Faceapp, the viral aging app, might be investigated by the FBI | iMore
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Half of dead baby turtles found by Australian scientists have stomachs full of plastic
In recent years, scientists have [realized] that animals ranging from plankton to whales are regularly consuming plastic, since around 10 million tons of it ends up in the sea every year.
…Very little [has been studied] about the overall effect plastic is having on ocean animals.
While some plastic can pass harmlessly through animals’ digestive systems, it can also accumulate and kill them by either blocking or tearing their guts.
There is also some evidence to suggest that plastic can leach toxic chemicals into their surroundings.
…While the number of plastic pieces in the reptiles’ guts varied wildly from one to over 300, the scientists were able to deduce that turtles have a 50 per cent probability of death after consuming 14 pieces.
The work emerges as another study documents the global decline of turtles and tortoises that has left over 60 per cent of the world’s species either extinct or facing extinction.
hmmmm
EPA expands use of pesticide that can be toxic to bees – CNNPolitics
The insecticide, called sulfoxaflor, will be allowed for use on some crops for the first time and in areas that were prohibited under the Obama administration. An EPA report this week notes that some forms of the pesticide can be “very highly toxic” to bees.
…Last week, the Trump administration announced that it will suspend data collection for its annual Honey Bee Colonies report. The move, which robs researchers and the honeybee industry of a critical tool for understanding honeybee population declines, comes as the Department of Agriculture is also curtailing other research programs.
In 2014, the Obama administration launched a program to address honeybee population losses, directing federal agencies to work toward preserving bee pollinator populations. The Trump administration has gone the other way, reversing an Obama-era rule meant to protect bees from a chemical family that can cause colonies to collapse.
EPA expands use of pesticide that can be toxic to bees – CNNPolitics
The cheeto does not want your children to have food to eat.
Border Patrol Chief Carla Provost posted in offensive “I’m 10-15” Facebook group.
Carla Provost, the chief of the United States Border Patrol, was one of a number of Border Patrol personnel to participate in a Facebook group in which members joked about migrant deaths and made other offensive comments about immigrants and asylum-seekers.
..Soon after ProPublica’s story published, Provost denounced the offensive posts and pledged to hold the participating agents responsible. “These posts are completely inappropriate and contrary to the honor and integrity I see—and expect—from our agents day in and day out,” she said in a statement. “Any employees found to have violated our standards of conduct will be held accountable.”
….Only one post from Provost has come to light so far, from November 2018, and it doesn’t appear offensive on its own. (A group member commented about Provost’s ascent to the top of the agency, and she chimed in to the resulting conversation to clarify the timeline.) But it indicates she was aware the group existed and participated without apparent concern months before she condemned it to the press.
…Politico then reported that officials with Customs and Border Protection, which oversees the Border Patrol, had known of the group and the offensive posts for up to three years before news of its existence broke. ….Officials told Politico that they did not know if any of the group’s members are actually being punished. A Department of Homeland Security official also said that CBP’s public affairs office had monitored the group “as a source of intelligence” to see “what people are talking about,” but CBP’s press office disputed that. CBP did not, however, deny that Provost and other senior Border Patrol agents had participated in the group.
…The group has declined in size—from 9,500 to 4,000—since the reporting made it known. A second group, “The Real CBP Nation,” was reported by CNN last week and appears to also involve CBP employees and similarly offensive content.
Border Patrol Chief Carla Provost posted in offensive “I’m 10-15” Facebook group.
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Indigenous Ethnologist: Gladys Tantaquidgeon
It was during his fieldwork with the Mohegans in Connecticut that Speck met …Gladys Tantaquidgeon CCT’29, who was being groomed as the tribe’s next medicine woman and the keeper of its customs and culture. She was also to become the first Native American student in the Penn anthropology department.
…With her father and brother, she cofounded the Tantaquidgeon Museum to house many of the gifts she received during her fieldwork, including a Penobscot birchbark canoe, donated by Speck. Founded on her belief that “you can’t hate someone you know a lot about,” it is the oldest Native American-owned museum in the United States. It also was a critical piece in proving the Mohegan tribe’s continuity when, in 1978, Congress created a federal recognition process for designating sovereignty.
…Bruchac calls Tantaquidgeon a “groundbreaking ethnologist” and “an Indigenous visionary who blended anthropological research with traditional training and community activism to preserve Mohegan cultural patrimony.”
Indigenous Ethnologist – The Pennsylvania Gazette
very cool
House Democrats defend Pelosi in dispute with AOC
“I think the speaker is doing a hell of job under some very trying and tough circumstances,” Rep. Val Demings (D-Fla.) said. “I first met her in 2011. You can say a lot of things about Nancy Pelosi, one thing you cannot say about Nancy Pelosi is that she – I’ve never seen her do anything that had racial overtones.”
…“You know how people lose elections — by not having the ability to see the big picture and not being able to keep their eye on the ball,” Demings said.
…Rep. Robin Kelly (D-Ill.) also rejected the notion Pelosi was singling out new members of color and found the speaker to be supportive to Ocasio-Cortez and her “squad.”
“I don’t feel she’s targeting. To me, with the freshman women, in general, it seems like she’s been supportive,” Kelly said. “It’s tough. She’s in a no-win situation in a number of ways. … I think she wants us all to be successful.”
…“When we have disagreements about tactics…we should not get personal about it,” Welch said.
House Democrats defend Pelosi in dispute with AOC
hmmmm
There’s An Environmental Disaster Unfolding In The Gulf of Mexico
First came Hurricane Katrina, the 2005 monster storm that devastated [the] small fishing community in Plaquemines Parish before roaring up the Gulf Coast, killing more than 1,800 people and destroying $125 billion in property. Five years later, BP’s Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded 40 miles offshore, spewing nearly 200 million gallons of crude. The fisheries have not fully recovered more than nine years later.
But this year may be worse. A historic slow-moving flood of polluted Mississippi River water loaded with chemicals, pesticides and human waste from 31 states and two Canadian provinces is draining straight into the marshes and bayous of the Gulf of Mexico — the nurseries of Arnesen’s fishing grounds — upsetting the delicate balance of salinity and destroying the fragile ecosystem in the process.
…The torrent of river water pushing into Gulf estuaries is decimating crab, oyster and shrimp populations. The brown shrimp catch this spring in Louisiana and Mississippi is already down by an estimated 80%, and oysters are completely wiped out in some of the most productive fishing grounds in the country, according to state and industry officials.
…It’s not just fisheries that are suffering. Dolphins have been dying in huge numbers across the region — nearly 300 this year already, which is three times the number in a normal year, according to federal and state officials. Fishermen report finding dead dolphins floating in water near shore or beached in the marshes, covered in painful skin lesions that scientists have linked to freshwater exposure. One fisherman reported finding a mother dolphin pushing her dead baby along in the water.
…Dolphins are particularly vulnerable to incursions of river water, he said. “Every time they open the Bonnet Carre spillway, we see a spike in deaths.”
“Dolphins are like the black box found on airplanes,” Solangi said. “They tell you what’s happening in the environment. When dolphins are doing well, the environment is doing well.”
…Officials say higher-than-normal dolphin strandings spiked in May, when there were 88 discovered along the Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama coasts. That’s nearly eight times the average monthly number of dolphin mortalities during the BP spill from 2010 to 2014.
…Many fishermen who have worked in these areas for generations suspect something else is threatening their future: politics. As part of a plan to save Louisiana’s rapidly sinking coastline, state agencies want to pump in more sediment-heavy river water to help rebuild the disappearing land. Fishermen question the efficacy of freshwater diversions and worry about the dangers to fisheries and marine life posed by these projects. They question why NOAA would grant waivers to Louisiana last year to bypass the Marine Mammal Protection Act and allow the freshwater diversion construction to proceed.
…[Acy Cooper, a fourth-generation fisherman and president of the Louisiana Shrimp Association] blames the Army Corps for not adequately managing the river and controlling and dredging the river passes that empty into the Gulf, making the effects of freshwater worse.
There’s An Environmental Disaster Unfolding In The Gulf of Mexico | HuffPost
hmmm
politician demands chaperone for interview with female reporter
US politician Foster demands chaperone for interview with female reporter – BBC News
Oy, what a child to need an grown up in the room to supervise him.
After a man has a few too many drinks, he sent an injured baby bird to a wildlife rescue center in an Uber
An animal shelter in Ogden, Utah, says its latest baby bird rescue was delivered by an Uber driver after a man, drinking responsibly, decided he didn’t want to risk driving the bird to the shelter himself.
Tim Crowley was day drinking with friends on a neighbor’s porch on a Saturday afternoon. That’s when he saw a little bird fall from the sky.
“You don’t exactly have to be sober to still make a difference.” – CNN
This story is awesome.
Just feel good warm fuzzies and hilarity. Responsible day drinker sends injured bird to shelter in an uber, what’s not to like?
The Inconvenience of Being a Woman Veteran
The military doesn’t just urge women, it requires them—especially if they want to succeed—to view themselves on the same playing field as their male counterparts. They are also expected to behave and perform in traditionally masculine ways—demonstrating strength, displaying confidence in their abilities, expecting to be judged on their merits and performance, and taking on levels of authority and responsibility that few women get to experience. The uniform and grooming standards work to downplay their physical female characteristics. Additionally, the expectation—explicit or implicit—is that they also downplay other attributes that are traditionally considered feminine, such as open displays of emotion.
…Highlighting female characteristics is undesirable. As General Lori J. Robinson, the U.S. military’s first female combatant commander, put it: “I’m a general, a commander, an airman. And I happen to be a woman.”
…They might appear to be like other women, but they aren’t operating on the expectations traditionally applied to women. Behaving at odds with these traditional expectations is often a significant drawback in the ability of women veterans to fit-in in the workplace, in the dating world, in the female civilian community, in society in general. And directly challenging these expectations can often lead to conflict.
…They expect, for example, to be afforded the same respect as their male counterparts—veteran and civilian.
And yet, women are often denied recognition for their military accomplishments. In a 2016 Service Women’s Action Network survey, 74 percent of the respondents said that the general public did not recognize their service.
…Operating in male-dominated environments and doing traditionally male activities, up to and including combat, are so different from the experiences of civilian women that the two sides often cannot relate. Moreover, the behaviors—male behaviors—that women veterans learned were correct in the military are now at odds with the expectations civilians have for women. Instead of helping them fit in, these same behaviors now make them stand out, often in ways that make other people uncomfortable.
The Inconvenience of Being a Woman Veteran – The Atlantic
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All Female Senators Ask U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team To Meet
The letter, spearheaded by Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), is signed by all of the Democratic and Republican women of the Senate. They end the letter with the hashtag the team has been promoting: #OneNationOneTeam.
All Female Senators Ask U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team To Meet | HuffPost
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Trump’s British ambassador takedown unnerves diplomats
The dust-up is just the latest to occur after the public airing of sensitive diplomatic cables — an era that kicked off a decade ago when WikiLeaks began publishing troves of America’s classified cables. And it illustrates the increasing challenges facing diplomats wishing to share blunt and unflattering assessments.
…“We have gotten to a point now where it would appear diplomats cannot report to their governments accurately in any way that is going to remain confidential, and that’s the essence of diplomacy,” said Roberta Jacobson, a former U.S. ambassador to Mexico.
…Diplomats across the globe essentially lead two lives: a public one in which they are cautious about what they say, careful to avoid upsetting host countries; and a private one in which they are duty-bound to report honest, unvarnished analyses about their surroundings with the governments they represent.
…The leak, some observers suspect, may have been aimed at ensuring Darroch’s successor is pro-Brexit.
Trump’s British ambassador takedown unnerves diplomats – POLITICO
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