text:
You couldn’t make this one up. A 12-year-old girl goes on a hit Russian matchmaking program to help her divorced father find a new wife, but ends up being bullied by the show’s hosts. When she stands up for herself online, the teenager finds herself battling not only Russia’s largest state TV network, but YouTube.

This is what happened to Anastasia (she didn’t want her last name broadcast) when she appeared on “Let’s Get Married,” triggering a David vs. Goliath-style struggle over how rules designed to protect content producers are increasingly being abused to silence free expression.

The popular dating show, broadcast on Russia’s Channel One, employs tricks familiar to daytime TV viewers in the West: intimidating speed rounds of questioning, dramatic reveals of exes and estranged family members, and tearful confessions, in front of a live studio audience.

[]
After filming was over, producers released a social media trailer for the program, with one host calling Anastasia “hooorrible” in the comments below
Three female hosts — one of them an astrologer — grill each contestant after they’ve been introduced to the potential spouses selected for them, on a set ringed with mock Greek columns. It’s not unusual for the children of the romantic hopefuls to be included in the mix too.

But when Anastasia appeared on the show, she was the first to face off with the hosts, with her father left waiting backstage. Wearing a white dress approved by the producers, she arrived on set carrying a bouquet of roses for each host, as they had rehearsed beforehand. But the teenager says after that, things went totally off script.

Instead of asking the questions she had practiced with producers, the hosts gave Anastasia a verbal roughing up. They interrogated her about her father’s “sea of girlfriends,” ridiculed her for declining to share her birth month with the astrologist, and lectured her on how to be respectful — after repeatedly interrupting her.

In the version that was broadcast, the 12-year-old was on her own for more than 10 minutes before her father was finally brought on. And even then, the bullying continued. One host, Larisa Guzeeva, told Anastasia she was “ten times more frightening than any mother-in-law,” before telling her father that his daughter was “totally insincere.”

It was an experience that would have reduced many people to tears, but she kept her cool on set — a sign of the determination she would show later on. But the producers hadn’t finished with her. After filming was over, they released a social media trailer for the program, with the host Guzeeva calling Anastasia “hooorrible” in the comments below.

When the show aired, she saw that they added a soundtrack called “Twisted Horror” to the sections when she appears, as if “I’m some kind of monster.” And the teenager then started attracting bullying posts online.

[]
“They wanted to silence my voice,” 12-year-old Anastasia
But Anastasia tore up the script once more, surprising the program makers by fighting back. They “assured me that everything would go well,” she said in an interview. “I didn’t sign up to be abused or humiliated.” With her father’s help, she launched a video campaign on YouTube and social media, calling for an end to hate speech on Russian television. And she gave as good as she had gotten in the studio.

“Advocating physical assault against children on Russia’s main government TV channel — is this normal?” read one of her tweets, tagging the Russian government, parliament and state prosecutor’s office, and demanding that they shut down “Let’s Get Married.”

Clearly rattled by the teenager’s campaign, the Russian state broadcasting giant responded by accusing her of violating its copyright, because she had used clips from “Let’s Get Married” in her videos. That led YouTube to take her videos down, and give her “two strikes,” according to its rules. One more, and her newly-minted “Respect on TV” channel would be deleted entirely.

“The fact that they blocked my video and tried to silence my voice of course shows that I hit them where it hurts,” said Anastasia, saying that she was sure she had complied with YouTube’s “fair use” terms after studying them online. “I wanted to show them the power of the internet,” she added. And after weeks of dispute with the video-sharing giant, her material was restored last week.

The program has not made clear why it decided to target the teenager in this way. The producers did not respond to requests for comment. But host Larissa Guzeeva was recently quoted attacking Anastasia’s motives. “The girl wants to become famous in any way,” she told Russia’s state news agency, before suggesting that the authorities “find out what’s wrong with the father and mother.”

In Anastasia, though, Russia’s state broadcasting behemoth may have met its match.

question: How did the hosts rough up Anastasia?

answer: They failed to ask her the questions that she had prepared. They also ridiculed her, interrupting her repeatedly and lecturing her on how to be respectful. One host also insulted her to her father.

question: What was Anastasia's reaction to their bullying?

answer: She launched a video and social media campaign calling for an end to bullying on Russian television. She tagged government departments, demanding that they shut down the program.


split: train

text:
Excerpts’ from “The Journal”

This is one of the journal entries from a book called “The Journal”.

Let me know what you think........

::

January 10th 7:55 am

It’s snowing. Still the first one here. I hate the snow. It took me 2 hours to drive to work and I smoked all my cigarettes. My head hurts. I have had the same head ache for 6 months. It seems to only go away when I am drunk or high. I remember a time in my life when I loved the snow. I was born in February, so snow was always reminded me of my birthday and that was exciting. I hate my birthday now too. I need more cigarettes.
I think it is the craziest shit in the world to go to work and pretend to be happy or excited to be there; when you are dying inside. If people acted the way they felt, everyone would fucking hate everybody. I hate the background noise of casual conversation. Who cares about your weekend, you’re probably telling me a lie about what you did anyway; so that you can think that I still respect you. If I told you the truth about what I did this weekend, you would think I’m fucking nuts. I can just imagine that conversation with these Midwest jerkoffs. “Oh, hey Bob, how was your weekend”? “Good, just relaxing, how ‘bout yours”? “Good, you know, the usual, got piss drunk wasted, blew coke in a bar’s bathroom until my nose was clogged and then spent Sunday masturbating in between throwing up”. Fuck these people. We have nothing in common. I am constantly acting. It’s hard not to curse.
I love coffee. I love coffee with cigarettes. I sometimes day dream about how awesome it was when you could smoke at your desk and basically anywhere you wanted. I have an old Playboy that shows add for TWA, where the hot stewardess is lighting the business man’s cigarette. That is awesome. But, I still think its ass backwards to smoke indoors. I hate the way you stink the next day after going to a bar that lets you smoke inside. It also seems to bring in the morons. I hate bar games. You can still smoke inside in my home town.  I hate my home town.
My dogs will probably shit inside my house today; they won’t go in the snow. They are good dogs though. We got them from the pound and they were abused as puppies. They have little scares on their feet from their cages at the puppy mills. What kind of soulless piece of trash do you have to be to abuse a fucking puppy? They were a gift to my fiancé.
We are getting married in September and moving to LA the first of the year. This is all I think about. I can’t wait to get out of here. I once planned to move there, but chickened out because I had to do it alone. Pussy. Now I have her and she wants to move there too, so it’s perfect. I don’t care if I have to be a bartender; at least it’s not here. At least there is some fucking culture and life and art and something to do besides, drink yourself to death every fucking weekend.  I am excited for every moment of our move; from the house hunting, to packing our shit, the drive, the hotels, the adventure. That is what life is about. Not this day-to-day Midwest bullshit, I suffer through. I am done playing this fucking corporate shit. I am successful, but fuck it, I hate it. People with any talent don't live here. I can’t stand anything about living here. The way people talk, the way people act, the fact that everyone is a grossly obese and no one seems to notice how fucking ridiculous that is. When the fuck did everyone become so fucking fat and stupid. I sometime wish I was stupid. That would be an easier road.
Someone just showed up. There goes my morning. fuck this.

title: The jounral of a someone

question: Who shows up at the end of the story?

answer: Presumably one of the narrator's coworkers.

question: What is the cause of the narrator's headache?

answer: Their headache seems to stem from their general displeasure with the monotonoy of their life.


text:
Racism properly belongs in a galaxy long, long ago and far, far away, especially since the “Star Wars” universe features humans, Gungans, Droids, Ewoks and Wookiees.

However, some racists are drawing the line at Asians and are having a hard time dealing with the fact that Vietnamese-American actress Kelly Marie Tran is starring in scenes of the film “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” as Rose Tico.

Last week, someone changed the Rose Tico page on the “Star Wars”-oriented Wookieepedia website to feature a character description that can only be described as flat out racist.

The page text has since been changed back to the original character description, but the screenshot below shows the offensive entry, which includes changing the character’s name to “Ching Chong Wing Tong” and referring to her as “stupid, autistic and retarded.”

Screenshot

FANDOM, the company behind the page, has removed the vandalism and closed off the Rose Tico page from further editing.

In addition, the person who posted the offensive entry has been banned from using Wookieepediaor any other FANDOM wikis, according to Newsweek.

“FANDOM has a zero tolerance policy for vandalism, inclusive of racism and harassment,” the company told Newsweek. “The wiki admins take this very seriously and took the steps to resolve this situation as quickly as possible, including escalation to our team, and subsequent lockdown. This lockdown will remain for the foreseeable future and we will be closely monitoring activity on this wiki.”

There has also been racist trolling of Tran on Twitter, including alt-right internet personality Paul Ray Ramsey who attempted to make fun of the actress’ body with this tweet.

  — RAMZPAUL (@ramzpaul) December 19, 2017

Ramsey’s nastiness inspired other comments of the same ilk. However, other fans were quick to call out the racism.

  While she’s counting all the bank she’s just made, you’ll still be jerking off to your box set of Frazier. The white fragility is too real. 😂😂😂 pic.twitter.com/tVRRBCa67U

  — HARUTO (@LimoJohnson) December 20, 2017

  Hello sir. You are a shithead.

  — Jon 🏒 (@28Loki) December 20, 2017

  You actually could have won the role of Snoke without having to wear makeup.

  — Raymondovitch 🐘 (@boredonliner) December 20, 2017

Tran is the first woman of color to play a leading role in a “Star Wars” movie. Most fans of the series are enjoying her performance as she discovered recently when she overheard a few talking about her character. She talked about the kind comments on Instagram.

question: Which movie is Kelly Marie Tran starring in?

answer: Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

question: Who is the person behind the offensive post?

answer: This information can't be found.

question: What role is Marie playing in the movie?

answer: She is playing the role of Rose Tico.

question: Did the post follow a public roar against the racist comments?

answer: While some people participated in trolling the actress on Twitter along with Paul Ray Ramsey, others were quick to call out the racism.

question: Write a ~5 sentence summary.

answer:
As the Vietnamese-American actress, Kelly Marie Tran plays the role of Rose Tico in Star Wars: The Last Jedi, some people have passed racist comments. A character description of Rose Tico on the Wookieepedia paged has been changed to something that is outright racist.

The company behind the page, FANDOM, has banned the person who posted the comment from using any of their FANDOM wikis. The company has also proclaimed that their admins took serious steps to resolve the situation.

Tran is the first woman of color to play a leading role in a Star Wars movie.


text:
MARCEL ANTOINE LIHAU or EBUA LIBANA LA MOLENGO LIHAU (29 September 1931 – 9April 1999) was a Congolese jurist, law professor and politician who served as the inaugural First President of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Congo from 1968 until 1975 and was involved in the creation of two functional constitutions for the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Lihau attended the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium with the help of sympathetic Jesuit educators, becoming one of the first Congolese to study law. While there he encouraged Congolese politicians to form an alliance that allowed them to secure the independence of the Congo from Belgium. He served briefly as a justice official and negotiator for the Congolese central government before being appointed to lead a commission to draft a permanent national constitution. He was made dean of law faculty at Lovanium University in 1963. The following year he helped deliver the Luluabourg Constitution to the Congolese, which was adopted by referendum.

In 1965, Joseph-Desiré Mobutu seized total control of the country and directed Lihau to produce a new constitution. Three years later Lihau was appointed First President of the new Supreme Court of Justice of the Congo. He retained the position, advocating for judicial independence, until 1975 when he refused to force a harsh sentence upon student protesters. Lihau was summarily removed from his post by Mobutu and placed under house arrest. Becoming increasingly opposed to the government, he helped found the reform-oriented Union pour la Démocratie et le Progrès Social. Mobutu responded by suspending his rights and banishing him to a rural village.

His health in decline, Lihau sought refuge from political persecution in the United States in 1985, accepting a job as a professor of constitutional law at Harvard University. He continued to advocate for democracy in the Congo and returned to the country in 1990 to discuss political reform. He went back to the United States to seek medical treatment and died there in 1999.

Early life and education

[Jesuit mission in Kisantu, where Lihau received some of his tertiary education|left] Marcel Lihau was born on 29 September 1931 in Bumba, Équateur Province, Belgian Congo,[1] the eldest of eight children.[2] After his secondary education at the Bolongo seminary, he attended the Jesuit University Centre in Kisantu, graduating from the school's administrative sciences division. One of Lihau's teachers, sociologist Willy De Craemer, resolved to help him enroll in the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium, a school mostly unavailable to Congolese. To do this, De Craemer tutored him in Latin, Greek, and Flemish so he could take the Jury Central entrance exam. Lihau passed the test with a high score and was admitted to the university. Since it was his goal to study law (not permitted to Congolese students at the time), De Craemer and several sympathetic Jesuit educators arranged for Lihau to take the necessary classes under the cover of studying Roman philology. He also studied economics and philosophy. For the duration of his studies he stayed with the family of a former director of Radio Léopoldville, Karel Theunissen. Lihau served as president of the small Congolese-Ruanda-Urundi students' union in Belgium, Association Générale des Étudiants Congolais en Belgique (AGEC).

In 1958 a conference of Belgian missionaries was held to discuss expanding tertiary education in the Congo. As an invited speaker, Lihau encouraged Belgian clergy to join the side of Congolese activists and abandon what he referred to as an attitude of “clerical paternalism”. In 1962, after spending time in the Congo, Lihau returned to Louvain to complete his studies. That year restrictions on Congolese education were loosened and Lihau became a Doctor of Philosophy law student.[3] By the following January he had become one of the first Congolese to receive a law degree, earning it with distinction.

Career and political activities

Early activities

On the eve of the Belgo-Congolese Round Table Conference in Brussels in January 1960, Lihau advised the Congolese political delegations to form a “Front Commun”. They did, and the decision significantly strengthened their bargaining position with the Belgian government. Lihau attended the political portion of the conference as an observer on behalf of the AGEC. While there, he presented two papers compiled by the AGEC. The first, entitled “The Congo Before Independence”, led the president of the conference to create one commission to discuss the future of the Congo's political institutions and another to address the upcoming elections. The second paper, entitled “The Internal Political Organisation of the Congo”, compared the merits of Federalism and Unitarianism and proposed that the Congolese adopt one system or the other to ensure the future integrity of their country. Before the conference dissolved, the Front Commun accepted the offer of the independence of the “Republic of the Congo” on 30 June 1960. In April and May, Lihau participated in the conference that addressed the Congo's planned economic transition.

Justice and judicial work

[Lihau (centre left) with President Kasa-Vubu and the College of Commissioners|alt=Lihau (centre left) with President Kasa-Vubu and the College of Commissioners] Shortly after independence, a widespread mutiny in the army and the secession of several provinces resulted in a domestic crisis.[4] In August Lihau met with a UN official in New York who encouraged him to disseminate support of a reconciliation between the central government and the authorities of the rebellious “State of Katanga”. President Joseph Kasa-Vubu dismissed Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba in September 1960 but the latter refused to leave his post, creating a political impasse. In response, Colonel Joseph-Desiré Mobutu launched a coup and displaced the parliamentary system.[5] On 20 September he announced the formation of the “College of Commissioners-General”, a government made up of university students and graduates. Lihau was appointed Commissioner-General of Justice.[6] The college was dissolved on 9February and replaced by a new government under Prime Minister Joseph Iléo. Lihau was made Secretary of State for Justice.[7] During this time he frequently worked with Belgian advisers.[8]

Lihau traveled to Katanga in November 1960 to negotiate with the rebellious province's leaders. He assisted in organising and subsequently took part in the Léopoldville Conference in January 1961 to discuss political compromise and reform. He also participated in the Tananarive Conference in March and the following Coquilhatville Conference in April on behalf of Iléo to try and bring about a reconciliation among the dissident factions in the Congo. As result of the latter conference, Iléo created a commission to prepare a new constitution for the Congo and appointed Lihau to chair it. Lihau played a key role in the drafting process from that point forward. In June he joined Cyrille Adoula and Jean Bolikango in negotiating with the representatives of the Stanleyville government. Their meetings continued into July and resulted in the reconvening of Parliament and the Stanleyville government agreeing to disband. On 2August the Iléo Government was replaced by a new government under Adoula. In January 1963 Lihau was hired to be professor and dean of the faculty of law at Lovanium University (later the National University of Zaire).[9] He encouraged his students to adopt a constitutionalist approach to law.

On 27 November 1963 President Kasa-Vubu announced the formation of a new “Constitutional Commission”. The commission convened on 10 January 1964 in Luluabourg, with Lihau serving as its secretary. A draft was completed by 11 April, but its presentation to the public was delayed as Kasa-Vubu's government and the commission debated over which faction held the prerogative to make revisions. Kasa-Vubu eventually yielded and the constitution was submitted for ratification to the Congolese electorate at the end of June. The “Luluabourg Constitution”, as it was known, was adopted with 80 percent approval. On 26 July Lihau was made a member of the Congolese section of the International Commission of Jurists. In 1965 another period of government paralysis led Mobutu to seize total control of the country. He requested that Lihau draft a new constitution, which was adopted on 24 June 1967.

On 14 August 1968 Lihau was named First President of the new Supreme Court of Justice of the Congo.[10] He was officially installed in the position on 23 November. In his inaugural speech, Lihau requested “the scrupulous respect of all the authorities of the Republic the status of the magistracy guaranteeing independence in the exercise of its functions.” Two years later he became editor of the new law journal _La Revue Congolaise de Droit_ and also served as general delegate to the Office Nationale de la Recherche et du Developpement for its judicial, political, and social research division. Marcel Lihau soon adopted the name Ebua Libana la Molengo Lihau, as per the encouraged Africanisation in accordance with Mobutu's policy of _Authenticité_. As a judge, he believed that the term “law” applied “not only to legislative acts, but also to regulatory acts which are at least not illegal, as well as international treaties and ratified agreements”. In 1971 Lihau was inducted into the executive committee of the state-sanctioned party, Mouvement Populaire de la Révolution (MPR). Three years later he was made a commissioner of its political bureau. That year a new constitution was promulgated that concentrated the government's authority in Mobutu as president. Lihau supported the independence of the judiciary and, despite Mobutu's centralisation, interpreted the document as only veiling such autonomy, not eliminating it. He explained that the constitution's references to the “Judicial Council” (a section of the MPR) in place of the previous term “Judicial Power” were, though obfuscating, done only for political reasons and signified no real change. He surmised, “[T]he attributions of courts and tribunals have remained the same as in the past, even if the spirit in which they declare the law will necessarily be different.” However, this interpretation ran contrary to Mobutu's ideals. In June 1975 Lihau refused to enforce a harsh sentence levied against student protesters. He was subsequently dismissed from the Supreme Court, removed from his teaching position, and placed under house arrest.

Opposition to Mobutu

In 1980, 13 members of Parliament published a letter criticising Mobutu's regime and were arrested for “aggravated treason”. Lihau testified on their behalf during the ensuing trial. Two years later he joined them in founding the Union pour la Démocratie et le Progrès Social (UDPS) as an opposition party to Mobutu; Lihau soon became the new party's president.[11] Mobutu was particularly disturbed by Lihau's membership in the party since, as a native of Équateur Province, he added to the geographic diversity of the organisation and therefore its political clout. In retaliation, Mobutu incarcerated him, suspended his rights, confiscated his personal property, and eventually banished him to the village of Yamake in Équateur Province.[12] In August 1983 Lihau joined several of his colleagues in attempting to interrupt a meeting between government officials and United States Congressmen at the Hotel InterContinental in Kinshasa while wearing Western suits and ties (then banned by Mobutu). A violent struggle between the UDPS members and Mobutu's security police ensued in full view of the American delegation and received a great amount of media attention in the United States.

By 1985 Lihau's health had deteriorated and he was attempting to seek political asylum abroad. His application to Belgian authorities was refused. Harvard University invited him to become a visiting scholar at its campus in the United States. David Heaps, chairman of the board of Human Rights Internet, convinced Mobutu to let Lihau leave the country. He was subsequently granted political asylum in the United States, and moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts, to become a professor of constitutional law at Harvard.[13] Meanwhile, in the Congo Mobutu persecuted the UDPS leadership, making it nearly impossible for Party President Étienne Tshisekedi to participate in political activities. In early 1988 a dozen party executives traveled to Boston and convinced Lihau to assume the presidency of the UDPS.[14] The following year Lihau founded a political conference with the goal of democratising the Congo.

[First meeting of the Union Sacrée de l'Opposition Radicale in Kinshasa in 1991. Lihau is seated in the first chair in the front row.] In April 1990 Mobutu announced he would accommodate multi-party politics. Lihau, who was at the time presiding over a meeting of exiled politicians in Brussels, demanded that before opposition elements returned to the country Mobutu's government guarantee the tolerance of a genuine multi-party system, agree to organise a round table conference for political reconciliation, and begin disbanding state security forces. On 22 May he visited the United States Department of State in Washington D.C.. Lihau returned to the Congo and became one of four directors of the UDPS under a reformed leadership model.[15] The UDPS then entered a coalition with other opposition groups to form the Union Sacrée de l'Opposition, and he served on the union's ruling council.[16] He joined the UDPS in endorsing the formation of a “Conference Nationale Souveraine” to discuss political reform in the country. One soon convened, but Lihau protested the large number of delegates summoned by Mobutu to participate, accusing him of trying to stack the representation in his own favor. Throughout the conference's existence Lihau chaired its constitutional commission. At one point during the conference, he denounced the perceived Baluba dominance of the UDPS and joined the Alliance des Bangala (ALIBA), a party with financial support from Mobutu that promoted politicians from Équateur. Eventually the constitutional commission produced a draft recommendation of a federal system that was intended to maintain the national integrity of the Congo while respecting its diversity. The conference disbanded in December 1992 having greatly reinvigorated democratic thought in the country but ultimately failing to enact significant institutional change. Lihau went back to the United States to receive medical treatment.

In June 1993 Lihau delivered a speech on television and radio, denouncing the Kasaian ethnic dominance of the UDPS and Tshisekedi's leadership. The UDPS then labeled him a “traitor” for his association with ALIBA and announced that it interpreted his statements as a resignation from the party. Kasaians close to Tshisekedi were incensed by Lihau's comments and considered assassinating him and fixing blame on Mobutu and Prime Minister Faustin Birindwa.

Personal life and death

Lihau married future politician Sophie Kanza on 26 December 1964. They had six daughters: Elisabeth, Anne, Irene, Catherine, Rachel and Sophie.[17] The couple separated in the late 1970s, and Lihau saw little of his family during his years in the United States. In Lihau's later life a young politician named Jean-Pierre Kalokola claimed to be his illegitimate son. In response, Lihau successfully filed a lawsuit against him. After Lihau's death, Kalokola legally adopted his surname. Lihau's daughters denounced the action as a ploy by Kalokola to further his own political career.[18] In 2019 National Deputy Dismas Mangbengu declared that Kalokola was not Lihau's son, and Kalokola responded by threatening to sue Mangbengu. The Lihau family issued a statement requesting Mangbengu not to involve himself in a private family matter.[19]

Lihau died on 9 April 1999 in Boston, seven days after the death of his wife in Kinshasa. He was initially buried in a Boston cemetery before his body was exhumed and entombed in Gombe, Kinshasa, on 12 May.[20][21] Lihau's family never requested an autopsy. In 2001 Kalokola, ostensibly on behalf of the Lihau family, filed a complaint against unknown persons with the Attorney General of Kinshasa, claiming that Lihau had been murdered. He based his assertion on a strange visit that Lihau supposedly had with someone the day after the death of his wife and on unusual signs that were observed on Lihau's body when it was brought to Kinshasa.[22]

John Dickie and Alan Rake described Lihau as “reserved and rather uncommunicative” but in possession of an “excellent legal mind”. According to diplomat Jean-Claude N. Mbwankiem, he was “one of the best constitutionalists that the [Congo] has ever known”. In 2009 a ceremony was held in memory of Lihau in Kinshasa during which a courtroom was dedicated in his name.[23] Three of Lihau's and Kanza's daughters organised a mass of thanksgiving in their parents' honor in Gombe on 28 March 2015. Several prominent politicians attended the ceremony, including Léon Kengo wa Dondo and José Endundo Bononge.[24]

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title: Marcel Lihau

question: Write a ~0 sentence summary.


text:
[]

Carmelo Anthony’s stay with the Oklahoma City Thunder is officially over. As first reported by ESPN.com’s Adrian Wojnarowski, he has been sent to the Atlanta Hawks, who will waive him and pave the way for his long-awaited marriage to the Houston Rockets.

The end to Anthony’s layover in Oklahoma City befits his career. He leaves the Thunder under circumstances not dissimilar to his breakups with the Denver Nuggets and New York Knicks: in a nebulous batter of self-government, potential unfulfilled, recycled criticism and relative division, his previous team not so much wrecked as rescued by his departure.

People care about Anthony, even if they don’t support him. Intrigue will at times be disguised by indifference, generally from his detractors, as a means of concurrently affirming his imperfect, if inflated, resume and his terminated stardom. But every attempt at camouflage is unsuccessful. The next phase of his career invites emotion, both for and against him.

He’s 34 years old, no doubt past his prime, but the plight of Carmelo Anthony, timeworn as it is, persists to near-universal curiosity: Can he help his team win meaningful basketball games?

It would be fair to refocus this issue to the past tense. (Was the best version of Melo ever good enough to aid, let alone carry, legitimate title contention?) The numbers now, on the heels of the failed experiment in Oklahoma City, paint him in inconsequential-to-detrimental terms.

Consider this:

  540 players logged at least one minute in the NBA this past season. Only four got down to MINUS-THREE Wins Over Replacement Player (a cumulative stat).

  537 – Carmelo Anthony
  538 – Josh Jackson
  539 – De'Aaron Fox
  540 – Tyler Ulis

  — Andy Bailey (@AndrewDBailey) June 24, 2018

Or this:

  2017-18 Carmelo Anthony: 18.2 PTS/36, .503 TS%, -3.8 BPM, .071 WS/48, 12.7 PER, 10 REB%, 6.5 AST%, 0.8 STL%

  2017-18 Ryan Anderson: 12.9 PTS/36, .592 TS%, 0.2 BPM, .132 WS/48, 12.6 PER, 10.8 REB%, 5.1 AST%, 0.7 STL%

  — Andy Bailey (@AndrewDBailey) July 7, 2018

Expecting Anthony to entirely or significantly flip facts entering Year 16 is a fool’s conviction. He can latch onto a title favorite, but the consensus opinion tilts heavily toward him having squandered his best shot(s) at positively impacting a championship pursuit.

Anthony’s NBA career has largely been an exercise in dissenting self-empowerment. He enforces leverage and indulges prerogative in a player-friendly era that welcomes both, but his application of that free will has not been celebrated the way it was and still is for LeBron James and Chris Paul. And why? Because his priorities have never clearly aligned with winning.

Whether Anthony ever viewed his career trajectory as a matter of money versus basketball is irrelevant. It has always come off that way irrespective of his motives. Whereas LeBron and CP3 have managed to juggle both, in no small part because they’re better players, Anthony consistently fostered either-or ultimatums in which he seemingly, without fail, prioritized his bank account and off-court comfort over proximity to the Larry O’Brien Trophy:

  Career on-court earnings thru 2017 of the Top 5 picks in the 2003 draft:

  Carmelo Anthony: $205.8 million
  LeBron James: $203.7 million
  Chris Bosh: $189.9 million
  Dwyane Wade: $179.5 million
  Darko Milicic: $52.3 million

  — Tommy Beer (@TommyBeer) July 20, 2018

In 2006, when James, Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade all signed four-year extensions with opt-outs before the final season, Anthony inked a five-year pact. Who knows what the LeBron-era Miami Heat would’ve looked like had Melo followed in the footsteps of his fellow 2003 draftees.

When he did orchestrate his exit from Denver in 2011, it came at the vast expense of his new team. He forced a trade to the Knicks when he could have signed with them in free agency and, by extension, left them with the assets to trade for soon-to-be teammate Chris Paul.

Look at this, assuming you can bear it:

-

     WHAT THE KNICKS TRADED FOR ANTHONY: Wilson Chandler, Raymond Felton, Danilo Gallinari, Timofey Mozgov, a 2014 unprotected first-round pick (Dario Saric), two second-round picks (Quincy Miller and Romero Osby), the right to swap 2016 first-round picks (Jamal Murray) and cash to Denver; Eddy Curry’s expiring deal, Anthony Randolph and cash to the Timberwovles.
-

    WHAT THE CLIPPERS TRADED FOR PAUL: Al-Farouq Aminu, Eric Gordon, Chris Kaman and a 2012 first-round pick (No. 10, Austin Rivers).

James Dolan remains an uncontrollable variable when dispersing blame for everything the Knicks gave up. His meddling and their subsequent overbidding is not on Anthony. And yet, he copped to his midseason urgency being motivated by money (i.e. his pre-lockout extension).

Then, in 2014, with the Knicks gearing up for a rebuilding effort under Phil Jackson, Anthony had the opportunity to join situations considered objectively better at the time. He could’ve signed with the Rockets, Chicago Bulls or Los Angeles Lakers. He instead chose the Knicks and their fifth-year carrot, accepting a slight discount.

“He did exactly what we asked him to,” Jackson said.

Waiving his no-trade clause to join the Thunder is the closest Anthony has come to making a purely basketball-driven decision. Playing in Oklahoma City instead of Los Angeles, Boston or another glitzier market was a concession. Spending what amounted to 83 percent of his minutes at power forward, per Cleaning The Glass, represented a sacrifice. Lowering his pull-up frequency (from 49.1 percent of his total shots to 39.1 percent) and increasing his spot-up volume (29.5 percent to 42.4 percent) constituted compromise.

Even as things went awry beside Paul George and Russell Westbrook, Anthony said and, for the most part, did all the right things. The problem? He let everyone know it immediately after the Utah Jazz bounced Oklahoma City from the playoffs:

  Carmelo spoke all season about sacrifice and acceptance. But yesterday made it clear that – for whatever reason – there was something festering. He vented after missing parts of only two straight games. Imagine what happens if that were a routine that started mid-season.

  — Fred Katz (@FredKatz) April 29, 2018

To top it all off, because Melo is Melo, his mutual divorce from the Thunder technically won’t cost him a cent. He will get his entire $27.9 million salary from the Hawks, per Woj.

For this, for all of it, Anthony’s reputation has and will continue to suffer. Hindsight will erode his legacy and abrade his Hall of Fame credentials—not in totality, because Anthony _is_ going to the Hall, but the fallout from retrospective assessments will be noticeable enough to necessitate defenses:

  Carmelo is a national champion, Final Four MOP, 3x gold medal winner, leading scorer in Team USA history and will end his career as a 10x All-Star who made All-NBA 6x and finished in the top 20 all-time in scoring. There is a less than 0% chance he doesn't make the Hall of Fame. https://t.co/tGeu5rK3P3

  — Yaya Dubin (@JADubin5) July 20, 2018

Context is key when evaluating Melo‘s arc. Whatever side of the fence you land on is mostly fine. But the focus on feats undone, on recurring mistakes, speaks more to a misapplication of the third wall.

Anthony has never feigned championship obsession. Holding him to a different, perhaps higher, standard judges him against a bar he’s never conformed to meeting. That he has so obviously asserted leverage, emphasized financial excess and indelicately advertised every adjustment and concession he’s made, both minor or marginally more than minor, should be enough to squelch this illusion that he’s strived to become the company-man caricature so many fans assume professional athletes want or need to be.

This does not make Anthony a villain or less of a person. Quite the contrary. Dwight Howard’s identity crisis has become an annual rite of passage; Anthony has not sought wholesale reinvention at any turn. His is more a tale of expectation by association. He endeared himself to the circle of his era’s best players—namely James, Paul and Wade—which created this warped sense of where he himself stood within the league.

There have been, to Anthony’s credit, some adaptations over the course of his career. He became more of a playmaker during the back end of his stint with the Knicks. He warmed up to three-point volume after the 2011-12 season. He half-contorted his play style in Oklahoma City.

And to that point, there should remain hope he steers into a more complementary twilight. The Rockets may even be just the team to float that optimism. They will ask Anthony to make sacrifices similar to those he didn’t truly embrace with the Thunder, but he has never been ill-suited for the role of potent accessory.

He drilled 37.3 percent of his catch-and-shoot triples within an Oklahoma City offense light on dependable spacing. Houston paced the league in the frequency with which it manufactured uncontested threes, and only the Brooklyn Nets launched more catch-and-fire threebies. Melo should eat.

Playing off Harden and Paul will be a different experience than working in tandem with George and Westbrook. The latter two are not natural-born distributors. George is a secondary setup man at his peak, and Westbrook passes more because the collapsing chaos he creates on full-bore drives to the basket mandates that he do so.

Paul and Harden are craftier and more holistically selfless in the aggregate. Flinging threes off the catch will take on a new meaning around them, particularly when Houston boasts an inherently superior floor balance.

This union will not be seamless. It never is with Anthony. Hiding both him and Harden on defense is untenable, and he’ll want his off-the-dribble touches. Mike D’Antoni—who is cool with the Melo add, per Woj—will help here. His staff staggered court time for Paul and Harden to borderline perfection last year. Paul averaged 15.1 minutes per game without Harden, while Harden saw 21.9 minutes without Paul.

Extending those principles to include Melo is neither effortless nor implausible. Eric Gordon logged more than nine minutes of me-time and under five minutes with both Harden and Paul in the lineup. Plus, as I’ve noted previously, D’Antoni will “do some things to keep Anthony involved during full-strength minutes. The Rockets’ iso-heavy offense isn’t revered for its off-ball motion, but they know how to incorporate pick-and-roll divers. Anthony can take on more rim-running duties in super-small lineups, much like [Luc] Mbah a Moute and PJ Tucker did this past year. He shot under 38 percent in these situations with the Thunder, but they weren’t routinely trotting out five-sniper arrangements.”

Equally important: Do not discount the effect playing alongside a good friend could have on Anthony’s mindset. His bond with Paul may compel him to buy into what he once rejected.

Yes, Anthony is mistaken if he believes the Rockets or any other team needs the full Melo experience, or that the full Melo experience can even translate to more than a lost season on its own. His approach to the game, even dating back to the peak of his powers, is inarguably flawed. And no, the best version of himself was never good enough to carry a viable title contender.

But can he, at age 34, help his team win meaningful basketball games? It’s possible. To write it off implies he’ll never find a balance between the functional and sentimental, between what makes the most sense and his own terms. Maybe that’s fair. Anthony has brought that doubt upon himself. But there’s an overlooked value in his refusal to ever totally conform.

Melo’s career, however undecorated, is not an accident, even if it’s not met with the intended or desired acceptance. Nor is it a disappointment by way of opportunities ignored and inferiority unaccepted.

It is a career, a legacy, of his own design.

_Unless otherwise noted, stats courtesy of NBA.com or Basketball Reference._

_Dan Favale is a Deputy Editor for NBA Math and covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter (@danfavale) and listen to his _Hardwood Knocks_ podcast, co-hosted by B/R’s Andrew Bailey._

question: Why did Carmelo Anthony leave the Oklahoma City Thunder?

answer: It might be implied he sought better opportunities and career advancement.

question: Did Carmelo Anthony still stand a chance at basketball games at his age?

answer: It is not stated.

question: In what year was Anthony drafted by the NBA?

answer: 2003.

question: Did Anthony prioritize off-court wealth and luxury over winning a trophy?

answer: According to the author, he did.

question: Write a ~5 sentence summary.

answer: Carmelo Anthony departed from the Oklahoma City Thunders to the Atlanta Hawks to later join the Houston Rockets. From the start of Anthony's career from when he was drafted in the NBA up until his departure from the Thunders, it appears Anthony was not the best version of himself. Also, the chances of him reaching championship title status was bleak because, according to the author, his priorities never aligned with winning, unlike his fellow 2003 NBA draftees. It seemed he prioritized wealth over the Larry O'Brien trophy. Even though a national champion, with a high chance he would make it to the hall of fame, the fallout from previous assessments would be apparent.


text:
AN AUSTRALIAN spy is being hailed after intervening in a major deal that would have seen a surge in China’s influence in the South Pacific.

Today Australia and its neighbour, the Solomon Islands, will sign off on the first stage of a 4000km high-speed undersea internet cable in a deal that has swiped China off the map.

The multimillion-dollar deal will provide a high speed internet link between Australia and the fifth-largest Oceanian country by population which struggles with unreliable and ineffective internet services. It will also connect Papua New Guinea to Australia.

_SBS_ described it as a “significant leap forward for communications” for the impoverished country, which currently relies on satellite networks.

The Solomon Islands had originally awarded the contract to Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei in 2016 but it was “diplomatic pressure and rare intervention” from a top Australian spy that saw the deal take a change of course, according to the _ABC_.

“Australian intelligence agencies never wanted the Solomon Islands to allow Chinese company Huawei to build the link, and were keen to prevent it happening,” journalist Matthew Doran reported.

Huawei has become the world’s third largest smartphone maker in recent years but the company faces headwinds in its expansion plans due to its close links with the Chinese communist party.

Australia halved the cost of the project for the island nation and refused to allow a “landing point” for the cable on Australian territory if China took control.

Julie Bishop this morning defended the decision, saying Australia’s neighbours needed other options than simply China.

“What we have offered the Solomon Islands, and they have accepted, is an alternative to the offer, and ours is cheaper. It’s likely to be faster results for them, and technically superior. And also more resilient,” she said.

“We put up an alternative, and that’s what I believe Australia should continue to do. We are the largest aid donor in the Pacific.

“We are a longstanding partner of Solomon Islands, and I want to ensure that countries in the Pacific have alternatives, that they don’t only have one option and no others, and so in this case we are in a position to be able to offer a more attractive deal for Solomon Islands and PNG, and they accepted it.”

Jonathan Pryke, director of the Pacific Islands Program at the Lowy Institute, warned in November last year that if Beijing had its way, it would result in some “really significant national security issues for Australia.

“Having a Chinese state-owned enterprise connecting up to a piece of critical domestic infrastructure is pretty unpalatable for the Australian Government.”

The contract change was only after Nick Warner, the head of Australia’s foreign spy agency, ASIS, intervened in July 2017. He warned the Solomon Island’s former Prime Minister that allowing the Chinese such measures would create a cybersecurity risk for Australia and its allies by giving the Chinese access to the “back end” of the Australian network.

Today Solomon Islands’ current Prime Minister, Rick Houenipwela, and Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull will cement the deal in Canberra.

“We have had some concerns raised with us by Australia, and I guess that was the trigger for us to change from Huawei to now the arrangements we are now working with Australia on,” Mr Houenipwela told _Sky News_ in New Zealand last week.

Taxpayers will be slugged for about two-thirds of the price, the government revealed in the 2018 Budget. The exact price of the deal, though, is unknown, despite reports it could cost more than $100 million from the aid budget.

Last month, the Pentagon ordered U.S. military bases worldwide to ban mobile phones and other telecommunications equipment made by the Chinese company Huawei after senior U.S. intelligence officials warned the phones could be used to spy on Americans and U.S. service members.

Although there has been no evidence, and steadfast denials from Huawei, that the Chinese tech company eavesdrops on behalf of Beijing, for a number of years the US has prohibited Huawei from bidding for government contracts out of fears for national security

Both Labor and Liberal government blocked Huawei from tendering for the National Broadband Network in 2012 and 2013.

_Continue the conversation with Matt Young on Facebook or Twitter_

question: Explain why an Australian spy is being hailed for?

answer: For preventing China's influence surge in the South Pacific

question: Who would have been awarded the contract if it wasn't for the Australian intervention?

answer: China's Huawei

question: How did Australia make the contract more lucrative for the Solomon Islands?

answer: An alternative and cheaper offering faster results and technically superior.

question: What was the warning the Australian foreign spy agency gave to Solomon Island's former Prime Minister?

answer: That allowing the Chinese such measures would create a cybersecurity risk for Australia and its allies by giving the Chinese access to the “back end” of the Australian network.

question: Write a ~3 sentence summary.

answer:
A multi-million dollar deal is providing a high-speed internet link between Australia and the Solomon Islands thanks to an Australian spy.
Australian intel intervened before China's Huawei was awarded the contract. The intervention prevented China's influence surging in the South Pacific.


text:
ZIETEN (foaled 23 March 1990) was an American-bred Thoroughbred racehorse and sire. Trained in France as a juvenile he was unbeaten in four races including the Prix La Flèche, Prix d'Arenberg and Middle Park Stakes. In the following year he took his unbeaten run to five in the Prix de Fontainebleau but was beaten in six subsequent races. As a four-year-old he raced in Japan and England and recorded a final big win in the Challenge Stakes. He was then retired to stud and had some success as a breeding stallion.

Background

Zieten was a “small, lengthy”[1] bay horse with a white star and white socks on his hind legs[2] bred in Kentucky by his owner, Sheikh Mohammed's Darley Stud. The colt was imported to Europe and sent into training in France with André Fabre.

His sire Danzig, who ran only three times before his career was ended by injury, was a highly successful stallion who sired the winners of more than fifty Grade I/Group One races. His offspring include the champions Chief's Crown, Dayjur and Lure as well as the important stallion Danehill.[3] Zieten's dam Blue Note was a top-class sprinter whose wins included the Prix de la Porte Maillot and the Prix Maurice de Gheest as a three-year-old in 1988.[4] She was a distant descendant of the British broodmare Stained Glass (foaled 1917) who was the dam of the 1000 Guineas winner Scuttle.[5]

Racing career

1992: two-year-old season

On his racecourse debut Zieten won the Prix Saint Crespin over 1100 metres at Evry Racecourse on 25 May. At the same track in June he was moved up to listed class for the Listed Prix La Flèche over 1200 metres and won by half a length from the filly Creaking Board.[6] The runner-up went on to win the Starlet Stakes at Hollywood Park Racetrack in December. The colt was then stepped up to Group Three class for the Prix d'Arenberg over 1000 metres at Longchamp Racecourse on 6 September. Ridden by Steve Cauthen he was made the odds-on favourite against four female opponents headed by the Prix Yacowlef winner Wixon. After moving up to dispute the lead at half way he stayed on well in the closing stages to win by three quarters of a length from Wixon with his stablemate Ski Paradise taking third place.[7]

For his final run of the year Zieten was sent to England and moved up to Group One class for the Middle Park Stakes over six furlongs at Newmarket Racecourse on 1 October. The Geoff Lewis-trained Silver Wizard was made the 8/13 favourite after wins in the Rose Bowl Stakes and Sirenia Stakes with Zieten, ridden by Cauthen, the 5/2 second choice in the betting. The other four runners were Pip's Pride (Phoenix Stakes), Factual, Wootton Rivers and Virilis. After settling behind the leader Pip's Pride, Zieten came under pressure a furlong out but gained the advantage in the closing stages and won by a length.[8] After the race Cauthen said “He was a bit green and today was the first time he's had to be picked up, but once I started quickening we didn't stop. He showed so much speed that I would have my reservations about him getting a mile”. His trainer André Fabre was happy with the colt's performance but indicated that Zieten was probably inferior to his stablemate Zafonic.[9]

1993: three-year-old season

Thierry Jarnet rode Zieten in all of his races as a three-year-old starting with the Prix de Fontainebleau over 1600 metres at Longchamp on 19 April. He was made the 1/10 favourite and won by three and a half lengths from the British challenger Semillon.[10] Zieten was unbeaten in five races when he started the odds-on favourite for the Group One Poule d'Essai des Poulains on 9 May but sustained his first defeat as he finished eighth of the ten runners behind Kingmambo, beaten twelve lengths by the winner.

Zieten was brought back to sprint distances for his remaining five starts in 1993. Sheikh Mohammed's racing manager Athony Stroud observed “His pedigree and his style of running makes us think he's a sprinter”.[11] In the July Cup over six furlongs at Newmarket he was outpaced in the early stages before staying to finish third behind Hamas and College Chapel. At Deauville Racecourse in August he finished fifth to College Chapel in the Prix Maurice de Gheest and fourth to Monde Bleu in the Prix de Meautry. In October at Longchamp he ran fifth behind Lochsong in the Prix de l'Abbaye before ending his season by finishing third to Lavinia Fontana in Prix du Petit Couvert.

1994: four-year-old season

In the winter of 1993/4 Zieten was transferred to Sheikh Mohammed's Godolphin organisation and entered the training stable of Hilal Ibrahim. In the spring of 1994 he was campaigned in Japan, beginning his season in the Keio Hai Spring Cup over 1400 metres at Tokyo Racecourse in April. In a race dominated by overseas challengers he finished second to Ski Paradise with the British filly Sayyedati in third.[12] In the Yasuda Kinen in the following month he raced just behind the leaders before tiring in the closing stages and finishing unplaced behind North Flight.

On his return to Europe, Zieten joined John Gosden's Stanley House training stable in Newmarket. On his first run for his new trainer he made little impact as he finished sixth of the eight runners behind Lavinia Fontana in the Haydock Sprint Cup on 3 September. On 13 October Zieten, ridden as on his previous appearance by Frankie Dettori, contested the seven furlong Challenge Stakes at Newmarket. He was made the 13/2 third favourite behind Soviet Line and First Trump in an eight-runner field which also included Piccolo. Zieten went to the front from the start and was never headed, staying on well in the closing stages to win by one and a quarter lengths from Soviet Line.[13] For his final race Zieten was sent to Japan for the Sprinters Stakes at Nakayama Racecourse on 18 December and finished ninth of the fourteen runners behind Sakura Bakushin O.

Stud record

Zieten was retired from racing to become a breeding stallion and stood at the Haras du Logis in France.[14] The best of his offspring included Seazun, Torgau, Ostankino (Prix Maurice de Nieuil) and Zinziberine (Critérium de Maisons-Laffitte)[15] He began to suffer from fertility problems and was retired from stud duty in 2009.[16]

Pedigree

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]

[7]

[8]

[9]

[10]

[11]

[12]

[13]

[14]

[15]

[16]

title: Zieten (horse)

question: What was Zieten?

answer: A horse.

question: When was Zieten foaled?

answer: 23 March 1990.

question: Where was Zieten trained?

answer: France.

question: Where did Zieten race as a four-year-old?

answer: Japan and England.

question: Write a ~2 sentence summary.

answer: This article is about Zieten, a horse born in 1990. It discusses its life and career as a racehorse.


text:
Updated Apr 01, 2016 @ 4:06 pm

The struggle with growing up is that sometimes you don’t look the age you’re supposed to look. When you’re in college, you look like a college kid, and then you leave college and still look like a college freshmen. It’s frustrating. You can change your hair, wear lots of two-piece suits, and throw around all sorts of adult jargon, but plain and simple, you still look young no matter how hard you try not to.

This is an ongoing issue for many, and it gets even worse throwing the ~work force~ into the mix. Congrats on landing your new Big Girl job! But oh yeah, everyone is going to assume you’re 5-10 years younger than you really are. The struggle is REAL.

1. YOUR CO-WORKERS DON’T INVITE YOU OUT FOR AFTER WORK FUNCTIONS, BECAUSE THEY DON’T THINK YOU’RE OF AGE.

Friday night, everyone’s going out, and you somehow miss the invitation. Actually, you didn’t miss it. You intentionally weren’t invited, because no one wants to take a youngin out to the bar that they won’t even be able to get into.

2. EVERYONE ASSUMES YOU’RE THE NEW INTERN FOR YOUR FIRST WEEK OF WORK

Someone may suggest you do a coffee run.

3. SOME ASK IF THIS IS YOUR “SUMMER JOB”

Maybe they won’t come out and ask if it’s your summer job, but rather probe into how your summer vacation is going, and when you’re heading back to school, and what your major is, and if your parents are excited to have you back home for a few months, and what’s it like being back in your childhood bedroom, and you’re like, “no.”

4. CO-WORKERS “BABY” YOU

Thinking that this is your first time in the ~real world~ many seasoned co-workers will take extra special care of you. Like, double checking that you’ve got the right work supplies, always making sure you’re invited out to lunch, seeing if you’ve got a ride home from work, like your parents dropped you off at the office complex in the morning on _their_ way to work.

5. YOU’RE PASSED OVER FOR IMPORTANT TASKS BECAUSE THE HIGHER-UPS DON’T THINK YOU CAN HANDLE IT

In any competitive field, when it comes down to two equally qualified applications, age might play a factor. Your bosses might not think you’re up to a challenge if they think you graduated college two weeks ago.

6. PEOPLE ARE CAUTIOUS ABOUT SAYING THINGS AROUND YOU THAT MIGHT NOT BE APPROPRIATE FOR YOUR AGE

Know how there’s “adult humor?” It’s super awkward when everyone is joking around in the work kitchen and then you walk in and everyone stops joking around, scared that they might say something that will go right over your head or offend you. Even worse when someone suggests you put figurative earmuffs on.

7. CO-WORKERS TRY TO SET YOU UP WITH THEIR THEIR WAY YOUNGER SON/DAUGHTER

Raise your hand if a mom/dad at work as ever tried to set you up with their child who is a solid 10 years younger than you and still trying to find their way through the world and you’re like, “I’m already in so much student debt and they’re not so I can’t.”

8. YOUR AGE IS A TOPIC OF DISCUSSION ALL THE TIME

It’s almost like your age has become a _joke_. It’s used as ice breaker at meetings like, “You’ll never guess how old Rachel is! Guess!” and then you feel super awkward during the rest of the very long conference call, because it feels like no one is taking your seriously, and everyone is trying to figure out how you could be that age and look the way you do.

question: Why would co-workers not invite young-looking people for drinks after work.

answer: Places that serve alcohol have age limits. If the co-workers think that you are underage, they will be reluctant to invite you as you would be turned away at the door. So, they don't invite you at all.

question: Why would coworkers think that this is a vacation job and how would they probe?

answer: Young people at college or school often take vacation jobs to earn more money or get experience. If you look young enough co-workers may think that this not your full-time job. They may be too embarrassed to ask outright if this is a vacation job so they ask indirect questions.

question: Why does the writer look so youthful?


text:
The water ran like molasses, tinged crimson with the blood of the the swordsman's fallen foes. Countless bodies, some with missing limbs, lay broken in the surf. The swordsman lay on the rust-red sand, his left arm trapped underneath the battered torso of an enemy archer. He had tried to stand, but his legs didn't seem to work. His blade, eighteen inches of lethally sharp, carefully-detailed steel, was half-buried in the ground.

Night fell. As the sun dipped below the waves, its glow illuminated a solitary figure staggering down the beach. The black-armored man stepped over mutilated corpses, kicking aside a half-shattered helmet. The swordsman grunted in pain as he raised his head, in an attempt to identify the shadowy fighter. Suddenly, his mind flashed with recognition. The bloodied, scarred man standing before him was none other than the one he had trusted with his darkest secrets, with his most desperate plans and the terrible details of his horrific past. It was his Lieutenant.

"So, it was you." The swordsman spit blood onto the sand. "It was you who let the enemy know. You let my men, your men, the soldiers who trusted you to lead them, die at the hands of their worst foes." The Lieutenant said nothing. With a burst of lightning quickness, the swordsman pulled his weapon from the sand. Rivulets of blood ran down the side of the blade. He stifled a scream of pain as he pushed himself up on his elbow, and then rolled to his feet. Painful as it was, the swordsman took a fighting stance. A look of amused surprise slowly appeared on the Lieutenant's face. He reached behind his back and drew a bone-white sword, its smoothly-finished metal hilt glinting in the dying sunlight. "Don't fight me, my General," the Lieutenant said. "It cannot end well for you. Stand down, and I'll make this quick." The swordsman responded with a single, sad shake of his head. Then he charged.

The swordsman's blade came down in a silver arc, spattering blood across the already-saturated ground. The Lieutenant, taken aback at his former commander's spurt of energy, was forced to parry. He whipped his blade around at the swordsman's head, only to find that the old man was no longer where he expected. The swordsman had ducked under the slash, bringing the tip of his sword up into his opponent's armpit. The Lieutenant screamed in rage, his armor penetrated. His foot swung furiously back, catching the swordsman by the ankle. The swordsman fell, exhaling thunderously as he hit the beach. The Lieutenant's blade was a white blur as it swung down at its master's old friend and confidant, but it was rebuffed by the swordsman's leather vambrace. The swordsman rolled to the right, sprung to his feet, and delivered a vicious kick to the side of his subordinate's head. As the swordsman landed, he pummeled the Lieutenant's sword hand with the hilt of his blade. The Lieutenant cried out, his hand shattered. His blade, once as white as ivory, was bloodied by the sand upon which it landed. The swordsman brought his blade down in a savage curve, severing the Lieutenant's head. The body of the swordsman's foe hit the surf, splashing bloody water onto the victorious General.

The swordsman, his energy spent, laboriously opened the fingers of his right hand, allowing his blade to fall. He sank to his knees, a slow stream of blood staining his cheek. He sighed, and his body twisted around as he landed on his back. He let out one last groan as he looked up at the silver circle of the moon, the seawater lapping up past his ancient greaves. And as the breath left his body, the swordsman realized that he had reached his equilibrium. He was, at last, at peace.

title: At Peace

question: Summarize everything relating to the theme of betrayal.

answer: The swordsman trusted the Lieutenant with his darkest secrets, his most desperate plans, and the terrible details of his horrific past. Despite this, the Lieutenant betrays the swordsman to the enemy, letting their men, the soldiers who trusted him, die at the hands of their foes.

question: Summarize the injuries sustained by characters in the story.

answer: Countless bodies lie broken with missing limbs in the surf. The swordsman's arm is pinned under the battered torso of an enemy archer. A black-armored man steps over the mutilated corpses. The swordsman recognizes the bloodied, scarred man as his Lieutenant. The swordsman attack, penetrating the Lieutenant's armor. The swordsman shatters the Lieutenant's hand. He then severs the Lieutenant's head.

question: What does the story say about the cause of the war?

question: Summarize everything related to weaponry.

answer: The swordsman's blade, eighteen inches of lethally sharp, carefully detailed steel, is half-buried in the ground. When he sees his Lieutenant, the swordsman draws his weapon out of the sand. Rivulets of blood run down the side of the blade. The Lieutenant draws a bone-white sword. The swordsman brings his blade down in a silver arc, and the Lieutenant parries. The Lietenant whips his blade, but the swordsman ducks and strikes at the Lieutenant's armpit. The Lieutenant slashes the swordsman's ankle, then tries to deliver a killing blow, which is rebuffed by the swordsman's vambrace. The swordsman pummels shatters the Lieutenant's sword hand with the hild of his blade then uses his sword to sever the Lieutenant's head. The swordsman then allows his blade to fall.


text:
Andrew Sullivan, gay political pundit and blogger at _The Daily Beast_, lobbed some rather nasty insinuations my way last Wednesday. He was flabbergasted that any fellow gay man could possibly think that infant male circumcision is justifiable. “The whole thing is madness,” wrote Sullivan, disgusted with the very thought of it. Now before I respond, here’s some of the context behind this spat.

Two years ago, here at my Bering in Mind column at _Scientific American_, I reviewed some of the science and bioethical issues associated with the always-incendiary topic of infant male circumcision. In that earlier piece, titled “Is Male Circumcision a Humanitarian Act?” I highlighted some research from the past decade elucidating the now established fact that rates of HIV acquisition are significantly lower among circumcised heterosexual males, namely because they lack the high concentration of target receptor cells for the virus found on the inner mucosal surface of the prepuce. This anti-HIV effect is dramatic; it is _at least_ on the magnitude of a 60 percent reduction in this demographic. Most of this research was conducted with African populations, but not exclusively so, nor has every study been equally incontrovertible.

About a week ago, I was asked by _Discover_ magazine to revisit this topic in light of the controversial revised position statement of the American Academy of Pediatrics, which had just been published in the journal _Pediatrics_ a few days earlier. The AAP task force, comprised of an accomplished team of pediatric bioethicists, epidemiologists, urologists and anaesthesiologists, along with consultants from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the American Academy of Family Physicians, and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, analyzed hundreds of peer-reviewed scientific studies published between 1995 and 2010, including the HIV findings that I’d gone over in my original _Scientific American_ piece. The consensus regarding this cascade of new datasets—all of which, they claimed, they went over methodically with a fine-toothed comb—moves the AAP away from its historically noncommittal view and towards a clear stance that the benefits of infant male circumcision now unambiguously outweigh its minimal risks when performed under sterile conditions by properly trained physicians.

The AAP has not strayed from their message that the decision is to be made by parents only. Yet the Academy’s endorsement of infant male circumcision as a minimally invasive prophylactic medical procedure offering potentially major health benefits makes it aligned—and unapologetically so—with a growing body of other formidable organizations, including the World Health Organization and UNAIDS.

In my editorial at _Discover_, I concurred with the AAP’s scientifically updated view. Sullivan read my piece and, in a post he chose to label with the deliberately rabble-rousing title, “Attacking Sexual Pleasure at Birth,” he cited dubious survey data suggesting negligible sexual problems in circumcised adult males, then wrote this:

_Jesse Bering thinks parents should follow the American Academy of Pediatrics's recommendation on male genital mutilation. Yes, I have seen someone slowly succumb to AIDS and it wasn't because they were uncircumcized. It was because we had no treatments for it. The 60 percent number is from female-to-male transmission in Africa - with very very limited application in the US. It's rare to read a gay man who still echoes the HIV-phobia of the 1980s - but Bering's irrational panic is pretty glaring. And the notion that in order to prevent infection via a body part, you just remove that body part after birth is equally bizarre. Can you imagine … forcible prophylactic mastectomies to prevent breast cancer? This whole thing is madness. Mutilation of any part of an infant's body should only be for vital immediate health dangers, not nebulous future threats, which the person could choose for himself later, if he so wanted. It's only the foreskin and the clitoris that can be treated this way - and rational people defend the barbaric. And by the way, why doesn't Bering demand his unmutilated partner to remove his own foreskin to lower the chance of HIV infection? Because this kind of barbarism could only be done to infants and be defensible._ __

There’s so much propaganda stuffed into Sullivan’s commentary that I’m not entirely sure where to begin. I should point out, before going any further, that my first choice in addressing this would have been to reconcile our differences privately. Having just finished a series of fun interviews for his Dish blog at the _Daily Beast_, I thought that Sullivan would at least respond to my friendly email about his rather personal post. Even a “well, let’s just agree to disagree” quick exchange would have gone far. But I heard only steely silence. My participation in the “Ask Jesse Bering Anything” video series was by his invitation, so if he feels so strongly about infant male circumcision, I’d have thought he’d have been aware of what I wrote on this subject two years ago (it’s been up at _Scientific American_ all this time, after all). My _Discover_ piece doesn’t waver from that earlier position; it’s merely a reiteration of my personal opinion that, knowing what we do now, and with a rationale no longer linked to indefensible, archaic religious customs, infant male circumcision is—_to me_—the more humane choice for parents facing this hard decision. Anyway, what I write below is the result of Sullivan’s revealing muteness. It’s not the way that I’d have preferred this go.

With that in mind, what on earth does my being gay—_our_ being gay—have to do with anything at all? It certainly doesn’t affect my ability to critically evaluate cumulative, peer-reviewed studies conducted by leading specialists in their fields. Or would Sullivan prefer I do as he does, which is to skim cherry-picked abstracts through his confirmation-biased lens, something that, contrary to unfounded accusations levelled against them, the AAP _did not_ do? Or perhaps like Sullivan, I should swallow whole the angry, emotionally flooded baby-harming message that litters intactivist websites, blog comments and Twitter feeds, all while brazenly turning a deaf ear to the measured and—more importantly—knowledgeable advice of world-renowned bioethicists serving at their own peril (given the vitriol of those like him regarding this subject) on expert panels working for the public good, and which are governed by the admirable, if impossible, goal of balancing ethics and objectivity?

Does Sullivan believe that, because I’m gay, I shouldn’t be concerned whatsoever about HIV/AIDS in heterosexual males, but rather only in gay males like us? That this is _their problem_ and not _our problem_? That’s quite a limited style of humanitarianism, if so. He also apparently hasn’t read some of the latest research indicating that male circumcision may reduce the likelihood of HIV acquisition in insertive-only gay males (“tops”) similar to straight males engaging in penile-vaginal sex. Or is Sullivan saying that because there are effective treatments for HIV now, any fear of HIV in the gay male community today must therefore be “panicky” and irrational? My own fears are entirely irrelevant to the arguments that I made, but in fact Sullivan is right that, while it may no longer be the 1980s, I’m still scared shitless by HIV. I’ve written about my relationship with AIDS before, and my paranoia is something, admittedly, I’ll probably never escape entirely. But I'm also a Type I diabetic on a writer’s salary, already paying a small fortune (one that exceeds my mortgage payments) for private health insurance just to keep myself alive with insulin and other basic medical supplies. Both of my parents had heritable forms of cancer at young ages, and that places me at heightened risk of other life-threatening illnesses. Adding HIV into the mélange of my worries is, indeed, scary as hell to me. Sullivan ought to do a little navel-gazing before traipsing any further into his fury—he is exceedingly fortunate to survive as an HIV-positive Brit in the US with employee-provided healthcare.

The circumcision debate is not my cause célèbre. I'm just a science writer who was asked to weigh in on the AAP decision in an editorial. Yet I confess, this whole issue really is starting to perturb. The righteous indignation of those who casually employ such mutilation rhetoric should be turned right back against them by those of us who are, in fact, circumcised males and do not appreciate being called “mutilated” or made to feel as if we are inferior or less desirable as sexual partners simply because we lack a foreskin. Likewise, women (or men) in healthy, positive sexual relationships with circumcised men should really be speaking up more loudly on behalf of their partners.

Sure, there are circumcised men out there who wish they still had their foreskin. There are people who have issues with _everything_ when it comes to bodily issues. There are also plenty of men who have suffered from god-awful infections and only wish today that their parents had them circumcised as infants. The vast, _vast_ majority of circumcised men who had the procedure done in infancy feel neither “violated” nor “mutilated.” To say that it’s the least of our worries is a monumental understatement. We have zero complaints about our sexual function, we are by no means jealous of men with foreskin (and smegma), and we feel absolutely no shame about our circumcised penises, in spite of the fact that the intactivists (an aggressively vocal minority that is, incidentally, overwhelmingly comprised of women and non-circumcised men who have no insight _whatsoever_ into what it’s like to be a man who had his foreskin removed during a developmental stage that guarantees he has no memory of it) have made it their mission in life to convince us that we should be.

Not everyone sees infant male circumcision as an important issue for our collective conscience to be grappling with. Nor do most conceptualize it as “genital mutilation,” least of all those of us who have actually been circumcised as infants and should arguably be the ones deciding whether what was done to us deserves to be classified as a human rights violation. Even if you insist on casting it in this light, parents today who opt for circumcision are saving their sons from having to decide as adult males, with adult male genitalia (and thus with much more elaborated, intricate veinal and nerve systems in their reproductive organs), whether or not to undergo a qualitatively more complicated and expensive medical procedure as a “consenting adult.”

Sullivan trots out the standard intactivist party line, which is to compare infant male circumcision with the removal of some critical body part as a pre-emptive measure. “Can you imagine … forcible prophylactic mastectomies to prevent breast cancer?” he writes, astounded by my and the AAP’s stupidity. Notice how intactivists like to sneak in loaded words like “forcible” to trump up the false horror. Nobody is “forcing” parents to circumcise their infant sons. I've stressed repeatedly that I am not “pro-circumcision” but “pro-parent choice," and the AAP has emphasized the same. Sullivan would have you believe that male circumcision is now occurring by government decree. We can play runaround mind games all day long about parents being okay with the removal of some body parts in our culture and not others. Perhaps I’m just not tapped in, but I’ve certainly not seen any activist communities take on the cause of prophylactic wisdom tooth removal in adolescents, or better yet, the non-health related extraction of fully functional teeth to make way for braces and create an aesthetically pleasing smile. Like foreskin, permanent teeth are permanently removed. And guess what, also like foreskin, while the risk of complications is present for any invasive procedure, their judicious removal doesn't really make much, if any, difference for the individual's quality of life either.

But here’s why Sullivan’s little thought experiment really had steam coming out of my ears. When I was in elementary school, my mother had a double mastectomy—one breast contained a malignant tumor that had already metastasized to her lymph nodes and the other breast harbored a precancerous growth that may or may not have done the same, and so she followed the surgeon’s advice to have that one removed a few months later as a preventative measure, which was not an easy decision. She endured years of chemotherapy, and I have clear memories of clumps of her hair falling out in my hands while she vomited her guts out over the toilet. This was followed by the brand new trauma of deciding to undergo breast reconstruction surgery—she was still a young woman, after all—with areolas formed by skin grafts from her inner thighs. (She died of a different cancer several years later.) For Sullivan to so breezily liken my _complete_ _non-issue_ of being circumcised as an infant to my mother’s devastating experiences in her mid-thirties with prophylatic mastectomy is the height of an emotionally addled arrogance masquerading as “obvious” logic.

Furthermore, infant male circumcision is not, as Sullivan would have you believe, the moral equivalent of female clitoridectomy. That analogy would only apply if, say, circumcision meant the removal of the actual glans penis (the “head”) and if it were done not in the best health interest of the child, but instead to eliminate his capacity for any future sexual pleasure. So to compare removal of the male foreskin with that hideous practice of clipping off the clitoris is, at best, a show of remarkable naiveté regarding human reproductive anatomy. At worst, it is patent dishonesty by a rhetorician that is designed to exploit the emotions of more ignorant others. I’LL LET YOU DECIDE WHICH OF THE TWO SULLIVAN IS GUILTY OF IN JUXTAPOSING FORESKIN WITH CLITORIS.

Even minor diminution of sexual pleasure is far from being an obvious result of male circumcision. Until some clever cognitive scientist comes up with a way to operationally define the subjective degree of “mind-blowing” sensitivity often claimed to be experienced by uncircumcised intactivist men, above and beyond that felt routinely by lifelong circumcised males, I remain thoroughly unimpressed by this particular argument. In fact, the limited data that do exist on this subject dispute such a claim. A thermal imagining study conducted in 2007 revealed _no difference_ between the sensitivity of circumcised and uncircumcised erect penises in males between the ages of 18 and 45. In fact, this alleged difference in pleasure-qualia also fails to find much anatomical support. In a systematic critique of anti-circumcision arguments currently _in press_ at the _Journal of Law and Medicine_, Richard Wamai and colleagues write that, “Of all glabrous (hairless) regions of the body, the foreskin has the lowest number and least sophisticated Meissner’s corpuscles (touch receptors). More important, though, is the fact that sexual sensations are mediated by genital corpuscles, not Meissner’s corpuscles, and these are absent from the foreskin.”

I don’t need someone else to tell me what I should be outraged by, Sullivan, thank you very much. It’s certainly not going to be in response to already stressed-out parents acting sensibly as their child’s health advocate and appealing to the ethical directives of professionals, rather than online blowhards who think that repeatedly referring to an act with an amygdala-fuelled term like “mutilation” makes it so. If you want your child to be at an increased risk of urinary tract infections, herpes, genital ulcers, HPV and HIV, that’s entirely your choice, and feel free to celebrate with other science-denialists sharing similarly misplaced passions. But spare me your righteous indignation over those parents today that fail to see their benevolent, educated decision to circumsize their infant sons as an “attack on their sexual pleasure at birth.”

DELIVERING UPON NEW PARENTS SUCH A GUILT TRIP IS SIMPLY LOATHSOME.

The views expressed are those of the author(s) and are not necessarily those of Scientific American.

question: Who is Andrew Sullivan?

answer: Andrew Sullivan is a gay political pundit and blogger at The Daily Beast who opposes circumcision.

question: What does the author think about circumcision?

answer: The author supports circumcision because it lowers the chance of HIV infection.

question: Why does Sullivan oppose infant male circumcision?

answer: Sullivan thinks it is mutilation and says it 'attacking sexual pleasure at birth'.

question: Who should make the decision on infant circumcision according to the American Academy of Pediatrics?

answer: The decision is to be made by parents only.

question: Write a ~3 sentence summary.

answer: Andrew Sullivan is a gay political pundit and blogger at The Daily Beast who opposes circumcision. He wrote a paper  “Attacking Sexual Pleasure at Birth” when he read the author's article. The author supports circumcision because it lowers the chance of HIV infection and claims that there is no proof that it affects negatively future sexual pleasure.


text:
HIGH FLYER

Captain Kate McWilliams, who works for easyJet, started flying aged 13 in the air cadets

-   26 Sep 2016, 0:43
-   Updated: 27 Sep 2016, 2:50

A BRITISH woman is believed to be the world’s youngest commercial airline captain at just 26.

Kate McWilliams began flying at 13 in the air cadets before embarking on a training programme on her 19th birthday.

In May 2011 she joined easyJet as a first officer and recently took up the rank of captain.

[ 26-year-old Kate McWilliams is the world's youngest commercial airline captain]

6

 26-year-old Kate McWilliams is the world's youngest commercial airline captainCredit: PA:Press Association
[ Kate first flew aged 13 with the air cadets]

6

 Kate first flew aged 13 with the air cadetsCredit: PA:Press Association
Gatwick-based Kate now flies Airbus A319 and A320 planes to around 100 destinations.

Last week she flew to Malta with Luke Elsworth, 19, the UK’s youngest pilot.

[ Kate McWilliams with co-pilot Luke Elsworth, who is also only 19]

6

 Kate McWilliams with co-pilot Luke Elsworth, who is also only 19Credit: PA:Press Association
[]

MID-AIR MADNESS

Woman booted off easyJet flight over disruptive behaviour after 'hurling abuse'

[]
Exclusive

COUNTDOWN TO THE JUNGLE

Carol Vorderman lined up for I'm a Celebrity as show bosses prepare six-figure deal

[]

PIPPA SUSPECT REVEALED

PlayStation geek held after hacker 'tried to sell 3,000 pics from Pippa Middleton's phone'

[]
Exclusive

'I'M NO RACIST'

England ace Jamie Vardy says he likes a drink and being Jack The Lad but is ashamed of drunken jibe

[]

ROYAL PLEA FOR NELLIE

Prince William leads call to save elephants as he fears they will be extinct by time Charlotte turns 25

[ Captain Kate works for easyJet]

6

 Captain Kate works for easyJetCredit: Getty Images
[ Kate McWilliams and Luke Elsworth before their flight to Malta]

6

 Kate McWilliams and Luke Elsworth before their flight to MaltaCredit: PA:Press Association
Kate, from Reigate, Surrey, said cabin crew and passengers ask her daily how old she is.

But she added: “Most people are pleasantly surprised and impressed with my achievement at such a young age.”

[ The captain and her co-pilot pose for a quick photo before takeoff]

6

 The captain and her co-pilot pose for a quick photo before takeoffCredit: PA:Press Association

question: At what age did Kate McWilliams start flying in the air cadets?

answer: 13.

question: Who is UK's youngest pilot?

answer: Kate McWilliams.

question: How do people feel about her achievement at such a young age?

answer: Surprised.

question: Where is Kate originally from?

answer: Reigate, Surrey.

question: Write a ~1 sentence summary.

answer: This is a news article about Kate McWilliams, the 26-year-old world's youngest commercial airline captain who started flying in the air cadets at 13.


text:
[]
Media Credit: Hatchet File Photo

EMeRG may be the first college-based emergency responders to fully integrate with a major city’s 911 system – another big step forward for a group that only started using its own ambulance five years ago.

The University’s student-run ambulance service hopes to become the first in line to handle 911 calls made on the Foggy Bottom Campus.

EMeRG raised $8,300 for a high-tech dispatch system that will allow the group to take charge of nearly all 911 calls on campus, bringing down costs for students who would otherwise pay between $400 and $800 for treatment by D.C. Fire and EMS.

The group will still need a green light from the University and the city to go forward with plans.

The student emergency medical technicians will be the first team called to offer basic life support for all emergencies in GW-owned buildings, excluding major medical emergencies such as a heart attack or stroke, which require a paramedic.

EMeRG raised the money for the new iMobile system, which pinpoints the location of all 911 calls, in just two days through a crowd-funding website.

“It’s something that will allow us to make sure that we’re servicing literally the entire GW community to the fullest of our capabilities,” Kirsten Hartwick, a senior and the group’s president, said.

Hartwick said she believed EMeRG would be the first college-based emergency responders to fully integrate with a major city’s 911 system – another big step forward for a group that only started using its own ambulance five years ago.

The group will also continue to field the roughly 30 calls a week from the University’s emergency line. The new system will ensure that students and faculty who may not know the University’s emergency line, or fail to remember it during an emergency, can still access EMeRG’s free care.

“You’re told as soon as you can talk and read that you’re supposed to dial 911 in an emergency, so [iMobile] will really catch all of those calls that we’re missing,” Hartwick said.

EMeRG arrives at campus emergencies about three times faster than D.C. Fire and EMS, which responds to calls on campus in about 12 minutes.

The student responders also recently began responding to medical emergencies across the city during high-demand times.

When a sweeping fire broke out in the city this summer, the city’s central dispatch asked EMeRG to help field 911 calls while other city crews responded to the fire. Since then, EMeRG officials said they have worked in a reserve capacity for the city, helping to assist D.C. Fire and EMS while crews mobilized during the Washington Navy Yard shooting last month.

Because the EMeRG crew does not include a paramedic, Engine 1 on M Street would still respond to cases involving severe bleeding, cardiac or respiratory issues. The other local D.C. Fire and EMS engine, located on the same G Street block as EMeRG headquarters, also doesn’t have a paramedic.

The city’s emergency response team, which faces a shortage of paramedics and ambulances, has struggled to keep pace with the growing number of calls.

Calls to 911 in D.C. have increased by 22 percent over the past four years, but D.C. Fire and EMS continued to deploy the same number of ambulances, according to a report from the Council’s public safety committee. Since last year, fewer than 4 percent of shifts have been fully staffed.

The report prompted GW Law School professor and D.C. Council member Mary Cheh to put pressure on the city’s fire chief to step down this summer. Since then, the District has added nine paramedics and begin to train 18 more, said Kenneth Lyons, president of the EMS union.

While he called EMeRG’s attempts to integrate the city’s 911 system a “great opportunity,” Lyons said he didn’t see a need for EMeRG to fill a gap in the city’s response capacity.

And because 911 calls from a cell phone don’t give dispatchers a specific address, Lyons said he worried that adding EMeRG to the central dispatch system could “cause some added confusion.”

About 100 people, mainly friends, family, and EMeRG volunteers and alumni, donated to help EMeRG purchase the iMobile system. The group will continue to accept donations to eventually equip their two other vehicles with the same device.

_– Jeremy Diamond and Brianna Gurciullo contributed to this report._

This article appeared in the October 14, 2013 issue of the Hatchet.

question: How would EMeRG improve health care for the students?

answer: It would bring down costs for the students who would otherwise pay between $400 and $800 for treatment by D.C. Fire and EMS.

question: What if the University does not agree with the plan?

answer: They would have to cancel the plan.

question: Why did Mary Cheh put pressure on the city’s fire chief to step down?

answer: Because fewer than 4 percent of shifts have been fully staffed.

question: How did the city’s fire chief react to the pressure?

answer: The District has added nine paramedics and begins to train 18 more.


text:
SAN ANTONIO — A Madison High School student was arrested Monday after weapons were found in his backpack, which caused the campus to be locked down, police said.

Brendan Tarwater, 17, was charged with one count of possessing a weapon in a prohibited place and one count of making a terroristic threat. His bond was set at $300,000, or $150,000 for each charge.

A woman who answered the phone at a home believed to be that of his family declined comment.

The school was placed on lockdown around 10:15 a.m. Officials lifted the lockdown by 11:28 a.m. and released the students back to their classes.

The male student, 17, had three loaded guns and a 12-inch knife, said Aubrey Chancellor, a spokeswoman for North East Independent School District. One was an AK-47, the others were handguns, a .45 caliber and .22 caliber, with additional magazines in his backpack, she added.

It is unknown whether he was planning a mass shooting, but Chancellor said he told district police that he intended to make some demands over the intercom system, although she did not know what those were. He told authorities that “if the demands were not met, he had planned on committing violence,” Chancellor said. She did not know whether he had a history of violence or mental health issues.

“Everyone is safe,” Chancellor said.

The student's parents had reported him as a runaway that morning and arrived at the school after it was determined that he was there, Chancellor said. During a meeting with school officials and their son, the student's parents asked that his backpack be checked, Chancellor said. After finding two loaded guns and the knife, his parents asked him where the third gun was, Chancellor said.

“So it seems at this point that the guns came from the student's home,” the district spokeswoman added.

The third gun was found in a trash can in the bathroom.

Police and K-9 officers were at the school, which is in the 5000 block of Stahl Road.

“Obviously, we'll continue talking with him to determine what his full intentions were,” Chancellor said. “Right now, we're just thankful that whatever he had planned was averted.”

Classes continued after the lockdown was lifted about 11:30 am, but a crowd of parents lined up to pick up their teenagers.

Parents said they were worried after hearing that between four and seven students had brought the loaded guns -- a rumor that Chancellor said was false.

Daisy Aleman, whose daughter Brittany Arizola is a sophomore, received an automated call just before 11 a.m. notifying her that the school was on lockdown. The call did not specify the reason for the lockdown, but Aleman found out about the loaded guns through social media.

“I was shaking,” said Aleman, who had kept Brittany home from school Thursday, after someone sent an email to Northside Independent School District officials threatening that a mass shooting would occur that day at an unnamed school.

When an announcement was made over loudspeakers Monday that the school was on lockdown, Brittany thought it was a drill. She, like many other students, sent text messages to her mother, and learned from text messages and social media that someone had brought loaded guns.

Freshman Katie Hunt, 15, said she and her entire class spent 50 minutes in a supply closet during the lockdown. The entire class was on their phones and Katie was also constantly in text message communication with her mother, Kim Hunt.

Kim Hunt said the threat from last Thursday jumped immediately to her mind.

“Sure they're going to say they're going to do it one day, but they're really not going to do it, and I feel that today was the day,” Kim Hunt said.

Kim Hunt went to collect her daughter as soon as she heard she could do so.

“It was just crazy,” said Katie through tears as her mother walked her out of school. “You couldn't believe it happened.”

Despite the rumor mill, students said they did not know who was arrested. Some students said they hoped the school would ramp up security and maybe install metal detectors.

“I just hope it's not a friend, because you would think your friends are good, safe people,” said Natalee Northcutt, 16, a sophomore.

Chancellor said that while she understands parents instinctually want to pick up their children when they're notified of a lockdown, that school officials recommend they not swarm the campus.

“It's certainly upsetting to receive one of those messages and parents instincts, of course, is to go get their child,” she said. “But police are there and they need to be able to do their job as efficiently as possible with as few distractions, which is why we ask parents to remain calm and know their children are safe but to not go to the school.”

Chancellor said that students have brought weapons to the high school in the past but noted that high schools in other school districts have also had to contend with similar safety concerns.

The incident comes days after an anonymous person threatened via email to carry out a mass shooting at a school. The email, sent to several employees of Northside Independent District elementary schools, said the shooting would take place last Thursday. Schools were placed on heightened alert, but no such incident took place.

Although the San Antonio Police Department determined that the threat was not credible, hundreds of parents kept their students home. School districts, which are partly funded by the state through average daily attendance numbers, lost millions in attendance revenue.

__

_Staff writer Drew Joseph contributed to this article._

_amalik@express-news.net_

_Twitter: @AliaAtSAEN_

_mcesar@express-news.net_

question: Who is Brendan Tarwater?

answer: Brendan Tarwater is a 17-year-old student from Madison High School in San Antonio who was arrested after weapons were found in his backpack. He was charged with one count of possessing a weapon in a prohibited place and one count of making a terroristic threat.

question: What weapons were found on Tarwater during the arrest?

answer: Three loaded guns: an AK-47 rifle, a .45 caliber handgun, and a .22 caliber handgun, as well as a 12" knife and additional magazines.

question: What happened to the school?

answer: The police put the entire school on lockdown.

question: How did the parents react?

answer: Parents were visibly upset and shaken about the incident, and some rushed to pick up their kids even if the authorities deemed it safe to go back to class.

question: Write a ~5 sentence summary.

answer: Brendan Tarwater, a 17-year-old student from Madison High School in San Antonio, was arrested after weapons were found in his backpack. He was charged with one count of possessing a weapon in a prohibited place and one count of making a terroristic threat. San Antonio police placed the school on lockdown around 10:15 a.m. and lifted it by 11:28 a.m, releasing the students back to their classes. As classes resumed, worried and upset parents rushed to the school to pick up their kids, worried about a rumor that there were more students with guns. The incident comes days after an anonymous person sent emails to several employees of Northside Independent District elementary school, threatening to carry out a mass shooting.