Saturday, July 15, 2017
An Exhibit of Farmworkers
From the Fresno Bee -
A first at the California State Fair, an exhibit on farmworkers
BY ROBERT RODRIGUEZ
The California State Fair has long recognized the state as an agricultural powerhouse. Now, for the first time in its 164-year history, it is devoting an exhibit to the people who keep it running: farmworkers.
The state fair, which started Friday and runs through July 30, is hosting a special exhibition in the California Building focusing on the groups and people who “helped cultivate the food that feeds our state, country and world, sustaining what is today a $47 billion agriculture industry,” according to the state fair’s website.
Read more here: http://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article161429803.html#nws=mcnewsletter#storylink=cpy
A first at the California State Fair, an exhibit on farmworkers
BY ROBERT RODRIGUEZ
The California State Fair has long recognized the state as an agricultural powerhouse. Now, for the first time in its 164-year history, it is devoting an exhibit to the people who keep it running: farmworkers.
The state fair, which started Friday and runs through July 30, is hosting a special exhibition in the California Building focusing on the groups and people who “helped cultivate the food that feeds our state, country and world, sustaining what is today a $47 billion agriculture industry,” according to the state fair’s website.
Read more here: http://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article161429803.html#nws=mcnewsletter#storylink=cpy
Friday, July 14, 2017
A Really Smart Guy
A question from Quora -
If MIT "only admits people with a 4.0 unweighted gpa and 2300+ test scores", why doesn't everyone with a 4.0 get in and why do people with low GPAs get in?
Jelani Nelson, studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Answered Jun 29 · Upvoted by Sam Sinai, studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Students live in different environments, and different environments have different measurements of success and different levels of knowledge about how to play the college admissions game. Top schools I imagine recognize that top talent exists everywhere, in all communities, so then they try to figure out how to evaluate someone within the context of their environment. If a kid writes on their application that they aced a differential equations class in an elite high school that offers such a course, I’m sure that’s impressive, but if a kid aced (with maybe even a worse score?) such a course in Podunk, Iowa where no kid had even thought to take such a course at the local community college in the last 8 years, I’m sure that’s even more impressive, since it speaks to things like initiative, passion, etc., as opposed to a kid who merely inherited and executed a pre-defined strategy. Similarly, if one school pumps out more perfect SAT students than another, doesn’t that reflect more on the quality of the school’s SAT prep than the quality of an individual kid when compared with kids at some other school?
Where I’m from (St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands), no one I knew cared about their GPA. I didn’t even know what my GPA was, or what that term really meant, until senior year when a college application required me to enter it into a box, so I asked our school’s guidance counselor. I think I had a 3.8, which put my rank at 2nd (in a class of 30). No one cared, including myself. The SAT was similar — I showed up on the day of without ever having taken a practice exam. In my St. Thomian bubble, the big things people around me emphasized were contests like Quiz Bowl, Science Bowl, and Moot Court. I was also into classical piano. I wasn’t playing the college admissions game. I didn’t even know the game existed.
I then ended up applying to MIT (and only MIT) early action, despite not having heard of it until Fall senior year (I found it in some college ranking magazine). I never saw my recommendation letters, but I suspect they helped MIT understand the environment I grew up in, and they were able to then judge me based on that environment. I was admitted. I ended up double majoring in computer science and pure math at MIT, taking a grad course my junior year and 5 more senior year, losing a perfect GPA to an independent project course I blew off in my final semester of senior year. I stayed on for an MEng and PhD in computer science. I’m now a computer science professor and think I did OK.
In short, I don’t think the numbers you posted are all that important, and I suspect MIT and other top universities are right to take holistic approaches in evaluating college applications. Even ignoring issues of balancing racial/gender/other forms of diversity, a holistic approach just makes good sense even if all you’re trying to do is to identify top talent.
https://www.quora.com/profile/Jelani-Nelson
If MIT "only admits people with a 4.0 unweighted gpa and 2300+ test scores", why doesn't everyone with a 4.0 get in and why do people with low GPAs get in?
Jelani Nelson, studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology
 |
| Jelani Nelson |
Answered Jun 29 · Upvoted by Sam Sinai, studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Students live in different environments, and different environments have different measurements of success and different levels of knowledge about how to play the college admissions game. Top schools I imagine recognize that top talent exists everywhere, in all communities, so then they try to figure out how to evaluate someone within the context of their environment. If a kid writes on their application that they aced a differential equations class in an elite high school that offers such a course, I’m sure that’s impressive, but if a kid aced (with maybe even a worse score?) such a course in Podunk, Iowa where no kid had even thought to take such a course at the local community college in the last 8 years, I’m sure that’s even more impressive, since it speaks to things like initiative, passion, etc., as opposed to a kid who merely inherited and executed a pre-defined strategy. Similarly, if one school pumps out more perfect SAT students than another, doesn’t that reflect more on the quality of the school’s SAT prep than the quality of an individual kid when compared with kids at some other school?
Where I’m from (St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands), no one I knew cared about their GPA. I didn’t even know what my GPA was, or what that term really meant, until senior year when a college application required me to enter it into a box, so I asked our school’s guidance counselor. I think I had a 3.8, which put my rank at 2nd (in a class of 30). No one cared, including myself. The SAT was similar — I showed up on the day of without ever having taken a practice exam. In my St. Thomian bubble, the big things people around me emphasized were contests like Quiz Bowl, Science Bowl, and Moot Court. I was also into classical piano. I wasn’t playing the college admissions game. I didn’t even know the game existed.
I then ended up applying to MIT (and only MIT) early action, despite not having heard of it until Fall senior year (I found it in some college ranking magazine). I never saw my recommendation letters, but I suspect they helped MIT understand the environment I grew up in, and they were able to then judge me based on that environment. I was admitted. I ended up double majoring in computer science and pure math at MIT, taking a grad course my junior year and 5 more senior year, losing a perfect GPA to an independent project course I blew off in my final semester of senior year. I stayed on for an MEng and PhD in computer science. I’m now a computer science professor and think I did OK.
In short, I don’t think the numbers you posted are all that important, and I suspect MIT and other top universities are right to take holistic approaches in evaluating college applications. Even ignoring issues of balancing racial/gender/other forms of diversity, a holistic approach just makes good sense even if all you’re trying to do is to identify top talent.
https://www.quora.com/profile/Jelani-Nelson
Lance Canales & The Flood - Plane Wreck At Los Gatos (Deportee)
https://ww2.kqed.org/news/2017/07/14/immortalized-by-woody-guthrie-deportees-who-died-in-plane-crash-are-nameless-no-longer/
Florida's State Attorney Pulled Over
https://www.buzzfeed.com/buzzfeednewsvideo/floridas-state-attorney-pulled-over-by-police?utm_term=.bwZllwgx0#.wuOggkBOd
Thursday, July 13, 2017
Wednesday, July 12, 2017
Breaking All the Rules
An excerpt from the Atlantic -
Trump's Campaign Succeeded by Breaking All the Rules—and It’s Catching Up to Him Now
Recalling his victory over Hillary Clinton has been the president’s only solace for months, but his personnel and management decisions now threaten to topple his presidency.
By DAVID A. GRAHAM
Donald Trump’s campaign for president seemed to vacillate between, to borrow Hunter S. Thompson’s dichotomy, being too weird to live and too rare to die. All the smartest analysts were convinced that it was definitely too weird to live. Stocked with amateurs, retreads, and minor-league washouts suddenly promoted for a cup of coffee, and overseen by a candidate with a penchant for enormous gaffes. The Trump team was widely viewed as on the verge of collapse. The joke was on the wise analysts: The candidacy turned out to be too rare to die, and now Trump is president.
But with a few months’ extra perspective, and after several days of damaging revelations, it’s becoming clear that although Trump’s chaotic approach to the campaign did not prevent him from winning the White House, and may actually have provided him with a crucial edge, it is hobbling his presidency. The undisciplined, untutored atmosphere is on display in the meeting that Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, and Paul Manafort had with a woman they believed to be a Russian government lawyer offering opposition research on behalf of the Kremlin, and there may be more damaging revelations to come.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/07/the-campaign-comes-back-to-haunt-trump/533397/?utm_source=nl-atlantic-daily-071217
Trump's Campaign Succeeded by Breaking All the Rules—and It’s Catching Up to Him Now
Recalling his victory over Hillary Clinton has been the president’s only solace for months, but his personnel and management decisions now threaten to topple his presidency.
By DAVID A. GRAHAM
Donald Trump’s campaign for president seemed to vacillate between, to borrow Hunter S. Thompson’s dichotomy, being too weird to live and too rare to die. All the smartest analysts were convinced that it was definitely too weird to live. Stocked with amateurs, retreads, and minor-league washouts suddenly promoted for a cup of coffee, and overseen by a candidate with a penchant for enormous gaffes. The Trump team was widely viewed as on the verge of collapse. The joke was on the wise analysts: The candidacy turned out to be too rare to die, and now Trump is president.
But with a few months’ extra perspective, and after several days of damaging revelations, it’s becoming clear that although Trump’s chaotic approach to the campaign did not prevent him from winning the White House, and may actually have provided him with a crucial edge, it is hobbling his presidency. The undisciplined, untutored atmosphere is on display in the meeting that Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, and Paul Manafort had with a woman they believed to be a Russian government lawyer offering opposition research on behalf of the Kremlin, and there may be more damaging revelations to come.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/07/the-campaign-comes-back-to-haunt-trump/533397/?utm_source=nl-atlantic-daily-071217
Quote
From the New York Post Editorial -
We see one truly solid takeaway from the story of the day: Donald Trump Jr. is an idiot.
http://nypost.com/2017/07/11/donald-trump-jr-is-an-idiot/?ncid=APPLENEWS00001
We see one truly solid takeaway from the story of the day: Donald Trump Jr. is an idiot.
http://nypost.com/2017/07/11/donald-trump-jr-is-an-idiot/?ncid=APPLENEWS00001
Tuesday, July 11, 2017
Monday, July 10, 2017
Sunday, July 9, 2017
Saturday, July 8, 2017
Shaqs
From Sports Illustrated -
https://www.si.com/nba/2017/07/05/shaquille-oneal-shaq-baby-name-popularity
From Homeless to Six-Figures in SF
An excerpt from the San Francisco Chronicle -
From homeless to six-figure salary in S.F.
By Ted Andersen
It was Christmas Day when Preston Phan, 29, stood on the streets of San Francisco’s Mission District chatting with his family over FaceTime, careful not to allow the building where he was staying to slip into view.
Phan had left Seattle jobless and was now broke and living in a homeless shelter. Interest on his student debt was growing, and his hopes of making it were shrinking.
Three months later he would be living in the South Bay, earning a six-figure salary at a major tech company. This is the story of how he turned his life around in tech’s heartland.
http://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/From-homeless-to-six-figure-salary-in-S-F-11264166.php
From homeless to six-figure salary in S.F.
By Ted Andersen
It was Christmas Day when Preston Phan, 29, stood on the streets of San Francisco’s Mission District chatting with his family over FaceTime, careful not to allow the building where he was staying to slip into view.
Phan had left Seattle jobless and was now broke and living in a homeless shelter. Interest on his student debt was growing, and his hopes of making it were shrinking.
Three months later he would be living in the South Bay, earning a six-figure salary at a major tech company. This is the story of how he turned his life around in tech’s heartland.
http://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/From-homeless-to-six-figure-salary-in-S-F-11264166.php
What a Cutie!
From the Daily Mail -
 | ||||
| Jolene Jackinsky snapped a photo of Barack Obama cradling her baby after meeting him at the airport | Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4676940/Mom-snaps-photo-Barack-Obama-holdinger-baby.html#ixzz4mFl5PRMO |
FM Texas and AM Texas
An excerpt from the New Yorker -
America’s Future Is Texas
With right-wing zealots taking over the legislature even as the state’s demographics shift leftward, Texas has become the nation’s bellwether.
By Lawrence Wright
I’ve lived in Texas for most of my life, and I’ve come to appreciate what the state symbolizes, both to people who live here and to those who view it from afar. Texans see themselves as a distillation of the best qualities of America: friendly, confident, hardworking, patriotic, neurosis-free. Outsiders see us as the nation’s id, a place where rambunctious and disavowed impulses run wild. Texans, it is thought, mindlessly celebrate individualism, and view government as a kind of kryptonite that weakens the entrepreneurial muscles. We’re reputed to be braggarts; careless with money and our personal lives; a little gullible, but dangerous if crossed; insecure, but obsessed with power and prestige.
Texans, however, are hardly monolithic. The state is as politically divided as the rest of the nation. One can drive across it and be in two different states at the same time: FM Texas and AM Texas. FM Texas is the silky voice of city dwellers, the kingdom of NPR. It is progressive, blue, reasonable, secular, and smug—almost like California. AM Texas speaks to the suburbs and the rural areas: Trumpland. It’s endless bluster and endless ads. Paranoia and piety are the main items on the menu.
America’s Future Is Texas
With right-wing zealots taking over the legislature even as the state’s demographics shift leftward, Texas has become the nation’s bellwether.
By Lawrence Wright
I’ve lived in Texas for most of my life, and I’ve come to appreciate what the state symbolizes, both to people who live here and to those who view it from afar. Texans see themselves as a distillation of the best qualities of America: friendly, confident, hardworking, patriotic, neurosis-free. Outsiders see us as the nation’s id, a place where rambunctious and disavowed impulses run wild. Texans, it is thought, mindlessly celebrate individualism, and view government as a kind of kryptonite that weakens the entrepreneurial muscles. We’re reputed to be braggarts; careless with money and our personal lives; a little gullible, but dangerous if crossed; insecure, but obsessed with power and prestige.
Texans, however, are hardly monolithic. The state is as politically divided as the rest of the nation. One can drive across it and be in two different states at the same time: FM Texas and AM Texas. FM Texas is the silky voice of city dwellers, the kingdom of NPR. It is progressive, blue, reasonable, secular, and smug—almost like California. AM Texas speaks to the suburbs and the rural areas: Trumpland. It’s endless bluster and endless ads. Paranoia and piety are the main items on the menu.
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/07/10/americas-future-is-texas
Hiking While Black
An excerpt from Outside Online -
Going It Alone
What happens when an African American woman decides to solo-hike the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine during a summer of bitter political upheaval? Everything you can imagine, from scary moments of racism to new friendships to soaring epiphanies about the timeless value of America’s most storied trekking route.
By: Rahawa Haile
It's the spring of 2016, and I’m ten miles south of Damascus, Virginia, where an annual celebration called Trail Days has just wrapped up. Last night, temperatures plummeted into the thirties. Today, long-distance Appalachian Trail hikers who’d slept in hammocks and mailed their underquilts home too soon were groaning into their morning coffee. A few small fires shot woodsmoke at the sun as thousands of tent stakes were dislodged. Over the next 24 hours, most of the hikers in attendance would pack up and hit the 554-mile stretch of the AT that runs north through Virginia.
I’ve used the Trail Days layover as an opportunity to stash most of my belongings with friends and complete a short section of the AT I’d missed, near the Tennessee-Virginia border. As I’m moving along, a day hiker heading in the opposite direction stops me for a chat. He’s affable and inquisitive. He asks what many have asked before: “Where are you from?” I tell him Miami.
He laughs and says, “No, but really. Where are you from from?” He mentions something about my features, my thin nose, and then trails off. I tell him my family is from Eritrea, a country in the Horn of Africa, next to Ethiopia. He looks relieved.
“I knew it,” he says. “You’re not black.”
I say that of course I am. “None more black,” I weakly joke.
“Not really,” he says. “You’re African, not black-black. Blacks don’t hike.”
I’m tired of this man. His from-froms and black-blacks. He wishes me good luck and leaves. He means it, too; he isn’t malicious. To him there’s nothing abnormal about our conversation. He has categorized me, and the world makes sense again. Not black-black. I hike the remaining miles back to my tent and don’t emerge for hours.
https://www.outsideonline.com/2170266/solo-hiking-appalachian-trail-queer-black-woman
Going It Alone
What happens when an African American woman decides to solo-hike the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine during a summer of bitter political upheaval? Everything you can imagine, from scary moments of racism to new friendships to soaring epiphanies about the timeless value of America’s most storied trekking route.
By: Rahawa Haile
It's the spring of 2016, and I’m ten miles south of Damascus, Virginia, where an annual celebration called Trail Days has just wrapped up. Last night, temperatures plummeted into the thirties. Today, long-distance Appalachian Trail hikers who’d slept in hammocks and mailed their underquilts home too soon were groaning into their morning coffee. A few small fires shot woodsmoke at the sun as thousands of tent stakes were dislodged. Over the next 24 hours, most of the hikers in attendance would pack up and hit the 554-mile stretch of the AT that runs north through Virginia.
I’ve used the Trail Days layover as an opportunity to stash most of my belongings with friends and complete a short section of the AT I’d missed, near the Tennessee-Virginia border. As I’m moving along, a day hiker heading in the opposite direction stops me for a chat. He’s affable and inquisitive. He asks what many have asked before: “Where are you from?” I tell him Miami.
He laughs and says, “No, but really. Where are you from from?” He mentions something about my features, my thin nose, and then trails off. I tell him my family is from Eritrea, a country in the Horn of Africa, next to Ethiopia. He looks relieved.
“I knew it,” he says. “You’re not black.”
I say that of course I am. “None more black,” I weakly joke.
“Not really,” he says. “You’re African, not black-black. Blacks don’t hike.”
I’m tired of this man. His from-froms and black-blacks. He wishes me good luck and leaves. He means it, too; he isn’t malicious. To him there’s nothing abnormal about our conversation. He has categorized me, and the world makes sense again. Not black-black. I hike the remaining miles back to my tent and don’t emerge for hours.
https://www.outsideonline.com/2170266/solo-hiking-appalachian-trail-queer-black-woman
Friday, July 7, 2017
Thursday, July 6, 2017
Wednesday, July 5, 2017
Volvo Goes All-Electric
From the Wall Street Journal -
Volvo Plans to Go Electric, to Abandon Conventional Car Engine by 2019
CEO reiterates target of selling one million electric cars and hybrids by 2025
By William Boston
https://www.wsj.com/articles/volvo-to-phase-out-conventional-car-engine-1499227202?mod=trending_now_1
Volvo Plans to Go Electric, to Abandon Conventional Car Engine by 2019
CEO reiterates target of selling one million electric cars and hybrids by 2025
By William Boston
https://www.wsj.com/articles/volvo-to-phase-out-conventional-car-engine-1499227202?mod=trending_now_1
He Has a Sacramento Connection
An excerpt from the Bleacher Report -
HUNTER GREENE IS NOT THE LEBRON OF BASEBALL. HE WANTS TO BE SOMETHING MORE.
Inside the unreal celebrity life of a 17-year-old prodigy who’s already expected to save America’s pastime from itself—part one of Make Baseball Cool Again, a B/R Mag special issue
By Joon Lee
Russell watches the games by himself. Occasionally, he'll cheer on Hunter and his teammates. ("Atta boy, bud!" "Good swing, kid!") Every once in a while, he'll shout out a coaching tip to his son. ("Keep your backside straight at the plate!" "Stop trying too hard!") Other parents will congratulate him on his son's success, but he keeps the conversations short. Between innings, he searches Hunter's name on Twitter. He wants to know everything. With all they've gone through, Russell needs to know everything.
When Russell became a parent at 25 years old ("He came out of this nut—the right one" he says, pointing to his groin), he promised to never miss one of his son's games. In the 17 years since, he has missed only two, and they were in Japan. "I made sure Hunter never experienced what I experienced," he says.
Russell's parents got divorced when he was two. He grew up with his father, a veteran of the Green Berets, in Sacramento, where they lived until Russell was in fifth grade. When Hunter's grandfather started dating his soon-to-be second wife, he stopped regularly attending Russell's football and baseball games. And then he stopped going to them at all. Feeling left behind, Russell decided to run away.
He called his mom, who lived in Los Angeles, and she came to pick him up. He lost contact with his dad. He smoked and transported weed. He drank. He was a good athlete, playing Division II football at Humboldt State, but he had no aspirations to play sports professionally. It's why he has no regrets about Hunter's abnormal high school experience. "What he's missed out on is stuff he doesn't need to be a part of," Russell says.
For 15 years, Russell worked for Johnnie Cochran, starting at the end of the O.J. Simpson murder trial, before opening a private practice, in which he specialized in violent crimes, often homicides and sexual assaults. His work with celebrities, Russell says, helped prepare his son for what, to him, was near-certain fame: "Everything you hear about Justin Bieber, Hunter knows about. Everything about the Kardashians, he knows about it because I use them as an example, whether they are good or bad."
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2718635-hunter-greene-is-not-the-lebron-of-baseball-marcus-stroman-mlb
HUNTER GREENE IS NOT THE LEBRON OF BASEBALL. HE WANTS TO BE SOMETHING MORE.
Inside the unreal celebrity life of a 17-year-old prodigy who’s already expected to save America’s pastime from itself—part one of Make Baseball Cool Again, a B/R Mag special issue
By Joon Lee
Russell watches the games by himself. Occasionally, he'll cheer on Hunter and his teammates. ("Atta boy, bud!" "Good swing, kid!") Every once in a while, he'll shout out a coaching tip to his son. ("Keep your backside straight at the plate!" "Stop trying too hard!") Other parents will congratulate him on his son's success, but he keeps the conversations short. Between innings, he searches Hunter's name on Twitter. He wants to know everything. With all they've gone through, Russell needs to know everything.
When Russell became a parent at 25 years old ("He came out of this nut—the right one" he says, pointing to his groin), he promised to never miss one of his son's games. In the 17 years since, he has missed only two, and they were in Japan. "I made sure Hunter never experienced what I experienced," he says.
Russell's parents got divorced when he was two. He grew up with his father, a veteran of the Green Berets, in Sacramento, where they lived until Russell was in fifth grade. When Hunter's grandfather started dating his soon-to-be second wife, he stopped regularly attending Russell's football and baseball games. And then he stopped going to them at all. Feeling left behind, Russell decided to run away.
He called his mom, who lived in Los Angeles, and she came to pick him up. He lost contact with his dad. He smoked and transported weed. He drank. He was a good athlete, playing Division II football at Humboldt State, but he had no aspirations to play sports professionally. It's why he has no regrets about Hunter's abnormal high school experience. "What he's missed out on is stuff he doesn't need to be a part of," Russell says.
For 15 years, Russell worked for Johnnie Cochran, starting at the end of the O.J. Simpson murder trial, before opening a private practice, in which he specialized in violent crimes, often homicides and sexual assaults. His work with celebrities, Russell says, helped prepare his son for what, to him, was near-certain fame: "Everything you hear about Justin Bieber, Hunter knows about. Everything about the Kardashians, he knows about it because I use them as an example, whether they are good or bad."
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2718635-hunter-greene-is-not-the-lebron-of-baseball-marcus-stroman-mlb
Telling Descriptors
From the Washington Post -
Bizarre. Absurd. Ridiculous. Embarrassing. Trump.
By Kathleen Parker
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/bizarre-absurd-ridiculous-embarrassing-trump/2017/07/04/f004b6dc-6033-11e7-a4f7-af34fc1d9d39_story.html?utm_term=.57da8346a099&wpisrc=nl_rainbow&wpmm=1
Bizarre. Absurd. Ridiculous. Embarrassing. Trump.
By Kathleen Parker
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/bizarre-absurd-ridiculous-embarrassing-trump/2017/07/04/f004b6dc-6033-11e7-a4f7-af34fc1d9d39_story.html?utm_term=.57da8346a099&wpisrc=nl_rainbow&wpmm=1
Robocops
From the Washington Post -
Meet the newest recruits of Dubai’s police force: Robo-cars with facial-recognition tech
By Hamza Shaban
Mini autonomous police cars paired with companion drones and facial-recognition technology will begin patrolling the streets of Dubai by the end of the year to help identify and track suspects.
The announcement by city officials this week comes as Dubai races to reshape the future of its law enforcement.
But don’t expect a high-speed chase out of the little cars. In demonstrations, the robot never appears to move beyond a stroll’s pace. But the four-wheeled security vehicle comes with a built-in aerial drone that can be deployed to surveil areas and people that the robot can’t reach.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2017/06/30/meet-the-newest-recruits-of-dubais-police-force-robo-cars-with-facial-recognition-tech/?utm_term=.741f575a100a&wpisrc=nl_rainbow&wpmm=1
Meet the newest recruits of Dubai’s police force: Robo-cars with facial-recognition tech
By Hamza Shaban
 |
| The model O-R3 autonomous security robot manufactured by Singapore-based Otsaw Digital. (Otsaw Digital) |
Mini autonomous police cars paired with companion drones and facial-recognition technology will begin patrolling the streets of Dubai by the end of the year to help identify and track suspects.
The announcement by city officials this week comes as Dubai races to reshape the future of its law enforcement.
But don’t expect a high-speed chase out of the little cars. In demonstrations, the robot never appears to move beyond a stroll’s pace. But the four-wheeled security vehicle comes with a built-in aerial drone that can be deployed to surveil areas and people that the robot can’t reach.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2017/06/30/meet-the-newest-recruits-of-dubais-police-force-robo-cars-with-facial-recognition-tech/?utm_term=.741f575a100a&wpisrc=nl_rainbow&wpmm=1
Searching for the Truth
How can we truly celebrate independence on a day that intentionally robbed our ancestors of theirs? To find my independence I went home. pic.twitter.com/hniYGJeLxG— Colin Kaepernick (@Kaepernick7) July 4, 2017
Tuesday, July 4, 2017
Do They Know This?
An excerpt from the Undefeated -
Locker Room Talk: First day of NBA free agency should be called Big O Day
Oscar Robertson is the reason today’s players can choose where to play and make megamillions
BY WILLIAM C. RHODEN
Henceforth and forever, the NBA should designate July 1 as Big O Day, in honor of Oscar Robertson, namesake of the rule that put NBA players on the road to free agency.
That road has been paved with gold ever since.
Robertson, 78, said he is open to the idea. “I like it,” he told me last week. “I don’t think a lot of players know anything about the Oscar Robertson Rule and what it really means.”
The rule has a number of ins and out, but what the players need to grasp is simple. “They should understand why they are making 15 and 20 million dollars a year playing basketball,” Robertson said.
Robertson v. National Basketball Association was a class-action lawsuit filed in 1970. Robertson at the time was president of the National Basketball Players Association. The NBA was represented by the firm Proskauer, Rose, Goetz & Mendelsohn, whose lead attorney was future NBA commissioner David Stern.
https://theundefeated.com/features/locker-room-talk-first-day-of-nba-free-agency-should-be-called-big-o-day/
Locker Room Talk: First day of NBA free agency should be called Big O Day
Oscar Robertson is the reason today’s players can choose where to play and make megamillions
BY WILLIAM C. RHODEN
Henceforth and forever, the NBA should designate July 1 as Big O Day, in honor of Oscar Robertson, namesake of the rule that put NBA players on the road to free agency.
That road has been paved with gold ever since.
Robertson, 78, said he is open to the idea. “I like it,” he told me last week. “I don’t think a lot of players know anything about the Oscar Robertson Rule and what it really means.”
The rule has a number of ins and out, but what the players need to grasp is simple. “They should understand why they are making 15 and 20 million dollars a year playing basketball,” Robertson said.
Robertson v. National Basketball Association was a class-action lawsuit filed in 1970. Robertson at the time was president of the National Basketball Players Association. The NBA was represented by the firm Proskauer, Rose, Goetz & Mendelsohn, whose lead attorney was future NBA commissioner David Stern.
https://theundefeated.com/features/locker-room-talk-first-day-of-nba-free-agency-should-be-called-big-o-day/
The Fourth of July
“What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?”
By Frederick Douglass
July 5, 1852
What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciations of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade, and solemnity, are, to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices, more shocking and bloody, than are the people of these United States, at this very hour.
~~~~~~~~~~
Fellow-citizens! I will not enlarge further on your national inconsistencies. The existence of slavery in this country brands your republicanism as a sham, your humanity as a base pretence, and your Christianity as a lie.
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/what-to-the-slave-is-the-fourth-of-july/
By Frederick Douglass
July 5, 1852
What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciations of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade, and solemnity, are, to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices, more shocking and bloody, than are the people of these United States, at this very hour.
~~~~~~~~~~
Fellow-citizens! I will not enlarge further on your national inconsistencies. The existence of slavery in this country brands your republicanism as a sham, your humanity as a base pretence, and your Christianity as a lie.
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/what-to-the-slave-is-the-fourth-of-july/
Not a Fan, But . . .
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. delivered the ninth-grade commencement address a Cardigan Mountain School, a boarding school for boys in New Hampshire. (Cardigan Mountain School)
A Hometown Hero
An excerpt from the LA Times -
Hiroshi Miyamura and his hometown had a lot in common. They believed in America.
By JOE MOZINGO
Two American soldiers trudged across the war-torn Korean peninsula as winter bore down.
To keep their minds off the cold and hunger, Hiroshi “Hershey” Miyamura told his new friend, an Italian kid from Boston, about his hometown of Gallup, N.M.
Joe Annello pictured the kind of strange buttes and red-rock desert he had seen in John Wayne movies. But Miyamura told him a different story, about how Gallup had risen to defend the American ideal when so many others stood by.
Sixty-seven years later, their enduring friendship is a testament to how a small town grappled with issues the nation is again debating today — where people of certain ethnic or religious backgrounds fit into its changing identity. It is the story of how a small act of courage helped turn an "enemy alien" into an American hero.
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-japanese-american-hero-hiroshi-20170703-htmlstory.html
Hiroshi Miyamura and his hometown had a lot in common. They believed in America.
By JOE MOZINGO
Two American soldiers trudged across the war-torn Korean peninsula as winter bore down.
To keep their minds off the cold and hunger, Hiroshi “Hershey” Miyamura told his new friend, an Italian kid from Boston, about his hometown of Gallup, N.M.
Joe Annello pictured the kind of strange buttes and red-rock desert he had seen in John Wayne movies. But Miyamura told him a different story, about how Gallup had risen to defend the American ideal when so many others stood by.
Sixty-seven years later, their enduring friendship is a testament to how a small town grappled with issues the nation is again debating today — where people of certain ethnic or religious backgrounds fit into its changing identity. It is the story of how a small act of courage helped turn an "enemy alien" into an American hero.
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-japanese-american-hero-hiroshi-20170703-htmlstory.html
Monday, July 3, 2017
Pushing STEM Careers
From the Undefeated -
Isiah Warner’s inspirational teaching at LSU never stops pushing STEM careers
The 2016 SEC Professor of the Year holds the highest professorial rank in the LSU system
BY MAYA A. JONES
Louisiana State University (LSU) professor Isiah Warner laughed as he recounted the many hats he’s worn throughout his 25 years at the school. Warner serves as vice president for strategic initiatives, Boyd Professor (the highest professorial rank in the LSU system) and Philip W. West Professor of analytical and environmental chemistry and as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professor who works to develop, apply and solve fundamental problems through research.
https://theundefeated.com/features/isiah-warner-lsu-stem-careers/
Isiah Warner’s inspirational teaching at LSU never stops pushing STEM careers
The 2016 SEC Professor of the Year holds the highest professorial rank in the LSU system
BY MAYA A. JONES
Louisiana State University (LSU) professor Isiah Warner laughed as he recounted the many hats he’s worn throughout his 25 years at the school. Warner serves as vice president for strategic initiatives, Boyd Professor (the highest professorial rank in the LSU system) and Philip W. West Professor of analytical and environmental chemistry and as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professor who works to develop, apply and solve fundamental problems through research.
https://theundefeated.com/features/isiah-warner-lsu-stem-careers/
Quote
From the Huffington Post -
Justice Official Quits Over White House Conduct ‘I Would Not Tolerate Seeing In A Company’
“Trying to hold companies to standards that our current administration is not living up to was creating a cognitive dissonance that I could not overcome.”
By Mary Papenfuss
“Even as I engaged in... questioning and evaluations, on my mind were the numerous lawsuits pending against the President of the United States for everything from violations of the Constitution to conflict of interest, the ongoing investigations of potentially treasonous conducts, and the investigators and prosecutors fired for their pursuits of principles and facts,” she wrote. “Those are conducts I would not tolerate seeing in a company, yet I worked under an administration that engaged in exactly those [conducts]. I wanted no more part in it.” - Hui Chen
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hui-chen-quits-justice_us_5959be5ce4b0da2c732455c9?77p&ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009
Justice Official Quits Over White House Conduct ‘I Would Not Tolerate Seeing In A Company’
“Trying to hold companies to standards that our current administration is not living up to was creating a cognitive dissonance that I could not overcome.”
By Mary Papenfuss
“Even as I engaged in... questioning and evaluations, on my mind were the numerous lawsuits pending against the President of the United States for everything from violations of the Constitution to conflict of interest, the ongoing investigations of potentially treasonous conducts, and the investigators and prosecutors fired for their pursuits of principles and facts,” she wrote. “Those are conducts I would not tolerate seeing in a company, yet I worked under an administration that engaged in exactly those [conducts]. I wanted no more part in it.” - Hui Chen
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hui-chen-quits-justice_us_5959be5ce4b0da2c732455c9?77p&ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009
App Improves Memory
An excerpt from the Independent -
New brain training app improves memories of people with early-stage Dementia
'We hope to extend these findings in future studies of healthy ageing and mild Alzheimer's disease,' said George Savulich, who led the study at Cambridge University
By KATE KELLAND
A brain training computer game developed by British neuroscientists has been shown to improve the memory of patients in the very earliest stages of dementia and could help such patients avert some symptoms of cognitive decline.
Researchers who developed the “game show”-like app and tested its effects on cognition and motivation in a small trial found that patients who played the game over a period of a month had around a 40 per cent improvement in their memory scores.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/brain-training-app-dementia-early-stage-patients-people-help-memories-improve-games-show-cambridge-a7820301.html
New brain training app improves memories of people with early-stage Dementia
'We hope to extend these findings in future studies of healthy ageing and mild Alzheimer's disease,' said George Savulich, who led the study at Cambridge University
By KATE KELLAND
A brain training computer game developed by British neuroscientists has been shown to improve the memory of patients in the very earliest stages of dementia and could help such patients avert some symptoms of cognitive decline.
Researchers who developed the “game show”-like app and tested its effects on cognition and motivation in a small trial found that patients who played the game over a period of a month had around a 40 per cent improvement in their memory scores.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/brain-training-app-dementia-early-stage-patients-people-help-memories-improve-games-show-cambridge-a7820301.html
The World is Watching
From Axios AM Newsletter -
How they see us ... The wrestling tweet was at the top of the front pages of the Financial Times and The Times of London (which said that in the video, Trump "attacked a person with a superimposed CNN logo on their head"). The BBC's Katty Kay said on "Morning Joe' that it '"looks like America has gone off the reservation."
https://www.axios.com/axios-am/
How they see us ... The wrestling tweet was at the top of the front pages of the Financial Times and The Times of London (which said that in the video, Trump "attacked a person with a superimposed CNN logo on their head"). The BBC's Katty Kay said on "Morning Joe' that it '"looks like America has gone off the reservation."
https://www.axios.com/axios-am/
Sunday, July 2, 2017
Saturday, July 1, 2017
Healing With Fish Skins
An excerpt from Bloomberg Businessweek -
Fish Skin for Human Wounds: Iceland’s Pioneering Treatment
The FDA-approved skin substitute reduces inflammation and transforms chronic wounds into acute injuries.
By Lois Parshley
The materials in fish skin, particularly omega-3 fatty acids, yield natural anti-inflammatory effects that speed healing. When placed on wounds, the product, made from dried and processed fish skin, works as an extracellular matrix, a group of proteins and starches that plays a crucial role in recovery. In a healthy person, a matrix surrounds cells and binds them to tissue, generating the growth of new epidermis. But in chronic wounds, this natural structure fails to form. So like a garden trellis, the fish skin provides the body’s own cells a structure to grow around so they can form healthy tissue, gradually becoming incorporated into the closing wound.
Some six and a half million Americans suffer from chronic wounds, whether related to vascular disease, diabetes, or complications from normal procedures. The five-year survival rate is 54 percent, compared with 88 percent for breast cancer, and treatments cost more than $25 billion a year. That total is steadily rising, in part because of a graying population. But precisely because many patients suffering from such wounds tend to be old, and many are also poor, they don’t get much attention.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-06-27/fish-skin-may-be-the-answer-to-chronic-wounds
Fish Skin for Human Wounds: Iceland’s Pioneering Treatment
The FDA-approved skin substitute reduces inflammation and transforms chronic wounds into acute injuries.
By Lois Parshley
The materials in fish skin, particularly omega-3 fatty acids, yield natural anti-inflammatory effects that speed healing. When placed on wounds, the product, made from dried and processed fish skin, works as an extracellular matrix, a group of proteins and starches that plays a crucial role in recovery. In a healthy person, a matrix surrounds cells and binds them to tissue, generating the growth of new epidermis. But in chronic wounds, this natural structure fails to form. So like a garden trellis, the fish skin provides the body’s own cells a structure to grow around so they can form healthy tissue, gradually becoming incorporated into the closing wound.
Some six and a half million Americans suffer from chronic wounds, whether related to vascular disease, diabetes, or complications from normal procedures. The five-year survival rate is 54 percent, compared with 88 percent for breast cancer, and treatments cost more than $25 billion a year. That total is steadily rising, in part because of a graying population. But precisely because many patients suffering from such wounds tend to be old, and many are also poor, they don’t get much attention.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-06-27/fish-skin-may-be-the-answer-to-chronic-wounds
Friday, June 30, 2017
What Respecting Women Looks Like
From the Huffington Post -
Obama Photographer Reminds Us What A President Who Respects Women Looks Like
Pete Souza, FTW.
By Jenavieve Hatch
Former White House photographer Pete Souza has made wonderful use of his Instagram account during the Trump Administration, subtly uploading photos from his days with President Barack Obama in response to some of President Trump’s most outlandish moments.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/obama-photographer-reminds-us-what-a-president-who-respects-women-looks-like_us_59565258e4b0da2c7322eed1?0dp&ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009
Obama Photographer Reminds Us What A President Who Respects Women Looks Like
Pete Souza, FTW.
By Jenavieve Hatch
Former White House photographer Pete Souza has made wonderful use of his Instagram account during the Trump Administration, subtly uploading photos from his days with President Barack Obama in response to some of President Trump’s most outlandish moments.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/obama-photographer-reminds-us-what-a-president-who-respects-women-looks-like_us_59565258e4b0da2c7322eed1?0dp&ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009
Thursday, June 29, 2017
Wednesday, June 28, 2017
Needle-Free Flu Shot
From NBC News -
Needle-Free Flu Vaccine Patch Works as Well as a Shot
by MAGGIE FOX
A press-on patch that delivers flu vaccine painlessly worked as well as an old-fashioned flu shot with no serious side effects, researchers reported Tuesday.
People who tried out the patch said it was not difficult or painful to use, and tests of their blood suggested the vaccine it delivers created about the same immune response as a regular flu shot, the team reported in the Lancet medical journal.
http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/needle-free-flu-vaccine-patch-works-well-shot-n777386
Needle-Free Flu Vaccine Patch Works as Well as a Shot
by MAGGIE FOX
A press-on patch that delivers flu vaccine painlessly worked as well as an old-fashioned flu shot with no serious side effects, researchers reported Tuesday.
People who tried out the patch said it was not difficult or painful to use, and tests of their blood suggested the vaccine it delivers created about the same immune response as a regular flu shot, the team reported in the Lancet medical journal.
http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/needle-free-flu-vaccine-patch-works-well-shot-n777386
Fake Cover
An excerpt from the Hill -
Time asks Trump Organization to remove fake cover from golf clubs
BY OLIVIA BEAVERS
Time magazine has asked the Trump Organization to remove copies of a fake cover of President Trump that were on display at the company’s golf clubs, The Washington Post reported Tuesday afternoon.
The request came after the newspaper reported that at least four Trump-branded golf clubs had displayed a fake Time magazine cover that depicted Trump with the headline “Donald Trump: The ‘Apprentice’ is a television smash!”
The cover, dated March 1, 2009, was never published by the magazine at any point, a spokeswoman for Time confirmed.
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/339741-time-mag-asks-trump-org-to-remove-fake-cover-from-golf-clubs
Time asks Trump Organization to remove fake cover from golf clubs
BY OLIVIA BEAVERS
Time magazine has asked the Trump Organization to remove copies of a fake cover of President Trump that were on display at the company’s golf clubs, The Washington Post reported Tuesday afternoon.
The request came after the newspaper reported that at least four Trump-branded golf clubs had displayed a fake Time magazine cover that depicted Trump with the headline “Donald Trump: The ‘Apprentice’ is a television smash!”
The cover, dated March 1, 2009, was never published by the magazine at any point, a spokeswoman for Time confirmed.
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/339741-time-mag-asks-trump-org-to-remove-fake-cover-from-golf-clubs
Tuesday, June 27, 2017
Skirting the System
From ProPublica -
THE LAST SHOT
Amid a surging opiate crisis, the maker of the anti-addiction drug Vivitrol skirted the usual sales channels. It found a captive market for its once-a-month injection in the criminal justice system.
By Alec MacGillis
https://www.propublica.org/article/vivitrol-opiate-crisis-and-criminal-justice
THE LAST SHOT
Amid a surging opiate crisis, the maker of the anti-addiction drug Vivitrol skirted the usual sales channels. It found a captive market for its once-a-month injection in the criminal justice system.
By Alec MacGillis
https://www.propublica.org/article/vivitrol-opiate-crisis-and-criminal-justice
White Collar Crime
From Literary Momma -
My Father, at Rikers
By ELIOT SLOAN
http://www.literarymama.com/creativenonfiction/archives/2017/06/my-father-at-rikers.html
My Father, at Rikers
By ELIOT SLOAN
http://www.literarymama.com/creativenonfiction/archives/2017/06/my-father-at-rikers.html
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