President Obama is officially running for reelection , but somehow his campaign slogan has gone from “Yes We Can” to “You Know, Whatever,” Jon Stewart complained last night on the Daily Show . Obama’s first campaign video features supporters with a disturbing lack of enthusiasm, saying (and Stewart is, of course, paraphrasing…
Continue reading …The ozone layer above the Arctic withered by 40% this winter, according to the UN’s weather agency, a stark increase from the previous seasonal record of 30%. The loss was driven largely by frigid conditions in the stratosphere—though surface temperatures were actually warmer than normal—and lingering chemicals banned…
Continue reading …After a strong start on Dancing With the Stars last month, Kirstie Alley took a tumble last night—literally. She had just started her emotional rumba with partner Maksim Chmerkovskiy when Chmerkovskiy’s leg gave out, and he fell to the floor and pulled Alley along with him. Fortunately they rebounded,…
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Unlikely to ever appear in a giant egg, Adele’s everyday universality has let her talent translate into phenomenal sales Last week Adele’s second album, 21, sold 257,000 copies in the UK , a sales figure that would look incredible as an opening sales week for any album by any global superstar. The fact that the album was celebrating its 10th week at No 1, and that each of the previous nine weeks it had sold over 100,000 copies, makes what Adele has achieved look miraculous. The last female singer to spend that long at No 1 in the UK was Madonna in 1990 with her greatest hits compilation, The Immaculate Collection. For Adele, the success of 21 is part of a perfect storm of talent, timing and a connection that’s transcended gender, age and credibility. But what does it say about the state of the music industry? Does Adele’s success signal a return to the mid-noughties musical depression, when the likes of James Blunt dominated the charts? Her success may well lead to a glut of similar acts aiming for an MOR audience, but that’s more the fault of an industry desperate to recreate any kind of success by creating poor facsimiles until the world shouts “stop now”. What seems to have set Adele apart is her apparent ordinariness, bar that incredible voice. While Gaga parades around in a dress made of meat and Beyoncé orbits a world out of touch to the majority of most human beings, Adele’s chain-smoking, girl-you’d-like-to-go-to-the-pub-with persona stands out. Even for a British act, her unstarriness goes against trend, with fellow Brit school alumnus Jessie J adopting a very American habit of over-emoting, talking about a ” journey ” and making the idea of being a pop star seem fairly arduous. It’s this universality and broad appeal that’s helped her translate talent into sales. While the first single from 21, Rolling in the Deep, appealed to Radio 1 listeners and bloggers with production by Paul Epworth and a remix by Jamie from the xx, the second single, Someone Like You, is a Radio 2 staple, a stripped-back, piano-augmented ballad that silenced the cavernous O2 Arena during this year’s Brit Awards . The broadsheet press can write pages and pages on her safe in the knowledge that there’s enough of a muso connection – Rick Rubin worked on the album, there’s a cover of the Cure, Mumford & Sons were an influence – while the gossip magazines have latched onto the fact that the album is one long break-up record, eager to find the ex. In 1990, Madonna was a global superstar with a back catalogue of era-defining hits to her name. She was untouchable and, tellingly, unknowable. She was (and still is) a megastar, but a megastar of a different age. These days, we want to know a bit more about our artists; that they have relationship problems, walk their dog. Her selling point and appeal is precisely the fact that she exists at the point between everyday ordinariness and pop star. She’s not boring, but at the same time she’s probably unlikely to arrive at the Grammys in a giant egg. Her success is testament to the power of good songs and the fact that if you can create a buzz (as she did in November with a stark reading of Someone Like You on Jools Holland) and harness that buzz through a solid album, then it can still translate to sales. For now, Adele’s success should be celebrated, not least for becoming an unlikely global star on her own terms. The danger is that we’re headed for a glut of fairly “beige” pop, a situation that led to the “birth” of Gaga a few years back. Pop goes in cycles and it feels like we’re headed back towards the very middle of MOR. Adele Pop and rock Celebrity Michael Cragg guardian.co.uk
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British Council celebrates 50th anniversary of Gagarin’s orbit of the Earth with an exhibition and statue in the Mall Yuri Gagarin, the son of peasant farmworkers who instantly became the most famous man on Earth when he went into space and orbited the planet 50 years ago, is to be celebrated with a statue on the Mall in London. The British Council announced that it is going to mark the achievements of the great Russian explorer by placing him opposite the statue of a great British explorer, Captain Cook. Andrea Rose, the council’s visual arts director and driving force behind the project, said the cosmonaut’s successful mission in Vostok 1 was “a story that is of importance to all of us”. She added: “The fragility and the daring and the bravery of the missions are something beyond recognition and are reasons why we wanted to celebrate Gagarin as a symbol of aspiration, as well as intellectual curiosity.” Rose said there was an imbalance in western knowledge of space history. We know the story of Apollo and Neil Armstrong but fewer of us now know the incredible story of Gagarin. As well as the statue, the British Council will host an exhibition on his life which will include rare and intimate photographs lent by the Gagarin family as well as artefacts such as an ejector seat and the first space suit, SK-1. The project partly stemmed from Rose’s professional connection with Gagarin’s daughter, Elena Gagarina, director of the Kremlin museums where, next year, a Henry Moore exhibition will be held. Rose had been talking to Gagarina about lending Moore’s double-edged sculpture – which has for the past 40 years been outside the Houses of Parliament – to Russia to display in the Kremlin gardens. Rose then began thinking about what could be brought from Russia as a possible replacement for Moore’s sculpture and so began the hunt for a suitable Gagarin statue. The one chosen is a copy of the Gagarin statue which stands outside the cosmonaut’s former school – Lyubertsy Vocational School No 10. The authorities there were reluctant to give up the original so the Russian space agency offered to have a cast made from the original moulds. It will be installed on the Mall on 14 July for a year. The date and spot were chosen to mark the 50th anniversary of Gagarin’s trip to London where he met the prime minister Harold Macmillan. The statue will be made from zinc alloy and stand on a white Portland stone plinth. “We don’t want kids swinging from the orbit,” said Rose. There are lots of more formal statues of Gagarin but this jaunty one was praised by the cosmonaut’s biographer, Piers Bizony. “It is a reflection of the man,” he said. “Yuri Gagarin was charming, funny, sweet-natured and kind.” The statue is also a way of fostering good relations between the UK and Russia. Vitaly Davydov, state secretary and deputy head of the Russian space agency, said: “Gagarin belongs not only to Russia but to all countries and nations, and it’s important to us that the statue of Yuri Gagarin will be shown in London – one of the world’s most international and intercultural cities – to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first manned spaceflight. “Russia and the UK have much in common, not only as allies during the second world war and victory gained through sacrifice, but as nations which have always been eager to travel to the unknown and to discover new space. Gagarin symbolises this aspiration.” Yuri Gagarin London Russia Space Sculpture Mark Brown guardian.co.uk
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Foreign minister declares Heather Hodges ‘persona non grata’ after leaked cables signed by her office allege police corruption The US ambassador to Ecuador has been asked to leave the country over leaked diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks that allege police corruption. The foreign minister, Ricardo Patino, told reporters he had not received a satisfactory explanation from the ambassador, Heather Hodges, about cables previously released by WikiLeaks and signed by her office. “Ecuador’s government has decided to consider this woman as a persona non grata … we have asked her to leave the country in the shortest time possible,” he said. Patino said the decision did not mean Ecuador was breaking off relations with the United States. WikiLeaks has caused an international uproar by handing sensitive US diplomatic documents to the media. The US ambassador to Mexico resigned last month after a public spat with President Felipe Calderón. Tensions were fueled by WikiLeaks reports of comments made by the envoy about Mexico’s lack of co-ordination in battling drug cartels. Late last year, Ecuador offered WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange the possibility of working and seeking residency in the Andean country. But President Rafael Correa later withdrew the offer saying Assange had broken US laws. Ecuador US foreign policy The US embassy cables US national security WikiLeaks United States guardian.co.uk
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PC Simon Harwood says he gave newspaper seller ‘a very poor push’ to move him away from police line during G20 protests The police officer who struck and pushed Ian Tomlinson shortly before he died was “amazed” to see the newspaper vendor fall to the ground after what he termed “a pretty poor push”, an inquest has heard. PC Simon Harwood told the central London jury that he had decided to tackle Tomlinson because he thought he was refusing to move away from a police line during the G20 protests in London in April 2009. “I felt at the time he was obstructing the police line moving forward,” he said. However, asked whether he had believed the 47-year-old posed a threat to either himself or anyone else, Harwood repied: “No, I don’t believe he did.” Harwood said he stepped out from behind a pair of police dog handlers to “engage” Tomlinson after he failed to move away. “I thought it was proportional to do so, because he was still not moving away from the police line,” he said. “I then struck Mr Tomlinson around the upper half of his left leg – to his thigh – with my baton. I didn’t get any immediate reacton from Mr Tomlinson … as [a] reaction, I pushed him in the top part of his right shoulder. I pushed him with my right palm. Once I had pushed Mr Tomlinson across the shoulder, he tended to fall forward and as he fell forwards I was then, was amazed, as he fell forwards, and once he had fallen over [I] was then looking around to make sure of any other threat that may be in front of me as well, and then retraced back behind the dogs.” Asked by Alison Hewitt, counsel for the inquest, why he had been amazed to see Tomlinson fall, Harwood replied: “The push that I had used wasn’t that much force in my mind to have caused that to happen.” Pressed on how much force he had used, Harwood said: “It was reasonable, but it was quite a poor push, from my recollection, it was a very poor push … usually [the blow] will go into the back of someone, but I actually pushed across Mr Tomlinson, it went across his shoulder, rather than into his shoulder … contact was made, but it glanced rather than pushed through. It wasn’t pushed through.” Asked if he agreed with witnesses who said he had fallen hard, the police officer said: “No I was more shocked [by] the fact that he actually fell forward, I couldn’t explain, from my memory whether he fell hard or not.” He told the jury he had moved away from the scene after judging Tomlinson to be OK as he had started to talk and gesticulate to other officers. He then walked away and did not see Tomlinson again. He heard what had happened to Tomlinson about a week later after watching a report on the news. The inquest continues. Ian Tomlinson G20 London Sam Jones Paul Lewis guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …A professor who got fed up with a student surfing the Internet instead of taking notes has been arrested and suspended for closing her laptop. Frank Rybicki, a professor of mass media at Valdosta State University, was arrested for battery after the student complained that her finger had been hurt…
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A programme of nuclear power stations will be delayed by at least three months awaiting report on Japan disaster • Chris Huhne faces legal challenge over nuclear link to cancer in children The government’s plans to build a new programme of nuclear power stations in England will be delayed by at least three months so that lessons can be learned from the accident at Fukushima in Japan. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and the Environment Agency (EA) , which are jointly assessing the safety of proposed reactor designs, have said this year’s deadline for completing the assessments will now not be met. The two regulatory agencies said that they would not come to any conclusions in June as had been promised. Instead they will wait for a final report on the implications of Fukushima, by the chief nuclear inspector, Mike Weightman, due in September. Weightman has been asked by the energy and climate change secretary, Chris Huhne, to examine the lessons that could be learned from the Japanese accident, triggered by an earthquake and a tsunami last month. Until now it had not been clear how this would impact on the ” generic design assessment ” of reactors which the HSE and EA have been working on since 2006. In a joint statement, the two agencies said: “Safety and protection of people and the environment will always be our top priority. It is important that we take the necessary time needed to ensure that we learn any relevant lessons emerging from the events in Japan, and implement any improvements that might be required to the new reactor designs.” New reactors cannot be built until the regulators are satisfied they are safe. A spokesman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said the Weightman’s recommendations should be taken into account. “It’s too early to say exactly what impact this will have on the overall timeline. We’re continuing with our facilitative actions to encourage investment to come forward as soon as possible,” he said. But this was in marked contrast to a statement by the climate change minister, Greg Barker. He was quoted by Bloomberg as saying that Fukushima would cause no “material delay” to Britain’s nuclear power programme. The French company that wants to build its EPR design of power station, EDF Energy, has been previously quoted as saying that any delays due to Fukushima would be “minimal” . The US firm, Westinghouse, is bidding to build differently designed AP1000 reactors. Last October the UK government gave the initial go-ahead for new nuclear stations at eight sites around the coast of England and Wales. Last week, the Guardian revealed that ministers were being taken to court over allegations that cancer risks had not been properly evaluated. The Nuclear Industry Association, which represents UK nuclear companies, said that the regulators’ announcement was “correct”. A spokesman said: “We should take time to review and learn the lessons of the Japanese crisis, while at the same time recognising that new nuclear development is essential for the UK.” Nuclear power Energy Japan disaster Japan Chris Huhne Green politics Rob Edwards guardian.co.uk
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Many military and security personnel join group pushing for peace treaties with Syria, Lebanon and the Palestinians A group of prominent Israelis, including heads of the army and security services, hope to revive the peace initiative by announcing details of possible treaties with the Palestinians, Syria and Lebanon. The Israeli Peace Initiative, a two-page document, states that Israel will withdraw from the land it occupied in 1967 in both the West Bank and the Golan Heights, and pay compensation to refugees. The document has been given to Binyamin Netanyahu, the prime minister, who has said he will read it with interest. The authors of the document, which will be launched at a press conference in Tel Aviv on Wednesday, say that it is partly inspired by the revolutions that have taken place in the Middle East. It presents an opportunity for Israelis to participate in the “winds of change” blowing through the Middle East, they say. “We looked around at what was happening in neighbouring countries and we said to ourselves, ‘It is about time that the Israeli public raised its voice as well.’ We feel this initiative can bring along many members of the public,” Danny Yatom, the former head of the Israeli external security agency, Mossad, told the New York Times. The group aims to generate public support for a peace agreement that will force the Israeli government to re-engage with the Palestinians, who have suspended meetings in protest at continued settlement building in the West Bank. Palestinians see such building as an attempt to create “facts on the ground” that obstruct negotiations. Yaakov Perry, a former head of Shin Bet, the internal security agency, said he hoped that the plan would galvanise the Israeli government in this time of change around the Middle East. “We are isolated internationally and seen to be against peace,” he told the New York Times. “I hope this will make a small contribution to pushing our prime minister forward. It is about time that Israel initiates something on peace.” The Israeli Peace Initiative recognises the Arab Peace Initiative of 2002, which was sponsored by the government of Saudi Arabia, as “a historic effort made by the Arab states to reach a breakthrough and achieve peace on a regional basis”. The Israeli initiative endorses the Arab statement that “a military solution to the conflict will not achieve peace or provide security for the parties”. The initiative lays out the framework for peace agreements between Israel, Syria and the Palestinians. It calls for a sovereign and independent Palestinian state based on the borders between Israel and Jordan in 1967 but modified to ensure territorial contiguity for the Palestinian state. Some settlements would be placed under Israeli control. Compensation would be paid to refugees and their host countries by Israel and the international community, according to the initiative, but the refugees would be able to return only to the Palestinian state, with a few exceptions who would be allowed to return to what is now Israel. The plan also calls for a road link between the West Bank and Gaza, which would cut across Israeli territory but would be under Palestinian control. It also calls for Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights over five years in order to achieve peace with Syria and a peace agreement with Lebanon. Dan Meridor, the deputy prime minister, speaking at an event in Jerusalem, said he had not yet studied the document. “The paradigm is clear, that is a two-state solution, but the other elements should be negotiated, not dictated,” he said. Referring to the uprisings elsewhere in the Middle East, he said: “Some people say that we should wait for the aftershocks to happen, for everything to settle down, but I don’t believe we can wait.” Israel Palestinian territories Syria Lebanon Middle East Conal Urquhart guardian.co.uk
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