Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Thursday, October 1, 2015

Did You Know This About BIG DATA?

http://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2015/09/30/big-data-20-mind-boggling-facts-everyone-must-read/

Thursday, August 20, 2015

Where are the missing girls?

http://117437.hs-sites.com/august-newsletter-back-to-school-where-are-the-missing-girls?ecid=ACsprvvlhBGfkuZpVdVXI2PIHA0n2T0_3ZZPWBY2qxVxANdl9a290cknTuqaDgG5iLJy9GQQZ9x0&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=21455751&_hsenc=p2ANqtz--jYFO38w_I1yiJOTAlYoQ1zNeaRPA-mkTPtElNxmyEiIhWUsx3dEX_Q_rNZ8X8rf0Vk6WbOU2w7yvDaeJFhipgiXZq0g&_hsmi=21455751

Thursday, August 6, 2015

Steinman Legal News Report August 6, 2015

http://paper.li/JanetSteinman/1368661556?edition_id=f3f49900-3c28-11e5-b412-002590a5ba2d&utm_campaign=paper_sub&utm_medium=email&utm_source=subscription

Wednesday, July 15, 2015

United Kingdom: New Law to Combat Supply Chain Slavery and Human Trafficking

United Kingdom: New Law to Combat Supply Chain Slavery and Human Trafficking http://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/united-kingdom-new-law-to-combat-supply-25038/

Wednesday, June 10, 2015

Needy Kids Eat Because of this One Man

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/10/marys-meals_n_7544334.html?utm_hp_ref=world&ir=WorldPost

Wednesday, May 27, 2015

Monday, May 25, 2015

CJC Music Radio Network Online Radio by CJCMusicRadioNetwork | BlogTalkRadio

CJC Music Radio Network Online Radio by CJCMusicRadioNetwork | BlogTalkRadio

Washington Post reporter’s trial in Iran will be closed to the public.

Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian will go on trial Tuesday on espionage charges in a Tehran courtroom that will be closed to the public, including his family. Martin Baron, executive editor of The Post, said in a statement released Monday that both Rezaian’s mother and his wife, a journalist who also faces related charges and will be tried separately, have been barred from attending. The Post tried to obtain a visa for an editor to be in Iran during Rezaian’s trial, but its inquiries were not answered, Baron said. http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/washington-post-reporter-jason-rezaians-trial-closed-to-the-public/2015/05/25/33514a79-b4ad-417b-905d-f8544defbd90_story.html

Sunday, May 24, 2015

Friday, May 15, 2015

Legendary blues guitarist B. B. King dies.

From Consequence of Sound by Len Comaratta. BB King has died. The legendary blues guitarist passed away Thursday in Las Vegas, his attorney confirmed. He was 89 years old. Riley B. King was born to sharecropper parents on a cotton plantation in Mississippi in 1925. Learning the fundamentals of the Blues from his mother’s cousin and Blues legend, Bukka White, King began his career in music as early as twelve years old, when he got his first guitar. In his earliest days as a musician, King also disc jockeyed at WDIA, earning the nickname Beale Street Blues Boy, eventually whittling down to Blues Boy before becoming the more familiar B.B. With a playing style that borrowed from the likes of legendary bluesmen such as T-Bone Walker and Blind Lemon Jefferson, King adapted those men’s styles, integrating string bends and a left-hand vibrato that resulted in a focused yet complex sonic signature akin to vocal-like inflections. Over time, his style of playing would become one of the most identifiable styles in the medium and an indispensable component to hundreds, if not thousands, of future guitar players, especially in the Rock canon. While a Bluesman through and through, King’s music blended myriad styles and genres including Blues, Jazz, Swing, Jump and even mainstream Pop. In 1970, King even managed to cross-over onto the Pop charts with his take on the classic Roy Hawkins tune “The Thrill Is Gone”; a song that today rests comfortably on Rolling Stone’s Greatest Songs of All Time list(s), though it tends to ebb and flow as to its position with each subsequent publication. Today, we wouldn’t think twice at an R&B performer charting simultaneously on the Pop charts, but in 1970, it was a rarity to see a Blues artist anywhere but on the Blues and R&B Charts. The success of “The Thrill Is Gone” was capped off when King won a Grammy for the song, one of 15 Grammy awards in his career, giving him the distinction of having the most Grammy wins in the Blues genre. Honored with a Recording Academy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1987, that same year saw King inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, a full seven years after his induction into the Blues Hall of Fame. The following year in 1988, King teamed up with the biggest band on the planet at the time, U2, for the single “When Love Comes To Town”, featured on the Irish group’s heralded Rattle and Hum. While his work with U2 or even with Eric Clapton in 2000, on their album together Riding With the King, may have put a spotlight on him to the uninitiated, King was no stranger to strong collaborations, working with Bobby Bland, Johnny Ace, The Spinners and theO’Jays, the Crusaders, John Lee Hooker, Etta James and KoKo Taylor at various points throughout his career. His earliest recordings were even produced by Sam Philips years before Philips’ own Sun Records was even a dream. However, of all the musicians that King had the pleasure to either work with or simply know, his favorite was Frank Sinatra. King has spoken many times to how Sinatra helped to open doors for black musicians, and it was Sinatra who got King into his first gigs in Las Vegas during the heyday of the Rat Pack in the 1960s. On May 1st, 2015, King announced that he had entered hospice care. At 88 years old and a long-time sufferer of Type II Diabetes, the disease finally gained the upper hand on Thursday. With the passing of this legend it may be tempting (and even perhaps a bit cliché) to use his biggest song’s title, “The Thrill Is Gone”, as a title to his eulogy, but personally, I prefer to take a song title from King’s favorite album, Sinatra’s In the Wee Small Hours, an album King listened to every night before falling asleep. With regards to losing King, Sinatra’s album’s penultimate track says it all – “I’ll Never Be the Same”.

Tuesday, May 5, 2015

Honor Killings in America

http://www.theahafoundation.org/honor-killings-in-america-ayaan-hirsi-ali-in-the-atlantic/

Congratulations to Gray Basnight on the launch of his new novel Shadows in the Fire at the Blue Mountain Gallery in Chelsea last night. Read it - you can get it on Amazon.

Congratulations to Gray Basnight on the launch of his new novel Shadows in the Fire at the Blue Mountain Gallery in Chelsea last night. Read it - you can get it on Amazon. http://www.graybasnight.com/shadows_in_the_fire__click_here__124085.htm

Monday, April 20, 2015

Supreme Court orders review of North Carolina redistricting

Supreme Court orders review of North Carolina redistricting http://www.aol.com/article/2015/04/20/supreme-court-orders-review-of-north-carolina-redistricting/21174142/?icid=maing-grid7%7Chtmlws-main-bb%7Cdl1%7Csec3_lnk3%26pLid%3D646784

Tuesday, February 24, 2015

DOJ declines to prosecute George Zimmerman.

Federal civil rights charges are difficult to press, let alone get convictions for. In its press release about the decision, the lack of charges against Zimmerman are said to be a result of being unable to meet the standard of proving that the "defendant knew his acts were unlawful, and committed those acts in open defiance of the law.".... The Department of Justice also opened a civil rights investigation into each of those cases [Michael Brown and Eric Garner]. It declined to press charges against former Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson in the case of the Michael Brown shooting. The decision regarding the Eric Garner case is still open. http://cbsn.ws/1BPCRW0

Thursday, February 12, 2015

Steinman Legal News Report February 12, 2015.

Steinman Legal News Report February 12, 2015. http://paper.li/JanetSteinman/1368661556?edition_id=65ab4a70-b2a5-11e4-9b86-002590a5ba2d&utm_campaign=paper_sub&utm_medium=email&utm_source=subscription

Friday, January 30, 2015

Steinman Legal News Report January 30, 2015

Steinman Legal News Report January 30, 2015 http://paper.li/JanetSteinman/1368661556?edition_id=2abaed80-a86e-11e4-9b86-002590a5ba2d&utm_campaign=paper_sub&utm_medium=email&utm_source=subscription

Thursday, January 22, 2015

January 22, 1973. The Supreme Court of the United States delivers its decisions in Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton, legalizing elective abortion in all fifty states through the end of the first trimester of pregnancy. The case was decided on due process and privacy grounds, and the rights of physicians to determine health issues in individual situations.

January 22, 1973. The Supreme Court of the United States delivers its decisions in Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton, legalizing elective abortion in all fifty states through the end of the first trimester of pregnancy. The case was decided on due process and privacy grounds, and the rights of physicians to determine health issues in individual situations. Roe v. Wade reached the Supreme Court on appeal in 1970. The Justices delayed taking action on Roe and a closely related case, Doe v. Bolton, until they decided Younger v. Harris, as they felt that the appeals raised difficult questions on judicial jurisdiction, and United States v. Vuitch, where they considered the constitutionality of a District of Columbia statute that criminalized abortion except where the mother's life or health was endangered. In Vuitch, the Court narrowly upheld the statute, though in doing so, it treated abortion as a medical procedure and stated that the physician must be given room to determine what suffices as a danger to (physical or mental) health. The day after they announced their decision in Vuitch, they voted to hear both Roe and Doe. In his opening argument in defence of the abortion restrictions, Jay Floyd made a joke that was later described as the "Worst Joke in Legal History". Appearing against two female lawyers, Floyd began, "Mr. Chief Justice and may it please the Court. It’s an old joke, but when a man argues against two beautiful ladies like this, they are going to have the last word." His remark was met with cold silence; one observer thought that Chief Justice Burger "was going to come right off the bench at him. He glared him down". Following a first round of arguments, all seven Justices tentatively agreed that the law should be struck down, but for varying reasons. Burger assigned the role of writing the Court's opinion in Roe (as well as Doe) to Blackmun, who began drafting a preliminary opinion that emphasized what he saw as the Texas law's vagueness. Justices Rehnquist and Powell joined the Supreme Court too late to hear the first round of arguments. Additionally, Blackmun felt that his opinion was an inadequate reflection of his liberal colleagues' opinions. In May 1972, Blackmun proposed that the case be reargued. Justice Douglas threatened to write a dissent from the reargument order (he and the other liberal Justices were suspicious that Rehnquist and Powell would vote to uphold the statute), but was coaxed out of the action by his colleagues, and his dissent was merely mentioned in the reargument order without further statement or opinion. The case was reargued on October 11, 1972. Weddington continued to represent Roe, and Texas Assistant Attorney General Robert C. Flowers stepped in to replace Jay Floyd for Texas. Blackmun continued work on his opinions in both cases over the summer recess, despite the fact that there was no guarantee that he would be assigned to write the opinions again. Over the recess, Blackmun spent a week researching the history of abortion at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, where he had worked in the 1950s. After the Court heard the second round of arguments, Powell stated that he would agree with Blackmun's conclusion but pushed for Roe to be the lead of the two abortion cases being considered. Powell also suggested that the Court strike down the Texas law on privacy grounds. White was unwilling to sign on to Blackmun's opinion, and Rehnquist had already decided to dissent. http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=410&invol=113

Saturday, January 17, 2015

Je suis Nigeria.

http://zeenews.india.com/news/world/tens-of-thousands-rally-in-chad-to-support-army-move-against-boko-haram_1531915.html

Tuesday, January 6, 2015

Trip to Northern Spain

Trip to Northern Spain

Stop Subsidizing Big Pharma

Stop Subsidizing Big Pharma http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/06/opinion/stop-subsidizing-big-pharma.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=c-column-top-span-region®ion=c-column-top-span-region&WT.nav=c-column-top-span-region From the NY Times By LLEWELLYN HINKES-JONES JAN. 5, 2015 WASHINGTON — ROBERT J. BEALL, the president and chief executive of the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, called his recent decision to sell the royalty rights to his organization’s research a “game changer.” Indeed: Deals like this, in which an investment company paid the foundation $3.3 billion for its future royalties from several cystic fibrosis drugs it helped finance, could revolutionize the way medical research is funded. Rather than the staid model of government-funded institutions handing out grants to academic research facilities, a new breed of “venture philanthropies” like the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation could corral private investment into developing lifesaving drugs quickly and cheaply. The problem is that venture philanthropy is, essentially, another term for privatizing scientific research. Instead of decisions about the fate of scientific funding being made by publicly oriented institutions, those decisions are being put in the hands of anonymous philanthropists and ostensibly benevolent nonprofits. At the risk of oversimplification, biomedical research divides into two categories: private and public. The former is the constellation of big pharmaceutical companies and start-up labs. The latter comprises government agencies and the universities and philanthropies that rely on government support — directly, through grants, or indirectly, through tax policy. The former can charge whatever it wants for its products; the latter is limited by government rules and price controls. Venture philanthropy complicates this picture by introducing a tax-exempt loophole. An organization like the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation will take in tax-exempt donations to invest in a pharmaceutical company — in this case, Vertex Pharmaceuticals — to develop drugs based on publicly funded research. Venture philanthropies can then sell the results of that research to private industry to deliver drugs to the market. There is nothing to stop pharmaceutical companies from creating their own philanthropies, funding research with tax-exempt dollars and then selling themselves the rights to the intellectual property. Without price controls on the final product that come with public funding, the potential costs of the resulting medicines are limitless. So far, there is no effort to extend government price controls to venture-philanthropy-derived research. The Cystic Fibrosis Foundation did little to lobby for lower prices on the drugs that were developed from the research it funded. As a result, Kalydeco, a cystic fibrosis medication it funded, is one of the most expensive drugs available, at $300,000 a year. The idea of a public-private research transfer is not without precedent. In 1980, Congress passed the Bayh-Dole Act, which allowed publicly funded universities to sell off exclusive licenses on their research to private industry. The act was intended to drive funding for academic research and innovation. But the resulting race for private funding has created perverse incentives to research blockbuster drugs, even if they are not the most imperative from a public policy standpoint. The impetus to produce more and more profitable research has also driven down the quality of academic work, promoting ghostwritten papers, sloppy peer review and the burying of unfavorable clinical-trial results. Venture philanthropy builds off the model created by Bayh-Dole, but with tax exemptions and a sheen of generosity on top of the lucrative payoff. Continue reading the main story Continue reading the main story