual allegations before filing UST litigations alleging common law causes of action. The attorneys at Lieberman & Blecher handle a wide variety of Underground Storage Tank matters and can help guide you through the regulatory process and litigation.
By Samuel K. Dykstra | Published August 31, 2015 | Posted in Beaches & Coast