Election result joke from AY live...

Nurse infected with Ebola knew risks of her work...

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DALLAS (AP) — A Texas nurse who contracted Ebola while caring for an infected Liberian man graduated from nursing school four years ago and was certified in critical care procedures two months before the disease arrived in the United States.

Nurse Nina Pham understood the risks of working so close to one of the world's most feared viruses and tried to reassure her family that she would be safe.
When Pham's mother learned her daughter was caring for Thomas Eric Duncan, Pham told her: "Mom, no. Don't worry about me," family friend Christina Tran told The Associated Press.
Pham's infection raised new questions about whether American hospitals and their staffs are adequately prepared to contain Ebola.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention acknowledged Tuesday that Pham might not have been infected if a special response team had been sent to Dallas immediately after the Liberian patient was diagnosed.
CDC Director Tom Frieden said the agency is creating an "Ebola response team" and bolstering training nationwide on how to respond to an Ebola case.
Pham, the first person to contract the disease within the United States, was among more than 70 staff members at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas involved in Duncan's care. The 26-year-old Texas Christian University graduate remained hospitalized Tuesday in stable condition and said in a statement that she was "doing well."

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Protect Environmental workers move disposal barrels to a staging area outside the apartment of a hea …

Duncan's medical records, which the family shared with The Associated Press, show that Pham helped care for Duncan throughout his hospital stay, including the day he arrived in intensive care and the day before he died.
The records make numerous mentions of protective gear worn by hospital staff, and Pham herself notes wearing the gear in visits to Duncan's room. But there is no indication in the records of her first encounter with Duncan, on Sept. 29, that Pham donned any protective gear.
Pham got her nursing degree in 2010. A spokeswoman for the Fort Worth-based school said infection prevention was part of the nursing curriculum. A classmate of Pham's said they had studied microbiology and discussed Ebola in detail, even reading "The Hot Zone," the 1994 book about the origins of Ebola. The classmate spoke on the condition of anonymity, saying she did not want to infringe on Pham's privacy.
Two nurses from Emory University Hospital in Atlanta with special training in Ebola care are helping to train staff at the hospital where Thomas Eric Duncan died last week, Frieden said.
"I've been hearing loud and clear from health care workers from around the country that they're worried," said Frieden, who also said the CDC is considering whether Ebola patients should be transferred to one of four hospitals with specialized bio-containment units.
Though the CDC said a breach in protocol was probably to blame for Pham's infection, the man's illness was so complicated and rare that the risk of transmission would have existed at any hospital, experts said.

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This Texas Christian University yearbook photo shows Nina Pham, 26, who became the first person to c …

"Even in the best of hospitals following all the protocol, we can minimize the risk to hospital personnel, but we can never eliminate it," said Dr. David Weber, an epidemiologist at the University of North Carolina's hospital.
What's more, staff in Atlanta and another containment unit in Omaha, Nebraska, would have trained and drilled for years for the possibility of such an occurrence, and they had advance warning of an Ebola case heading their way.
"They were notified in advance, 24, 48 hours — they had plenty of time to prepare, they were met at the door by people all garbed," Weber said. "That's a more controlled situation than a patient walking through the door that you think may or may not have Ebola."
The isolation unit at the Nebraska Medical Center has been working since it opened in 2005 to perfect routines to protect medical staff against infection, said Shelly Schwedhelm, nursing and training director of the unit.
The most important difference in the Nebraska unit and some hospitals, she said, are protocols for putting on protective equipment and safely taking it off.
Martha Kuhl, a pediatric nurse in Oakland, California, and an officer with National Nurses United, said the same training and gear that helped safeguard nurses at Emory and in Nebraska must be offered everywhere.

Kuhl said she simply received a lengthy email about Ebola, but no other training.

"Most nurses have not been properly prepared," she said. "You never know when you're going to be approached by a patient or family member who meets the criteria."

Back in Texas, people who know the Pham family said they were part of a closely knit, deeply religious community of Vietnamese Catholics in Fort Worth.

The Rev. Jim Khoi, pastor at Our Lady of Fatima Church, said Pham appeared to be in good spirits when she spoke to her mother, Ngoc Pham, via video chat.

Pham's mother is "calm," Khoi said. "She trusts in God. And she asks for prayers."

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Associated Press Writer Alex Sanz in Dallas and Margery Beck in Omaha, Nebraska, contributed to this report.

Photographer Joe Broyles tried for five years before finally capturing split-second moment an aircraft hit the speed of sound, forming a vapor cone around it

Photo captures split-second moment jet breaks the sound barrier. Photo by Joe Broyles/Caters news

A photographer spent five years attempting to photograph the moment a jet breaks the sound barrier and finally succeeded, capturing the split-second moment the aircraft reached “transonic velocity,” or the speed of sound at 766 mph.



Joe Broyles, 61, attending an air show at the Oceania Naval Air Station in Virginia Beach, Virginia, picked a spot in the sky and snapped eight images in less than two seconds, hoping he’d get lucky, 
“They move so fast it’s near impossible to time when to start pushing the shutter button,” Broyles told Caters.
Luck was on his side as Broyles captured the moment an F-18 Super Hornet 2 jet broke the sound barrier, forming a vapor cone around the jet that lasted tenths of a second.
Broyles had been to several air shows in the past attempting to get his tough-to-get photo. Not only is it difficult because of the speed of the aircraft but so is judging the height that the jet will pass overhead.
“I didn’t know if he would come in high, low, or somewhere in the middle,” he said. “I have experienced all three.”
Now he’s finally experienced success.
“When I saw the photograph, I was absolutely ecstatic,” Broyles said. “I’ve been waiting for this moment for at least five years, so when I saw the image I raised my arm with a closed fist—I finally got it.”

Update: Officer Assigned to Desk Duty for Stomping on Man's Head ..

Update: July 28, 2014, 12:30 p.m. 

A Brooklyn cop who was caught on camera stomping on a man's head while he was being subdued has been assigned to desk duty, according to the NY Daily News.
Joel Edouard, 36, also waved a gun toward Jahmil-El Cuffee's head while he was on the ground being arrested on suspicion of marijuana possession at 8 p.m. Wednesday. Edouard was ordered to surrender his gun and shield as well.


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A new video showing a NYPD officer pointing his gun at an unarmed man who is being restrained has surfaced online and is putting the city's police department in further controversy over its arrest tactics.
This comes only a week after footage of the choking death of Eric Garner by officers in Staten Island, New York, surfaced and spread across the Internet.

The latest incident took place in the Bedford-Stuyvesant area of Brooklyn. The video shows two officers restraining and holding a man up against a vehicle on the property where the man lives, according to the voice of the man recording the video.

The officers tell him to stop resisting arrest. "I didn't do s--t," the man being held down repeatedly says. One cop then pulls out his weapon and points it at the man's head to threaten him and then places it back in his holster. Seconds later, the same officer stomps on the man's head as other cops gather to restrain the man and arrest him.

Videos showing alleged police misconduct continue to surface more and more as witnesses look to expose these incidents. This also comes following the arrest of a man being held in a chokehold by officers in Harlem, which was recently posted online.
 
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 (Photo: Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

Jay Z ATTACKED by Beyonce's Sister Solange [FULL VIDEO]

Jay Z Slapped By Beyonce's Sister Solange Knowles [WATCH]

play Jay Z and Beyonce left separately after the brawl

play The trio left the elevator with no smiles

Jay Z was under attack by his wife Beyonce's younger sister, Solange Knowles as the trio departed the 2014 Met Gala after-party in New York last Monday.
A surveillance camera caught the 27 year old singer lashing out at her brother-in-law, 44, with her arms and legs flaring up while Queen Bey watched helplessly.
The famous family were in an elevator descending from a soiree that followed the annual fashion fest at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
According to TMZ sources, Solange was screaming at her family member when the fight erupted. In the footage, a man who looks to be a bodyguard tries to hold Solange back but she manages to reach the rapper several times.
The cause of the fight is still under wraps but from the footage, Jay Z grabs her foot to block a kick but never attempts to retaliate.
Beyonce tried to muster a showbiz smile as the threesome left but then departed with her sister in a car while her husband left separately.

Watch the fight below:
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Photo of 'firenado' sets the Web ablaze..

An incredible image of a "firenado," a combination of (you guessed it) a fire and a tornado, appeared on the Web this week and quickly inspired many to wonder if the otherworldly image could possibly be real.

It is indeed. The photo was taken near Chillicothe, Mo., by Janae Copelin and then posted to her Instagram account.

She wrote, "Had such a wonderful weekend, but this had to be the coolest/scariest thing I've ever seen. A farmer burning off his field and as we stopped so I could take a picture the wind whipped up this fire twister."

There were

no reported injuries.

Firenados can occur when strong ground-level winds connect with fire, propelling the flames into a twisting vortex that sucks in debris, accuweather.com explains.

While unusual, firenados aren't unheard of. Back in 2012, Chris Tangey, an Australian filmmaker, captured footage of a firenado while scouting locations. He then shared the clips with ABC News. Tangey remarked that it sounded like a "jet engine."

Tadpoles ‘flying overhead’ unlikely winner of underwater photo contest..Cute

“Tadpoles”
Gold in Compact Cameras; Best in Show
Bert Willaert, Belgium
Location: Lovendegem, Belgium
Comment: Sort of looks like aliens flying overhead.

You wouldn’t think that an underwater photo taken with a point-and-shoot camera would produce an award-winning photograph, but a nature photographer from Belgium proved otherwise.
Bert Willaert was snorkeling in a small canal in Lovendegem, Belgium, and encountered a huge school of tadpoles of the common toad. Using his compact camera, Willaert took a photograph from a unique angle.
“From below it looks like they are flying overhead,” he wrote in a blog post about the photo.
The distinctive photo not only won the gold for compact cameras but was the Best of Show for the entire 2014 DEEP Indonesia International Underwater Photo Competition, the results of which were released in the past week.
It is the first time in the history of the eight-year series that a compact camera winner has won the Best of Show, “so it’s pretty unusual,” said Matt Weiss, owner of DivePhotoGuide.com, which hosted the contest with Wetpixel and DEEP Indonesia.
More than 5,000 photos were entered from more than 30 countries, with photographers from 18 countries winning more than $40,000 in prizes.
Here’s a variety of the winning photos, courtesy of 2014 DEEP Indonesia International Underwater Photo

“Red Sea at Sunset”
Bronze in Reefscapes
Theresa Guise, Indiana
Location: Red Sea
Comment: The Red Sea, located between Africa and Asia, is known for its spectacular recreational diving sites, and its sunsets, too, apparently.

Chinese ship hunting for missing Malaysia jet detects 'ping'

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Plane search goes underwater

By Siva Govindasamy and Swati Pandey
KUALA LUMPUR/PERTH, Australia (Reuters) - A Chinese patrol ship hunting for a missing Malaysia Airlines jetliner detected a pulse signal in the south Indian Ocean on Saturday, the state news agency Xinhua reported, in a possible indicator of the underwater beacon from a plane's "black box".

Australian search authorities said such a signal would be "consistent" with a black box, but both they and Xinhua stressed there was no conclusive evidence linking the "ping" to Flight MH370, which went missing on March 8 with 239 people aboard shortly after taking off from Kuala Lumpur for Beijing.

A black box detector deployed by the vessel Haixun 01 picked up the "ping" signal with a frequency of 37.5kHz per second - the same as emitted by flight recorders - at about 25 degrees south latitude and 101 degrees east longitude, Xinhua said.

Xinhua also reported that a Chinese air force plane had spotted a number of white floating objects in the search area.

Dozens of ships and planes from 26 countries are racing to find the black box recorders before their batteries run out.

Up to 10 military planes, three civilian jets and 11 ships are scouring a 217,000-sq-km (88,000-sq-mile) patch of desolate ocean some 1,700 km (1,060 miles) northwest of Perth, Australia, near where investigators believe the Boeing went down.

"The characteristics reported (by the Chinese vessel) are consistent with the aircraft black box," Retired Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, head of the Australian agency coordinating the operation, said in a statement.

"However, there is no confirmation at this stage that the signals and the objects are related to the missing aircraft," he said, adding his agency was seeking more information from China.

SONAR EQUIPMENT

Authorities have not ruled out mechanical problems as a cause of the plane's disappearance, but say the evidence, including loss of communications, suggests it was deliberately diverted thousands of kilometers (miles) from its set route.

Sonar equipment on two ships joining the search may help find the black box voice and data recorders that are key to unlocking what happened on the flight.
Australian authorities said the so-called Towed Pinger Locator would be pulled behind navy ship HMAS Ocean Shield, searching a converging course on a 240-km (150-mile) track with British hydrographic survey ship HMS Echo.

Japan's Maritime Self-Defence Force Commander Hidetsugu Iwamasa is pictured in front of one of t …

Experts say the Towed Pinger Locator may be of little use unless investigators can get a much better idea of exactly where the plane went into the water because its limited range and the slow speed at which it must be pulled behind the ship mean it cannot cover large areas of ocean quickly.

"I won't even call it an area. What we are doing is we are tracking down the best estimate of the course that the aircraft was on," U.S. Navy Captain Mark Matthews told Reuters. "It takes a couple of days on each leg so it's a slow-going search."

Britain is also sending HMS Tireless, a nuclear submarine with sonar capabilities, and a Malaysian frigate was due to arrive in the search area on Saturday.

"If we haven't found anything in six weeks we will continue because there are a lot of things in the aircraft that will float," Australia's Houston told reporters.

Dozens of flights by a multinational taskforce have failed to turn up any trace of the plane in the past four weeks.

The Boeing 777 was briefly picked up on military radar on the other side of Malaysia and analysis of subsequent hourly electronic "handshakes" exchanged with a satellite led investigators to conclude the plane had crashed far off the west Australian coast hours later.

INVESTIGATION

Malaysian authorities have faced heavy criticism, particularly from China, for mismanaging the search and holding back information. Most of the 227 passengers were Chinese.

Malaysia said on Saturday it had launched a formal investigation into the plane's disappearance that would include experts from Australia, the United States, China, Britain and France.

Normally, a formal air safety investigation is not launched until wreckage is found. But there have been concerns that Malaysia's informal investigations to date have lacked the legal standing of an official inquiry convened under U.N. rules.

Under International Civil Aviation Organization rules, the country where the aircraft is registered leads the investigation when the incident takes place in international waters.

Malaysia's Defense Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said the investigation would comprise three groups: one would examine maintenance records, structures and systems; an "operations" group would study flight recorders, operations and meteorology; and a "medical and human factors" group would look into psychology, pathology and survival.

(Additional reporting by Tim Hepher in Paris, Niluksi Koswanage in KUALA LUMPUR, Jane Wardell in SYDNEY; Writing by Siva Govindasamy and Mark Bendeich; Editing by Nick Macfie and Gareth Jones)

South Park: The Stick of Truth is raunchy fun, say critics..

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(Credit: Ubisoft)

Given the pedigree of previous South Park games, there was very valid reason for gamers to be worried about South Park: The Stick of Truth. The game's multiple delays did nothing to assuage those fears.
But as the game hits stores today, critics say there's actually a lot to love. It is, however, absolutely not for the faint of heart.
South Park: The Stick of Truth, which currently boasts a Metacritic average of 84, is being called one of the funniest titles in years -- and that's being credited to the direct involvement of series creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone.
"The Stick of Truth makes one thing abundantly clear: I never want to play another South Park video game made without Trey Parker and Matt Stone's direct, intimate involvement," says IGN's Ryan McCaffrey in a 9/10 review. "With a controller in your hand, you are almost literally -- gloriously -- playing a 14-hour episode of South Park. There’s much, much more here for series fans than the uninitiated, but it’s a light but good quality role-playing game in its own right. ... It is funny, shocking, self-effacing, and pretty much everything I could ask for from a South Park game."

Francesca Reyes of Official Xbox Magazine agrees, adding: "[Stick of Truth] is absolutely not for the meek of heart, the un-indoctrinated, or the underage set. But good god is it a hilarious marvel when it hits its target." Reyes also rates the game a 9 out of 10.

While the jokes are getting a lot of critical love, the RPG gameplay isn't receiving quite as much praise.

"If you're looking for a solid RPG first and a South Park game second, this isn't it," says Sam Prell at Joystiq in a 3.5/5-star review. "If you can also forgive the repetitive nature of combat and some uninspired quests, it's worth taking up arms – or dildos – for The Stick of Truth's hilarious, disgusting adventure."

The frustrations don't outweigh the game's highlights, though, meaning if you can handle three lifetimes worth of fart jokes and are able to find humor in some very politically incorrect scenarios, South Park: The Stick of Truth might be for you.

"It's a testament to The Stick of Truth that my enthusiasm for the game didn't dim in the face of those hiccups," says Polygon's Justin McElroy, who awards it an 8.5/10. "Despite them — and the jokes that occasionally run out of steam — this is an experience that even the most casual fan of South Park is going to get something out of, and one of the truest translations from screen to game I can recall. ... Other games treated the world Matt Stone and Trey Parker have crystallized over the past two decades as a prison they have to escape from. The Stick of Truth happily confines itself to that world, and manages to build a comfortable, hilarious home of its own."

5-year-old exposes Xbox One security flaw..

Kristoffer Von Hassel, 5, discovered a security flaw in Microsoft's Xbox One (Credit: KGTV)

It's not uncommon for kids to break things. It is, however, pretty special when what they break is the security of a hi-tech video game console.

Kristoffer Von Hassel from San Diego’s Ocean Beach neighborhood is the wunderkind who discovered a security loophole on the Xbox One, reports local news station KGTV.

It happened just after Christmas, when Kristoffer’s father Robert Davies walked in to find his five-year-old son not playing family fave Minecraft, but a more mature game that he wasn't supposed to be able to access as it was tied to his father’s account.

Like most kids who just got busted by dad, Kristoffer's first instinct was dread.

“I got nervous. I thought he was going to find out,” said Kristoffer.

But lucky for Kristoffer, dad happens to work in computer security. He asked his son how he managed to access dad’s Xbox account, so Kristoffer showed him. After entering the wrong password on his father's account, the Xbox defaulted to a password verification screen. Kristoffer simply typed in a bunch of space keys and hit ‘enter’, unwittingly opening up a back door that Microsoft had previously been unaware existed.

"How awesome is that!" said Davies. “Just being 5 years old and being able to find a vulnerability and latch onto that. I thought that was pretty cool.”

Definitely cool, but surprising? Not really. Kristoffer, it turns out, has a history of finding back doors in technological gadgets. At the ripe old age of one, he got hold of his father's cell phone and bypassed the toddler lock screen by holding down the home key.

Microsoft has since issued a fix for the error, but not before publicly thanking the boy by listing him as an official security researcher on the company's website. He'll also receive four free games, $50 cash and a year-long subscription to Xbox Live. Not a bad haul for a few minutes work, though Kristoffer figured something much worse was going to happen when his dad reported the error to Microsoft.

"I thought someone was going to steal the Xbox," he said.

For game news, free codes and more, Like us on Facebook and follow @yahoogames on Twitter!

GM faces Congress' furor over deadly ignition defects: Watch live..

Family members of victims of the GM recall failure arrive to hold a news conference on the U.S. Capitol grounds in Washington April 1, 2014. General Motors has not yet reported to federal regulators the "vast majority" of 133 cases of safety concerns about ignition switches, House of Representatives Democrats said on Tuesday ahead of congressional testimony by General Motors (GM) Chief Executive Mary Barra. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst (UNITED STATES - Tags: POLITICS TRANSPORT BUSINESS)

A moment of reckoning arrives this afternoon for General Motors, as America's largest automaker will face intense questions from Congress about why it delayed and denied a deadly defect existed in some 2.6 million vehicles.

The hearing in front of the U.S. House Energy and Commerce subcommittee on investigations will feature GM chief executive Mary Barra, who has said the company isn't sure why it did what it did, along with regulators from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration who blame GM for withholding key details that they say could have spurred the agency to act earlier. Since launching a review of its safety process last month, GM has recalled some 7 million vehicles worldwide.

Last night, Barra met with family members of people who had died or were injured in crashes from the bad ignition switches; many of them later turned up outside the Capitol this morning. GM acknowledges at least 13 deaths linked to the ignition switches in Chevy Cobalts and other GM cars; safety advocates say the number could be far higher. "This car was surely a death trap," Samantha Denti, of Toms River, N.J., told USA Today. "Driving this car was like playing a game of Russian roulette."

You can watch the hearing live starting at 2 p.m. EDT below; we'll have running updates on the key moments from the hearing as well; refresh this page for the latest.

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1:45 PM: For those who want to skip ahead a bit, here's Mary Barra's prepared testimony and that of David Friedman, interim cheif of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
1:50 PM: The Center for Responsive Politics has the numbers on GM's campaign donations to the House committee asking questions today

Twenty-one members, or more than 40 percent of the House Energy and Commerce Committee -- which today will question Barra on the company's previous knowledge of the faulty technology that has been blamed for 13 deaths -- have been helped by cash from GM's PAC in the 2012 or 2014 election cycles, according to an OpenSecrets Blog analysis. The company has given $72,000 to the committee's members from 2011 through 2013, or about $3,500 to each member who received donations.

2:05 PM: Subcommittee chairman U.S. Rep. Tim Murphy, R-Penn., runs through the history of GM's igntion problem — how it passed on a recall in favor of telling consumers to take off heavy keychains, and how NHTSA investigated the problem twice without ordering a recall.
"The red flags were there for GM and NHTSA to take action," Murphy said, "but for some reason it didn't happen." He adds: "To borrow a phrase, what we have here is a failure to communicate, and the results were deadly."
2:10 PM: Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Colo., holds up a defective GM switch assembly and demonstrates how the keys turn. "If you had a heavy keychain like my mom keychain, or if you were short and your knee bumps the key, you can easily switch it off," she says.
"Time and time again, GM did nothing. The company continued to sell cars knowing they were unsafe."

2:15 PM: Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich., notes he oversaw the committee hearings into the Ford-Firestone defects, which led to tougher laws requiring automakers share defect data with federal regulators to help spot problems early. Two of the 13 deaths linked to the problem happened in his district. "It's deja-vu all over again," Upton says.

2:25 PM: Barra is sworn in, and reads her statement, apologizing to the victims and saying GM is not sure why the recall took so many years to launch. She says GM has already loaned 13,000 vehicles to people who are getting their cars fixed. Sitting behind her is Mark Reuss, head of GM's global vehicle development, and GM's top lawyer.

2:33 PM: Barra reveals that GM has hired Ken Feinberg, the attorney who's overseen settlements from Sept. 11, the Boston Marathon bombing and the BP oil spill among others as a consultant to work on compensation for owners. This move comes after some lawmakers had pressed the company to set up a multi-billion fund for victims. (Feinberg also served as the special master for the U.S. Treasury setting executive pay for bailed-out companies in 2009 and 2010 — including at General Motors.)

2:38 PM: Under questioning from Murphy, Barra says she finds the idea that the ignition switches weren't fixed becuase of cost "very disturbing." When asked how the automaker balanced cost and safety, Barra says: "We don't. If there's a safety issue we take action...We've moved from a cost culture after the bankruptcy to a customer culture."

2:47 PM: Upton asks Barra why GM changed the igntion switch without changing the part number — a key mistake that made the problem much harder to track. Barra admits that was a mistake, but says it's not clear why that happened. As for why complaints never led to a recall: "There was information in one part of the company and the other part didn’t have access to that."

2:57 PM: Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., draws out from Barra that GM's senior leaders didn't know about the problem until Jan. 31 of this year, and that her predecessor as CEO, Dan Akerson, was not aware of it either. Barra declines to answer Blackburn's question of whether "it was a cover-up or sloppy work," or if it had any connection with GM's $50 billion bailout, saying GM's investigation was looking into those questions.
3:09 PM: Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, asks an engineering question: "Why in the world would a company with a stellar reputation as GM purchase a part that would not meet its own specifications?"
"I want to know that as much as you do" says Barra. "That's not how we work today."

Barton presses, and Barra says there are exceptions to when a part might be accepted after testing if it didn't meet GM's specifications. Barton, flashing the first temper of the hearing, calls her response "gobbledygook," adding "there's no reason to have specifications if you don't enforce them."

Barra says, again, that GM's investigation was looking into those questions.

3:15 PM: Rep. Bruce Braley, D-Iowa, pulls out a tiny screwdriver and cap that he said was a promotional item GM gave out two decades ago, emblazoned with the slogan "Safety Comes First At GM." He uses the part in an attempt to explore whether GM's past promises were truthful or mere marketing blather:

"Hasn't the core values of GM always been that safety comes first?" Braley asks

"I've never seeen that part before," Barra replies. "All I can tell you is that today's GM is focused on safety," and she lists the safety aspects of current models.

"But we're talking about these vehicles (under recall) and what's changed," Braley replies.

"This incident took way too long, that's why we're making radical changes...we will continue to make process changes and people changes," Barra replies.

Obama Has 4 Days to Stop Putin..

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Sanctions for Russia, Obama says

Now that Crimea has “voted,” the Obama administration has unveiled sanctions against Russian and Crimean leaders who are linked to what the West is calling Russia’s invasion and subversion in Crimea. But with a fragile ceasefire set to expire by Friday, the sanctions are unlikely to work in time to head off a conflict.

There are signs that the short-term measures, which include asset freezes and visa bans for Russian government officials and business leaders, will not be biting enough to really put pressure on Putin and his friends.
According to one independent analysis being studied by the Kremlin and reviewed by The Daily Beast, such measures could be a drag on the Russian economy over time and an embarrassment for the Russian government, but would only be an “inconvenience” for the Russian economy in the near term. More drastic measures would include going after Russia’s ability to interact in global financial markets, which the analysis calls “disruptive,” and restrictions on Russian energy exports or trade sanctions, which the analysis says would be “catastrophic.”

The analysis by Macro-Advisory, an investment firm operating in Russia, predicts that the West, especially European countries, will not move to impose “disruptive” or “catastrophic” sanctions on Russia until Putin crosses another red line, such as the outright invasion of Ukraine.

“The key risk [for Russia] is Stage 3, i.e. a ban or restrictions on Russia’s interaction in global financial markets and/or any selected restrictions on trade or investment with Russia,” the report stated. “Investors assume that Stage 4 [catastrophic] sanctions are not yet on the agenda simply because these would also have a negative contagion to several EU countries, and many high-profile companies, as well as indirectly on the global economy.”

President Barack Obama pauses while speaking about Ukraine, Monday, March 17, 2014, in the James Bra …

Meanwhile, the crisis in Crimea continued to unfold Sunday, when a reported 95.5 percent of voters opted in a near-choiceless referendum to leave Ukraine and join Russia. President Obama called Vladimir Putin shortly after the results were announced to reiterate that vote would never be recognized by the United States and the international community. It was a violation of the Ukrainian constitution, Obama added, made under duress of military intervention.

“He emphasized that Russia’s actions were in violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and that, in coordination with our European partners, we are prepared to impose additional costs on Russia for its actions,” a White House read-out of the call said.
The Obama administration's plan to impose those additional costs was set last week. Secretary of State John Kerry revealed, perhaps accidentally, that the U.S. had no intention of waiting for the results of the Crimean referendum and was planning a “very series of serious steps on Monday” against Russia.

Also on Sunday, the Ukrainian government announced that it had struck a truce with the Crimean government and the Russian foreign ministry (which still doesn’t acknowledge that Russian troops have taken over Crimea) that will avoid attacks on Ukrainian bases inside Crimea until March 21. A leaked document reported to spell out the Russian position on Ukraine sets terms the West is not likely to accept as an offer to stave off war

Pro-Russian people celebrate in the central square in Sevastopol, Ukraine, late Sunday, March 16, 20 …

A senior State Department official said this weekend that the administration is not predicting that the coming sanctions will be enough to change Putin’s calculus on Crimea and reverse course the

“I would simply say that there have already been significant costs.  Just take a look at what’s happening to the Russian stock market.  Look at what’s happening to the Russian ruble,” the official said. “So as both – as the United States, Canada, the European Union, others exact further costs, we’ll just have to see what cost-benefit analysis President Putin makes.”

The administration is also bracing for Russian retaliation to the limited sanctions being rolled out Monday. Michael McFaul, who served until last month as U.S. ambassador to Russia, said he expected the Obama administration to announce sanctions against Russian officials in the coming days and that the Kremlin would respond--as they have done in the past--with a sanctions and travel ban list of their own. "They will have their own list and their own people they will sanction in terms of travel and assets in Russia," the former ambassador said "I fear someone like me could be on that list." s

McFaul as ambassador was demonized by Russian controlled media and harassed by the country's intelligence service. His private schedule as ambassador in the past would be shared with Russian media, who would ambush him at public events. In more ominous moves, anonymous videos appeared on the internet accusing McFaul of being a child molester. Because of his work on civil society, Russian hardliners have portrayed him as an agent of influence seeking regime change in Moscow. 

Last year, in response to the U.S. creation of the Magnistky list, a list of Russian human rights violators subject to sanctions, Russia created its own list of Americans banned from traveling to Russia. The list included Bush administration officials including John Yoo, a former US Justice Department official, David Addington, the chief of staff for former vice-president Dick Cheney, and two former commanders of Guantanamo Bay.

Toby Gati, the White House senior director for Russia during the Bush administration, said that broad attacks on the Russian economy are not practical but well crafted, targeted sanctions against Russian elites can  have the effecting of placing pressure on Putin if implemented smartly.

“Remember this, unless we are coordinated with the Europeans, the Russians are going to get missed signals,” she said. “The question is how do we want to hurt them. You want to isolate them, you want to make it more difficult for the people who have been getting a free ride on the Western economic system.”

Wastewater Injection Triggered Oklahoma's Earthquake Cascade...

One of Oklahoma's biggest man-made earthquakes, caused by fracking-linked wastewater injection, triggered an earthquake cascade that led to the damaging magnitude-5.7 Prague quake that struck on Nov. 6, 2011, a new study confirms.

The findings suggest that even small man-made earthquakes, such as those of just a magnitude 1 or magnitude 2, can trigger damaging quakes, said study co-author Elizabeth Cochran, a seismologist with the U.S. Geological Survey.

"Even if wastewater injection only directly affects a low-hazard fault, those smaller events could trigger an event on a larger fault nearby," she told Live Science.

The Prague earthquake was the largest of thousands of quakes that rattled Oklahoma in late 2011. Three were magnitude-5 or stronger. The 2011 quakes struck along the Wilzetta fault, a fault zone near Prague. Earthquakes break faults like a boat plowing through thick ice — the fault zips open as the earthquake ruptures the fault, and then seals itself shut behind. Each of the three biggest quakes tore apart a different part of the Wilzetta fault, the researchers said. [Image Gallery: Deadly Earthquakes]
Triggered foreshock

The magnitude-5.7 earthquake near Prague was preceded by a 5.0 quake that hit a day earlier, on Nov. 5. This "foreshock" occurred near an active wastewater disposal well. The wastewater injection triggered the Nov. 5 earthquake, researchers concluded in a study published in March 2013 in the journal Geology. However, the Nov. 6 earthquake was farther from the wells.

"Just because two earthquakes occur close to each other in time and space doesn't necessarily mean they are related," said Cochran, who also co-authored the 2013 Geology study. "We wanted to look one step further and determine whether the stress change from the foreshock actually pushed the main shock rupture plane [the fault] to failure."

Earthquakes linked with fracking are rarely triggered by the actual oil-and-gas extraction. Rather, these quakes are caused by fluid disposal in deep wells. Fracking, short for hydraulic fracturing, involves injecting water, sand and chemicals into the Earth to crack open rock and remove oil and gas. The millions of gallons of waste fluids are usually pumped back into the Earth via deep "wastewater injection wells." The wastewater can lubricate or jack open fractures and faults, triggering earthquakes.

Fault primed

In the new study, the researchers modeled the stress added to the Wilzetta fault by the Nov. 5 earthquake (the foreshock). The findings suggest that the first earthquake primed the fault for another, larger earthquake, which, in this case, hit the next day. The study was published March 7 in the Journal of Geophysical Research.

"When you have an earthquake, the stress goes up in some places and down in other places," Cochran said. "We determined that the mainshock [the Nov. 6 Prague earthquake] occurred in an area that had an increase in stress."

The boom in fracking in the central United States has paralleled an uptick in seismicity, with moderate-size earthquakes increasing in Colorado, Texas, Oklahoma, Ohio and Arkansas. The number of quakes in the central United States has jumped 11-fold in the past 30 years, according to the March 2013 Geology study.

‘Nigeria ATMs are disease dispensers’. Real talk.

In Nigeria today, there are over 12,000 ATMs and this number is going to increase to over 20,000 in a few years time. The banks are desperately deploying ATMs all over the major cities, towns, villages, schools, hospitals. These ATMs are deployed with one of the most of important service, which is to dispense cash to customers whenever the customers want cash as
long the customer has the fund available in his or her account.
A low performing ATM is an ATM without cash. Most banks have deployed their ATMs without proper maintenance structure. These include maintaining the technical, aesthetic, the hygiene of the ATMs and the safety of their customers. Some ATMs are found to be worse than public toilets. There was a new study carried on ATMs in USA that found that there are more dangerous disease-causing germs and bacteria on ATMs than that found in Public latrines. If the same study is carried out here in Nigeria, these disease dispensers called ATMs in Nigeria would be far worse.
In situations where the branches are left with the responsibility of maintaining especially hygiene or aesthetics of the ATMs using existing branch cleaners, most branches do not bother about the
aesthetics or the customer as long there is cash available from the ATMs.
The bank should be thinking their ATM is a branch on its own as a customer channel. Every
point of contact with a customer should be as important as the branch itself or head office. Some banks just ignore these simple customer ethics and forget about their most important self-service channel that represents the entire bank as a whole.
For example, take a drive along Awolowo Road at Ikoyi, Lagos, most of the ATMs are filthy, covered in dust and grime especially after a heavy rain. Some banks are not even aware of the importance of the ATMs; some use the security guard houses and use dirty rags to cover their ATMs. Our Nigeria weather and surrounding presents a real challenge since there is so much dust, grit, smug and smoke in the air.
Our culinary or diet, food, habits and clothing means that we wipe our hands on whatever we see. The Cash we even collect from the ATMs are in a bad state, that’s another topic entirely.
According to a famous Microbiologist in the USA who found out that ATMs are the 3rd dirtiest among 7 dirtiest public places. It is number 3 in the list that include Restaurant Menus, Door handles, Public toilets, Soap Dispensers, Lemon Wedges, and Grocery Carts or
trolley.
In some cities such as Port Harcourt, Kano, Abuja, the ATMs are so filthy, you will need to cover your nose to use the ATM. A couple of weeks ago, I visited an ATM along Ligali Ayorinde in Victoria Island, Lagos.
I slot in my ATM card, it took a while to read, then I tried pressing my PIN, but ATM keypads were sticky, I had to force down each key. Also, the visual screen was dusty; I had to bend so close to the visual screen to read the messages on the screen. The worst came, when I had to struggle to take my cards out of the card slot.
This is common all over Nigeria among the 18 banks with functional ATMs. The irony is that the ATM was within a large bank branch complex within a city centre, I can imagine the state of ATMs in places like Ile-Ife, Abaji, Ikenne, Ilesha or Kontagora. Customers visit these ATMs without the knowledge that each key on the keypad they touch contains a concoction of disease causing germs and bacteria, which they eventually pass around.
In the United Kingdom where studies have been conducted, Experts took swabs from the numeric keypads on a string of city centre ATMs around England that are used by thousands of shoppers every day.  They then took similar swabs from the seats of nearby public lavatories and compared the bacteria under microscopes in a lab. The swabs were left to grow overnight and samples from both locations were found to contain pseudomonads and bacillus, bacterias which are known to cause sickness and diarrhoea.
Dr Richard Hastings, a microbiologist for BioCote, a built-in, antibacterial product coating, said:  interested in comparing the levels of bacterial contamination between heavily-used ATM machines and public lavatories. ”We were surprised by our results because
the ATM machines were shown to be heavily contaminated with bacteria; to the
same level as nearby public lavatories”
Some Nigerian banks use branch cleaners without proper training, who cannot differentiate between general cleaning and specialized cleaning. These cleaners use the rags for cleaning toilets, tables and chairs to clean the ATMs. The branch cleaners over time, discolour the ATMs, add more germs and act as transfer agent for external germs into the bank and vice
versa.
CBN has ignored this area but have focus more on other important areas of compliance, e.g. cashless policy, more important than the customers itself. NAFDAC, SON, NMA and other bodies have also not initiated any study on these disease dispensers. Some banks focus more on the quarterly technical support from these ATMs supplier and spend billions of Naira.
The Technical Engineers only focus on the inside of the ATM and do not concern themselves with the beautification or hygiene of the ATM. As long as the software is up to date and any electro-mechanical part is tested and functioning, their business is completed. The Engineer gets signed off from the branch manager and then maybe comes back to the ATM in 3-6 months time to perform another update. Case Studies from ATM manufacturers such as NCR, WINCOR, King Teller and others, shows that regular cleaning is an effective way to optimize the life span of magnetic strip/PIN and CHIP card readers, and exteriors of ATMs. Most CEOs are
oblivious as to why the ATM Support budget is so high and is on increase every year, yet their ATM customer satisfaction survey tells a different story.
The common sense is not common anymore. A simple cleaning schedule using tested products will reduce their ATM Support spending drastically. In the UK, USA and other Modern economy, the cleaning of ATMs are outsourced. This ensures that a high quality of service is maintained throughout the contractual period.
Salim Faroyji  – An Entrepreneur lives in Oshodi, Lagos, (faroyji@yahoo.com)

Czech invite to Uzbek leader angers human rights groups..

        

Uzbekistan's President Islam Karimov makes a statement after talks with his Russian counterpart Vladimir …

PRAGUE (Reuters) - A planned visit by Uzbek President Islam Karimov next week to the Czech Republic has sparked an outcry among human rights groups critical of his authoritarian rule who say he should be shunned, not courted.

However, Czech President Milos Zeman shrugged off their complaints as "hypocritical" and said he was merely renewing a decade-old invitation to the Uzbek leader to visit Prague.
Karimov, in power since 1991, keeps a tight grip over his largely Muslim central Asian nation of 30 million people. Frosty relations with the West worsened further after he used force to suppress protests in the eastern town of Andizhan in 2005.
"As the leader of one of the most repressive governments in the world, President Karimov is not someone we would expect to be invited for such meetings," said an international group of more than 30 human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch, in a letter to Zeman.
"In fact, he is rightly shunned by most Western leaders, particularly after the Andizhan massacre of 2005, in which his security forces shot into crowds of mostly peaceful protesters in that city, killing hundreds."
The U.N. torture watchdog said last November that torture was rife in prisons and police stations in Uzbekistan and that activists were routinely mistreated in a crackdown on dissent.
However, Uzbekistan is a transit point for supplying U.S.-led military operations in neighboring Afghanistan and there has been some thaw in relations with the West as NATO prepares to draw down its troops from there.
CRITICISM
Karimov visited Brussels in 2011 at NATO's invitation, where he also met European Commission head Jose Manuel Barroso, Human Rights Watch said. But bilateral visits to Western nations by the Uzbek leader are rare, it added.
Zeman rejected the NGOs' criticism, saying he was merely heeding an invitation to Karimov extended by his predecessor Vaclav Klaus back in 2004 - before the Andizhan shootings - and he denied that the Uzbek president was internationally isolated.
"President Karimov recently held talks with high representatives of the European Commission in Brussels. I did not notice you protest against that," Zeman said in his reply to the human rights groups.
"I wish you to be better informed and less hypocritical."

Concern for human rights was a key feature of Czech foreign policy under its first president Vaclav Havel, a former anti-communist dissident who came to power after the 1989 "Velvet Revolution". That focus became less pronounced under his successor Klaus.

The Czech president does not have extensive day-to-day powers under the constitution, but Zeman has tried to push the limits of his influence since being elected last year in the country's first direct presidential election.

Unlike many Western leaders, Zeman attended the opening of the Winter Olympics in Sochi last week, ignoring European and U.S. criticism of Russian President Vladimir Putin's human rights record.

Newlywed Utah BASE Jumper Dies After Falling 2,000 Feet..

"A great American tragedy" is what some today are calling the death of a Utah woman who died in a BASE jumping accident.
Amber Bellows, a 28-year-old rising star of the extreme sport, died Saturday afternoon after falling nearly 2,000 feet due to a failed BASE jumping attempt with a wing suit at Zion National Park, park officials said.
Her husband of two weeks and BASE jumping partner, 29-year-old Clayton Butler, told officials that the couple hiked up Mount Kinesava, a rugged route in the southwestern corner of Zion, that morning.
Butler told authorities that Bellows was the first to jump while he waited behind, but when he noticed his wife's parachute failed to deploy properly, he leaped after her but failed to reach her in time. The body was recovered the following day in a remote, rugged location, park officials said.
Butler could not be reached by ABC News for comment.
Josh Lloyd, a promotional specialist who worked with Bellows and her husband, told ABC News today that Bellows had high ambitions to become a professional BASE jumper and called her "one of the premier BASE jumpers in the world."
The leap at Zion National Park would have been one of hundreds of BASE jumps for the fearless athlete, Lloyd said, noting that Bellows and her husband hired him to produce video content of the couple's jumps together as a way to boost their professional career.
"I represent athletes of all kinds and I've never come across such a horrible situation like this," Lloyd said. "Amber is probably one of the most genuine people I've ever known. She is just so lighthearted and her laugh is so infectious. You don't run into people like this every day."
Bellows' death was the first ever fatality of a BASE jumper in Zion National Park, said park officials, noting that BASE jumping is illegal within the park.
"It is just really sad and our condolences go out to her family and friends," Zion National Park Acting Superintendent Jim Milestone said in a statement. "BASE jumping is so dangerous. Even for those that are experienced, like Amber Bellows. That is one of the reasons it is not allowed in the park."
Lloyd said that while this is known by the BASE jumping community, it doesn't stop them. "Hundreds of BASE jumpers flock there every year to do it anyway," he said.
But a park spokesman who has worked there for more than a decade told ABC News that there is no indication BASE jumpers frequent the Utah park. "In my 11 years here, this is the second encounter I have heard of," he said.
He also said Mount Kinesava is not an area of the park that is regularly maintained and is rarely recommended to visitors as a park attraction.
Butler told park officials that he hiked more than two hours over what officials described as "a fairly remote location with difficult terrain." Officials said that since the mission was recovery and not a rescue, and the location of Bellows' body was unknown, Grand Canyon National Park's rescue team commissioned by Zion National Park decided to wait until the following morning to reduce risk.
Bellows body was located Sunday morning, officials said, noting that two rangers then hoisted Bellows' body a short distance to an awaiting ambulance.
"Amber will be missed, not just by the BASE jumping community, but everyone in Salt Lake City who knew her," Lloyd said.
Friends and family have posted anecdotes and photos of Bellows on social media to keep her memory and spirit alive.
"Thank you so much for remembering our sweet Amber," Kelli Bellows Pugh wrote on Facebook. "We are grateful for the thoughts and prayers from our friends and family. Your support and well wishes are truly appreciated. As a family we would like to request that the press and media refrain from contacting us while mourn our loss and heal. Thanks again to everyone for all of your love."
The incident is still under investigation, park officials said.

Obama: Choosing between Britain and France would be like picking a favorite daughter..

President Barack Obama threw a platterful of red meat to Britain’s tabloid press on Tuesday, saying that he could not judge a “best ally” contest between Britain and France any more than he could pick a favorite between daughters Sasha and Malia.

“I have two daughters. And they are both gorgeous and wonderful, and I would never choose between them,” Obama said at a joint press conference with visiting French President Francois Hollande at the White House. “And that's how I feel about my outstanding European partners. All of them are wonderful in their own ways.
“What I do believe is, is that the U.S.-French alliance has never been stronger,” Obama went on. "That's good for France. It's good for the United States. It's good for the world, because we share certain values and certain commitments and are willing to act on behalf of those commitments and values.”

Obama had been asked whether Paris had “replaced” London as Washington’s best friend on the global stage. The tight friendship between Britain and the United States is, as a rule, referred to in diplomatic circles as the “special relationship” — a kind of first among equals in world affairs.

Given a chance to answer the same question, Hollande took his answer in much the same direction. “Well, I have four children, so that makes it even more difficult for me to make any choice at all,” he said. “But we're not trying to be anyone's favorite. There are historic links. We share common values.

“And I can see that our views converge on many issues. But it's not about hierarchy; it's just about being useful to the world,” Hollande said through an interpreter.

It’s a recurring and sensitive question. Hollande’s proudly pro-American predecessor, Nicolas Sarkozy, irritably brushed it aside when he was asked roughly the same one in June 2008.

“The Americans and the French have had a privileged relationship for two centuries now,” Sarkozy said. “So, yes, it is a privileged relationship, but it's not privileged since I came to be elected; it's been privileged for two centuries now.”

Raids net 24 tied to mafia drug-trafficking ring 'ndrangheta..

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Raids target mafia drug smuggling in Italy and U.S.

The FBI and Italian police say they have arrested two dozen suspects in connection with a transnational heroin- and cocaine-trafficking conspiracy linking Italy's 'ndrangheta syndicate with the notorious Gambino and Bonanno crime families in the United States.

Nighttime raids carried out in southern Italy, the United States and Canada early Tuesday netted 24 people — including seven in New York: 'ndrangheta member Raffaele Valente, also known as “Lello”; Gambino associate Franco Lupoi; Bonanno associate Charles Centaro, also known as “Charlie Pepsi”; Dominic Ali; Alexander Chan; Christos Fasarakis; and Jose Alfredo Garcia, also known as “Freddy."

“The ‘Ndrangheta is an exceptionally dangerous, sophisticated, and insidious criminal organization with tentacles stretching from Italy to countries around the world,” U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch said in a statement. “The defendant Lupoi sought to use his connections with both ‘Ndrangheta and the Gambino crime family to extend his own criminal reach literally around the globe. Today, thanks to the vigilance and sustained cooperation of the Department of Justice and its law enforcement partners in Italy, the ‘Ndrangheta’s efforts to gain a foothold in New York have been dealt a lasting blow.”
Using wiretaps and an undercover agent named "Jimmy," the FBI said it was able to infiltrate the Brooklyn-based mob and stop "a plot to transport 500 kilograms of cocaine, concealed in frozen food, in shipping containers from Guyana to Calabria."
Investigators estimated the street value of the cocaine after cutting would have been about 750 million euros, or $1 billion.
In Italy, 17 others were arrested in connection with the alleged drug ring. The massive joint operation targeted the breakup of a new trafficking route into the southern Italian port of Gioia Tauro.
According to CBS News, which was invited to witness the predawn Italian raids, more than 150 anti-mafia police participated in the operation, dubbed "New Bridge."

Mafia raids: Allen Pizzey describes operation as & … Play video

"Five carloads of police arrived at one location so fast, that the target only appeared to realize what was going on moments before he was placed under arrest — when the officer in charge knocked politely on his door, and said good morning," CBS News correspondent Allen Pizzey wrote.
The 'ndrangheta was "determined to move deadly narcotics across international boundaries, attempting to build a bridge of criminality and corruption to stretch from South America to Italy and back to New York," U.S. Attorney Marshall Miller told reporters at a press conference in Rome. "What we see here is 'Ndrangheta attempting to gain a foothold in the New York area and the United States. We also see efforts to forge cooperation between the 'Ndrangheta and the Cosa Nostra."

Hundreds of thousands of dollars laundered through U.S. banks were seized during the operation, officials said.

Raffaele Grassi, head of the Italian police's central operative service unit, said it's clear that the 'ndrangheta "has left its territory of origin: beyond occupying areas of our country and infiltrating itself in northern Italy, the 'ndrangheta is looking for criminals beyond the borders, invading new markets to make profit."

Miller added: "This operation strikes at the heart of international organized crime."