After a season rife with rumors of trades and fistfights, is this—finally—Dion Waiters’ coming out party?

Dion Waiters stood outside of his locker, squinted his eyes and shook his head as a half-smile-half-grimace formed on his face. It was early January, just days after the calendar turned to 2014. The Cleveland Cavaliers had just lost a heartbreaker to the Indiana Pacers, contenders for the NBA title, and he came pretty damn close to pulling off a miracle that would have propelled his name even further up the ranks in the minds of Cavalier fans. The Cavs were playing in their third game without All-Star point guard Kyrie Irving who had fallen victim to a bruised knee. In Irving’s absence, Cavs head coach Mike Brown opted to go with Matthew Dellavedova at point guard, an undrafted rookie out of St. Mary’s who had grown a bit of a cult following due to his never-ending hustle, rather than Waiters, who was drafted fourth-overall just a year earlier. Down 16 points in the fourth quarter, however, Cavaliers head coach Mike Brown reached to his bench, placing Waiters in the rotation as the primary ball handler. Waiters, who had mysteriously been given very little in the way of playing time to this point, took immediate advantage, rattling off 12 straight points—a barrage of jumpshots between 17 and 26 feet, all different locations on the floor, all finding the bottom of the net. Once the Pacers defense started to converged, the second-year guard from Syracuse turned into a distributor, a facilitator, finding Varejao for two roof-raising assists.

Days earlier, needing overtime to pull out a win against the Orlando Magic, it was Waiters who drove to his left with the clock running down, sinking a lay-up that would eventually send the Cavaliers into extra frames. Down two points with 20 seconds to go against the Pacers, Waiters once again took an inbound pass at the top of the key. The 6-foot-3-inch guard was being guarded by a 6-foot-9-inch small forward in Paul George, one of the best defenders in the league. Waiters made quick work of George, blowing by him on a drive to his right side. The catch: The Pacers center, a 7-foot tall Roy Hibbert, was playing weak-side defense and turned into a brick wall, forcing Waiters to take a tough shot that would ultimately not fall .

“Paul George is a good defender, but I knew I could get by him,” Waiters would say. “It was that next guy you had to worry about. If I could do it differently, I would, but I was just trying to be aggressive at that moment and put the pressure on the refs to make a call.”

This is the same Paul George who, in a feature for ESPN The Magazine, was recently dubbed one of the game’s top players even in the event that he would never score a single, solitary point; the same George who has transcended himself to being the 1A among small forwards, behind only the reigning MVP in LeBron James. When asked by WFNY about going to his left, a voice came shooting over the horde of media members who were swirling about. It was fellow swingman CJ Miles who prodded his teammate—”Everyone knows you wanted to go left,” he said, drawing a laugh from anyone within earshot. All it takes is a quick Google Image search of “Dion Waiters driving” to find dozens of images of Waiters, full steam ahead, with the basketball in his left hand. The left wasn’t there.

Brown, hardly one to hand out compliments in what had been a season of disappointment, was willing to budge a little on this very night, categorizing any one-on-one matchup between his shooting guard as favorable. “He’s a talented guy offensively,” said Brown. “He knows it. Everybody knows it.”

See what he did there?

*****

Offense has never been an issue for Dion Waiters. Drafted fourth overall in 2012, he arrived on the NBA scene with a chip on his shoulder and a try-and-stop-me attitude that would allow him to get to the rim with ease. Just 24 hours after Waiters’ arrival to Cleveland, then head coach Byron Scott was lacing him with praise, saying that he felt the sixth man out of Syracuse was the second-best player in the draft . Scott salivated while daydreaming of a young and spry backcourt duo with the on-ball skills of Irving and Waiters pick-and-rolling teams into oblivion. As Waiters will attest, however, getting to the rack at the NBA level would merely serve to be half of the battle—finishing upon arrival is the tougher of the tasks, one which would produce historically terrible numbers. Not given much in the way of a superstar treatment, Waiters often finds himself frustrated with the lack of whistles blown in his favor. This, at times, has led to poor defense and even worse body language, reportedly drawing the ire of a few teammates who were tired of watching teams score while their shooting guard is back on the other side of the floor seeking an explanation from an official. It was Dion Waiters whose face was plastered on the poster of shame following the Cavs’ embarrassing loss to the Sacramento Kings earlier in the year—his pouting was hitting a crescendo; his team was careening toward chaos.

Amidst a roller coaster of a season, fewer players wearing wine and gold on a nightly basis have experienced the twists and turns that have been associated to Dion Waiters. Less than one month into the season and it was Waiters’ name penned into the heart of stories rooted in team dysfunction—some going as far as speculation surrounding a fist fight, aided by Irving showing up with a black eye Trade rumors swirled, looming large like black clouds over the ebbs and flows of each passing day, but were consistently shot down like clay pigeons with both the team and the player toting verbal shotguns—”It’s nonsense,” said Waiters of a rumored meeting between he and then GM Chris Grant. “Man, I ain’t sitting in no office for three hours.” As the season wore on, when posed a question specifically regarding Waiters, Brown has gone as far as he has to to admit pleasure in his player’s offensive skill set, but consistently stops short of delivering full-blown praise—enough to keep other teams interested in the event that they had yearned to acquire the shooting guard via trade, but not enough to make the player feel as if he was meeting all expectations during what was just his sophomore season.

*****

There is something inherently compelling about Dion Waiters. From the day he stepped foot into Cleveland, he has been the player who is adored by most fans while being simultaneously shunned by those not looking through a lakefront prism. He arrived here having not been interviewed or taken part in a pre-draft workout. He showed up overweight and was shut down mid-way through his first run at an NBA Summer League. He was, after all, a sixth man.

Waiters’ decision-making has long been criticized, often predicated upon shot selection, shot form, and a lack of anything that could be classified as “hustle.” At the same time, over the course of the last two years, when selecting a topic for the annual CavsZine, this very author has made Waiters his subject of choice . Maybe it’s the mystery. Maybe it’s the way he’s the first person to rush over and defend a pesky teammate or an irate coach. Maybe it’s the unfair (and oftentimes inaccurate) notions cast upon the man who lives inside of said mystery. To be fair, it is easy to be the subject of criticism when you tell the world that you believe you can be the best shooting guard in the entire world and subsequently put up a win-share total that is lower than your team’s reserve center.

“This year, I’m going to show a lot of people who doubted me and still doubt me,” Waiters said back in September. “I’m going to show them. I don’t need praise and all of that. I just want to be respected. I’m coming. That’s all I have to say. I’ve taken my work ethic to another level and I feel as though I still have something to prove. So, watch out.”

Then again, it could be that same (somewhat inflated) sense of self that makes Dion Waiters. Despite all of the struggles that the 2013-14 season has thrown his way, he’s still that same kid out of inner-city Philly who stepped into Cleveland Clinic Courts and stared wide-eyed like it was the Land of Oz; he’s the kid with “BLESSED” scrawled across his shoulders; he’s still as confident as ever. When recently asked about his mindset between being a member of the starting five or providing relief off of the bench, Waiters didn’t skip a beat. “It’s all the same: Go in there and kill somebody.”

*****

The Cavaliers are heading toward the finish line once again. For all of the hope and expectations that came with last year’s draft, some free agency additions and internal growth, a lottery pick awaits. Kyrie Irving just celebrated his 22nd birthday while wearing street clothes. Dion Waiters has had his own celebration, scoring nearly 24 points per game in the All-Star point guard’s absence.

Long having provided off-the-ball relief, leading the NBA in scoring off of the bench, Waiters has taken on a different persona as of late, doing so against the best the NBA has to offer. Against the Miami Heat earlier this month, Waiters’ ball skills were on display as he recorded his first double-double. He would thank his teammates for hitting their shots after he found them, whether it was for an easy two or a clutch three. Two nights later, he tied a career high with 30 points against the Oklahoma City Thunder, being a part of a 21-2 run that rivaled the comeback attemp made against the Pacers back in early January. His driving lay-up pulled his team within five; as things began to slip away, he would drain a three-pointer to give the Cavs one final chance. Against the Houston Rockets, Waiters once again paced the Cavaliers with 26 points, adding eight more assists for good measure. One night later, on the second night of a back-to-back, he provided 22 more points as the wine and gold ended the New York Knicks’ eight-game winning streak. It would be Jarrett Jack in the spotlight, leading the team in scoring and assists (31 and 10, respectively), but it would be Waiters who not only kept double-teams away from his backcourt mate, but hit a clutch three-pointer to put his team up by four late in the fourth quarter, having entered it down by nine.

By now, you’ve heard the story. Following the loss to the Thunder, a game that not only left many feeling good, but showed that his team was still fighting despite the point in the season and the opponent, it was Dion Waiters, having just scored 30 points, who was sitting in Mike Brown’s office, in a towel having not yet gotten dressed, waiting for his coach to finish his post-game address of the media. You see, despite the 30 points that he had just scored, Waiters felt that he did not do all that he could have done—in the rebounding and hustle department, specifically—and wanted to apologize. Why? Because “that’s what men do,” he would later say.

“At the end of the day you have to look in the mirror at yourself,” said Waiters. “If you feel as though you didn’t rebound and you were part of the problem, why not admit it? It’s easy to point the finger, but you have to look in the mirror and see what you can do better. Where I come from, we just tell it how it is. We don’t point the finger at someone else.”

Brown said that Waiters is trying to take some “initiative in the process.” His teammates, the same ones who were fed up with his antics during the winter-month drubbings, are also taking notice. Small forward Luol Deng said Waiters is “playing great right now.” Jack, the man who inhabits the locker next to Waiters when the two find themselves within the confines of The Q, has also seen marked improvement, but not just in the young guard’s play. Jack assured Waiters that the only reason people are hard on him is because of his ability and the expectations that come with being one of the best athletes in the world. He’s challenged Waiters to not only bring it on the court, but off of it as well.

“I think he’s done a hell of a job these last few games with Ky being out, stepping up making plays,” said Jack. “He’s still a work in progress, but I think he’s doing a hell of a job. Leaps and bounds from where we were at the beginning of the season—decision making, being more assertive, talkative, being more receptive to criticism but him also being able to lead others as well.”

Right now. A work in progress. Sure, all signs for Waiters are currently pointing up, but just like their head coach, his veteran teammates know that with life comes with qualifiers, with praise comes the notion that things are far from over. No matter where you are, no matter how far you’ve come, the rug can be pulled out from under your feet at any time—it comes down to how quick you can adapt to the altered landscape. For Waiters, to this point, his NBA career has been stocked full of almosts and what-could-have-beens. Fortunately for him, he’s just 22 years old and has shown that he finally knows what everyone else has for the last two years— just because you want to go to your left doesn’t mean the defense is going to give it to you.

—

(Image: Michael Ivins-US PRESSWIRE)


Learning C and Objective-C

If you have no programming experience and you want to write extensions/tweaks, you'll need to learn a lot about Objective-C and developing ordinary apps for iOS. (If you'd like to first try modifying code in simple ways to explore some possibilities, you can try the paid package Flex, on the BigBoss repository in Cydia.)

To give you a taste, Code School has an iOS programming course for beginners, with a free interactive guide to getting started with Objective-C. You can also try the free courses offered by Codecademy - they're not about Objective-C or iOS, but they can give you a general sense of what programming is like.

For further study:

It's good to learn some C too; it'll give you a better foundation for learning Objective-C. You'll want to know about pointer arithmetic, the Objective-C runtime, buffer overflows, bitwise operations, the model-view-controller pattern, etc.

Ideally you'll get to a point where you're comfortable writing and running code for iOS. If you're already there, definitely keep reading!

Setting up Theos

Follow Theos/Setup to set up your Theos environment by installing Theos and creating your first project. These links may also be helpful: guide on Stack Overflow, this Theos documentation by theiostream, and Theos Install Script.

You'll probably also want to read more about Cydia Substrate - see saurik's Substrate documentation.

Finding example projects

Here is a list of just a few of the many open source projects that can be used as examples: Open Source Projects.

For some simple example projects you can build with Theos, see codyd51's Theos Examples.

Not finding what you are looking for? Try searching through GitHub for iOS Tweaks with a simple trick, "extension:xm".

Example:

extension:xm SBAwayController

Using the above code will search GitHub for all files with the extension .xm (because Theos by default creates a Tweak.xm file when creating a new tweak). The example above will result in finding tweaks that reference SBAwayController. Not all developers use the .xm file extension, but a large number do, and this will help you in finding those examples.

Looking at frameworks, classes, and processes

To figure out what code to modify, you'll want to explore around iOS and apps.

You can extract Objective-C class interfaces with class-dump, class_dump_z, or classdump-dyld. Remember that the resulting files are not the original headers, so use them with caution.

You can also find other developers have done this process for many frameworks and compiled their work into github repositories (e.g. iOS-Runtime-Headers).

For further help, take a look at Finding classes/methods and using them by Sassoty.

See Reverse Engineering Tools for detailed information about these tools and many others, including Logify.

See Notifications for information about observing and posting notifications informing observers of events within a process and for IPC purposes, for example.

Prototyping a tweak

You can use Cycript to explore running processes. Check out the official manual, especially the section about process injection. For a demo, see Adam Bell's JailbreakCon talk (example code and slides).

Building your tweak

After prototyping you will want to make your tweak into a project to build it and debug it. To achieve this you will most likely use Theos. It is available for different platforms including iOS and Mac OS, and, to a certain extent, Linux. On Mac OS you can use Xcode's command line tools, but for the other platforms you should use a toolchain. On iOS there are two available toolchains (On-device toolchains), and there is a project for Windows.

To learn about setting up your package's control file, see saurik's article on building packages. If you need to list dependencies or conflicting packages, Debian's packaging manual may be useful (because Cydia packaging is based on Debian packaging): Syntax of relationship fields, Dependencies, Conflicts -- or if you're submitting this package to a default repository, you can just ask your repository maintainer for help with this.

Debugging

See Debugging on iOS 7 for how to run gdb and/or lldb.

The System Log article on TheiPhoneWiki has useful tips about accessing the device's syslog.

The Crash Reporter package in Cydia is a convenient way to grab crash reports, and it's helpful to run symbolicate (also available in Cydia) on crash reports to get more detail.

Debugging memory issues in Substrate tweaks

A few problems you may run into while getting started

Problem: Whenever I run programs I compile with your toolchain, they are immediately "Killed". I hate Apple :(.

Solution: iOS only wants to run signed code. Jailbreaks patch the signature verification out of the kernel, but you still need to at least add a valid CodeDirectory to the binary that contains SHA1 hashes of the executable. See Code Signing for a few ways to do this.

Problem: I tried copying a graphical program to the iPhone, and ran it from the command line. I am nearly 100% certain my program is correct, and I did your codesign instructions, but it doesn't work.

Solution: You can't run things from the command line, you have to run them from SpringBoard.

Problem: OK, but when I copied the file to /Applications it didn't even show up in SpringBoard.

Solution: iOS caches the Info.plist files of all installed applications in a centralized place. The fastest/best way to handle this cache is to install UIKit Tools and then run its uicache as mobile:

su mobile -c uicache

Problem: When I add setuid bits to my program, it no longer starts up and syslog doesn't seem to provide any useful information, either (True?).

Solution: I am not quite certain what is preventing this. However, it is easy to defeat: replace your program with a two line shell script that, in turn, runs your program. Example, maybe MyProgram (setuid) gets renamed to MyProgram_, and MyProgram (not setuid) becomes the script:

#!/bin/bash dir = $( dirname " $0 " ) exec " ${ dir } " /MyProgram_ " $@ "

Publishing your package in a default repository

When you've completed a project, you may want to submit it to one of Cydia's default repositories (sources) for distribution.

[Context about Cydia: Unlike the App Store, which is a centralized system, Cydia itself does not host/distribute packages - instead, Cydia is a way to browse and install packages from repositories. By default, Cydia comes with a list of good repositories (independently-owned but work closely with the makers of Cydia) - so if you want to distribute a package to the general audience of Cydia users, submitting it to a default repository is a good plan. If you use a default repository and want to sell your package, you can choose to use the Cydia Store system so that people have a simple way to purchase it. You can also choose to run your own repository (see Repository Management) and ask interested users to type your repository address into Cydia to get your package.]

These are your options for default repositories, with links to information about submitting:

BigBoss (managed by Optimo)

ModMyi (managed by Tyler)

MacCiti (managed by MacCiti)

If you aren't sure which to pick, look up what your favorite developers use, or ask other developers for suggestions (if you don't already know any other developers, IRC may be helpful). If you have questions, email is usually the best way to get in contact with repository managers.

For questions about the Cydia Store system for paid packages, you can ask your repository manager; they've helped many developers figure this out. See also: Cydia Store Integration.

Some guides on other sites

Also check out the list of development blogs for more writing by tweak developers.

Theos challenges

This section is a set of tweaks/apps that can be created with Theos for new or experienced developers to practice with.

Title Description Example Need Help? LaunchNotifier Show a UIAlertView on the screen after any app has been launched. The title of the UIAlertView is the name of the app being opened. Example Guide AskLaunch Show a UIAlertView after tapping an app, asking the user whether they want to launch it or not. Example TransparentSBEditor Make the SpringBoard icons transparent while editing, instead of jittering. Example

If you're interested in ideas for something else to build, the "Request" tag on /r/jailbreak has lots of tweak ideas from real people.


FROM: Project Lead

TO: Arma 3 Users

INFO: Helicopters DLC released, 1.34 update released, MP mode "Support"

PRECEDENCE: Flash

SITUATION

Late yesterday afternoon we rolled the Helicopters DLC out of its hangar for lift off. Of course the 1.34 update contained not just the premium additions, but also the free platform update for everyone. We are very happy to be able to continue supporting the game in this way. By buying the game and DLC you provide us with the opportunity to strengthen, expand and enrich the platform and game. For an in-depth look at what changes arrived with Arma 3 Helicopters and version 1.34, read through the SPOTREP. Modders can do the same for the latest update of sister product Arma 3 Tools in the TECHREP.

What's next for the team? Development focus will be on the second DLC: Marksmen. It is to follow a similar approach by delivering a set of premium assets, bundled with relevant new platform updates for all. We're right in the middle of producing the first new personal firearms and developing concepts for the rest of them. Meanwhile the designers and programmers are prototyping new gameplay features for weapon handling. In parallel, we do also have pre-production and early production of the Expansion terrain in progress. Finally, we obviously will be doing post-release support of Arma 3 Helicopters and we'll continue the maintenance cycle. Do check out this splendidly splendid write-up by Creative Director Jay Crowe on all of these topics.

INTELLIGENCE

Friendly reminder: if you have bought a Supporter Edition or own the DLC Bundle, you already own Arma 3 Helicopters DLC. This is not true for the (Digital) Deluxe Edition. If you've forgotten what version you own, one way to find out could be to check Steam. In the client, open Arma 3's properties. Visit the DLC tab and there it should list your DLC plus Digital Deluxe Edition content packages.

Last Friday the voting stage for the Make Arma Now War Singleplayer category closed. This voting process selected the 20 finalists for that category (to be revealed in detail over the coming weeks). The other categories are in process of having their finalists selected by a Bohemia Interactive Task Force. After that, a soon-to-be-announced jury will carefully select the winners. Good luck to all contestants!

OPERATIONS

One cool part of the 1.34 platform update is the "Support" multiplayer mode. This mode was designed to focus on aerial logistics, rather than combat (although the sessions are not exactly peaceful!). You and your friends are helicopter pilots whose main responsibility is to capture sectors by transporting infantry NPCs to them. Extra support options are Sling Loading supplies and performing casevacs. The mode does a great job of showing the many improvements that Helicopters DLC allowed us to make. We decided however, not to lock this mode to owners of the DLC. Everyone can play it and non-premium helicopters are available besides the Huron and Taru. The design Task Force consisting of Jirí Wainar, Nelson Duarte and Václav Oliva is looking forward to your feedback in this forums thread. A good way of trying the mode is to connect to one of our official servers. We're also hoping to livestream the mode this Friday!

We are tracking one server crash that is particularly elusive. Our working theory is that it may be caused by a recent Steam client update, because the same crash affects our other games (e.g. DayZ) without those receiving updates. We are in direct contact with Valve's network engineers to get to the bottom of this. The investigation will hopefully result in either a fix of their client, or a way for us to solve the issue ourselves.

LOGISTICS

Check out this nifty little web app to search and filter scripting commands. Kudos to Craig Vander Galien for creating it!

The 1.34 update added a bunch of nice decorative objects for scenario designers. You'll find objects to bring your airports and heliports alive, as well as objects for Forward Operating Bases (from fuel bladders to desktop PCs and canteen supplies to sports equipment). The SPOTREP lists all of them, but you may have to explore the editor for a while to find the right categories. Shout out to our colleagues in Black Element Thailand, who did a good job of creating many of these!

#splendid


Luis Antonio Caballero is an Argentine dog groomer who loves his job. A lot. His wife and business partner Gabriela Caballero caught him enjoying his job quite a bit on August 22, dancing to a song on the radio; even gently dancing with the dog he was bathing!

"I stepped away to make some tea and returned to find Luis dancing," Gabriela told The Dodo . "He didn't realize I was there." So, Gabriela did what every good wife would do in this modern era -- she whipped out her phone, took some video, and promptly posted it on Facebook.

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"I diiiiiiied, haha, this is how you bathe your pets," she wrote. "A happy puppy, hahaha, go Lu."

The video cuts off just as Gabriela is found out, but it's been viewed more than 5.6 million times since it was posted. People are touched by Luis' obvious happiness: it's clear that he loves dogs, loves good music and loves dancing!

"He loves them, and they love him," Gabriela said. Luis' life is all about dogs -- when he's not grooming them, he is working to get strays off the streets of Buenos Aires and into good homes.

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"We are a family dedicated to the dogs," Gabriela said.


College students love socialism, just look at how Bernie Sanders captivated the youth vote during the Democrat Primaries. However, if you were to ask them to define it, you might not be able to get a straight answer.

Campus Reform visited Washington D.C to ask college students “Do you like socialism?” and then asked “What is socialism?” Many students expressed favor for socialism, though when they were asked what it was, had trouble articulating an answer. If these kids can’t even define socialism, you can hardly expect them to recall the tens of millions who have been slaughtered under socialist and Marxist regimes throughout the 20th century. Hopefully they get a chance to take Econ 101 next semester.

Via Campus Reform:

Last year, a poll was released showing 53 percent of Americans under age 35 are dissatisfied with our nation’s current economic system and think socialism would be good for the country.

“I guess just, you know, getting rid of that wealth gap in the United States?”

The same poll found that 45 percent of young Americans would be willing to support an openly socialist Presidential candidate.

The findings of this poll coincide with the rise of Senator Bernie Sanders, an avowed “Democratic Socialist” from Vermont who received millions of votes in the 2016 Democratic Primary, many of them from millennials.

While it’s clear that young people increasingly view socialism in a positive light, it’s also clear that many of them are uneducated about what it entails, or the impact it’s had throughout history.

The same poll found many millennials are unfamiliar with historical figures often associated with socialism, such as Che Guevara, Joseph Stalin, and Karl Marx.


Children make up over 25 percent of the civilians killed by Russian airstrikes, according to a report by a Syrian human rights organization.

The Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR) released a report Friday that claimed Russian airstrikes in Syria killed approximately 2,704 civilians, 746 of which are children. In just over 11 months, Russia killed more Syrian civilians than the Islamic State killed in three years.

The report documents several examples of Russian transgressions against civilians, many of which appear to be intentional, and have little or no military purpose. Many of the examples provided in the report show a Russian penchant for targeting schools.

“Russian warplanes bombed a building that we were [using] to educate children in the neighborhood,” Abu al-Fatih, a resident of Aleppo’s al-Hollok neighborhood, told the SNHR. “The bombing was at a time when students were leaving their classrooms, which led to a number of deaths among children and the teaching staff.”

Fatih noted that there were no legitimate military targets in the surrounding area when the attack occurred Dec. 7, 2015. He noted that several ethnic Turkmen-Syrians live in the neighborhood.

“I think the Russian bombing deliberately targeted the neighborhood as a retaliation for the Russian warplane that was shot down by Turkey,” explained Fatih.

WATCH:

One month later, a Russian attack on three schools in the Einjara district of Aleppo left 17 people dead, 15 of whom were students. Russian jets targeted an elementary school and two high schools. Mohammad al-Khatib, a media activist who witnessed the aftermath of the attack, described the scene in vivid detail.

“A teacher told me that a massacre happened at the western school after it was targeted with a missile by a Russian warplane, I went there. The missile fell in a classroom that was destroyed completely,” said Khatib. “Residents told me they pulled only four dead bodies and lost about 15 others who were reduced to shreds including the female teacher of the targeted classroom.”

Russian bombing strikes are ongoing, despite failed diplomatic attempts to secure a cessation. The Islamic Republic of Iran has been complicit in Russian air strikes more recently, allowing fighters and bombers to stage attacks from an airbase in the Hamadan region.

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State Democrats’ three-day convention had a raucous start Friday, as liberal activists booed and heckled Democratic National Committee Chair Tom Perez after marching from the state Capitol to promote a universal heath care program.

The leader of the nurses’ union that opposed Perez’s recent election had just warned California Democrats that they would put up primary election challengers against lawmakers if they don’t support a bill to create public-funded, universal healthcare.

“They cannot be in denial anymore that this is a movement that can primary them,” RoseAnn DeMoro, executive director of the California Nurses Association, told hundreds of nurses and health care advocates gathered for a rally at the Capitol.

“Vote them out,” the crowd chanted back, referring to Democrats in the Legislature wavering on whether to support their cause.

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As California Democrats kicked off their weekend convention here with a cocktail reception featuring trays of scallion pancakes with Hoisin sauce and red grapes rolled in blue cheese and coated in pistachios, the throng advocating for a statewide publicly funded, universal health care system snaked down a staircase behind Perez, shouting down his calls for unity.

“This gathering kind of reminds me of Thanksgiving dinner at my house with my extended family,” Perez said, trying to lighten the mood.

As Perez launched into a riff about shared party values, California Democratic Party John Burton told activists he backed universal healthcare before many of them were born, in 1998. He jabbed at a protester: “Put your (expletive) sign down...We’re all for it.”

“We make sure that healthcare is a right for everyone,” Perez said. “And not a privilege for a few.”

The showdown over health care exposed deep rifts within the party that may have scabbed over, but have not healed, since last year’s primary fight between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, a favorite of the nurses union, which also backed Perez’s opponent in the chair’s race, Rep. Keith Ellison.

Sanders has called for a national single-payer system, and earlier this month called on Californians to adopt the model at a speech in Los Angeles.

DeMoro argued the Republican health care bill that passed the House has generated anger and fear among people from across the political spectrum, and many have turned their attention to the issue of health care because they fear losing coverage. Lawmakers have expressed skepticism over its projected steep cost.

“There’s been a seismic shift because of Donald Trump,” she said in an interview.

Perez, in his brief remarks to delegates, sought common ground over their shared anger toward Trump.

“We have a president .... I don’t know who it is, Putin, or Trump,” Perez said. ‘They’re in a bromance. This is really weird.”


CHICAGO -- Patrick Kane was nearly done talking with reporters after a practice on Saturday afternoon when he was asked about Duncan Keith, the Chicago Blackhawks' top defenseman.

Duncan Keith Defense - CHI GOALS: 1 | ASST: 4 | PTS: 5

SOG: 12 | +/-: 5

The question was about how Keith continues to go somewhat overlooked when the conversation turns to the NHL's best at the position. Names like Shea Weber Ryan Suter and Erik Karlsson roll right off the tongue, while Keith only seems to make national headlines while he's embroiled in some sort of controversy.

"He's one of those guys you kind of take for granted because he's back there every night and does pretty much the same thing," Kane said. "Whether it's shutting down the other team, or creating offensive chances, or jumping in the rush, or how fast he skates, or how good he is defensively with his stick … he does so many things that you can name and really is huge for our team."

It's true that Keith's numbers have dipped since winning the Norris Trophy in 2010, the same season Chicago ended a 49-year Stanley Cup drought, but he's still in the prime of his career at 29 and is still the Blackhawks' top blueliner. He also remains one of the best in the League, even if he does fly under the radar a bit.

As he listed all of Keith's responsibilities and tools on the ice, even Kane started to sound a little surprised at just how much Keith does for the Blackhawks, who racked up 77 points in 48 games to win the Presidents' Trophy. Chicago used a noticeably improved defensive effort this season to stay so consistent, and Keith's three goals, 24 assists and plus-16 rating led the way.

Kane even compared him to Blackhawks captain Jonathan Toews -- who doesn't necessarily rack up a ton of stats, but consistently does many things at an elite level.

"It's kind of like Johnny," Kane said "You kind of take for granted, maybe, some of the things he does because he does the same thing every night."

One thing that has changed for Keith from the previous three seasons is his ice time. It's gone down.

During the regular season, Keith averaged 24:06 and nearly 29 shifts per game this season as compared to 26:53 and 31 shifts a game a year ago. His time during the Stanley Cup Playoffs also dropped during the Blackhawks' Western Conference Quarterfinal series victory against the

Minnesota Wild.

He averaged 23:21 and 31 shifts in five games against the Wild, which was down quite a bit from the 30:15 and 33 shifts he logged per game in a first-round loss to the Phoenix Coyotes last year.

The decreased ice time is by design.

Blackhawks coach Joel Quenneville tried to keep his team's legs as fresh as possible during the shortened season, which was packed with back-to-back games and sets of three games in four nights. He knew how important a refreshed Keith would be, so he stuck to a plan that cut back his top defenseman's minutes and shifts by roughly three a game.

Keith had become known for his desire to absorb minutes, but the new plan hasn't bothered him. In fact, he said he's barely noticed being on the ice less. While Suter and rookie Jonas Brodin logged some eye-popping amounts of ice time for the Wild, Keith was content with the amount he got.

"I don't really notice it, to be honest with you," Keith said. "When you think about it, it's only one or two shifts less in the course of a game. Sometimes maybe it's two or three minutes, but it's really only one or two shifts or one shift less a period. It's not that much. Every year's kind of different. This year we have (more defensemen) that can play and there's no need to play those minutes that maybe Suter was playing. I think it's good for the team, too."

"He's been so good, for so long, that I think after a while you just take it for granted what you see from him."

-- Blackhawks goalie Corey Crawford

Keith's stamina in that opening series did get tested, though. His wife, Kelly-Rae, gave birth to their first child, son Colton, last Wednesday morning prior to the fourth game of the series. Keith had already flown back to Chicago for the birth on Tuesday and flew back to the Twin Cities, without sleeping, for the game. After playing a team-high 23:57, Keith realized he'd been awake for about 48 hours -- and didn't really care.

"I definitely feel more responsible to look after a little guy," Keith told NHL.com on Saturday. "My wife's doing most of the work right now, though. I don't want her thinking that I said I'm doing all the work. Her mom's in town and she's helping out a lot, so we're thankful she's been able to help out and be here."

The other thing on Keith's mind, of course, is the playoffs.

As of Saturday afternoon, the Blackhawks still didn't know if they'd be facing the Detroit Red Wings or San Jose Sharks in the Western Conference Semifinal round. For Keith and defense partner Niklas Hjalmarsson, that question also meant wondering what star's line they'd draw as an assignment -- Pavel Datsyuk or Joe Thornton.

Keith and Hjalmarsson, who were paired together midway through this season, led the way in shutting down the Wild's Mikko Koivu and Zach Parise in the first round. They did it, according to Keith, with a simple formula -- hard work plus teamwork.

"It was just trying to play good defense, having a good gap in the neutral zone, eliminating the second and third chances and [goalie Corey Crawford] doing a good job, too," Keith said. "It's not two guys who do it. It's not three. It's not one line of forwards. It's a team game."

Nobody on the Blackhawks understands that more than Mr. Under-The-Radar himself.

"He's been so good, for so long, that I think after a while you just take it for granted what you see from him," said Crawford, who often has a front-row seat. "He's definitely a special player. The plays he makes sometimes … it looks easy, but when you're on the ice you appreciate the talent he has and what he can do for us."

Crawford then laughed before adding: "I think that's enough for pumping his tires. I don't want his head getting too big, but I think he knows how good he is. He's an awesome player."


What Portland bike thieves took away, our community is giving back.

As we shared last week, South Korean bike tourer Kim Minhyeong was pedaling through Portland on his dream trip when his bike was stolen from outside the Southeast Hawthorne Fred Meyer. It was fully loaded with all his gear, including his laptop, camera, and more. As word spread, Bryan Hance from Bike Index decided to help. Hance swung into action and held a fundraiser for Kim last Thursday.

According to Hance, about 40 people showed up to Apex Bar — many of them with gear and donations in-hand. They showed Minhyeong what Portland is really all about as they shared free food donated to the event by Grind Musubi. “Definitely made me proud to be a Portlander! It was overwhelming, I won’t lie.” Hance wrote on in an email to supporters.

Thanks for reading BikePortland. Please consider a $10/month subscription or a one-time payment

to help maintain and expand this vital community resource.

Portland-based apparel company Showers Pass donated store credit that Minhyeong has used to get a new jacket (the cool Atlas model no less). Right now Hance is helping Minhyeong organize a list of gear he still needs to replace with hopes of getting back on the road in 2-3 weeks. He also said friends of Minhyeong’s took him shopping for a new bike today. The outpouring of support has certainly made an impression.

“When I started this journey, I was alone,” Minhyeong wrote on his Facebook page yesterday. “But now, because of everyone’s support, I no longer feel alone.”

A GoFundMe campaign site has also been set up in case you would like to support this cause and help Minhyeong turn his bad experience into a good memory.

And in case you’re wondering, Minhyeong finally got a u-lock.

— Jonathan Maus: (503) 706-8804, @jonathan_maus on Twitter and jonathan@bikeportland.org

BikePortland is supported by the community (that means you!). Please become a subscriber or make a donation today.

Bike Theft, Front Page

bike index, bryan hance


Adventurer and Filmmaker Leon McCarron has completed a 1500km walk around the heart of the Middle East, concluding his journey on the summit of Mt Sinai, Egypt.

McCarron, 29, from Northern Ireland, began his journey on foot in Jerusalem in early December 2015.

Following three weeks of trekking north through the West Bank and Jordan Valley, the expedition was briefly put on hold after McCarron’s walking partner, writer Dave Cornthwaite, suffered two stress fractures in his left foot.

Discovery TV endurance athlete Sean Conway later joined the journey in Wadi Rum, after McCarron had walked the length of Jordan, dodging flash floods, spending days unsupported through rugged desert and experiencing the true face of the Middle East.

Following several new and innovative local walking trails on 'Walk the Masar' (masar means ‘path’ in Arabic), including the Masar Ibrahim (in Palestine), the Jordan Trail and the Sinai Trail, McCarron’s intention was to look beyond the natural struggles and tensions of the region; to fill a current void in the global media by focusing on the other side - the people, the stories, the communities, and compassion that comes with travelling on foot. For four months he immersed himself in the lives of the people of the regions he passed through, gathering their thoughts and opinions.

He says, “I feel extremely privileged to have seen this part of the world in such a deep way. I came here with a working theory that most people are good. This trip has reinforced that no end. This is one of the most maligned parts of our world, yet in reality I've found it to be perhaps the friendliest, kindest and most peaceful place to spend time.”

McCarron is now working on a series of short films and a book to tell the full story of his findings.

Find out more on www.walkthemasar.com and www.facebook.com/leonmccarron


By Matthew Bridge

Hip Hop Vibe Staff Writer

Where Kanye West and Jay Z are concerned, there are a lot of rumors surrounding them. Much like he said on his 2005 hit, “Diamonds From Sierra Leone,” it seems like they are “praying for the death of their dynasty, like amen.” They have pinned their hopes on TIDAL.

When it comes to business, Jay Z has experienced all types of success over the past two decades. These decades have seen Jay Z launch various music-related businesses. His latest venture is TIDAL, a partnership with the likes of Kanye, Beyonce, J. Cole, Nicki Minaj, Usher, and many others.

Since then, Kanye West has faced rumors of trying to distance himself from TIDAL, due to it being perceived as a failure. There were even rumors of Kanye West leaving Roc Nation, but it turned out he fired his manager within the company. Now, there are rumors of Kanye West premiering his new album on Apple Music, as opposed to TIDAL.

Source: Hits Daily Double

Follow Matthew Bridge on Twitter @dgfxla.


WikiLeaks cables and the Iraq War Yet another accomplishment for the leaker of the cables: preventing an agreement to keep troops in Iraq

From a CNN report on why the Iraqi Government rejected the Obama administration's conditions for keeping U.S. troops in Iraq beyond the 2011 deadline:

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and other top brass have repeatedly said any deal to keep U.S. troops in Iraq beyond the withdrawal deadline would require a guarantee of legal protection for American soldiers. But the Iraqis refused to agree to that, opening up the prospect of Americans being tried in Iraqi courts and subjected to Iraqi punishment. The negotiations were strained following WikiLeaks' release of a diplomatic cable that alleged Iraqi civilians, including children, were killed in a 2006 raid by American troops rather than in an airstrike as the U.S. military initially reported.

That description from CNN of the cable's contents is, unsurprisingly, diluted to the point of obfuscation. That cable was released by WikiLeaks in May, 2011, and, as McClatchy put it at the time, "provides evidence that U.S. troops executed at least 10 Iraqi civilians, including a woman in her 70s and a 5-month-old infant, then called in an airstrike to destroy the evidence, during a controversial 2006 incident in the central Iraqi town of Ishaqi." The U.S. then lied and claimed the civilians were killed by the airstrike. Although this incident had been previously documented by the U.N. special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, the high-profile release of the cable by WikiLeaks generated substantial attention (and disgust) in Iraq, which made it politically unpalatable for the Iraqi government to grant the legal immunity the Obama adminstration was seeking. Indeed, it was widely reported at the time the cable was released that it made it much more difficult for Iraq to allow U.S. troops to remain beyond the deadline under any conditions.

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In other words, whoever leaked that cable cast light on a heinous American war crime and, by doing so, likely played some significant role in thwarting an agreement between the Obama and Maliki governments to keep U.S. troops in Iraq and thus helped end this stage of the Iraq war (h/t Trevor Timm). Moreover, whoever leaked these cables -- as even virulent WikiLeaks critic Bill Keller repeatedly acknowledged -- likely played some significant in helping spark the Arab Spring protests by documenting just how deeply corrupt those U.S.-supported kleptocrats were. And in general, whoever leaked those cables has done more to publicize the corrupt, illegal and deceitful acts of the world's most powerful factions -- and to educate the world about how they behave -- than all "watchdog" media outlets combined (indeed, the amount of news reports on a wide array of topics featuring WikiLeaks cables as the primary source is staggering). In sum, whoever leaked those cables is responsible for one of the most consequential, beneficial and noble acts of this generation.

And yet (or more accurately: therefore) the person accused of accomplishing all of this, Bradley Manning, has been imprisoned for more than a year without trial, and, if convicted, is almost certain to remain in prison for many more years (with the possibility, albeit unlikely, of death, and as the Obama administration continues to block an unmonitored visit by the U.N. official investigating what had been the inhumane conditions of his detention). If one believes the authenticity of the chat logs produced by Wired, Manning's goal in leaking those cables -- "hopefully worldwide discussion, debates, and reforms . . . i want people to see the truth… regardless of who they are… because without information, you cannot make informed decisions as a public" -- have been fulfilled beyond what must have been his wildest dreams. Assuming the truth of those chat logs, he was motivated precisely by seeing cables of the sort that detailed this civilian slaughter and subsequent cover-up in Iraq, and the extreme levels of theft and oppression by Arab dictators, and the desire to have the world know about it. Meanwhile, those responsible for the Iraq War, and who suppressed freedom and democracy in the Middle East by propping up those tyrants, and who committed a slew of other illegal and deeply corrupt acts, continue to prosper and wield substantial power.

History is filled with examples of those who most bravely challenged and subverted corrupted power and who sought reforms being rewarded with prison or worse, at the hands of those whose bad actions they exposed. If Bradley Manning did leak these cables, his imprisonment is a prime example of that inverted justice.


Thomas Friedman Whines About His Lost TPP

Thomas Friedman, who is legendary for his boldly stated wrong assertions, got into the game again making absurd claims about the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the great loss the U.S. suffers from it going down. Friedman tells readers:

"It was not only the largest free-trade agreement in history, it was the best ever for U.S. workers, closing loopholes Nafta had left open. TPP included restrictions on foreign state-owned enterprises that dumped subsidized products into our markets, intellectual property protections for rising U.S. technologies — like free access for all cloud computing services — but also anti-human-trafficking provisions that prohibited turning guest workers into slave labor, a ban on trafficking in endangered wildlife parts, a requirement that signatories permit their workers to form independent trade unions to collectively bargain and the elimination of all child labor practices — all to level the playing field with American workers."

This is of course wrong. First, and most importantly, all the provisions on items like human trafficking, child labor, and trading in endangered wildlife depended on action by the administration. In other words, if the TPP had been approved by Congress last year we would be dependent on the Trump administration to enforce these parts of the agreement. Even the most egregious violations could go completely unsanctioned, if the Trump administration opted not to press them. Given the past history with both Democratic and Republican administrations, this would be a very safe bet.

In contrast, the provisions on items like violations of the patent and copyright provisions or the investment rules can be directly enforced by the companies affected. The TPP created a special extra-judicial process, the investor-state dispute settlement system, which would determine if an investor's rights under the agreement had been violated.

Friedman also bizarrely seems to be claiming that increased intellectual property restrictions will benefit U.S. workers. These forms of protectionism (yes folks, patent and copyright protection are protectionism — even if you like them) are directly antithetical to the interest of most U.S. workers. It means that foreign countries will pay more money to Microsoft for its software and Pfizer for its drugs. This means that they will have less money to buy U.S. manufactured goods. This is pretty straight and simple economics; in other words, way over the head of Thomas Friedman. (He wrongly uses the term "free-trade" in reference to the TPP four times. This is a propaganda term used to sell the deal. It is not accurate since the increased protections in the pact likely more than offset the tariff reductions in the deal.)

In this respect, it is worth noting that the projected gain to GDP of $130 billion by 2030 by the strongly pro-TPP Peterson Institute for International Economics (the non-partisan United States International Trade Commission projected a more modest gain of 0.21 percent of GDP by 2032) does not take into account any negative impact from the increased copyright and patent related protections in the TPP. It is quite plausible that a model that actually took account of the negative effects of these protectionist provisions would show a loss to the U.S. from the TPP and especially to the bulk of the workforce who are not situated to benefit from these protections.

This raises the issue of currency rules, which are notably absent from the TPP. The deliberate decisions by China and other countries to prop up the dollar against their currencies has led to the enormous U.S. trade deficits of the last two decades. This both cost millions of manufacturing jobs and led to the huge imbalances that provided the basis for the housing bubble and the subsequent crash.

For this reason, it would have been reasonable to include enforceable provisions on currency management in the deal. Remarkably, the TPP includes nothing on the topic of currency. (There is a separate letter of understanding that has exactly zero legal status.)

In short, there are very good reasons why anyone who cared about workers, the environment, and access to medicine, both in the U.S. and elsewhere, would strongly object to the TPP. It is unfortunate that Friedman seem completely unfamiliar with these issues.

In this respect it is ironic that Friedman twice criticized Trump for rejecting the TPP without having read the deal. Thomas Friedman himself famously declared that there is no need to read these deals:


Out of all of the content I’ve dropped on this blog, this is one you should definitely bookmark, because you can use it the rest of your life.

This article will help steer your interactions with women in the right direction and keep you from losing your sanity.

There’s a few axioms that I live by which I have put together over the years of dealing with hundreds of women and these commandments have stood the test of time over and over again.

If you adhere to these, then you will be years ahead of your peers and it will save you a ton of bullshit experiences with women, that could have been avoided.

Here’s a few of them…

#41. Who you marry will be the most important decision you ever make in life. Better make sure she’s up for the job.

#40. Never get married or get tied down with a woman who you’re settling for. You will be miserable. She will be miserable. And life is too damn short to spend it with a woman low in caliber, personality and desire to suck your cock dry every motherfucking day.

#39. Believe a woman the first time she SHOWS you who she is. Don’t allow your emotions to blind you to her flaws and shortcomings.

#38. Women are not the enemy. They are merely following their inherent nature. Learn how to handle them and you will be rewarded with their positive attributes. Flail about blindly and be cursed with their negative attributes.

#37. Women are led by their emotions. Therefore, learn to use their emotions to your favor. Become the puppet master.

#36. Your greatest defense against the manipulations of women, is to learn Game. There is no substitute.

#35. Always lead a woman in the relationship. If you don’t know how, then learn how.

#34. You are not to be the bitch in the relationship. If you have to pause and think about it, then you are.

#33. Women are just as sexual, if not more than men. They crave depravity. Do not be fooled.

#32. ALL girls think they are unique. 99.9% of girls are not unique. Do not be fooled.

#31. The moment you feel you cannot live without a certain girl, is the moment you have officially put her pussy on a pedestal.

#30. Less is more when dealing with women.

#29. Be ready to walk away from the relationship at any time for any reason. If she acts up, be ready to walk. If you stay you will lose a small piece of self-respect, until eventually you won’t even know who you are anymore.

#28. Never take advice on sleeping with women FROM women.

#27. If you can’t see who’s the sucker in the relationship, then you’re the sucker my friend.

#26. What is unsaid when communicating with a woman, is oftentimes more powerful than what is said. Learn to use your eyes when flirting with women and conveying sexual tension.

#25. If you get caught cheating, always, always, always deny. Deny until death and she will eventually get over it.

#24. Always treat a woman’s tantrums like you would treat a child’s. Firm and unpersuaded.

#23. Buying gifts, groveling, begging and changing for a girl will never keep her around. You’ll only intensify her disdain for you and speed up her hunt for an alpha cock.

#22. If you think she’s cheating, she already has. Learn to trust your instinct. It’s ‘talking’ to you for a reason.

#21. Never fully trust a woman. It’s not in their nature to be trustworthy. Self-preserve by only allowing for 60% of your trust given after a full and long courtship of at least 2 years.

#20. Never get married before 30yo and always marry a younger woman. No exceptions.

#19. You’re not really ready for a relationship, until you know what’s out there. Go fuck 20 women. When you get done, go fuck another 20. Then you might have an idea of what you want.

#18. The moment you make a woman “your life”, is the moment she’s preparing to walk out of yours.

#17. The only thing that matters to women between the ages of 18-26yo is: “Does he make my vagina wet?”

#16. Women would rather be with a psychopath broke bad boy, then a stable, sane beta bitch boy.

#15. Never regret cheating.

#14. Don’t put pussy ON the pedestal, put it UNDER the pedestal.

#13. Always fuck her like it’s your last time before you go to prison.

#12. Frame IS Game. If you don’t learn to have a strong Frame, your ‘Game’ will always be weak and you will always struggle with women.

#11. Always let her say “I love you” first. She’ll love you more for your self-control.

#10. Watch what a girl DOES, not what she SAYS.

#9. If a girl dumps you, never take her back. She will never respect you the same and the relationship is doomed to fail.

#8. If you notice 1 red flag take note. If you notice 2 red flags prepare to eject. When you notice three red flags you had better be out the door.

#7. Women lie. Get used to it. Learn to play the game better than them.

#6. The more money you get, the more you will attract women who are attracted to resources. Learn to put on a ‘Humble Front’ at first in order to screen the golddiggers out.

#5. Women are hypergamous. Get used to it. Learn to develop yourself into a High Value Man.

#4. The moment you invest more into the relationship than she does, then you’re already fucked and you’re starting to ‘lose’ her.

#3. Never put aside your personal goals and dreams in order to please a woman. You won’t please her and you will be miserable.

#2. You will never lose a woman by having other admirers, but you will lose women by concentrating all of your efforts on one. You won’t just lose the one you’re focused on, you’ll lose all of them.

#1. If you don’t choose to learn Game, then don’t be surprised when the wool gets pulled over your eyes by a woman. Game is the great equalizer.

Sick and tired of getting fucked over with women? Learn my secrets to success with women in my system here.

Read More: How To Approach Girls


A second car has become stuck on Gold Coast tram tracks, just hours after an unmarked police car on the way to a pedestrian fatality became wedged when it attempted a shortcut.

The driver of a white Toyota Corolla became stuck on the Sundale Bridge in Southport just before 2pm, halting light rail services between the Main Beach and Surfer's Paradise stops in both directions.

A second car has become stuck in Gold Coast tram tracks, just two hours after an unmarked police car. Photo: Matthew Howard / Ten Eyewitness News / Twitter Credit:Matthew Howard/Ten Eyewitness News

A Translink spokeswoman said buses were replacing trams between the two stops and commuters could expect delays of up to 40 minutes.

A Queensland Police spokesperson said the male driver was assisting police with their inquiries.


One journalist hacked phones of 100 celebrities every day for 18 months, says barrister acting for victims including Sadie Frost and Paul Gascoigne

The “industrial scale” of phone hacking at the Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and the People made the News of the World look like a “small cottage industry” in comparison, the high court in London has heard.

Scores of celebrities, including the actor Sadie Frost and ex-footballer Paul Gascoigne, were targeted thousands of times by journalists using the illegal practice from mid-1999 until 2009, it was claimed.

In the first hint of the true extent of phone hacking at the three titles, the court heard that the former Sunday Mirror journalist Dan Evans hacked about 100 celebrities every day from 2003 to mid-2004.

Such was the reliance on phone hacking for stories that one senior journalist was desperate for Evans to create “an enigma-type machine that would automatically crack pin codes”, the court was told.

David Sherborne, the barrister for eight victims, said hacking at the titles was “utterly unprecedented” and that knowledge of the activity went to the highest levels of the newspaper group.

“This was not just the work of junior reporters … quite the opposite,” he said. “The evidence demonstrates that voicemail interception, as well as the unlawful obtaining of personal information by blagging or use of private investigators, was in widespread and habitual use by a large number of journalists across all three MGN titles.”

Between June 2002 and mid-2006, Sherborne said MGN journalists made nearly 10,000 calls to Orange’s voicemail platform, which allows people to access their messages by calling a general number and entering their personal details. He said senior MGN journalists gave “deliberately crafted and disingenuous statements” to the Leveson inquiry into press ethics, and accused MGN of withholding key evidence that meant that only the “very tip of the proverbial iceberg” could be revealed.

Two senior journalists, who cannot be named for legal reasons, allegedly introduced Evans to phone hacking in April 2003 and ordered him to build a “phone-hacking database” using pay-as-you-go phones and a list of celebrity mobile numbers. Evans, who later pleaded guilty to phone hacking, covered up his illegal activities by throwing his mobile phones – dubbed “burners” – into the river Thames every two months, the court heard.

The evidence came on the opening day of a civil trial brought by eight claimants – including Frost, Gascoigne and BBC creative director Alan Yentob – against MGN for invasion of privacy.

The judge, Mr Justice Mann, is being asked to assess the extent of phone hacking across the three titles and rule on the level of damages for each of the claimants. The other claimants involved in the case are TV soap stars Lucy Taggart, Shane Richie and Shobna Gulati, flight attendant Lauren Alcorn and TV producer Robert Ashworth.

Frost is alleged to have been hacked on a daily basis, morning and evening, in part because she was married to fellow actor Jude Law and was good friends with the model Kate Moss.

She described having her voicemails intercepted as like being “monitored and hunted down by a sort of secret police, who were digging into our lives as much as they could in order to discover every possible detail about our private lives, as well as our professional ones, to use against us”.

Sherborne said the “most deeply private” information was intercepted and published by journalists, including Frost’s attendance at AA meetings, Richie’s financial problems, Ashworth’s divorce, and Taggart’s relationship with actor Steve McFadden.

Of the stories that Mirror Group has admitted were the result of phone hacking, 49 were printed in the Sunday Mirror, 40 in the Daily Mirror and 23 in the People between June 2000 and October 2006.

“Strangers were deliberately picking through this, sifting for things they could get away with publishing,” Sherborne said. “No one imagined that all this private information, this treasure trove about just the sort of people who filled these newspapers in their millions, could be accessed and listened to in this way, let alone plundered as a source for stories.”

Frost, for example, was hacked at least twice daily by Evans because, like Yentob, she was deemed a particularly fruitful source of stories and was on his so-called “back pocket list” of targets. In Frost’s case, this hacking resulted in 27 articles that Mirror Group has admitted were gleaned unlawfully from her private messages.

By comparison, Sienna Miller received £100,000 in damages from the News of the World publisher in 2011 over 11 articles based on hacking by that newspaper.

MGN has admitted that 99 articles relating to the eight celebrities would not have been published without phones being hacked, the court heard.

Landline call records show that Yentob had his voicemails intercepted 330 times from July 2002 to March 2005, although the court heard that the true extent was likely to be much greater when hacking from pay-as-you-go phones was included.

James Hipwell, a former Daily Mirror journalist, said Yentob was a principal target of showbusiness journalists and that his voicemails would be used in hacking tutorials. Journalists would sing an amended version of a Spike Milligan song while eavesdropping on his messages, Hipwell claimed. In a witness statement, the BBC executive said he felt “violated on a truly massive scale” by the hacking.

Sherborne said: “It is abundantly clear that the documentary evidence before the court is only likely to reveal a tiny proportion of the total wrongdoing committed by MGN as against each of the claimants – merely the very tip of the proverbial iceberg.”

Lawyers for the victims pieced together a picture of hacking at Mirror Group using evidence including landline call data, expenses receipts for pay-as-you-go telephones, internal emails from the Sunday Mirror and the People and witness statements from former exployees including Evans and ex-reporters James Hipwell and David Brown.

Evans, who will give evidence as a witness in the trial, was allegedly instructed not to refer to telephones or voicemails explicitly in emails. Instead, he used the euphemism “getting the muppets” to stand up a story.

In one email read to court, a Sunday Mirror journalist told his bosses that an unnamed celebrity “sounds so cute on the voicemail”. In another email, a senior editorial staff member warned colleagues not to telephone a TV producer because “he’s answering” – meaning the journalists would not be able to access his voicemails and may be rumbled.

The court also heard that senior journalists made in-jokes about a hacked voicemail alleged to have been the source of a scoop revealing Sven-Göran Eriksson’s affair with Ulrika Jonsson.

In Mirror Group’s written defence statement, Matthew Nicklin QC said the group had published a public apology and had written privately to the eight victims before the start of this trial. However, he said the discovery of hacking could not be said to have caused the victims serious long-term, life-changing suffering like that in personal injury cases. Nor could their hurt be equated with the kind of traumatic lengthy bullying suffered in harassment or discrimination cases.

The publicly listed publisher had strenuously denied any wrongdoing until September last year, when it made limited admissions in court. The newspaper group has since set up a £12m compensation fund for hacking victims and last month printed an apology in its three papers for “an unwarranted and unacceptable intrusion into people’s private lives”.


Causes and symptoms of fish TB. Mycobacterium marinum. Possible treatment. There is some danger to humans when servicing

Tuberculosis was once a dreaded disease in Europe as well as North America and virtually everyone knew someone who had succumbed to ‘consumption’, the commonly used name for the disease caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis is still widespread in most third world countries and after the fall of the Soviet Union, the numbers of tuberculosis patients have sky rocketed in Russia as well as in many other post-soviet states.

What few of us know, however, is that a bacterium closely related to Mycobacterium tuberculosis called Mycobacterium marinum can be present in wild caught as well as captive bred fish and stay lurking in our aquariums without us ever realizing it. After all, when one of our fishes goes belly up, few of us drag out the Petri dish and starts growing bacterial cultures to find out exactly what caused its demise.

Since Mycobacterium marinum is so closely related to Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the disease it causes is commonly referred to as fish tuberculosis of fish TB. Learning more about fish tuberculosis is recommended for all aquarists since it can be lethal to our beloved fish. What’s even worse, Mycobacterium marinum can spread to the aquarist and cause serious health problems. It can also spread to other animals and is capable of surviving in both soil and water without any host for prolonged periods of time. Don’t be fooled by the word “marinum” – this nasty little organism will survive just as well in freshwater conditions.

Susceptibility

Certain types of fish seem to be more at risk of carrying, or at least succumbing to, fish tuberculosis. This group includes the labyrinth fishes, among which you will find many popular aquarium fishes such as Bettas and Gouramis.

Symptoms in fish

The main symptoms of fish tuberculosis are loss of scales, loss of color, lesions on the body, wasting, and skeletal deformities such as curved spines.

Diagnosing

Looking a slides of infected tissue under a microscope is sometimes enough to recognize Mycobacterium marinum, but in most cases a bacterial culture will be necessary. Both Mycobacterium tuberculosis and Mycobacterium marinum are acid fast, which means that they stain bright pink against a blue background.

Treatment

Treating fish tuberculosis is really difficult and euthanizing the fish a probably less painful for the fish than forcing it to go through endless treatments that may not have any effect on the disease. Euthanizing all the fish in the infected aquarium is also the best way of preventing the disease from spreading.

If you decide to try and treat your fish, keep in mind that Mycobacterium marinum can infect you as well. The risk of being infected can however be decreased dramatically by following a few simple safety guidelines. You can read more about this further down in this article.

Fish can be treated with the same drugs as humans get when they become infected by Mycobacterium marinum, e.g. Kanamycin. Since this is a very resilient microbe, normal treatment involves administering at least two different medications over the course of at least three months.

A lot of aquarium problems can be fixed by performing frequent water changes, increasing the water temperature and adding some salt to the water, but fish tuberculosis is not one of them. Raising the water temperature may even worsen the problem since Mycobacterium marinum prefers warm water (their ideal temperature is 30°C).

Prevention

Since curing fish is virtually impossible once the disease begins to manifest, preventative measures are highly important.

Keeping your fish healthy, happy and well-fed will boost their immune system and make it possible for them to handle limited exposure to Mycobacterium marinum.

Wounded or otherwise weakened fish should be moved to quarantine tanks where they can be treated and given time to recuperate, since weak fish that is left in the main aquarium can serve as a breeding ground for all sorts of malicious microorganisms that may eventually grow numerous enough to attack even the healthy fishes.

New fish should ideally be quarantined before you allow it into you main aquarium. Plants, substrate, equipment etcetera should be sterilized to kill of potentially harmful bacteria before being introduced to the aquarium. See the plant section for more info about how to sterilize plants without causing injury to them.

An aquarium that has had an outbreak of fish tuberculosis should be meticulously cleaned out with bleach and left to dry before you restock it.

Fish tuberculosis and the aquarist

Prevention

When aquarists become infected by Mycobacterium marinum, it is usually because the carry out maintenance work when they have cuts or other skin problems on their hands or arms. Our skin is remarkably good at keeping malevolent microorganisms out, but as soon as the skin gets injured, an important part of the body’s defense system has been breached. It doesn’t have to bee a large wound; a simple paper cut or eczema can be enough for Mycobacterium marinum to slip through. When handling an aquarium where you suspect that Mycobacterium marinum may be present, it is consequently important to use protective gloves. You may have a tiny sore that you haven’t even noticed, such as a torn cuticle. Some aquarists prefer to use gloves all the time, or at least when they have damaged skin, since it is impossible to know if Mycobacterium marinum exists in an aquarium before the fish start to show symptoms of fish tuberculosis. You can also catch fish tuberculosis by using your mouth to start a siphon. Washing your hands and lower arms with soap after handling fish and aquariums is naturally always recommended.

Symptoms and treatment

When aquarists become infected with fish tuberculosis, it normally starts as a skin problem. Mycobacterium marinum is a slow growing mycobacterium and it can therefore take several weeks before you notice any symptoms. The first sign is normally small purple lesions or “bumps”. The lesions will grow and spread and Mycobacterium marinum can proceed to destroy the soft tissue under the skin, including tendons and joints. In severe cases, fish tuberculosis can spread to the bones and cause symptoms similar to arthritis.

Most doctors never come in contact with fish tuberculosis and if you show up with some strange lesions on your hands, they might not realize what is causing it and put you on a general oral antibiotic that will not kill Mycobacterium marinum. It is therefore very important to inform your doctor that you are an aquarist and that you may have caught fish tuberculosis or some other disease from your aquarium. Mycobacterium marinum can be successfully treated but only if the right combination of drugs are used. Just as with Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the treatment will normally need to be carried out over the course of several months. In serious cases, intravenous administration of antibiotics may be required.

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He sees the global West, led by the US, Britain, and Nato, as guilty of unprovoked aggression against Russia. He supports the separatist movement in east Ukraine, but repeats the Kremlin’s (long debunked) line that there is “no proof” of Russian involvement in the war there.

And he harbours a near-religious veneration for the Second World War as the foundation of a sense of Russian exceptionalism – the nearest thing contemporary Russia has to an official state ideology.

A sign of just how far the convergence of hawkish public ideology with football terrace nationalism came after the now infamous assault on England fans in Marseille Old Port and Velodrome stadium in June.

The discipline, brutality, and obvious preparation of those attacks provoked outrage in Britain, but barely disguised glee amongst some Russian officials in Moscow.

Mr Khuslyutdinov says this was pure political opportunism, rather than evidence of collusion between hooligans and the state.

“They were just saying what the broad electorate wanted to hear. With the exception of Vladimir Putin’s personal rating, these officials have basically no popularity. So allegedly supporting us is a way of showing they are in tune with the public mood,” he said.

“Besides, the day before that Russian and English fans were on the same side fighting some of the French, and no one mentions that.”

And he vigorously rejects the suggestion that the Marseilles hooligans included soldiers sent by the Kremlin in an act of "hybrid warfare."

In fact, he claims, they were not even Russia's best hooligans.

“You have to make a distinction. There’s the kids and there’s real fighters, the osnova,” he says, using a word that roughly translates as “the base” or “foundation.”

This praetorian guard of Russian hooliganism is made up of older, more experienced men who train hard, seldom drink, and follow health and fitness regimes that make them the diametric opposite of “getting drunk and having a go.”

“These are the best fighters, the first line. They’re people who never run from a fight. But they stayed away because we expected a much more serious policing operation from the French, especially given the recent terror attacks there.”

To prove the point, he sketched a map of Marseilles' Old Port and described in detail how the Russian attackers missed an opportunity to outflank French riot police and failed to set a second ambush.

“I could see those mistakes immediately just by watching on TV, and no experienced fighters would have made them,” he said. “In Marseilles it was kids, youngsters.”

“If we’d known the policing would be so limp-wristed a lot of other guys would have gone, and it would have been a very different story.”

To illustrate the point, he pointed out a well-built but far from muscle-bound man strolling past the training ground. “He’s in the osnova. He once killed a man with one punch and did five years inside for it. Now, you can imagine what it would have been like if they were there.”

“The authorities don’t really know what attitude to have to us. We have a lot of people who just don’t like the system, they don’t recognise the state, its authority, or anything like that. And people like that cannot be ruled,” he said.

“On the one hand we’re useful to the government, because they can point at us and say ‘you see how terrible and violent and scary these people are? that’s why we need so many police!’”

“But at the same time, some people in power are very fearful that this ‘army’ could be turned against them.”

As a result, Russian police have pursued a no-nonsense crackdown on domestic hooliganism in recent years that has seen mass brawls mostly banished from stadiums and many hooligans jailed.

“That’s why there will be no trouble at the 2018 World Cup. We will be strongly repressed in advance,” said Mr Khuslyutdinov. “There will be no repeat of what we’ve seen in France. It’s impossible.”


Obamacare! The War on Drugs! A War on Poverty! Prohibition! The idea that government will bring social progress isn't new.

Europe's monarchs believed in big government long before there was a Soviet Union or a welfare state. Eighteenth-century philosopher Voltaire praised "enlightened" monarchs like Prussia's Frederick the Great. Since the nineteenth century, so-called "progressives" have wanted government to get ever larger. They got their wish. The results were not so good for people.

Today pundits and protesters moan about fiscal "austerity" in nations like Greece. But if austerity means cuts in government, there hasn't been much of it.

Sure, Greece cut spending, but only by 3 percent. One in four Greek workers still works for government (vs. one in seven in the U.S.). Greek politicians run government "businesses" that employ politicians' cronies. In other words, Greece has barely begun what I would call austerity.

Paul Krugman deceitfully trashes real cuts and writes that he wants to see "some example, somewhere, of austerity policies that succeeded."

But there are plenty. The Cato Institute's Chris Edwards and Dan Mitchell discussed some at FreedomFest, a giant gathering of people who care about free markets held last week in Las Vegas. Mitchell points out that Ireland, New Zealand, Sweden, Canada and the Netherlands cut government spending and were quicker to recover from economic problems.

In the mid-90s, Canada was going broke, so the government cut its budget by about 10 percent. The growth that followed allowed Canada to cut its debt dramatically -- from about 68 percent of GDP to 28 percent. During that same decade, unemployment shrank. Canada's economy grew faster than that of every other G7 nation. Good things happened not because government spent more, but because it spent less.

The U.S. contains its own version of the Greek debt crisis in the form of Puerto Rico.

A recent island governor tried to cut Puerto Rico's bloated government. Luiz Fortuno fired thousands of workers and made it easier to open a business. The economy improved. But firing workers isn't popular. Fortuno lost the next election and his successor increased spending and raised taxes. Of course that didn't work. Now Puerto Rico can't pay its $70 billion debt.

"Are there any success stories based on tax hikes or bigger government? The answer is no," warns Mitchell.

Progressives pretend they have a technical fix for problems. On a national level, their fixes always involve giving more power to Washington, D.C. That soothes the left, since they love the idea of centralizing decision-making.

For a while, around the start of the twentieth century, technology advanced while government grew. Intellectuals thought the two things must go hand in hand. Government electrified rural areas! It can do anything!

Well, government can do some things, mostly expensive, obvious things, like building interstate highways, guarding borders and going to war -- though government doesn't do those things efficiently. Almost all its projects end up way over budget and behind schedule.

"Centralization of government spending in Washington over the past century has severely undermined good governance," argues Edwards on the site he edits, DownsizingGovernment.org. "Citizens get worse outcomes when funding and decision-making for education, infrastructure and other things are made by the central government rather than state and local governments and the private sector."

Politicians rarely notice the millions of tiny opportunities for people to make progress via new inventions and smarter ways of doing things -- the new app, the robotics start-up, the do-it-yourself metalworking printer.

Instead, politicians' limited imaginations lean toward big government-run projects like building bigger airports (needed or not), more welfare and micromanaging every private workplace.

"Politicians and lobby groups constantly complain that America does not spend enough," writes Edwards. "But they rarely discuss how to ensure efficiency in (government) spending, or cite any advantages of federal spending over state, local and private spending."

Government shovels more money into its big, dumb projects and pretends to build the future. But our future is more likely to be built by thousands of entrepreneurs who make the countless contributions that quietly improve our lives.


Having met the author on his battlefield tours - Gary Weight has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the Normandy campaign and the units involved - I eagerly awaited this book and it did not disappoint from the view of a wargamer and modeller with an interest in the NW European campaign.

The number of photos of personnel and the detail on personnel, training, locations in the UK and overseas, and movements will appeal in particular to relatives of veterans wishing to follow the paths of their families.

It is long (498 pages), well indexed, and concentrates absolutely on the 2nd Battalion the Lincolnshire Regiment, including only where necessary the minimum of background on the wider operations the unit took part in. Given the very large number of more or less general books, especially on the Normandy Campaign, this focus is welcome, as is the use only of photographs that are specific to the unit.

There are two 'prelude' sections on the history of the Lincolnshire Regiment (1685-1857 and 1857-1939), then 14 chapters on the 2nd Lincs part in:

Entering France with the BEF;

the Blitzkrieg in Flanders;

the Dunkirk evacuation;

Two on rebuilding, training and preparation in the UK;

Normandy 1 June-6 July (covering the landings and operations inland from Sword beach);

Normandy 6 July- 11 July (covering Operation Charnwood)s

Normandy 12 July - 31 July (Covering operation Goodwood);

the battle of Pont-de-Vaudrey;

crossing the Escaut Canal;

The Battle of Overloon and Venray;

fighting in the Maas Salient;

Into Germany and Operation Heather; and

Crossing he Rhine until the German surrender.

An Epilogue contains a selection of photos of personnel taken immediately after the war, the Roll of Honour, and seven appendices cover Awards and Citations, a note on assault river crossings, background on two particular individuals, the War Establishment (organisation) of a British Infantry Battalion at various stages throughout the War, and the order of Battle (names where known of key personnel and their roles in the battalion command structure).

Overall the book strikes the right balance between business-like but sympathetic coverage of the Battalion and their actions, and helps redress the balance of the majority of books on the big operations and armoured warfare. It really brings home the unrelenting grind of day-to-day infantry work, punctuated by short but bloody battalion level attacks.

Appropriate weight is given to the various sections, with the emphasis on the key battalion level engagements. It is not padded out with an overview of the campaigns and is mercifully free of generalisations about the strategic arguments around the Normandy fighting and the capabilities of various German weapons.

The (30!) maps deserve special mention and are an object lesson in how to present maps in books of this genre. There are wide overviews of movements, the theatre and annotated contemporary maps but the jewels are, firstly, the annotated and faintly colourised contemporary air recon photos of the areas of detailed actions and, secondly, and presumably where suitable photos were not available, original maps by the author that bring out every detail referred to in the text.


It’s no trick: Anoka’s famed Halloween parades will be free of Tootsie Rolls, Starburst and other sugary treats this year, with event organizers citing safety concerns as the reason behind a new candy ban.

Stormy debate and criticism have swirled on social media over the recently announced rule change. The new ban means no more candy handouts at the Grand Day Parade. It’s a marquee event in a city that Congress has proclaimed the “Halloween Capital of the World,” with Anoka’s spooky celebrations tracing back nearly a century.

Event organizers say worries over children mobbing parade vehicles for sweets, as well as a dip in volunteers able to patrol for this behavior, resulted in the decision to forgo candy giveaways. The annual festival — which includes two other parades where handouts were already prohibited — is put on by Anoka Halloween Inc., a nonprofit made up of volunteers.

“I don’t know what else to do,” said Liz McFarland, the festival’s parade chair. “Something is going to happen with a child because people aren’t watching their children.”

While there have been no injuries reported, previous parades have resulted in “close calls,” McFarland said.

The Halloween hullabaloo over the ban has prompted calls to City Hall and some barbed posts on social media, which range from “Candy IS Halloween!” to “How about parents actually parent their children?”

Costumed children walked down Main Street during Anoka’s Halloween festivities in 2015.

“It was a very swift uprising of people in response to that announcement,” said Colleen Halligan, secretary of this year’s Anoka Halloween board of directors.

A Facebook post made Friday about the rule change on the Anoka Halloween page had attracted about 250 comments as of Tuesday.

“We had hoped that the floats and bands were why people were coming to our parade,” the post read, “but we are learning that candy is very important.”

Before this latest rule change, parade organizers say they had already barred tossing treats from floats, limiting candy to handouts by groups walking along the route. They had also tried restricting candy to certain sections of the parade and imposing minimum age requirements for those handing it out.

“I’m out of ideas,” McFarland said. “We had to regroup this year.”

Some found out about the new ban after parade applications became available online earlier this month.

Jeremy Anderson, who owns a local construction and retail business, said he has decided not to participate in this year’s parade, despite it being a favorite tradition among his employees’ families.

He said his business, Countryside Services of MN, typically buys a pallet of candy from Costco and spends thousands of dollars on goodies for parade revelers.

“It’s just a bummer,” Anderson said. “It’s like every year they keep taking the fun out of it.”

The outcry has festival organizers pondering ways to safely bring back the treats. They say they’re now working to recruit more volunteers and fielding ideas.

“I hope to bring candy back,” McFarland said. “It’s Halloween. But safety is our No. 1 concern, and I don’t want to be part of an accident.”


By Tom Bell

Arya Esfandmaz has declared he intends on showing the world what both he and the UK is capable of on the competition mats when he flies out to Abu Dhabi next month to compete in the World Pro Jiu Jitsu Championship.

Esfandmaz won an all expenses paid trip to compete in the prestigious event after taking gold at the British National Pro Jiu Jitsu Championships in Birmingham, securing the $8000 package in the male +95kg division, which was a mix of black and brown belts. Arya also took bronze in the brown/black absolute.

The Lucio ‘Lagarto’ Rodrigues brown belt coaches and trains out of Gracie Barra Knightsbridge and is known for his acrobatic, entertaining style, with many trademark flying submissions on his competitive resume.

With a background in Judo, training at the famed Budokwai from a young age, Esfandmaz has declared he wants to fly the British flag and show what the UK has to offer on a world stage.

Speaking to Jiu Jitsu Style, he said:

“The tournament was really nice for me, I got to achieve one of my dreams in fighting black belts, as I always wanted to test myself at that level. I did well, I got lucky, and I ended up taking gold so it shows great improvement in myself.

“I also want to give a shout out to British BJJ because man, we had some good guys there like Bradley Hill and Viking Wong – they were very unlucky. They both drew Alan ‘Finfou’ Nascimento, so yeah, the UK smashed pretty much the whole thing and it showed that BJJ is improving a lot in the UK and it’s really nice to see. I couldn’t be more happy man. I just want to fly out there, do my best and bring home some medals.”

Speaking passionately after training, the brown belt nostalgically spoke of early Jiu Jitsu in the UK and believes the country has an immense talent pool that we should be proud of compared to larger nations. He intends to show what the UK is capable of.

“I want to fly the flag, of course I do,” says Arya. “I want to show that we aren’t some random small island that only likes to drink tea, we’re quite handy on the mats too.

“It’s funny, I remember back in my Judo days, I walked past Roger Gracie’s first gym and it was like a garage man, it was really run down and that was only like ten, fifteen years ago and you look at his academy now.

“It shows how much we’ve improved and it shows how respected we are and I think we’re top in Europe man, yeah, you have some Scandinavian countries coming through but I think we can smash it and to help fly that flag is something I want.”

Those familiar with the competitive circuit will know of the influx of Scandinavian talent Esfandmaz talks of, with the likes of Sebastian Brosche, winner of the Toukon Challenge Brown Belt Grand Prix and Eiren Cathrine Nygren who took double gold at brown belt at this year’s Europeans.

“California alone is bigger than the UK,” explains Arya. “If you look at some Californian academies, they have nice facilities, loads of training space and lots of training partners.”

The entire UK holds a population of around 64 million people over a total area of 243, 610km2, however the Jiu Jitsu hotbed of California alone is home to 38 million over an area of 423, 970km2. You can fit the UK into the US around 38 times and there are just short of five Americans to every Brit.

“Man, in London, if you try and find some space to open an academy it’s like, super hard,” says Arya. “People want space, people want apartments, they don’t want to sell you space to put some mats down. It’s hard to find the perfect training space here, so we need to appreciate our talent, look at the things that are actually against us and see how we’ve done – it’s really cool.”

Esfandmaz now looks forward to hard training with his master, Lagarto, and his partners at Gracie Barra Knightsbridge ahead of making his trip to the United Arab Emirates and is excited about the opportunity ahead of him.

“I always watched Abu Dhabi’s championships, like, it is super professional,” states Arya. “The fighters get a proper walkout, you even get a body guard to escort you. It’s televised too, so that’s an opportunity that’s awesome to have, you know.

“It’s a really big opportunity and I’m lucky enough to go into it training under Lagarto and Paul Hartley, as well as everyone else at Gracie Barra Knightsbridge. Man, I’ve been waiting and I’ve been training my ass off and now I’m getting that confidence to go out there and be the best I can. Although Lagarto has called me out about doing cool moves, he wants me to win above everything else.

“I’m like ‘Lagarto! I’m gonna do this, I’m gonna flying armbar this guy’, but he’s like ‘Arya! Go for the win first!’ so I’m going to do everything I can to take this opportunity for myself and for the UK.”

Check out our latest issue HERE with cover star, Garry Tonon!


10 years ago

Limbaugh took aim at Powell's comments about the GOP.

WASHINGTON (CNN) – Rush Limbaugh fired back at Colin Powell for his critical comments earlier this week, saying Wednesday that the former secretary of state should join the Democratic Party.

"What Colin Powell needs to do is close the loop and become a Democrat instead of claiming to be a Republican interested in reforming the Republican Party," Limbaugh said on his radio show Wednesday.

Limbaugh also took aim at Powell's decision to endorse President Obama over John McCain during the presidential election, repeating his earlier sentiment that Powell's move was "solely based on race."

"He's just mad at me because I'm the one person in the country who had the guts to explain his endorsement of Obama," Limbaugh said. "It was purely and solely based on race."

During a speech on Monday, Powell said the "the Republican Party is in deep trouble" and said the GOP would be better off without Limbaugh, according to a report by the National Journal.

"I think what Rush does as an entertainer diminishes the party and intrudes or inserts into our public life a kind of nastiness that we would be better to do without," Powell said.

Earlier: Powell: GOP 'polarization' backfired in election