Friday, December 17, 2010

North Korea has warned of “self-defensive blows” to South Korea if they participate in joint, live-fire military exercises with the United States, scheduled to begin in the next few days. The U.S. and South Korea will be taking part in a one day, live-fire exercise on Yeonpyeong Island, the island which was shelled by North Korean artillery on November 23. Nearly 200 rounds of artillery were fired at the island. Four people were killed and another 14 were injured in the attack. South Korea had been taking part in annual military exercises with the U.S., off the island’s west coast when the attack occurred. They returned fire, firing nearly 80 rounds of artillery, but no damage was reported on the North Korean side.

“Second and third self-defensive blows that cannot be predicted will be dealt. The intensity and range of the firepower will create a situation more serious than one on Nov. 23,” said a statement released by the North Korean government via the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), the country’s main news agency. It accused the two nations of creating “hysteria of war of aggression against the DPRK, escalating the military tension and confrontation.” The nation’s official website Uriminzokkiri, warns that “if war breaks out, it will lead to nuclear warfare and not be limited to the Korean Peninsula.”

North Korea further demands the exercises be canceled saying, “the South Korean puppet warmongers must immediately cancel the provocative coastal live-fire drills planned on Yeonpyeong.” The country considers any exercises that take place on Yeonpyeong Island, to be a violation of their territory.

According to the U.S. State Department, the exercises are part of regular drills between the U.S. and South Korea and are not provocative.

“These are routine exercises. There’s nothing provocative or unusual or threatening about these exercises. The North Koreans have been notified about what South Korea plans to do,” said Philip J. Crowley, a spokesman for the State Department. The U.S. and South Korea have no plans to cancel the exercises.

Tuesday, April 3, 2007

The discovery of an old World War II bomb in a construction site has caused at least 1000 residents in Plymouth located in South-West England, to be evacuated.

“Evacuations are being carried out of properties within 100m [328ft] of the scene. Properties within the 100m-300m [328-984ft] zone are being advised to open windows and draw curtains,” said a spokesman for the police department in Plymouth.

Workers on the site discovered the bomb at about 10:30 a.m. local time in Plymouth, England on Brentor Road.

Reports say that the bomb is sticking out of the ground by about 6 inches, and weighed an estimated 113 kilograms, or 250 pounds, but could have weighed as much as 500 pounds.

“The item was protruding about six inches from the ground and was described as being up to 10-inches in diameter,” said a spokesman for the Devon and Cornwall Police.

The Army bomb disposal team from Wales is currently trying to figure out what to do with the bomb and it could take several hours before authorities can dispose of it. Reports say that the bomb will be taken to the ocean to be detonated.

“The precise nature of this operation and any potential route are yet to be confirmed,” added the spokesman.

Sunday, January 27, 2008

Viktor Schreckengost, the father of industrial design and creator of the Jazz Bowl, an iconic piece of Jazz Age art designed for Eleanor Roosevelt during his association with Cowan Pottery died yesterday. He was 101.

Schreckengost was born on June 26, 1906 in Sebring, Ohio, United States.

Schreckengost’s peers included the far more famous designers Raymond Loewy and Norman Bel Geddes.

In 2000, the Cleveland Museum of Art curated the first ever retrospective of Schreckengost’s work. Stunning in scope, the exhibition included sculpture, pottery, dinnerware, drawings, and paintings.

Sunday, August 21, 2005

A robotic system at Stanford Medical Center was used to perform a laparoscopic gastric bypass surgery successfully with a theoretically similar rate of complications to that seen in standard operations. However, as there were only 10 people in the experimental group (and another 10 in the control group), this is not a statistically significant sample.

If this surgical procedure is as successful in large-scale studies, it may lead the way for the use of robotic surgery in even more delicate procedures, such as heart surgery. Note that this is not a fully automated system, as a human doctor controls the operation via remote control. Laparoscopic gastric bypass surgery is a treatment for obesity.

There were concerns that doctors, in the future, might only be trained in the remote control procedure. Ronald G. Latimer, M.D., of Santa Barbara, CA, warned “The fact that surgeons may have to open the patient or might actually need to revert to standard laparoscopic techniques demands that this basic training be a requirement before a robot is purchased. Robots do malfunction, so a backup system is imperative. We should not be seduced to buy this instrument to train surgeons if they are not able to do the primary operations themselves.”

There are precedents for just such a problem occurring. A previous “new technology”, the electrocardiogram (ECG), has lead to a lack of basic education on the older technology, the stethoscope. As a result, many heart conditions now go undiagnosed, especially in children and others who rarely undergo an ECG procedure.

Wednesday, March 1, 2017

On Sunday, Disney’s Zootopia won the Oscars award for the Best Animated Feature Film at the 89th Academy Awards ceremony held at Los Angeles. Pixar’s animated short Piper won the Oscar for Best Animated Short Film and Disney’s The Jungle Book won for Visual Effects.

Others competing with Zootopia in the category were Kubo and the Two Strings, My Life as a Zucchini, The Red Turtle, and Disney’s Moana. This was the first Oscar for directors Byron Howard and Rich Moore who were previously nominated for, respectively, Bolt and Wreck-It Ralph.

In the acceptance speech, director Byron Howard said, “About five years ago, almost six now, […] we got this crazy idea of talking about humanity with talking animals in the hopes that, when the film came out, it would make the world just a slightly better place.” The Disney movie addresses several social problems such as racism, sexism, prejudice, stereotyping, and fear. The New York Times said the parental guidance (PG) rated movie was “Funny, smart, thought-provoking — and musical, too.”

Before announcing the award, Mexican actor Gael Garcia Bernal said, “As a Mexican, as a Latin-American, as a migrant worker, as a human being, I’m against any form of wall that wants to separate us.” The movie was released in March, during the 2016 US presidential race.

In an interview with Variety, the directors of Zootopia said movies about bias and discrimination haven’t been Disney’s main focus, but during its production, “Things were not great in the world. […] It was more like we had our finger on something important right now and we really need to do our best to portray this as honestly as we can. Then with the election and the campaign, the real move towards governing by fear […] I don’t think we could have predicted it any closer with this film.”

With this win, the Walt Disney Company has won nine out of ten Best Animated Feature Film Oscars in the last decade, with Pixar Animation Studio winning six out of them. Zootopia also won Best Animated Film at the Annie Awards and the Golden Globe Awards.

Monday, April 29, 2013

Sunday, the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks drafted Brisbane, Australia native nose tackle Jesse Williams in the fifth round of the NFL Draft. Going into the draft, there were some expectations by the Brisbane Times and other media outlets that Williams might be selected in the first round. Injuries, which resulted in Williams being unable to participate fully in the NFL Combine, likely were reasons why he was not selected higher.

Gridiron football is not the most popular football code in Australia, with rugby league, rugby union, soccer, and Australian rules football all being more popular participation sports. Williams’ youth sporting career reflected this, with Williams playing rugby union until he was 15 years old at which time he switched codes and joined the local gridiron team, the Bayside Ravens. A year later, his playing ability earned him a scholarship offer from the University of Hawaii. He could not meet the university’s academic standards so eventually he attended Western Arizona Community College instead. In 2011, he transferred to the University of Alabama and played for the Alabama Crimson Tide for two seasons. Both seasons, his Crimson Tide team won the national championship.

Williams’ selection is unique amongst Australians as most Australians who have played in the NFL have been kickers. He is also only the second Australian ever to be drafted in the NFL Draft.

Friday, July 8, 2016

On Tuesday, Italian police charged homeless forty-year-old Massimo Galioto with the aggravated murder of Beau Solomon, a college student from Wisconsin, US. The police arrested the man after finding the student’s body in the Tiber River in Rome on Monday. The defendant has attorney Michele Vincelli.

According to reports, Massimo Galioto is homeless and lived in a tent under a bridge. Italian police said two witnesses reported they saw someone being thrown from the Garibaldi bridge into the Tiber River. The authorities also reportedly obtained CCTV footage near the bank of the river, showing the incident.

A homeless woman sharing a tent with Massimo Galioto said she saw Massimo Galioto and Beau Solomon fighting each-other, and then saw Beau Solomon fall into the river. The woman alleged Beau Solomon was drunk and the company included two people from North Africa.

On Monday, Italian police found Beau Solomon’s body near Guglielmo Marconi bridge about three miles (five kilometres) downstream from Trastevere, where the student was last seen at about 1AM in G-Bar in Piazza Trilussa on Friday night after his first day in Italy. Solomon was beginning a summer school at John Cabot University. His parents arrived on Monday using emergency passports.

The body had no mobile device or wallet, suggesting to local authorities it was a robbery. The body also had a head wound and bloody shirt, the victim’s 23-year-old brother Cole Solomon told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on Monday.

Last week on Friday morning, Beau Solomon’s parents received bank alerts. According to the student’s brother Jake Solomon, the bank told his parents Beau’s bank card was charged “thousands of dollars”. Authorities later confirmed the amount as about 1,500 euro (about US$1700). The credit card of the victim was charged in Milan over 300 miles away from Rome on Friday.

Beau Solomon was aged 19. He came to Italy to attend summer school on Thursday. Beau Solomon did not attend university student orientation next morning, and the institution reported him missing to the local authorities at 9PM.