- This is how a true dictatorship rolls. Venezuelan despot
Nicolas Maduro has been increasingly unpopular during his reign of terror and
these days, with even basic necessities in scarce supply in the South American
nation, there is a recall drive against the socialist leader - or at least
there’s supposed to be. The Venezuelan opposition's campaign to oust their
current dictator has hit a major pothole with elections officials' decision to
suspend the effort a week before it was to start. Working in tandem with the
government, a Venezuelan court issued a ruling blocking key opposition leaders
from leaving the country. The government just might be working to halt the
recall effort because most polls suggest Maduro would have lost by a wide
margin and the ruling comes just days before critics of the socialist
administration were to start gathering the one-fifth of voters' signatures
needed to place the issue on the ballot. The three-day signature collection
period was expected to be a busy time, but now observers are coming to the
obvious, overdue conclusion that Venezuela isn’t really a democracy at all. To
justify their unjustifiable decision, election officials cited alleged fraud in
a preliminary effort to get 1 percent of voters' signatures as justification
for blocking the opposition from proceeding to the next stage of the referendum
on Maduro's removal. Maduro seems more and more like the chosen heir of late
dictator Hugo Chavez by the way and the opposition immediately blasted the
decision as unconstitutional. "The government is pushing toward a very
dangerous scenario," former presidential candidate Henrique Capriles said
on Twitter. If the opposition can find a way to make the recall happen and
Maduro is ousted, it would trigger a presidential election and give the
opposition a good shot at winning power………..
- Time to look in the mirror, Phil Collins fans. You can
choose to be angry that tickets for the singer’s five-night residency at
London’s Royal Albert Hall in June, followed by dates in Cologne and Paris,
sold out in a matter of seconds and that many of those who bought ducats
apparently did so to make a quick buck by reselling them. Or you could really
consider your life, realize that you’re way too into a
well-past-his-prime-quasi-rocker while hordes of better, newer bands are on the
scene and currently being ignored by you. Right now, Collins devotees are
clearly choosing the former with their hero coming out of retirement to perform
and having tickets for his first live shows in a decade snapped up in record
time. Within minutes, those tickets showed up on secondary ticket sites and
would-be buyers looking for tickets on Ticketmaster are now redirected to its
official ticket reselling site Get Me In, where prices range from $400 to
$3,000. Many angry fans took to social media to denounce the opportunists who
are trying to use the occasion as a way to pad their bank accounts. Some took
their anger to another level by urging the Royal Albert Hall to discourage
reselling by honoring its stated, yet-always-ignored policy of rendering any
resold tickets invalid for events. Right now, there appears to be no help for
the disenfranchised, but they can bide their time reading the cash grab, er,
autobiography, “Not Dead Yet: The Autobiography,” which Collins published as a
way to bank extra cash along with his sizeable income from the tour……..
- This is not a new story. A town is struggling with water
issues, sees its supply drop to precarious levels and mandates that residents
keep their usage to a bare and necessary minimum in order to avert total
disaster. What’s weird about this one is that the story doesn’t come from some
drought-ravaged town in California or Arizona, where rock lawns are the norm
and rain is a rarity. No, it’s Bristol, Connecticut, where residents are being
told to stop using water outside of their homes immediately or risk having
their water shut off by the city. According to Mayor Ken Cockayne's office, the
city's reservoir levels dropped below 50 percent capacity, which prompted the
ban. What that means for residents - and this may not be a huge problem in
mid-October when the weather is often inhospitable to outdoor activity and when
lawns are getting ready to shut down on the growth process for the year - is
that they cannot water lawns, use sprinklers or wash cars. . "We've had a
beautiful summer, you can't complain about the summer," Cockayne said.
"We've had no rain so now we're paying for it." City officials warned
that anyone caught violating the mandatory water restrictions could have their
water shut off and service could stay off for a minimum of 24 hours, according
to Robert Longo, the superintendent for the Bristol Water Department. "These
restrictions apply to all customers and unfortunately any customer who has
recently planted new grass must also stop all outside use," Longo said.
"Due to the severity of the levels and no major precipitation in the
forecast, we must conserve all the water we can." For now, no one knows
how long the water crackdown will last……..
- Pirate Mike Leach bought exactly what he wanted with his
$10,000. The quirky, cantankerous Washington State football coach is known for
his affinity for pirates, history and other random topics, but there was
nothing random about comments he made about Arizona State earlier this week. As
his team readied to take on the Sun Devils, Leach threw shade Arizona State’s
way in not-so-subtle fashion. "I think they still steal signs, and we'll
have to keep an eye on that," Leach said. "That is a very unsavory
practice they have, so we'll have to do what we can to defend against it."
He made similar comments last year about the Sun Devils' attempts to steal
signs, though stealing signs isn't illegal in college football. What is
illegal, according to Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott, is what Leach did in
casting aspersions on Arizona State. "Conference rules prohibit Pac-12
member institutions from disparaging each other and discrediting other
institutions," Scott said in a statement. "Information or accusations
relative to rule violations must be handled by institutions filing those
concerns with the conference office through a formal process, and institutions
must refrain from discussing those concerns publicly." The simple fact is
that Leach knew exactly what he was doing and he knew full well he would be
fined for his words, but his real goal was getting attention on an issue he
believes is real. "They have a whole command center," he said,
explaining that he’d heard rumors about Arizona State has microphones and
cameras specifically designated to facilitate its spying operation……….
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