Zorro
Zorro's JournalVenezuelan government managers to lose jobs over recall
Source: AP
President Nicolas Maduro is ordering retaliation against managers in government agencies who signed a petition to recall him from office.
Socialist party leader Jorge Rodriguez said Monday that Maduro had set a 48-hour deadline for ministers to fire high-ranking public workers who added their names to a petition seeking a new presidential election.
The sackings would affect the ministries of food, finance, work and basic business, as well as workers in the office of the president.
Hundreds of public workers have already said they were fired this summer after signing the petition.
Read more: https://www.yahoo.com/news/venezuelan-govt-workers-lose-jobs-131607837.html
It's all the USA's fault, I'm sure.
Trump Spends Entire Classified National Security Briefing Asking About Egyptian Mummies
Sitting down with officials from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to discuss a range of foreign and domestic threats facing the United States, presidential candidate Donald Trump reportedly spent the entirety of his first classified national security briefing Wednesday asking about Egyptian mummies.
“What can you tell me about the dangers posed by mummies, and what are we doing to prevent invoking the ire of King Tut?” Trump reportedly asked in response to an update on growing militarism among insurgent factions in Egypt, before requesting a detailed assessment on mummies’ known strengths and weaknesses and an estimate on the total number of burial chambers in the region.
“Have we disturbed any of their tombs? Are they seeking revenge? I want to know which pyramids we need to worry about. Just tell me how many years of curses we’re talking about here.”
Upon the conclusion of the top-secret briefing, Trump reportedly double-checked with the intelligence agents that Vikings no longer exist and that they currently pose no threat to the United States.
http://www.theonion.com/article/trump-spends-entire-classified-national-security-b-53550
Venezuela’s military has been getting stronger since the days of Hugo Chavez
When General Néstor Reverol was appointed Venezuela’s new home secretary, much of the world interpreted it as an ominous sign of growing military influence.
The appointment was a strange one in itself: just one day after Reverol was indicted in the US on charges of drug trafficking, president Nicolás Maduro called him “an exemplary officer”, “a brave man”, and the ideal candidate to stake out the mafioso gangs supposedly holding Venezuela to ransom.
This was the latest in a growing number of military appointments to Maduro’s government.
Only a fortnight before, the incumbent defence minister, General Vladimir Padrino López, was given control of a national distribution network that oversees the administration of food, medicine and basic goods in an attempt to ease the country’s notorious shortages.
http://www.businessinsider.com/venezuelas-military-stronger-since-the-days-of-hugo-chavez-2016-8
Maduro’s costly serenade for Castro’s birthday
Venezuela is suffering its worst economic crisis in recent memory, but that doesn’t seem to have stopped President Nicolas Maduro from spending $375,000 to travel to Cuba with an 80-member delegation — including musicians, dancers, relatives and friends — to celebrate the 90th birthday of Cuba’s retired maximum leader Fidel Castro.
When I read this news report in the Venezuelan daily El Nacional, my first reaction was to wonder whether the figures were accurate. So I called opposition Congressman Carlos Berrizbeitia, the legislator who had disclosed these figures at a National Assembly session, and asked him how he had come up with his estimate.
Berrizbeitia, a member of the National Assembly’s appropriations committee, told me that Maduro traveled to Cuba on Aug. 12 with about 80 people aboard three airplanes, including the 45-55 passenger presidential aircraft, an older 45-55 passenger presidential plane and a smaller Falcon aircraft owned by Venezuela’s state-run PDVSA oil monopoly.
The fuel expenses of the three planes for the 2,700-mile round-trip amounted to about $270,000, he said. In addition, the Venezuelan delegation spent about $250 per person a day in food and lodging, which added another $105,000 to the total bill, he said.
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/news-columns-blogs/andres-oppenheimer/article96503672.html
Just did a round trip to the East Coast on Virgin America
Have to say I was pleasantly surprised. It was a different experience than what one encounters with more traditional airlines.
Here's their awesome safety video, as an example on how they approach things.
Huntington Library sets out to decode thousands of Civil War telegrams hidden for a century
They ticked out news of typhoid, scurvy and fear. They spoke of long marches and vast battles. They hummed with frailty and humor, fretting over drunken soldiers and praising the unwavering president of a fraying republic. They clacked in broken rhythms that rang with the ominous: “We will not remain undisturbed tonight. Even the Rail Road men have been ordered to leave.”
The 15,971 telegrams — hidden in a wooden foot locker for more than a century — scrolled like a Twitter feed through the Civil War. The messages from the Union side, many tapped out in code to elude Confederate forces, carried the urgings and reflections of Abraham Lincoln, Gen. Ulysses S. Grant and other prominent players. But most echo with the thoughts and schemes of colonels, infantrymen and lesser-knowns that offer a peek into the bureaucracy and machinery of war.
“It’s mind-boggling and unpredictable,” said Olga Tsapina, curator of the Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens’ trove of 35 leather-bound ledgers and documents relating to telegrams sent between 1862 and 1867. “We don’t really know what is in here. Every single telegram has a story behind it, from the president to the greatest generals and to the privates and telegraph operators. It’s like putting together a huge jigsaw puzzle.”
The telegrams were part of papers kept by Thomas T. Eckert, a Lincoln confidant and head of the U.S. military telegraph office at the War Department. The Huntington has started a Decoding the Civil War crowdsourcing campaign that relies on volunteers using cipher charts to unravel secret texts. So far, more than 2,100 “citizen archivists” and war buffs worldwide have transcribed less than one-third of the collection, which includes encrypted messages sent in grids.
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/la-ca-cm-civil-war-telegrams-20160810-snap-story.html
Scientists unlock a secret to Latinos' longevity, with hopes of slowing aging for everyone
A new way to measure how humans age suggests that Latino Americans withstand life’s wear and tear better than non-Latino whites — and that they may have their Native American ancestors to thank for their longer lives.
The findings offer some insight into a long-standing demographic mystery: Despite having higher rates of inflammation and such chronic diseases as obesity and diabetes, Latinos in the United States have a longer average lifespan than do non-Latino whites.
The research also helps answer questions about why some people die young while others live to old age, and what chronic diseases have to do with aging.
To get a handle on some of these thorny issues, UCLA bioinformatician Steve Horvath and his colleagues have been trying to devise a biological clock that measures age more comprehensively than simply counting up birthdays. Their method reflects the activity level of the epigenome, the set of signals that prompt one’s genes to change their function across a lifespan in response to new demands.
http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-latinos-aging-20160817-snap-story.html
Despite fears, Mexico's manufacturing boom is lifting U.S. workers
Enrique Zarate, 19, had spent just a year in college when he landed an apprenticeship at a new BMW facility in San Luis Potosí, Mexico. If he performs well, in a year he’ll win a well-paid position, with benefits, working with robots at the company’s newest plant.
Within a decade or so, most of the BMW 3 series cars that Americans buy will probably come from Mexico, built by people like Zarate.
“When you start with such little experience, and get such a big salary, it’s unbelievable,” says Zarate, whose father is a taxi driver and whose mother is a housewife.
Mexico is in the throes of a manufacturing boom.
http://www.latimes.com/projects/la-fi-manufacturing-boom-mexico/
Hearst Castle threatened by fast-moving Chimney Fire
The Chimney fire, a 17,000-acre fire in San Luis Obispo County, is threatening Hearst Castle and the buildings around it, Cal Fire authorities said Saturday afternoon.
The fire was headed toward the national historic landmark and the leading edge was just two miles away, said Emily Hjortstorp, Cal Fire spokeswoman. Crews are expecting winds of up to 20 miles per hour, but the fire isn’t traveling especially fast, she said.
Bulldozers, trucks and firefighters are digging containment lines around the castle, Hjorstorp said. No evacuation orders have been issued for the area, she said.
“It is fire, and it is traveling in that direction, but it’s not raging the way it has been in the past,” Hjortstorp said.
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-hearst-castle-threatened-20160820-snap-htmlstory.html
Venezuela condemns 'bold threats' from Paraguay
Venezuela's Foreign Minister Delcy Rodriguez on Saturday condemned what she called "bold threats" from her Paraguayan counterpart after he announced a "total freezing of relations."
Paraguayan Foreign Minister Eladio Loizaga announced on Friday that he would not return to Caracas indefinitely over what he called "rants" by Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
"Venezuela will not allow itself to be threatened or succumb to the fear from those who choose to serve the empire rather than the people," Rodriguez tweeted in response. "
Loizaga's) bold threats... insult our heritage of independence and freedom."
Earlier this month, Maduro said Venezuela was being "persecuted" by "a corrupt Paraguayan oligarch and drug trafficker," referring to Paraguayan President Horacio Cartes.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/venezuela-condemns-bold-threats-paraguay-170031711.html
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