The Electronic Privacy Information Center, also known as EPIC, skipped lower federal courts and took their petition against the NSA straight to the Supreme Court.
They claimed that a secret federal court improperly authorized the government to collect electronic records from telecom giant Verizon and leading Internet companies, including Microsoft, Apple, Google, Yahoo and Facebook.
The court denied the petition on Monday and will allow the NSA to keep spying on American citizens’ phone records, according to CNN. For now, anyway. The NSA has publicly acknowledged it received secret court approval to collect vast amounts of metadata from telecommunications and internet companies, and EPIC says it Obama administration should have to publicly explain its legal justification for the spying program.
“Telephone records, even without the content of the calls, can reveal an immense amount of sensitive, private information. There are no reasonable grounds for the NSA to have access to every call record of every Verizon customer,” said Marc Rotenberg, president of EPIC.
The group argued that stripping the power of the NSA to collect metadata would be beneficial to the Supreme Court, itself, relegating power back where it should be. “Because the NSA sweeps up judicial and congressional communications, it inappropriately arrogates exceptional power to the executive branch.”
While the NSA may still be able to monitor calls, the information collected only includes the numbers, time, and length of phone calls to and from the United States in the past five years. However, if it makes you feel any more secure, it does not include the location or actual monitoring of the conversations themselves, because in order to do that, the NSA would require a separate, specifically targeted search warrant.
A sequel to Nelson Mandela’s book, “A Long Walk to Freedom”, was started by Mandela. However, after numerous hospital stays, and after his last release from the hospital, he will not be able to finish it.
According to AFP, Mandela is stable but still in critical condition. His former wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, says that the tubes that run down his throat to drain his lungs prevent him from speaking.
His illness dates back to his prison years in an apartheid jail, when he was diagnosed with tuberculosis. While his pneumonia has cleared, his lungs remain sensitive, she said, adding that it was “difficult for him”.
“He remains very sensitive to any germs, so he has to be kept literally sterile. The bedroom there is like an ICU (intensive care unit) ward.” she said. “He remains quite ill, but thank God the doctors were able to pull him through from that (last) infection.”
Due to his conditions, he is unable to write or even dictate his words to someone, so a few former colleagues are stepping in to finish the book of the great anti-apartheid hero, and South Africa’s first black president, according to Reuters. Mandela Foundation chief executive Sello Hatang said former colleagues have begun to finish the work, based on Mandela’s own writings, other archive material and their own personal recollections of the Nobel peace laureate.
“It’s a collective work, a project by the people who worked with Mandela in that office,” Hatang said at the Foundation in Johannesburg, where Mandela spent his professional time after leaving office.
Mandela began writing the book shortly before he left office as a sequel to his autobiography “Long Walk to Freedom”. The first draft is entitled “The Presidential Years”, and is dated October 16,1998. He wrote about the hopes and fragilities that go along with any liberation movement.
Mandela strived to create a better society for South Africans. He wanted liberty, safety and a smaller gap between rich and poor, but since he left office, South Africa remains one of the most corrupt governments in the world. It tumbled down the rankings in global watchdog Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index from 38th in 2001 to 69th last year.
This is a fact which might make those currently in charge a little uncomfortable, especially present leaders of Mandela’s African National Congress (ANC) and President Jacob Zuma, who is currently dealing with a scandal over a 206 million rand, or $20 million, taxpayer-funded upgrade to his private mansion.
Mandela is clear about his stance on this kind of thing in his book, and by his very words, calls out this kind of behavior. “Frequently, erstwhile revolutionaries have easily succumbed to greed and the tendency to divert public resources for personal enrichment ultimately overwhelmed them. By amassing vast personal wealth, and by betraying the noble objectives which made them famous, they virtually deserted the masses of the people and joined the former oppressors, who enriched themselves by mercilessly robbing the poorest of the poor.”
There is no information on when the book will be finished or who will publish it, but when it does make its debut, it is sure to step on some toes.
Lea Michele may not be over the death of her long-time boyfriend and co-star Cory Monteith, from a mix of heroin and alcohol, but at least there is hope now for the “Glee” star that things are getting better. Lea has chosen to throw herself into work on the show and on a new music video for her new album.
“Lea is doing much better,” a source close to her said, according to People. The source added that she has found solace in dedicating herself fully to her show and music video.
In her highly anticipated new music video, she sheds her Rachel image and is just herself, well, a sultry version of herself. All that can be told from the few snaps she’s shared, according to InStyle, is that she will be sticking with her signature smokey eye, courtesy of L’Oreal, I’m sure. She is still their global ambassador, after all.
Her new album will surely be a hit for her, and pays tribute, in part, to Cory Monteith. She revealed that a song on the album entitled ‘You’re Mine’ is one she intends for Cory, explaining: ‘The album was done, and the label said, “Do you want to add anything?” I was like, “I might regret it if I don’t”. It makes me so happy, this song. It makes me think so much of Cory. It was ours. When I think if him, I play this.’ On Sunday she tweeted this,
Scott Walker made a surprise statement on Sunday on ABC’s “This Week”, according to the Huffington Post. In his opinion, he says that the next Republican presidential nominee needs to be an outsider, meaning a governor or former governor with a successful track record in their state. Like himself, of course.
Well, if he is right, that would rule out some Tea Party favorites, like Republican Sens. Marco Rubio (Fla.), Ted Cruz (Texas) and Rand Paul (Ky.), all of whom are considered very likely to seek their party’s nomination in 2016. Cruz is a Tea Party icon, and highly spoken of by the likes of Sarah Palin and other conservatives who might disagree, and Rand Paul is a huge favorite among Ron Paul fans and general lovers of the constitution.
Walker is considered one of the greatest enemies of the “Occupy” movement from three years ago that saw days, sometimes weeks and months, of protests all over the country.
He even had to use a secret tunnel to go to and from work during the tumultuous times. He and his family were the recipients of death threats. But now he’s turning his attention to the 2016 ballots and what’s next for the country. About the nominee, he said,
“I think it’s got to be an outsider. I think both the presidential and the vice presidential nominee should either be a former or current governor — people who have done successful things in their states, who have taken on big reforms, who are ready to move America forward.”
ABC’s Jonathan Karl asked him about Paul Ryan, Walker’s Wisconsin colleague and former vice-presidential candidate to Mitt Romney. “I love Paul Ryan. Paul Ryan, if he had a fan club, I’d be the president of that,” Walker said. He then added that, unfortunately, Ryan also wouldn’t meet his criteria for an ideal candidate.
According to ABC, he said the reason for his harsh criteria is the misguided efforts of Republicans in the government shutdown debacle last month. When asked if he thought it was a mistake, he said, “I think so.”
He observed that Republicans at the state level are much more willing to compromise to make things happen.
“Republicans, at the state level, are showing we’re much more optimistic, we’re speaking in terms that are much more relevant to where real voters are at,” he said.
Some Republicans and Independents may not see this as a good thing, however. Tea Party members and the conservative Right have spent a considerable amount of time and money supporting those that held their ground in Washington during the shutdown.
Is this a ploy by Walker to make room for his own name on the upcoming nomination? When asked if he would run himself, he said, “I don’t rule anything out.”
Jennifer Lawrence is already well-known as one of the most popular and approachable stars in Hollywood. You would never know that during her childhood, she suffered from social anxiety, and even though she had some friends, she hard a hard time coming out of her shell and just being herself. According to Us Weekly, her mother noticed the change in her first.
“My nickname was ‘Nitro,’ as in nitroglycerin,” she tells the Madame Figaro (translated from French). “I was hyperactive, curious about everything. When my mother told me about my childhood, she always told me there was like a light in me, a spark that inspired me constantly. When I entered school, the light went out. We never knew what it was, a kind of social anxiety. But I had friends.”
She tried to see a therapist, among other things, but nothing seemed to help her overcome her paralyzing anxieties. Then one day, she discovered acting, and the rest is history.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keT5CRhhy84
“One day, I begged my parents to take me to a casting,” the actress tells the mag. “We went to New York, and that’s where I started acting. Just on stage, my mother saw the change that was taking place in me. She saw my anxieties disappear. She found her daughter, the one who had this light and joy before school.”
She added, “I finally found a way [to] open the door to a universe that I understood, that was good for me and made me happy, because I felt capable, whereas before I felt worthless,” she says.
It’s hard to imagine her feeling worthless with all the love that comes her way. Especially from many of her co-stars, like Donald Sutherland. According to E!, the seasoned actor can’t get enough of his young counterpart.
“She’s a delivery system for the truth,” he said of her, while they were promoting Catching Fire. “She channels epiphanies. She’s brilliant, she’s brilliant. She’s unlike other performers.”
He added, “When I work with her, between Katniss Everdeen and Coriolanus Snow, it’s a battle I can taste, eat—I love it!”
He’s not the only one that likes to gush about her, “She’s still the same ole girl,” her X Men costar James McAvoy said earlier this year. “We love Jennifer, she’s amazing. Properly amazing.”
Perhaps it is her struggle that has allowed her to remain so down-to-earth?
Rumors of divorce have been plaguing Tim McGraw and Faith Hill heavily lately, and now the famously happy couple is finally setting the record straight. Hill said after the couple’s show in Las Vegas on Friday night, which they ended with a kiss like usual, that the rumors are “absolutely not true”.
Husband Tim McGraw said, “We’ve been married 17 years, and since the first week we were married those things were out,” according to People. “We don’t even think about it. The only time we ever think about it is [when we] worry about the kids. But they’ve been around it, too, so they laugh it off.”
The couple isn’t usually bothered by the rumors, according to the Huffington Post, and have gotten used to laughing them off. The same goes for their three daughters, and they have seen some doozies. For example, in August, the National Enquirer, the old crown jewel of journalism, claimed their marriage was on the rocks because McGraw felt like he was being mistreated by Faith, while she reportedly has trust issues stemming from supposedly having “sexual chemistry” with Taylor Swift.
Of course the couple dismissed the rumors as false and ridiculous. McGraw even offered a tried and true secret for happy marriage, “The easy answer is just to shut up and not say anything, that’s easy,” he said. “But really it’s a lot of give and take and it’s a lot of no ultimatums.”
“[Rumors] seem to be running like crazy right now for some reason. It’s perplexing,” Hill said. “I don’t know why ‘happy’ can’t be a story.”
The only thing the two are concerned about right now are their daughters ever-tightening schedules, especially that of their 16-year-old, Gracie. “I don’t recall in high school ever being so busy.” said Hill.
Mt. Etna in Sicily erupted over the weekend. Lava and hot ash began spewing out on Saturday, and tapered off on Sunday. Etna is Europe’s most active volcano, with 16 paroxysmal, or sudden, eruptions this year and the last major eruption occuring in 1992, according to Fox News.
The eruption didn’t pose a threat to surrounding villages, and evacuations were not ordered. Thanks to successful diversion efforts, only one building was destroyed, according to the Daily Mail. The nearby airport in Catania was even operating normally, except for the blocking of two sectors of air space over the volcano.
The eruption was announced by a violent tremor, producing a string of perfectly-shaped smoke rings. Experts think that the eruption may have caused a change in the structure of a vent, perhaps into a circular shape, which could have allowed Mount Etna to spew the smoke-like formations.
The activities of Mt. Etna have been well documented as far back as 1500 BC, and since then, has erupted over 200 times, ranging from almost undetectable to the catastrophic. For example, in 122 BC, an explosive eruption spewed so much ash onto the town of Catania, that it crushed hundreds of houses. The damage was so bad that the town’s inhabitants were exempted from paying taxes to Rome for ten years.
Mt. Etna’s current activities, which usually just include continuous summit degassing, explosive Strombolian eruptions, and frequent basaltic lava flows, is always a concern for the island of Sicily because 25 percent of the population lives around the base of Mt. Etna.
The effects of Etna have been positive over the years, with most of the island’s income stemming from agriculture, which is abundant because of the rich volcanic soil, and tourism. Should Mt. Etna become a reason to fear visiting Sicily, the effects on the island could be devastating.
More men are taking on the crown jewel of the Thanksgiving meal, the turkey. That means fewer turkeys will be roasting this year and more will be grilled or fried, and turkey producers, as well as grill and fryer companies, are keeping up with the changing times.
For instance, the Butterball talk line, which provides assistance and advice to those who need a little help with their turkeys, added male staffers to answer calls for the first time in 32 years. They have also reportedly been looking for a male spokesperson, according to Today. They started taking calls November 1st.
“Men are cooking more and more — 84 percent are involved in the meal and 42 percent are involved with the actual turkey,” said Talk-Line director Mary Clingman. She also said that about 25 percent of calls fielded by staffers come from men.
In general, many times when men get involved in cooking, there is a search for a way to tweak it. Sometimes this involves a cool gadget. Carlos Faxas, for expample, found a meat thermometer that links to his iPhone. He can keep an eye on his turkey and watch football at the same time.
The 31-year-old e-commerce manager for United Airlines said he brines and roasts his family’s Thanksgiving turkey. But, there was one year he experimented with deep-frying. “I think it’s more socially acceptable now and it’s sort of impressive,” he said of men tackling the main bird.
Another company, Char-Broil, which has had an oil-less infared turkey “fryer” for six years, opened up its own Thanksgiving helpline three years ago. “We field thousands of calls each year and overwhelmingly, the callers are male,” a company spokesperson said via email.
“A lot of guys will roast or grill the Thanksgiving turkey,” said Mike Kempster, chief marketing officer of Weber-Stephen Products.
Between 18 percent and 20 percent of American families cook their turkeys on a grill, according to Kempster. The rest of the year, about two-thirds of grilling is done by men, and callers to Weber’s helpline during the days leading up to and on Thanksgiving are “predominantly” men, he said.
“When we hear this in focus groups, guys say, ‘Well, it’s kind of a way to give back to my family or take some of the workload off my spouse at Thanksgiving,’” Kempster said.
While using a giant turkey fryer also remains popular this year, so do injuries resulting from unsafe use of them. Some safety advice to follow, according to 7 News Miami, would be “Use it away from your house. Make a surface made out of pavers or gravel in case the oil were to spill,” said Fire Rescue Lt. Arnold Piedrahita. “Do not let anyone but the person frying the turkey to get near the turkey fryer … kids, pets, your buddies coming over.”
“Oil gets over 350 degrees. Remember this is peanut oil, it’s meant to cook at extremely high temperatures. You can only imagine what 350 degrees hot cooking oil can do to the human skin.” he added.
Farrah Fawcett left behind an Andy Warhol painting of herself, which is valued at anywhere between $600,000 and $10 million.
The portrait was painted from a Polaroid picture Warhol took of the actress in 1980. He gave her red lips and green eyes, but other than that, it is colorless.
The question that will soon be decided in court, is who does it belong to, according to ABC.
Fawcett’s long-time love, Ryan O’Neal, the man she had a relationship with for over 30 years, says that the portrait was his. He says that he brought it to her house so that the salty sea air at his beach property wouldn’t ruin the valuable art work.
O’Neal has countersued the University for the return of a napkin that Andy Warhol drew hearts on for Farrah Fawcett.
“It is a precious memento of his life with Ms. Fawcett, the love of his life, with whom he was romantically involved for 30 years up until the time of her death,” O’Neal’s lawyers wrote in a trial brief. “Because O’Neal’s Warhol portrait is an heirloom, he never intends to, nor will sell it.”
On the other side, her alma matter, the University of Texas at Austin claims that the portrait was given to them in her will, and should hang beside the other one they have from her, at the University. They also claim that Ryan O’Neal wrongly removed the painting, which was one of the main attractions in a 2011 exhibit on portraiture at UT’s Blanton Museum of Art, from her condo after her death.
“We simply want to honor and respect the charitable intent and wishes of Farrah Fawcett,” UT’s Vice Chancellor for External Relations Randa S. Safady wrote in a statement. “It is indisputable that in Ms. Fawcett’s living trust, she named the University of Texas at Austin as the sole beneficiary of all of her works of art, including artwork she created and all objects of art that she owned, for charitable purposes.”
Jury selection will begin this week. Jurors will hear evidence concerning Ryan O’Neal’s relationship to Fawcett, as well as his friendship with Andy Warhol. They could also possibly hear testimony from Fawcett’s “Charlie’s Angels” co-star, Jaclyn Smith. They will hear testimony of Fawcett’s final wishes, as well, which reportedly state that she wanted the portrait to go to the school.
The trial will start Wednesday, when attorneys will begin arguing over which evidence should be admitted into court, and is expected to last two weeks.
If you were alive in the 90s, you most likely owned the “Nirvana: Unplugged” CD, and burned it out. It was amazing and the show on MTV was even better, in fact, it was probably the iconic show for the series.
Well, not to make us feel old or anything, but this week will mark the 20th anniversary of that taping, which took place Sony Studios in New York on Nov. 18, 1993. With that acknowledgement, comes inside stories about how that taping almost never happened, as well as some behind the scenes issues that could have led to disaster, according to Yahoo.
First, when MTV producers received the set list they saw, to their dismay, that Nirvana didn’t intend to play any of their biggest hits, namely “Smells Like Teen Spirit”, except for “Come As You Are”. On the list was an unnerving list of obscure covers, and freaking out commenced.
“We got a setlist out of the band, and other than ‘Come As You Are,’ there are no real Nirvana hits,” producer Alex Coletti remembered. “I wish Kurt or someone in the band or management clued us into ‘We put thought into this, this works this way, trust us.’ Instead it was just [defiantly] ‘This is what we’re doing.’…Not being familiar with some of the covers, some of the people here became very tense about ‘We’ve got to get them to do more hits.’”
Kurt Cobain, himself, almost did the infamous show in on the day before, suddenly informing staff that he was pulling the plug on the taping. “He did it just to get us worked up. He enjoyed that power,” MTV’s Amy Finnerty said.
He was also wracked with physical pain caused by his heroin withdrawals. “The morning of Unplugged, Kurt spent an hour filling out a physician’s questionaire on his eating habits,” Cross said. He added that Cobain had been “vomiting bile and blood.”
The panic grew when the idea was floated that perhaps someone should get some “medicine” for Cobain. Finnerty revealed to Cross, “They told me that ‘he’s not going to make it on the show if we don’t help him out.’ And I was like, ‘I’ve never done heroin, and I don’t know where to find it.’”
Luckily he was able to make it through the night with just Valium, but he just made it to the end, no further. Forget the encore. Coletti had everyone else ready to do an encore, “but Kurt just wasn’t into it. I was just doing my job for MTV at that point, trying to get that one extra song in the can, to see if the night could produce one more gem. The pleading went on for about five minutes. Finally Kurt said, ‘I can’t top that last song’ [a cover of Leadbelly’s morbid folk song ‘Where Did You Sleep Last Night’]. And when he said that, I backed off. ‘Cause I knew he was right.”
Finnerty felt the same way: “When you saw the sight of his face brefore the last note, it was almost as if it was the last breath of life in him.”
There was also serious tension between band members, well, Dave Grohl to be exact. His drumming was not good enough for Cobain leading up to the show, and tempers were hot.
“I had this small cocktail drum set and these really light sticks,” Grohl recalled, “In rehearsal, we would do a song, and Kurt would turn to me and say, ‘Hey, do you think you could play it a little bit lighter?’ ‘Oh yeah, I’ll try.’ So we’d do another take, and he’d turn around and go, ‘Could you bring it down just a little bit more?’ And we’d do another take, and he’d say, ‘You know what, just still, could you bring it down?’ And I was like, ‘Should I even f—ing be here?’”
The day was saved by Coletti, who lent him a set of sizzle sticks as well as brushes, which Grohl had never used in the place of normal drumsticks before. “We ran through a song, and Kurt’s face lit up,” the drummer said, “Those sticks saved the entire show.”
The finished product was an incredibly memorable show, where everything came off without any bumps or even any re-dos. Dave Grohl said about “Unplugged”, “We’d seen a lot of other bands do Unplugged tapings, and what they’d done was basically rock out the songs as if they were playing electric instruments. They didn’t do anything to change the songs; they just basically plugged in acoustic guitars instead of electric ones. There was no way we were going to try to pull off ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ with f—ing acoustic guitars. It wouldn’t work…I think Kurt wanted to bring it down to just the lowest, most dirge-like, Leonard Cohen level, which was really fun. I think that’s what made it so special; it wasn’t just acoustic versions of Nevermind.”
The show is as iconic to our generation as witnessing “The Beatles” on “The Ed Sullivan Show” was to our parents. Kurt Cobain took his own life just a few months later on April 5th, 1994. After that, MTV staff couldn’t help but recall how the set, requested by Cobain, had the aura of a funeral.
“He did specify that he wanted star lilies, which are these big, white flowers,” Coletti said in 1995. Along with the candles and heavy drapes, made for a sort of morbid backdrop. When Coletti asked Kurt if he really wanted it to look like a funeral, he answered, “Yeah.”
Coletti added, “I don’t want to read too much into it, but that memory sure spooked me out a [few] months later.”
Angelina Jolie was honored late last night at the Governor’s Awards with a Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award, which is identical to an oscar, for her humanitarian work, according to AFP. She has travelled around the world on over 40 missions since 2012 in her role as special envoy for the United Nations Refugee Agency.
“It was only when I began to travel that I understood my responsibility to others.”, she said of her experiences on foreign grounds.
The poverty and suffering she saw all around her in other countries made her grateful for what she has, and made her want to do all she could to make a difference.
“When I met survivors of wars and famine, and rape, I learned what life is like for most people in this world and how fortunate I was to have food to eat, a roof above my head, a safe place to live and the joy of having my family safe and healthy,” she said.
The actress became emotional as she thanked her late mother, Marcheline Bertrand, for setting an example for her to always think of others and to give back, according to the AP. “To stand here today means I did as she asked,” Jolie said. “And if she were alive, she’d be very proud.”
As reported by E!, She also thanked her husband-to-be, Brad Pitt, “My love. Your support and your guidance make everything I do possible.”
She didn’t leave out their brood of adorable kids, and oldest son Maddox, 12, accompanied his parents to the awards. “I’m not going to cry, I promise,” Jolie said to Maddox from the stage. “I’m not going to embarrass you. You and your brothers and sisters are my happiness and there is no greater honor in this world than being your mom.”
Apparently, Taylor Swift’s performance at Wednesday’s Victoria Secret fashion show at the Lexington Armory in NYC wasn’t enjoyed by everyone. Although Swift has declared that she is now BFF with some of the shows top models, like Lily Aldridge, Erin Heatherton and Cara Delevingne, there is one model who is just…not impressed.
When Jessica Hart was asked what she thought about Swift’s performance at the Victoria’s Secret show, she said, “I think, you know what, god bless her [Taylor Swift] heart. I think she’s great,” Hart said at the show’s afterparty. “But, I don’t know, to me, she didn’t fit. I don’t know if I should say that.”
Um, probably not.
Well, at least Swift seemed to have a really great time with her model friends at the show. She had fun taking silly selfies with new BFF, model Cara Delevingne, who also previously dated the singer’s ex Harry Styles. The two exchanged a friendly butt-slap on stage, as well, to seal their new friendship.
It’s a good thing Taylor has other friends in the industry, according to Us Magazine. Take Karlie Kross for example, a 21-year-old Angel gushed to Us magazine that, “she and I need to be best friends! I think she’s the coolest young girl. She a great role model and I love her music.”
Lily Aldridge was of the same opinion and gushed about Swift, “We had a little moment at the end of her song ‘Trouble,’ where we walked in front of the stage together,” the 28-year-old supermodel said of the singer. “[Taylor] is one of my best friends, so we had so much fun.”
Hart doesn’t think that Swift fits into their world, however, and wasn’t afraid to say that either. When she was asked if she thought Taylor could be a Victoria’s Secret Model, she simply replied, “No.”
She added, “I think what you find is that for a lot of us, we’ve been working for 14, 15 years. What it takes to make it here comes from experience and confidence and knowing how to be confident with yourself,” she explained. “I think it comes with age. It’s definitely the benchmark of all jobs.”
Camille Grammer, “Real Housewives” star and cancer survivor opened up on Thursday’s episode of Dr. Oz about her radical hysterectomy on October 11th, according to ABC.
“It’s been four weeks today, a month ago. I’m feeling great,” Grammer said. “I have to say once in a while I’ll get a little pain here and there, but I’m walking around. I was able to go trick-or-treating with my kids and my life is moving forward and I’m feeling very well.”
Her healing is obviously going well, but anytime a person finds out they have cancer, that can really be an emotional and detrimental moment. When asked about the moment she found out that she had cancer, Grammer said, “My heart sank. You know, you think about your children, am I gonna make it, I want to be alive for them. I want to see my daughter get married, I want to see my son get married, graduate high school, college.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6yUhuvhRK4
However, in the midst of all this talk of serious issues going on in her life, including the restraining order she recently had to obtain against ex-boyfriend Dimitri Charalambopoulos for alleged physical abuse, Camille took the time to make sure and get in a quick jab at ex-husband Kelsey Grammer, regarding their two children together,
“My ex-husband hasn’t seen the kids since July, so I’m mom. I’m there. So I really needed to be here for them. My son doesn’t really understand it that well, but my daughter said, Mom, I’m so glad you’re getting surgery ’cause then the cancer’s gonna be all gone.”
According to Reality TV magazine, his rep replied to the gut-punch, and explained that Camille “neglected to say that Kelsey was filming out of the country” during the that time, and then added, “Also, Kelsey does not wish to be drawn into commenting on their personal life in a public forum.”
“The Killing” has been killed twice, and refuses to die. Netflix has now ordered the fourth and final season, to be aired only on its streaming service, with Veena Sud returning as the show’s executive producer, according to NBC.
The Popular AMC show has quite the following and since its premiere in 2011, has been a fan favorite. The third season debuted to 1.8 million viewers, while the finale brought in 1.5 million viewers. The show is based on the Danish show, “Forbrydelsen”. It chronicles murder investigations, which are led by homicide detectives Sarah Linden (Enos) and Stephen Holder (Kinnaman).
“It’s a true testament to The Killing creator Veena Sud, and the stellar cast led so compellingly by Mireille Enos and Joel Kinnaman, that fans remained so passionate about the show, ” Fox TV Studios president David Madden said. “We’re gratified that our partners at Netflix recognized this.”
The show’s first two seasons were based around the murder of a teenage girl, and the third revolved around a series of murders that involved one of the older cases of Detective Linden’s.
Now fans can have some closure! The show was initially canceled after two seasons on AMC. Then, this year Netflix entered an agreement with Fox Television Studios to offer the murder drama to its members, but three months after it aired on AMC. This gave the network and studio a financial carrot to continue the series.
Then, in September, AMC announced that “The Killling” was canceled again, leaving fans in the lurch. A premiere date has yet to be announced, but Netflix has assured that all six episodes will be available immediately following the premiere, according to E!.
“The rich, serialized storytelling in The Killing thrives on Netflix, and we believe that it is only fitting to give Sarah Linden (Mireille Enos) and Stephen Holder (Joel Kinnaman) a proper send off,” Cindy Holland, vice president of original content for Netflix, said. “We are looking forward to offering fans—both existing and new—a series that we know is perfectly suited for on-demand viewing.”
John Stewart is in deep (dish) trouble in Chicago. After his Chicago-focused rant on Wednesday night’s “Daily Show“, he may have lost numerous viewers from the Windy City. His rant was in response to the anger surrounding the decision to name the new One World Trade Center the tallest building in America, over the current title holder, Chicago’s Willis Tower, according to CBS.
Stewart’s rant lasted over 6 minutes and made fun of Chicago’s homicide rate, Chicago’s weather and Chicago style hot dogs, but in all fairness, Chicago started it, according to the New York Post, by going and insulting New York’s famous thin crust pizza. Watch the hilarious ranting:
He began his rant by insulting Chicago’s famous deep dish pizza. “Deep dish pizza is not only not better than New York pizza, it’s not pizza.” It went downhill from there. He called it “[expletive] casserole,” “a cornbread biscuit,” and “tomato soup in a bread bowl.”
Nice. Unfortunately, it doesn’t stop there. There’s also this wordy jewel, “When I look at your deep dish (expletive) pizza, I don’t know whether to eat it or throw a coin in it and make a wish,” Stewart said. “And if I made a wish, it would be that I’d wish for some real (expletive) pizza.”
He screams, “It’s a cornbread biscuit which you’ve melted cheese on and then — in defiance of God and man and all things holy — you poured uncooked marinara sauce atop the cheese. Atop! The sauce, naked, cold on display like some sort of sauce whore!”
In response to Stewart’s rant, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel had a little jab of his own.
Theodore P, Wafer, the suburban Detroit homeowner who shot 19-year-old Renisha McBride, has now formally been charged with 2nd degree murder and manslaughter. He shot Renisha in the face while she was on his front porch two weeks ago.
She crashed her car into a nearby vehicle and her parents said she was probably trying to find help at the homes on that street. Toxicology reports said that she had a blood alcohol level of 0.22, which is twice the legal limit, and also tested positive for marijuana, according to AP.
“I can’t imagine what that man feared from her. I would like to know why,” Renisha’s mother, Monica McBride said during a news conference at a Southfield hotel an hour after Wafer was arraigned. Under a 2006 Michigan law, a homeowner has the right to use force during a break-in, but that person must show that his or her life was in danger.
Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy said that evidence shows McBride knocked on the locked screen door. There was no forced entry. Wafer fired through “the closed and locked screen door”.
“We do not believe he acted in lawful self-defense,” she added.
One of Wafer’s lawyers, Matt Carpenter told the judge his “client has a very strong defense.” When questioned about just what that defense would be, Carpenter said, “Because of the time, her condition.”
The discussion now is whether or not this was a hate crime, since Wafer is white and McBride was black. Renisha’s parents are hestitant to call it a crime based on race. “We didn’t want to make this a racial situation. We didn’t want to inflame anybody,” family attorney Gerald Thurswell said. “The family is not taking a position that this is black or white. You don’t take a gun and shoot somebody because there’s a noise outside.”
Civil rights groups, including the NAACP and the National Action Network, including the Rev. Al Sharpton are all over it, and have held numerous rallies and vigils since the shooting. Protesters have continually compared the case to the death of Trayvon Martin, but whether or not it will be tried as a hate crime remains to be seen.
There is a difference between the Martin Case and this one, according to ABC. Trayvon Marting was tracked down and there was a fight, which ended in Martin’s death at the hands of George Zimmerman. In this case, there doesn’t seem to have been any physical contact made at all.
The Detroit branch of the NAACP made a statement that said, “Often, many of us are very anxious and impatient when it comes to justice being equally applied in every situation. This particular case had the appearance that it might have been headed down the same road. While no trial has been held, and Mr. Wafer has yet to be brought before the court, anxiety is still high as the jury is still a long way out.”
Times have changed for the Secret Service since the ill-fated day of November 22, 1963, when John F. Kennedy was shot. Riding in the back of a convertible is absolutely unthinkable these days, after numerous assassination attempts since JFK have made it impossible for a president, or even a candidate, to be unprotected during appearances.
When Kennedy was shot, his bodyguards were powerless to help him, according to Yahoo. There was nothing they could do. “It isn’t something that we’re marking. It wasn’t a good day for us or for the country,” Secret Service spokesman Brian Leary said. “It was a dark day.”
That “dark day” began round after round of changes in order to do the absolute most that the Secret Service could do to protect our country’s leader. It began with JFK. After his assassination, there were obviously no more convertibles. As the years went by, and Robert Kennedy was killed, followed by an attempt on President Reagan, things have become very, very different for the Secret Service.
Now, Obama rides around in a limousine-shaped fortress, called “The Beast” that is reportedly outfitted with its own oxygen supply, as well as blood transfusion supplies. Just in case. The fuel tank is sealed in foam so that it won’t explode. It’s also sealed against biological or chemical attack and the doors weigh as much as those on a Boeing 757!
“The Beast” is never alone. There can be dozens of vehicles in the presidential motorcade, and the arrangement changes all the time, depending on the Secret Services perceived threat. He could be absent from the motorcade altogether, in a helicopter above, for example.
Of course, there are times when a president just wants to step out and wave to the people, like Obama did on Inauguration day in January. A past member of the Secret Service said their “collective blood pressure spikes” during those surprise moments.
Adam Levine was in the front row at the Victoria’s Secret Fashion show on Wednesday to support his fiancee, Nambian model Behati Prinsloo. He sat with a group of friends who were more than happy to cheer their buddy’s girl down the runway. A witness told Us Weekly that “stood and cheered for Behati when she walked by.”
“He was a proud fiance,” the onlooker blabbed. “They were the only group going really crazy for any model. Behati would look over and blow him a kiss.”
Prinsloo walked the runway twice, both times throwing her cheering section giddy smiles and blowing kisses. On her final walk, leading the “Snow Angels” procession in a tiny, sparkly getup and gigantic angel wings, Levine and his group gave her the standing ovation, according to People.
This is strangely similar to a scene just two years ago, when Levine was present at the show, but a little more involved and in support of his now ex-girlfriend, model Anne Vyalitsyna. His band, Maroon 5 performed their hit song “Moves Like Jagger”. Then Levine walked Vyalitsyna down the runway. The two held hands, then Levine even gave her a peck on the cheek onstage. Awww.
But, Alas! It was not meant to be. Vyalitsyna said in a statement in April of 2012, “Adam and I have decided to separate in an amicable and supportive manner. We still love and respect each other as friends. I wish him all the best.”
But a source later confided to Us Weekly that their split wasn’t as amicable as she made it out to be. “Adam’s heartbroken. He wasn’t even fully sure they were really broken up.”
He was quick to move on, however, and ended up with Prinsloo the next month, and despite a quick split after a year, they became engaged over the summer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3ugwBJRACM
“We’re just very excited to start a new chapter.” Said Prinsloo, who said she hasn’t made any wedding plans just yet.
A reform document released by China’s Communist party, after a four day-long meeting of its top officials, includes a flood of sweeping changes to reportedly attempt to undo decades of failed expansion plans, according to Reuters.
Among the reform plans are allowances that would accelerate capital account convertibility and scrap residency restrictions in small cities and townships. There are also plans to integrate urban and rural social security systems and to move ahead with a long over-due environmental tax.
Keith Bowman, equity analysts at Hargreaves Lansdown, thinks this is at least a great start for China. “Whilst further assessment and detail is needed, the policy moves on the surface appear to be a sizeable step in the right direction. Any actions which aid the domestic Chinese economy and therefore help re-balance the global economy should be welcomed with open arms.”
One of the more surprising elements of the reform, include changes to China’s strict family planning policies, according to a previous report from Reuters. Up until now, parents were only allowed to have one child. They could have a second child if both parents were only children. Now, under the new reforms, only one parent has to be an only child in order to have a second child.
Another unexpected area of reform is the abolition of China’s Labor Camp system. The system was set up in order to provide “education through labor” and also to reduce the number of crimes that were considered punishable by death.
One of the major goals with these reforms is a shift in China’s economy. The party is hoping to transition the main feeders of their economy away from imports and investments, and toward services and consumption.
These announcement come just hours after a major change in China’s leadership, as reported by the New York Times. The new leadership is now headed by Xi Jinping, who is the son of nationally respected revolutionary leader and reformer, Xi Zhongxun. Xi Jinping has also assumed the chairmanship of the 12-member Central Military Commission.
Time will tell how all of these changes will affect China, as well as the rest of the world.
There has been much debate about whether or not cursive writing is still relevant in the digital age. Some supporters of the Common Core curriculum say that with the small amount of time in classrooms and higher testing standards than ever, that cursive is just something that needs to go in order to lighten the weight.
However, there are many who say that cursive is necessary. Cursive handwriting used to be thought of as a sign of intellect, education, and eloquence. Advocates, such as Linden Bateman, State Representative from Idaho, contend that cursive has proven necessary to good brain function. “Modern research indicates that more areas of the human brain are engaged when children use cursive handwriting than when they keyboard. We’re not thinking this through. It’s beyond belief to me that states have allowed cursive to slip from the standards.”
“The Constitution of the United States is written in cursive. Think about that,” Bateman said. Bateman, himself, habitually handwrites 125 beautiful letters each year.
This has become quite the consideration according to the Huffington Post. The Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and Bill of Rights are all written in cursive. Not that the Constitution hasn’t already been trampled, but these are supposed to be the documents that we are supposed to live by everyday. Future generations will only be able to read transcripts of these documents, and the awe and inspiration of the originals will be lost on them.
Now, seven states, California, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Massachusetts, North Carolina and Utah, have made it known that they are going to keep the cursive requirement, according to AP. This, along with the renewed requirement for students to memorize multiplication tables, is part of a growing “back to basics” movement.
Scholars argue that if cursive is allowed to fall by the wayside, their successors in the coming generations won’t be able to read or translate valuable documents, letters or journals from the generations before. A link could be broken.
Cursive is also touted as being helpful to the creative process. Kristen Purcell is an associate director for research at Pew’s Internet & American Life Project. She said fellow researchers found it shocking that 94 percent of the 2,462 Advanced Placement and National Writing Project teachers that were surveyed said they “encourage their students to do at least some of their writing by hand.”
The reasons for this, the teachers said, were that most standardized tests are still in paper-and-pencil format, and also teachers believe that having students write by hand helps them slow down their thinking. It also encourages deeper and better thinking.
Perhaps some deeper and better thinking is in order for those of us who have grown up learning cursive just like the generations before. Is it really unnecessary and dispensible, a waste of time?
Demi Lovato has been in the spotlight since leaving the Jonas Brothers Live in Concert tour to go to rehab in 2010, and not for much that is positive. But now that the singer has come back to the land of the living after great struggle, she’s ready to tell her story, according to Us Weekly. Not just because she will profit from it, but so she may be able to help someone who is struggling with similar issues.
While many young stars have taken the low road, and declared that they “are not a role model”, in order to do whatever they want and not care…you know who I’m talking about….Demi has taken a higher and more difficult road. She has come out of some very rough times, dealing with issues like cutting, drug use, and bipolar disorder. She is hoping to use her experience to help others, and to actually be a role model.
“I used to say that too,” she said, according to Entertainment Weekly. “That was my excuse to do whatever the f— I wanted and not give a s— about what other people thought. Then I ended up going through some stuff. I realized I’m never going to escape the fact that I’m in the public eye, so I might as well do the best I can.”
Lovato’s struggle, unlike other Disney veterans, was happening while she was still working for Disney. In fact, she was in the middle of a star role in the network’s show, “Sonny with a Chance”, when she went into rehab. She thought her career was over, but when she came out of rehab, she was surprised to find fans that were as dedicated and supportive as ever.
She has since written a book full of daily affirmations called “Staying Strong: 365 Days a Year”, which goes on sale November 19th. She has also signed a deal to write a tell-all about her experience growing up Disney, but is not sure if “tell-all” is the right way to go. “I’m battling with internal thoughts on how honest I should be,” she said. “Yes, I’ve been very honest, but if people really knew how dark and deep my struggles got — not just with my eating disorder but with drugs and alcohol — they’d be really shocked. But I’ll most likely end up saying everything. Maybe it’ll help other people in the industry who are headed down the wrong path.”
Now that she has broken the destructive mold of what seems to be the normal pattern for child stars, she has high hopes to make some really big changes. “I want to be a director, and I want to pass bills in Congress about bullying. I really, really want to have my own talk show one day — be the next Oprah. I really do want to save the world. I know that’s kind of impossible, but I’m striving for it.”
What come next for Lavato may be a mystery right now, but if she has it her way, she will give back to those who have supported her all these turbulent years. Good for her.
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