Ringling’s Last Show Will Be Broadcast on Facebook Live
Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus first wowed audiences in the 19th century. For the iconic American spectacle’s final act, it will broadcast the final performance on a 21st century medium: Facebook Live.
The company told The Associated Press this week that the final circus show on the evening of May 21 will be streamed live on the social media network and on the circus’s website. The final performance will be in Uniondale, New York.
Earlier this year, Feld Entertainment, the company that owns the iconic circus, announced that the show would end in May.
Many reasons for decline
The circus’s decline happened because of a variety of factors. Declining attendance, combined with high operating costs, changing public tastes and prolonged battles with animal rights groups all contributed to its demise.
Sam Gomez, the circus’s vice president of digital and relationship marketing, said Ringling did something similar, although on a smaller scale, during the final elephant act performance in 2016.
During that broadcast on Facebook, Ringling showed a pre-recorded intro, then cut to the live act. For the May 21 show, the entire performance will be broadcast live from start to finish and will be hosted by Kristen Michelle Wilson, Ringling’s first female ringmaster.
Organizers have taken into consideration that most people will probably tune in on phones or tablets.
“It’s basically a TV shoot and we’re certainly thinking about lighting and sound,” said Gomez. “How will this look when you’re looking at it on your phone or your tablet? We’ve had lots of conversations about tight shots so you can see the performer’s skill and expressions and their artistry.”
Gomez said Ringling would leave the video up for a short while — it’s unclear how long — but not forever.
Witness end of an era
The live show allows people to “witness the end of an era.”
“We wanted to give families around the world one last chance to experience ‘the greatest show on earth’ together,” he said.
Ringling Bros. has two touring circuses; one will perform for four nights in Providence, Rhode Island, starting Thursday and ending for good in that city Sunday. The other touring show will end at the Nassau County Coliseum in New York on May 21.
The circus, with its exotic animals, flashy costumes and death-defying acrobats, has been a staple of entertainment in the United States since the mid-1800s. Phineas Taylor Barnum made a traveling spectacle of animals and human oddities popular, while the five Ringling brothers performed juggling acts and skits from their home base in Wisconsin. Eventually, they merged and the modern circus was born.
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Scientists Track Beetles to Stop a Plant Plague
Modern agriculture is feeding more people more cheaply than ever, with large-scale farms that grow just one or a few crops. But there are risks in this way of feeding the world. A new book explores how large-scale agriculture invites large-scale attacks of pests and diseases. VOA’s Steve Baragona met the author, who is enlisting the public to try to stay ahead of the next crop plague.
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‘Mr. Trash Wheel’ Gobbles up Garbage
An unusual machine working in Baltimore, with more than 20,000 followers on Facebook and Twitter, has just celebrated its third birthday. Imaginatively named “Mr. Trash Wheel,” this hybrid-powered contraption is responsible for preventing the city’s trash from reaching its inner harbor. VOA’s George Putic reports.
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Racial Slurs Launch Major League Baseball Security Review
Major League Baseball is reviewing its security protocols in all 30 stadiums after Orioles outfielder Adam Jones complained of fans shouting racial slurs in Boston this week and other black players reacted by saying it’s a common reality.
League officials are starting by figuring out how individual clubs handle fan issues and complaints.
“We have reached out to all 30 clubs to assess what their in-ballpark announcement practices are regarding fan behavior,” MLB spokesman Pat Courtney said. “We are also reviewing text message and other fan security notification policies that are operating in the event there is an incident.”
Each stadium is different
All MLB teams have a mechanism for fans to alert security to issues, but individualized ballparks mean different protocols and practices in each stadium.
The Red Sox on Wednesday said another fan had been ejected from the previous game for using a racial slur toward another spectator.
“The offending individual was promptly ejected from the ballpark, and has since been notified they are no longer welcome at Fenway Park,” the team said.
The team turned the matter over to police.
“The Red Sox organization will not tolerate the use of racial slurs at Fenway Park, and we have apologized to those affected,” the team said. “There is no place for racial epithets at Fenway Park, in baseball, or in our society.”
Jones complained Monday night that he was racially abused, then a fan threw peanuts toward him in the dugout. Boston Red Sox officials apologized and said that only one of 34 fans kicked out of the game was ejected for using foul language toward a player, and it wasn’t clear whether that was toward Jones. Boston police said the peanuts hit a nearby police officer and Fenway security kicked out the man who threw them before he could be identified by authorities.
Commissioner Rob Manfred quickly condemned the incidents.
On Wednesday night, Jones was ejected in the fifth inning after striking out swinging against the Red Sox. He was upset about a late strike call during the at-bat.
Nothing new, black players say
Earlier this week, black players around the majors made it clear that what he experienced is an ongoing experience during road trips, varying by ballpark.
“Everybody knows what those cities are. It’s bad. You’ve got security guards there and people there and they just sit there and let it happen,” Braves outfielder Matt Kemp said. “That to me is just crazy.”
Kemp said the vitriol in some parks has become a talking point among the dwindling fraternity of black players.
According to the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport, the number of African-American or African-Canadian players dipped from 62 each of the previous four years to 58, or 7.7 percent, on MLB’s opening day active rosters.
Dusty Baker, the Nationals manager who played 19 seasons, said Jones’ complaints weren’t surprising because he’s been targeted with racial slurs in almost every city he played in.
“Minor leagues, big leagues … from L.A. to New York, it’s more apparent in some places than other places,” Baker said.
Adding security guards
Yankees pitcher CC Sabathia said he heard racial slurs from fans when he pitched for the Indians in Boston, but has never had a problem with New York, where security guards follow players out to the bullpen and maintain a visible presence.
“It’s easier for us because we have our security guards,” Sabathia said. “Maybe teams should travel with security guards. That’s made a huge difference since I’ve been here.”
Kemp said he spoke to security officials about a week ago about how things were getting out of hand.
“I don’t know what kind of precautions or what they’re doing to get things under control but I hope something is going to get done,” he said. “Of course the racial slurs are out of line, and that’s big, but there’s a lot of other big things happening as far as people threatening other people’s families.”
Soccer a possible model
One solution could be to adopt the model used in some European soccer leagues, where clubs are held responsible for the actions of their fans. Soccer authorities have spent decades trying to eradicate racism from stadiums, with limited success. Sanctions were strengthened in 2013 after a high-profile incident in Italy saw Kevin-Prince Boateng lead his AC Milan team off a field after facing abuse from fans.
Parts of stadiums can be closed during matches after a first instance of abuse, while repeated abuse can result in fans being locked out of games completely.
Still, during a Serie A game in Italy on Sunday, Pescara player Sulley Muntari complained he was being racially abused by Cagliari supporters and the referee’s only action was to penalize Muntari for his protests and show him a second yellow card as he walked off the field, which amounted to a red card kicking him out of the game and his team’s next game. The league didn’t punish Cagliari because it said only 10 fans were hurling the abuse, despite a clear sliding scale of punishments for four years.
FIFA, soccer’s global governing body, has also given leagues the power to dock points or relegate teams for serious repeated racist incidents. Players also face a minimum 10-game ban in Europe if they racially abuse opponents.
But FIFA has been criticized for disbanding its anti-racism task force even as it prepares to take the World Cup in 2018 to Russia, where racism continues to blight matches.
Hall of Famer and Yankees senior adviser Reggie Jackson said improving security at ballparks might not be a magic wand.
“I don’t know how you control that,” he said. “You throw someone out of the stadium, you have them leave. And it would be interesting to see if fans really cheered.”
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Colombia’s Famous Guerrilla Singer Searches for a New Tune
In a dimly lit university auditorium in the Colombian capital, not far from where the country’s largest rebel group once launched bomb attacks, Julian Conrado sings to eager-eyed students about the pain of war.
“Instead of a rifle in my hands I’d like to carry a flower,” he croons, wearing wire-rimmed glasses and an olive green fedora that make him look more like a geeky dad than someone who spent over three decades as a guerrilla fighter in Latin America’s longest-running armed conflict.
“Call me the singer of unity,” Conrado told The Associated Press in a recent interview. “I like that.”
The setting is a new one for the man known as the “singer of the FARC,” the Spanish acronym for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, which last year reached a landmark peace agreement with the government to end a half century of fighting.
Rather than singing battle hymns to fellow rebels in the mountains, Conrado is now living in a demobilization camp and gradually venturing out for shows that have not only enthralled idealistic college kids but also drawn the ire of opponents who say he shouldn’t be performing at all.
“It’s unacceptable that FARC terrorists are giving concerts in Bogota without even having confessed their crimes or made reparations to their victims,” conservative lawmaker Daniel Palacios said.
Just a distraction
Conrado said such criticisms are a temporary distraction from a larger mission of transforming himself into a messenger of peace and forgiveness.
However the ballad he performs most these days is one he wrote in 1984 during a previous, failed peace attempt. He has been struggling to compose new material in the early days of the post-conflict era, wary that his frank, socially critical lyrics might cause more discord than his performances already have.
“I wrote a song but I don’t want to sing it,” Conrado said while driving through Bogota in an SUV with tinted windows. “I see the looks in people’s faces . and there is like a glow of peace.”
“But then I see other people .” he continued, his voice trailing off. “Hopefully, I am wrong.”
Born in a small city near Colombia’s Caribbean coast, Conrado, whose birth name is Guillermo Torres, learned to read by reading the lyrics to ballads known as “corridos.” From an early age he found himself drawn toward leftist causes, and he began organizing neighbors to improve access to water and electricity and incorporating politics into his music, drawing rebukes from officials and also death threats.
After narrowly escaping gunfire that he believes was aimed at him while exiting a building, Conrado decided to join the rebels in the mountains. Just shy of 30 years old, he had never fired a weapon.
His acoustic guitar was among the few belongings he took with him.
In rebel encampments and later in jail, he wrote folksy tunes in the “vallenato” style paired with cheerful accordions, flutes and acoustic guitar. His songs vary from lighthearted professions of love to darker themes decrying social inequality and paramilitary violence or paying homage to fallen guerrilla comrades.
“For our dead, not a minute of silence,” one goes. “A whole life of combat.”
A guitar and a gun
Conrado’s songs were played at rebel parties and shared through videos and CDs — the cheerful, seemingly out-of-place rebel playing guitar while his AK-47 leaned against a wall.
“If there is anyone who made music in the middle of the conflict, it’s him,” said spokesman Fabian Ramirez of the Bogota artist collective Independencia Records, which recently invited Conrado to perform. “And if there is a cultural reference of the FARC, it is him.”
Being a musician wasn’t always easy in the jungle. Three times Conrado was forced to abandon guitars while fleeing bombs or soldiers. But he was never more than a few days without a new one.
One of the two he uses today was delivered by guerrillas who traveled by canoe to find it. The other was given to him in a Venezuelan jail where he says he shared a cell with several bankers. He calls the first guitar the “the guerrilla” and the latter “the oligarch.”
“But ‘the oligarch’ sings revolutionary songs, too,” he said.
The U.S. State Department at one time offered a $2.5 million reward for information leading to Conrado’s arrest, identifying him as a member of the FARC’s top leadership and accusing him of helping set and implement its cocaine policies. Colombian authorities have investigated him on allegations of terrorism, forced displacement of civilians and recruiting minors.
Captured in Venezuela
For a time Conrado was believed to have been killed in a 2008 army attack, but he was captured in 2011 in Venezuela while reportedly living at a farm under an Ecuadorian alias. He remained behind bars until 2013, when he was released to travel to Cuba to participate in peace negotiations.
These days Conrado, now 62, lives beneath a plastic tarp at a demobilization camp near the northern coast. Independencia Records invited him and two other former guerrillas to perform at a peace concert, arguing it was time for Colombians in cities far removed from the armed conflict to hear “the other side.”
“They are coming to sing, not to shoot,” Ramirez said. “And we believe that if they have their hands busy playing a guitar, painting a picture, writing a poem or acting in a play, they will never have to return to war.”
Conrado also gave talks and small performances that were mostly unannounced in an attempt to keep a low profile. But at the National University, he packed an auditorium with several hundred students who sang along to songs that for years were considered taboo — best listened to only in private or with like-minded friends.
“The FARC were part of the insurgency,” said Lorena Parra, a 21-year-old political administration student. “Now that we are in a more open environment. It’s the perfect opportunity to discover that ‘other’ who was in the mountains.”
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WhatsApp Back in Service After Global Outage
WhatsApp, a popular messaging service owned by Facebook Inc., suffered a widespread global outage Wednesday that lasted for several hours before being resolved, the company said.
“Earlier today, WhatsApp users in all parts of the world were unable to access WhatsApp for a few hours. We have now fixed the issue and apologize for the inconvenience,” WhatsApp said in an email late Wednesday afternoon.
WhatsApp was down in parts of India, Canada, the United States and Brazil, according to Reuters journalists. It affected people who use the service on Apple Inc’s iOS operating system, Alphabet Inc.’s Android and Microsoft Corp.’s Windows mobile OS.
WhatsApp is used by more than 1.2 billion people around the world and is a key tool for communications and commerce in many countries. The service was acquired by Facebook in 2014 for $19 billion.
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Alec Baldwin: Trump Is ‘Saturday Night Live’ Head Writer
Alec Baldwin welcomes the chance to share the screen with President Donald Trump on Saturday Night Live.
“I think if he came it would be a great show,” Baldwin said in an interview Wednesday. “I think it would be better for everybody. It’s always fun to defuse some of the tensions and unpleasantness of all this because we are mocking him — by no means with more frequency or more maliciousness, if you will, than other people.”
But he will have to wait. The actor, whose Trump impersonations became a staple this season and helped propel SNL to its best ratings in years, said the president recently turned down an invitation to appear on the NBC show.
“We invited him to come when I hosted recently, but he refused to come, which is fine,” Baldwin said. “I’m hoping SNL was the one thing he chose to ignore so he could actually do his job.”
Trump has repeatedly bashed SNL and Baldwin’s impersonations on Twitter, but the actor said his performance is driven by Trump’s words and actions.
“Trump himself is responsible for nearly all of the content,” he said. “Trump is the head writer at SNL. Nearly everything, every consonant and every vowel, is something that Trump himself has rendered in some way. So I think Trump is even more frustrated because he has only himself to blame for that.”
He also praised ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, who on Monday night detailed how his son was born last month with a heart defect and required surgery. Kimmel’s tearful monologue included a plea for all families to have access to lifesaving medical care.
“Good for him to get real about that,” said Baldwin, who’s a father of four. “I’d love to see this country turn in a direction where it makes things easier for moms and dads.”
Baldwin said he has reached out to Kimmel, who was his co-star in the animated film The Boss Baby.
“I can’t imagine any time in your life when you buckle down more and kind of batten down the hatches more than when you’re going through that with your wife,” Baldwin said. “That’s just mind-blowing. Mind-blowing. And I hope everything is great for his son.”
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Don’t Click That Link: Google Docs Ruse an Example of ‘Future of Phishing’
Alphabet Inc. warned its users to beware of emails from known contacts asking them to click on a link to Google Docs after a large number of people turned to social media to complain that their accounts had been hacked.
Google said Wednesday that it had taken steps to protect users from the attacks by disabling offending accounts and removing malicious pages.
The attack used a relatively novel approach to phishing, a hacking technique designed to trick users into giving away sensitive information, by gaining access to user accounts without needing to obtain their passwords. They did that by getting a logged-in user to grant access to a malicious application posing as Google Docs.
No malware needed
“This is the future of phishing,” said Aaron Higbee, chief technology officer at PhishMe Inc. “It gets attackers to their goal … without having to go through the pain of putting malware on a device.”
He said the hackers had also pointed some users to another site, since taken down, that sought to capture their passwords. Google said its abuse team “is working to prevent this kind of spoofing from happening again.”
Anybody who granted access to the malicious app unknowingly also gave hackers access to their Google account data including emails, contacts and online documents, according to security experts who reviewed the scheme.
Someone else controls your accounts
“This is a very serious situation for anybody who is infected because the victims have their accounts controlled by a malicious party,” said Justin Cappos, a cyber security professor at NYU Tandon School of Engineering.
Cappos said he received seven of those malicious emails in three hours Wednesday afternoon, an indication that the hackers were using an automated system to perpetuate the attacks.
He said he did not know the objective, but noted that compromised accounts could be used to reset passwords for online banking accounts or provide access to sensitive financial and personal data.
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Mid-life Obesity: There Might Be a Pill for That
As they get older, most people tend to gain weight. But it’s not their fault, according to scientists who have discovered a biological mechanism that causes peoples’ waistlines to expand in middle-age.
Endocrinologist Jay Chung says the average weight gain is 13 kilos or more between the ages of 20 and 50.
Chung, head of the laboratory of obesity and aging research at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute near Washington, DC, led a team of scientists that discovered the role of an enzyme called DNA-PK in middle-aged spread. Chung said it becomes overactive as we age.
“It’s like trying to accelerate with a foot on a brake,” said Chung. “And what it does is prevents fat release from our belly and it prevents fat burning by our tissues like skeletal muscle.”
Chung explained that overactive DNA-PK causes people to gradually lose a tiny structure inside their cells called mitochondria that act as powerhouses to fuel the body, at the same time burning fat.
In a paper published in the journal Cell Metabolism, Chung and colleagues described the role of DNA-PK in weight gain among aging adults. They reported testing a compound that inhibited the enzyme in mice.
After discovering the biological pathway in middle-aged monkeys, investigators fed older mice high fat diets. Half of the mice were given the DNA-PK inhibitor while the others were not.
Chung said the treated animals didn’t gain as much weight as the untreated rodents, “about 40 percent less weight and they were protected against type 2 diabetes. They also ran on a treadmill significantly longer than control mice.”
In addition to reducing the risk of diabetes, Chung said the DNA-PK inhibitor could potentially bring down rates of heart disease and other illnesses that tend to occur in older adults.
The finding could address what Chung called the middle-age paradox. As people grow older, they usually gain a significant amount of weight even though they tend to eat less, and they are blamed for their condition.
“Our society attributes middle age weight gain, lack of exercise, to lifestyle choices, and lack of willpower and discipline. But what our study shows is that there’s actually a genetic program that makes us the way we are in middle age,” Chung said.
Chung said the DNA-PK inhibitor is unlikely to work in younger people who are obese because they eat a poor diet, rather than experience a reduction in mitochondria.
More animal studies are needed before the DNA-PK could be tested in humans, according to Chung, who said drug approval could take many years after that.
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Kylie Jenner’s Star-studded Met Gala Selfie Rivals Ellen’s Oscar Pic
Kylie Jenner’s star-studded Instagram picture is coming close to Ellen DeGeneres’ all A-list Twitter selfie in social media popularity.
Jenner’s bathroom mirror shot posted Monday night from the Met Gala in New York included Jenner’s sisters Kendall Jenner and Kim Kardashian, as well as Sean “Diddy” Combs, Frank Ocean, A$AP Rocky and Oscar winner Brie Larson.
As of early Wednesday, the picture had more than 3.3 million likes. That compares to the more than 3.4 million retweets DeGeneres got for her selfie featuring Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie and Meryl Streep taken at the 2014 Oscars.
Jenner’s photo was taken in spite of a rumored ban on selfies at the Gala.
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Facebook to Hire 3,000 to Stop Violent Videos
In the wake of several Facebook videos depicting murder, suicide, rape and other violent acts, the social media giant says it is hiring 3,000 more people to review videos and remove those that violate its terms of service.
The company has been facing increased pressure to stop people from posting and sharing violent videos.
According to Facebook’s terms of service, violent videos are not allowed, but as recent events have shown, it can take the company some time to review and remove them.
The announcement to add staff to the already 4,500 who review videos was made Wednesday on Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page.
Facebook’s founder and CEO wrote, “Over the last few weeks, we have seen people hurting themselves and others on Facebook – either live or in video posted later. It is heartbreaking, and I have been reflecting on how we can do better for our community.”
“These reviewers will also help us get better at removing things we don’t allow on Facebook like hate speech and child exploitation, “ Zuckerberg wrote. “And we’ll keep working with local community groups and law enforcement who are in the best position to help someone if they need it – either because they’re about to harm themselves, or because they’re in danger from someone else.”
In addition to more staff, Zuckerberg said the company was going to enhance its software to keep violent videos off the site.
“We’re going to make it simpler to report problems to us, faster for our reviewers to determine which posts violate our standards and easier for them to contact law enforcement if someone needs help,” he wrote, adding the company had recently acted on a report of someone considering suicide on Facebook, preventing them from going through with it.
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Royal Caribbean Cruises Are Returning to New Orleans
Royal Caribbean International has announced it will resume weeklong cruises from New Orleans to the Bahamas and Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula.
News outlets report Royal Caribbean said in a news release Monday that their 2,435-passenger Vision of the Seas cruise ship will relocate in December 2018 to the Port of New Orleans after a three-year hiatus. The company announced the move as part of an overview of its 2018-2019 fleet plans.
After a two-year agreement with the Port of New Orleans ended in 2014, the Miami-based company chose to end sailings from the city. The departure came despite several years of growth for the city as a cruise hub.
The 915-foot ship will sail from Miami to Los Angeles before setting sail for New Orleans.
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New Observation of Nearby Star System Confirms Similarity to Ours
A relatively nearby planetary system is structured remarkably like what ours probably looked like when it was young, the U.S. space agency NASA confirms.
The system around the star Epsilon Eridani, or eps Eri, is just 10.5 light-years away and astronomers say it provides an excellent example of how planets form around stars in systems like ours.
Previous studies of the system using the Spitzer Space Telescope led to two theories about how the system formed. One suggested a wide debris disk made up of gas, dust and small rocky and icy bodies. Another suggested several thin debris disks similar to our system, which has an asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, and the Kuiper Belt of mostly icy objects beyond the dwarf planet Pluto.
Using the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, or SOFIA, astronomers found eps Eri has two narrow bands like our system. Furthermore, they detected a Jupiter-sized planet roughly the same distance from its star as Jupiter is from the sun.
“It really is impressive how eps Eri, a much younger version of our solar system, is put together like ours,” said Kate Su of the University of Arizona who led the study.
SOFIA, which is a larger telescope than Spitzer, is mounted on a Boeing 747. It previously found oxygen in Mars’ atmosphere, offered close-up looks at Jupiter and has documented the formation of new stars.
If the name eps Eri sounds familiar, you may have already heard of it as the setting for the science fiction television series Babylon 5.
The description of eps Eri was published in the Astronomical Journal on April 25, 2017.
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97-Year-Old Credits Harmonica as Key to Long Life
Stacey Blank remembers the day she first read about an innovative tool for her chronic lung patients. The Coordinator of the Pulmonary Rehabilitation Department at the Western Maryland Health System describes it as “something outside the box.”
Blank’s career objective was to help her patients breathe better. “You don’t realize how tough it is to live everyday and be short of breath,” she says.
She became instrumental in the nationwide Harmonicas for Health Program
through the COPD Foundation (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease) in conjunction with the Academy of Country Music and its Lifting Lives charitable division.
Blank met country music sensation Chris Janson, who explained how playing the harmonica calmed his asthma. Since then, medical groups have formed across country and the COPD foundation sells Harmonica for Health leader and players’ kits on their website.
Better breathers, now vacuuming with oxygen
“One, two, three….” Stacey Blank counts the beats as her 25 pulmonary patients, appropriately named, “Better Breathers” alternately “blow” and “draw” on their harmonicas. The song, “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” emerges as a fun cacophony of pitches. The harmonica strengthens lungs as the player exhales and inhales to create notes.
Jodie Steward has been battling COPD since 2008. She joined Better Breathers two years ago and is amazed at what she’s accomplished. “I can even run my sweeper with my oxygen attached,” she says. “I didn’t think I’d ever be able to do that.”
91 years of playing
Jack Hopkins doesn’t have a pulmonary condition, but he played his harmonica in the hospital last year while recovering from a heart attack. Hopkins — who is quick to laugh or to run up a flight of steps — turned 97 at the Virginia Harmonicafest in late April.
The group saluted him with a “Happy Birthday” song on their harmonicas and a cake shaped like a silver harmonica. Hopkins responded by playing “This Old Man” on his instrument. “Got to watch out for us old guys on the harmonica!” he chuckles.
He says his harmonica kept him breathing all those years. He doesn’t smoke. “I do a lot of drinking.” He pauses for effect. “… water,” he adds with another of his signature chuckles.
Santa brought Hopkins his first harmonica in his Christmas stocking when he was six years old. Within two weeks he was playing complete songs and convinced his dad to buy him a chromatic harmonica – one with sharps and flats.
Hopkins didn’t take formal lessons until he was 49. “Sometimes I’m playing it before I get out of bed. Usually I’m singing before I get out of bed. I love singing too!”
Physical, social, emotional benefits
Medical professionals say the instrument small enough to fit in a shirt pocket benefits the player physically and mentally. It’s been known to bring COPD patients out of depression, since the disease isolates people from normal activities.
A group like “Better Breathers” is a social venture too. “I think we laugh the whole time,” says Blank. “The whole hour and a half that we are here, we’re just having a great time.”
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Bison Reclaim, Restore their Natural Range
Bison once thundered across the North American plains by the millions. But they were hunted to near extinction in the 19th century for their hides. Today, their numbers are growing again, thanks in part to the important role they can play in land restoration.
The 429-hectare Kankakee Sands Nature Reserve is a sea of tall dried grass, with bits of spring green filling in here and there, but it once was Beaver Lake, the largest body of water in Indiana. Pioneers drained it for farmland in the 19th century. While the Indiana chapter of the Nature Conservancy can’t bring back the lake, it can restore the prairie.
And that’s where the bison come in.
Doing what bison do
This spring, a dozen or more fuzzy bison calves, notable for their orange hue and tiny stature, will gambol across the landscape.
That’s good news, says Ted Anchor, the program manager for this Nature Conservancy project, because although they are very young, they and their herd are responsible for fixing a very old problem: more than 100 years of environmental damage. “By creating this large-scale restoration project, we’ve been able to harbor all those species that were just barely hanging on.”
The Indiana Chapter of the Nature Conservancy has been working for 20 years to restore the prairie at Kankakee Sands. Late last year, they took the final step, bringing in 23 bison, including 16 pregnant cows. The Conservancy now owns 13 herds, in preserves from Mexico to North Dakota.
“Bison are a really easy way to get short grass prairie,” Anchor explains. “Just by living and doing what bison do which is eat grasses and make little bison, they create the short grass prairie for us.”
Environmental managers
Unlike domestic animals, the wild herd basically takes care of itself. The only thing Conservancy members do is make sure there’s enough water on the land and provide salt licks.
While farmed bison are raised for meat, these animals exist solely for environmental management. In addition to grazing on prairie grasses, which allows wildflowers to grow and provides habitat for rare birds, the bison wallow. The depressions they create fill with rainwater, which attracts amphibians and other small animals.
The animals are also a tourist attraction, bringing new sources of revenue to the community. Some visitors return again and again.
It’s expected that the Kankakee Sands herd will eventually grow to between 55 and 75 animals, and return the landscape to resemble what it was when herds numbering in the thousands roamed here.
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97-Year-Old Credits Harmonica as Key to Long Life
Since the beginning of time, every generation has tried to find the secret to staying young. One man might have discovered the key in something we can all do, no matter what our age. VOA’s Carolyn Presutti takes us on his musical journey and tells us how it can help anyone with breathing problems.
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Jimmy Kimmel Tearfully Recounts Newborn Son’s Heart Surgery
A tearful Jimmy Kimmel turned his show’s monologue into an emotional recounting of his newborn son’s open-heart surgery — and a plea that all American families get the life-saving medical care they need.
“It was a scary story and before I go into it, I want you to know it has a happy ending,” Kimmel assured ABC’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live” studio audience Monday as he detailed how his son’s routine birth April 21 suddenly turned frightening.
Several hours after his wife, Molly, gave birth to William John, a “very attentive” nurse at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center alerted the couple and doctors to the baby’s purple-ish color and an apparent heart murmur, the host said.
The baby’s lack of oxygen was either due to a lung problem or heart disease, Kimmel said, and it was found to be his heart.
“It’s a very terrifying thing,” he said. He was surrounded at the hospital by very worried-looking people, “kind of like right now,” he told the audience, one of the jokes he managed despite choking up and having to pause at times.
A test showed his son had a birth defect called tetralogy of Fallot with pulmonary atresia — a hole in the wall separating the right and left sides of the heart and a blocked pulmonary valve, Kimmel said. The baby, nicknamed Billy, was taken by ambulance to Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles to undergo surgery to open the valve.
“The longest three hours of my life,” Kimmel said.
Billy will have another open-heart surgery within six months to repair the hole and then a third procedure when he’s a young teen, but he came home six days after the surgery and is “doing great,” Kimmel said. He shared photos of him with his wife, their 2-year-old daughter Jane and a smiling Billy.
After thanking by name the nurses, doctors and staff at the two hospitals, along with his colleagues and friends — “Even that (expletive) Matt Damon sent flowers,” Kimmel said of his faux rival — the comedian then gave an impassioned speech on health care.
He criticized President Donald Trump’s proposed cuts to the National Institutes of Health and praised Congress for instead calling for increased funding.
“If your baby is going to die and it doesn’t have to, it shouldn’t matter how much money you make. … Whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat or something else, we all agree on that, right?” he said.
Washington politicians meeting on health care need to “understand that very clearly,” he said. Partisan squabbles shouldn’t divide American on something “every decent person wants. We need to take care of each other.”
Former President Barack Obama took to social media, retweeting Kimmel and touting the benefits of the Affordable Care Act.
“Well said, Jimmy. That’s exactly why we fought so hard for the ACA, and why we need to protect it for kids like Billy. And congratulations,” he tweeted.
Kimmel said he would skip the rest of this week’s shows to be with his family while guest hosts take his place.
He was joined Monday by Dr. Mehmet Oz, who was a previously scheduled guest but jumped in to offer an illustrated description of Billy Kimmel’s heart problem. Also on the show at Kimmel’s request was Shaun White, the Olympic gold medal snowboarder who discussed overcoming the same heart defect as Kimmel’s son.
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Mystery Illness Kills 12 in Liberia
Global health experts are striving to identify a mysterious illness in Liberia that has already killed 12 people.
Officials with the World Health Organization in Monrovia have already ruled out Ebola, yellow fever and a regional virus called Lassa.
They have sent samples to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta for further tests.
The illness causes fever, vomiting, diarrhea and headaches.
At least 21 cases have been confirmed so far and nearly all of the victims had attended the funeral of a religious leader last month in Sinoe County.
The health experts are looking for a link between the victims and food and drinks they may have consumed at the funeral.
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Low-dose Aspirin Might Reduce Risk of Most-common Breast Cancer
Low-dose aspirin might help fend off breast cancer, according to a new study.
Researchers at the City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer Center noted an overall 16 percent reduction in breast-cancer risk among the 57,000 women who took an 81-milligram dose of aspirin three or more times a week.
The most striking finding, according to researchers, was the effect the aspirin had on the most common form of breast cancer, known as estrogen or progesterone receptor positive HER2-negative breast cancer. The risk of developing that subtype was reduced by 20 percent.
The participants, part of the California Teachers Study that began in 1995, filled out questionnaires that included their exercise, smoking and drinking habits, family history of cancer and medications they took, including hormone replacement therapy.
By 2013, almost 1,500 women reported having developed invasive breast cancer.
The reduction in breast cancer risk in the City of Hope study was seen in comparison to the results of other large studies investigating the possible benefits of higher-dose aspirin and other painkillers. The study’s findings were published online in the journal Breast Cancer Research.
Investigators did not see a breast-cancer risk reduction among women who took regular-strength aspirin or other types of painkillers. They said that may be because some women only took the aspirin occasionally, for pain relief.
Low-dose aspirin taken regularly has been linked to other health benefits, including reductions in the risk of heart disease and colon cancer.
Investigators in the latest study only found an association, not a causal link, between the use of baby aspirin and a reduced risk of breast cancer.
Researchers noted aspirin reduces inflammation, which plays a role in the initiation of disease. They also said the painkiller is a mild aromatase inhibitor. Aromatase inhibitors reduce the amount of the female hormone estrogen circulating in the bloodstream, which fuels breast tumors, so they are used to treat some forms of breast cancer in post-menopausal women.
At this point, researchers are not recommending that women start taking low-dose aspirin to protect themselves against breast cancer. They said more research is needed showing a definite link between baby aspirin and cancer prevention.
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Eagles Sue Mexican ‘Hotel California’
The surviving members of the legendary rock band The Eagles, are suing a Mexican hotel that calls itself Hotel California, which is also the title of what is likely the band’s most famous song.
The suit was filed Monday against the 11-room hotel in Baja California Sur, saying the hotel owners “actively encourage” the notion that the hotel is somehow associated with the band.
Allegedly one way the owners do this was through playing the song and other Eagles hits over the hotel’s sound system. The hotel also sold merchandise such as T-shirts calling itself “legendary.”
The suit, which was filed in Los Angeles, also claimed the hotel owners tried to register the Hotel California name with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
“Defendants lead U.S. consumers to believe that the Todos Santos Hotel is associated with the Eagles and, among other things, served as the inspiration for the lyrics in Hotel California, which is false,” according to the complaint.
The hotel opened in 1950 and was called Hotel California, but had gone by the name Todos Santos until it was purchased by a Canadian couple in 2001 who changed the name back to Hotel California.
Hotel California appeared on the 1976 album of the same name and took home a Grammy for album of the year.
The song, which is known for winding guitars and oblique lyrics, was written by Don Felder, Glenn Frey and Don Henley. Frey died in 2016 at age 67.
According to Henley, the song is about “a journey from innocence to experience. It’s not really about California; it’s about America,” he said in an interview with CBS News last year.
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Privacy Group Sues NYPD Over Facial-recognition Documents
A privacy group sued the New York Police Department on Tuesday to demand the release of documents related to its use of facial-recognition technology, which rights groups have criticized as discriminatory and lacking in proper oversight.
The lawsuit is the latest attempt to compel U.S. law enforcement agencies to disclose more about how they rely on searchable facial-recognition databases in criminal investigations.
NYPD has previously produced one document in response to a January 2016 freedom of information request, despite evidence it has frequently used an advanced face-recognition system for more than five years, according to the Center for Privacy & Technology at Georgetown University law school, which filed the suit in New York state court.
“The department’s claim that it cannot find any records about its use of the technology is deeply troubling,” said David Vladeck, the privacy group’s faculty director. He added that an absence of responsive documents, such as contract and purchasing documents, training materials or audits, would be an indication the police force did not possess controls governing its use of facial-recognition software.
NYPD could not be immediately reached for comment on the suit.
Facial-recognition databases are used by police to help identify possible criminal suspects. They typically work by conducting searches of vast troves of known images, such as mug shots, and algorithmically comparing them with other images, such as those taken form a store’s surveillance cameras, that capture an unidentified person believed to be committing a crime.
But the technology has come under increased scrutiny in recent years amid fears that it may lack accuracy, lead to false positives and perpetuate racial bias.
Democratic and Republican lawmakers expressed consternation at the secrecy surrounding facial-recognition technology during a U.S. House Oversight Committee hearing in March.
The Center for Privacy & Technology released a report last year concluding half of America’s adults have their images stored in at least one searchable facial-recognition database used by local, state and federal authorities.
The study, titled “Perpetual Line-Up,” found that states rely on mug shots, driver’s license photos, or both in assembling their databases, and that images are often shared with the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The U.S. Government Accountability Office estimated last year that more than 400 million facial pictures of Americans were stored in databases kept by law enforcement agencies.
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Met Gala: Inside It’s Hard Not to Step on Someone’s Dress
A thunderous drumbeat echoed through the cocktail reception at the Met Gala. Either an earthquake was hitting the Upper East Side of Manhattan, or the glittering assembly of guests was being called in to dinner.
Hasan Minhaj, a correspondent on Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show,” was standing with the show’s host, Trevor Noah, and marveling about the week he was having. Just two days earlier, he’d made a huge splash with his blistering speech at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, and now he was at one of the most exclusive parties on the planet, rubbing shoulders (literally) with a ridiculous number of A-list celebrities, and getting praise for his performance.
“It’s been an insane week,” he said. “I keep thinking, what if the other night had gone poorly, what would tonight have been like?”
Like everyone, he was somewhat shell-shocked at the number of famous people present. He mentioned Matt Damon and Michael B. Jordan in particular, just two of hundreds of celebrities attending what often feels like a combination of the Oscars, Emmys, Grammys and Tonys, plus the worlds of fashion and sports.
The stars were packed so tightly together, in fact, that the major hazard of the evening seemed to be potential hem damage, from famous feet stepping inadvertently on long, delicate trains. Halle Berry, wearing a black-and-gold Atelier Versace jumpsuit, was one of those who had to stop and release her train from a stranger’s foot as she glided across the Carroll and Milton Petrie European Sculpture Court during cocktail hour.
The evening began with invited guests making their way past the assembled media and up the red-carpeted stairs, then into the huge entry hall of the museum, where a massive tower of hot pink and white roses, in the form of a flower, awaited them. Nobody seemed to know how many roses had been called into service. That tower and the rest of the evening’s decor was inspired, of course, by revered designer Rei Kawakubo, founder of Comme des Garcons and the subject of the Costume Institute’s spring exhibit.
After climbing up the huge interior staircase, and past a receiving line, many opted to head before cocktails to the exhibit, set in a pure white setting with geometric structures housing some of the designer’s most famous collections.
One of those displays had actor Ansel Elgort staring at the strange body forms dreamed up by Kawakubo for her 1997 collection “Body Meets Dress, Dress Meets Body,” in which garments are stretched over bizarre protrusions coming from the stomach, the back, the waist or the hip.
“It’s sort of a comment on what people are doing to their bodies these days. I think that may be what she’s doing here,” Elgort suggested.
Some of the guests were wearing Kawakubo’s designs, known for their boundary-pushing, avant-garde nature, but not for their wearability. One of them, Michele Lamy, wife of designer Rick Owens, was wearing a red-and-pink Comme des Garcons dress that looked like a pile of unfinished strips of fabrics, somehow hanging loosely together.
“Yes, she’s a visionary, she is hugely influential, but she also makes it fun,” Lamy said.
Isabelle Huppert, the French film star, was wearing a Dior leather beret as she examined the exhibit. “It’s amazing, really like an art installation, not a fashion exhibit,” she said.
Lucas Hedges, the young actor nominated for an Oscar this year for “Manchester by the Sea,” suggested that the exhibit felt “like a guided meditation on fashion, life and beauty.”
Broadway actress Laura Osnes was experiencing her first Met gala. Wintour, she said, had come to see her new show, “Bandstand,” the week before, and suddenly invited her. There followed a mad rush to find something worthy to wear. Osnes ended up with a dramatically voluminous – in other words, huge – pink skirt with rose appliques and a long train by Christian Siriano. It was one of the more striking outfits of the evening.
“I figured, who knows if I’ll be here ever again,” Osnes said.
She soon found other Broadway stars to compare notes with: Josh Groban was there, as was Tony-winner Cynthia Erivo, and Andy Karl, who stars in “Groundhog Day” and famously tore his anterior cruciate ligament just before the show opened. Karl seemed in good shape, saying he was progressing well in physical therapy.
Speaking of being in shape, two of the best tennis players in history were in the room. The pregnant Serena Williams was in bright green Versace – and yes, she was glowing. As for ever-dapper Roger Federer, he lived up to his reputation with a Gucci tux that held a huge, jeweled surprise on the back.
“Is that a dragon?” he was asked.
“No! It’s a king cobra,” he replied. Then he posed for a few more pictures, and headed into dinner.
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Midler, Blanchett, Field Score Tony Nominations for Best of Broadway
Bette Midler, Cate Blanchett and Sally Field received best actress nominations in Broadway’s Tony Awards on Tuesday, while “Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812” scored a leading 12 nominations including the top prize, best musical.
Close behind was the hit revival of “Hello, Dolly!” which took 10 nominations, including one for actor David Hyde Pierce.
“Dear Evan Hansen,” “Groundhog Day The Musical” and “Come From Away” received best musical nominations as well.
Best play nominees included “Oslo,” “Sweat,” “Indecent,” and “A Doll’s House, Part 2,” which won nominations for stars Laurie Metcalf and Chris Cooper.
The Tony Awards will be presented on June 11 at Manhattan’s Radio City Music Hall in a ceremony headlined by film and stage star Kevin Spacey.
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Singer Janet Jackson to Go Back on Tour After Time off for Family
Singer Janet Jackson has announced she is going back on tour later this year, returning to the stage in the United States and Canada after taking time off to give birth to her first child.
In a video message to fans, the pop star also referred to media reports that she had split from her Qatari businessman husband Wissam al-Mana, saying: “Yes I separated from my husband, we are in court and the rest is in God’s hands.”
Jackson, 50, last year said she was postponing her “Unbreakable” music tour due to a “sudden change” in the couple’s plans to start a family. She gave birth to son Eissa in January.
“I’m continuing my tour as I promised, I’m so excited,” the singer said in the video posted on her Twitter feed, thanking fans for their patience and support.
“I decided to change the name of the tour, ‘State of the World’ tour. It’s not about politics, it’s about people, the world, relationships and just love.”
The youngest child in the famed musical Jackson family, the Grammy Award winning singer began her “Unbreakable” tour in summer 2015. She will kick off the four-month, 56-date North American “State of the World” tour on Sept. 7 in Lafayette, Louisiana.
“I am so excited,” Jackson said. “I cannot wait to see you on stage September 7th.”
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