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criscimagnael

Park Geun-hye, Ex-Leader of South Korea, to Be Pardoned - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...orea-park-geun-hye-pardon.html

shared by criscimagnael on 27 Dec 21 - No Cached
  • SEOUL, South Korea — The government of President Moon Jae-in said on Friday that it would pardon former President Park Geun-hye, who is serving a 20-year prison term after she was convicted on bribery and other criminal charges.
  • Ms. Park, 69, who became the first democratically elected South Korean leader to be removed from office through parliamentary impeachment,
  • will be freed on Dec. 31 to promote “reconciliation and consolidate national power to help overcome the national crisis caused by the Covid-19 pandemic,” the Justice Ministry said in a statement.
  • ...11 more annotations...
  • She has served four years and nine months of her sentence so far. Concerns about her health were raised after she was taken to a hospital in Seoul, the capital, for various illnesses last month.
  • Mr. Moon said that Ms. Park’s declining heath had also been a factor in his government’s decision to release her.
  • Ms. Park was pardoned under a broad amnesty that benefited 700 other prisoners, whose remaining prison terms will be eradicated or cut in half. The South Korean president has the power to grant amnesty to prisoners under the Constitution, and has often exercised it to mark major national holidays or the beginning of a new year.
  • Ms. Park, a daughter of the former military dictator Park Chung-hee, was in her fourth year in power in 2016 when hundreds of thousands of protesters began months of weekly rallies in central Seoul demanding that she be forced from office for corruption and incompetence.
  • In January this year, the Supreme Court approved a reduced 20-year prison term for Ms. Park and ordered her to pay 18 billion won ($15 million) in fines, saying that she and her longtime friend and confidante Choi Soon-sil had collected or demanded $19.3 million in bribes from three big businesses, including $7 million from Samsung, South Korea’s largest and most lucrative business group.
  • The younger Mr. Lee, who was sentenced to two and a half years in prison in the corruption scandal, was released on parole in August, when South Korea freed hundreds of prisoners to mark the Aug. 15 National Liberation Day, which commemorates the end of Japanese colonial rule of South Korea at the end of World War II.
  • Despite her conviction, Ms. Park still had a sizable following of die-hard supporters, mostly older conservative South Koreans, who have held rallies in downtown Seoul calling her innocent and demanding her release.
  • Those who have argued for her pardon have compared her case to those of the former military dictators Chun Doo-hwan and Roh Tae-woo.
  • Mr. Moon’s government granted a special amnesty to former Prime Minister Han Myeong-sook, one of the president’s former political allies. Ms. Han was sentenced to two years in prison in 2015 on charges of collecting illegal political donations. She finished her term in 2017.
  • The government also released Lee Seok-ki, a progressive politician, on parole on Friday. He was arrested by Ms. Park’s government in 2013 on charges of conspiring to start an armed revolt to overthrow the Seoul government in the event of war with North Korea. He has served all but nine months of his nine-year sentence.
  • calling him a victim of what they saw as a political witch hunt by Ms. Park to repress her political enemies.
anonymous

Disneyland Reopening April 30 To California Residents : Coronavirus Updates : NPR - 0 views

www.npr.org/...-california-residents-in-april

shared by anonymous on 18 Mar 21 - No Cached
  • Disneyland Park and Disneyland California Adventure Park will reopen their gates to state residents on April 30, more than a year after shutting down due to the coronavirus pandemic.
  • "Beloved characters will pop up in new ways and sometimes in unexpected places as they remain mindful of physical distancing,"
  • "It's going to be a great opportunity for us, I think, to bring that magic back to everyone involved."
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  • California's public health directives have kept the parks closed since last March. But under new guidance released last week, red-tier counties — the second-highest level of risk — can open theme parks to in-state visitors, at 15% capacity, starting April 1.
  • The parks will operate under a new reservation system designed to enforce capacity limits and promote physical distancing
  • Face coverings will be required, and the facilities will adopt enhanced cleaning procedures and modify certain experiences in order to reduce contact.
  • The Anaheim, Calif.-based theme parks will reopen at limited capacity and in line with state public health requirements,
  • "Certain experiences that draw large group gatherings – such as parades and nighttime spectaculars – will return at a later date."
  • The resort is moving to reopen in phases. Disney's Grand Californian Hotel & Spa plans to reopen with limited capacity starting April 29, followed by Disney Vacation Club Villas at Disney's Grand Californian Hotel & Spa on May 2.
  • "We've seen the enthusiasm, the craving for people to return to our parks around the world," Chapek said.
  • Disneyland and Disney's California Adventure were initially planning to open their doors on July 17 — Disneyland's 65th anniversary — but delayed their reopening indefinitely pending state guidance. Employees had also raised safety concerns and questions about the availability of COVID-19 testing.
  • Disney announced in September it was laying off 28,000 workers from its Parks, Experiences and Products division, with 67% of those part-time employees.In their announcement on Wednesday, officials said more than 10,000 employees will be returning to work.
anonymous

6 Lions Found Dead In Ugandan National Park : NPR - 0 views

www.npr.org/...-dead-in-ugandan-national-park

shared by anonymous on 21 Mar 21 - No Cached
  • Conservationists and wildlife enthusiasts are mourning the case of six lions that have been found dead and dismembered in what is a suspected to be a poisoning in one of Uganda's most renowned national parks.
  • In a statement, the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) said the big cats were found Friday evening with "most of their bodies parts missing" in Queen Elizabeth National Park, their carcasses surrounded by the lifeless scavengers, "which points to possible poisoning of the lions." UWA said it was "saddened" by the grisly case, and it "cannot rule out illegal wildlife trafficking."
  • The discovery is a devastating blow that officials say can negatively impact the country's tourism sector, which is a top foreign exchange earner for Uganda. Nature tourism pours $1.6 billion into the economy each year.
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  • It's not the first time lions have been set upon in the country's most popular national park. In 2018, a pride of 11 lions, including eight cubs, were discovered dead, believed to have been poisoned. Suspicion then fell on farmers who denied any involvement, but who also expressed frustration at wildlife that kills their cattle and damages their crops.
  • To incentivize farmers living near preserves and parks to protect increasingly vulnerable wildlife, Ugandan authorities give farmers 20% of the gate fees taken at national parks. The UWA says the revenue-sharing scheme enhances the livelihood of the local community and helps sustain protected areas.
  • According to wildlife conservation groups, the illegal wildlife trade, poachers, and trophy hunters are all contributing to the disappearance of lions on the African continent. The loss of habitat, poor regulation of legal trade, and climate change are also drivers in their declining numbers
  • About 20,000 lions still live in the wild of Africa; a century ago there were 200,000 lions, the largest of Africa's big cats. Lions are currently listed as "vulnerable" on the "red list" of threatened species compiled by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
  • The park is famous for having the largest population of tree-climbing lions, and whole prides can be spotted in trees. The newly discovered mutilated lions are reported to have had this particular tree-climbing trait.
  • Nearly half live in Queen Elizabeth National Park, where a team of investigators are now on the ground, joined by conservationists and police to probe this latest grim assault on Africa's wildlife.
carolinehayter

Two Park Police Officers Face Manslaughter Charges in Virginia Shooting - The New York Times - 1 views

www.nytimes.com/...n-ghaisar-police-indicted.html

police politics US Culture shooting

shared by carolinehayter on 17 Oct 20 - No Cached
  • Two U.S. Park Police officers in Virginia were indicted Thursday on state manslaughter charges in a 2017 case in which they fired nine shots at close range into the car of a 25-year-old man, a prosecutor announced.
  • Each officer was indicted on single charges of manslaughter and reckless discharge of a firearm
  • If convicted, the officers, members of the U.S. Park Police, a unit of the National Park Service within the Interior Department, face up to 15 years in prison, he said.
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  • The officers were placed on administrative leave after the shooting, a Park Police sergeant told The Washington Post.
  • A video of the shooting was released in 2018 by Chief Edwin C. Roessler Jr. of the Fairfax County Police Department
  • He died 10 days later.
  • The officers have said they acted in self-defense. In 2019, the Justice Department said it would not pursue charges against them because it was unable to disprove the officers’ claim of self-defense. At a news conference on Thursday to announce the indictments, Mr. Descano said this was a “complex and nuanced case” involving “the careful review of 10,000 pieces of documentary evidence, the chasing down of additional evidence and the conducting of in-person interviews” amid a pandemic
  • In November 2017, what started as a fender-bender turned into a deadly shooting in a matter of minutes. After a brief chase by the police, one of the motorists involved in the crash, Bijan Ghaisar, stopped at a stop sign. Two police vehicles surrounded his car and officers converged. Several shots were fired into his vehicle.
  • the episode began on Nov. 17 at 7:31 p.m. According to the report, Mr. Ghaisar was driving south on George Washington Memorial Parkway — a federal road — in a green Jeep when he abruptly “stopped in the roadway.” The car behind Mr. Ghaisar then rear-ended him, according to the report, and Mr. Ghaisar drove away.The driver who struck Mr. Ghaisar’s Jeep got a citation for failing to “maintain proper control,” according to the police report, which did not classify the episode as a hit-and-run.
  • It was not clear why the Park Police sought Mr. Ghaisar, given that they had cited the other driver.
  • The video captured by the county police begins about six minutes later, at 7:37 p.m. It appears to show the Jeep being pursued by a Park Police car, its lights flashing and sirens blaring. A Fairfax County police officer follows behind.The chase continues along several residential streets. At 7:41 p.m., the Jeep stops at a stop sign, and the Park Police vehicle wheels around in front of it, effectively blocking it.The video then appears to show one officer approach the Jeep’s driver-side door, with a gun drawn and pointed toward the door’s window. The Jeep moves slightly forward, and one gunshot rings out.After a brief pause, three more shots are fired as the car continues to lurch forward. Another officer then approaches, and the sound of a fifth gunshot can be heard on the video.
  • Two more gunshots can be heard.
  • Another two gunshots can be heard.
  • At the news conference on Thursday, Mr. Descano said: “I wish this could have been done in a faster fashion. However, there is no shortcut to justice.”
marleymorton

National Park Service climate change Twitter campaign spreads to other parks - 0 views

www.theguardian.com/...trump-twitter-campaign-spreads

politics US climate

shared by marleymorton on 26 Jan 17 - No Cached
  • marleymorton on 26 Jan 17
     
    The National Park Service employees' Twitter campaign against Donald Trump spread to other parks on Wednesday, with tweets on climate change and a reminder that Japanese Americans were forcibly interned in camps and parks during the second world war.
zachcutler

South Korea Government Accused of Using Defamation Laws to Silence Critics - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...rea-critics-press-freedom.html

south korea government laws

shared by zachcutler on 06 Mar 16 - No Cached
  • SEOUL, South Korea — In late 2014, months after 304 people died in the sinking of a South Korean ferry
  • Was Ms. Park, the flier asked, now cracking down on her critics in an attempt to keep that scandal from coming to light?
  • Last year, the United Nations Human Rights Committee warned against South Korea’s “increasing use of criminal defamation laws to prosecute persons who criticize government action.” Freedom House, a rights group based in Washington, criticized “the increased intimidation of political opponents” under Ms. Park, who took office in 2013.
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  • An opposition lawmaker, Park Jie-won, said the indictment had embarrassed the country. “It’s prosecutors who should be indicted for defaming South Korea,” he said
  • Charges that her administration was suppressing political rights sprang up almost as soon as Ms. Park — whose father, the military dictator Park Chung-hee, ruled South Korea with an iron fist during the 1960s and ’70s — assumed office.
  • The government’s use of the laws against critics predates Ms. Park’s presidency. During the five-year tenure of her predecessor, Lee Myung-bak, 30 such cases were filed, 24 of them criminal and six civil, according to People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy, an influential South Korean civic group.
  • Attempts to amend the defamation laws have also been unsuccessful. Last month, the Constitutional Court struck down a proposal to ban defamation charges in cases where the supposedly defamatory comment circulated online is true
  • Bills that would bar government officials from filing defamation cases have stalled in Parliament.
  • “I can never support this attempt to place a dog collar on the people,” Eun Soo-mi, an opposition lawmaker who was once tortured by the spy agency, said during a 10-hour filibuster against the bill, which was approved but has not yet become law.
  • Such rulings aside, critics argue that South Korean prosecutors and judges have largely failed to protect the public’s rights, often because they want to earn the favor of politicians who can promote them.
anonymous

'A bold agenda': hopes rise for US climate change reversal as Deb Haaland sworn in | Climate change | The Guardian - 0 views

www.theguardian.com/...interior-policy-climate-change

shared by anonymous on 25 Mar 21 - No Cached
  • Haaland, the first Native American cabinet secretary in US history and a member of the Laguna Pueblo, was sworn in to her post last week and has vowed to be a “fierce advocate” for public lands. Wildlife, parks and climate advocacy groups have hailed her confirmation as a major win for public lands and say that under Haaland’s leadership the interior department will renew its focus on fighting the climate emergency.
  • The corps established by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 1930s, by way of comparison, put 3 million jobless Americans to work and helped create national park infrastructure.
  • As a US representative, Haaland backed the Green New Deal and sponsored a bill that aimed to protect 30% of US lands and oceans by 2030, a commitment Biden later made by executive order.
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  • National parks are warming twice as fast as the rest of the country, said Brengel, the NPCA’s vice-president of government affairs. “We’re seeing the effects, whether it’s invasive species, wildfires, sea level rise or wildlife being pushed out of its usual habitat.”
  • Haaland is charged with managing natural resources and federal lands that comprise one-fifth of the United States and are responsible for a quarter of the country’s annual carbon emissions.
  • In its first two months, the Biden administration has started to reverse some of Donald Trump’s most controversial decisions, directing the interior department to review the boundaries of the Grand Staircase-Escalante and Bears Ears national monuments – a step toward restoring their protections – and paused the sale of new oil and gas leases on public lands.
  • “I think the encouraging thing is they want to do something and they’re being very inclusive,” said David Willms, the senior director for western wildlife with the National Wildlife Federation.
  • The National Parks Conservation Association hopes to see the department move away from the last administration’s energy dominance agenda, enhance water protections, support more wildlife corridors and expand national park land. And Haaland is the right person for the job, Brengel said.
anonymous

Los Angeles park closed after protest to save homeless camp - 0 views

apnews.com/...083f4d56bbb865f76b8e79547208ff

shared by anonymous on 26 Mar 21 - No Cached
  • A newly installed fence surrounded a popular Los Angeles park Thursday after authorities moved in to evict residents of a large homeless encampment despite protests by the people who live there and their supporters.
  • Residents argued that the complaints were overblown and the encampment offered a community setting for people without means who have nowhere else to live.
  • Those who leave have been offered temporary housing, and at least 166 people had already been sheltered, said Mitch O’Farrell, a city councilman whose district includes the park.
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  • A few dozen demonstrators gathered peacefully Thursday evening outside O’Farrell’s nearby office with a large banner that said “services not sweeps.”
  • A police statement said there were verbal confrontations but that the protest was largely peaceful and demonstrators voluntarily departed. One person was arrested for failing to comply with an officer’s orders, and officers twice used force that was characterized as minor, police said.
  • The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority said its outreach workers had moved 44 people into housing on Monday and Tuesday, mostly into hotel rooms under the state-funded Project Roomkey program aimed at providing shelter for those most at risk during the coronavirus pandemic.
  • Kelvin Martinez, an organizer with the advocacy group Street Watch LA, accused city officials of “bad faith communication.” He said requests for services during the past year were largely ignored until the sudden announcement that the park would be closed.
  • The location of the encampment in the fast-gentrifying Echo Park neighborhood gave it a high profile, but it was not unique for the metro Los Angeles area. Tents can be found throughout the city and region despite an array of state and local programs aimed at sheltering people and transitioning them to permanent housing.
  • A January 2020 count by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority reported that there were more than 66,400 homeless people living in Los Angeles County — by far the largest single concentration in the state. That included more than 41,000 people within Los Angeles city limits. Both figures were up more than 12% from the previous year. The annual count was canceled for 2021 because of the pandemic.
  • The lawsuit accuses the city and county of failing to comprehensively address the desperation that homeless people face — including hunger, crime, squalor and the coronavirus pandemic.U.S. District Judge David Carter, who is overseeing the case, called parties to a hearing in a Skid Row parking lot last month and said that if politicians can’t provide solutions, he wants to explore what powers the court has to order and oversee remedies.
Javier E

Disputing Korean Narrative on 'Comfort Women,' a Professor Draws Fierce Backlash - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...-comfort-women-park-yu-ha.html

korea japan historiography women WWII history

shared by Javier E on 19 Dec 15 - No Cached
  • In her book, she emphasized that it was profiteering Korean collaborators, as well as private Japanese recruiters, who forced or lured women into the “comfort stations,” where life included both rape and prostitution. There is no evidence, she wrote, that the Japanese government was officially involved in, and therefore legally responsible for, coercing Korean women.
  • Although often brutalized in a “slavelike condition” in their brothels, Ms. Park added, the women from the Japanese colonies of Korea and Taiwan were also treated as citizens of the empire and were expected to consider their service patriotic. They forged a “comradelike relationship” with the Japanese soldiers and sometimes fell in love with them, she wrote. She cited cases where Japanese soldiers took loving care of sick women and even returned those who did not want to become prostitutes.
  • Ms. Park’s book, published in Japan last year, won awards there. Last month, 54 intellectuals from Japan and the United States issued a statement criticizing South Korean prosecutors for “suppressing the freedom of scholarship and press.” Among them was a former chief cabinet secretary in Japan, Yohei Kono, who issued a landmark apology in 1993 admitting coercion in the recruitment of comfort women.
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  • Even then, however, Mr. Kono noted that the recruiting had been conducted mainly by private agents working at the request of the Japanese military, and by administrative and military personnel. For outraged South Koreans, the caveats rendered the apology useless.
  • others said the talk of academic freedom missed the main point of the backlash. This month, 380 scholars and activists from South Korea, Japan and elsewhere accused Ms. Park of “exposing a serious neglect of legal understanding” and avoiding the “essence” of the issue: Japan’s state responsibility.
  • Yang Hyun-ah, a professor at the Seoul National University School of Law, said that Ms. Park’s most egregious mistake was to “generalize selectively chosen details from the women’s lives.”
  • Ms. Park said she had tried to broaden discussions by investigating the roles that patriarchal societies, statism and poverty played in the recruitment of comfort women. She said that unlike women rounded up as spoils of battle in conquered territories like China, those from the Korean colony had been taken to the comfort stations in much the same way poor women today enter prostitution.
  • She also compared the Korean comfort women to more recent Korean prostitutes who followed American soldiers into their winter field exercises in South Korea in the 1960s through ’80s. (The “blanket corps,” so called because the women often carried blankets under their arms, followed pimps searching for American troops through snowy hills or built field brothels with tents as the Americans lined up outside, according to former prostitutes for the United States military.)
  • “Korean comfort women were victims, but they were also collaborators as people from a colony,” Ms. Park wrote in one of the redacted sentences in her book.
  • she added that even if the Japanese government did not directly order the women’s forced recruitment and some Korean women joined comfort stations voluntarily, the government should still be held responsible for the “sin” of creating the colonial structure that allowed it to happen.
  • “Whether the women volunteered or not, whether they did prostitution or not, our society needed them to remain pure, innocent girls,” she said in the interview. “If not, people think they cannot hold Japan responsible.”
bluekoenig

The lost neighborhood under New York's Central Park - YouTube - 0 views

www.youtube.com/watch

politics US history culture centralpark nyc

shared by bluekoenig on 24 Mar 20 - No Cached
  • bluekoenig on 24 Mar 20
     
    Under New York City's Central Park sits a neighborhood previously inhabited by an African American community after the abolition of slavery in New York. Seneca Village was created after former slaves were made uncomfortable or cast out of what was NYC at the time. Over time, it became very populated, becoming one of the first integrated communities with Irish immigrants moving in, sharing a similar goal of finding a new way of life. In 1853, however, the idea and plans for Central Park were proposed by the NYC elites who wanted something like Kensington Park for their own city, right overtop of Seneca Village and other homes. The cities newspapers portrayed Seneca Village as a no man's land filled with dirty people in shacks and huts living off the land, unimportant and easily removed, before forcing people out of their homes and leveling everything into a park. A recent archeological dig unearthed a rich history revealing it wasn't a shanty town but a rich middle-class community of educated and even rich individuals. Many fought to keep their property but due to their skin color they were entirely disregarded and forced out by the end of the summer.
mariedhorne

Denver Wants to Fix a Legacy of Environmental Racism - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...city-parks.html

environmental racism

shared by mariedhorne on 01 Oct 20 - No Cached
  • DENVER — In most American cities, white residents live near parks, trees and baseball fields, while communities of color are left with concrete and the heat that comes with it. Now, in a push that could provide a road map for other cities, officials in Denver are working to rectify that historical inequity.
  • Correcting decades of discriminatory municipal planning is especially important as climate change heats up American cities. Adding green space, researchers have found, can help residents cope with rising heat and brings all sorts of side benefits, like filtering air pollution or boosting residents’ mental health.
  • “It’s always just felt more like it’s a whole front,” said Alfonso Espino, a community activist and lifelong Denver resident, speaking of the city’s parks initiative. “Not for us, you know. It’s for the people that are coming.”
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • That year, the city allocated $1 million of the new tax money for saplings along the 16th Street Mall, the city’s downtown business district, with no funds for poorer neighborhoods with sparse canopies. By the end of 2020, the city will have allocated six times more for trees in downtown areas than in residential zones.
  • “There’s these tough histories that make it really hard for residents to trust government, to possibly trust nonprofits,” said Kim Yuan-Farrell, executive director of The Park People, a local nonprofit group that advocates for parks and helps organize tree plantings in low-income neighborhoods.However, Ms. Yuan-Farrell said, things seem to be changing.
Javier E

No rides, but lots of rows: 'reactionary' French theme park plots expansion | France | The Guardian - 0 views

www.theguardian.com/...nch-theme-park-plots-expansion

historiography france history

shared by Javier E on 22 Sep 23 - No Cached
  • Nicolas de Villiers said the theme park – whose subject matter includes Clovis, king of the Franks, and a new €20m (£17m) show about the birth of modern cinema – was not about politics. He said: “What we want when an audience leaves our shows – which are works of art and were never history lessons – is to feel better and bigger, because the hero has brought some light into their hearts … Puy du Fou is more about legends than a history book.”
  • He said the park’s trademark high-drama historical extravaganzas worked because, at a time of global crisis, people had a hunger to understand their roots and traditions. “The artistic language we invented corresponds to the era we live in. People have a thirst for their roots, a thirst to understand what made them what they are today, which means their civilisation. They want to understand what went before them.” He called it a “profound desire to rediscover who we are”.
  • e added: “People who come here don’t have an ideology, they come here and say it’s beautiful, it’s good, I liked it.”
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  • Guillaume Lancereau, Max Weber fellow at the European University Institute in Florence, was part of a group of historians who published the book Puy du Faux (Puy of Fakes), analysing the park’s take on history. They viewed the park as having a Catholic slant, questionable depictions of nobility and a presentation of rural peasants as unchanged through the ages.
  • Lancereau did not question the park’s entertainment value. But he said: “Professional historians have repeatedly criticised the park for taking liberties with historical events and characters and, more importantly, for distorting the past to serve a nationalistic, religious and conservative political agenda. This raises important questions about the contemporary entanglement between entertainment, collective memory and politically oriented historical production …
  • “At a time when increasing numbers of undergraduates are acquiring their historical knowledge from popular culture and historical reenactments, the Puy du Fou’s considerable expansion calls for further investigation of a phenomenon that appears to be influencing the making of historical memory in contemporary Europe.”
  • Outside the park’s musketeers show, André, 76, had driven 650km (400 miles) from Burgundy with his wife and grandson. “We came because we’re interested in history,” he said. “The shows are technically brilliant and really make you think. You can tell it’s a bit on the right – the focus on war, warriors and anti-revolution – but I don’t think that matters.”
knudsenlu

Claudette Colvin: The 15-year-old who came before Rosa Parks - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/stories-43171799

parks colvin history civil rights US

shared by knudsenlu on 12 Mar 18 - No Cached
  • In March 1955, nine months before Rosa Parks defied segregation laws by refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, 15-year-old Claudette Colvin did exactly the same thing. Eclipsed by Parks, her act of defiance was largely ignored for many years. She herself didn't talk about it much, but she spoke recently to the BBC.
  • "I remember during Easter one year, I was to get a pair of black patent shoes but you could only get them from the white stores, so my mother drew the outline of my feet on a brown paper bag in order to get the closest size, because we weren't allowed to go in the store to try them on."
  • "The white people were always seated at the front of the bus and the black people were seated at the back of the bus. The bus driver had the authority to assign the seats, so when more white passengers got on the bus, he asked for the seats."
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  • "He wanted me to give up my seat for a white person and I would have done it for an elderly person but this was a young white woman. Three of the students had got up reluctantly and I remained sitting next to the window," she says.
  • Under the twisted logic of segregation the white woman still couldn't sit down, as then white and black passengers would have been sharing a row of seats - and the whole point was that white passengers were meant to be closer to the front.
  • "I was more defiant and then they knocked my books out of my lap and one of them grabbed my arm. I don't know how I got off that bus but the other students said they manhandled me off the bus and put me in the squad car. But what I do remember is when they asked me to stick my arms out the window and that's when they handcuffed me," Colvin says.
  • Instead of being taken to a juvenile detention centre, Colvin was taken to an adult jail and put in a small cell with nothing in it but a broken sink and a cot without a mattress.
  • After Colvin was released from prison, there were fears that her home would be attacked. Members of the community acted as lookouts, while Colvin's father sat up all night with a shotgun, in case the Ku Klux Klan turned up.
brickol

Job Vacancies and Inexperience Mar Federal Response to Coronavirus - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...ronavirus-expertise-trump.html

us trump politics crisis

shared by brickol on 27 Mar 20 - No Cached
  • Of the 75 senior positions at the Department of Homeland Security, 20 are either vacant or filled by acting officials
  • The National Park Service, which like many federal agencies is full of vacancies in key posts, tried this week to fill the job of a director for the national capital region after hordes of visitors flocked to see the cherry blossoms near the National Mall, creating a potential public health hazard as the coronavirus continues to spread.
  • At the Department of Veterans Affairs, workers are scrambling to order medical supplies on Amazon after its leaders, lacking experience in disaster responses, failed to prepare for the onslaught of patients at its medical centers.
  • ...7 more annotations...
  • Ever since President Trump came into office, a record high turnover and unfilled jobs have emptied offices across wide sections of the federal bureaucracy. Now, current and former administration officials and disaster experts say the coronavirus has exposed those failings as never before and left parts of the federal government unprepared and ill equipped for what may be the largest public health crisis in a century.
  • Some 80 percent of the senior positions in the White House below the cabinet level have turned over during Mr. Trump’s administration, with about 500 people having departed since the inauguration
  • Between Mr. Trump’s history of firing people and the choice by many career officials and political appointees to leave, he now finds himself with a government riddled with vacancies, acting department chiefs and, in some cases, leaders whose professional backgrounds do not easily match up to the task of managing a pandemic.
  • Equally notable may have been the resignation last year of Scott Gottlieb, the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, who was an early advocate for broad coronavirus testing and stronger mitigation policies. He was succeeded by Dr. Stephen M. Hahn, a noted oncologist, who has struggled during Senate hearings to explain some of his positions. The agency is largely viewed as slow in engaging the private sector to develop tests for the coronavirus. Many members of Mr. Gottlieb’s team departed with him, leaving the agency with many people new to their jobs.
  • The Department of Homeland Security, the agency tasked with screening at airports and carrying out the travel restrictions that were Mr. Trump’s first major action to combat the coronavirus, is full of vacancies. Of the 75 senior positions listed on the department’s website, 20 are either vacant or filled by acting officials.
  • Even National Park Service vacancies have taken a toll. The park service — which has its own police force — in recent days closed some parking lots near the Tidal Basin on the National Mall, where the cherry blossoms attract huge crowds each year, and urged people to stay away. Mayor Muriel Bowser stepped in and limited access to the area and sent police officers and members of the National Guard to enforce the shutdown.
  • Even the Pentagon, which is broadly viewed as better positioned than many other agencies for the pandemic response, is not immune. More than a third of all Senate-confirmed civilian positions at the Defense Department are vacant or filled by temporary officials, a peak level for the administration outside of the transition period, according to Pentagon statistics. Of 60 senior positions, 21 lack permanent appointees.
katherineharron

Relaxed restrictions across US will have a dire impact on coronavirus death toll, experts warn - CNN - 0 views

www.cnn.com/...index.html

crisis

shared by katherineharron on 05 May 20 - No Cached
  • Public spaces were filled with visitors over the weekend as some states began loosening lockdown measures, and experts now warn the easing could drive up the country's coronavirus death toll -- by nearly double, according to one prediction.
  • But easing restrictions now may come with a heavy price.
  • "How many deaths and how much suffering are you willing to accept to get back to what you want to be some form of normality, sooner rather than later?
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  • The US could now see 134,475 deaths by early August -- nearly double the prediction just last week of 74,000 deaths by a model from the University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.
  • So far, the US has recorded more than 1,180,600 infections and at least 68,934 deaths. Over the weekend, parks in New York City and Atlanta drew crowds as residents began venturing out of their homes. In the city of Miami Beach, more than 7,300 warnings were issued to people who weren't wearing face covers, while more than 470 warnings were given to those who failed to practice social distancing.
  • California was one of the states where crowds gathered over the weekend as thousands of protesters descended on the state's Capitol and an Orange County beach to protest social distancing orders.
cartergramiak

How Bad Was the Coronavirus Pandemic on Tourism in 2020? Look at the Numbers. - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...tourism-2020-coronavirus.html

politics US pandemic history Culture crisis policy

shared by cartergramiak on 09 Mar 21 - No Cached
  • Numbers alone cannot capture the scope of the losses that have mounted in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. Data sets are crude tools for plumbing the depth of human suffering, or the immensity of our collective grief.
  • The following charts — which address changes in international arrivals, emissions, air travel, the cruise industry and car travel — offer a broad overview of the effects of the coronavirus pandemic within the travel industry and beyond.
  • Before the pandemic, tourism accounted for one out of every 10 jobs around the world. In many places, though, travel plays an even greater role in the local economy.
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  • All told, CO2 emissions from fossil fuels dropped by 2.6 billion metric tons in 2020, a 7 percent reduction from 2019, driven in large part by transportation declines.
  • The figures tell the story of a rebound that’s slightly stronger than that of air travel: a sharp drop in March and April, as state and local restrictions fell into place, followed by a gradual rise to around 80 percent of 2019 levels.
  • Some national parks located near cities served as convenient recreational escapes throughout the pandemic. At Cuyahoga Valley National Park, 2020 numbers exceeded 2019 numbers from March through December. At Great Smoky Mountains National Park, numbers surged after a 46-day closure in the spring and partial closures through August; between June and December, the park saw one million additional visits compared to the same time period in 2019.
carolinehayter

What We Know About Security Response At Capitol on January 6 : NPR - 0 views

www.npr.org/...ty-at-the-capitol-on-january-6

capitol politics US trump crisis

shared by carolinehayter on 15 Jan 21 - No Cached
  • The Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol was a security failure, an intelligence failure — or both. How could security forces in the nation's capital be so swiftly and completely overwhelmed by rioters who stated their plans openly on a range of social media sites? President Trump had even tweeted on Dec. 19: "Big protest in D.C. on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!"
  • In a letter to the Justice Department, Bowser says "we are mindful" of events in 2020 — likely referencing the June 1 clearing of peaceful protesters in Lafayette Square by Park Police and other federal law enforcement that not answerable to the city.
  • And then there is the National Guard. In the 50 states and Puerto Rico, the Guard is under the command of the governor. In Washington, D.C., however, the Guard is under the command of the president, though orders to deploy are typically issued by the secretary of the Army at the request of the mayor.
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  • The Department of Homeland Security produces a threat assessment — but it is an overview, a DHS spokesperson told NPR, focusing on the "heightened threat environment during the 2020-2021 election season, including the extent to which the political transition and political polarization are contributing to the mobilization of individuals to commit violence."
  • This raw intelligence — bits and pieces of information scraped from various social media sites — indicates that there will likely be violence when lawmakers certify the presidential election results on Jan. 6.
  • But the DHS and the FBI do not create an intelligence report focused specifically on the upcoming pro-Trump rally.
  • These threat assessments or intelligence bulletins are typically written as a matter of course ahead of high-profile events. It's not clear why this didn't happen.
  • The Metropolitan Police Department arrests Enrique Tarrio, leader of the far-right Proud Boys group. He is charged with destruction of property and possession of high-capacity firearm magazines. He's released the next day and told to leave Washington.
  • U.S. Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund asks permission from House and Senate security officials to request that the D.C. National Guard be placed on standby in case the protest gets out of control. The Washington Post reports: "House Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving said he wasn't comfortable with the 'optics' of formally declaring an emergency ahead of the demonstration, Sund said. Meanwhile, Senate Sergeant at Arms Michael Stenger suggested that Sund should informally seek out his Guard contacts, asking them to 'lean forward' and be on alert in case Capitol Police needed their help."
  • The FBI Field Office in Norfolk, Va., issues an explicit warning that extremists have plans for violence the next day, as first reported by the Post. It releases its advisory report after FBI analysts find a roster of troubling information including specific threats against members of Congress, an exchange of maps of the tunnel system under the Capitol complex and organizational plans like setting up gathering places in Kentucky, Pennsylvania and South Carolina so extremists can meet to convoy to Washington.
  • The head of the FBI's Washington Field Office, Steven D'Antuono, later says that information is shared with the FBI's "law enforcement partners" through the bureau's Joint Terrorism Task Force. That includes the U.S. Capitol Police, U.S. Park Police, D.C.'s Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) and other agencies.
  • Officials convene a conference call with local law enforcement to discuss the Norfolk warning.
  • Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser announces that the MPD will be the lead law enforcement agency and will coordinate with the Capitol Police, Park Police and Secret Service.
  • The Metropolitan Police Department has jurisdiction on city streets; the U.S. Park Police on the Ellipse, where Trump's rally took place; the U.S. Secret Service in the vicinity of the White House; and the U.S. Capitol Police on the Capitol complex.
  • That day appears to have profoundly influenced the mayor's approach to the Jan. 6 events. In her letter, Bowser describes the difficulty and confusion of policing large crowds while working around other law enforcement personnel without proper coordination and identification.
  • Bowser requests, and receives, a limited force from the D.C. National Guard. The soldiers number 340, though they are unarmed and their job is to help with traffic flow — not law enforcement — which is to be handled by D.C. police.
  • Trump begins to address the crowd at the Ellipse, behind the White House. He falsely claims that "this election was stolen from you, from me, from the country." Trump calls on his supporters at the rally to march on the U.S. Capitol, saying he will walk with them. Instead, he returns to the White House.
  • "We see this huge crush of people coming down Pennsylvania Ave. toward the Capitol," reports NPR's Hannah Allam. "We follow the crowd as it goes up to the Hill, toward the Capitol. There's scaffolding set up for the inauguration already," she adds. "But as far as protection, all we really saw were some mesh barriers, some metal fencing and only a small contingent of Capitol Police. And we watched them being quickly overwhelmed." The FBI says multiple law enforcement agencies receive reports of a suspected pipe bomb at the headquarters of the Republican National Committee. Fifteen minutes later, there are reports of a similar device at the Democratic National Committee headquarters.
  • Mayor Bowser asks Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy for additional Guard forces
  • Capitol Police Chief Sund speaks with the commanding general of the D.C. National Guard Maj. Gen. William Walker by phone and requests immediate assistance.
  • White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany says on Twitter that the National Guard is on its way at Trump's direction.
  • Capitol Police send an alert that all buildings in the Capitol complex are on lockdown due to "an external security threat located on the West Front of the U.S. Capitol Building. ... [S]tay away from exterior windows and doors. If you are outside, seek cover."
  • The House and Senate abruptly go into recess.
  • On a conference call with Pentagon officials, D.C. Mayor Bowser requests National Guard support and Capitol Police Chief Sund pleads for backup.
  • Trump tweets criticism of Vice President Pence: "Mike Pence didn't have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution, giving States a chance to certify a corrected set of facts, not the fraudulent or inaccurate ones which they were asked to previously certify. USA demands the truth!"
  • From inside the House chamber come reports of an armed standoff at the door to the chamber. Police officers have their guns drawn on someone trying to get in.
  • Acting Defense Secretary Miller determines that all available forces of the D.C. National Guard are required to reestablish security of the Capitol complex.
  • Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam tweets that his team is working closely with Mayor Bowser, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to respond to the situation.
  • Moving to the Senate terrace, they see protesters smashing the door of the Capitol to gain entry, as Capitol Police inside work to push them back.
  • rump tweets a video downplaying the events of the day, repeating false claims that the election was stolen and sympathizing with his followers, saying: "I know your pain, I know you're hurt. We had an election that was stolen from us. It was a landslide election and everyone knows it, especially the other side. But you have to go home now. We have to have peace. ... You're very special. You've seen what happens. You see the way others are treated that are so bad and so evil. I know how you feel, but go home, and go home in peace."
  • Acting Defense Secretary Miller authorizes the mobilization of up to 6,200 National Guard troops from Maryland, Virginia, New York, New Jersey, Delaware and Pennsylvania, according to the Pentagon.
  • Trump tweets a message to his supporters. "These are the things and events that happen when a sacred landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously stripped away from great patriots who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long. Go home with love & in peace. Remember this day forever!"
  • Capitol Police, MPD and the D.C. National Guard establish a perimeter on the west side of the Capitol.
  • The Capitol is declared secure. Members of Congress return to complete the opening and counting of the Electoral College votes.
  • Pence affirms that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have won the Electoral College: "Joseph R. Biden Jr. of the state of Delaware has received for president of the United States, 306 votes. Donald J. Trump of the state of Florida has received 232 votes."
  • The FBI formally warns local law enforcement that armed protests are being planned for all 50 statehouses and the U.S. Capitol. The warning says an unidentified group is calling on others to help it "storm" state, local and federal courthouses, should Trump be removed as president before Inauguration Day.
  • Rep. Tim Ryan, D-Ohio, says two Capitol Police officers have been suspended. One of the suspended officers took a selfie with a rioter. The other put on a MAGA hat "and started directing people around," says Ryan.
  • The U.S. Justice Department says it has received more than 100,000 pieces of digital information in response to its call for tips about those responsible for the Capitol riot. The Justice Department says MPD acted on its intelligence to arrest the Proud Boys' Tarrio before the protest, and federal officials interrupted travel of others who planned to go to D.C.
  • The secretary of the Army announces that as many as 20,000 National Guard troops are expected to be deployed to D.C. for the inauguration. Some will be armed, while others will have access to their weapons but will not carry them.
  • FBI Director Christopher Wray says the bureau has identified more than 200 suspects from the Capitol riots and arrested more than 100 others in connection with the violence. "We know who you are if you're out there — and FBI agents are coming to find you," he warns.
  • U.S. Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz announces his office will begin "a review to examine the role and activity of DOJ and its components in preparing for and responding to the events at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021." Horowitz said his review will coordinate with IG reviews in the departments of Defense, Homeland Security and Interior.
Javier E

The Widening Gap Between the Super-Rich and Other Americans | History News Network - 0 views

hnn.us/173406

rich inequality us poverty corporate billionaire

shared by Javier E on 27 Oct 19 - No Cached
  • in 2018, the average pay of CEOs at America’s 350 top firms hit $17.2 million―an increase, when adjusted for inflation, of 1,007.5 percent since 1978.  By contrast, the typical worker’s wage, adjusted for inflation, grew by only 11.9 percent over this 40-year period.
  • the three richest U.S. families―the Waltons (owners of Walmart), the Mars candy family, and the Koch family (owners of a vast fossil fuel conglomerate)―possessed a combined fortune ($348.7 billion), which is 4 million times the wealth of the median U.S. family.
  • average CEO pay in 2018 had increased by $5.2 million over the preceding 10 years.  This resulted in an average CEO-to-worker pay ratio of 287-to-1.
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  • According to the AFL-CIO, the CEO-to-worker pay ratio at Walmart (America’s largest private employer) is 1,076 to 1, at Walt Disney Company 1,424-to-1, at McDonald’s 2,124-to-1, and at Gap 3,566-to-1
  • At 49 S&P 500 firms, noted an Institute for Policy Studies report, half the work force―that is, 3.7 million employees―received wages below the official U.S. poverty line for a family of four.
  • “average Americans have spent this entire century on a treadmill getting nowhere fast.  The nation’s median―most typical―households pocketed 2.3 percent fewer real dollars in 2018 than they earned in 2000.”
  • in 2018, the nation’s income inequality reached the highest level since the U.S. Census Bureau began measuring it five decades before
  • Bernie Sanders reminded Americans that just three U.S. billionaires (Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, and Warren Buffett) possessed as much wealth as half the people in the United States combined
  • In 1965, the ratio of CEO-to-worker’s pay stood at 20-to-1; by 2018 (when CEOs received another hefty pay raise and workers received a 0.2 percent pay cut), it had reached 278-to-1.  
  • the ten wealthiest Americans (with riches ranging from $53 billion to $107.5 billion each) had combined wealth of $697 billion―or an average of $69.7 billion each.  Assuming that, henceforth, they had no further income and had limitless longevity, they could each spend a million dollars a day for approximately 191 years.
  •  In 2018, 38.1 million Americans lived below the U.S. government’s official poverty threshold, including many people working at multiple jobs
  • another 93.6 million Americans lived close to poverty, bringing the total of impoverished and near-impoverished people to nearly 42 percent of the U.S. population.  
  • in 2019, for the first time in a century, life expectancy in the United States declined for three consecutive years
  •  Suicide rates, which closely correlate with poverty, increased by 33 percent since 1999
  • America’s ultra-wealthy, who, in addition to pouring money into the campaign coffers of politicians that safeguard and expand their fortunes, continue purchases like one multi-billionaire’s acquisition of a $238 million Manhattan penthouse―a supplement to his two floors at the Waldorf Astoria hotel in Chicago ($30 million), Miami Beach penthouse ($60 million), Chicago penthouse ($59 million), and additional apartment in Manhattan ($40 million)
  • 131-floor Central Park Tower building which, when completed, will become the tallest, most expensive residential dwelling in the United States.  It will feature179 luxury condos ranging in price from $6.9 million to $95 million and a seven-story Nordstrom flagship store with six restaurants, plus three floors of “amenity space” (dubbed the Central Park Club) spanning 50,000 square feet, with an outdoor terrace, pools, a wellness center, and a massive ballroom.
Javier E

Opinion | I've Seen a Future Without Cars, and It's Amazing - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...ban-cars-manhattan-cities.html

car transportation urbanism urban nyc future

shared by Javier E on 09 Jul 20 - No Cached
  • Rather than stumble back into car dependency, cities can begin to undo their worst mistake: giving up so much of their land to the automobile.
  • There is little evidence that public transit is responsible for the spread of the coronavirus in New York or elsewhere; some cities with heavily used transit systems, including Hong Kong, were able to avoid terrible tolls from the virus.
  • rian paths for people to avoid intense overcrowding — transit might be no less safe than cars, in terms of the risk of the spread of disease. In all other measures of safety, transit is far safer than cars.
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  • Chakrabarti is among a group of urbanists who’ve been calling attention to a less-discussed problem with cars. Automobiles are not just dangerous and bad for the environment, they are also profoundly wasteful of the land around us: Cars take up way too much physical space to transport too few people. It’s geometry.
  • In most American cities, wherever you look, you will see a landscape constructed primarily for the movement and storage of automobiles, not the enjoyment of people: endless wide boulevards and freeways for cars to move swiftly; each road lined with parking spaces for cars at rest; retail establishments ringed with spots for cars; houses built around garages for cars; and a gas station, for cars to feed, on every other corner.
  • In the most car-dependent cities, the amount of space devoted to automobiles reaches truly ridiculous levels. In Los Angeles, for instance, land for parking exceeds the entire land area of Manhattan, enough space to house almost a million more people at Los Angeles’s prevailing density.
  • in the most populated cities, physical space is just about the most precious resource there is. The land value of Manhattan alone is estimated to top $1.7 trillion. Why are we giving so much of it to cars?
  • Without cars, Manhattan’s streets could give priority to more equitable and accessible ways of getting around, including an extensive system of bike “superhighways” and bus rapid transit — a bus system with dedicated lanes in the roadway, creating a service that approaches the capacity, speed and efficiency of the subway, at a fraction of the cost.
  • The amount of space devoted to cars in Manhattan is not just wasteful, but, in a deeper sense, unfair to the millions of New Yorkers who have no need for cars.
  • More than half of the city’s households do not own a car, and of those who do, most do not use them for commuting. Of the 1.6 million commuters who come into Manhattan every weekday (or, who did, before the virus), more than 80 percent make the trip via public transit, mostly trains and buses. Only around 12 percent of daily commuters get to the island by car.
  • New York’s drivers are essentially being given enormous tracts of land for their own pleasure and convenience. To add the overall misery of the situation, though, even the drivers are not especially happy about the whole deal, because despite all the roadway they’ve been given, they’re still stuck in gridlock.
  • cars are not just greedy for physical space, they’re insatiable. There is even a term for the phenomenon: “induced demand,” which holds that the more land you give to cars, the more attractive driving becomes, leading to more traffic, leading to more roads — an unwinnable cycle that ends with every inch of our cities paved under parking lot.
  • Even if you’re a committed daily driver, “it’s in your best interest for walking, biking and public transit to be as attractive as possible for everyone else — because that means you’re going to be able to drive easier.”
  • PAU’s plan bears this out. Banning private cars on Manhattan would reduce traffic by as much as 20 percent on routes that start and end within New York’s other boroughs — that is, in places where cars would still be allowed
  • Under PAU’s plan, road traffic in a car-free Manhattan would fall by about 60 percent. The absence of cars would allow pedestrians, buses and bikes to race across New York at unheard-of speeds. Today, a bus trip from uptown to downtown — for instance, from Harlem to City Hall — takes an hour and 48 minutes. With the sort of rapid bus system PAU imagines, and without cars in the way, the same trek would take 35 minutes.
chrispink7

Almost a Dozen Earthquakes Recorded in Clusters Near Yellowstone Park in Just 24 Hours - 0 views

www.sciencealert.com/lowstone-park-in-just-24-hours

shared by chrispink7 on 04 Jun 20 - No Cached
  • An area near Yellowstone National Park has been struck by nearly a dozen earthquakes on Friday, according to the US Geological Survey.West Yellowstone in Montana reported around eleven earthquakes on Friday, with the strongest one measuring a magnitude of 3.1. The area has been hit by an additional 34 quakes in the past month, according to Idaho Statesman.
  • The other quakes ranged between 1.6 to 3.1 magnitudes and were about three miles (4.8 km) deep.A swarm of earthquakes is not unusual for the area. Yellowstone is one of the most seismically active places in the US, experiencing around 700 to 3,000 earthquakes every year, according to the national park's website.The earthquakes tend to occur in clusters. The largest occurred in 1985 when more than 3,000 earthquakes were recorded in three months on the northwest side of the park.
  • cientists don't think Yellowstone's supervolcano would be erupting soon (at least not in the next thousand years). Despite it being the subject of many apocalypse fantasies, the odds of it erupting within a given year are one in 730,000, according to the US Geological Survey. It last erupted 174,000 years ago.However, in the unlikely case, the supervolcano was to erupt – with the force of 1,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs – it would cause massive destruction in the US, along with other devastating natural phenomenons, including acid rain.
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