Author: Admin

Thursday, February 28, 2008

Representatives from the British insurance industry have said that the cost of the earthquake which hit Britain early yesterday could be over 10 million GBP. The Association of British Insurers has said in a statement that the cost for the earthquake is “likely to run into the low tens of millions of pounds.”

The Senior claims manager at the UK bank Norwich Union has described the damage by saying that at the moment most insurance claims regarding the earthquake describe “minor damage such as tiles off roofs, breakages inside the homes and brick walls collapsing.” It has also been reported that approximately 1,200 insurance claims were made in the first twelve hours after the earthquake hit Britain.

These reports come one day after the United Kingdom was hit by a 5.2 earthquake. Tremors were reported as widespread as Edinburgh, Manchester, Sheffield, Middlesbrough, Cambridge, London, Birmingham and Southampton .

Monday, June 21, 2010

Sweden’s first royal wedding since 1976 took place Saturday when Crown Princess Victoria, 32, married her long-time boyfriend and former personal trainer, Daniel Westling, 36. The ceremony took place at Stockholm Cathedral.

Over 1,200 guests, including many rulers, politicians, royals and other dignitaries from across the world, attended the wedding, which cost an estimated 20 million Swedish kronor. Victoria wore a wedding dress with five-metre long train designed by Pär Engsheden. She wore the same crown that her mother, Queen Silvia, wore on her wedding day 34 years previously, also on June 19. Victoria’s father, King Carl XVI Gustaf, walked Victoria down the aisle, which was deemed untraditional by many. In Sweden, the bride and groom usually walk down the aisle together, emphasising the country’s views on equality. Victoria met with Daniel half-way to the altar, where they exchanged brief kisses, and, to the sounds of the wedding march, made their way to the the silver altar. She was followed by ten bridesmaids. The couple both had tears in their eyes as they said their vows, and apart from fumbling when they exchanged rings, the ceremony went smoothly.

Following the ceremony, the couple headed a fast-paced procession through central Stockholm on a horse-drawn carriage, flanked by police and security. Up to 500,000 people are thought to have lined the streets. They then boarded the Vasaorden, the same royal barge Victoria’s parents used in their wedding, and traveled through Stockholm’s waters, accompanied by flyover of 18 fighter jets near the end of the procession. A wedding banquet followed in the in the Hall of State of the Royal Palace.

Controversy has surrounded the engagement and wedding between the Crown Princess and Westling, a “commoner”. Victoria met Westling as she was recovering from bulemia in 2002. He owned a chain of gymnasiums and was brought in to help bring Victoria back to full health. Westling was raised in a middle-class family in Ockelbo, in central Sweden. His father managed a social services centre, and his mother worked in a post office. When the relationship was made public, Westling was mocked as an outsider and the king was reportedly horrified at the thought of his daughter marrying a “commoner”, even though he did so when he married Silvia. Last year, Westling underwent transplant surgery for a congenital kidney disorder. The Swedish public have been assured that he will be able to have children and that his illness will not be passed on to his offspring.

Westling underwent years of training to prepare for his new role in the royal family, including lessons in etiquette, elocution, and multi-lingual small talk; and a makeover that saw his hair being cropped short, and his plain-looking glasses and clothes being replaced by designer-wear.

Upon marrying the Crown Princess, Westling took his wife’s ducal title and is granted the style “His Royal Highness”. He is now known as HRH Prince Daniel, Duke of Västergötland. He also has his own coat-of-arms and monogram. When Victoria assumes the throne and becomes Queen, Daniel will not become King, but assume a supportive role, similar to that of Prince Phillip, the husband of the United Kingdom’s Queen Elizabeth II.

Saturday, April 9, 2022

On Thursday, the United States Senate confirmed Ketanji Brown Jackson as an associate justice of the Supreme Court, becoming the first African American woman to sit on the Court.

The vote was 53 in favor of Jackson and 47 opposed, largely split along party lines between Democrats and Republicans, respectively. Susan Collins (Maine), Mitt Romney (Utah) and Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) broke ranks with their fellow Republicans to cast votes for Jackson. Vice President Kamala Harris presided over the vote. Had there been a deadlock, she would have cast a tiebreaking vote.

Jackson and President Joe Biden watched the proceedings from the Roosevelt Room of the White House. Biden nominated Jackson on February 25 to replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer. In 2020, Biden promised while running for President to nominate a African American woman to the Supreme Court, the country’s highest. Presidential nominations are required to be confirmed by the Senate.

On March 21, Jackson was introduced to the Senate by Thomas B. Griffith, a former judge on the Court of Appeals for Washington, D.C. During her opening remarks, Jackson said: “My parents taught me that unlike the many barriers that they had to face growing up, my path was clearer, so that if I worked hard and believed in myself, in [the US] I could do anything or be anything I wanted to be.”

She closed with: “Members of this committee, if I am confirmed, I commit to you that I will work productively to support and defend the Constitution and this grand experiment of American democracy that has endured over these past 246 years. During this hearing I hope that you will see how much I love our country and the Constitution and the rights that make us free.”

On the second day of confirmation hearings, Senator Josh Hawley (Republican; Missouri) challenged Jackson on child pornography cases over which she had presided. He questioned a three-month prison sentence handed out by Jackson in United States v. Hawkins where the prosecution had sought two years imprisonment. Federal Sentencing Guidelines recommended eight years in the case, based on the number of images. Jackson responded that she disagrees with the current guidelines, arguing they fail to differentiate defendants, and are contentious by the Sentencing Commission.

Jackson explained: “Congress has given the judges not only the discretion to make the decision but required judges to do so on an individualized basis taking into account not only the guidelines but also various factors including the age of the defendant, the circumstances of the defendant.” The defendant in the case was eighteen years old.

On the third day of the hearings, Jackson was pressed on how to apply Constitutional provisions written over two hundred years ago, to current issues. Jackson responded: “It’s a process of understanding what the core foundational principles are in the Constitution, as captured by the text, as originally intended, and then applying those principles to modern day.”

Senators Lindsey Graham (Republican; South Carolina) and Ted Cruz (Republican; Texas) continued a line of questioning from Tuesday on light sentences which led head of the Judiciary Committee Senator Dick Durbin (Democrat; Illinois) to intervene numerous times on Jackson’s behalf. While Durbin said Jackson was being interrupted, he was accused of filibustering in the nominee’s favor.

On the fourth and final day of the hearing on March 24, Durbin announced the Judiciary Committee would meet on March 28, potentially setting up a vote on Jackson for April 4. That day, Jackson herself was not present on March 24 as the Senate heard testimony from other parties, such as Wade Henderson, president of nonprofit group the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. Henderson said of Jackson: “Her background is absolutely extraordinary and her demonstration and mastery of the law is second to none.”

Senator Marsha Blackburn (Republican; Tennessee) requested access to confidential pre-sentencing reports in Jackson’s past child pornography cases. Reports of this nature are confidential to protect the victims. Durbin refused, saying: “I would not want that on my conscience, that we did this for some political exercise here, which I think is totally unnecessary, and someone was harmed as a result of it. I’m going to resist it every step of the way.”

On April 4, the Judiciary Committee voted 11-11 on Jackson, a deadlock broken by a vote called by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (New York) which sent it to the Senate floor.

Prior to her nomination, Jackson served as a clerk for Breyer, a federal public defender, a federal district court judge and a member of the sentencing commission, as well as an attorney in private practice.

The Supreme Court has eight associate justices and one chief justice.

Sunday, January 27, 2008

Viktor Schreckengost, the father of industrial design and creator of the Jazz Bowl, an iconic piece of Jazz Age art designed for Eleanor Roosevelt during his association with Cowan Pottery died yesterday. He was 101.

Schreckengost was born on June 26, 1906 in Sebring, Ohio, United States.

Schreckengost’s peers included the far more famous designers Raymond Loewy and Norman Bel Geddes.

In 2000, the Cleveland Museum of Art curated the first ever retrospective of Schreckengost’s work. Stunning in scope, the exhibition included sculpture, pottery, dinnerware, drawings, and paintings.

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

The UK Government has stated that children in Britain will no longer be required to take compulsory, externally marked tests at the age of fourteen.

The change takes effect immediately, meaning that children who were due to take the test this year no longer have to do so.

Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families Ed Balls yesterday announced his plans to radically change the UK testing system, in parliament.

Currently, almost ten million tests are sat each year by British pupils. This change is expected to cut the number of tests taken in half, according to The Guardian.

The tests for seven and eleven year olds are not being abolished. A review group is being set up, however, to research the effect of these tests on eleven-year-olds.

Instead of league tables showing test results, the government will produce report cards for secondary schools. According to Ed Balls, the results from GCSEs will be adequate to judge the performance of schools by their test results.

The decision to abolish the tests for fourteen year olds came as a result of a situation earlier this year, when there were long delays with the delivery of test results to students of this age.

According to Christine Blower, acting general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, the government is admitting that the previous test system failed by making this move.

“For too long English, mathematics and science teachers in secondary schools have found themselves skewing everything to enable their pupils to jump through a series of unnecessary hoops,” she claimed, while Chris Keates, general secretary of the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers, said that “the sound of a deep collective sigh of relief will emanate from secondary schools across the country.”

Both major UK opposition parties welcomed this move. Conservative Shadow Secretary of State for Children Michael Gove stated that his party have “argued for fewer national tests and more rigor and we want to work constructively to improve the assessment and qualifications regime.”

David Laws, Shadow Secretary of State for Children for the Liberal Democrats, said that “the Sats tests taken by 14-year-olds are not only a waste of time but have been highly unreliable over the last few years.”

Sunday, September 4, 2005

In Louisiana, southeast of New Orleans, two storage tanks estimated to be filled with up to 160,000 barrels (6.7 million gallons) of oil are reported to be leaking into the Mississippi River. It was first noticed on September 1, 2005 by an aircraft flying overhead. Officials are not certain whether the tanks are the cause of the leak or how full the tanks are. Inspection of the storage tanks from the ground is impossible due to flooding in the area.

In comparison, the Exxon Valdez oil spill off Alaska leaked between 11 and 35 million gallons of oil.

Due to massive efforts directed toward search and rescue in New Orleans, the Coast Guard has not been able to look into the matter.

Monday, June 12, 2017

On Friday night, Adam West, a US actor best known for his role as Batman in 1960s television series Batman, died at the age of 88 in Los Angeles, his family spokesperson said. Before his death, West “fought a short but brave battle with leukemia”, his family said via Facebook.

Actors Ben Affleck, Val Kilmer, and Mark Hamill, comic book writer Frank Miller, Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane as well as author Neil Gaiman paid tribute to Adam West via Twitter. Affleck and Kilmer portrayed the titular character in, the 2016 film Batman v Superman and the 1995 film Batman Forever respectively.

Burt Ward, who played the role of Batman’s sidekick Robin in the TV series with West, paid tribute via The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Julie Newmar, who played the role of Catwoman in the 1960s show, paid tribute as well via the BBC World Service radio program Newshour.DC Entertainment president and CEO Geoff Johns and publisher Jim Lee paid tribute via DC Comics’s official blog.

Adam West, younger of the two brothers, was born on September 19, 1928 in Washington. His father was a wheat farmer and his mother was a pianist and an opera singer. He received a Bachelor’s Degree in English literature from Whitman College and worked as a station master at Stanford while he was a graduate student.

West worked at McClatchy station in Sacramento, California before moving to Hawaii, where he hosted a weekday show in the late 1950s. He moved to Hollywood, California in 1959 and signed a contract with Warner Bros. He appeared in multiple series before portraying Detective Sergeant Steve Nelson in the 1959–62 television series, The Detectives, from 1961 to 1962. His film debut was the 1959 film The Young Philadelphians, starring Paul Newman. Before Batman, West appeared in many films throughout the 1960s.

Lyle Waggoner and Adam West auditioned for the role of Batman while Peter Deyell and Burt Ward auditioned for the role of Robin. Batman TV series debuted on January 12, 1966 on the ABC network. Though the first season was a success, two subsequent seasons had a significant drop in the Nielsen ratings, and it was cancelled in March 1968.

After Batman, West was given typecast roles throughout his career. He voiced Batman in animated shows, like The New Adventures of Batman, Legends of the Superheroes, and Super Friends: The Legendary Super Powers Show. He also voiced a role in an Academy Award-nominated 1997 short film Redux Riding Hood. He also voiced the role of Mayor Adam West in Family Guy, which MacFarlane called an “alternative universe” version of West.

West married Marcelle in 1970; each had two children from their previous marriages. After the marriage, the couple had two children. West is survived by his wife Marcelle, six children, five grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.