News and Current Events - 2017 - 2022

[fritzkep]

Came across an interesting comment in a WaPo article from yesterday.

"Morality is never easy even though the word itself is abused and twisted by the right-wing to make doing the wrong thing more palatable."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/02/22/mark-harriss-son-irony-trumpism/?fbclid=IwAR13SO-SZhNvjK7gx_ATpHJU4RmDZMH3a8zmPZLPeUx7dIMiqJBv8BT37tI&utm_term=.115ae628064b

[killersmom]

So very good, Fritz.

[Paul029]

He wanted more money, plain and simple. Now he is going to jail, has lost his career, and mostly his reputation. Greed really does make people do really STUPID things. Was it worth it? NO! And I agree Nancy, this does the reporting of hate crimes no good.

... I believe there are more important things to report on at the top of the newscasts than a greedy, big headed, not very well known actor.

Yes indeed, Linda

... with everything else bad that is so more important in the world to report about, the media has blown this so out of proportion.

I guess disproportionate reporting of events depends on which media outlets are involved.

[Paul029]

Meanwhile, to maintain a sense of proportion, or just to keep things in perspective ...

Hayabusa 2 Successfully Collects Sample From Asteroid Ryugu

In a history-making mission that could provide clues to the origin of the solar system, the Japanese probe Hayabusa 2 had an eventful landing on Thursday at 11.30pm GMT, some 186 million miles from Earth.

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) sent a long-awaited command, and the probe landed on the surface of the speeding type C asteroid Ryugu, shot it with a pellet to scoop up surface material, then blasted back to its orbiting position.

According to JAXA, Hayabusa 2 made it to the surface as intended. As soon as it made contact, the probe fired off a 5-gram “bullet” composed of the high-density metal tantalum at more than 300 meters per second. The impact created a cloud of dust and rock fragments, some of which fell into the collection tube. JAXA confirmed that Hayabusa 2 then returned to its orbiting position 20 km above the asteroid.

Asteroid Ryugu from Hayabusa 2

The image above, taken from 6 km above the asteroid, shows surface structures unknown before the spacecraft’s arrival, including rock fields and craters.

Ryugu belongs to a family of space rocks that are the most primitive building blocks of the solar system. “This is the material that didn’t get swept up into planets, it got left behind,” said John Bridges, a professor of planetary science at the University of Leicester. “The reason we want to study it is that this is what material was like at year zero.”

Similar material falls to Earth as meteorites, but it is battered and burned as it tears through the atmosphere and quickly becomes contaminated when it thumps into the ground. The asteroid material from Hayabusa 2 will show scientists what meteorite material is like before it plunges to Earth.

Studying Ryugu (Asteroid 162173) could provide information not only about the asteroid’s surface and interior, but about what materials were available in the early Solar System for the development of life. Asteroids like Ryugu are interesting for several reasons, perhaps foremost because they are near the Earth and might, one day in the far future, pose an impact threat. But as it is thought to be composed of mostly nickel and iron, Ryugu is also interesting because it may be possible to send future spacecraft there to be mined, thus providing humanity with a new source of valuable metals.

Hayabusa 2 still has another tantalum bullet in the chamber with Ryugu’s name on it. JAXA hasn’t offered specifics on when it will be used, but a subsurface sampling is currently scheduled for April of this year.

The surface of Ryugu has been exposed to solar radiation for billions of years, so material inside the asteroid may have a different composition. To get at it, Hayabusa 2 is going to have to blast a crater.

To do that, the probe will deploy the Small Carry-on Impactor (SCI) device then retreat to a safe distance on the other side of the asteroid. The SCI carries an HMX shaped explosive charge that will accelerate a 5.5 pound (2.5 kilograms) copper impactor into the surface. The probe will then wait about two weeks for the particulates to settle before descending into the newly formed crater to collect a sample.

JAXA hopes to get as much as 100 milligrams of material from Ryugu over the course of the mission. How much is collected won’t be known until the probe returns to its landing site in Woomera in late 2020, after a journey of more than three billion miles.


https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/286238-hayabusa-2-successfully-collects-sample-from-asteroid-ryugu
https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/21/18234782/jaxa-hayabusa-2-ryugu-asteroid-sample-return-mission
https://phys.org/news/2005-11-japanese-probe-asteroid-apparently-samples.html
https://phys.org/news/2010-07-hayabusa-hint.html
http://www.isas.jaxa.jp/en/missions/spacecraft/current/hayabusa2.html
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/feb/22/japans-hayabusa-2-successfully-touches-down-on-ryugu-asteroid

[morrobay]

Meanwhile, to maintain a sense of proportion, or just to keep things in perspective ...

Hayabusa 2 Successfully Collects Sample From Asteroid Ryugu

In a history-making mission that could provide clues to the origin of the solar system, the Japanese probe Hayabusa 2 had an eventful landing on Thursday at 11.30pm GMT, some 186 million miles from Earth.

The only way you could get a majority of people to pay attention to this is if Beyonce pimped it.........and then it would only be to see when her new video would be released........

[Paul029]

Richard E Grant and Glenn Close get late Oscars boosts with Independent Spirit Awards

The actors, hoping for glory at Sunday night’s Oscars, took top honours at the alternative ceremony, which gave Best Film to Barry Jenkins’s If Beale Street Could Talk.

A late surge in momentum for Richard E Grant ahead of Sunday night’s Oscars peaked on Saturday with victory at the 34th Film Independent Spirit Awards.

The Oscar-nominated actor received the Best Supporting Male award for his role as Jack Hock in the story of celebrity biography Lee Israel, played by Melissa McCarthy, in Can You Ever Forgive Me?

Grant, also nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the upcoming Oscars ceremony, hugged actress Glenn Close when she presented him with the award at the ceremony in Santa Monica.

The actor, 61, said he was “absolutely astonished and emotional” to have won in a category also containing Paul Castillo for We The Animals, Adam Driver for BlacKkKlansman, Josh Hamilton for Eighth Grade and John David Washington for Monsters And Men.

Grant told the audience he was third choice for the part of Jack Hock, a hard-drinking friend to Melissa McCarthy’s literary forger, behind Sam Rockwell and Chris O’Dowd, and that his casting was “arbitrary and it’s luck.”

Hock is diagnosed with HIV in Can You Ever Forgive Me?, and Grant said the role was an “homage” to men “wiped out by that disease.”  Grant dedicated his award to a number of actors during his heartfelt speech, and said his portrayal of Hock was inspired by Scottish actor and star of Chariots of Fire Ian Charleson, a family friend of Grant’s who died aged 40 in 1990 after being diagnosed with AIDS.

It was not Can You Ever Forgive Me?’s only win of the night, with Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Whitty taking out the Best Screenplay award.

Glenn Close received the Best Actress award for her role in The Wife. Close, who has never won an Oscar, has also been Nominated in the Best Actress category at the Oscars for her performance in The Wife, about which she said she was still surprised.

“I mean, it’s a very quiet performance,” she noted. “It’s a very internal performance. And the fact that something that’s so internal had such resonance with people, I still can conjure up how I felt when we first showed it at Toronto and I was astounded by the power that this movie had with the audience. And I’ve never lost that feeling of astonishment.”


https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/feb/24/oscars-richard-e-grant-glenn-close-spirit-awards
https://apnews.com/f61e02e484b04c8a99adc8c0adb2b5a5
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-6738309/Independent-Spirit-Awards-2019-Richard-E-Grant-breaks-tears-wins.html

[BlueAmber63]

Richard E Grant and Glenn Close get late Oscars boosts with Independent Spirit Awards

The actors, hoping for glory at Sunday night’s Oscars, took top honours at the alternative ceremony, which gave Best Film to Barry Jenkins’s If Beale Street Could Talk.

A late surge in momentum for Richard E Grant ahead of Sunday night’s Oscars peaked on Saturday with victory at the 34th Film Independent Spirit Awards.

The Oscar-nominated actor received the Best Supporting Male award for his role as Jack Hock in the story of celebrity biography Lee Israel, played by Melissa McCarthy, in Can You Ever Forgive Me?

Grant, also nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the upcoming Oscars ceremony, hugged actress Glenn Close when she presented him with the award at the ceremony in Santa Monica.

The actor, 61, said he was “absolutely astonished and emotional” to have won in a category also containing Paul Castillo for We The Animals, Adam Driver for BlacKkKlansman, Josh Hamilton for Eighth Grade and John David Washington for Monsters And Men.

Grant told the audience he was third choice for the part of Jack Hock, a hard-drinking friend to Melissa McCarthy’s literary forger, behind Sam Rockwell and Chris O’Dowd, and that his casting was “arbitrary and it’s luck.”

Hock is diagnosed with HIV in Can You Ever Forgive Me?, and Grant said the role was an “homage” to men “wiped out by that disease.”  Grant dedicated his award to a number of actors during his heartfelt speech, and said his portrayal of Hock was inspired by Scottish actor and star of Chariots of Fire Ian Charleson, a family friend of Grant’s who died aged 40 in 1990 after being diagnosed with AIDS.

It was not Can You Ever Forgive Me?’s only win of the night, with Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Whitty taking out the Best Screenplay award.

Glenn Close received the Best Actress award for her role in The Wife. Close, who has never won an Oscar, has also been Nominated in the Best Actress category at the Oscars for her performance in The Wife, about which she said she was still surprised.

“I mean, it’s a very quiet performance,” she noted. “It’s a very internal performance. And the fact that something that’s so internal had such resonance with people, I still can conjure up how I felt when we first showed it at Toronto and I was astounded by the power that this movie had with the audience. And I’ve never lost that feeling of astonishment.”


https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/feb/24/oscars-richard-e-grant-glenn-close-spirit-awards
https://apnews.com/f61e02e484b04c8a99adc8c0adb2b5a5
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-6738309/Independent-Spirit-Awards-2019-Richard-E-Grant-breaks-tears-wins.html

I love Richard E Grant. Such a lovely down to earth bloke. Not up his own
ass at all. Go Richard ! 

[Paul029]

I love Richard E Grant. Such a lovely down to earth bloke. Not up his own
ass at all. Go Richard ! 

I totally agree, BlueAmber, been impressed ever since I saw him in Withnail & I and then, later, in Gosford Park.

Memorable as Jack Hock, and he had a real connection with Melissa McCarthy in their scenes together.

A true gentleman, and a fine actor.

[Paul029]

Cardinal George Pell guilty of sexually abusing choirboys

Pell was convicted last year of sexually abusing two choirboys in 1996 when he was Archbishop of Melbourne.

Details of the trial could not be made public as a suppressions order, prohibited any reporting of the case in Australia, including any website accessible within Australia, was put in place by the Victorian County Court to avoid potentially influencing jurors in another trial on separate sexual offences involving two boys in the state’s regional city of Ballarat, Pell’s home town, in the 1970s.

Prosecutors have now decided not to proceed with the second trial, and the suppression order has been lifted.

Australia’s most senior Catholic cleric, the Vatican’s treasurer and the third most powerful man in the Catholic Church, Pell now faces the prospect of prison time. His five-week trial ended last December, when a jury found Pell guilty of sexual penetration of a child under 16, as well as four counts of committing an indecent act with, or in the presence, of a child.

In December 1996, fresh from presiding over his first Sunday mass in Melbourne’s imposing St Patrick's Cathedral, the newly-installed Archbishop of Melbourne sexually molested a thirteen-year old choirboy in the priest’s sacristy. Exposed and pleasuring himself while still dressed in his ornate ceremonial robes, he then indecently assaulted the boy’s 13-year-old friend.

He will be remanded in custody after a plea hearing on Wednesday, before he is sentenced in two weeks’ time.

Pell leaving the County Court today

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-26/george-pell-guilty-child-abuse-how-it-happened/10847786
https://indaily.com.au/news/2019/02/26/pells-dark-past-finally-exposed/

[brianr]

Cardinal George Pell guilty of sexually abusing choirboys

Pell was convicted last year of sexually abusing two choirboys in 1996 when he was Archbishop of Melbourne.

This is headline news here in New Zealand as well as all over the Australian news. Although not a Catholic, I taught in Catholic schools in Sydney for over 25 years. Pell only moved from Melbourne to Sydney in 2001 towards the end of my teaching time. I know he was generally disliked, he was a cold fish and, of course, I intensely disliked him after he refused to give communion to a group wearing rainbow sashes.
Much as I disliked him, I cannot understand how any intelligent person could have done what he has been found guilty of doing, so openly at the back (robing room) of the cathedral. He had just been ordained archbishop and power must have gone to his head literally.

[fritzkep]

Wrong head.

[Paul029]

This is headline news here in New Zealand as well as all over the Australian news.

It’s also being reported on news sites in many other countries, Brian; in the UK, Ireland, the US, Canada, plus

Nordic: Denmark, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden;

Europe: Albania, Austria, Estonia, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Romania, Spain, Switzerland; 
 
Central & South America: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Venezuela;

Africa: Egypt, Kenya, Libya, Morocco, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe;

Asia: Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Phillipines, Singapore, South Korea, Vietnam;

Middle East: Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, Qatar.

I’ve probably missed a few, but this Australian event is clearly global news.

Although not a Catholic, I taught in Catholic schools in Sydney for over 25 years. Pell only moved from Melbourne to Sydney in 2001 towards the end of my teaching time. I know he was generally disliked, he was a cold fish and, of course, I intensely disliked him after he refused to give communion to a group wearing rainbow sashes.

Well, it looks as if the chickens have at last come home to roost.

[Gazapete]

It opened the news here in Spain, Paul. We clearly have lots to learn from this, we are still waiting to see one of these swines judged.

[Paul029]

Thanks, Elena.
It's also all over YouTube, too, and now I see that I missed Poland and Italy from my Europe list.
In Australia just about every regional online newspaper, and not just those in the capitals, is running the story, too.

[ingmarnicebbmt]

Cardinal George Pell guilty of sexually abusing choirboys

What a dreadful man, what a dreadful affair.

May it "serve" as an example for similar cases - severe punishment without pity or further hypocrisy.