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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 9:40:12 GMT -8
That awkward moment when a zombie looking for brains walks right past you.
While they Hand Out Death Sentences for Protesting, This Happened
Protesters in Iran have set fire to the ancestral home of the founder of the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
Images posted on social media show part of the structure in the city of Khomein - named after him - being set ablaze.
But despite news agencies verifying the videos' location, regional authorities denied there had been an arson attack.
Ayatollah Khomeini is said to have been born in the house, which is now a museum that commemorates his life.
He served as the first supreme leader of Iran from 1979 until his death in 1989. His death is still marked by a day of mourning each year.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 9:42:03 GMT -8
You Must Come to Work. You Can't Come to Work.
Hundreds of Twitter employees appeared to flee on Thursday after Elon Musk demanded that only “extremely hardcore” staffers remain as he seeks to transform the social media giant to fit his own vision.
Musk sent a memo to staffers Wednesday morning saying Twitter would only have room for those prepared to work “long hours at high intensity,” echoing expectations at his other companies, Tesla and SpaceX.
“Going forward, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore,” he wrote. “Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.”
The email asked staffers to click on a link if they were prepared to meet those expectations. Anyone who declined would be offered three months’ severance, it said.
The New York Times reported that Musk and his team met with some Twitter workers who had not signed on to the new expectations just hours before the 5 p.m. deadline on Thursday, trying to stop some employees deemed “critical” to the business from leaving.
He also appeared to scale back his demand that all employees return to the office for at least 40 hours a week.
“Regarding remote work, all that is required for approval is that your manager takes responsibility for ensuring that you are making an excellent contribution,” Musk said before adding that any manager who “falsely claims” someone is doing excellent work would be fired.
But as the Thursday ultimatum period passed, it appeared that hundreds of resignations had begun to pile up, including from some employees Musk had tried to woo before the 5 p.m. deadline.
CNN’s Oliver Darcy reported that the company’s Slack server was full of employees posting the salute emoji, effectively signaling their departure. One former employee who left recently described the event as a “mass exodus.”
Maybe the Facilities Staff All Quit
Twitter has told employees that the company's office buildings will be temporarily closed, with immediate effect.
In a message seen by the BBC, workers were told that the offices would reopen on Monday 21 November.
It did not give a reason for the move.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 9:43:16 GMT -8
A Honk-Out For the New King
There will be no foie gras served in royal residences, a letter from Buckingham Palace to animal rights campaigners has confirmed.
King Charles is understood to have been a longstanding opponent of the food, made from the liver of a duck or goose, that campaigners say is cruel.
The King's household wrote to the Peta campaign group that foie gras was not bought or served in royal residences.
There have been protests about force-feeding used to produce foie gras.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 9:45:24 GMT -8
Fighting the Enemy and Fighting the Cold
As temperatures slowly sink, the nature of the fighting will change sharply.
Both militaries are trained to fight in the cold, indeed Russia invaded, and Ukraine fought back, during one the coldest months in 2022 – February – but Kyiv has received far better winter clothing and equipment from NATO militaries.
On the day of the invasion in Kyiv, the temperature was about 3 degrees Celsius (37.4 degrees Fahrenheit). Today, it is 1C (33.8F).
The changes to fighting in subzero temperatures are significant.
With fewer daylight hours, whichever army is more skilled at night fighting will have the advantage. Night vision goggles and thermal imagers have been at the top of the list of equipment requested by Ukraine from the West.
The chances of survival in the “golden hour” – the critical 60 minutes after a battlefield wound – increase if soldiers are treated or moved to a first aid station, and plummet if they are exposed to harsh weather.
In the cold, equipment is more likely to malfunction.
Weapons jam as the frigid temperatures freeze vital parts. Tanks fare better once the ground hardens, but defensive positions are much harder to dig as the ground freezes solid, making artillery barrages all the more deadly.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 9:48:47 GMT -8
The QOP Gets to Meet Their Hero
Kyle Rittenhouse, the rifle-wielding teenager who shot two unarmed racial justice protesters to death in Kenosha, Wisconsin, two years ago, met with members of the GOP Second Amendment House caucus on Thursday.
Rittenhouse, found not guilty of homicide charges last year for killings his lawyers argued were self-defense, met with members of the pro-gun caucus at a gathering at the Conservative Partnership Institute office near the Capitol.
Rittenhouse repeated his self-serving defense and held a question-and-answer session, The Hill reported. He has been hailed as a right-wing celebrity since the killings.
The caucus is chaired by Reps. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.). Rittenhouse posed for a photo with both of them, and with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.).
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 9:50:46 GMT -8
Slime of the Lowest Order
A California couple who fled the country after being convicted in a multimillion-dollar Covid relief scam have been extradited from Montenegro, the Justice Department said Friday.
Richard Ayvazyan, 44, and his wife, Marietta Terabelian, 38, arrived in Los Angeles on Thursday, approximately nine months after they were captured in the small, mountainous country in southeastern Europe. They are expected to appear at the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles on Friday afternoon.
They were among eight members of a California crime ring convicted of stealing more than $18 million in Covid relief loans. The fraudsters used the stolen money for down payments on luxury homes and to buy such items as gold coins, diamonds and a Harley-Davidson motorcycle.
Following their conviction in June 2021, the couple cut off their ankle monitoring bracelets and fled their home, leaving behind their three children.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 9:52:32 GMT -8
Thank You, Nancy
There's one night I will remember most when thinking about Nancy Pelosi - the night I watched her single handedly save health care for 20 million Americans.
It was at the first Democratic caucus meeting after Scott Brown won the special Senate election in Massachusetts.
Many rank-and-file Democrats were in a panic, and they lined up at the microphone to tell Pelosi that it was time for us to give up on the Affordable Care Act. Or chop it up into little pieces - as some in the White House were suggesting.
2 months later, Congress passed the Affordable Care Act. And today, it's so popular the new Republican Congress won't dare touch it.
I had never seen any person do what Pelosi did that night. I've never seen it since.
There hasn't been, and will not be, anyone like her.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 9:54:33 GMT -8
Bloody Wankers!
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 9:58:17 GMT -8
Some Change is Possible
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 10:00:14 GMT -8
With Friends Like This, Who Needs Lie-Walker
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 10:07:21 GMT -8
They Announce This Two Days Before the Start? What Are They Smoking?
The taps at the FIFA World Cup have run dry.
Alcoholic beer will no longer be sold at the World Cup stadiums in Qatar, according to a statement from FIFA on Friday. The change is a stunning about-face, given that Budweiser is one of the international governing body's longest and biggest sponsors and the start of the tournament is just two days away.
“Following discussions between host country authorities and FIFA, a decision has been made to focus the sale of alcoholic beverages on the FIFA Fan Festival, other fan destinations and licensed venues, removing sales points of beer from ... stadium perimeters,” FIFA said.
From NFL plays to college sports scores, all the top sports news you need to know every day.
Alcoholic beer will still be available at the Fan Festival along Doha's waterfront.
I Suspect When This is Over, They'll Be Sadder, Budweiser
Twelve years after FIFA announced that the world’s largest football tournament would be played in the Middle East for the first time, the Qatar World cup is finally here. The first game between Qatar and Ecuador kicks off on Sunday (Nov. 20).
The host country, mired with controversies relating to bribery, budgetary mismanagement, and human rights abuses, is expecting over a million tourists during the monthlong tournament.
Qatar, a tiny country with fewer than 3 million people, did not, at first, have the infrastructure to handle this influx. But over the past decade, it has built roads, added rooms to its hotel and apartment inventories, and spruced up existing airports while preparing to reopen old ones.
To do all this, it has spent more than any other World Cup host country ever—not by a little, but by hundreds of billions of dollars.
$220 billion: Estimated cost of the Qatar World cup. Until now, the most expensive was Brazil’s 2014 tournament, which cost just $15 billion. $17 billion: The expected economic gain of hosting the World Cup for Qatar, down from an earlier estimate of $20 billion 8: Number of stadiums across which the tournament will be played. All but one have been built from scratch for the World Cup.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 10:35:08 GMT -8
The Owner of Tesla Owns Twitter. If You Are a Car Company, Do You Really Want to Advertise on Twitter
Volkswagen AG has set up accounts on fast-growing Twitter Inc. alternative Mastodon amid questions over the future of the social network under Elon Musk.
Europe’s biggest carmaker on Friday confirmed it created the handles @vwgroup and @cariad_Tech on Mastodon for communications related to its group and software unit, respectively.
“Mastodon is an attractive platform that we would like to try out,” the company said in a statement.
Mastodon, an open-source micro-blogging platform run by a German non-profit, has seen a surge in sign-ups since Musk took over Twitter.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 10:43:25 GMT -8
Now That the QOP Has Control of the House, They Will Solve Inflation, Crime, and Immigration
By investigating private citizen Hunter Biden.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 10:44:23 GMT -8
Musk is Mucking Up More Than Twitter
Former SpaceX employees who say they were fired for writing an open letter criticizing the behavior of CEO Elon Musk have now filed unfair labor practice charges against the company.
The eight employees filed charges with the National Labor Relations Board on Wednesday, alleging their firings were retaliatory and illegal under the National Labor Relations Act.
"The employees were fired for being part of a larger group that drafted a letter to S
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 18, 2022 10:45:20 GMT -8
At Least He Died Dancing
A 25-year-old man who jumped on top of an 18-wheeler and started dancing died after the truck passed under a bridge and he was knocked off, police said.
The incident unfolded on Nov. 10 at about 11:35 a.m. at 200 Eastex Freeway, the Houston Police Department said in a Monday news release.
The driver of the red Kenworth tractor-trailer truck was traveling southbound and didn’t realize when the man “jumped or climbed onto the top of the trailer portion of the vehicle,” police said.
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