- It looks like Donald Trump’s mind isn't the only one
Russian despot Vlad Putin is using as his personal playground. The Russian
dictator also seems to have the International Association of Athletics
Federations (IAAF) locked down, as evidence by IAAF president Lord Coe’s
proclamation that Russian athletes could compete internationally by the end of
the year after progress in tackling drug cheating. You might remember a
widespread ban on Russian track athletes that wiped the country’s running
contingent out of the 2016 Summer Olympics, but Coe and his IAAF cohorts are
"encouraged" by Putin's admission that Russia’s anti-doping systems
had failed and needed to be overhauled. Yes, admitting you have a problem is
the first step and Coe said the Russian Athletics Federation had "grasped
the enormity" of the challenge, but believing that Russia actually wants
to clean up its act is tough. "There's no doubt at all that the new
federation is populated by people who I do genuinely think have grasped the
enormity of this challenge," Coe said. "That's a good statement to
make and it's important we maintain that progress." What’s amazing is that
Putin continues to deny that widespread doping was state-sponsored, yet at the
same time said reforms were needed. Coe saying that we need to “acknowledge the
progress that is being made” is like getting a serial polluter to walk down to
the lake behind its plant, look at the water and concede that, “Someone should
probably do something about that red, yellow and orange water,” then walk back
inside and get back to work. Tell yourself what you’d like, Coe, but the only
real progress here is Putin’s and it’s in the area of making you his b*tch…….
- Here’s a new standard for the American legal system: If a
court case is not interesting enough to keep the judge from napping it out on
the bench, that case is not only dismissed, but it’s permanently and
irrevocably erased from our collective memory due to being criminally boring. This
new precedent was set last week in the Kansas Court of Appeals, which threw out
Daquantrius Johnson's 2014 convictions on the ground that a man convicted of
assault and weapons charges deserves a new trial because his trial judge fell
asleep during testimony. The court came down hard on Sedgwick County District
Judge Ben Burgess, who fell asleep and had his bailiff field the always-awkward
question of whether Johnson could get a fair trial. In other words, if the jury
sees the judge bored to REM sleep, would they be biased? Burgess heard that
message from his bailiff and later told jurors they alone would decide the case
and that no attorneys indicated his nodding off affected his decisions.
Johnson’s clueless attorney received a golden chance to give his client another
chance to maintain his freedom when the judge asked him if he wanted to request
a mistrial, but this visionless legal eagle declined, leading to his client’s
conviction. Now, Johnson will receive another chance and hopefully this time,
he finds himself an attorney who can do his job and a judge who gets a solid
eight hours of rest before showing up to court……..
- When you’re the visionary director of a massively
successful sci-fi franchise whose first film banked an insane amount of money,
you get a lot of leeway. James Cameron is helming the Avatar franchise and
though it’s been eight years since the first movie came out, there is no sense
of urgency to crank out its first sequel. He recently revealed yet another
delay in the process, meaning “Avatar 2” won’t be released until 2019….maybe.
The movie was originally scheduled to drop this past Christmas, but 20th
Century Fox announced that date had moved back to this coming Christmas…only to
postpone it a second time, to Christmas 2018. Now, Cameron believes even that
re-revised date is a tad too soon. “Well, 2018 is not happening,” he said. “We
haven’t announced a firm release date.” At least the director was honest about
the problem, noting that the massive scale and ambition for the project are the
culprits for the myriad delays. However, he wants everyone to understand that
this is all part of the process and that looking at the situation as simply
having to wait much longer for “Avatar 2” is the wrong point of view. “What
people have to understand is that this is a cadence of releases,” he explained.
“So we’re not making Avatar 2, we’re making Avatar 2, 3, 4 and 5. It’s an epic
undertaking. It’s not unlike building the Three Gorges dam. So I know where I’m
going to be for the next eight years of my life. It’s not an unreasonable time
frame if you think about it.” Making four movies at the time definitely lends
itself to continuity, even if it’s going to be a bit cruel to fans who have
already waited nearly a decade for the next chapter in the story……..
- History has been made - and found - in Egypt. For one of
the first times ever, a massively powerful political leader has been found
hanging out in the slums. Of course, it’s not a living leader, but rather a massive statue found in a Cairo slum, a statue
believed to be of pharaoh Ramses II, who ruled Egypt 3,000 years ago.
Archaeologists unearthed the 25-foot statue in ground water in the eastern part
of modern-day Cairo last week and while it’s hard to grasp the value of
something just discovered, the Egyptian Antiquities Ministry is calling the
find, made near the ruins of Ramses II's temple in the ancient city of
Heliopolis, one of the most important discoveries ever. "Last Tuesday they
called me to announce the big discovery of a colossus of a king, most probably
Ramses II, made out of quartzite," said antiquities minister Khaled
al-Anani. Ramses II was also known as Ramses the Great and he was the most
powerful and celebrated ruler of ancient Egypt. For those who slept through
history class in high school and college, the pharaoh was the third of the
Nineteenth Dynasty of Egypt and ruled from 1279 to 1213 BC. During his time at
the helm, Ramses led several military expeditions and expanded the boundaries
of the Egyptian empire to Syria in the east to Nubia in the south. It was a
great time for a nation that is now a shell of what it once was an has been
mired in turmoil and chaos for much of the past decade……….
No comments:
Post a Comment