A computer repairman in California doubled up as a virtual Peeping Tom, adding spyware to the Mac laptops of female customers so he could photograph them undressing and showering, police say. Hundreds of thousands of images and videos have been seized from the computer of 20-year-old Trevor Harwell, who faces…
Continue reading …As NATO jets continue to pound Tripoli, a senior military official in the alliance refused to tell CNN whether Moammar Gadhafi was being directly targeted. He did, however, stress that the leader, as head of the Libyan military, is a “legitimate target” to protect civilians. The UN resolution authorizing NATO’s…
Continue reading …Stately homes, cream teas … and an indie band: countryside opens up to crossover culture
June 10, 2011 No Comment
Guillemots members are among the exhibitors at National Trust’s Nunnington Hall, one of the UK’s most unlikely cutting-edge galleries Two miles from the nearest B road, one of the UK’s leading indie rock band members pauses, hammer in hand, below a 17th-century roof beam, and admits: “I’m scared.” “I mean, can I really put nails into the walls of a National Trust house dating back hundreds of years?” asks Aristazabal Hawkes of Guillemots, the band that has taken over the ancient manor’s top floor. Busy with his own staple gun and a tough stretch of Yorkshire oak, the manager of Nunnington Hall, Simon Lee, replies: “Sure. Bryan Adams did, and Mary McCartney. Why not Guillemots as well?” It’s an exchange that highlights the extraordinary growth of one of the country’s most unlikely cutting-edge galleries, spread across miles of stately home and cream tea country on the edge of the North York Moors. Not just Nunnington, but an entire, delectable slice of North Yorkshire countryside has joined the contemporary circuit for critics, collectors and anyone interested in “crossover culture” – musicians who paint, artists who sing, sculptors who write and many more. “It’s an exploration of the nature of creativity,” says Lee, one of a string of arts commissioners who are bringing well-known names from across the world to nooks such as Nunnington and the former home of Lawrence Sterne, nearby Shandy Hall. The curator there, Patrick Wildgust, hosts New York poets, South American intellectuals and European artists at the world’s first Centre for Non-Linear Narrative, inspired by Sterne’s erratic masterpiece Tristram Shandy. “There seems to be something restless about creativity,” says Fyfe Dangerfield, founder of Guillemots, which has been nominated for Mercury and Brit awards. He is equally busy with tape and glue as the band’s exhibition goes up in a corridor and two rooms at Nunnington. “Some people argue that it can be narrow – a well-developed ear, for instance, may mean less visual awareness. But we find that music, doodling, taking photographs and making films all play a part in what Guillemots wants to do.” A noted classical music composer as well as Guillemots’ lead singer, Dangerfield was talent-spotted for his drawings by Lee. After increasing Nunnington’s annual visitor numbers to 65,000 with photograph shows by Adams and McCartney, as well as Rolling Stone Ronnie Wood and Andy Summers of the Police, Lee was surfing Guillemots’ website and clicked on their gallery of artwork. “I thought: this is good stuff and very much in our line of discovering other creative sides to people known for one talent,” says Lee. “To put it crudely, if you cut off a guitarist’s hand, what are the odds that they would find another medium to express themselves?” Guillemots members were initially fazed by the invitation. “I thought it might be a wind-up,” said Dangerfield, “but then I suggested extending it to the whole of the band, and it’s fascinating what’s come out.” Hawkes is exhibiting family photographs and collages of concert wristbands, backstage passes and the like; MC Lord Magrão screens a 10-minute film noir; and the fourth band member, Greig Stewart, who says his closest public brush with art was being hugged by Damien Hirst at a drunken Groucho Club bash, has clay sculpture and wall-hangings. Visitors to the hall keep dropping in on the hanging sessions; with one demanding the “disgusting music” to Magrão’s film be switched off, but others intrigued by the crossover theme. Retired teachers Judy and Eric Murphy from Sheffield chimed with Dangerfield’s ‘restless notion’, saying: “We’ve always liked Guillemots and got their first album, but this looks as though it’s going to tell us a whole lot more about them.” The exhibition runs from 14 June to the end of July, after which Lee will Polyfilla and revarnish his attics while planning Nunnington’s next contribution to the wider countryside gallery programme. “There’s no problem getting busy or famous people to come here,” he said, “because it’s one of the loveliest parts of England. And they appreciate being asked. If anyone says, ‘Who do they think they are?’ or ‘It’s all rubbish’, the answer is that we invited them; they didn’t push to come.” The National Trust Indie Guillemots Art Cultural trips Martin Wainwright guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …A British university student is accusing Apple of stealing a syncing app that he presented to the official Apple app store over a year ago. Earlier this week Apple unveiled new features for its upcoming iOS 5, including a function to wirelessly sync iPhones and iTunes which has the same…
Continue reading …MTV has pulled the plug on controversial sexed-up teen drama Skins after just one season. The much-talked-about US adaptation of the British hit, deserted by advertisers under pressure from the Parents Television Council , never attracted a huge audience, although it outperformed MTV’s other scripted show, The Hard Times of R….
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Up to 5,000 troops and dozens of tanks reportedly massed near Turkish border as revolt against regime enters decisive phase Syrian forces equipped with dozens of tanks were reportedly massed outside a near-deserted town near the Turkish border as the revolt against the regime of President Bashar al-Assad entered a potentially decisive phase. Human rights campaigners and people who have been in the vicinity of Jisr al-Shughour said there had been shooting near the town on Friday, where there has been shelling in recent days. Witnesses have claimed up to 5,000 troops are involved, which appeared to confirm reports on Syrian state TV that the regime has started a new military operation on the town where a mass defection of troops to rebels has also been credibly reported. Damascus has admitted 120 officers and security personnel based in the town were killed by “armed groups”. Information about events on the ground remained patchy, since most foreign journalists are banned and there are heavy restrictions on local media, but previous Fridays have seen increased violence across Syria as protesters and forces loyal to Assad have clashed. Jisr al-Shughour usually has a population of 41,000 but thousands of people have fled to nearby villages and across the border into southern Turkey, where the authorities are offering humanitarian assistance. They have been reluctant to let most people speak to waiting media, although some refugees making their way independently have managed to give their accounts of the latest crackdown on the national uprising which began three months ago and is said by human rights groups to have cost at least 13,000 lives. The government says 500 members of the security forces have been killed. Nadim Houry from Human Rights Watch, which is monitoring the situation from Beirut, told the Guardian: “We managed to get through to someone in a town not far from Jisr al-Shughour and they reported hearing gunshots in a town called Sermaniyyeh. That seems to confirm what Syrian state TV indicated earlier today that the army has started its ‘military operation’ on Jisr al-Shughour. “Based on what’s happened over the last three months we are very worried that we are going to see yet again a large number of killings of protesters.” Houry said: “Based on various testimonies there have been some defections, what we don’t know is the scale of these defections. In Egypt and Tunisia, the decision of the army to stop shooting at protesters or to refuse orders was key to convincing the regime that it was time to go [but] we have to wait and see what’s going to happen in Syria. Things are playing out differently there, the loyalty of the officers in Syria remains clearly with the regime.” Turkey’s prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who had close ties to Assad, on Thursday criticised the crackdown. Interviewed on Turkey’s ATV television, he said some images coming out of Syria were “unpalatable” and suggested Turkey could support a UN security council decision against Syria. “They are not acting in a humane manner. This is savagery,” he said. Syria Arab and Middle East unrest Bashar Al-Assad Middle East Refugees Martin Chulov Matthew Weaver James Meikle guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Mitt Romney is going to skip the Ames Straw Poll in Iowa this summer, along with every other straw poll in the country. The Iowa poll is seen as a crucial test of a campaign’s strength, but Romney campaign officials say they plan to save resources for winning primaries and…
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Prime minister takes responsibility for public anger over NHS bill but brushes off claims he is making a ‘mess’ of reforms David Cameron has claimed that the listening exercise the government was forced to undertake to salvage the NHS bill was a “strong” thing for the government to do. Earlier this week, the prime minister announced that key elements of health secretary Andrew Lansley’s original blueprint were being abandoned following the two-month listening exercise on the health and social care bill launched in April. The announcement came amid mounting criticism of the coalition’s controversial NHS reforms. The U-turn on elements of the bill prompted Labour leader Ed Miliband on Wednesday to accuse Cameron of making a “complete mess” of health and justice reforms. Miliband launched the attack after reports the government had also ditched plans to introduce a 50% prison sentence discount for early guilty pleas after holding talks with Ken Clarke, the justice secretary, on Tuesday. In an appearance on ITV’s This Morning on Friday, Cameron sought to cast the NHS rethink as a sign of political strength rather than weakness. He said “a number of doctors and nurses are coming back on board”, adding that openness to change is “not weak, it’s sensible”. “In fact, I think it’s strong,” he said. Appearing relaxed on the show, the prime minister said he took responsibility for the two policy areas that have provoked a public outcry – health and sentencing policy. “I knew exactly what was in our health plans when they were announced and exactly what was in our criminal justice consultation paper when we launched it,” Cameron said. “It’s as much my responsibility as it was Andrew Lansley’s or Kenneth Clarke’s. We are a team, we play as a team, and that’s absolutely the way I run my government.” Cameron stressed Clarke’s plans were out to consultation. But he appeared to confirm reports that the 50% sentence reduction idea had been dropped by saying he wanted rapists and murderers and those who commit violence to go to prison “for a very, very long time”. He said: “We are going to make sure the right people are being sent to prison for the right amount of time and make sure we reform.” Asked if Clarke got a yellow card for his comments about giving rapists a 50% sentence reduction if they admitted to the crime, Cameron said many things in the consultation paper that were “extremely good” would be taken forward, including “tougher community punishments”. He rejected the idea that prisons were holiday camps – “They are tough, and they should be tough” – but he indicated that criminals working in the community to make amends for their crimes would form part of his plans for the “big society”. Cameron said it was appalling that people were going to prison, at a cost of £45,000 a year for each place, only for half of them to re-offend again within the first year of release. “Magistrates will be happier punishing people in the community if they really felt they were scrubbing graffiti off walls and cleaning up the streets and making amends for the dreadful things they have done,” he said. Asked why those who commit crimes were not part of the “big society” plans, Cameron told co-host Eammon Holmes, “They will be”, before adding that it would take time to deliver. Cameron fielded questions on NHS pay, welfare reforms, overseas aid and the economy. He said the government’s plans to “rebalance” the economy was making progress but that “it is going to be choppy”. “There will be good months and bad months,” he said. “People will judge this government at the end of our parliamentary term in 2015. People will be able to make a judgement – did they do the right thing in terms of dealing with the deficit? We are taking difficult decisions, unpopular decisions, but I would rather take the right decisions now and actually see the economy grow in the long term than try and be popular now and do the wrong thing.” He added: “It’s very easy in politics just to think of tomorrow and what the papers will say and not think of the long term. In my job you have got to think, ‘Is what I am doing going to help the country in the long term?’” David Cameron NHS Health Prisons and probation UK criminal justice Liberal-Conservative coalition Hélène Mulholland guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …America’s baking heat wave claimed five lives yesterday before storms plunged temperatures as much as 40 degrees. The heat was so intense across the Midwest and East that it buckled pavement on a major Michigan interstate, killed power in Detroit, and shut schools across New Jersey, reports MSNBC . Dozens of…
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Immigration rights activists plan court challenge to state law requiring public schools to check students’ status The Republican governor Robert Bentley has signed a crackdown on illegal immigration into Alabama law, with both supporters and critics considering the measures to be the toughest in the country. The crackdown will require public schools to determine the immigration status of students – an aspect not covered in an Arizona law that has been at the forefront of attempts by several US states to crack down on illegal immigrants. Under the Alabama law, police must detain someone they suspect of being in the country illegally if the person cannot produce proper documentation when stopped for any reason. It also will be a crime to knowingly transport or harbour someone who is in the country illegally. The law imposes penalties on businesses that knowingly employ someone without legal resident status, and business licences could be suspended or revoked. The law – due to come into effect on 1 September – requires businesses to use a database called E-Verify to confirm the immigration status of new employees. “We have a real problem with illegal immigration in this country,” Bentley said after signing the law on Thursday. “I campaigned for the toughest immigration laws, and I’m proud of the legislature for working tirelessly to create the strongest immigration bill in the country.” Immigration rights advocates are vowing to challenge the law in court, after having sued to block similar measures in Arizona, Utah, Indiana and Georgia. The US justice department also sued over Arizona’s law. The courts blocked the implementation of a provision allowing Arizona police to check the immigration status of people there . But the US supreme court recently endorsed a separate Arizona law requiring employers to use E-Verify . The court also ruled that Arizona could suspend or revoke business licences of companies that knowingly employ illegal immigrants. Alabama’s law is unique in requiring public schools to determine, by review of birth certificates or sworn affidavits, the legal residency status of students. “We fear that it will, in effect, ban the student through fear and harassment,” Shay Farley, the legal director of Alabama Appleseed, a non-profit policy and legal advocacy organisation, said. Farley said there was concern about the increased financial burden on schools for collecting the information. “We definitely believe this is the nation’s toughest immigration law,” Jared Shepherd, a law fellow with the Alabama American Civil Liberties Union, said. The Alabama bill passed the state House of Representatives and Senate by large margins before landing on Bentley’s desk. Republicans took majority control of both chambers last year for the first time in 136 years. Civil and immigrant rights groups mounted a campaign against the measure, urging voters to contact the governor and ask him to veto the bill. Some pointed to concerns in Georgia, where farmers have complained that tough new curbs on immigration are creating a shortage of seasonal workers before they even come into effect. But Gene Armstrong, the mayor of Allgood, Alabama, a small community in which the Hispanic population has grown to almost 50%, said: “We managed in the past without illegal immigrants to pick the tomatoes here, and I haven’t heard anyone say that if we sent them all home nobody would be left to do that work. “When you have 9% unemployment, I think that some people who might not have wanted those jobs previously might reconsider.” Several states have enacted immigration restrictions, even though the US government considers it to be a federal issue. Alabama US immigration United States guardian.co.uk
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