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Trump frames new social media empire as selfless effort to counter Big Tech
Dave Goldiner, New York Daily News on Oct 26, 2021
Published in Political News
It's not all about me — or the money.
Former President Donald Trump asserted on Tuesday that his planned new social media company is an altruistic effort to give a voice to his supporters who have been "silenced by Big Tech" — not a big-bucks scam to raise quick cash.
"This is about saving our country. America has always been a nation of smart, spirited, and independent people who take pride in thinking for themselves," Trump said in an uncharacteristically lengthy and in-depth statement.
"We have fallen far down the "slippery slope" of censorship in our country, and the topics that Americans are increasingly forbidden to debate are among the most important issues of our day," the ex-president added.
Trump announced the creation of the Trump Media & Technology Group last week, saying it would launch a new social media platform as an alternative to Twitter and Facebook, which banned him for inciting the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
The new company also claims it will launch on-demand video streaming, cloud computing and payments services that will somehow take on Big Tech behemoths Amazon, Microsoft and Google.
The new venture, created through a merger with Digital World Acquisition Corp., seeks to become a publicly listed company on the NASDAQ stock exchange in 2022.
Shares of Digital World Acquisition quadrupled in value after the deal was first announced, even though there's a long way to go before the deal gets finalized and the venture becomes a bona fide media outlet.
Trump did not address any of those concerns in his statement, or his long history of doomed business launches like Trump Steaks, Trump University and his Atlantic City casinos that left a trail of bad debts and bankrupt companies.
The former president blasted Big Tech as a "small group of self-righteous scolds and self-appointed arbiters of what everyone else is allowed to think, say, share, and do."
He claimed that social media policies aimed at combating his election lies and anti-vaxxer conspiracy theories are actually efforts at liberal groupthink.
"How many millions of Americans silently oppose so much of the nonsense being inflicted on us, but see the heavy hand of the cancelers, and conclude that their voice can make no difference?" the twice impeached one-term former president asked.
Trump said that he "realized" that only he has the wealth and power to challenge what he calls the self-serving monopoly of Big Tech.
"I might be the only person in America with the megaphone, the resources, the experience, and the desire to make it all happen," he said. "I am determined to break their chokehold over the voices of the American People—not just for myself and my own supporters, but for the United States of America!"
©2021 New York Daily News. Visit at nydailynews.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
Trump lied about value of business empire -- and size of his penthouse, NY attorney general says
Political News / January 19, 2022
NEW YORK — President Donald Trump lied about seemingly everything related to his business empire, from the value of his properties around the world to "objective facts" like the size of his penthouse in Trump Tower, ...Read More
WASHINGTON — A key part of President Joe Biden's legislative agenda is headed toward another defeat Wednesday, handing Democrats their second high-profile setback in as many months.
The Senate will hold a procedural ...Read More
Sen. Ted Cruz asks Supreme Court to void anti-corruption campaign rule
WASHINGTON — Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and the Republican National Committee joined Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, on Wednesday in urging the Supreme Court to strike down a campaign funding law that bars ...Read More
Analysis: 'Back of the line': Trump debuts new material, ramping up race-based claims
WASHINGTON — Donald Trump did more than perform his greatest hits Saturday night in Arizona, revving up his loyalists with claims of anti-white discrimination and contending that no U.S. election is legitimate unless ...Read More
NY Attorney General Letitia James alleges 'significant evidence' of Trump Organization fraud
NEW YORK — New York Attorney General Letitia James dropped a bombshell disclosure Tuesday night, claiming her office had found "significant evidence" of fraud committed by the Trump Organization.
The revelation came...Read More
After setbacks, Biden enters year two looking to emphasize accomplishments
WASHINGTON — On the eve of President Biden's first press conference in 10 months, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki stepped to the briefing room podium on Tuesday and referred to the television screen over her ...Read More
Senate begins debate on voting rights legislation
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Camera IconDamage, vandalism and anti-social behaviour are some of the issues prompting the City of Wanneroo to close Dewars Track in January. Credit: Supplied/Supplied
North Coast Times
Dewars Track to close on January 15
Lucy JarvisNorth Coast Times
DEWARS (Durrs) Track will close on January 15, the Wanneroo City Council decided tonight.
Going behind closed doors at a special council meeting on December 15, all councillors present voted for the City to surrender its easement agreement with two private landowners.
The council agreed to liaise with the landowners " Tokyu Group and Capricorn Investment Group " to provide "reasonable assistance" after it closes.
"Increased ranger patrols will be undertaken to focus on non-compliant behaviour in and around the Dewars beach access track to assist the respective landowners," the decision said.
It also agreed to install signs advising people it would close, and liaise with the Shire of Gingin to install signs in Wilbinga.
The easement was established in 2008 to provide a beach access track that would allow surfers and fishers to access Dewars Beach by foot.
However, it has been increasingly popular with four-wheel-drivers, many of whom use it to get to Wilbinga or drive on the beaches.
A report attached to the council meeting agenda outlined findings of a risk assessment undertaken in October, including several "extreme" risks.
Issues raised by the City have included anti-social behaviour, vandalism, safety concerns, ongoing maintenance, trespass on adjoining private properties, illegal beach access and erosion along the track.
A report recommending the City close the track this month was presented at the December 8 meeting, but deferred for further legal advice.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


The reflecting over its verses is nothing but following it with actions. By Allāh, it's not the memorization of its letters and the wasting of its prescribed limits. It's to the point that one of them says: 《By Allāh, I read the entire Qurān and I do not leave off one letter》 but he indeed has left off all of it (in practice). You don't see in him the mannerisms of the Qurān nor the actions. It's to the point that one of them says: 《By Allāh, indeed I read the Sūrah in one breath》By Allāh, these individuals are not (true) reciters, nor scholars, nor wise, nor people of religious piety. When have the (true) reciters ever said the likes of this?! May Allāh not increase the likes of these individuals among the Muslims!!


The African Peacebuilding Network (APN) of the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) invites letters of interest from Alumni and current grantees to transform their APN projects or related peacebuilding research into publishable book manuscripts. Applicants are expected to have completed their APN projects by the time of application and show sufficient evidence that work on ongoing book manuscripts—either based on their former APN award or previous peacebuilding-related research—can be completed and submitted to a publisher within four to six months.
The Book Manuscript Completion grants are intended to support researchers and practitioners who are former recipients of an APN grant or fellowship and have completed their APN projects. This award is intended to support dedicated time from work for up to six months to complete or update a book manuscript and finalize it for publication, as either sole or joint authors or editors. To be supported, Alumni must demonstrate that they have sufficiently progressed in writing or editing an ongoing book manuscript, and that they will use the following period to complete the manuscript and prepare it for publication.
This grant is meant to cover costs for the preparation, editing, copyediting, fact-checking, and finalization of manuscripts for publication by reputable publishers including, where relevant, a "buy-out" of teaching responsibilities or other duties. Other possible activities under the grant include residency, as well as affiliation to centers of excellence, for additional library and desk research and engagement with leading experts that will facilitate the completion of said manuscript. The program envisions two kinds of publishable manuscripts: full length monographs or edited volumes on African peacebuilding-related topics and themes. Each awardee will therefore be expected to have completed a final draft at the end of six months, with proven intent of future publication.
This initiative is meant to support APN Alumni as either sole or joint authors or editors in transforming their APN projects or related peacebuilding research into publishable book manuscripts. It also serves as a vehicle for enhancing the quality and visibility of independent African peacebuilding research both regionally and globally, while making the peacebuilding knowledge already gathered from a prior APN grant accessible to key policymakers and research centers of excellence in Africa and around the world. It is expected that recipients will produce and disseminate research-based knowledge that is relevant to, and has a significant impact on, peacebuilding policy and practice on the continent.
For its part, the APN will nominate one member of the program's Advisory Board to work closely with each awardee and help enhance the quality and visibility of their research. The program will also work towards inserting the awardee's scholarship into regional and global debates and policies focusing on peacebuilding.
Grants are awarded on a competitive, peer-reviewed basis and are intended to support six months of writing and manuscript completion, from June 1, 2019 to December 1, 2019. Up to two (2) grants of a maximum of USD $10,000 each will be awarded.
It is expected that grantees will complete a manuscript for an edited book or monograph—either as sole authors, editors, or co-editors—by the end of the award period. During this period, grantees are also expected to explore ways to make their work accessible through seminars or other presentations.
Applicants should clearly describe their former APN-supported project in the letter of interest and explain the originally expected outputs, particularly the research findings. It will also be useful to show how any previous non-APN research that is relevant to peacebuilding has cumulated into the draft manuscript at the current time of application. Applicants will also be expected to detail their achievements since their original APN-supported project began and accomplishments (both professional and academic) since the completion of the former award.
Applicants will also be required to submit evidence showing how far the book manuscript has progressed and a realistic estimation of the time required to complete the manuscript. Please note that the grant encourages the completion of either an ongoing monograph or an edited book project involving the collation and editing of existing contributions around a topic or regional focus for publication. Preference will be given to applicants who aim to publish new research findings, or updated or additional material related to their APN project. We strongly encourage the inclusion of a brief but realistic budget outline (keeping within the allotted amount for the grant).
Applicants must be Alumni of either the APN's Individual Research Grant program, the APN's Collaborative Working Group grant program, or the APN's Postdoctoral Fellowship program. Individuals who are not APN Alumni or current grantees will not be considered.
Proposed uses of grant funds with a brief description and budget estimate; if proposing a residency or affiliation, please identify the host institution.
The letter of interest must be written in clear, coherent, and non-technical prose not exceeding three pages and submitted in Portable Document Format (.PDF). The letter should be double-spaced (footnotes and endnotes may be single-spaced, but must be included within the page limit), written in Times New Roman, 11-point font, with one-inch margins on all sides.
Materials 1-5 must be submitted through the SSRC's Online Application Portal (SOAP) no later than 11:59pm (EST) on January 12, 2019.


A factory reset removes all of your data, so use it as a last resort.
If your Kindle Fire stops unexpectedly or otherwise exhibits unusual behavior, first try rebooting the device. If you continue to experience issues after rebooting, perform a factory reset to reinstall the operating system files. A factory reset deletes all of your accounts, data and apps. However, you can replace your Amazon content using the Manage Your Kindle tool from your Amazon account.
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Columbo, Tammy. "How to Fix a Kindle Fire That Stopped Unexpectedly." Synonym, https://classroom.synonym.com/fix-kindle-fire-stopped-unexpectedly-20602.html. Accessed 22 April 2019.


Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche gave this teaching on anger at the 14th Kopan Course in 1981. This is an edited excerpt from Lecture 15, Section Four of the course. Click here to read more.
The real bravery, the real hero is the person who can fight anger, and can overwhelm and climb over anger. The real hero is the person who can face the most difficult and dangerous enemy—the inner enemy.
One person's anger can kill sixty million people. That is how dangerous anger is—it is much more dangerous than an atomic bomb. There is no comparison between one person's anger and an atomic bomb. Anger is much more harmful than an atomic bomb.
The danger of an atomic bomb is that it harms others and it can destroy the whole earth—more than half of the world—millions and millions of human beings and creatures. There are so many creatures—uncountable numbers in the water, under the ground, in the bushes and in the sky. There are so many, it is unbelievable. All this gets destroyed—not only human beings, but also creatures and so many buildings, bridges and cities. All these things that thousands and thousands of people for many years planned and spent so much money on, and worked so hard in order to collect the money to give to the workers—all these enjoyments, all the rich and comfortable apartments and the huge buildings, took so much time and effort. People put so much effort into building all this and in just one minute or one hour, it all gets destroyed. In so many of these cities, it is unbelievable how much effort people put into these things. They suffered so much to construct all this, then in one day or in one hour, it is all completely destroyed.
The danger of the atomic bomb comes from anger. If there is patience and no anger, this destruction would not happen. Even without talking about the narak realms, anger produces negative karma. Even without talking about karma, we can easily see how anger is so harmful and so dangerous. So then, if we talk about karma, it is unbelievable—when we think about the suffering result of that, there is no need to talk much. Today's anger arises towards another sentient being, and this anger causes harm and suffering from life to life. The suffering result is experienced from life to life for a long time. Particularly if we think about karma creating a result that is similar to the cause, we understand. Because of the habit of getting angry in this life, we see that if we do not cease it in this life, again the habit comes out in the next life and anger arises, and so it goes on and on like this.
As it is explained in the Bodhicaryavatara by Shantideva, even if all the devas, the worldly gods, human beings and all sentient beings become our enemy, they could not lead us to the fire of the narak realms. Even if all sentient beings become our enemy and become aggressive toward us, they could not lead us into the fire of the narak realms. But if we meet the inner enemy, the unsubdued mind, this powerful enemy destroys whatever we need and it turns even great mountains into dust. Besides the fragile bodies of other sentient beings, it destroys even very solid, concrete mountains, and makes them non-existent.
So the real hero, the real bravery, is being able to face, fight and defeat the powerful, great inner enemies, such as anger, attachment and the unsubdued minds. We should face whatever is stronger in our mind—jealousy, pride or anger. If we can defeat this true enemy, the inner enemy, we are the real hero and that is real bravery.
All those leaders who have many ranks and medals due to killing—who were in a war and killed many people, and get extra colors and different materials—we think of them as brave. Especially when there is a scar somewhere on their hands or bodies where the bullet went through, we recognize them as so precious, and think of them as very important. We think of them as going down in history, with a long story, and we believe they are very important, brave and competent.
Similarly, we believe that someone who climbed a rocky mountain or a snow mountain is a brave and competent person. However, this is wrong. This person is not a real hero and it is not real bravery or real competency. Someone who is able to defeat the delusions and accomplish temporal or ultimate happiness is the real hero. The real bravery and the real hero is someone who is able to face the unsubdued mind of anger and attachment.
The real hero is the person who defeats the delusions and accumulates virtue in daily life. The real bravery is living in the precepts, because this means we have faced the delusions, the inner enemy. Living in the precepts is making war with the delusions, and a person who lives in the precepts is the real army, the inner army. That is a worthwhile army—an army that will accomplish nirvana and the omniscient mind.


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Mansour Abbas, Mahmoud Abbas and the 'Abraham Effect'
Israel's Ra'am Party head Mansour Abbas's responsiveness to the democratic demands of a broadening Arab constituency in Israel may have opened a veritable Pandora's box for the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah.
Dan Diker & Khaled Abu Toameh
Apr 23, 2021, 12:06 PM (GMT+3)
Mahmoud AbbasJCPAKhaled Abu ToamehDan DikerMansour Abbas
Protest against deal between Israel and UAE in RamallahFlash 90
(JNS) Israel's March 2021 parliamentary elections and those scheduled for the Palestinian Authority on May 22, 2021, in the \West Bank\ have focused international attention on two Arab leaders: Mansour Abbas, leader of Israel's United Arab List faction (Ra'am), and Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the 'West Bank'-based Palestinian Authority and chairman of its ideological "parent," the Palestine Liberation Organization.
Although Mansour Abbas and Mahmoud Abbas share the same family name, they are unrelated. They also diverge in their approaches to their local constituencies, Israel and the Middle East. Dr. Mansour Abbas, a 46-year-old dentist from northern Israel and chairman of the Southern Branch of the Islamic Movement, scored a dramatic electoral victory in securing four seats in Israel's March Knesset elections. He ran on a platform of cooperation, integration and normalization, breaking with decades of Arab party nationalist and Islamist rejectionist rhetoric against Israel.
Instead, Mansour Abbas publicly declared readiness to join an Israeli right-wing coalition headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. In contrast, Mahmoud Abbas, the longtime leader of the PLO, Fatah and chairman of the Palestinian Authority, running for reelection in May after 16 years of a four-year term, is still campaigning with the hard-line, anti-Israel, anti-normalization messages that have characterized his Fatah party for decades.
Israel's internal 'Abraham Accords'?
Mansour Abbas's success has positioned him as a prospective kingmaker in determining Israel's governing coalition. Shelving nationalist and Palestinian slogans, Mansour Abbas, while a devout Muslim representing an Islamic party, has pursued a pragmatic political path to electoral success, advancing the socio-economic agenda of Israel's Arab population. This was not a short-term tactical move. During 2020, Abbas had publicly signaled his openness to working with conservative Zionist coalitions, including cooperating with Netanyahu, who had aggressively courted Abbas and the Israeli Arab sector.
Mansour Abbas's unilateral reset mirrors the spirit of the Abraham Accords and creates an internal "Abraham Effect" on Israeli Arab politics. Abbas appears to have moved Arab politics from years of political and ideological rejectionism and inflammatory rhetoric against Israel. Instead, Abbas has chosen a pragmatic, issue-oriented approach to tackle pressing security, social and economic challenges within Israel's Arab communities.
Shopping in the Arab market next to the Old City in Jerusalem, May 13, 2011. photo by Nati Shohat/Flash90.
The political context and complexity of the "Ra'am Phenomenon"
Abbas's prime-time television Hebrew address on April 1 reflected an unprecedented outreach by an Arab politician to the Israeli public, particularly the political right. Abbas said that he would "courageously champion a vision of peace, mutual security, partnership and tolerance between the peoples."
Abbas's move was not a spur-of-the-moment decision. Several months earlier, in a December 2020 interview, Abbas said, "Our failure is due to lack of self-criticism." Abbas also noted the urgency of addressing economic and social crises in the Arab sector that required political pragmatism to solve. Abbas's campaign avoided incendiary default statements on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict—that had characterized the Israeli Arab political leadership's rhetoric for decades, including the April swearing-in of Knesset members. Instead of pledging allegiance to Israel, Joint Arab List faction MKs used the platform to condemn Israel as an "apartheid, racist, occupation state."
Joint Arab List Party member Ahmad Tibi speaks during a press conference in Nof HaGalil, northern Israel, Feb. 20, 2021. Photo by Roni Ofer/Flash90.
Abbas's successful campaign responded to growing frustration in the Israeli Arab community. Since 2007, the Israeli Arab middle class has grown significantly. Israel's nearly two million Arab citizens have increasingly sought economic and political integration, with 63 percent of Israeli Arabs supporting Arab parties joining an Israeli coalition government. Ra'am's emphasis on grassroots, day-to-day issues
Abbas's new approach surprised Israel's political class, triggering a debate among commentators regarding his intentions, motivations and goals: Was he communicating a sincere desire for Israeli-Arab integration, or was he employing a recognized strategy of political Islam based on penetrating a sovereign state's political system to achieve Islamic ideological goals?
attracted a broad and varied voter base despite the faction's Islamic brand. Ra'am succeeded in attracting a wide electoral base, including young people, Christians, secular Muslims and Bedouins who voted for their pragmatic solution-oriented approach over Islamist and nationalist sloganeering. Israeli Arab political analyst and activist Joseph Haddad noted that Mansour Abbas positioned Ra'am as the Jewish ultra-Orthodox Shas Party of Israeli Arab politics.
Abbas's new approach surprised Israel's political class, triggering a debate among commentators regarding his intentions, motivations and goals: Was he communicating a sincere desire for Israeli-Arab integration, or was he employing a recognized strategy of political Islam based on penetrating a sovereign state's political system to achieve Islamic ideological goals? Some viewed Abbas's outreach with trepidation, comparing Abbas's political approach to power to Turkish President Erdoğan, the Hamas leadership in Gaza and Iran's Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Some have argued that Ra'am and its fellow Southern Branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel's more moderate approach compared to the militant and radical Northern Islamic Movement still threatens Israel's Jewish majority character. Some of Abbas's Arabic-language post-election references to fellow Arab leaders seemed to confirm these suspicions. However, notably, his rhetoric and overall public declarations have avoided "hot button" issues such as Islam, the Palestinians, Jerusalem, Hamas, "apartheid" and occupation, unlike Joint Party List leaders such as Dr. Ahmad Tibi, Azmi Bashara, Hanin Zoabi and Ayman Odeh—all of whom are known for their diatribes against Israel.
Abbas had also developed friendly working relationships with senior Likud members, including Knesset speaker Yariv Levin, who had partnered with Abbas to counter violent organized crime in the Israeli Arab sector, a key agenda item for Abbas's constituency. Levin had also reached out to Muslim members of the Knesset when in 2020, he blessed them in fluent Arabic in honor of the Eid Al-Fitr holiday in an unprecedented move.
Knesset Speaker Yariv Levin at a conference of the Srugim news website above the Bedouin village Khan al-Ahmar in the 'West Bank' on March 21, 2021. Photo by Yonatan Sindel/Flash90.
Shifts in the Israeli Arab body politic
The electoral success of Ra'am reflects a broader-based societal shift in the Israeli Arab sector. Two polls in early 2020 indicated a growing Israeli-Arab identity as opposed to a Palestinian-Arab identity that had more commonly characterized Arab citizens of Israel.
In parallel, the coronavirus pandemic emphasized the equality between Israel's Jewish and non-Jewish citizens. Media coverage of close cooperation between Jewish and Arab medical caregivers created a sense of unity during a national crisis. Additionally, Israeli Arabs got vaccinated months ahead of other Arabs in the Middle East, including Palestinians under P.A. governmental authority.
An Israeli student receives a COVID-19 vaccine injection at Amal high school in Beersheva, March 17, 2021. Photo by Flash90.
The shift to issue-oriented Arab politics had picked up momentum over the past six years. President Reuven Rivlin had also proposed a "shared society" program in 2015 to help bridge the divide between Jews and Arabs. In 2015, the Knesset passed an unprecedented social and economic investment plan for the Arab sector in Resolution 922, earmarking 10 billion shekels ($3 billion) to train teachers, build water and sewage pipes, renovate public buildings and subsidize employment. Although the plan generated high expectations, robust budgets prompted organized crime groups to take over development projects.
In recent years, the Arab public's priorities have changed. They have placed the Palestinian issue lower on their agenda, prioritizing their own needs, such as fighting violent crime, employment discrimination and allocating budgets for local infrastructure, health and education.
Since 2010, organized crime has risen sharply in the Arab community. In 2019 alone, 15 Israeli Arab mayors and their families were targeted by gunfire, firebombs and car bombs by crime families vying for control. In 2020, there were 96 homicides in the Israeli Arab sector, an all-time high.
Israeli Arabs protest against violence and organized crime, in the Arab town of Majd al-Krum in northern Israel. Oct. 3, 2019. Photo by David Cohen/Flash90.
In response, Arab MKs proposed a 5 billion shekel ($1.5 billion) anti-violence legislation. The program included stiff penalties for illegal weapons possession, additional police stations, proposals for protecting the integrity of public bidding for projects, scholarships for Arab students, more Arab police officers and encouraging young Arab citizens to perform National Service.
However, Israel's ongoing parliamentary crises in 2019-2020 stalled the Arab development plan. Abbas filled the political vacuum, reiterated its urgency, and recalculated his political approach.
Arab disenchantment with its Knesset leadership also increased Arab public support for Zionist parties. Notably, the nationalist Likud faction won more votes in the Arab sector in the 2021 elections than the left-wing Meretz and Labor factions combined (21,403 opposed to 21,714 for Likud).
Arab Israelis cast their ballots as they vote in Israel's general election, in Kafr Manda, northern Israel, on March 23, 2021. Photo by Jamal Awad/Flash90.
The growing support for Likud and other Zionist parties in the Arab sector did not occur in a vacuum. Abbas had developed friendships with several Knesset members from the right-wing Likud and Yisrael Beiteinu parties, with whom he regularly conversed in Arabic. Abbas even expressed appreciation to hawkish nationalist transportation minister Bezalel Smotrich, who had helped Abbas solve longstanding traffic infrastructure problems near two large Israeli Arab towns in Northern Israel. Abbas, who served as Deputy Speaker of the Knesset under Speaker Yariv Levin of Likud, noted right-wing Knesset members' readiness to solve Israeli Arab issues, which served as an impetus for Abbas to respond in kind to their outreach.
Rahat mayor and Abbas ally, Faiz Abu Sehban, noted that Ra'am's readiness to align with the political right in Israel reflects its conservative values, similar to those of Jewish haredi parties, as opposed to the liberal, progressive agenda that defines the Israeli political left.
Abraham Accords' 'ripple effect'?
The Arab world's normalization of relations with Israel via the Abraham Accords has helped foster a more open environment both in the region and Israel to encourage Arab-Israeli relations. The Abraham Accords have provided new opportunities for Israeli Arabs through business and trade with their Arab counterparts. The United Arab Emirates launched a $10 billion technology fund for investment in Israel, and Israeli Arabs have increased their participation in the high-tech sector. Former U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman, an architect of the Abraham Accords, initiated a program in Nazareth to advance Israeli Arab high-tech entrepreneurs.
Palestinian Arab paralysis?
'West Bank' Palestinians, aware of the Abraham Accords' positive effect on economic and political relations, have grown increasingly disillusioned with P.A. leader Mahmoud Abbas and the PLO leadership. While Israeli Arabs and Jews explore new opportunities with Bahrain and the UAE, Palestinians find themselves wedged in by Mahmoud Abbas's hard-line anti-normalization platform. As the authors noted in their November 2020 policy brief, the Palestinian Authority leadership has radicalized and isolated itself from Israel, much of the Arab world and even the Palestinian public.
Khaled Abu Toameh noted that the 2021 Palestinian general elections—if held—feature Mahmoud Abbas's hard-line campaign messages which reject peace and normalization with Israel. The radical PLO faction, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), and the Islamist Hamas movement are still dedicated to destroying Israel and "liberating Palestine from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea." P.A. leadership still preaches boycotts to the detriment of its citizens and continues to pay families of "martyrs," referring to Palestinians who carried out terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians. Notably, Marwan Barghouti, incarcerated in Israel since 2004 and serving five life terms for planning and executing deadly terror attacks that killed four Israelis and a Christian cleric, is a leading candidate to replace Mahmoud Abbas.
Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas delivers a speech regarding the coronavirus outbreak, at the P.A. headquarters in Ramallah, May 5, 2020. Photo by Flash90.
As normalization progresses between Israel and the Arab world, including Sudan and Morocco, Mahmoud Abbas's promotion of BDS policies and his outreach to terror-supporting regimes, such as Turkey and Iran, only isolate the Palestinians more among critical Arab countries, specifically Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states. Moreover, Mahmoud Abbas's misguided policies have dealt a blow to revive the Palestinian-Israeli peace process, setting back normalization prospects. Abu Toameh points out that, "It seems that Palestinians who support terrorism and do not accept the two-state solution are headed toward dominating the next Palestinian parliament and government."
The P.A.'s anti-Israel policies, particularly its boycott of the $50-billion investment program as part of the Abraham Accords 2019 economic workshop in Manama, Bahrain, contrasted sharply with Arab normalization with Israel and growing Israeli-Arab normalization within Israeli politics.
P.A. policies of radicalization and self-isolation have not been lost on the Palestinian public. The P.A.'s arrest, detention and mistreatment of Palestinian participants at Bahrain's 2019 "Peace to Prosperity" workshop prompted defiant responses by some in the Palestinian private sector. "We are being pursued and threatened," complained a Palestinian businessman. "All of us are in a precarious position. Why is it that people working on advancing peace and building a better future receive this type of treatment?"
Despite the Palestinian leadership's radical policies, the "Abraham Effect" on the Israeli Arab community and the Abraham Accords between Arab states and Israel have established precedents and pathways for Palestinian normalization with Israel. While largely unnoticed in Western policy circles, Palestinian Israeli normalization and economic cooperation have taken root. Since 2005, normalization between Palestinians and Israelis in Area C of the 'West Bank' has flourished in 15 industrial and commercial zones, providing a career path to some 40,000 'West Bank' Palestinian Arabs who work together with Israelis under identical conditions and receive the benefits and protections of Israeli labor and social security laws.
The Area C industrial and commercial zone economic program represents a proven, sustainable and productive model for economic, social and political normalization between Israelis and Palestinians. This bottom-up economic normalization approach is a necessary precondition to top-down political agreements. Many Palestinian employees in these zones hold senior and managerial positions in Israeli companies and factories, where they are offered equality of opportunity and full economic normalization close to home.
The P.A.'s Mahmoud Abbas, on the other hand …
Mansour Abbas's positive politics of normalization and integration contain lessons for Palestinian leadership and discourse. However, it appears at present that Mahmoud Abbas remains stuck in the past. Young 'West Bank' Palestinians have expressed dissatisfaction with the 86-year-old Abbas and Fatah's intransigent and ineffective politics and called on him to resign, as reflected in a late 2020 Palestinian poll.
Some moderate Palestinian leaders think creatively and can offer the Palestinian public a positive vision and a pragmatic approach to a better future. Presently, this seems an unlikely scenario given the P.A.'s poor democratic track record.
Potential moderate and pragmatic candidates remain primarily silent in Palestinian politics. Those who have attempted to change the Palestinian discourse have been shunned by their own families, while their economic wellbeing and even their lives have been threatened. The Palestinian leadership and its loyalists do not tolerate public criticism or effective opposition.
Regional and local political pressure may soon force P.A. politicians to follow the trend of normalization with Israel that today characterize Arab state relations with Israel, Israeli Arab relations within Israel, and increasingly, economic ties between 'West Bank' Palestinian Arabs and Israelis.
Dan Diker is a foreign-policy fellow at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and a research fellow at the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism at IDC Herzliya.
Khaled Abu Toameh is a veteran award-winning journalist who has been covering Palestinian affairs for nearly three decades. He studied at Hebrew University and began his career as a reporter by working for a PLO-affiliated newspaper in Jerusalem. He currently works for the international media, assisting foreign journalists in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
This article was first published by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs.


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SHREWSBURY HIT WITH 21 CAR BREAK-INS
By DUSTIN RACIOPPI
Adding to a multi-town spree that police say may be the work of one individual or group, at least 21 vehicles were illegally entered and burglarized in Shrewsbury last Friday.
In all cases, the vehicles were unlocked, said police Chief John Wilson.
The break-ins were all concentrated in a residential section of town near the Monmouth County Library branch, Wilson said.
The suspect(s) took "whatever was loose," from cars, he said. In one case, somebody took a wallet — but not its contents.
"I guess they just needed a wallet," Wilson said.
In another instance, one home had four cars in the driveway. Two were locked.
"And of course the two that were unlocked, they took the change," Wilson said.
"The funny thing is we're taking in all these reports, and people say, 'we saw your message to lock our doors, and we just didn't,'" Wilson said
The latest big hit in illegal entries raises the total number of vehicles that have been broken into to between 40 and 50 in the last month to six weeks, Wilson said.
And with near certainty, Wilson said the crimes are linked to break-ins in Red Bank, Little Silver, Fair Haven and Rumson.
None have been reported in Red Bank or Fair Haven since redbankgreen's last news update.
The break-ins tend to occur around 2 a.m., Wilson said, and they're believed to involve more than one suspect.
"I'm going to guess it's got to be two or more to hit that many cars in that amount of time," he said.
Shrewsbury continues to work with other departments to try and track down suspects.
Anyone with information in any of the cases is asked to contact your local police department.
Posted on April 26, 2011 at 6:42 am, filed under Auto, Breaking News, Cars, Crime, Entertainment, FAIR HAVEN, Law & Justice, LITTLE SILVER, Real Estate, RED BANK, RUMSON, SHREWSBURY and tagged car break-ins, john wilson, monmouth county library, shrewsbury police. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Trackbacks are closed, but you can post a comment. Email this story.
PREVIOUS: CAR SMASHES FAIR HAVEN STOREFRONT	NEXT: RUBBER STAMP NO. 3: SUSHI SPREAD
Chris Barnett
I'm surprised they would pick a neighborhood where there's only one way in & out. If someone called police, they'd be easily stopped.


Lakeshore Ridge is facing a challenge, and it is one that all of us can help with.
There are communities in every Area that we can rebuild relations with, Cobourg is one of them. Lakeshore Ridge has an opportunity to facilitate that change, but we extend our hands to our fellow Areas for support.
Over the next few weeks, there are multiple community events happening that provide us with opportunities to show that we are active in the communities we serve.
· On September 17 The Cobourg Harvest Festival is from 9 am – 4pm on King Street, Cobourg.
· On October 1 The Volunteer Fair Cobourg is from 10-4 at the Cobourg Community Centre.
I would also offer the same support for other Areas in our Council. Share your events and lets make the presence and relevance of Scouting seen in our communities.


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Foreign Affairs (1973)
Hugh Fleetwood
With a new preface by the author
Paolo Levin is an accomplished American concert pianist living in Rome. Intensely self-absorbed, Paolo values his independence above all else and has no desire to be trapped in the commitments of a relationship. But he can't seem to shake off the attentions of Ralph, a sinister crippled boy who is in love with Paolo and persists in stalking him.
One morning Paolo awakes in terror to find himself handcuffed to his bed with Ralph looming over him. Paolo's most precious parts – his hands – are to be forfeit unless he submits to Ralph's bizarre demands . . .
Described by one critic as "the master of modern horror," Hugh Fleetwood is the award-winning author of more than twenty volumes of fiction, including the classics The Girl Who Passed for Normal and The Order of Death. Foreign Affairs (1973), his third novel, is a literary thriller whose unexpected twists and turns will keep readers on the edge of their seats until the shocking conclusion.
'I must repeat my admiration for the high promise shown in Foreign Affairs. Hugh Fleetwood appears much the most talented young English author I've come across in some time.' – Peter Prince, New Statesman
'A gripping novel.' – Books and Bookmen
'A rich, gruesome, irresistibly readable book.' – Sunday Times
'Mr. Fleetwood can write like a dream ... and really get into your head. He reaches down and stirs up with venomous delight the nameless, faceless things swimming far below the levels of consciousness.' – Scotsman
Book Depository*
iTunes
Hugh Fleetwood was born in England in 1944. At the age of 18 he went to live in France; at 21, he moved to Italy, where he remained for the next fourteen years. He had his first exhibition in 1970 at the Festival dei Due Mondi in Spoleto; in 1971 he published his first novel, A Painter of Flowers, for which he also designed the jacket, as he did for his second novel, The Girl Who Passed for Normal, winner of the John Llewellyn Rhys Memorial Prize. His fifth novel, The Order of Death, was made into a film starring Harvey Keitel and John Lydon (Johnny Rotten). His most recent one-man show, at the Calvert Gallery in London, coincided with the reissue of six of his books by Faber & Faber's Finds series. In 2012, he was cited in David Malcolm's The British and Irish Short Story Handbook as a key figure in the development of the English short story; his most recent publication, "How the Story Ends", will appear in the anthology Speak My Language in November 2015. Hugh Fleetwood currently lives in London.


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Pennell's Picks: Fantasy NASCAR Trends at Pocono
Matt Taliaferro
This weekend the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series returns to the Pocono Mountains for the Pennsylvania 400 at Pocono Raceway. When the series last hit the 2.5-mile oval in June, it was Joe Gibbs Racing's Joey Logano that went to Victory Lane, leading 49 of the 160 laps and moving veteran Mark Martin out of the lead in the closing laps.
As the series heads back to Pocono, Logano is back in the rumor mill with his name being mentioned as a potential candidate for the No. 22 Penske Racing ride for 2013. While said rumor mill churns and silly season heats up, it is important to remain focused on the job at hand, and that is winning races — and for you, your weekly fantasy match up.
Last weekend at Indianapolis, it was five-time champion Jimmie Johnson that put on a dominant performance to earn his fourth Brickyard 400 trophy. The No. 48 car was the class of the field all day, with few cars even in the same zip code (to borrow a phrase).
This week, Johnson leads all drivers in average finish (8.8) and has two victories at Pocono. While he failed to lead a lap in June, the five-time series champion finished fourth. With the team looking as if it is rounding into championship form, it will be hard to pick against Johnson.
NFL Playoff Games on TV Today (Saturday, Jan. 15)
However, the two-time Pocono winner is not this week's fantasy favorite (although he is among the top five). That honor goes to his Hendrick Motorsports teammate, Dale Earnhardt Jr.
After his fourth-place finish last weekend at Indianapolis, Earnhardt took over the points lead from Matt Kenseth. Leading the championship standings for the first time since 2004, Earnhardt is enjoying his best season in years, but is still hungry for wins before the Chase field is reset for the final 10 races of the season.
In June, Earnhardt Jr. led 36 of the 160 laps at Pocono before finishing a disappointing eighth. One of the strongest cars that afternoon, crew chief Steve Letarte called his driver to pit road late in the race, concerned about making it to the end on fuel. When Logano and others on the same strategy stretched it to the end, Earnhardt understood it was too early in the season to start taking gambles and losing a host of points.
With six races left before the Chase field is set, Earnhardt is now in a position to gamble for wins. Hungry for victories and continuing his consistent ways, look for Earnhardt — who has finishes of sixth, ninth and eighth in his last three Pocono starts — to score his second victory of the season.
Five Favorites: Dale Earnhardt Jr., Jimmie Johnson, Denny Hamlin, Joey Logano, Tony Stewart
NASCAR fantasy tipsPocono
Jimmie JohnsonCarl EdwardsDenny HamlinJeff GordonDale Earnhardt Jr.Kurt BuschSam Hornish Jr.
5 Most Memorable NFL Wild Card Games of All Time
10 Best NFL Wild Card Teams of All Time
AFC Wild Card Prediction and Preview: Pittsburgh Steelers vs. Kansas City Chiefs
NFC Wild Card Prediction and Preview: San Francisco 49ers vs. Dallas Cowboys
By Scott Whittum
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By Juan Jose Rodriguez


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The Music Show
with Andrew Ford
Program Home
ABC Radio National
Christine Alcino
By Andrew Ford on The Music Show
Download John Adams (17.18 MB)
John Adams occupies a unique position in the world of American music and is known as a composer, conductor and creative thinker. He's in Australia to conduct several of his works including a brand new saxophone concerto. He also talks about his interest in composing works on religious themes.
Sydney Symphony Orchestra concerts
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra concerts
Duration: 18min 45sec
Broadcast: Sat 17 Aug 2013, 11:10am
Transcription of a conversation between Andrew Ford and John Adams, recorded August 2013
Andrew Ford: The saxophone concerto which Sydney is about to hear is the first piece since your violin concerto to have the word 'concerto' in the title. Is this significant?
John Adams: I wouldn't attach too much meaning to that. I generally stay away from conventional titles, simply because I love language. In 2003 I wrote a concerto for amplified violin, a six-stringed amplified violin, and the title of that piece is The Dharma at Big Sur, which I think is a much more interesting title than 'Violin Concerto No 2'. But I don't know, in the case of the sax concerto, there are so few of them that just the concept of a saxophone concerto is shocking enough to the classical music world.
Andrew Ford: Of course it is an established classical instrument, but it's much more associated with jazz, for obvious reasons. I know it was invented by a Belgian, but it really seems like an American instrument. Is that something which you respond to?
John Adams: I think that Adolphe Sax—who invented the saxophone as an instrument that was intended to be performed in military bands and should have the sound of a brass instrument but the agility of a woodwind instrument—I think he would have been shocked if he'd known that the saxophone became the emblematic instrument of this whole new art form called jazz. And then of course it was adopted in blues and R&B and all kinds of commercial music.
So it's an amazing instrument, and it's actually kind of puzzling and disturbing in a way that it has not been used more in the classical repertoire. I think I can count on the fingers of one hand the pieces of music, mostly by Ravel and Prokofiev and Leonard Bernstein, that feature a famous saxophone solo. So I think it's high time that the instrument be acknowledged for a sound that can be incorporated into the symphonic repertoire.
Andrew Ford: Yes, it is quite versatile as well, isn't it, because it can blend with all sorts of other instruments. So you've got a very useful instrument, it seems to me, when you have a saxophone, and if you make it the solo instrument you can presumably pit it against other instruments in the orchestra to change its colour.
John Adams: Yes, and of course the thing is the saxophone does have this sound that immediately makes people think of jazz or popular music, so when we hear it the imagination takes a certain leap, and for that reason I've used it in many pieces of mine. I mean, Nixon in China has a saxophone quartet that plays through all three hours of that opera, and I have written for it in three or four other orchestral works as well.
Andrew Ford: Yes, and Berg of course uses it, come to think of it, doesn't he, in Lulu very effectively.
John Adams: He does, yes, but it's in a very kind of cautious and careful way. He doesn't really let it rip, and the best thing about the saxophone is just letting it wail.
Andrew Ford: Yes. And anyway, Berg uses it to denote sleaze.
John Adams: Yes.
Andrew Ford: And he's not the only composer to have done so. So what was the approach you took to your saxophone concerto? What can we expect to hear?
John Adams: I had met this fantastic American virtuoso Tim McAllister, because the LA Philharmonic hired him to play a very difficult solo part in a recent work of mine, City Noir, which is kind of a symphony inspired by noir film scores, and I had written a very jittery and virtuosic solo part for the jazz saxophone. And it was very hard to find somebody who could play that post-bop sound but also read the music and count and be in the orchestra. And fortunately they found this fellow and I was astonished by him and got to know him. And when he mentioned to me that in high school he had been a stunt bike rider and done all these incredibly dangerous things on a bicycle in competitions, I thought, now, this is somebody I really have to write a concerto for.
Andrew Ford: And you weren't tempted to increase his role with stunt riding as well?
John Adams: No, he leaves the bike backstage.
Andrew Ford: We look forward to hearing the piece. I'd like to ask you, John Adams, about another one of your recent pieces, The Gospel According to the Other Mary, which Australia hasn't heard yet but I hope it's not too long. I was reading something about the piece, about your revisions to it, and I thought it might be interesting for our listeners to know a bit about how you approach your work and particularly how you approach your work after you think you've finished it and then you hear it and then you realise the proportions are wrong or something like that. How does that process work?
John Adams: Well, I can't tell you how I approach a work initially. If I knew how I made something, first of all it would take all the mystery out of creating something, and secondly I'd probably write a lot more pieces because it would be no struggle. But the struggle is really essential to the creative process. And I liken the beginning of a new work to being in a completely dark room stumbling around, feeling for the light switch. It's that unknowable, that experience of trying to form a piece. I mean, you have very, very vague images and rhythmic ideas, but you really don't know its genotype. And part of composing is getting to know your materials and then watching them grow.
As far as hearing a piece performed and discovering that the form is too long or not long enough or needs revision, that's just part of the critical process. I think I have a pretty high batting average. I don't often make massive structural changes in my works. But in the dramatic one something may fit and feel perfectly right in your studio, but you get it out into the real world with real singers and real human beings struggling to play these difficult passages or sing these complex lines, and you often discover that you have to shrink something or expand it.
Andrew Ford: So it's to do with timing as much as anything then?
John Adams: You know, it's a very visceral kind of thing. I don't think it's something that you can intellectually judge in advance. Musicians are…we are organisms. We have brains, highly refined brains for certain things, you know, pitch and rhythm and colour and texture, but how a piece feels on the large meta level, its emotional flow, its ups and downs, those are very tricky things. Sometimes I've heard a bad performance of a piece of mine and I've thought it was the fault of the piece and I've thought, oh, I have to go back and spend God knows how many hours and money to fix this. And then I hear some other performer do the same piece and it sounds perfect. So it's a really, really very unknowable situation.
Andrew Ford: Yes. I might suggest that in matters of timing it can be almost split-second stuff, if it's the difference between one performer and another.
John Adams: Yes, it is, and of course it's a funny thing in classical music because in classical music, particularly let's say the Beethoven Fidelio overture, which is also on my Sydney program, I mean, the differences between one performance and another are like matters of 1% or 2% really. Maybe somebody takes a radically slow tempo, like Leonard Bernstein did for this particular overture. But when you compare that to how one jazz performance differs from another, or one Indian master playing a raga from another, where the creativity is so much part of the moment, classical music is kind of a frozen art form with very little room to wriggle in. Nonetheless, when we go and hear the same piece played by different performers, just that little 5% difference from one to another is something that we savour.
Andrew Ford: Yes, and you know when you've heard a great performance, don't you, and it's in that 5%, it's in the detail.
John Adams: It is, exactly. So it's kind of like some sort of fine Japanese flower arrangement where just the slightest little adjustment of a leaf or a blossom makes the difference between something absolutely banal and mediocre and something that's just magical.
Andrew Ford: You're listening to The Music Show on RN, and my guest is the composer John Adams who is talking to us on the phone from just outside San Francisco.
Coming back to The Gospel According to the Other Mary, and of course I haven't heard it yet, I've only read about it, but it seems to be in a line with other works of yours, particularly El Niño, but works which have…I hesitate to use the word 'religious' intent, but a sort of spiritual side to them, and I wonder whether you could talk about this.
John Adams: I guess the stage works that you are speaking of, I would probably include my second opera, The Death of Klinghoffer, which although it leads to a terrorist event, the hijacking of a cruise ship and the murder of an American Jew by Palestinian hijackers, the general feeling of the opera has a kind of grave, oracular, almost sacred tone.
And then there's my nativity oratorio, El Niño, which I composed in the year 2000, which tells the story of Christ's birth, Mary's conception and Christ's birth and the flight into Egypt, but it does it in a very whimsical way by using women's poetry from the Middle Ages and from contemporary Latin America.
And in the piece that you mentioned, the new oratorio, which I view as a companion piece to the nativity oratorio, which is the story of the passion and includes the raising of Lazarus and the crucifixion and resurrection. With that said, I have to admit that I'm not a particularly conventionally religious person. I was brought up in the Protestant religion in New England, I went to church with my mother, but I don't belong to a church and I don't think religiously. But these stories have immense meaning to me, and I find great psychological drama in them, I find spiritual drama, and I guess ultimately I find some very deep personal meaning which I can't even articulate in words, and that draws me to these subjects. But that said, I doubt I will ever write another piece of that sort. If I go back to composing another opera or oratorio I suspect it will be a secular subject.
Andrew Ford: But even with some of the secular subjects, even in Doctor Atomic there's the big John Donne set piece, and in A Flowering Tree, although it is not a religious story, there is this important spiritual dimension to it. And I'm just wondering whether there is some sort of connection between music, musical expression and what we could broadly call spirituality, in your mind at least.
John Adams: We hear here in the US this tedious phrase over and over again 'the death of classical music', and we are constantly being reminded of how off-the-radar what we do is and it's not important, it's not important like rock 'n' roll or like the movies, television or whatever, but I feel that classical music, whether it's Beethoven or Bach or Mahler or Stravinsky or what I do, can speak to the essence of the human experience in a way that other musical art forms can't. And that's a very sublime expression. It's complicated, it involves effort, but it's also immensely emotional.
Right after September 11, 2001, in the weeks that followed the events in New York City, I was curious to read about how many people felt they needed to listen to classical music. I mean, more people than normally listened to classical music. And it was an admission of the fact that there was a deep psychological and spiritual need that could only be satisfied by the kind of sublime expression that classical music provides. And that's why I do it, and that's why the people that I know that are classical music performers or composers devote their life to it.
Andrew Ford: John Adams, I think that's a good moment to stop. Thank you very much indeed for talking to me again on today's Music Show. It's been good to catch up.
John Adams: It's a pleasure.
Presenter Andrew Ford
Producer Penny Lomax
John Adams talks about the spiritual in classical music
Full episode 1hr 38min 48sec
Music Show 17th August 2013
Christian McBride Trio
20mins 10secs The Jack Quartet
Jonathan Zwartz channels Bacharach
22mins 27secs Dirk Powell and Gabriel Harris
Stuart Greenbaum's new album
18mins 45secs John Adams
11mins 48secs Kelly Lovelady and Ruthless Jabiru
Sam Anning Trio
29mins 6secs George E Lewis
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Finding Relief from Uterine Fibroids
Looking for a Specialist Who Treats Uterine Fibroids?
Choosing a high-quality gynecologist will help you get the best care.
Search gynecologists near you
7 Things to Know About Uterine Fibroids
Uterine Fibroids: Why See a Specialist?
Questions to Ask Your Doctor About Uterine Fibroids
How Much Do You Know About Uterine Fibroids Treatment?
Are you an expert on treating uterine fibroids? Find out by taking this quiz.
How Doctors Diagnose Uterine Fibroids
Fibroids can be as small as a marble and don't cause symptoms. But, if your fibroids do cause symptoms, getting a diagnosis becomes important. That's because fibroids can also cause complications.
Black Women: Tips for Talking to Your Doctor About Your Fibroids
Talking with your doctor about uterine fibroids doesn't have to be nerve wracking. Follow four simple tips to make the conversation flow smoothly.
How Do You Manage Heavy Bleeding Due to Uterine Fibroids?
Medication to stop heavy periods
Birth control pills or devices
A medical procedure or surgery
Meet the Ob/Gyn: Uterine Fibroids
As an Ob/Gyn, Dr. Richard Guido treats patients with uterine fibroids, offering treatment and advice for managing this condition. Learn more about the life of a uterine fibroids doctor.
4 Ob/Gyn Tips for Women With Uterine Fibroids
Uterine fibroids affect everyone differently, so it's important to know how to advocate for yourself and find relief. Dr. Richard Guido, an Ob/Gyn, shares his tips for patients with fibroids.
An Expert's Perspective on Treating Heavy Periods With Uterine Fibroids
You don't have to live with the symptoms of uterine fibroids. Dr. Richard Guido, an Ob/Gyn, shares his tips on managing heavy bleeding with fibroids.
Alternatives to Surgery for Uterine Fibroids
Uterine fibroids can cause heavy periods and pain, but treatment can help—and surgery isn't the only option anymore. Dr. Richard Guido, an Ob/Gyn, explains the uterine fibroids surgery alternatives available to patients.
Ask an Ob/Gyn: What Are the Symptoms of Fibroids?
Fibroids are almost never cancerous, but they can cause serious symptoms, such as abnormal bleeding. Understand what symptoms your doctor needs to know about now.
Telehealth and Uterine Fibroids
How to Get the Most Out of a Virtual Doctor Visit for Fibroids
Many women use telehealth to help manage uterine fibroids. If you're having a telehealth appointment with an online OB/GYN, it's easy to get the most out of your visit.
What to Expect With a Telehealth Appointment for Uterine Fibroids
Did you know doctors offer telehealth appointments for treating uterine fibroids? Learn more, including what you should expect during your visit with an online OB/GYN.
How Telehealth Can Help Women With Fibroids
Dealing with uterine fibroids can be hard. Learn more about visiting with an online gynecologist to see how you can get the most out of your treatment plan.
Need a 5-Star Doctor for Uterine Fibroids?
Find a Gynecologist
Managing Uterine Fibroids Day to Day
Preventing Iron-Deficiency Anemia in Women with Fibroids
Uterine Fibroid Risk in Black Women
8 Possible Complications of Fibroids
Minimally Invasive Procedures to Remove Uterine Fibroids
Hysterectomy for Uterine Fibroids: It's Not Your Only Option
Relieving Period Pain and Heavy Bleeding With Fibroids
What You Should Know About Fibroids and Fertility
What Black Women Should Know About Fibroids
Friends Talking About Fibroids Isn't Taboo
Fibroids Symptoms Are Different for African American Women


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FUS and ALS: What's the Connection?
by Amy Madsen | Wednesday, May 11, 2011
A roundup of research about how the FUS gene and FUS protein may contribute to the development of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
The gene for FUS was associated in 2009 with some forms of ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's disease).
Now, overlapping findings from four recent studies have revealed tantalizing clues about the molecular underpinnings of FUS-related forms of the disease.
FUS (also called FUS/TLS for "fused in sarcoma – translated in sarcoma") normally resides inside the cell nucleus, where it serves its primary function as an RNA binding protein. (RNA is the chemical step between DNA and protein synthesis. Through multistep RNA processing, the cell's protein building machinery reads genetic instructions carried in DNA and manufactures the proteins it encodes.)
Previous studies have shown that both mutant forms of FUS and excessive amounts of normal FUS protein are found in the main compartment of the cell (the cytoplasm) instead of in the nucleus.
In ALS-affected muscle-controlling nerve cells in the spinal cord (spinal motor neurons), or in the glial cells that nourish and support motor neurons, FUS recruits other proteins and assembles into clumps. These clumps are called inclusion bodies or aggregates. In addition, FUS-containing stress granules (a type of protein clump that forms when a cell is in trouble) can occur.
Although FUS mutations are predominantly associated with familial (inherited) ALS, inclusions containing FUS protein (a hallmark of FUS-related familial ALS) have been found in the motor neurons of people with the noninherited, or sporadic, form of the disease. This makes it likely that an understanding of FUS-associated familial ALS will provide a clearer picture of sporadic ALS as well.
Here are reports from four investigations of FUS in ALS.
Human protein hUPF1 reduces FUS-associated toxicity in yeast
Yeast strains carrying either normal or mutated (flawed) human FUS genes have been developed for use as a research model by a team of research scientists at several institutions in Massachusetts and New York.
The team used the new model to draw a distinction between two separate aspects of the FUS-associated ALS disease process: mislocation of the FUS protein to the cytoplasm, and cellular toxicity.
Analysis showed that, in yeast, both flawed FUS protein and overproduced (overexpressed) normal FUS protein mimic the toxicity and inclusion-body formation that occur in human ALS.
The investigative team identified five proteins able to suppress toxic human FUS in the yeast model. Interestingly, the proteins did this without affecting FUS levels, location of FUS in the cell, or FUS-containing protein clumps in the cytoplasm.
Additionally, the researchers identified hUPF1, a human version of one of the five toxicity-fighting yeast proteins, and found that it also reduces toxicity in the yeast model.
Other findings include:
toxicity in yeast caused by both mutant and overexpressed normal FUS protein correlated with protein levels – the higher the levels, the greater the toxicity;
a flawed C terminal (or "tail-end") region of the FUS protein, where most ALS-associated mutations cluster, is necessary, but not sufficient, for toxicity;
a nuclear localization signal (responsible for directing transport of the FUS protein to the cell's nucleus) that originates from the C-terminus region of FUS is affected by ALS-causing mutations; and
the majority of overexpressed mutant or normal FUS protein forms inclusions in the cytoplasm.
"Most importantly," the researchers wrote, "we found that expression of hUPF1 – or of its physical interacting partner hUPF2 and, to a lesser extent, hUPF3 – rescues FUS/TLS toxicity."
The group noted that the new yeast research model is a model of one particular aspect of ALS – the cellular toxicity that results from mislocation of the FUS protein – not necessarily the disease as a whole.
The investigators intend to test their findings in more sophisticated (animal model) cell cultures and neuronal systems. Favorable results could provide insight into the FUS-associated ALS disease process and potentially uncover targets for therapy development.
To learn more, see A Yeast Model of FUS/TLS-Dependent Cytotoxicity in the April 26, 2011, issue of PLoS Biology.
Flaws in specific regions of FUS cause aggregation and toxicity
A research team at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in Philadelphia analyzed protein biochemistry in a yeast research model and identified the particular regions of the FUS protein that are (at least partially) responsible for causing FUS to form protein clumps and become toxic in ALS and other neurodegenerative diseases.
The team previously used a similar approach to examine the molecular basis of aggregation and toxicity associated with TDP43, another RNA binding protein tied to cases of familial and sporadic ALS.
In the FUS study, the scientists found that:
overexpression of human FUS in yeast caused mislocalization of the protein to the cytoplasm, while lower levels resulted in a wider distribution of the protein to both the cytoplasm and cell nucleus;
as is the case with human TDP43 in yeast, FUS forms aggregates in the cytoplasm and confers toxicity to the cell (although the molecular mechanisms by which the two proteins operate differ);
particular areas in the C-terminal region are associated with FUS aggregation and toxicity;
the FUS protein in the yeast model is inherently prone to aggregation – far more so than TDP43 – and readily assembles into structures that closely resemble those of FUS aggregates in the motor neurons in people with ALS;
activity of FUS in the yeast model mimics what is seen in human ALS, including the formation of FUS-containing aggregates, toxicity and stress granules.
The study team found that disabling the RNA binding activity of FUS resulted in reduced toxicity (the same thing happens with TDP43) — a finding that may help define potential targets for therapeutic intervention.
Despite a number of similarities in FUS- and TDP43-associated toxicity in ALS, the researchers noted key differences in the ways in which the two proteins cause it, as well as a lack of overlap in the genetic modifiers that influence the proteins themselves.
This leaves open the question of whether there is a connection between TDP43 and FUS in ALS, the researchers say. The two proteins may contribute separately to the disease, or they may share a common pathway.
To learn more, see Molecular Determinants and Genetic Modifiers of Aggregation and Toxicity for the ALS Disease Protein FUS/TLS in the April 26, 2011, issue of PLoS Biology
A fruit fly model mimics FUS-related human ALS
A team of scientists at four U.S. institutions has engineered a fruit fly (Drosophila) model of FUS-related ALS and demonstrated that blocking abnormal FUS protein activity in the flies blocks the ALS disease process as well.
Analysis showed that flies carrying the mutated human FUS gene targeted to their eyes and motor neurons produced abnormal FUS protein based on the gene's flawed instructions.
As happens in humans with FUS-related ALS, the mutant protein in fruit flies mislocalizes to the cell's cytoplasm. Neurodegeneration renders the flies unable to walk or climb, and abnormalities develop in the biological structure of the flies' eyes.
Other signs of ALS found in the new fruit fly model include motor neuron degeneration, loss of muscle function, aggregation of FUS-containing protein clumps in nerve cells and shortened life span.
In studies conducted in the fruit fly model, the investigators noted that:
preventing the mislocation of FUS to the cytoplasm blocked the ALS disease process;
deletion of the biochemical signal responsible for causing FUS to settle outside the nucleus led to decreased neurotoxicity; and
interaction of normal FUS with mutated TDP43 enhances TDP43-mediated motor neuron death, and likewise, interaction of normal TDP43 with mutated FUS enhances FUS-associated neurodegeneration.
The new fruit fly model may prove to be a valuable resource not only in the study of the ALS disease process, but also in screening drugs for potential therapeutic benefit.
The team's findings, A Drosophila model of FUS-related neurodegeneration reveals genetic interaction between FUS and TDP-43, were reported online April 12, 2011, in Human Molecular Genetics.
ALS-linked FUS mutations cause FUS proteins to gather in the wrong place
A team of investigators in Japan has found that ALS-linked mutations in the gene for FUS disrupt the transport process responsible for helping FUS protein properly localize in the cell nucleus. The mutated protein localizes instead to the cytoplasm, where it recruits other proteins essential for RNA processing. There the proteins assemble into protein clumps.
The team conducted its studies in cell cultures derived from three sources: human cells, mouse motor neuron cells, and a hybrid cell line called NSC-34 that combines embryonic mouse spinal-cord cells with abnormal mouse nerve-tissue cells.
Additional findings include:
FUS that contains mutations in the C-terminal region of the protein aggregates into stress granules;
the molecular mechanism underlying proper trafficking of FUS to the cell nucleus is dependent on a nuclear localization signal contained in the protein's C-terminal region;
high levels of flawed FUS proteins do not recruit normal FUS proteins into aggregates (the opposite appears to be true in TDP43-related ALS, in which TDP43-containing inclusions recruit and capture normal TDP43 protein from the nucleus); and
normal FUS protein (at normal levels) does not take part in the formation of aggregates.
Based on these findings, and on reports from previous studies showing that neurons containing FUS inclusions appear to retain some normal FUS protein in the nucleus, the investigators say the FUS-mediated ALS disease process likely does not involve the loss of the protein's normal nuclear function. Instead, they suggested, it hinges on the toxic effects conferred by mutant FUS protein in the cytoplasm.
The study team's findings, Nuclear transport impairment of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis-linked mutations in FUS/TLS, was published in the January 2011 issue of Annals of Neurology.
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NBCUniversal Launches 'Heroes Reborn' Companion App
The app features clips from the original Heroes series, as well as a prequel for Heroes Reborn.
By Brandy Shaul
NBCUniversal has released a companion app for the upcoming Heroes Reborn television series. The app serves as an overall guide to the Heroes television franchise, which follows the lives of evolved humans with extraordinary powers. The app includes plenty of content from the original television series, including show clips, character information and more.
Brandy Shaul


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tag > Religion
Polens Kirche gründet Ausbildungszentrum für Exorzisten https://derstandard.at/2000104917729/Polens-Kirche-gruendet-Ausbildungszentrum-fuer-Exorzisten #Religion #Politics
Pope Francis' position on "Technology", from "Laudato si'":
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laudato_si%27#Technology #Religion #Technology
Pope Francis declares 'climate emergency' and urges action https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jun/14/pope-francis-declares-climate-emergency-and-urges-action
The last time the catholic church declared a "emergency" was against "witchcraft", resulting in the inquisition burning enormes amount of innocent (mainly women) alive (from the middle ages up to the 19th century). Maybe they should declare a priest pedophilia emergency instead?
#Religion #ClimateChange #Ethics
"Just as silence makes a sonata possible and the white paper carries a drawing, I think of God as the foundation of existence." - John Fowles, from his collection of aphorisms The Aristos (1980)
#Religion #Philosophy
Tay al-Arz: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tay_al-Arz #Magic #Religion
"folding up of the earth" or "covering long distances in the twinkling of an eye" is the name for thaumaturgical teleportation in the mystical form of Islamic religious and philosophical tradition.
World Peace: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_peace
The World's Religious Leaders Call On Everyone To Make Friends Across Religions
https://sputniknews.com/us/201904051073840850-trump-usa-china-russia-invest-peace/
WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - US President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House that the United States, Russia and China should stop spending on weapons and invest toward long-term peace.
"Between Russia, China and us, we're all making hundreds of billions of dollars worth of weapons, including nuclear, which is ridiculous," Trump said on Thursday. "I think it's much better if we all got together and didn't make these weapons… those three countries I think can come together and stop the spending and spend on things that are more productive toward long term peace."
Chinese Vice Premiere Liu He, who was present at the White House, said he agreed with Trump's idea.
#Religion #Philosophy #Politics
http://www.rheingold.com/texts/tft/14.html
"ORIGINS is a movement that started on this computer (Santa Cruz, 408-475-7101). Origins began on the START-A-RELIGION conference, but we don't call it a religion. ORIGINS is partly a religion, partly like a westernized form of yoga society, partly a peace movement. It is a framework for improving your life and improving the world at the same time.
The movement centers on "practices" — actions you can use in everyday life to build effective human relationships, strength of community, and self-awareness. All the practices are based on action. None require any special equipment, settings, leaders, theories or social status. The human universals of the ordinary, everyday moment, and the personal relationship, form the basis for this training.
ORIGINS has no leaders, no official existence, nothing for sale. Because it started in an open computer conference, no one knows who all the creators are.
This movement has just begun. The brochure mentioned above recommends seven practices (Leverage a favor, Ask for help and get it, Use charisma, Finish a job, Use magic, Observe yourself, Share Grace), but these suggestions are only starters. The idea is to continually develop new training/action methods, as a community project, then discuss and share them through whatever communications media are available. This movement will never be finished, because it seeks a community of permanent innovation.
The hope is to build something which can make a better world. The first step is to make your own life better. For a more detailed overview of ORIGINS, get the brochure from the address above. To see how the movement developed, read the START-A-RELIGION message and its submessages.
"Weizenbaum's argument, in part, points out that the aspect of human nature that was externalized by the invention and evolution of computers was precisely the most machine-like aspect. The machines that embody this aspect can do some very impressive things that humans cannot do, and at present can do very little of the more sophisticated intellectual feats humans can accomplish. Even so, they are taking over the management of our civilization. Before we begin to give more decision-making responsibility over to the machines, Weizenbaum warns that it is a terrible mistake to believe that all human problems and all important aspects of human life are computable.
This "tyranny of instrumental reasoning" can lead to atrocities, Weizenbaum warns, and in the closing years of the twentieth century, it is not at all paranoid to have some healthy suspicions about what any shiny new technology that came from the Defense Department in the first place might do to our lives when they get around to mass producing it. And there is no dispute that war was the original motivation and has been the continuing source of support for the development of computer technology."
"Licklider believed that a human-computer symbiosis would be the means of steering our planet through the dangerous decades ahead. Others have used another biological metaphor for our future relationship with information processing technology — the concept of coevolution, an agreement between two different organisms to change together, to interact in such a way that improvements in the chances for survival for one species can lead to improvements in the chances for survival of the other species.
Perhaps yet another biological metaphor can help us foresee the transformation ahead. When a caterpillar transforms into a butterfly, it undergoes a biologically unique process. Ancient observers noticed the similarity between the changes undergone by a butterfly pupa and those of the human mind when it undergoes the kind of transformation associated with a radical new way of understanding the world — in fact the Greek word for both butterfly and soul is psyche.
After the caterpillar has wound itself with silk, extraordinary changes begin to happen within its body. Certain cells, known to biologists as imaginal cells, begin to behave very differently from their normal caterpillar cells. Soon, these unusual cells begin to affect cells in their immediate vicinity. The imaginal cells begin to grow into colonies throughout the body of the transforming pupa. Then, as the caterpillar cells begin to disintegrate, the new colonies link to form the structure of the butterfly's body.
At some point, an integrated supercolony of transformed cells that had once crawled along the ground emerges from the cocoon and flies off into the spring sky on multicolored wings. If there is a positive image of the future of human-computer relations, perhaps it is to be seen reflected in the shapes of the imaginal cells of the information culture — from eight-year-olds with fantasy amplifiers to knowledge engineers, from Ted Nelson to Murray Turoff, from Clyde Ghost Monster to Sourcevoid Dave, from ARPA to ORIGINS.
The flights of the infonauts are not the end of the journey begun by the patriarchs, but the beginning of the most dramatic software odyssey of them all. It is up to us to decide whether or not computers will be our masters, our servants, or our partners.
It is up to us to decide what human means, and exactly how it is different from machine, and what tasks ought and ought not to be trusted to either species of symbol-processing system. But some decisions must be made soon, while the technology is still young. And the deciding must be shared by as many citizens as possible, not just the experts. In that sense, the most important factor in whether we will all see the dawn of a humane, sustainable world in the twenty-first century will be how we deal with these machines a few of us thought up and a lot of us will be using."
#Magic #Technology #Religion
Ahimsa in Jainism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahimsa_in_Jainism
#Religion #Ethics
Albert Schweitzer: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Schweitzer
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverence_for_Life
#Philosophy #Religion #Ethics
Marcus du Sautoy: "Humans will never know if the universe is infinite":
What We Cannot Know - with Marcus du Sautoy
#Science #Magic #Religion
#ML #Comedy #Religion
Robots and AI: Papal academy decodes newest pro-life challenges:
https://cruxnow.com/vatican/2019/01/03/robots-and-ai-papal-academy-decodes-newest-pro-life-challenges/ #ML #Religion
Religion for the Hell of It - lecture by Robert Anton Wilson. #Comedy #Religion #Politics
"The great paradox of anarchism: If laws are outlawed only outlaws will have laws" - R.A.Wilson
China is exceptionally 'pagan'. #Politics #Religion
"China's Religious Landscape: Models of Religious Pluralism" - talk by Dr. David A. Palmer, Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Hong Kong


The members of TEAM SUDC share a personal connection to a child lost to sudden unexplained death in childhood. Each member is running in support of the mission of the SUDC Foundation, with the hope that in the future families will raise their children in a world without Sudden Unexplained Death in Childhood (SUDC).
A HUGE thank you to everyone who has generously donated to a member of Team SUDC!! Together, we will find an Answer.
The SUDC Foundation envisions a world where no more children are lost to Sudden Unexplained Death in Childhood. The SUDC Foundation is the only organization worldwide whose purpose is to promote awareness, advocate for research and support those affected by SUDC.
SUDC is the fifth leading category of death in children ages one to four, yet SUDC receives no public funding. The SUDC Foundation provides all services at no cost to families.
To learn more please visit www.sudc.org.


text:
Q: Django: TemplateSyntaxError at /category/2/ 1. Summarize the problem
I great custom tag. In file news_tags.py
from django import template

from news.models import Category

register = template.Library()

@register.simple_tag()
def get_categories():
    return Category.objects.all()

I called the tag in the sidebar.html file
{% load news_tags %}
{% get_categories %}

    {% for item in categories %}
    {{ item.title }}
    {% endfor %}

This my folder structure

My Error:
TemplateSyntaxError at /category/2/
'news_tags' is not a registered tag library

2. Describe what you've tried
I looked at this question. But there was an error in an unclosed quote
I looked at this question. I write in settings.py TEMPLATES.options.context_processors 'mainsite.news.template_tags.news_tags',. But error No module named 'mainsite.news'

A: The folder name must be templatetags.
Make sure you are not missing any of the following steps:

*

*Create a folder called templatetags at the same level as models.py
and views.py in your application folder

*Your application must be in the INSTALLED_APPS in settings.py

*The templatetags folder must have __init__.py

*Restart the django server

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Continuing down the road he's been exploring recently, of stepping away from the desk and into the booth, Faze Miyake's back with a new collection of vocal cuts. He still has a hand in the beats he spits over, but much of the work here is handled by hired guns like Diamondz, Honeywood Six and Jikay. He's also gotten a bit more melodic, especially on "Weekend", but tracks like "Too Much" are still heavy reminders that this is the guy behind the "Take Off" instrumental. Listen to the EP below and then make sure you head to his SoundCloud to catch up on everything he's dropped lately.


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Yakuza Kiwami Review
Find out whether or not Yakuza Kiwami is worth playing here.
richards100	on September 29, 2019
I never got into the Yakuza franchise. I always overlooked the titles as the franchise was always for a niche audience but whoever played them always seemed to regard installments as great games. However, last year, when Sega released Yakuza Zero (a prequel to the entire series), I thought it a great time to jump in.
I picked it up without having any idea what to expect but what I found was one of the most interesting, well-written, engrossing games I've ever played. It made me a fan of the series and I immediately wanted to play through the games in the rest of the franchise.
So, when they announced Yakuza Kiwami (a remaster of the first game), I was immediately on-board. But does Yakuza Kiwami still hold up after being released more than ten years ago?
The year is 1995, and Kazuma Kiryu has worked his way up in the ranks of his clan and is ready to be head of his own family. But on one night, gunshots are heard throughout Kamurocho and the chairman of the Dojima Family lays dead. Kiryu seeing that his friend may be responsible for the incident, takes the fall for him, and spends 10 years in prison.
Upon his release, Kiryu finds that the world has changed. He is thrown into a battle for head of the Tojo clan, and has to deal with finding a missing ten billion yen, a friend turned enemy, and a little girl that seems to be connected to all.
Yakuza's story is rich and engrossing and will keep players hooked. I experienced several moments of anger, shock and sadness as I played through the story. It's nothing but excellent and coming fresh off of Zero makes a bigger impact on the story as many characters make a reappearance.
In all honesty, Kiwami seems like a finale for Zero and its characters. So, it's my recommendation that players look at playing Yakuza Zero first just to feel the full impact of the story. Kiwami does feature extra additions to the story, such as extra cut scenes, to tie-in more to Zero's story to make the story more coherent.
I especially loved the extra scenes with Nishikiyama as he turns from friend to enemy. Although the story is great, it does slow down quite a bit towards the middle of the story, so players need to be prepared to push through that.
If you've never played a Yakuza game before, gameplay can be summed up as a third-person action-adventure beat-em up, set in an open-world environment. Players traverse Kamurocho; a fictional city set in Japan. The city may be small but if you've played Zero, you'll feel right at home.
Players are able to buy items, access main missions, Sub Stories (side quests), play mini games and go to restaurants as they explore the city. The bulk of the gameplay is fighting and you'll sure be doing a lot of it.
Whenever you come across other Yakuza or missions, you'll be fighting. Kiryu has four distinct fighting styles that all make a return from Zero. The styles are:
Brawler: a balance of speed and power.
Rush: a balance of speed and evasion.
Beast: a slow style with a focus on causing heavy damage.
Dragon Style: a combination of all of the above.
You'll have access to all these styles from the beginning. When fighting, you'll gain heat, which will allow you to pull off special moves that produce high damage. Moves are always fun to pull; just be careful not to get hit as you lose heat if you are.
You'll be able to upgrade yourself with experience points earned while fighting. These experience points can be used to get new moves, increase health, increase the heat metre or add on to other abilities.
Big boss fights allow players to perform special maneuveres in combat known as Kiwami moves. When a boss is hurt, they'll hunch over and glow a certain color. You'll then need to match that color with a different fighting style to perform a Kiwami move. These moves are more powerful than normal heat actions. They also stop bosses from healing but the problem is that there is only one move for each style, and it can feel very repetitive to watch the same move over and over again.
Repetitiveness is probably the biggest problem with gameplay. While not all players will feel this way, it can get quite tiresome to fight every enemy you come across as you walk around Kamurocho.
You'll get noticed by an enemy, and most of the time you'll have to fight your way out. In Zero, players could throw money to distract enemies but that feature has been removed from this installment, which means an unnatural number of back alley fights.
I also found that I gained experience points far too quickly. I already maxed out everything way before the end of the game and just kept earning more experience for nothing as there is no other use for it.
Majima Everywhere
The only fighting style that you can't upgrade with experience points is the "Dragon Style". The only way you can upgrade it is by fighting Majima in a new addition called "Majima Everywhere". In the world, you'll encounter a crazed, obsessive Yakuza at completely random times and will be forced to fight him.
Sometimes, he walks around the world (like Mr Shakedown in Zero); other times, he hides in mini games. He also pops out of corners or manholes, and sometimes he'll barge in while you are fighting someone else.
Majima is always a great fight. Just remember each time you beat him, he becomes stronger too as more life is added to him for the next time you fight.
Sub Stories And Mini Games
Although Kamurocho isn't very big, there is a lot to keep you busy. Sub Stories (the game's equivalent of side missions) are scattered all over Kamurocho. Some occur out of the blue, while others have certain conditions that need to be met before they pop up.
There are 78 stories in total; some are short, while others are long. Many provide some of the best moments in the game and can be random, funny or sad. All-in-all, they are all great.
Then, there are a number of mini games available, which is unsurprising as the Yakuza series is famous for it. The usual games make an appearance, such as bowling, karaoke, mah-jong, shogi, pool, darts, etc.
Two standout mini games are Pocket Circuit Racing and Mesu King. Pocket Circuit Racing is still a bad mini-game as it focuses a little too much on RNG. Mesu King, which is a card collecting mini game using rock, paper and scissors, is a nice addition and is even involved in some Sub Stories.
For a game that was released more than 10 years ago, the remaster looks great. Sega used the same engine they used in Yakuza Zero to boost visuals, meaning the game looks better than ever. This is especially true with regards to cut scenes, which are all full HD.
It is important to note that using the same engine did bring up some familiar problems, such as textures not rending, pop in and NPCs behaving oddly. So, although Kiwami is still a pretty game, problems do exist.
Yakuza Kiwami is the best way to play the original Yakuza. With additional content, such as extra Sub Stories, mini games, cut scenes and Kiwami moves, it's one of the best remasters I've played and a must have for any fan of the series.
Although its story suffers from pacing issues and gameplay can be repetitive, there is no doubt that players are in for a rollercoaster of a ride.
Recommendation: Yakuza Kiwami is definitely a buy, and at a cheaper price than most games, it seems like a steal.
Category: Gaming, Review
Tag: Playstation, Playstation 4, Review, Sega, Sony, Yakuza, Yakuza Kiwami, Yakuza Zero
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