Article:

Tweet with a location

 You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more ||||| The Anti-Defamation League and the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect both condemned Mr. Trump for what they characterized as trivializing one of the singular horrors of the 20th century to score a political point.

 “Has he no sense of shame?” said Steven Goldstein, executive director of the Anne Frank Center, the American chapter of an international group that fights prejudice to honor the legacy of Anne Frank, the teenage diarist who perished in the Holocaust in 1945.

 “The president-elect has shown the grossest possible insensitivity to survivors of the Holocaust before he even takes office,” Mr. Goldstein said. “Either he is completely callous in attacking U.S. intelligence, or he is so ignorant of history that you would never want this man to be president.”

 Jonathan A. Greenblatt, the chief executive of the Anti-Defamation League, said that Mr. Trump’s analogy was “not only an inappropriate comparison on the merits, but it also coarsens our discourse.”

 “We have a long record of speaking out when both Democrats and Republicans engage in such overheated rhetoric,” he said. “It would be helpful for the president-elect to explain his intentions or apologize for the remark.” ||||| The extraordinary but unverified documents published on Tuesday on Donald Trump’s ties with Moscow began life as a piece of opposition research, which has become as much a part of US politics as yard signs and coloured balloons.

 There is a small industry of research and investigative firms in Washington, typically staffed by a mix of former journalists and security officials, adept at finding information about politicians that the politicians would rather stay hidden. The firms often do not know who exactly is hiring them; the request could come from a law firm acting on behalf of a client from one of the parties.

 In this case, the request for opposition research on Donald Trump came from one of his Republican opponents in the primary campaign. The research firm then hired one of its sub-contractors who it used regularly on all things Russian: a retired western European former counter-intelligence official, with a long history of dealing with the shadow world of Moscow’s spooks and siloviki (securocrats).

 Explainer: what is in the Trump-Russia dossier John McCain passed to the FBI? Read more

 By the time the contractor had started his research, however, the Republican primary was over. The original client had dropped out, but the firm that had hired him had found a new, Democratic client. This was not necessarily the Hillary Clinton campaign or the Democratic National Committee. Opposition research is frequently financed by wealthy individuals who have donated all they can and are looking for other ways to help.

 By July, the counter-intelligence contractor had collected a significant amount of material based on Russian sources who he had grown to trust over the years – not just in Moscow, but also among oligarchs living in the west. He delivered his reports, but the gravity of their contents weighed on him. If the allegations were real, their implications were overwhelming.

 He delivered a set to former colleagues in the FBI, whose counter-intelligence division would be the appropriate body to investigate. It is believed he also passed a copy to his own country’s intelligence service, but it felt constrained in what action it could take and left it up to the Americans to do their own investigation and draw their own conclusions.

 As summer turned to autumn, the investigator was asked for more information by the FBI but heard nothing back about any investigation. The bureau seemed obsessed instead with classified material that flowed through a private email server set up by Clinton’s aides. The FBI’s director, James Comey, threw the election into a spin 11 days before the vote by announcing his investigators were examining newly discovered material.

 The former intelligence official grew concerned that there was a cover-up in progress. On a trip to New York in October, he was persuaded to tell his story to David Corn, the Washington editor of Mother Jones, who first reported the existence of the material on 31 October.

 The FBI however continued to refuse to comment on the issue, despite reports that it had requested and perhaps acquired a warrant for further investigation from the Foreign intelligence surveillance (Fisa) court. The silence was not altogether surprising. The FBI counter-intelligence division, headquartered in Washington, is extremely secretive, much more so than the New York field office, which had strong links to former prosecutor and mayor Rudy Giuliani, who was by then working for Trump. The threat of leaks from New York about Clinton emails had reportedly pushed Comey into making his October surprise announcement.

 Donald Trump press conference: Russia allegations something 'Nazi Germany' would have done – live Read more

 In mid-November, the documents took another route into Washington that ultimately led to them being mentioned in the joint intelligence report on Russian interference that was delivered to President Obama and President-elect Trump. On 18 November, the annual Halifax International Security Forum opened in the Canadian city, bringing together serving and former security and foreign policy officials from around the world.

 Senator John McCain, a hawkish Republican, was there and was introduced to a former senior western diplomat who had seen the documents, knew their source and thought him highly reliable. McCain decided the implications were sufficiently alarming to dispatch a trusted emissary, a former US official, to meet the source and find out more.

 The emissary hastily arranged a transatlantic flight and met the source at the airport as arranged. (The Guardian has agreed not to specify the city or country where the meeting took place.) The meeting had a certain cold war tradecraft to it, as he was told to look for a man with a copy of the Financial Times. Having found each other, the retired counter-intelligence officer drove the emissary to his house, where they discussed the documents and their background.

 The emissary flew back within 24 hours and showed McCain the documents, saying it was hard to impossible to verify them without a proper investigation. McCain said he was reluctant to get involved, lest it be perceived as payback for insulting remarks Trump had made about him during his rambunctious campaign.

 However, on 9 December, McCain arranged a one-on-one meeting with Comey, with no aides present, and handed them over.

 BuzzFeed publishes unsubstantiated Trump report, raising ethics questions Read more

 “Upon examination of the contents, and unable to make a judgment about their accuracy, I delivered the information to the Director of the FBI. That has been the extent of my contact with the FBI or any other government agency regarding this issue,” the senator said in a statement on Wednesday morning.

 It is not clear what underpinned the FBI’s decision to include a summary of the documents in its highly classified briefing to the president and president-elect and their top staff, before the bureau had completed its investigation. It may have been as a defensive measure, to prove for posterity that it was not involved in a cover-up, or because its investigators believed them to be credible.

 Whatever the motive, it was quickly leaked – first to CNN, which reported on the material on Wednesday. That triggered a controversial decision by BuzzFeed to publish an unredacted version of the documents on its website. It is unclear where the BuzzFeed version came from. The author of the reports had been insistent on blotting out references to his Russian sources in the copies he gave to the press, out of fear for their safety. The unredacted version could have come from the original client, who commissioned the research, or from intermediaries between the counter-intelligence contractor and the client. ||||| In January 1961, Dwight Eisenhower delivered his farewell address after serving two terms as U.S. president; the five-star general chose to warn Americans of this specific threat to democracy: “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.” That warning was issued prior to the decadelong escalation of the Vietnam War, three more decades of Cold War mania, and the post-9/11 era, all of which radically expanded that unelected faction’s power even further. This is the faction that is now engaged in open warfare against the duly elected and already widely disliked president-elect, Donald Trump. They are using classic Cold War dirty tactics and the defining ingredients of what has until recently been denounced as “Fake News.” Their most valuable instrument is the U.S. media, much of which reflexively reveres, serves, believes, and sides with hidden intelligence officials. And Democrats, still reeling from their unexpected and traumatic election loss, as well as a systemic collapse of their party, seemingly divorced further and further from reason with each passing day, are willing — eager — to embrace any claim, cheer any tactic, align with any villain, regardless of how unsupported, tawdry, and damaging those behaviors might be. The serious dangers posed by a Trump presidency are numerous and manifest. There is a wide array of legitimate and effective tactics for combating those threats: from bipartisan congressional coalitions and constitutional legal challenges to citizen uprisings and sustained and aggressive civil disobedience. All of those strategies have periodically proven themselves effective in times of political crisis or authoritarian overreach. But cheering for the CIA and its shadowy allies to unilaterally subvert the U.S. election and impose its own policy dictates on the elected president is both warped and self-destructive. Empowering the very entities that have produced the most shameful atrocities and systemic deceit over the last six decades is desperation of the worst kind. Demanding that evidence-free, anonymous assertions be instantly venerated as Truth — despite emanating from the very precincts designed to propagandize and lie — is an assault on journalism, democracy, and basic human rationality. And casually branding domestic adversaries who refuse to go along as traitors and disloyal foreign operatives is morally bankrupt and certain to backfire on those doing it. Beyond all that, there is no bigger favor that Trump opponents can do for him than attacking him with such lowly, shabby, obvious shams, recruiting large media outlets to lead the way. When it comes time to expose actual Trump corruption and criminality, who is going to believe the people and institutions who have demonstrated they are willing to endorse any assertions no matter how factually baseless, who deploy any journalistic tactic no matter how unreliable and removed from basic means of ensuring accuracy? All of these toxic ingredients were on full display yesterday as the Deep State unleashed its tawdriest and most aggressive assault yet on Trump: vesting credibility in and then causing the public disclosure of a completely unvetted and unverified document, compiled by a paid, anonymous operative while he was working for both GOP and Democratic opponents of Trump, accusing Trump of a wide range of crimes, corrupt acts, and salacious private conduct. The reaction to all of this illustrates that while the Trump presidency poses grave dangers, so, too, do those who are increasingly unhinged in their flailing, slapdash, and destructive attempts to undermine it. For months, the CIA, with unprecedented clarity, overtly threw its weight behind Hillary Clinton’s candidacy and sought to defeat Donald Trump. In August, former acting CIA Director Michael Morell announced his endorsement of Clinton in the New York Times and claimed that “Mr. Putin had recruited Mr. Trump as an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation.” The CIA and NSA director under George W. Bush, Gen. Michael Hayden, also endorsed Clinton and went to the Washington Post to warn, in the week before the election, that “Donald Trump really does sound a lot like Vladimir Putin,” adding that Trump is “the useful fool, some naif, manipulated by Moscow, secretly held in contempt, but whose blind support is happily accepted and exploited.” It is not hard to understand why the CIA preferred Clinton over Trump. Clinton was critical of Obama for restraining the CIA’s proxy war in Syria and was eager to expand that war, while Trump denounced it. Clinton clearly wanted a harder line than Obama took against the CIA’s long-standing foes in Moscow, while Trump wanted improved relations and greater cooperation. In general, Clinton defended and intended to extend the decadeslong international military order on which the CIA and Pentagon’s preeminence depends, while Trump — through a still-uncertain mix of instability and extremist conviction — posed a threat to it. Whatever one’s views are on those debates, it is the democratic framework — the presidential election, the confirmation process, congressional leaders, judicial proceedings, citizen activism and protest, civil disobedience — that should determine how they are resolved. All of those policy disputes were debated out in the open; the public heard them; and Trump won. Nobody should crave the rule of Deep State overlords. Yet craving Deep State rule is exactly what prominent Democratic operatives and media figures are doing. Any doubt about that is now dispelled. Just last week, Chuck Schumer issued a warning to Trump, telling Rachel Maddow that Trump was being “really dumb” by challenging the unelected intelligence community because of all the ways they possess to destroy those who dare to stand up to them:

 Chuck Schumer on Trump's tweet hitting intel community: "He's being really dumb to do this." https://t.co/MOcU8ruOPK — Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) January 4, 2017

 And last night, many Democrats openly embraced and celebrated what was, so plainly, an attempt by the Deep State to sabotage an elected official who had defied it: ironically, its own form of blackmail. Back in October, a political operative and former employee of the British intelligence agency MI6 was being paid by Democrats to dig up dirt on Trump (before that, he was paid by anti-Trump Republicans). He tried to convince countless media outlets to publish a long memo he had written filled with explosive accusations about Trump’s treason, business corruption, and sexual escapades, with the overarching theme that Trump was in servitude to Moscow because they were blackmailing and bribing him. Despite how many had it, no media outlets published it. That was because these were anonymous claims unaccompanied by any evidence at all, and even in this more permissive new media environment, nobody was willing to be journalistically associated with it. As the New York Times’ Executive Editor Dean Baquet put it last night, he would not publish these “totally unsubstantiated” allegations because “we, like others, investigated the allegations and haven’t corroborated them, and we felt we’re not in the business of publishing things we can’t stand by.” The closest this operative got to success was convincing Mother Jones’s David Corn to publish an October 31 article reporting that “a former senior intelligence officer for a Western country” claims that “he provided the [FBI] with memos, based on his recent interactions with Russian sources, contending the Russian government has for years tried to co-opt and assist Trump.” But because this was just an anonymous claim unaccompanied by any evidence or any specifics (which Corn withheld), it made very little impact. All of that changed yesterday. Why? What changed was the intelligence community’s resolution to cause this all to become public and to be viewed as credible. In December, John McCain provided a copy of this report to the FBI and demanded they take it seriously. At some point last week, the chiefs of the intelligence agencies decided to declare that this ex-British intelligence operative was “credible” enough that his allegations warranted briefing both Trump and Obama about them, thus stamping some sort of vague, indirect, and deniable official approval on these accusations. Someone — by all appearances, numerous officials — then went to CNN to tell the network they had done this, causing CNN to go on air and, in the gravest of tones, announce the “Breaking News” that “the nation’s top intelligence officials” briefed Obama and Trump that Russia had compiled information that “compromised President-elect Trump.” CNN refused to specify what these allegations were on the ground that it could not “verify” them. But with this document in the hands of multiple media outlets, it was only a matter of time — a small amount of time — before someone would step up and publish the whole thing. BuzzFeed quickly obliged, airing all of the unvetted, anonymous claims about Trump. Its editor-in-chief, Ben Smith, published a memo explaining that decision, saying that — although there was “serious reason to doubt the allegations” — BuzzFeed in general “errs on the side of publication” and “Americans can make up their own minds about the allegations.” Publishing this document predictably produced massive traffic (and thus profit) for the site, with millions of people viewing the article and presumably reading the “dossier.” One can certainly object to BuzzFeed’s decision and, as the New York Times noted this morning, many journalists are doing so. It’s almost impossible to imagine a scenario where it’s justifiable for a news outlet to publish a totally anonymous, unverified, unvetted document filled with scurrilous and inflammatory allegations about which its own editor-in-chief says there “is serious reason to doubt the allegations,” on the ground that they want to leave it to the public to decide whether to believe it. But even if one believes there is no such case where that is justified, yesterday’s circumstances presented the most compelling scenario possible for doing this. Once CNN strongly hinted at these allegations, it left it to the public imagination to conjure up the dirt Russia allegedly had to blackmail and control Trump. By publishing these accusations, BuzzFeed ended that speculation. More importantly, it allowed everyone to see how dubious this document is, one the CIA and CNN had elevated into some sort of grave national security threat. Almost immediately after it was published, the farcical nature of the “dossier” manifested. Not only was its author anonymous, but he was paid by Democrats (and, before that, by Trump’s GOP adversaries) to dig up dirt on Trump. Worse, he himself cited no evidence of any kind but instead relied on a string of other anonymous people in Russia he claims told him these things. Worse still, the document was filled with amateur errors. While many of the claims are inherently unverified, some can be confirmed. One such claim — that Trump lawyer Michael Cohen secretly traveled to Prague in August to meet with Russian officials — was strongly denied by Cohen, who insisted he had never been to Prague in his life (Prague is the same place that foreign intelligence officials claimed, in 2001, was the site of a nonexistent meeting between Iraqi officials and 9/11 hijackers, which contributed to 70 percent of Americans believing, as late as the fall of 2003, that Saddam personally planned the 9/11 attack). This morning, the Wall Street Journal reported that “the FBI has found no evidence that [Cohen] traveled to the Czech Republic.” None of this stopped Democratic operatives and prominent media figures from treating these totally unverified and unvetted allegations as grave revelations. From Vox’s Zack Beauchamp:

 Look, don't take anything in this dossier as gospel. But it's definitely evidence in favor of some pretty extraordinary claims. — Zack Beauchamp (@zackbeauchamp) January 10, 2017

 BuzzFeed’s Borzou Daragahi posted a long series of tweets discussing the profound consequences of these revelations, only occasionally remembering to insert the rather important journalistic caveat “if true” in his meditations:

 Whoa ????. So guessing the press conference tomorrow is off. https://t.co/e4iNrNKgrh pic.twitter.com/VEa44PeICe — Borzou Daragahi (@borzou) January 11, 2017

 Stunning and believable narrative in leaked docs describing alleged rift in Kremlin over meddling in US elections https://t.co/e4iNrNKgrh pic.twitter.com/qY2TuSM5Fc — Borzou Daragahi (@borzou) January 11, 2017

 According to raw intel file, Kremlin info ops regarded Trump, @DrJillStein, LaRouche and @GenFlynn all potential assets in war vs Clinton pic.twitter.com/3fxTcqUIUL — Borzou Daragahi (@borzou) January 11, 2017

 Bombshell if true: Trump lawyer @MichaelCohen212 & Kremlin reps allegedly held clandestine August meeting in Prague https://t.co/e4iNrO1RiP pic.twitter.com/7FBZjJyXMq — Borzou Daragahi (@borzou) January 11, 2017

 Meanwhile, liberal commentator Rebecca Solnit declared this to be a “smoking gun” that proves Trump’s “treason,” while Daily Kos’s Markos Moulitsas sounded the same theme:

 With CNN confirming that intelligence chiefs consider this report credible, it's about time to start using the word "treason" — Markos Moulitsas (@markos) January 11, 2017 ||||| In June, the tenor of the effort suddenly changed. The Washington Post reported that the Democratic National Committee had been hacked, apparently by Russian government agents, and a mysterious figure calling himself “Guccifer 2.0” began to publish the stolen documents online.

 Mr. Simpson hired Mr. Steele, a former British intelligence officer with whom he had worked before. Mr. Steele, in his early 50s, had served undercover in Moscow in the early 1990s and later was the top expert on Russia at the London headquarters of Britain’s spy service, MI6. When he stepped down in 2009, he started his own commercial intelligence firm, Orbis Business Intelligence.

 The former journalist and the former spy, according to people who know them, had similarly dark views of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, a former K.G.B. officer, and the varied tactics he and his intelligence operatives used to smear, blackmail or bribe their targets.

 As a former spy who had carried out espionage inside Russia, Mr. Steele was in no position to travel to Moscow to study Mr. Trump’s connections there. Instead, he hired native Russian speakers to call informants inside Russia and made surreptitious contact with his own connections in the country as well.

 Mr. Steele wrote up his findings in a series of memos, each a few pages long, that he began to deliver to Fusion GPS in June and continued at least until December. By then, the election was over, and neither Mr. Steele nor Mr. Simpson was being paid by a client, but they did not stop what they believed to be very important work. (Mr. Simpson declined to comment for this article, and Mr. Steele did not immediately reply to a request for comment.)

 The memos described two different Russian operations. The first was a yearslong effort to find a way to influence Mr. Trump, perhaps because he had contacts with Russian oligarchs whom Mr. Putin wanted to keep track of. According to Mr. Steele’s memos, it used an array of familiar tactics: the gathering of “kompromat,” compromising material such as alleged tapes of Mr. Trump with prostitutes in a Moscow hotel, and proposals for business deals attractive to Mr. Trump.

 The goal would probably never have been to make Mr. Trump a knowing agent of Russia, but to make him a source who might provide information to friendly Russian contacts. But if Mr. Putin and his agents wanted to entangle Mr. Trump using business deals, they did not do it very successfully. Mr. Trump has said he has no major properties there, though one of his sons said at a real estate conference in 2008 that “a lot of money” was “pouring in from Russia.” ||||| Democrats have resisted openly questioning Donald Trump’s legitimacy as the next president — despite Vladimir Putin’s efforts to get him elected, now acknowledged by Trump himself.

 But the party is finding it increasingly difficult to hold back.

 Story Continued Below

 Democrats are struggling with how far to go in exploiting Trump’s Russia troubles for political gain — wary of prolonging election-year acrimony and undermining confidence in American democracy, but tempted to try to maximize their chances of making Trump a one-term president.

 The dilemma was heightened by this week’s explosive reports about Russia possibly obtaining compromising information on Trump, which he flatly denied at a news conference Wednesday. Where the party ends up could say a lot about how Democrats intend to mount a comeback from their shocking defeat at Trump’s hands in November.

 For now, at least, they’re trying to straddle a middle ground, saying it’s up to Trump to prove his legitimacy with his own actions. That means backing stronger sanctions against Russia and allowing a full investigation into its apparent election meddling instead of bashing U.S. intelligence agencies and lavishing praise on Russian leader Putin.

 “It casts a shadow over the presidency,” Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) said in an interview. While Russia’s cyber-intrusion into the election “doesn’t change the outcome of the Electoral College,” he added, it does demonstrate that “there is no mandate for Trump’s vision or policies for America. He lost the popular vote — that’s the citizens’ vote — by a huge margin.”

 Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) was more direct in his challenge to Trump’s “bizarre and so otherwise inexplicable” refusal to agree with the intelligence community’s findings that Russia mounted a campaign to hurt Hillary Clinton’s chances of winning the White House.

 “What is the nature of your compulsion to deny and to avoid this conversation?” Connolly said he would like to ask Trump. He warned Republicans who have sidestepped Trump’s friendliness toward Russia that “you put yourself at great peril depending on subsequent facts” by embracing any “rationalization of this Russian interference and possible troubling relationship between the president-elect and Putin.”

 So far, House Democrats are more willing than their Senate counterparts to assert that Trump’s presidential victory has lost credibility due to Russian meddling. Even before Trump’s Russia troubles deepened late Tuesday, two members of House Democratic leadership wryly nicknamed him “Moscow Donald” during a news conference.

 “This was the most un-American election ever,” said Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.), a member of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, which oversees human rights in the region.

 If Trump commits to “stronger sanctions” against Russia, Cohen added, “I think people would feel comfortable that he would put America first. It would maybe limit people’s concerns that there was a relationship with Russia that was unhealthy that we don’t know about. People think Putin had something on him.”

 California Rep. Eric Swalwell, who’s helped lead a Democratic push for an independent commission to investigate Russian hacking, said lawmakers should not worry about appearing to try to invalidate the results of the election because there is no evidence that Trump’s campaign coordinated with Russia.

 “There’s a fear that, if you acknowledge it, you’re putting an asterisk on our president-elect, and that’s really a short-sighted way of looking at this,” Swalwell said in an interview. “It’s only an asterisk if there was any collaboration.”

 Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle have called for further investigation into links between Trump emissaries and Russia, however. FBI Director James Comey said during Senate testimony Tuesday that he could neither confirm nor deny a probe of alleged coordination between Trump allies and Russia.

 “He can legitimize himself by being forthcoming about his global interests,” Swalwell said, reviving long-running Democratic insistence that Trump follow presidential precedent and release his tax returns.

 Senior Democrats are renewing their push for an independent, bipartisan commission to probe Russia’s meddling following the revelation, first reported by CNN, that U.S. intelligence officials briefed Trump on Russia’s alleged attempts to collect compromising information on him. Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said Wednesday that Trump’s friendliness toward Russia is “even more worrisome” in light of the reports, acknowledging they remain uncorroborated.

 “The allegation that an American president could be susceptible to blackmail by a hostile foreign government is historic and deeply troubling,” Durbin said in a statement. “It makes the resistance of Republican leaders in the Senate and House to a fulsome investigation all the more inexplicable.”

 Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen says Russia's preference for Donald Trump in the November election is not in dispute. | AP Photo

 Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), chairman of Senate Democrats’ campaign committee, said in a Tuesday interview before the CNN report that while “it’s unknowable to what extent Russian interference affected the outcome” of the election, Moscow’s preference for Trump isn’t in dispute.

 “What we do know is they were working hard to elect Donald Trump and try to disqualify Hillary Clinton, and that means it’s really important that we not only shine a light on what happened,” Van Hollen said, “but that we protect our electoral system and we sanction the Russians.”

 Several Democrats steered clear of questioning Trump’s validity. Sen. Robert Menendez of New Jersey, one of several Democrats who joined four Republican senators Tuesday on a new Russia sanctions bill, said the Putin regime’s involvement in the election was critical — not what that involvement says about Trump’s victory.

 “I don’t even pass an opinion on whether it affected the legitimacy of his election,” Menendez said.

 Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) offered a road map for his party’s messaging efforts, blaming Trump for putting his own legitimacy at risk by resisting intelligence reports and underscoring Democrats’ interest in a bipartisan process.

 “What undermines the incoming president is his unwillingness to agree with the intelligence community,” Schatz said in an interview. “There are very few serious members of Congress who are using this to question the legitimacy of the president-elect, but there are very many people on both sides who want to get to the bottom of this — not for the purpose of re-litigating 2016, but for the purpose of protecting our republic.” ||||| President-elect Donald Trump says allegations made about him in an unverified dossier prepared by ex-British intelligence officer, Christopher Steele, are completely fabricated. WSJ’s Jason Bellini breaks down what we know about the material and the person behind it. Photo: Getty.

 A former British intelligence officer who is now a director of a private security-and-investigations firm has been identified as the author of the dossier of unverified allegations about President-elect Donald Trump’s activities and connections in Russia, people familiar with the matter say.

 Christopher Steele, a director of London-based Orbis Business Intelligence Ltd., prepared the dossier, the people said. The document, which an official close to the matter said was prepared under contract to both Republican and Democratic... |||||
What is a summary?

– The author of the explosive dossier dogging Donald Trump less than 10 days before his inauguration has been named as a former British intelligence officer—but the investigative firm he co-directs won't confirm or deny his involvement. Sources tell the Wall Street Journal that the document was prepared by Christopher Steele, a former Russia expert in Britain's spy service who founded the Orbis Business Intelligence research firm in 2009. The New York Times, in a look at how the dossier came to light, reports that Steele was hired by Washington research firm Fusion GPS, which was hired by a wealthy GOP donor in the fall of 2015 to compile anti-Trump material. After Trump became the presumptive nominee, the GOP donor no longer needed the research firm's services, but wealthy Democratic donors stepped in, and Steele continued to send monthly memos detailing alleged Russian efforts to both compromise Trump and assist his campaign, per the Times' sources. In other coverage: The Guardian looks at John McCain's involvement, which apparently included clandestine efforts to obtain the dossier after hearing about it from a diplomat during a conference in Canada. "Upon examination of the contents, and unable to make a judgment about their accuracy, I delivered the information to the director of the FBI," McCain said in a statement Wednesday. The AP reports that it has been unable to contact Steele. A neighbor of the former spy, who lives outside London, says Steele and his family are away and it's not clear when they will return. Intelligence chiefs are defending their decision to take the very unusual step of attaching a summary of the unverified dossier to last week's briefing on Russian hacking, the Washington Post reports. "Part of our obligation is to ensure that policymakers are provided with the fullest possible picture of any matters that might affect national security," Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said Wednesday. He said he spoke with Trump and expressed dismay at the "extremely corrosive" leaks in the press. Early Thursday, Trump tweeted that Clapper had called him "to denounce the false and fictitious report that was illegally circulated." He added: "Made up, phony facts.Too bad!" Politico looks at how Democrats are dealing with Trump's Russia troubles. So far, senators have been more restrained than House members, some of whom have started referring to Trump as "Moscow Donald." The New York Times reports that Trump is facing a backlash from Jewish groups for wondering if we "are living in Nazi Germany" when he was criticizing intelligence agencies' handling of what he called "fake news." At the Intercept, Glenn Greenwald calls the dossier "farcical" and warns that this episode could backfire badly for Democratic operatives and others treating the dossier as gospel. He warns that if it is proved false, it will "forever discredit ... future journalistic exposés that are based on actual, corroborated wrongdoing."


– President Obama's acceptance speech last night wasn't a complete dud, but it wasn't the finest speech of his career—or of the Democratic National Convention, or even of yesterday, say pundits. At 38 minutes, it was the shortest acceptance speech from an incumbent since Gerald Ford in 1976, Politico notes. The Democrats were having a great convention until the president delivered a "warmed-over rehash of his stump speech" with a "laundry list of familiar proposals," writes Molly Ball at the Atlantic. His speech—which "seemed engineered as a series of defensive moves"—was "so befuddlingly flat as to make you wonder whether its lameness was intentional," she writes. The speech wasn't make-or-break for Obama, but he could surely have done better than the "fourth best speech of the Democratic convention" after Bill Clinton's, Michelle's, and Joe Biden's, writes Yuval Levin at the National Review. Obama "laid out no discernible second-term agenda of his own," and his attack on Romney's "supposed plans to eradicate all of government while giving tax cuts to the wealthy" was the speech's "sole coherent message," he writes. Chris Cillizza at the Washington Post names his winners and losers of the convention, and puts Obama between the two categories. "At times, it felt more like a State of the Union address than a convention acceptance speech. It was workmanlike more than inspirational," he writes. The speech wasn't in the same league as Bill Clinton's, "but neither will it be remembered as a colossal flop." The speech was "forceful, animated, and error-free—but not among his most lustrous rhetorical moments," write Niall Stanage and Amie Parnes at the Hill. The speech "highlighted Obama’s accomplishments, drew broad outlines of what a second White House term would bring, and was jam-packed with stark, sometimes mocking, contrasts between his policies and those" of Mitt Romney, but there wasn't a glimpse of the "more elevated oratory that powered his historic journey to the Oval Office in 2008" until the final minutes.

Expand this summary.

President Barack Obama's convention speech ranks as the shortest acceptance speech by an incumbent in 36 years.

 According to C-SPAN research, Obama's speech clocked in at 38 minutes and 23 seconds, the briefest nomination acceptance speech by a president since Gerald Ford in 1976.

 While it was roughly 26 minutes shorter than the record-holder since 1972 — Bill Clinton's long-winded 1996 speech — Obama still fell short of Mitt Romney's mark. Romney's acceptance address at the GOP convention ran 37 minutes and 47 seconds, the shortest in either party since Walter Mondale in 1984.

 Read more about: Democratic National Convention 2012 ||||| CHARLOTTE -- That's a wrap.

 The Democratic National Convention is over and the sprint -- 60 days left as of tomorrow! -- to the November election is on.

 But before you start running, rest a while and read our picks for the winners and the losers from the final night of the Democratic convention.

 One person you won't see in winners and losers is President Obama. His speech was certainly not among the best he has ever delivered -- the #1 seed in those rankings is his 2007 Iowa Jefferson-Jackson dinner address -- and, at times, it felt more like a State of the Union address than a convention acceptance speech. It was workmanlike more than inspirational.

 That said, Obama always faces a very high bar when he speaks since he is rightly regarded as one of the best (if not the best) political orator in the country. The speech will certainly send convention-goers back to their home states excited about the final 60 days of the campaign and there were enough appeals to the political center to make the case that Obama is the right home for them.

 In short: It won't be the sort of historically memorable speech that former President Bill Clinton delivered Wednesday night. But neither will it be remembered as a colossal flop. If we had a category between winning and losing -- we don't -- that's where Obama's speech would fall.

 Without further ado, we present our winners and losers. Have picks of your own? The comments section is open for business.

 WINNERS

 * Gabby Giffords: The former Arizona congresswoman's recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance was an emotional high point at the Democratic convention. Giffords, who survived an assassination attempt in January 2011, was aided across the stage by Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz but Giffords spoke the words of the pledge clearly. It was a moment of genuine emotion -- a rarity in our world of pre-planned politics. (video)

 * John Kerry: The Massachusetts senator started off slowly but he certainly amped it up. Kerry, in what will be cast as a tryout for secretary of state if Obama is elected to a second term, offered a scathing assessment of Mitt Romney's foreign policy credentials (or lack thereof). "Ask Osama bin Laden if he is better off now than he was four years ago," Kerry boomed in what will be one of the most oft-quoted lines of the convention. Kerry's 2012 speech left many Democrats wondering where that kind of edge and passion was when he was the party's standard-bearer. Fair question. But tonight Kerry shined. (video and transcript)

 * John Lewis: The Georgia congressman -- and civil rights pioneer -- is among the best speakers Democrats have in the party. On Thursday Lewis delivered a stirring speech connecting the civil rights fight to the fight over voter ID laws. Our issue? Lewis spoke very early in the night, before almost anyone except people like the Fix were watching. Why not put him a little later in the schedule?

 U2: First, Mary J. Blige sang "One." Then Obama came out to give his acceptance speech to "City of Blinding Lights." Not bad for four guys from Dublin.

 * Foo Fighters: The Fix has never been a huge Dave Grohl fan. But the Foo was very good tonight with its acoustic-y set. (video)

 * "Literally": Has the word ever been uttered more in a single convention speech than it was by Vice President Biden tonight? We think not. "Literally" had a coming out party tonight in Charlotte!

 LOSERS

 * Brian Schweitzer: The governor of Montana was one of the breakout stars of the 2008 Democratic National Convention with a speech that lit up the Denver hall. But tonight Schweitzer seemed too folksy by half (or maybe more) -- like he was playing a character named "Brian Schweitzer." And his "that dog won't hunt" refrain, well, it just didn't hunt.

 * Charlie Crist: Party switching convention speakers are rarely well received since the partisans in the audience tend to see the switcher as a wolf in sheep's clothing. That's especially true for Crist who was the REPUBLICAN governor of Florida when President Obama was elected in 2008. Crist's speech was a transparent attempt to get right with the party that he wants to represent when he runs for future office. Even in the room, it was only politely received. At best. (video)

 * Caroline Kennedy: Yes, we know that the daughter of John F. Kennedy is a private person who doesn't like the spotlight. But her speech at the convention tonight was incredibly flat, taking the energy out of an emotionally charged room following Giffords' recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance. (video)

 * Osama bin Laden: If you didn't know it before tonight, you know it now: He's dead. Big time. ||||| The president’s convention speech was never going to be a make-or-break moment for him in this campaign: People already have an opinion of him, they basically know his pitch, and unless he planned to offer a major new proposal or argument it wouldn’t have been easy for him to move anyone with his convention closer. But he surely could have done better than he did. He gave the fourth best speech of the Democratic convention, and the three better ones—Bill Clinton’s, Michelle Obama’s, and (rather surprisingly, at least for me) Joe Biden’s—weren’t spectacular. And he gave a speech that couldn’t rank near the top tier of his own presidential speeches.

 The basic problem for a president running for reelection in hard times is to explain how the next four years would be different from the last four without making himself sound like a failure. Obama simply didn’t do that. He offered the Left’s usual confused nostalgia for the early postwar years followed by a vague vision of hope and a set of bland goals that had to leave his listeners wondering why he hadn’t done these things in the last four years, and therefore why we should expect him to be more effective with (almost certainly) even fewer votes in Congress on his side in the next four. He offered no sense that he thinks some significant change of direction is necessary, and therefore seems set on spending the fall insisting that things are on the right track but Mitt Romney would disrupt them. I suspect that won’t be an easy sell.

 The president and his speechwriters must have recognized that this would seem strange, so they gave the speech two further themes—one defensive and one offensive. The defensive theme was an attempt to roll back his “you didn’t build that” gaffe by simply asserting that he and his party do believe in individual initiative, self-reliance, and earned success. He said there were some problems the government couldn’t solve, though he declined to name them. (Later in the speech he also acknowledged that he, not unlike Abraham Lincoln, actually had some failings, though he declined to name those too.) But even as he said this he persisted in the dominant trope of this convention—and, it seems, of contemporary progressive thought: the jump from the sheer fact of human interdependence to a defense of every federal program in precisely its current form. It’s the liberal welfare state or the law of the jungle, and no other alternative is imaginable. This mental gesture—which simultaneously offers an excuse for ignoring the imminent collapse of the liberal welfare state and for ignoring what conservatives are actually saying and offering—really deserves to be thought through. It is a fascinating indicator of the contemporary Left’s intellectual exhaustion.

 The offensive theme was, however, far more ably developed, and it seemed to be the only part of the speech that the president really cared about. It was in part an outgrowth of the same self-righteous progressive error—of the sense that the Republicans are offering radical individualism and a cold and selfish you’re-on-your-own philosophy of government. And to this extent it was answered by a very revealing display of the left’s tendency to collapse all of society—all that stands between the individual and the state—into the state. Different speakers this week took this up in different ways (starting with the opening video in which one of the speakers said that government is the only thing we all belong to), and Obama’s way was to say that his party’s alternative to the every man for himself philosophy of the Right is an idea of citizenship. “We believe in citizenship,” he said, “a word at the very heart of our founding, at the very essence of our democracy.” It’s an odd claim, as the word “citizenship” doesn’t appear in any founding document (and to the extent that “citizen” does it describes a legal resident, and never seems to be assigned much significance) and the term citizen actually had a rather complicated place in the parlance of late 18th century Anglo-American politics, often used to refer derisively to radicals. Hamilton’s friends in the newspapers frequently referred to Thomas Jefferson as “Citizen Jefferson,” to Jefferson’s very great displeasure, to highlight his affinity for the French revolutionaries. For Obama, the term seemed to be useful as a way of identifying our commonality with our membership in a political community defined by its government. It is, again, a fascinating instinct, conveying at once both the best and the worst of the old progressive outlook but (it seems) without much reflection on its serious limitations. There is rich potential in the notion of citizenship, but only if it is seen as denoting membership in a society that consists of more than a government. Obama gave no real indication that the word has this meaning for him.

 #more#For the most part, though, the offensive theme was a simpler matter: attacking Mitt Romney and his supposed plans to eradicate all of government while giving tax cuts to the wealthy. The president sought to use the fact that the Republicans last week didn’t have much to say about their own agenda to try to describe that agenda for the country himself. This consisted largely of some indefensible interpretations of Romney’s budget goals and a downright falsehood or two about his Medicare proposal plus the assertion that someone with no foreign policy experience couldn’t be trusted to be president (which does take some gall for this particular president). But the thrust of it, again, was to suggest that Romney wanted to decimate the government for the sake of his rich friends.

 This was really the only coherent message of the speech: Romney would be bad for America. The president laid out no discernible second-term agenda of his own, and his defense of his first term bore no resemblance to what that first term had involved.

 After these two weeks, I think it’s fair to say that both Romney and Obama seek to make the election a referendum on the other guy. Both conventions only got specific in their criticisms of the opposing party, and neither did much to offer a particular agenda for the next four years. This is, at least to this wonk, a disappointing fact. But it does suggest that Romney has some advantage going into the final stretch: the idea that this election is a referendum on the incumbent president will certainly seem much more plausible to swing voters than the idea that it is a referendum on Mitt Romney. If neither side offers much that is new, our unhappy electorate will vote against the status quo.

 Taken as a whole, the Democratic convention was surprisingly strident and culturally liberal, while the Republican convention was mostly just very dull. But if we compare only their 10pm hours—the only ones any moveable voters probably saw—the Democrats put on a better show. At the end of the day, it’s hard to see how these two conventions taken together will move the needle much either way. Good fun for us political junkies, but not a whole lot more. |||||


News article:

FCA is obviously acting fast to patch the problem, and it's clear why. As Wired details, the hack makes it possible to "kill" the engine, remotely activate or disable the brakes, and keep tabs on a vehicle's location. Full steering control is currently being worked on. The party responsible for the hack revealed it would "publish a portion of their exploit" openly on the web, timed to coincide with the Black Hat security conference in August.

 Although the company clearly accepts that the issues are serious, it notes that it's "unaware of any injuries related to software exploitation, nor is it aware of any related complaints, warranty claims or accidents – independent of the media demonstration." It adds that it's "conducting this campaign out of an abundance of caution." ||||| Yikes. Fiat Chrysler announced on Friday that it’s recalling 1.4 million automobiles due to concerns about their software security. The announcement comes just days after hackers demonstrated a terrifying hack of a Jeep that was driving down the highway at 70 miles per hour.

 BACKGROUND: Hackers take over a Jeep driving down the highway at 70 mph

 The company says that it’s also “applied network-level security measures to prevent the type of remote manipulation demonstrated in a recent media report,” presumably referring to the report in Wired earlier this week that detailed the Jeep hack.

 The vulnerability affects cars equipped with 8.4-inch touch displays on the inside. Here is the complete list of cars that may be affected:

 2013-2015 MY Dodge Viper specialty vehicles

 2013-2015 Ram 1500, 2500 and 3500 pickups

 2013-2015 Ram 3500, 4500, 5500 Chassis Cabs

 2014-2015 Jeep Grand Cherokee and Cherokee SUVs

 2014-2015 Dodge Durango SUVs

 2015 MY Chrysler 200, Chrysler 300 and Dodge Charger sedans

 2015 Dodge Challenger sports coupes

 Customers whose vehicles are affected by the threat will receive USB devices that will offer additional security upgrades besides the patches that FCA delivered over the air this week.

 Earlier this week, Wired reported that hackers Charlie Miller and Chris Valasek had developed code that could use a Jeep’s entertainment system to control “its dashboard functions, steering, brakes, and transmission, all from a laptop that may be across the country.” The hackers plan to give their research a full vetting at the big Black Hat conference in Las Vegas next month in what will surely be a highlight of the show.

 To learn more, check out FCA’s full press release posted below. |||||
What is a shorter version of the above article?

– Here's a first in the annals of auto recalls: Fiat Chrysler is providing a fix for 1.4 million vehicles because they might be vulnerable to hackers, reports BGR. Owners of the affected cars—which all have 8.4-inch touchscreens—will apparently receive a USB dongle containing security upgrades as part of the "voluntary safety recall," notes Engadget. The automaker also says it "applied network-level security measures" in the wake of a report in Wired that provided a first-person account of hackers gaining control of a Jeep remotely. The vehicles affected, from the automaker's statement: 2013-2015 MY Dodge Viper specialty vehicles 2013-2015 Ram 1500, 2500 and 3500 pickups 2013-2015 Ram 3500, 4500, 5500 Chassis Cabs 2014-2015 Jeep Grand Cherokee and Cherokee SUVs 2014-2015 Dodge Durango SUVs 2015 MY Chrysler 200, Chrysler 300 and Dodge Charger sedans 2015 Dodge Challenger sports coupes


Article:
Backstreet Boys Tease New Single 'Coming Soon,' Announce More Vegas Residency Dates

 Backstreet's back, all right -- with new music and new Vegas shows.

 The Backstreet Boys just announced that their Larger Than Life Vegas run is far from over, unveiling 21 new dates spanning from July 25 to Nov. 17. In celebration of the latest additions, BSB visited the Twitter headquarters in Los Angeles on Tuesday (Feb. 6) to answer some fan questions in a live Q&A;, which also revealed some even bigger news: Their next single is on the way.

 "Yes, we have a single. We've chosen it," Kevin Richardson said in response to a question about their next release. "It's coming out real soon. I mean, really soon."

 The guys didn't disclose what "soon" means, but hinted that it could be within the next few days or weeks. "It's on Backstreet time," AJ McLean jokingly added.

 Despite the cryptic hints, Richardson decided to give fans a little taste of what's in store when another tweeter asked whether the song will be a ballad or a dance track. As Howie Dorough explained that there's "some tempo to it," Richardson ran across the screen playing a short, upbeat snippet featuring the words "baby don't go breaking my heart." (Listen below.)

 As the guys have previously declared, they're working on their 10th studio album. No further details have been released, but a press release with the new Vegas dates said the album coincides with BSB's 25th anniversary later this year, so a 2018 release is likely.

 Whenever the new Backstreet single is set to arrive, it should definitely be before the summer, as McLean said they'd possibly be adding the song to their Vegas set list come July or August. "We're definitely going to keep trying to let the Vegas show grow," he said.

 Presale tickets are available to BSB Fan Club members now, and general on-sale starts Friday. Get your tickets here, and take a look at the new dates and clip of the new single below.

 Backstreet Boys: Larger Than Life new 2018 dates

 July 25, 27 and 28

 August 1, 3, 4, 8, 10, 11

 October 24, 26, 27, 31

 November 2, 3, 7, 9, 10, 14, 16, 17 ||||| The Backstreet Boys dropped their first new music since 2013 early Thursday morning with a single called “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart.” The band, which celebrated 25 years together last month, will release an as-yet-untitled album later in the year featuring the new song. The Backstreet Boys’ last studio album, In a World Like This, was released in 2013. “The minute we heard this song, we knew it was special,” said bandmate Kevin Richardson in a statement. “I geeked out over the piano and synths. When that groove drops on the second verse, COME ON. Great verse, hook, and melodies. Just makes you wanna listen over and over again.” We’ll let you decide for yourself... |||||Summary:

– Backstreet's back for the first time in five years. The Backstreet Boys, who just celebrated 25 years together, released their first new single since 2013 on Thursday, along with a music video featuring plenty of five-person dance formations. "Don't Go Breaking My Heart," not to be confused with 1997's "Quit Playing Games (With My Heart)," follows up the 2013 album In a World Like This. "The minute we heard this song, we knew it was special," band member Kevin Richardson says, per the Daily Beast. "Just makes you wanna listen over and over again." The single will appear on the band's yet-untitled 10th studio album, due for release later this year, to coincide with 21 new dates for the band's Las Vegas residency, reports Billboard.


News article:

It's long been assumed that yawning delivers a fresh supply of oxygen to the brain to help us wake up, but studies have been unable to show an increase in blood oxygen levels after yawning.

 Now Austrian researchers have found that yawning actually works to manage brain temperature to improve alertness and mental efficiency.

 We tend to yawn when we are tired, stressed or under-stimulated, which are all factors that can alter the temperature of the brain, and the University of Vienna researchers tested whether air temperature could influence how much we yawn.

 The researchers showed pictures of people yawning to pedestrians in Vienna in order to spark contagious yawning. They conducted the test in both summer months and winter months to see how air temperature affected their yawning frequency.

 They compared the results to a similar US study conducted in Arizona, where the climate is arid, and found that people in Vienna yawn more in summer than winter, while people in Arizona yawn more in winter than summer.

 The researchers concluded that contagious yawning is most frequent when the temperature is around 20°C.

 Yawning frequency reduced when temperatures were around 37°C in Arizona's summer and also in the freezing depths of the Vienna winter.

 Lead author Dr Jorg Massen said yawning appears to be unhelpful when the air temperature is as hot as the body, or when it is freezing, as the cold air is unnecessary or could even be harmful.

 Source: Science Daily Author: Kimberly Gillan; Approving editor: Rory Kinsella ||||| Common belief is that yawning helps to increase the oxygen supply. However, previous research has failed to show an association between yawning and blood oxygen levels. New research by a team of researchers led by Psychologist Andrew Gallup of SUNY College at Oneonta, USA now reveals that yawning cools the brain.

 Sleep cycles, cortical arousal and stress are all associated with fluctuations in brain temperature, Yawning subsequently functions to keep the brain temperature balanced and in optimal homeostasis. According to this theory, yawning should also be easily manipulated by ambient temperature variation, since exchange with cool ambient air temperature may facilitate lowering brain temperature. Specifically, the researchers hypothesized that yawning should only occur within an optimal range of temperatures, i.e., a thermal window.

 To test this, Jorg Massen and Kim Dusch of the University of Vienna measured contagious yawning frequencies of pedestrians outdoors in Vienna, Austria, during both the winter and summer months, and then compared these results to an identical study conducted earlier in arid climate of Arizona, USA. Pedestrians were asked to view a series of images of people yawning, and then they self-reported on their own yawning behavior.

 Results showed that in Vienna people yawned more in summer than in winter, whereas in Arizona people yawned more in winter than in summer. It turned out that it was not the seasons themselves, nor the amount of daylight hours experienced, but that contagious yawning was constrained to an optimal thermal zone or range of ambient temperatures around 20o C. In contrast, contagious yawning diminished when temperatures were relatively high at around 37o C in the summer of Arizona or low and around freezing in the winter of Vienna. Lead author Jorg Massen explains that where yawning functions to cool the brain, yawning is not functional when ambient temperatures are as hot as the body, and may not be necessary or may even have harmful consequences when it is freezing outside.

 While most research on contagious yawning emphasizes the influence of interpersonal and emotional-cognitive variables on its expression, this report adds to accumulating research suggesting that the underlying mechanism for yawning, both spontaneous and contagious forms, is involved in regulating brain temperature. In turn, the cooling of the brain functions to improve arousal and mental efficiency. The authors of this study suggest that the spreading of this behavior via contagious yawning could therefore function to enhance overall group vigilance. ||||| The thermoregulatory theory of yawning posits that yawns function to cool the brain in part due to counter-current heat exchange with the deep inhalation of ambient air. Consequently, yawning should be constrained to an optimal thermal zone or range of temperature, i.e., a thermal window, in which we should expect a lower frequency at extreme temperatures. Previous research shows that yawn frequency diminishes as ambient temperatures rise and approach body temperature, but a lower bound to the thermal window has not been demonstrated. To test this, a total of 120 pedestrians were sampled for susceptibly to self-reported yawn contagion during distinct temperature ranges and seasons (winter: 1.4 °C, n = 60; summer: 19.4 °C, n = 60). As predicted, the proportion of pedestrians reporting yawning was significantly lower during winter than in summer (18.3% vs. 41.7%), with temperature being the only significant predictor of these differences across seasons. The underlying mechanism for yawning in humans, both spontaneous and contagious, appears to be involved in brain thermoregulation. ||||| Why Did You Just Yawn? Perhaps Your Brain's Too Hot

 Chances are you read this sentence about yawning and you yawned. Right? Well, a new study suggests that you may not really be yawning because it's contagious, or you're bored or tired.

 You're actually yawning because your brain is too hot.

 A group of researchers at the University of Vienna tested subjects in Austria and Arizona and tracked their activity, finding that that the only significant predicator of yawning was temperature: subjects were much more likely to yawn at higher temperatures. Other factors like sex, season, age, humidity, time spent outside, and hours of sleep the night before did not have a significant effect on the likelihood of a subject's yawning.

 Ultimately, it appears that yawning is related to regulating brain temperature and creating a state where arousal in a yawner can be achieved. The idea is that if it's hot, but still cool enough so that a large intake of air will bring your body temperature down, you're in perfect storm territory for yawns.

 The study builds on research that shows that in both rats and humans, yawns are preceded by intermittent rises in brain temperatures, and that brain temperature decreases immediately afterward. |||||
What is a shorter version of the above article?

– If you're yawning a lot, check the temperature: Researchers say we may yawn when it's warm out because that cools down the brain. In the study, which agrees with earlier research, experts at the University of Vienna showed pictures of yawns to pedestrians in Austria and Arizona, ScienceDaily reports; they aimed to induce contagious yawning, ninemsn explains. After the study was conducted in both summer and winter, researchers found that such yawns occurred most often at temperatures around 68 degrees Fahrenheit. The scientists argue that there's a "thermal window for yawning," and it opens when we're warm but the air is cool enough for a yawn to lower our temperatures, Time reports. Previous research has indicated that we yawn after our body temperatures rise. The study found that people's age, sex, and previous night's sleep, on the other hand, didn't have much of an effect on our yawning patterns. All this talk of temperature still fits the idea that we yawn when sleepy, ninemsn notes. Tiredness, stress, and a lack of stimulation can have an effect on our brain temperatures.


Write a summary based on this article:

Rating is available when the video has been rented.

 This feature is not available right now. Please try again later. ||||| Dresnok was among a handful of American servicemen to desert after the Korean war and was loyal to Kim Jong-un

 The only US soldier known to still be living in North Korea after defecting more than five decades ago died last year, pledging his loyalty to the “great leader Kim Jong-un”, his sons have said.

 James Joseph Dresnok was among a handful of American servicemen to desert following the Korean war, crossing the heavily fortified demilitarised zone in 1962.

 He went on to appear in North Korean propaganda films and was believed to be the last US defector in the country, the others all having died or been allowed to leave.

 North Korea's bold wave of propaganda art - in pictures Read more

 In a video interview posted on the state-run Uriminzokkiri website, Ted and James Dresnok, his two sons, confirmed their father had a fatal stroke in November last year.

 “Our father was in the arms of the republic and received only the love and care of the party until his passing at age 74,” said Ted Dresnok, the elder of the two.

 In the video, Dresnok and his brother wore a Korean People’s army uniform, adorned with a badge depicting the North’s founder Kim Il-sung and his son and successor Kim Jong-il.

 Both men were born in North Korea and spoke Korean with a heavy northern accent.

 “Our father asked us to render devoted service to our great leader Kim Jong-un,” said Ted Dresnok, who also goes by the Korean name Hong Soon-chol.

 Their comments were similar to those of North Koreans, who normally only express officially approved sentiments when speaking for a foreign audience.

 It was the brothers’ second appearance on the programme, after they praised the country in an interview in May 2016.

 Play Video 1:01 Sons of US defector to North Korea James Dresnok speak out after father's death – video

 Addressing the recent tensions between Pyongyang and Washington, Ted Dresnok warned that the “US imperialists” were raising “war hysteria madness” with little knowledge about the North’s military and its people.

 If war breaks out, he said, “we will not miss the opportunity and wipe the land of the US from the earth for ever”.

 Tensions have been mounting in the region since Pyongyang tested two intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) last month that appeared to bring much of the US within range.

 That sparked a volley of threats between Pyongyang and Washington, with the US president, Donald Trump, warning of bringing “fire and fury” on the North while Pyongyang threatened to fire a salvo of missiles towards the US territory of Guam.

 “We have our dear supreme commander Kim Jong-un. If he is by our side, our victory is certain,” said James Dresnok, who also goes by his Korean name Hong Chol, in the video posted on Friday.

 The late James Dresnok, known as Joe, crossed a minefield at 21 to reach North Korea, after his wife divorced him and he was reportedly about to be court martialled.

 He was the subject of a British documentary, Crossing the Line, in 2006 and expressed satisfaction with his life in Pyongyang, whose citizens enjoy better standards of living than those elsewhere in the isolated country.

 He also told CBS that he would not leave even if “you put a billion damn dollars of gold on the table”. ||||| Published on Jun 3, 2016

 The sons of an American defector to North Korea appear in a video scolding the U.S. and saying American troops should leave South Korea. CNN's Brian Todd reports. ||||| Rating is available when the video has been rented.

 This feature is not available right now. Please try again later. |||||

– He might have been the most famous American in North Korea. But now James "Joe" Dresnok, a US soldier who defected after fighting in the Korean War, is dead, reports the Guardian. His two Korean-born sons made the news public in a government video, saying their father had suffered a stroke and died at age 74. Dresnok was one of a few American soldiers to cross into North Korea in 1962, and he went on to star in propaganda films, generally as the evil American. The BBC made a documentary about him in 2006 called Crossing the Line in which he said he had no regrets about his defection. "I wouldn't trade it for nothin,'" the native of Richmond, Va., says in the video. (The film is on YouTube. CBS' 60 Minutes also did a feature on Dresnok, which can be seen here.) The few other Americans who defected are believed to have died or left the country. Dresnok, who crossed a minefield into the North, had faced a court-martial for leaving his base without permission for a night on the town. "I was fed up with my childhood, my marriage, my military life, everything," he said. Sons Ted and James Dresnok, aka Hong Soon-chol and Hong Chol, spoke of their father in the new state video. "Our father was in the arms of the republic and received only the love and care of the party until his passing at age 74," said Ted Dresnok. Though half-American himself, Ted Dresnok showed where his loyalties lie, warning that if war breaks out, "we will not miss the opportunity and wipe the land of the US from the earth for ever." His brother had a similar sentiment, saying: "We have our dear supreme commander Kim Jong Un. If he is by our side, our victory is certain." (You can see the two of them in this video from about a year ago.)


Article:

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. and MENLO PARK, Calif., Dec. 18, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- William Morris Endeavor Entertainment (WME), one of the world's leading talent, entertainment and media companies, and Silver Lake, a global leader in technology investing, today announced an agreement to acquire IMG Worldwide (IMG). The company is a market leader in college and professional sports, event management, client representation, fashion and multi-media rights management.

 "IMG has incredible strategic value to WME. The brand's global reach, outstanding management team and leadership across sports, fashion and media are a strong complement to our business," said WME Co-CEOs Patrick Whitesell and Ariel Emanuel. "We are honored to build on the legacy of founder Mark McCormack and recent owner Ted Forstmann. Supported by Silver Lake's continued partnership, WME and IMG together will deliver a broad range of opportunities and resources to the companies and talent we collectively represent."

 The combination of WME and IMG creates a unique global sports and entertainment platform, operating across North America, Europe, Asia, South America and Africa. WME and IMG together will have an unparalleled client roster; a broad relationship base with sponsors, brands and broadcasters; and marquee assets in sports, events, film and television, and fashion. Patrick Whitesell and Ariel Emanuel will serve as Co-CEOs of the combined company.

 "IMG is well positioned in large and expanding end markets, with significant and untapped potential for growth. We look forward to building on IMG's illustrious heritage by accelerating its existing growth plans and expanding the company's digital platform," said Egon Durban, Managing Partner of Silver Lake. "This investment extends our successful partnership with Ari, Patrick and the WME team as the company continues its transformation into an integrated player across the new media landscape."

 The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Mubadala Development Company will be a minority investor in the transaction.

 Silver Lake and WME were advised and financed by J.P. Morgan, Barclays, RBC Capital Markets and Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. and advised by The Raine Group, Dean Bradley Osborne, Lazard and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett. Evercore and Morgan Stanley served as the financial advisors to Forstmann Little.

 About William Morris Endeavor Entertainment

 WME is a leading entertainment and media company with an unparalleled client list of artists and content creators across film, television, music, literature, theatre and digital media. Led by an experienced and innovative management team, WME was formed by the 2009 merger of the William Morris Agency and Endeavor. The company has over 1,000 employees and is headquartered in Beverly Hills, with offices in New York, Nashville, London and Miami. Through its partner companies, including award-winning global creative agency Droga5, WME also provides clients with unique advertising, brand integration and marketing opportunities across traditional, social media, mobile and gaming platforms.

 About Silver Lake

 Silver Lake is a global leader in private investments in technology and technology-enabled industries. Silver Lake invests with the strategic and operational insights of an experienced industry participant. The firm has approximately 110 investment and value creation professionals located in New York, Menlo Park, San Mateo, London, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Tokyo and manages approximately $20 billion in combined assets under management. The Silver Lake Partners portfolio includes or has included technology and technology-enabled industry leaders such as Alibaba, Allyes, Ameritrade, Avago, Business Objects, Dell, Flextronics, Gartner, Gerson Lehrman Group, Global Blue, Go Daddy, Instinet, Intelsat, Interactive Data Corporation, MCI, Mercury Payment Systems, MultiPlan, the NASDAQ OMX Group, NetScout, NXP, Sabre, Seagate Technology, Skype, Spreadtrum, SunGard Data Systems, UGS, Vantage Data Centers, Virtu and William Morris Endeavor. For more information about Silver Lake and its entire portfolio, please visit www.silverlake.com.

 Media Contacts:

 WME

 Christian Muirhead

 (310) 859-4184

 cmu@wmeentertainment.com

 Silver Lake

 Gemma Hart, Brunswick Group

 (212) 333-3810

 silverlake@brunswickgroup.com

 SOURCE Silver Lake ||||| One of the oldest names in the Hollywood talent business reached a deal that will combine it with one of the premier companies representing sports stars and fashion models, the latest consequence of a rapid shift in the economics of Hollywood.

 William Morris Endeavor Entertainment LLC said Wednesday it agreed to buy rival talent and marketing agency IMG Worldwide Inc. Financial details weren't disclosed, but the deal value was... |||||
What is a summary?

– What do Oprah Winfrey and Maria Sharapova have in common? Soon, they could both be represented by the same company. Hollywood talent titan William Morris Endeavor Entertainment has reached a deal to buy the massive sports agency IMG Worldwide, the companies announced today. "IMG has incredible strategic value," WME's co-CEOs said in a statement. IMG's "leadership across sports, fashion, and media are a strong complement to our business." WME, and its private equity partner Silver Lake, will pay about $2.4 billion, sources tell the Wall Street Journal, beating out a bid from another private equity firm, CVC Capital Partners, for about $2 billion. The deal is in part a sign that movie stars aren't what they used to be, the Journal explains; Hollywood agencies are diversifying in part because contracts for A-list stars have fallen off significantly. The fall of sitcoms and rise of original cable shows have also cut into once massive syndication revenues.


Here is a news article: Image copyright Getty Images Image caption As the oil and gas industry has expanded in parts of the US, so have the number of earthquakes

 Massive injections of wastewater from the oil and gas industry are likely to have triggered a sharp rise in earthquakes in the state of Oklahoma.

 Researchers say there has been a forty-fold increase in the rate of quakes in the US state between 2008-13.

 The scientists found that the disposal of water in four high-volume wells could be responsible for a swarm of tremors up to 35km away.

 Their research has been published in the journal, Science.

 Sudden swarm

 There has been increasing evidence of links between the process of oil and gas extraction and earthquakes in states like Arkansas, Texas, Ohio and Oklahoma in recent years.

 If a fault is close to failure, the amount that the pressure is going up at these locations in our model is enough to push them over the edge Dr Katie Keranen, Cornell University

 In 2011, a small number of people were injured and 14 houses were destroyed in the town of Prague, Oklahoma by a 5.7 tremor.

 Investigators linked it to the injection of wastewater from the oil industry.

 The US Geological Survey (USGS) has also reported on the question of seismicity induced by wastewater disposal.

 This new research goes further, linking a large swarm of Oklahoma tremors with a number of specific water wells, distantly located.

 More than 2,500 earthquakes greater than magnitude 3.0 have occurred around the small town of Jones since 2008. This represents about 20% of the total in the central and western US in this period.

 Image copyright Cornell Image caption There has been a significant increase in the number of tremors in central Oklahoma since 2008

 Researchers have now linked this increase to a near doubling in the volumes of wastewater disposed of in the central Oklahoma region between 2004 and 2008.

 Water is never far away in the energy extraction process. It is used not just for hydraulic fracturing, but also to squeeze more oil out of conventional wells.

 Large amounts of naturally occurring water are often released with the oil and gas - and this briny liquid needs to be separated from the fuels, using a method called "dewatering".

 "There is a high ratio of water to oil," said the study's lead author Dr Katie Keranen from Cornell University.

 "It differs for each well. The typical nationwide ratio is five to one. We're seeing much higher ratios, in the hundreds, at the beginning of the well."

 According to Dr Bill Ellsworth from the USGS, the high price of oil has driven this water-based approach. But the law says that drinking water has to be protected from the salty flow.

 "As part of the business model, you have to be able to dispose of these very large volumes of saline water. You can't treat it; you can't put it into the rivers. So, you have to inject it underground."

 Pressure points

 Four of the biggest of these wells in Oklahoma have been pumping around 4 million barrels of water a month to a depth of 3.5km beneath the surface.

 To determine the impact of this water, the scientists developed a model that could calculate the way the underground wave of pressure from these wells spread out.

 By comparing this to seismic data from the Jones cluster, it was concluded that the injection of wastewater is "likely responsible" for the swarm.

 "It is possible that pressure looks to have risen in the places where the earthquakes are occurring," said Dr Keranen.

 "That pressure increase is what we see in natural triggering. So, if a fault is close to failure, the amount that the pressure is going up at these locations in our model is enough to push them over the edge."

 The four wells that are the subject of the study are owned by a company called New Dominion. It insists that it operates its wells (named Sweetheart, Chambers, Flower Power and Deep Throat) safely and within permitted parameters.

 "The company notes the author did not consult with New Dominion's geologist and engineers to determine whether her premises are in any way correct," the company said in a statement.

 "At best, these incorrect assumptions are irresponsible."

 Bigger triggers

 The authors say that they are uncertain about the potential for the large-scale disposal of wastewater to trigger events of larger magnitude.

 They point to an incident in 2010 when an earthquake ruptured a portion of a 7km long fault. If the entire fault had gone, the authors write, it could have led to a magnitude 6.0 tremor.

 "We often see more larger earthquakes when we see a lot of smaller ones," said Dr Keranen.

 "But this is new situation with induced seismicity and we still have a lot of questions that we are trying to address."

 This view is echoed by Dr Bill Ellsworth from USGS.

 "There are thousands of these wells in the US, so only a few appear to be problematic. The difficulties can be avoided but we need to know more about the process so we can give proper guidance to the authorities."

 Follow Matt on Twitter @mattmcgrathbbc. ||||| More than 230 earthquakes with a magnitude greater than 3.0 have shaken the state of Oklahoma already this year. Before 2008 the state averaged one such quake a year. The surge in seismic activity has left residents and experts alike wondering about the underlying cause.

 Past research has shown that processes such as wastewater injection at oil drilling and fracking sites throughout the state could induce a small number of earthquakes but scientists have never been able to specifically link some of the more distant or stronger earthquakes with these sometimes faraway wastewater wells. That is, until now.

 A study published today in Science explains how wastewater injection sites—areas where toxic water left over from oil drilling and fracking processes is injected into the ground between impermeable layers of rocks to avoid polluting freshwater—could be driving the sharp increase in the sometimes-disastrous earthquake events. “It really is unprecedented to have this many earthquakes over a broad region like this,” says study co-author Geoffrey Abers of Cornell University. “Most big sequences of earthquakes that we see are either a main shock and a lot of aftershocks or it might be right at the middle of a volcano in a volcanic system or geothermal system. So you might see little swarms but nothing really this distributed and this persistent.”

 Abers and his colleagues dug up data on the rates and volumes of liquids associated with the wastewater injection sites. They then modeled the flow of the water and calculated the physical properties of the rocks into which the water was injected. In so doing the team determined that a relatively small number of wastewater injection sites used in oil drilling and fracking in Oklahoma may have the ability after all to induce relatively strong earthquakes a long distance away, throughout the state. “The important thing is that we are seeing earthquakes that are much more widely distributed, much farther from wells and in a lot of different directions,” Abers observes “Some of these earthquakes are as much as 20 miles away from what seems to be the primary wells that are increasing the pressure.”

 Scientists have known since the 1960s that wastewater injection, during which millions of barrels of wastewater are forced into a disposal well, can induce earthquakes by increasing the fluid pressures underground. That increasing pressure reduces the frictional strength of faults, Abers explains, allowing them to slip.

 Seismologist Austin Holland of the Oklahoma Geological Survey, who was not involved in the study, says there could be a large number of factors playing into the quakes. But like the authors of the new paper, he, too, has found evidence linking the Oklahoma quakes specifically to oil and gas activity. “We certainly do have a contribution from oil and gas, but the question is how much, how extensive is this and how is this occurring,” he says. “This study will certainly help improve our understanding in the scientific discussion of what is occurring in Oklahoma.”

 The number of wastewater injection sites also seems to keep increasing, according to Abers, who notes that the permitted rate of wastewater doubled between 2004 and 2008, and has most likely increased since then. He says several earthquakes in Texas over the past few years have been linked to wastewater injection but the scale of these events pales in comparison with what is happening in Oklahoma. There have also been well-documented cases of wastewater injection-driven quakes in Ohio, Utah, Colorado and British Columbia, all within the last year or so.

 Holland added that these events demand political and social discussion. “Just how important is it to produce oil and gas in Oklahoma, and are we willing to deal with the issues of these disposal wells in order to produce the oil and gas that we are accustomed to producing?” he asks.

 Abers notes that ongoing research on this topic will be needed to better understand the complexity of these processes as they continue into the future. “I think this rate of earthquake increase in the midcontinent is really extraordinary and is continuing, but this isn’t the last word on this in any means,” Abers remarks. “There is clearly something important going on there that we need to keep an eye on and that we need to be trying to understand.” |||||
A summary of this is?

– Earthquakes in Oklahoma are up more than a hundredfold in recent years, and a new study spies a pretty clear link between the shaking and the fracking that has given the state's economy a huge boost. Researchers took a close look at four specific sites where wastewater from oil and gas extraction was injected into the ground and found that the process could be linked to swarms of quakes in areas up to 20 miles away from the sites, reports the BBC. The four wells examined have been pumping four million barrels of water a month to a depth of around two miles underground. At one site linked to the wells, a small town called Jones, there have been more 2,500 earthquakes greater than magnitude 3.0 since 2008—a fifth of the total in the central and western US during that period. "It really is unprecedented to have this many earthquakes over a broad region like this," a study co-author tells Scientific American, explaining that wastewater injection can cause quakes by sending out waves of fluid pressure, causing faults miles away to slip. "Most big sequences of earthquakes that we see are either a main shock and a lot of aftershocks or it might be right at the middle of a volcano in a volcanic system or geothermal system. So you might see little swarms but nothing really this distributed and this persistent," he says. (In Texas, several small towns troubled by quakes are considering banning fracking.)


Summarize this article:

A Chinese mother has died after becoming trapped following the sudden collapse of an escalator at a shopping mall. The woman fought to push her son out of danger before being swallowed by the mechanism.

 The woman’s body was recovered more than four hours later, according to witnesses who posted pictures on China’s Twitter-like Weibo platform.

 Rescuers told local newspaper Wuhan Evening News that the victim’s whole body was sucked into the treads of the escalator. Firefighters had to cut up the treads to pull her body out, the newspaper said.

 Video: Viewer discretion advised:

 The accident happened at Anliang Department Store in Jingzhou, Hubei on Sunday.

 The 31-year-old mother and her son, who is under three years of age, had just reached the top of an escalator when a metal board adjoining the escalator and the concrete floor subsided, creating a void that threatened to swallow the two, according to a video posted on Weibo.

 The mother quickly held up her child, who was pulled out by one of three women standing nearby while she herself fell into the pit. It is thought that the women, wearing uniforms, may have been members of staff from the shopping mall.

 The woman who took the child appeared to try pulling out the mother, but it was too late as the mother disappeared under the escalator. Weibo users accused the shopping mall of trying to cover up the accident, which was not reported in the Chinese media until hours after it happened.

 Less than two hours after the accident, a user on Weibo who claimed to be the victim’s sister-in-law, posted pictures of the victim’s family waiting for authorities to pull out her body. The pictures also showed police guarding the accident scene.

 Netizens questioned why the escalator did not stop after the victim fell inside. Some also pointed out witnesses should have pushed the emergency button to stop the escalator.

 Update: Mall escalator tragedy could have been prevented.

 Update: New footage shows moment staff almost fall victim to faulty escalator minutes before mother is killed

 Related: Manufacturer of escalator that killed woman applies to go public in China

 Related: Times Square elevator terrifies passengers after plunging four storeys

 Comments ||||| A woman was killed in central China when part of an escalator she was travelling on in a shopping centre collapsed under her feet and she fell through the gap.

 The woman aged 30 managed to push her two-year-old boy to safety at the top of the escalator before she fell into the machinery, the Wuhan Evening News reported.

 Surveillance video at the shopping mall in Jingzhou shows the woman holding her son as she prepares to get off the escalator when a footplate collapses under her feet.

 Stuck in the hole and with only her upper body above the structure, she pushed her son forwards and he was caught by a shopping assistant standing near the top of the escalator.

 The woman fell beneath the floor only a few seconds later after another shopping assistant tried to grab her arm and failed.

 The South China Morning Post has not published the video as some readers might find it disturbing.

 Relatives said the woman, who was only identified by her surname Xiang, was shopping with her husband on Sunday when the accident happened.

 The husband was walking behind her wife and son and had yet to take the escalator from the fifth to the sixth floor, the newspaper reported.

 An unnamed sourced was quoted as saying that the accident was probably caused by workers failing to tighten screws on a footplate in the escalator during maintenance.

 The shopping mall has yet to make a formal statement about the accident.

 It took rescuers nearly four hours to recover the body of the woman, according to the newspaper.

 Twelve people were injured last year after an escalator on the subway in Shanghai started going backwards.

 One boy was killed in a similar accident on Beijing’s subway in 2011 when an escalator went into reverse. ||||| Beijing (AFP) - A woman was killed after she plunged through flooring over an escalator in a Chinese department store, reports said Monday, thrusting her toddler to safety as she fell to her death.

 Xiang Liujuan, 30, was holding her son in front of her as they went up the stairway on Saturday, the Wuhan Evening News said.

 Security camera footage of the incident posted online showed a panel in the floor giving way as Xiang stepped off the escalator. As she fell half-way through she pushed her son forward, and a nearby shop assistant dragged him to safety.

 But the escalator continued rolling, and several seconds later Xiang is seen disappearing downwards into the mechanism, despite one of the staff briefly grabbing her hand.

 It took firefighters more than four hours to cut open the machine and recover the woman, who showed "no signs of life", the newspaper report said.

 The footage shows employees standing at the top of the escalator as the mother and child approach.

 Maintenance had just been carried out on the escalator at the Anliang department store in Jingzhou in the central province of Hubei, and workers forgot to screw the access cover back into place, the newspaper cited an unnamed source as saying.

 The accident was one of the top topics on China's Twitter-like Sina Weibo on Monday with more than 6.6 million views.

 Most comments expressed fury at the shop management.

 "Why didn't the staffers stop customers at the entrance to the machine or just turn it off?" wrote one. "The department store is definitely responsible."

 Others were moved by the woman's final actions.

 "I was appalled when I saw her sink and at the same time felt the greatness of maternal love -- the mother wasted no time pushing the child out when it happened," said one.

 China is prone to safety accidents as regulations and standards are often flouted and enforcement is lax, sometimes due to corruption.

 In 2012, a nine-year-old boy was killed after he got stuck in an escalator at a Beijing department store as horrified shoppers looked on.

 In July 2011, a 13-year-old boy was killed and more than 20 others injured when an escalator in a Beijing underground station suddenly reversed direction during the rush hour. |||||

– It's a gruesome way to go: A 30-year-old mother was killed in central China over the weekend when the metal floor panel that sat between the top of a mall escalator and the floor beyond gave way as she and her son exited the escalator. But as the woman, identified as Xiang Liujuan, fell halfway through, she pushed her toddler son to safety. The South China Morning Post reports a woman standing nearby caught him, moved him to the side, then managed to briefly grab Xiang's hand. But seconds later she was gone, pulled in by the machinery. Most details come from outlets citing the Wuhan Evening News, as well as an extremely graphic video of the incident. The Hong Kong Free Press reports by way of the Evening News that Xiang's entire body was "sucked into" the escalator's treads. Those treads had to be cut in order for her to be removed, in a process that took roughly four hours. Her husband was reportedly on the scene; he had apparently been with his wife and son but hadn't gotten on the escalator yet. AFP cites an anonymous Evening News source who claims work had recently been completed on the escalator and that the maintenance workers failed to properly screw in the access panel. The incident occurred at the Anliang department store in Jingzhou, Hubei province, and public opinion seemed to be split between faulting store management for not immediately turning the escalator off and praising the mother's dying act of love. (A woman was killed last year after her scarf and hair became caught in a Montreal subway.)


Write an article based on this summary:

– They've been living separately for a while, and now Mariah Carey and Nick Cannon are making the split official, reports People. Cannon filed divorce papers last month, and TMZ reports that the couple has worked out a deal to split their property. (They've also got 3-year-old twins.) The website takes note of an unusual feature of their prenup: If Cannon violates a confidentiality clause and talks about their marriage, he has to pay up $250,000; if Carey talks, she has to pay $500,000. The reason is simple: She's got a lot more money than he does, and an upcoming artist-in-residence gig in Vegas will only widen the gap.

Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. |||||