March 21, 2018

Unarmed black man shot to death in own backyard after police mistake cell phone for weapon

Police said Clark held an “object” that he “extended in front of him” as he approached two officers.

“The officers believed the suspect was pointing a firearm at them. Fearing for their safety, the officers fired their duty weapons striking the suspect multiple times,” the police department said in a release. Clark was pronounced dead at the scene.

Police said Monday that the only item found near Clark’s body was a cell phone.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/unarmed-black-man-shot-death-backyard-article-1.3886562

March 21, 2018

no one shows up at kid's cool "Stranger Things" themed birthday party

A little boy who was left heartbroken when none of his classmates showed up to his Stranger Things-themed birthday party has received messages of support from the stars of the show themselves - including its leading light, teenager Millie Bobby Brown.

Teenager Ayen Alambat, who is thought to be based in California, has been retweeted more than 40,000 times after sharing a series of photos of her little brother Aaron at his birthday party, revealing that his friends had let him down.

'My brother invited eight of his classmates for his Stranger Things themed bday party and none of their punk selves showed up,' Ayen wrote in the post.


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-5523705/Millie-Bobby-Brown-supports-young-boys-Stranger-Things-party.html

March 21, 2018

Trump's briefing materials said DO NOT CONGRATULATE, in all caps. He did it anyway

Trump’s national security advisers warned him not to congratulate Putin. He did it anyway.

President Trump did not follow specific warnings from his national security advisers when he congratulated Russian President Vladi­mir Putin Tuesday on his reelection, including a section in his briefing materials in all-capital letters stating “DO NOT CONGRATULATE,” according to officials familiar with the call.

Trump also chose not to heed talking points from aides instructing him to condemn Putin about the recent poisoning of a former Russian spy in the United Kingdom with a powerful nerve agent, a case that both the British and U.S. governments have blamed on Moscow.

The president’s conversation with Putin, which Trump called a “very good call,” prompted fresh criticism of his muted tone toward one of the United States’s biggest geopolitical rivals amid the ongoing special counsel investigation into Russia’s election interference and the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russian officials.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trumps-national-security-advisers-warned-him-not-to-congratulate-putin-he-did-it-anyway/2018/03/20/22738ebc-2c68-11e8-8ad6-fbc50284fce8_story.html?utm_term=.cfc9db967cb3

March 20, 2018

Plight of Phoenix: how long can the worlds 'least sustainable' city survive?

Jennifer Afshar and her husband, John, pushed their bikes across the grass and paused to savour the sunshine, while their two boys went to look at the duck pond. Other kids were playing soccer or doing tricks in the skate park, and families picnicked on blankets or fired up a barbecue across from the swimming pool.

“We moved here from Los Angeles, to get away from the rising cost of living and the traffic,” said Jennifer. “When we saw this park, we thought they were punking us it was so good. There’s low crime, the home owners association takes great care of the grass and trees – we like it.”

***


To look around Anthem would be to imagine there is no such thing as a water shortage. But the lush vegetation and ponds do not occur naturally. Phoenix gets less than eight inches of rainfall each year; most of the water supply for central and southern Arizona is pumped from Lake Mead, fed by the Colorado river over 300 miles away. Anthem’s private developer paid a local Native American tribe to lease some of its historic water rights, and pipes its water from the nearby Lake Pleasant reservoir – also filled by the Colorado.


That river is drying up. This winter, snow in the Rocky Mountains, which feeds the Colorado, was 70% lower than average. Last month, the US government calculated that two thirds of Arizona is currently facing severe to extreme drought; last summer 50 flights were grounded at Phoenix airport because the heat – which hit 47C (116F) – made the air too thin to take off safely. The “heat island” effect keeps temperatures in Phoenix above 37C (98F) at night in summer.

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/mar/20/phoenix-least-sustainable-city-survive-water

March 20, 2018

What Should You Do if a Flight Attendant Tells You to Put Your Dog in an Overhead Bin?

What Should You Do if a Flight Attendant Tells You to Put Your Dog in an Overhead Bin?
A guide to arguing on an airplane when you know you’re in the right.

By JEFF FRIEDRICH

First of all, consider the complexities of Robledo’s situation: Reporting has indicated that she does not speak English fluently, and she was traveling alone with an 11-year-old, a newborn, and her dog.

But even holding those challenges aside, much of the second-guessing presupposes that you can get what you want on an airplane using the same tactics you’d deploy to resolve a dispute with Amazon, Walmart, or Olive Garden. This expectation makes sense, because outwardly the airlines greet you with a smile and emphasize a similar commitment to customer service. But complaining on an airplane is fundamentally different, because the inside of a cabin is ultimately governed by a set of inflexible laws that prioritize safety and anticipate worst-case scenario disasters. Most of the time these regulations are just background noise, but at the heart of most passenger horror stories lies some rule that transformed an ordinary service interaction into something more akin to a police stop. These dynamics are the special sauce that makes airplanes uniquely terrible venues for conflict mediation.

So what should you do if you need to win an argument on a plane, as if your dog’s life were on the line? As a former flight attendant, here’s the advice I’d offer.

Speak Up, but Beware the Limits of Speaking Up

But you should still speak up—as Robledo did. The key is to remain calm and to avoid monopolizing the flight attendant’s attention. “You’re allowed to disagree with flight crew,” says Justin T. Green, a partner at Kreindler, a large plaintiff-side aviation law firm, “but you must do so without interfering with the flight crew’s duties.”

https://slate.com/business/2018/03/what-you-should-do-if-a-flight-attendant-tells-you-to-put-your-dog-in-an-overhead-bin.html

March 20, 2018

Amid the battles in D.C., who do you trust more to tell you the truth? msn poll, 583k votes

http://www.msn.com/?ocid=iehp

poll - located in middle page


Amid the battles in D.C., who do you trust more to tell you the truth?

30% President Trump


38% FBI leadership


32% Don't trust either

March 19, 2018

This barber tried for years to cut an autistic boys hair. Then they had a breakthrough.

The first time 10-year-old Jordie Rowland came into the barber shop it was a “disaster,” barber Lisa Ann McKenzie said.

***

McKenzie ended up walking around the barber shop with Jordie that day two years ago, even lying on the floor with him. She got in a few snips but stopped the haircut when she saw that Jordie was agitated.

After the first unsuccessful haircut, she suggested to Jordie’s parents that they bring him back every two weeks at closing time, often at no charge. That went on for a few months.

***

Then the owner of the barber shop chastised McKenzie for allowing a customer to come in after closing time. Frustrated, she left that job, and soon after opened her own shop, the Celtic Barber Rothwell Central.

Every two weeks, Jordie would come by McKenzie’s shop after it was closed, and the music was turned down. This lasted about eight months.

Then, a few weeks ago, they had a breakthrough. She sang “The Wheels on the Bus” to him.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/inspired-life/wp/2018/03/19/this-barber-tried-for-years-to-cut-an-autistic-boys-hair-then-they-had-a-breakthrough/?utm_term=.21ba95aeeb8e

Now she has many special needs customers.

March 19, 2018

Jim Carrey pic of Christian "whose only purpose in life is to lie for the wicked" looks like huckabe

https://twitter.com/JimCarrey/status/975123558803259392/photo/1

March 18, 2018

NYPD David Grieco bursts into homes without warrants, runs amok terrorizing people of color

http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.3881365.1521335253!/img/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/article_1200/david-grieco.jpg

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nypd-bullethead-detective-sued-23-times-costing-city-280g-article-1.3881366


They were jolted awake as cops tore through their apartment, breaking two TVs, emptying containers of rice and pulling clothes out of closets, the family said.


One of the men — who the family later found out was Detective David Grieco — began barking questions at them.

“Where’s the guns?” he demanded, according to Luis Vargas. “Where’s the drugs?”

Ultimately, the cops — who did not have a search warrant — found nothing more than two bottles of sedatives for Lillian Vargas, who said she tried without luck to show police the paperwork from her doctor to prove the pills were legally prescribed.

But it made no difference to the officers, who handcuffed her and dragged her into the January cold dressed only in a robe.


------------------------------------------------

Victims of ‘Bullethead’ cop recount shaky busts, traffic stops

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc-crime/victims-bullethead-recount-shaky-busts-traffic-stops-article-1.3881459

There was a good reason the CCRB couldn’t find Felix’s encounter with Grieco — the cop never recorded it in his memo book, according to CCRB records obtained by the Daily News.

Felix’s complaint stalled — until he saw a picture in The News about Grieco, who was then under investigation by the Internal Affairs Bureau for an unrelated case. Although Felix accurately described Grieco and the other cops with him, the CCRB couldn’t substantiate the unjustified stop allegation.

March 18, 2018

Kushner Cos. filed false NYC housing paperwork

NEW YORK (AP) — When the Kushner Cos. bought three apartment buildings in a gentrifying neighborhood of Queens in 2015, most of the tenants were protected by special rules that prevent developers from pushing them out, raising rents and turning a tidy profit.

But that's exactly what the company then run by Jared Kushner did, and with remarkable speed. Two years later, it sold all three buildings for $60 million, nearly 50 percent more than it paid.

Now a clue has emerged as to how President Donald Trump's son-in-law's firm was able to move so fast: The Kushner Cos. routinely filed false paperwork with the city declaring it had zero rent-regulated tenants in dozens of buildings it owned across the city when, in fact, it had hundreds.

https://www.sfgate.com/news/politics/article/Kushner-Cos-false-documents-queens-apartments-rent-12762185.php