Two Montanas? New maps highlight state's split personality

Redistricting MontanaFarmland and ranches are seen on the outskirts of Cascade, Mont. on Friday, Oct. 15, 2021. Incorporated 110 years ago, Cascade has changed little since then, aside from a recent upgrade of the town's water and sewage pipes. For the first time in 30 years, the Census has awarded Montana a second seat in Congress and a commission is being tasked with determining how to divide the state into two congressional districts. (AP Photo/Iris Samuels)Less

IRIS SAMUELS
Tue, October 19, 2021, 10:03 PM·5 min read


CASCADE, Mont. (AP) — For the first time in 30 years, the Census has awarded Montana a second seat in Congress. On paper, that leaves the state's redistricting commission with the easiest task of all its counterparts across the country: Divide the expansive state in half.

If only.

Nothing is ever that simple in redistricting battles, as political parties jostle for control over maps that will give their candidates an advantage and the simple act of drawing a line becomes a fraught battle over the identity of the state.


In Montana, Republicans are pushing to separate the two booming college towns of Bozeman and Missoula in the western half of the state. Putting the two Democratic-leaning communities in different districts would make it hard for Democrats to win either seat. Democrats want to consolidate their strongholds in one district that would give them a fighting chance to win a House seat. They argue the towns — filled with craft brew drinkers, liberal academics, remote workers and California transplants — share more in common with each other than the vast expanse of rural ranches and farms between them.

The bipartisan commission is set to select the district boundaries on Thursday. With little common ground between the commission’s two Republican and two Democratic members, much of the decision may fall on the nonpartisan chairperson, Maylinn Smith, who was appointed to the commission by the state's Supreme Court.

She has a history of giving small donations to Democratic political candidates in the state, but has said her experience working as a judge in several tribal court systems has given her the ability to act impartially.

To Republicans, there's a simple solution — a neat line splitting the state into eastern and western districts that puts Bozeman in the eastern one and Missoula in the western one. They contrast that with the more tortured route Democrats propose to lump the two cities together.

“When you have a shape that isn’t even a shape, it’s looks like the C from the Cookie Monster, that is not a reasonable district,” said Jennifer Carlson, a Republican state lawmaker from a town 20 minutes outside Bozeman, during a meeting of the commission on Tuesday.

Earlier in the meeting fellow Republican lawmaker Derek Skees held up a pumpkin carved with one of the maps proposed by Democrats, jeering at its unusual borders.

But Democrats say it's not that simple. Terry Cunningham, deputy mayor of Bozeman, notes that his city along with Missoula and the state capital of Helena are the only three in the state that have voted for carbon reduction goals while much of the rest of the state depends on the fossil fuel industry.

“I believe it is immoral to add new fossil fuel burning resources to the mix,” Cunningham said. “Other communities in Montana would vehemently object (to our goals) because fossil fuel extraction is part of their lifeblood. So those make us incompatible politically with what could be described as the number one issue facing the entire planet.”

Part of the reason Montana gets a second congressional district is the population growth fueled by Bozeman, a city of 50,000 that has become a hotbed for startups and pandemic-era remote workers. Home to Montana State University, Bozeman grew a whopping 33% in the last decade, growth that dwarfs that seen anywhere else in the state.

Its downtown is packed with pedestrians wearing the latest moisture-repelling microfibers, boutique bakeries and upscale restaurants. Housing prices have skyrocketed, as has homelessness. Missoula, home to the University of Montana, has similar headaches.

Democrats in the two cities argue that their common situation cries out for them being in the same district, which would likely lean only slightly Republican and therefore be competitive in a state where the beet-red hue of its rural swathes has tilted it solidly toward the GOP.

“In order for democracy to function well in the United States, you need to have a political system that is responsive to the electorate’s desires,” said Jeremy Johnson, a political scientist at Carroll College in Helena. In safe districts, “there is less incentive for legislators to listen to constituents.”

Republicans argue that the way they slice up the state would still preserve competition. Still, both seats would lean GOP, in part because of the changes since the last time Montana had two congressional seats.

In the 1990 census, Montana's population growth slowed so much that it lost its second seat and began electing a single representative for the entire state. That seat has been held by Republicans for the past 24 years as rural areas that once voted Democratic became more conservative, leaving the blue islands of Bozeman and Missoula surrounded by vast expanses of red.

“You don’t have to go far from city lines when you’re really in ruby red Republican territory across most of the state,” Johnson said.

But not all towns fit neatly into the redistricting arguments laid out by Republicans and Democrats. The town of Cascade 115 miles north of Bozeman falls alternatingly in eastern and western districts proposed by both Democrats and Republicans. Home to around 700 people, Cascade is sandwiched between an interstate highway on one side and the Missouri River on the other and surrounded by farms and ranches.

In contrast to Bozeman, its sparse main street holds only a handful of businesses, including a couple restaurants, a market, a gas station, a fly fishing shop and a bank. Incorporated 110 years ago, Cascade has changed little since then -- aside from a recent upgrade of the town’s water and sewage pipes.

The contrast with Bozeman is obvious to the town's residents.

“There are two Montanas -- socially, economically, culturally -- we are two states,” said Ken Speidel, who owns a horse boarding business with his wife, Kelly, in the rural town and works as a river guide in the summer and a hockey referee in the winter.

Like many in Cascade, Speidel favors the Republican proposals. But he acknowledges the power of counterarguments.

“There is no solution that is going to make everybody happy,” he said.

___

Iris Samuels is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

A meteor that incinerated the residents of an ancient city inspired the biblical story of Sodom, research suggests


A meteor that incinerated the residents of an ancient city inspired the biblical story of Sodom, research suggests

Researchers stand near the ruins of ancient walls in Tall el-Hammam. Phil Silvia

Aylin Woodward
Tue, October 19, 2021


An artist's depiction of a meteor in the sky above Tall el-Hammam, an ancient Middle Eastern city in present-day Jordan. Allen West and Jennifer Rice


In the biblical story of Sodom, God destroys the city and its inhabitants due to their wickedness.


A study suggests the tale was inspired by a meteor that wrecked the ancient city of Tall el-Hammam.


A 165-foot meteor exploded in the sky there 3,600 years ago, incinerating people and homes.

About 3,600 years ago, residents of the city of Tall el-Hammam started their days like any other. A guard likely sat on the parapet atop the local palace.

Then, to the southwest, an object fell through the sky.

"All of a sudden, this thing explodes in a sudden burst of light," researcher Malcolm LeCompte told Insider. "The guard's instantly blinded. He's done."


The heat from the explosion melted the bricks beneath the guard. A shockwave followed, which sheared off the top 40 feet of the palace roof and, presumably, liquefied his insides.

That explosion, according to a study LeCompte co-authored last month, was a 165-foot-wide meteor that blew up before hitting the ground, annihilating the city. The blast killed at least 8,000 people and animals.

"It was essentially a mini-sun," LeCompte said. "And if the heat didn't kill you, the shockwave would've be sufficient to basically tear you apart and turn you into nothing but a bag of bones or goo."

He and his colleagues think the saga of Tall el-Hammam could have inspired the biblical tale of Sodom. The disaster bears an uncanny resemblance to Moses' account in the book of Genesis, in which he warns against acts of wickedness by describing a city and its sinful people that God destroyed in a firestorm.

Archaeologists already knew that Tall el-Hammam, located in a valley in present-day Jordan, was suddenly abandoned millennia ago and remained uninhabited for centuries. Yet the reason for its demise remained up for debate - some historians suggested a natural disaster or violent war. But the new research, a culmination of 15 years of excavation, reveals that the city and its residents were subject to extreme temperatures and pressures.

LeCompte, who researches meteors and their impacts at Elizabeth City State University, said the only thing that can explain it is an extraterrestrial impact.

"An earthquake couldn't do that," he said.
A layer of melted pottery and glass tells a tale of destruction

Electron microscope images of numerous small cracks in grains of shocked quartz found in Tall el-Hammam. Allen West

Excavations at Tall el-Hammam began in 2005. Archaeologists first uncovered pottery, buildings, and bodies.

But then they started finding evidence that things had gotten really hot, really fast - like a rock that had melted to black on all sides, remnants of melted pottery and metal, and glass that had liquefied and splattered onto fragments of human bones.

Glass melts starting at 2,500 degrees Fahrenheit. Iron and pottery's melting points are even higher.

"The technology didn't exist at that time, in the Middle Bronze Age, for people to be able to generate fires of that kind of temperature," Sid Mitra, a geologist from East Carolina University who coauthored the study, said in a press release.

Thinking a space rock could be the explanation, excavators called in LeCompte and other members of his international Comet Research Group in 2014.

Spherules made of melted sand (upper left), palace plaster (upper right) and melted metal (bottom two) that suggest a meteor destroyed Tall el-Hammam

Malcolm LeCompte

Over the next seven years, LeCompte visited the site three times to collect samples. Multiple findings by his team confirmed that a cosmic airburst had happened near the city.

In a layer of sediment dating back 3,600 years, the group found fractured sand grains - known as shocked quartz - which only form at very high pressures. Those pressures had also converted wood and plants in the city into microscopic diamonoids that are almost indestructible.

Additionally, the group found dust-like particles called spherules composed of vaporized iron and sand. Spherules form at about 2,900 degrees Fahrenheit.

The sediment layer also contained platinum, iridium, and osmium - some of the rarest elements on Earth, which often come from meteorites.
People in the area were blinded, deafened, or smushed

Yet another indication that a meteor was responsible is that city buildings, including the palace, all fell toward the northeast.

"It appears things were destroyed directionally," LeCompte said.

This suggests the space rock exploded to the southeast of the city, and the resulting shockwave traveled north.

Meteors that explode in the atmosphere before striking Earth's surface are called bolides. Their cosmic airbursts can be more powerful than a nuclear bomb. The explosion above Tall el-Hammam, LeCompte said, had a yield between 5 and 30 megatons - at least 330 times more powerful than the atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima.

The air temperature rose to 3,600 degrees Fahrenheit (2,000 degrees Celsius). Those who looked at the incoming meteor lost their sight.

"More than likely, everything that was burnable would've caught fire, like wood and clothes," LeCompte said. "If you were on a hillside looking down into the valley, the sound of the explosion might've broken your ear drums."

Then came the shockwave, which would have felt like an intense wind barreling in at 740 miles per hour.

"The shock that would pass through your body would make mush out of your insides," LeCompte said.

He added that the pressure from the wind would have been 100,000 times what we normally feel.

Fallen trees at Tunguska, Russia, 10 miles from the epicenter of a cosmic airburst that occurred in 1908. N. A. Setrukov, 1928/European Space Agency/Flickr

Indeed, in Tall el-Hammam archaeologists unearthed bodies that were missing legs and skulls. Some victims had been blown against the walls of rooms and buried under rubble. Many of the people likely died without knowing what had happened, LeCompte said, incinerated by the blast.

The study suggests that the explosion was similar to that of a bolide over Russia more than a century ago. That event resulted in minimal human casualties due to its remote location in Sibera, but destroyed 800 square-miles of forest, knocking down 80 million trees.
The impact may have splashed salt from the Dead Sea into the soil

In the Sodom story, God leaves nothing alive - wiping out even "that which grew upon the ground."

The researchers' findings also offer an explanation for that line: They observed a high concentration of salt in the sediment layer, which would have been toxic to crops.

The city of Tall el-Hammam is located about seven miles northeast of the Dead Sea in what is now Jordan. NASA

If the meteor exploded southwest of Tall el-Hammam, it may have vaporized or splashed water from the nearby Dead Sea into the surrounding soil.

Historical records show that this area of the Middle East was abandoned for up to 600 years following the disaster - which would have been the only option if salty soil had made agriculture impossible.

SPACE RACE 2.0

S Korea test launches 1st domestically made space rocket ICBM

By KIM TONG-HYUNG

1 of 6

In this photo provided by Korea Aerospace Research Institute via Yonhap, the Nuri rocket, the first domestically produced space rocket, sits on its launch pad at the Naro Space Center in Goheung, South Korea, Wednesday, Oct. 20, 2021. South Korea was preparing to test-launch its first domestically produced space rocket Thursday, Oct.21, in what officials describe as an important step in its pursuit of a satellite launch program. 

(Korea Aerospace Research Institute/Yonhap via AP)


SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea test launched its first domestically produced space rocket on Thursday in what officials describe as an important step in the country’s pursuit of a satellite launch program.

It wasn’t immediately clear whether the three-stage Nuri rocket succeeded in delivering a dummy payload – a 1.5-ton block of stainless steel and aluminum – into orbit 600 to 800 kilometers (372 to 497 miles) above Earth.

Live footage showed the 47-meter (154 foot) rocket soaring into the air with bright yellow flames shooting out of its engines following blastoff at Naro Space Center, the country’s lone spaceport, on a small island off its southern coast.

The launch, which was observed by South Korean President Moon Jae-in, was delayed by an hour because engineers needed more time to examine the rocket’s valves. There had also been concerns that strong winds and other conditions would pose challenges for a successful launch.

Officials at the Korea Aerospace Research Institute, the country’s space agency, said it would take about 30 minutes to determine whether the rocket successfully delivered the payload into orbit.

The Nuri rocket, the first domestically produced space rocket, lifts off from a launch pad at the Naro Space Center in Goheung, South Korea, Thursday, Oct. 21, 2021

Nuri’s largest first stage, the core booster stage, was expected to land in waters southwest of Japan after separation, and its second stage was expected to fall in remote Pacific waters east of the Philippines, about 2,800 kilometers (1,740 miles) away from the launch site. The smallest third stage carries the payload and is designed to place it into orbit.

After relying on other countries to launch its satellites since the early 1990s, South Korea is now trying to become the 10th nation to send a satellite into space with its own technology.

Officials say such an ability would be crucial for the country’s space ambitions, which include plans for sending more advanced communications satellites and acquiring its own military intelligence satellites. The country is also hoping to send a probe to the moon by 2030.

Nuri is the country’s first space launch vehicle built entirely with domestic technology. The three-stage rocket is powered by five 75-ton class rocket engines placed in its first and second stages.

Scientists and engineers at KARI plan to test Nuri several more times, including conducting another launch with a dummy device in May 2022, before trying with a real satellite.

South Korea had previously launched a space launch vehicle from the Naro spaceport in 2013, which was a two-stage rocket built mainly with Russian technology. That launch came after years of delays and consecutive failures. The rocket, named Naro, reached the desired altitude during its first test in 2009 but failed to eject a satellite into orbit, and then exploded shortly after takeoff during its second test in 2010.

It wasn’t clear how North Korea, which had been accused of using its space launch attempts in past years as a disguise for developing long-range missile technology, would react to Thursday’s launch.

While pushing to expand its nuclear and missile program, the North had shown sensitivity about South Korea’s increasing defense spending and efforts to build more powerful conventionally armed missiles.

In a speech to Pyongyang’s rubber-stamp parliament last month, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un accused the U.S. and South Korea of “destroying the stability and balance” in the region with their allied military activities and a U.S.-led “excessive arms buildup” in the South.

While Nuri is powered by liquid propellants that need to be fueled shortly before launch, the South Koreans plan to develop a solid-fuel space launch rocket by 2024, which possibly could be prepared for launch more quickly and also be more cost effective.

South Korea space rocket test prompts fear of arms race with North

Tensions between Seoul and Pyongyang have grown in recent months. South Korea's failed test of its first-ever homegrown rocket has prompted worries of a new arms race.


South Korea has launched a Nuri rocket from the launch pad of its Naro Space Center in Goheung, South Korea

Shortly after 5 p.m. local time (0800 UTC) on Thursday, South Korea launched its first domestically produced rocket from the Naro Space Center in the northeastern county of Goheung.

All three stages of the liquid-fueled Nuri rocket, which cost around 2 trillion won ($1.7 billion, €1.46 billion), worked but the rocket reportedly failed to complete the mission of delivering a test satellite into orbit.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in said the rocket reached an altitude of 700 kilometers (435 miles), and that the 1.5 ton payload separated successfully.

However, Moon said that "putting a dummy satellite into orbit remains an unfinished mission."

Despite the test being unable to fulfill its task of putting a satellite into orbit, the launch comes as South Korea is locked into a growing rivalry with North Korea over technological advances in weaponry.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in called the test an "excellent accomplishment,'' taking South Korea a step further toward a space launch program.

Many South Koreans gathered to watch the launch of the country's first homegrown space rocket

North Korea submarine missile test was planned, experts think

South Korea's launch of the Nuri rocket has long been planned. Analysts said it was no coincidence that North Korea on Tuesday carried out what it claims was the first launch of a ballistic missile from a submerged submarine (SLBM).

The test launch was conducted off the naval base on the west coast of the peninsula. It was the eighth time that the North has carried out a missile launch this year.

It also coincided with the five-day Seoul International Aerospace and Defense Exhibition, where South Korean President Moon Jae-in was pictured in a flight suit and in the cockpit of a domestically produced FA-50 fighter jet.

Speaking to reporters, Moon said it is imperative for South Korea to build up its defenses: "A strong defense capability is always aimed at ensuring peace."

"The Republic of Korea seeks to build a smart and strong armed forces based on state-of-the-art technology," he added.
North justifies military buildup

Exactly one week earlier, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un attended a defense development exhibition in the North's capital Pyongyang to mark the 76th anniversary of the founding of the Workers' Party, issuing a similar justification for his own military buildup.

"We must be powerful for our coming generations as well," the state-run Korea Central News Agency (KCNA) quoted Kim as saying. "That is our first and foremost task."

"The military danger facing our state daily to the military tension prevailing around the Korean peninsula is different from 10 or five, even three years ago," he said.

Kim blamed "the unstable situation in the region" on the United States.


North Korea confirmed it had tested a new type of submarine-launched ballistic missile

In late September, the North tested what it claimed was an advanced new hypersonic missile.

US defense analysis suggests that Pyongyang may resume underground nuclear tests or fire a long-range ballistic missile within the next year.

Both would be violations of United Nations Security Council resolutions. But Pyongyang insists that its military developments are purely defensive and necessary as its enemies — primarily the US, South Korea and Japan — remain committed to overthrow of the Kim regime.

Those countries deny that they are planning a regime change in North Korea. But they all point out that they cannot sit by as a nuclear-armed and deeply unpredictable neighbor continues to build out its military capabilities.

South Korea tested its own submarine-launched ballistic missile recently, and is investing heavily in improved equipment on land, sea and air.

Significantly, the Korean navy is pushing ahead with plans to build the nation's first aircraft carrier. Meanwhile, discussions are also underway about the possibility of developing a nuclear-powered submarine.
North Korea 'careful not to cross red lines'

"The North just tested its first hypersonic missile and has now launched an SLBM, so it seems that they are showing the South and the rest of the world just what they can do," said June Park, a political economist with Princeton University.

"South Korea cannot just sit by and let that happen, so the Seoul defense show is a chance to demonstrate, 'we also have the ability to defend ourselves,'" she told DW.

Robert Dujarric, co-director of the Institute of Contemporary Asian Studies at the Tokyo campus of Temple University, says there has been an uptick in saber-rattling after a period of relative restraint on the Korean Peninsula. But he said Pyongyang is very aware where the "red line" lies.

"Ever since the armistice at the end of the Korean War in 1953, we have seen these periodic bouts of development of new weapons in the North — such as nuclear tests and then intercontinental ballistic missile launches — but the North has been very careful to not go too far, to not cross any red lines," he said.

"They have caused small-scale border incidents and been provocative and made a nuisance of themselves — but they have never gone too far as they know that crossing that red line would bring down a massive US retaliation," he said.

Just a phase?

"I think we are in that cycle again, and it must be remembered that it is one thing to parade a new missile through Pyongyang or to carry out a test launch, but it's an entirely different thing to fire one of these things in an operational situation," Park explained.

Unfortunately, says Park, the North's development of nuclear weapons gives the South little leeway in where to advance its own military capabilities in the years to come.

South Korean people are split almost half-and-half on the question of whether or not to develop a domestic nuclear deterrent, she said.

Should that happen, however, the reverberations would be felt far beyond North Korea and could arguably destabilize the entire northeast Asian region, where Russia, China and Japan are also major powers, Park explained.

Vienna museums resort to OnlyFans for cultural naked truth



Issued on: 21/10/2021

Vienna's Albertina museum is one of several to have social media sites judge some pieces, including in current exhibition of Italian artist Amadeo Modigliani, too "explicit" JOE KLAMAR AFP


Vienna (AFP)

An inspired publicity coup on the part of Vienna's tourist board, the OnlyFans account has won several hundred subscribers since its launch last month.

But the office's director Norbert Kettner says the move is mostly meant to "start a debate about censorship in the arts and the role of algorithms and social networks in the arts".

Kettner says the idea was born of museums' frustrations at the "difficulties when they are promoting exhibitions" due to the strict criteria some social media platforms use when deciding what counts as pornographic.

A notorious example was Facebook's censoring in 2018 of the prehistoric "Venus of Willendorf" figurine on display in Vienna's Natural History Museum, considered a masterpiece of the paleolithic era.

The prehistoric 'Venus of Willendorf' figurine at the Natural History Museum in Vienna also fell foul of social media nudity guidelines

 Helmut FOHRINGER APA/AFP/File

Kettner brands the decision "bizarre" and Facebook itself later apologised for the "error".

\

'Provocative character'

"It seems almost strange or even ridiculous" that the nude body is still a subject of controversy, says Klaus Pokorny, spokesman for the city's Leopold Museum.

"It should be very natural but it is not at all," he adds.

The museum boasts a key collection of work by early 20th-Century painter Egon Schiele, whose paintings frequently fall foul of social media censorship.

One of Vienna's other star art attractions, the Albertina, has had pieces in its current exhibition dedicated to Italian artist Amadeo Modigliani likewise judged too "explicit" by some sites.

Pokorny says such incidents have "forced" museums to explore alternatives.

"We did not want to open an account on OnlyFans... but it happened because the most well known international platforms like TikTok, Facebook or Instagram did not accept our works," he says.

Kettner says it's almost as if when it comes to taboos around the human body "we are pretty much the same as 100 years ago".

Social media censorship has also hit work by Austrian painter Egon Schiele, whose "L'Etreinte" is pictured here AFP

Art historian and director of France's Hartung-Bergman Foundation Thomas Schlesser describes the OnlyFans account as a "shrewd" move.

It means "the work regains the provocative or even pornographic character that they could have had when they were first produced," he told AFP.
'Self-censorship'

The issue goes far beyond the high art canon, according to Kettner.

"Many young artists depend on their online channels and many of them are already thinking: what is it possible to post there?" he points out, warning this can lead to a "sort of unconscious self censorship".

Several social media sites have said their rules on explicit content have evolved and now make exceptions for works of art.

However, Olivier Ertzscheid, specialist in information technologies at Nantes University, says despite these ostensible efforts "the reality is that when it comes to the representation of the body (especially female bodies) nothing has really changed, whether or not it's in an artistic form".

For Ertzscheid, sites' policies on nudity are part of a sort of "marketing of prudishness" in order to present the sites as safe and suitable for all.

Facebook did not respond to a request for comment from AFP on the Viennese initiative.

As for whether the museums could make headway in changing platforms' policies, Kettner says he hopes for direct discussions with them but has not yet been approached.

OnlyFans has become a popular platform for creators of erotic content but recently itself had to back down on a planned ban on sexually explicit content after an outcry from performers 

Lionel BONAVENTURE AFP

He has no qualms about being linked to OnlyFans, a site which has become known in recent years as a popular platform for creators of erotic content.

In August, OnlyFans itself had to back down on a planned ban on sexually explicit content after an outcry from performers.

For Pokorny, the move onto the platform is "not a question of our success on social media but a question of principles".

He describes it as "a war by other means", a "fight for our rights, for freedom, for love, for understanding and not for restrictions and people who want to influence our lives".

© 2021 AFP

Paris pushes vision of '100-percent bikeable' city

Issued on: 21/10/2021 - 

Paris city hall wants more of this - AFP


Paris (AFP)

Socialist mayor Anne Hidalgo, who runs Paris with support from the Green party, placed a push for more bike-friendly policies at the centre of her platform that got her re-elected by a wide margin in June of last year.

She is now also the Socialist party's candidate in next year's presidential election, hoping to unseat President Emmanuel Macron, but her campaign has got off to a woeful start with single-digit ratings.

Her policies have found wide support among the capital's urban elites with short commutes, but they are seen as a much harder sell in the rest of the country.

"Our target is to make our city 100 percent bikeable," David Belliard, deputy mayor in charge of urban transformation and Green party member, told AFP.

Some 180 million euros of new spending is earmarked for infrastructure, including plans for major bike routes across the city and into surrounding suburbs, and additional measures to make crossings and key entry points into inner Paris safer for cyclists, Belliard said.

Some flashpoints will get dedicated paths for cyclists and pedestrians completely separate from any car traffic, he added.

The city already spent 150 million euros on an initial biking plan, calling this the start of a "revolution" for the capital.

An added sense of urgency came with the Covid-19 pandemic that sparked a rapid extension of the city's cycling path network, dubbed "corona-pistes", as commuters shunned public transport for fear of infection.

As part of the new plan, those lanes, often hastily built to meet sudden demand, are to be made permanent and secure.

By 2026 the Parisian network of safe cycling paths is to total 180 kilometres (112 miles). Cyclists will be allowed to use one-way streets against oncoming car traffic on another 390 kilometres of streets.
Bike-friendly Paris?

The mayor's bike-friendly policies have sparked anger from motorists, with decisions such as turning stretches of urban motorways along the river Seine over to bikes and pedestrians.

Paris now often makes it into the top leagues of the world's most bike-friendly cities, ahead of any other mega-city, although still well behind European cycling models Copenhagen and Amsterdam.

The city also plans to help prevent bike theft, which Belliard said was "one of the obstacles to bicycle use".

By 2026, he said, Paris would have 100,000 new dedicated parking spots for bikes, of which 40,000, notably near train and metro stations, would be guarded.

Paris will also curb inner-car traffic further, aiming to end cross-city car transit completely, and cutting car traffic by half in a designated city centre zone.

Schools in the capital are to boost bike training to ensure that "all young Parisians know how to ride a bike when they leave primary school", Belliard said.

Hidalgo, who will also face Green candidate Yannick Jadot in the election, is now looking to kickstart her flagging presidential campaign with a rally in the city of Lille on Sunday.

© 2021 AFP

Sudan protest: Rival camps take to the streets as tensions rise in central Khartoum

Issued on: 21/10/2021 - 

Tens of thousands of supporters of Sudan's transition to a civilian-led democracy took to the streets Thursday, as rival demonstrators kept up a sit-in demanding a return to military rule. Both sides appealed to their supporters to keep apart and refrain from any violence, but there was a heavy police and troop presence around potential flashpoints. FRANCE 24's Bastien Renouil reports from Khartoum, Sudan.

GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s Transphobic Taunt Slammed On Twitter

Lee Moran
Thu, October 21, 2021, 1:09 AM·1 min read

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) faced backlash on Wednesday for a tweet mocking assistant health secretary Dr. Rachel Levine, the country’s first transgender four-star officer.

Another Trump-worshipping Republican, Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado, drew similar outrage with her “welcome to woke medicine, America” post about Levine. Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) called Boebert “a hateful bigot.”

Greene has made transphobic comments before, even going so far as to post an anti-transgender sign near the office of another representative who has a transgender child.

Critics of Greene’s tweet said they had reported it to Twitter as targeted harassment. The company did not immediately respond to HuffPost’s request for comment.

Critics slammed the Donald Trump-adoring, conspiracy theory-endorsing Greene for transphobia with her post, below:

This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.

GOP Rep. Lauren Boebert Slammed As ‘Hateful Bigot’ For Tweet

 About Transgender Official

The conspiracy-endorsing Republican drew fierce criticism for her

 "woke medicine" post about Dr. Rachel Levine, the first U.S. transgender

 four-star officer.

By Lee Moran

10/20/2021

Critics accused Boebert — who has a history of transphobic comments — 

of dog-whistling hate.

Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) noted that Levine is “an accomplished pediatrician,

 a graduate of Harvard and Tulane, a former fellow at one of America’s top 

teaching hospitals, a professor who created medical programs at Penn State 

to help young people, and PA’s former Physician General.”

Boebert, in contrast, is “just a hateful bigot,” Beyer said.

Others agreed:

 

Watch Out, an Otter Gang Is Roving the Streets Waiting to Strike

Rotem Rusak
Tue, October 19, 2021, 

Yes, you heard that right. Otters are generally loveable and playful creatures. But it seems like one group of otters is fed up and striking out. And, we guess, given the state of the world, we can’t blame them. Boing Boing first shared news of this Alaskan otter gang which has orchestrated three separate attacks in September alone.

These attacks seem to have extended over a couple of years now. The first reported otter gang attack dates back to 2019. In these cases, the otters attacked dogs. And there have been several incidents since. David Battle, an Alaska Department of Fish and Game biologist, shared more details with Live Science:

There always seem to have been four or five otters involved in all the incidents. Considering the rarity of this behavior in otters, and the fact that our first reported attack was in 2019 and it’s happened several times since then, this is very likely one group that has stayed together for a while or that come together frequently over a period of time.

A gang of otters standing on a ledge   Emily Nelson

These otters are also proving hard to catch, given their ability to stay on the move using interconnected waterways. Researchers don’t seem to have ruled out rabies as a cause. But overall, the reason for this aggression is hard to pin down.

Battle further offers this insight:

Most otters never display this strong a reaction to dogs or people. By and large, they are curious animals, but not typically aggressive toward people or dogs. It’s possible there was some sort of incident involving a dog that led them down this path, after which the otters learned to take aggressive action against dogs, but it’s impossible to say.

Although a gang of angry otters certainly paints a picture, we’re rooting for otter, man, and dog to find happy endings. Battle notes he hopes to evaluate the otters when researchers can finally catch up to them. We’re crossing our fingers there’s an easy way to get this otter gang to put down their claws.

The post Watch Out, an Otter Gang Is Roving the Streets Waiting to Strike appeared first on Nerdist.

Helium: South Africa strikes new 'gold'




Helium: South Africa strikes new 'gold'The natural gas from Renergen's wells is currently being used to power buses, but eventually it will be turned into liquefied natural gas that can be used to heat homes or in power stations (AFP/LUCA SOLA)More

Linda GIVETASH
Wed, October 20, 2021

In a grassy plain in South Africa, once the world's largest gold producer, prospectors have stumbled upon a new treasure: helium.

Popularly known for birthday balloons and squeaky voices, helium plays an underappreciated role in medical scanners, superconductors, and space travel.

It's also rare -- produced by fewer than 10 countries and often treated as a waste product in natural gas wells.


Natural gas is what Stefano Marani and Nick Mitchell had on their minds when they bought gas rights on this 87,000-hectare piece of land in the Free State province in 2012, for just $1.

When they had their gas finds tested, they discovered unusually high amounts of helium mixed in with the gas that mean their dollar investment could be worth billions.

Their company Renergen is almost ready to start producing both natural gas and helium, placing South Africa on an elite map with helium reserves that could be the richest and cleanest in the world.

Those first tests revealed helium concentrations of two to four percent. In the United States, helium is extracted at concentrations as low as 0.3 percent.

"That was when we knew we had something special," Marani said. "It really was right place, right time."

Further exploration has found concentrations as high as 12 percent, Renergen says.

Other major producers are Qatar and Algeria.

- 'It's big' -

The global helium market was worth $10.6 billion in 2019, according to the firm Research and Markets. Since few countries produce helium, supplies are frequently disrupted.

Renergen estimates its helium reserve could be as much as 9.74 billion cubic meters -- larger than the known reserves in the entire United States.

That's enough to fill about 1.4 trillion party balloons.

If proven, Marani said those reserves would be worth over $100 billion (86 million euros). More conservative estimates remain substantial at 920 million cubic meters.

Chris Ballentine, chair of geochemistry at the University of Oxford, said helium is usually produced as part of liquified natural gas operations.

Companies often treat it as a bonus, if they bother to separate it out.

What sets South Africa's find apart is how the gas is extracted.

Natural gas is often obtained by fracking, a process that injects water, sand and chemicals into bedrock under high pressure to split it to release any oil and gas trapped inside.

But fracking also contaminates groundwater and causes small earthquakes that can ruin nearby homes and buildings.

"We don't frack," Marani said. "Our rock has already cracked, there's a giant fracture underground. And so when we drill, we're literally drilling just into that giant fracture where the gas is and then the gas escapes naturally with no stimulation at all."

Renergen plans to have 19 wells installed by early next year. Gas currently extracted is being used as compressed natural gas in a pilot project to run buses.

Eventually the plant will process liquified natural gas for domestic use and liquid helium for export around the world.

Keeping helium as a liquid requires cooling it to nearly absolute zero.

Those temperatures -- combined with the fact that helium doesn't burn or interact with other gases -- make it useful for cooling incredibly hot things. Magnets on MRI scanners, for example, or rocket engines.

Demand, and prices, for helium have more than doubled over the last 30 years. As the uses for helium multiply, nations around the world are increasingly concerned about securing a steady supply.

Russia, Tanzania and the United States have all been looking at developing new reserves.

Eventually, helium production at the South African site could rise to five tonnes daily — roughly seven percent of the planet's current helium production, Marani said.

"It's big," he said. "It's quite meaningful by global standards."

str/gs/sn/rl/mbx

Trump Organization, under indictment, faces new probe by New York county -NYT


FILE PHOTO: A view of the putting green of the Trump National Golf Club Westchester where U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump was scheduled to deliver remarks in Briarcliff Manor


Wed, October 20, 2021

(Reuters) - Donald Trump's family company, indicted in July after a Manhattan district attorney probe, is under scrutiny by another New York prosecutor for financial dealings at a golf course it owns, the New York Times reported on Wednesday, citing people with knowledge of the matter.

The district attorney in Westchester County, a suburb north of New York City, has subpoenaed records from the Trump Organization property in recent months under a criminal investigation, the report said.

Also subpoenaed were records from Ossining, the town that sets property taxes on the opulent Trump National Golf Club Westchester, according to the New York Times.


Westchester District Attorney Mimi Rocah seems to be examining whether the company misrepresented the value of the private club to reduce its taxes, but it was unclear if Trump's own conduct was under scrutiny, the report said.

A spokesperson for Rocah's office declined to comment, as did Kerry Lawrence, a lawyer for Trump's golf club.

Trump's business has faced mounting accusations of financial misconduct since he took office, with the latest investigations threatening to undermine the Trump Organization's business relationships and complicate his political future as the Republican mulls a 2024 White House run.

The Trump Organization and its chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, pleaded not guilty to tax fraud after Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance indicted the company in July, following a three-year investigation.

New York Attorney General Letitia James in May joined Vance's probe, which Trump has referred to as a politically motivated "witch hunt." Vance, James, and Rocah are all Democrats.

(Reporting by Julia Harte; Editing by Richard Chang)


Report: Trump golf club under new criminal probe over taxes


Trump Investigation-Golf Course

FILE - In this June 7, 2016, file photo, a photographer is reflected in a golf cart at the the Trump National Golf Club Westchester in Briarcliff Manor, N.Y. Former President Donald Trump's company is under criminal investigation by a district attorney in a New York City suburb into whether it misled officials to cut taxes for a golf course there, according to The New York Times. The district attorney’s office subpoenaed records from both the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester and the town that handles its taxes, said the Times, citing “people with knowledge of the matter.”

( Photo/Mary Altaffer, File

Wed, October 20, 202

NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump's company is under criminal investigation by a district attorney in a New York City suburb into whether it misled officials to cut taxes for a golf course there, according to The New York Times.

The district attorney’s office subpoenaed records from both the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester and the town of Ossining that handles the club's taxes, said the Times, citing “people with knowledge of the matter.” The newspaper didn’t say why those people had requested anonymity.

The probe led by District Attorney Mimi E. Rocah, a Democrat, appears to focus in part on whether the former president’s company submitted misleading valuations on the golf course.

In a statement, the Trump Organization suggested the probe was politically motivated, noting that it had hammered out a compromise with the town over its long-running efforts to cut taxes in June, a deal signed off by a county judge.

“The suggestion that anything was inappropriate is completely false and incredibly irresponsible," the Trump statement said. "The witch hunt continues.”

The district attorney's office has not accused anyone at the company of wrongdoing and it was not immediately clear if the probe will ultimately lead to any charges. A spokesperson for the office, Jess Vecchiarelli, wouldn't confirm the probe to The Associated Press, stating only, “We have no comment.”

The probe adds to several legal challenges facing the former president and his company. In July, the Manhattan district attorney indicted the company and its longtime financial chief with allegedly failing to pay taxes on employee perks, like cars and apartments. Both the company and the finance chief, Allen Weisselberg, have pleaded not guilty.

The New York state attorney general's office, which joined in the Manhattan district attorney probe, has also launched its own investigation into Trump's finances. That civil investigation is looking in part into whether the Trump Organization may have misled tax officials in valuations of another of the company's Westchester County properties, its Seven Springs estate featuring a Georgian-style mansion set among 213-acres of bucolic countryside.

The Trump Organization has been fighting the town of Ossining for lower tax assessments for its Westchester golf course for years. The company once valued the golf club for tax purposes at about $1.4 million, later increasing its estimate to $6.5 million, while the town for years valued it at more than $15 million.

In June, a New York judge ruled on a compromise that would cut the assessment to $9.5 million for 2021. The compromise also cut assessments going back several years by about 30%, triggering refunds to the company of about $875,000 for overcharges on its back taxes.