Two premium meats -- Kate Upton and Snoop Dogg -- team up for this wildly ludicrous new music video for Hot Pockets, which humorously remixes BizMarkie's 1989 hit single "Just a Friend (You Got What I Need)" as "You Got What I Eat."
Lines like "I need your hot buttery crust" and "It's my premium meats that make your lips sing a song" are mixed in with lots of marijuana references and psychedelic imagery to produce a crispy finished product that's both fake and flavorful -- just like Hot Pockets.
"I love working with the Hot Pockets sandwiches team," Snoop says in a statement. "They let me do what I do and bring the funk out with their message, you know? We needed to top [previous video] 'Pocket Like It's Hot,' and this video is so dope. It's funnier, and we got the flyest girl in it with me."
"I love the premium meats and the buttery seasoned crusts of the new Hot Pockets sandwiches," adds Upton. "I'm excited to hear which side the fans pick in this IRRESISTIBLY HOT™ battle!"
She's referring to a public vote being held at hotpockets.com pitting #TeamCrust against #TeamMeat in a battle to the death over which Pocket part is preferable.
FULL LYRICS: One, two, three to the heat Stop counting sheep, And move your feet to the beat I bet you're wonderin' "Who are you?" The baker who made new HOT POCKETS come true Now let me give you an introduction To the Master Baker of this production You know he bakes here You know he bakes there He be baking all day I bake everywhere Wanna bake with me? Then come on in We light up taste buds From beginning to end My buttery seasoning so hip It drips Tastes so good Gotta lick your lips Smell my savory garlic but don't disturb The garden where I grow flavor-fantastic-al herbs ...his flavor-fantastical herbs. - YOU... YOU Got What I Eeeeaaattt! You say you're just a baker But you're my HOT POCKETS maker
Oh baby, YOU... YOU Got What I Eeeeaaattt! You got the hot buttery crust I need your hot buttery crust - Hold up, hold up My friend's gotta beef with you Take a step back baker The Butcher's coming through I see you like the crust well I like it too But without my premium meats You got nothing to chew See I'm the Master Butcher And I bow down to zero Online they call me The 8-Bit hero I fly cross the land So my flocks are protected Try to come for my beef And ya gonna get rejected Cuz if you step to me Ya gonna get stuck As your head takes a buck From pepperoni nun-chucks He's got premium meats, The cream of the crop Welcome to my B.I.G.G. Butcher's shop.....ya heaarrdd - YOU... YOU Got What I Eeeeaaattt! You make the Steak and Cheese That brings me to my knees
Oh baby, YOU... YOU Got What I Eeeeaaattt! The flavor is so sweet You know how to spice that meat - Now I know the Butcher Likes to take credit for the show But there's a reason that my bakery Is rollin' in the dough Listen little baby Don't fall for the cuts It's the buttery crust That makes you want it so much
Don't listen to him, girl He's been baking too long It's my premium meats, that make your lips sing a song When that sauce heats up The pepperonis do the rest It's exactly why my new HOT POCKETS are the best - No no no... YOU, both Got What I Eeeeaaattt! I love your buttery crust But I love that meat just as much
Oh YOU... both Got What I Eeeeaaattt! You got all my hot treats You both make me complete
Tristram Stuart, founder of Feeding the 5000, is helping to organize several disco soup events across Europe for World Food Day.
Courtesy of Feeding the 5000
Tristram Stuart, founder of Feeding the 5000, is helping to organize several disco soup events across Europe for World Food Day.
Courtesy of Feeding the 5000
Wednesday is World Food Day, an occasion food activists like to use to call attention to world hunger. With 842 million chronically undernourished people on Earth, it's a problem that hasn't gone away.
This year, activists are trying to make the day a little spicier with pots full of disco soup to highlight the absurd amount of food thrown away that could feed people: one-third of all the food produced every year.
What is disco soup, you ask? It's the tasty outcome of a party designed to bring strangers together to cook food that would otherwise end up in the trash. Oftentimes, the soup is donated to the hungry. Oh, and as the name suggests, there's music involved, too.
The first disco soup party was held in Germany in early 2012 by some folks affiliated with the Slow Food Youth Network Deutschland. The organizers collected discarded fruits and vegetables from a market, blasted some disco music and made a huge pot of soup.
Two months later, a group in France threw a disco soup party and attracted 100 people. More parties followed, in Australia, South Korea, Ireland and beyond. You can check out an earnest little video of another French disco food event here:
The idea eventually caught the attention of Tristram Stuart, a British food waste activist and writer who started Feeding the 5000, a campaign named for an event held in London in 2009 and 2011, where 5,000 members of the public were given a free lunch made with perfectly edible ingredients bound for the rubbish bin.
Stuart is adamant that consumers and businesses in the developed world have a moral obligation to reverse "the global scandal" of food waste. In addition to throwing events to cook up blemished but edible produce, his campaign is working to change European Union legislation on feeding food waste to pigs through the Pig Idea project.
For World Food Day, Feeding the 5000 is hosting a "flagship" disco soup party in Brussels. And the group says more pots full of disco soup will be bubbling away today in the Netherlands, France, Germany, Greece and Macedonia. The event hub is the Disco Anti Food Waste Day Facebook page.
And what if you don't like disco? Can you still have a disco soup event?
"We play anything that gets people dancing as they peel and chop the vegetables and fruit," Dominika Jarosz, event coordinator for Feeding the 5000, tells The Salt in an email.
While there are no disco soup events scheduled for Oct. 16 in the U.S., Feeding the 5000 says disco soup is starting to get traction here. The first U.S. disco soup event was held on Sept. 20 in New York, with the support of Slow Food NYC, the Natural Gourmet Institute, chef Paul Gerard of the East Village restaurant Exchange Alley and the United Nations Environment Program.
In advance of the soup blitz, Stuart visited local farms in New York and New Jersey and gleaned blemished tomatoes, oversized watermelons, squash, eggplants and other fresh produce that the farmers were unable to sell. A rotating crew of DJs provided a soundtrack at the soup-making party at the Chelsea Super Pier, and most of the food was donated to the Bowery Mission. Such events, he says, help raise awareness among food donors like grocery stores and farmers and help them forge long-term relationships with organizations that feed the hungry.
Americans may be getting more motivated to address food waste, but we have to hand it to the Europeans, who do seem to be out in front on the issue. It was a group of Austrians, after all, who started a reality cooking show centered around Dumpster diving.
Food waste was also a talking point for world leaders who spoke up on World Food Day. "Reducing food waste is not, in fact, only a strategy for times of crisis, but a way of life we should adopt if we want a sustainable future for our planet," Nunzia De Girolamo, Italy's minister for agriculture, food and forestry policy, said at a ceremony Wednesday at the Food and Agriculture Organization's headquarters in Rome.
NEW YORK (AP) — The stock market rallied Wednesday afternoon after the Senate announced a last-minute agreement to avoid a U.S. default and reopen the government.
Senate leaders announced the agreement following a partial, 16-day government shutdown. Congress raced to pass the measure by day's end.
The Dow Jones industrial average rose 174 points, or 1.2 percent, to 15,342 in early afternoon trading.
Despite the gridlock, stock investors have stayed largely calm throughout the latest twists in the current fiscal drama in Washington. Even before Wednesday's news, the Standard & Poor's 500 index and the Dow Jones industrial average were up for the month.
"Investors have become, unfortunately, accustomed to some of the dysfunction," said Eric Wiegand, a senior portfolio manager at U.S. Bank. "It's become more the norm than the exception."
The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose 19 points, or 1.2 percent, to 1,717 Wednesday, just eight points from its all-time high of 1,725 set Sept. 18.
The Nasdaq composite rose 41 points, or 1 percent, to 3,835.
Without a debt deal, the U.S. would have hit a Thursday deadline after which it could no longer borrow money to pay its bills, increasing the chance of a default on government debt.
The market for U.S. treasury bills reflected relief among bond investors. The yield on the one-month T-bill dropped to 0.20 percent from 0.40 percent Wednesday morning, an extraordinarily large move. The decline means that investors consider the bill to be less risky.
The yield on the 10-year bond edged down to 2.71 percent from 2.74 percent Tuesday. Yields on longer-term U.S. government debt haven't moved as much as those on short-term debt because investors believed that the government would work out a longer-term solution.
The feeling among traders in recent days was that panicking and pulling money out of the market would hurt their investments.
In the summer of 2011, the S&P 500 index plunged 17 percent between early July and early August as lawmakers argued over raising the debt limit and Standard & Poor's cut the U.S. credit rating from 'AAA,' its highest ranking. The market later recovered.
Stocks also slumped in the last two weeks of 2012 as investors fretted that the U.S. would go over the "fiscal cliff" as lawmakers argued over a series of automatic government spending cuts. Stock also rebounded.
Among stocks making big moves:
— Mattel gained 96 cents, or 2.2 percent, to $42.51, after the company's third-quarter net income rose thanks to high demand for dolls like Monster High, Barbie and American Girl. The results were better than Wall Street analysts had forecast.
— Bank of America rose 30 cents, or 2.1 percent, to $14.55 after the second-largest U.S. bank reported a surge in third-quarter earnings.
— Stanley Black & Decker plunged $12.81, or 14.3 percent, to $76.76 after the company lowered its profit forecast for the year, citing slower growth in emerging markets and a hit from the U.S. government shutdown.
WINTER HAVEN, Fla. (AP) — After 12-year-old Rebecca Sedwick committed suicide last month, one of her tormenters continued to make comments about her online, even bragging about the bullying, a sheriff said Tuesday.
The especially callous remark hastened the arrest of a 14-year-old girl and a 12-year-old girl who were primarily responsible for bullying Rebecca, Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said. They were charged with stalking and released to their parents.
"'Yes, I bullied Rebecca and she killed herself but I don't give a ...' and you can add the last word yourself," the sheriff said, quoting a Facebook post the older girl made Saturday.
Police in central Florida said Rebecca was tormented online and at school by as many as 15 girls before she climbed a tower at an abandoned concrete plant and hurled herself to her death Sept. 9. She is one of at least a dozen or so suicides in the past three years that were attributed at least in part to cyberbullying.
The sheriff said they were still investigating the girls, and trying to decide whether the parents should be charged.
"I'm aggravated that the parents aren't doing what parents should do," the sheriff said. "Responsible parents take disciplinary action."
About a year ago, the older girl threatened to fight Rebecca while they were sixth-graders at Crystal Lake Middle School and told her "to drink bleach and die," the sheriff said. She also convinced the younger girl to bully Rebecca, even though they had been best friends.
The girls repeatedly intimidated Rebecca and called her names, the sheriff said, and at one point, the younger girl even beat up Rebecca at school.
Both girls were charged as juveniles with third-degree felony aggravated stalking. If convicted, it's not clear how much time, if any at all, the girls would spend in juvenile detention because they did not have any previous criminal history, the sheriff said.
The sheriff's office identified the two girls, but The Associated Press generally does not name juveniles charged with crimes.
The bullying began after the 14-year-old girl started dating a boy Rebecca had been seeing, the sheriff said.
A man who answered the phone at the 14-year-old's Lakeland home said he was her father and told The Associated Press "none of it's true."
"My daughter's a good girl and I'm 100 percent sure that whatever they're saying about my daughter is not true," he said.
At their mobile home, a barking pit bull stood guard and no one came outside despite shouts from reporters for an interview.
Neighbor George Colom said he had never interacted with the girl but noticed her playing roughly with other children on the street.
"Kids getting beat up, kids crying," Colom said. "The kids hang loose unsupervised all the time."
A telephone message left at the 12-year-old girl's home was not immediately returned and no one answered the door.
Orlando attorney David Hill said detectives may be able to pursue contributing to the delinquency of a minor charge for the parents, if they knew their daughters' were bullying Rebecca yet did nothing about it.
But it "will be easy to defend since the parents are going to say, 'We didn't know anything about it,'" said Hill, who is not involved in the case.
Perry Aftab, a New Jersey-based lawyer, told AP last month that it is difficult to bring charges against someone accused of driving a person to suicide, in part because of free-speech laws.
The case has illustrated, once more, the ways in which youngsters are using the Internet to torment others.
In a review of news articles last month, AP found about a dozen suicides in the U.S. since October 2010 that were attributed at least in part to cyberbullying. Aftab said she thought the number was at least twice that.
Before her death, Rebecca changed one of her online screen names to "That Dead Girl" and she messaged a boy in North Carolina: "I'm jumping." Detectives found some of her diaries at her home, and she talked of how depressed she was about the situation.
Last December, Rebecca was hospitalized for three days after cutting her wrists because of what she said was bullying, according to the sheriff. Later, after Rebecca complained that she had been pushed in the hallway and that another girl wanted to fight her, Rebecca's mother began home-schooling her in Lakeland, a city of about 100,000 midway between Tampa and Orlando, Judd said.
This fall, Rebecca started at a new school, but the bullying continued online, authorities said.
"Rebecca's mother went above and beyond to create interventions. The one issue that Rebecca's mom said to us was, 'I just didn't want to have her not like me, so I wanted to give her access to her cell phone so she could talk to her friends,'" Judd said. "Rebecca's family is absolutely devastated by this. Quite frankly, we're all devastated by this."
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Twenty-one people, including four children and six women, were killed when a minibus exploded in the southern town of Noa early on Wednesday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said.
Opposition activists told the Observatory the minibus drove over a mine planted by forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad. There was no immediate comment from the government.
The explosion was reported in rebel-held territory in Syria's Deraa province but there are also army troops in the nearby base of Tel al-Jumaa, which is besieged.
Assad's forces are battling a civil war which grew out of protests against his family's four-decade grip on the country.
Violence has continued despite pleas from regional Arab and Muslim organizations for a ceasefire to mark the Muslim festival of Eid al Adha.
The British-based Observatory, which is opposed to Assad, reported clashes in most provinces on Wednesday and said that war planes had been deployed to the eastern desert city of Deir al-Zor.
The group said at least 27 government soldiers had been killed during intense clashes in Deir al-Zor over the past two days although rebels gave a figure more than double that.
(Reporting by Oliver Holmes; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
By Agence France-Presse Tuesday, October 15, 2013 7:18 EDT
EU finance ministers prepared Tuesday to take a key step towards a new bank regulatory framework with final clearance of a single supervisor regime for the eurozone.
“We are set to finally approve the Single Supervisory Mechanism today,” Lithuanian Finance Minister Rimantas Sadzius said.
Once approved, the SSM will formally “enter into force in November next year,” Sadzius said, as he arrived for a meeting of all 28 European Union finance ministers.
The SSM was originally supposed to start early next year but the timetable slipped amid sharp differences over its precise role and especially over how it would relate to non-euro countries.
Non-euro Britain is home to the European Banking Authority, which is supposed to draft the rules for all banks in the EU, while the SSM is to be run by the European Central Bank.
To ensure that the 17 eurozone members did not out-vote the 11 non-euro members also grouped in the EBA, London won agreement in December that there would have to be a ‘double majority’ in both camps for any action.
London has since won fresh assurances that this would be the case, clearing the way for the SSM.
ECB executive board member Joerg Asmussen said this means “we can now start the real work — hire people, rent a building … all the practical things to be ready to start working in one year.”
The SSM is to be complemented by a Single Resolution Mechanism to close failing banks and a Deposit Guarantee regime protect savers.
Combined, this will provide the comprehensive, single regulatory framework meant to prevent taxpayers having to fund the disastrously expensive bank bailouts which led to years of austerity and recession in the eurozone.
The SRM however is proving even more controversial than the SSM, with many member states including powerhouse Germany reluctant to cede too much control over their banks and concerned about how it should be financed.
Sadzius said finance ministers will also “discuss today backstop arrangements” to pay for potential bank closures until the SRM begins its work, most likely in several years.
One option being discussed is to tap the European Stability Mechanism, the 500-billion-euro eurozone bailout fund which has been used to help Spanish banks.
However, it is unclear how this would work in practice and especially if a member state seeking such ESM help would also have to accept tough economic policy conditions as in a full debt bailout.
Sweden’s Anders Borg said ministers “first and foremost must clarify backstops” before the ECB completes tough asset tests on the banks next year to pave the way for the SSM to begin its work.
The tests are supposed to be much tougher than previous reviews which critics say failed to pick up problems at many banks and should give a clear indication of whether they need fresh capital.
If they do, new rules require governments to progressively “bail-in” private creditors and uninsured larger depositors.
If that is not enough, then state aid is the next option.
EU Economic Affairs Commissioner Olli Rehn said last week that this would be acceptable and would not count against deficit and debt targets, giving it official blessing.
The EU finance ministers will also discuss the overall economic outlook ahead of an EU leaders summit next week, with one eye on developments in Washington as talks continue on avoiding a first ever US sovereign debt default.
Several officials, including Rehn, have voiced concern about the prospect of such a US default given fears it could plunge the global economy into a deep recession or even worse.
There have been a lot of headlines during the government shutdown suggesting that that our food supplies may be at risk as agencies like the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control have furloughed workers. But food suppliers and processors increasingly rely on a large network of private companies to make sure food is safe.
Twitter is changing the way direct messages work. In the past, Twitter required two people to follow each other for direct messages to be exchanged in either direction; now, users have the option to change settings so that any of their followers can send them a direct message, without having to follow them back.
Nintendo has a rhythm that’s predictable when it comes to product releases: Create a new console, then create different iterations of those consoles with upgrades aimed at expanding market share in clever ways. The new Nintendo 2DS is no exception to that rule, but it is remarkable in that it’s a bit of a backtrack for the company, which takes the marquee feature out of its 3DS generation of portable gaming devices. It may be a backtrack on the surface, but the 2DS is an admirable step forward for Nintendo underneath it all.
1300mAH battery, good for 3.5 – 5.5 hours 3DS game play
MSRP: $129.99
Product info page
Nintendo’s design for the 2DS at first appears somewhat lazy and strange. They’ve taken the trademark two screens of the traditional clamshell DS and 3DS hardware and simply stacked them one on top of the other vertically on a single plane. It’s like a 3DS without a hinge in the middle, and without seeing or touching the thing, I was expecting something unwieldy and awkward.
What I actually found was that the Nintendo 2DS is cleverly designed, and fits nicely in the hands. It’s highly plastic design doesn’t feel necessarily all that refined, and my 3DS XL definitely comes off as a more “premium” device, but the 2DS feels durable and well-built. It feels, in fact, like the kind of gadget you can probably spill some Kraft Dinner on without much adverse effect, which I suspect is exactly the point.
The hand positioning in terms of the controls fit my grip perfectly, but your mileage may vary. And it’s not all roses: the lack of a Wi-Fi physical toggle seems somewhat arbitrary given the rather thick bezel on the side of the device. But the sleep switch ensures you wont’ burn through battery too quickly in the absence of a clamshell sleep trigger, and the light/durable feeling of the overall package makes it seem like an ideal choice for rugrats who might not be completely neat, or for travellers who just want something they can throw in the duffel on the way out the door.
The 2DS performs like its more expensive predecessor, in most respects except for the absence of a 3D display. That’s where the perceived backslide comes into play; Nintendo made much of the 3DS’ ability to provide glasses-free 3D visuals when it launched. Taking it out of the picture with the 2DS seems a pretty clear admission that the feature was little more than a gimmick.
Regardless of what you think of Nintendo’s 3D efforts, you’d probably be hard-pressed to find an instance where you truly miss that feature on the 2DS. I have yet to wish it was there, and that’s the really impressive part about this hardware – Nintendo has been humble enough to scrap their marquee 3D for users who don’t need it, and offer up a significant dollar savings in exchange. It’s not the type of reverse-course move you’ll often see from big companies mid product cycle.
The only other aspect of the 2DS’ performance that differs from Nintendo’s other handhelds is in terms of battery life. The 2DS is rated at 3.5 to 5.5 hours of play time on 3DS titles, or 5 to 9 hours for DS games. That’s just slightly better than the 3DS, and just slightly worse than the 3DS XL. In a world where people are used to 8 to 10 hours of play time on iOS and Android tablets, those figures aren’t great, but in practice, and given the three days of standby energy time, it actually doesn’t feel inadequate.
The 2DS doesn’t have 3D, as mentioned above, but its displays are worth drawing attention to if only to note that they’re the same as the ones in the 3DS in all other respects. The lack of 3D will be a feature to some, as it does seem to minimize somewhat any annoying visual artifacts left by the physical changes needed to make 3D possible on a display without glasses. And so long as your eyesight is good, the 2DS has better pixel density and therefore sharper resolution than the big-screened 3DS XL.
Does that mean they 2DS screens are great? No, and the low resolution relative to today’s modern smartphones and tablets is really beginning to show. Plus, that bottom touchscreen is still resistive, which means that even though it’s tempting to want to tap buttons with your fingers, especially in settings menus, you’ll still need to break out that stylus to get good, consistent results in terms of registering taps.
The 2DS plays all the games I want it to play, costs a decent amount less than a 3DS, does away with needless 3D, and despite weighing slightly more, actually feels like a more durable travel companion (fewer moving parts definitely helps with that). It’d be nice if they’d left out the 3D cameras on the back and included a hardware Wi-Fi toggle, but that’s splitting hairs – the 2DS is, ultimately, a clever re-imagining of Nintendo’s current generation mobile hardware that should convince casual fans and fence-sitters it’s finally time to take the plunge.
Nintendo, a technology company widely known for its line of game consoles, was actually founded in 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi. It began as a card game company and evolved into one of the largest Japanese companies with a Market Capitalization of over $85 billion.
An image showing the final front page of The International Herald Tribune, published Monday Oct. 14. The newspaper will become The International New York Times Tuesday.
New York Times
An image showing the final front page of The International Herald Tribune, published Monday Oct. 14. The newspaper will become The International New York Times Tuesday.
New York Times
Monday marks the last day of newsstand sales of the International Herald Tribune, the newspaper that was once instrumental in keeping American expatriates up to date on their homeland. On Tuesday, the paper will bear a new name: The International New York Times.
"The paper has changed names a number of times since its founding 126 years ago," reads a story in the newspaper about the change, "but its mission has always remained the same: to provide a global perspective on events and ideas shaping the world."
A slideshow accompanying the Herald's story about the name change includes black-and-white photos of luminaries such as Andy Warhol and Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. reading The International Herald Tribune.
For decades, the newspaper was a cultural force, featuring in Ernest Hemingway's novel The Sun Also Rises in addition to French director Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless (or if you prefer the original title, À Bout de Souffle). In that film, actress Jean Seberg is seen hawking it on the street.
For our Newscast unit, NPR's Eleanor Beardsley reports:
"The New York Times has owned the Herald Tribune for the last decade, and the name change is meant to streamline the company's print and online editions.
"Founded in 1887 by New York Herald publisher Gordon Bennett, the paper aimed to provide American expats living in Paris with news from home, from stock prices to the latest baseball scores.
"Charles Trueheart was the Paris correspondent for The Washington Post in the 1990s when the Post jointly owned the Herald Tribune with The New York Times. He says the Tribune began as a Paris local paper.
"'To me, the Herald Tribune represents a time when Paris truly was the expatriate capital of America,' he said.
Harry Reid leaves the Capitol on Oct. 13, 2013 as Congress continues to struggle to find a solution.
Photo by Andrew Burton/Getty Images
Majority Leader Harry Reid moved the goal posts. On Saturday, when Republican Senate negotiators came to work, they thought they were close to a deal with Democrats based on the proposal offered by Republican Sen. Susan Collins. The government would be reopened for six months in exchange for a delay of the medical device tax that helps fund Obamacare, flexibility in managing sequestration cuts, and new requirements to verify income for those entering the federal exchanges as a part of the Affordable Care Act. But the Senate Democratic leader didn't like the six-month date, so he called it off.
Why did Reid back out? The agreement would have made it harder for Democrats to negotiate changes to the next round of sequestration cuts, something they have sought as part of a larger budget deal. If Reid was moving the goal posts, it's because he—or some of the Democrats negotiating with Collins—temporarily forgot where he'd put them.
It has always been a Democratic goal to wipe out the new round of sequestration cuts that kick in next January. It was something they were hoping to negotiate once the government shutdown ended and all the lights were turned back on. It was on the Democratic wish-list, just as entitlement and tax reform are on the GOP list. What elevated the issue into the center of the debate this weekend was the six-month timeline in Collins’ proposal. Under that agreement, which Collins worked on with Democratic senators, the government would be kept open until March. That seems reasonable, given how long it will take negotiators to wrangle with each other in the post-shutdown negotiations. But that also means that new sequestration cuts scheduled to start in January would kick in while the negotiations were ongoing. Democrats worry that if they allow them to take effect they won't be able to negotiate for their removal.
Democrats say they aren't dictating how the future sequestration cuts will be replaced, just that they want to have a chance to negotiate how to replace them. "Republicans want to do it with entitlement cuts," said Sen. Chuck Schumer on Face the Nation. "Democrats want to do it with a mix of mandatory cuts, some entitlements and revenues. And so how do you overcome that dilemma? We're not going to overcome it in the next day or two. But if we were to open up the government for a period of time that concluded before the sequester took place, which is Jan. 15, we could have a whole bunch of discussions."
Reid would like the government to stay open for a shorter period of time and the debt ceiling lifted for a longer period. McConnell would like something closer to the opposite.
This disagreement about dates is what caused the six Democrats working with Collins to say that they did not support her final offer. Some Republicans have claimed that the Democrats are trying to change the Budget Control Act, which is the law of the land. They are, but not as a condition of ending the partial shutdown or lifting the debt ceiling. That's an important distinction because actually asking to change the budget law now would be identical to the GOP requesting to lock in specific entitlement changes as a condition of lifting the debt ceiling or funding the government. The administration and Democrats have said that linking those issues to the current crisis is out of bounds.
As a negotiating posture however, Democrats have no problem letting Republicans charge that Reid spent the weekend attempting to undo the Budget Control Act. When the final agreement includes no such thing, Republicans will be able to claim that they thwarted Reid’s plan.
Minority Leader Mitch McConnell says Reid should just take yes for an answer, but Reid thinks he has enough leverage to hold steady and not deal away future discussions on the sequestration cuts. Democrats say, “Why should we diminish our right to negotiate in the future over something they don't like, just because Ted Cruz and some House Republicans created a crisis?” This is the White House’s position, too. When asked if they were overplaying their hand, an administration official pointed to this weekend’s rallies with Cruz and Sarah Palin. The demonstrations on the mall were keeping the Tea Party brand in the news, which Democrats believe hamper those lawmakers who are trying to ameliorate the Tea Party inspired budget detour over Obamacare.
So now Reid and McConnell will have a debate about dates. It's not an impossible divide. Reid would like the government to stay open for a shorter period of time and the debt ceiling lifted for a longer period. McConnell would like something closer to the opposite. Those are not differences big enough to cause a breach of the debt limit and suggest that, despite the weekend hiccup, the Senate will get its act together. After this brief Senate interlude, we'll be focused on the House again. House Speaker John Boehner will have to decide what bill he brings to the floor and how many Democrats he'll need to pass it. Will he be able to get a majority of Republicans, as he did during the debt limit votes of 2011 and early 2013? The clock is ticking.
Video captions improve comprehension, professor finds
Public release date: 11-Oct-2013 [
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Contact: Jonathan Morales jmm1@sfsu.edu 415-338-1743 San Francisco State University
A simple change -- turning on captions -- can make a big difference in the classroom
A simple change -- switching on captions -- can make a big difference when students watch educational videos, an SF State professor has discovered.
Robert Keith Collins, an assistant professor of American Indian studies, found that students' test scores and comprehension improved dramatically when captions were used while watching videos. The tool is often utilized for students with learning disabilities, but Collins says his results show captions can be beneficial to all students.
Collins developed the idea while he was a member of a faculty learning committee focused on ways to make the classroom more accessible to all students. During the first year of a two-year case study, he showed videos without captions to establish a baseline of student comprehension. Once that baseline was established, he turned captions on and began to see improvements. Those improvements continued into the second year of the study.
"Not only were students talking about how much having the captions helped them as they took notes, their test scores went up," Collins said. "During the baseline year, there were a lot of Cs. In the second years, they went from Cs, Ds and Fs to As, Bs and Cs. It was really significant improvement."
That improvement didn't just manifest itself in grades. Class discussions also became livelier and more detailed, with students recalling specific information shown in the videos such as names of people and places.
"We're living in an age where our students are so distracted by technology that they sometimes forget where they should focus their attention when engaged with technology or media," he said. "Turning on captions seems to enable students to focus on specific information."
The study was unique, Collins added, in that it explored captions' impact broadly, as opposed to other studies that examined their effect solely on students with learning disabilities.
The study has particularly important implications for his academic field, American Indian studies, he said. Addressing the needs of Native American students with learning disabilities has recently come into greater focus at the same time as the field is beginning to move beyond the impacts of colonialism on Native American students and toward asking more specifically what those students need in higher education.
The results of Collins' case study were published Aug. 9 in the American Indian Culture and Research Journal in the article "Using Captions to Reduce Barriers to Native American Student Success." In addition to contributing the article, Collins also guest edited this edition of the journal, which was focused on reducing barriers to Native American student learning.
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The study begun in 2007 as part of Collins' participation with the Ensuring Access through Collaboration and Technology -- Faculty Learning Committee (EnACT -- FLC) at SF State, funded through EnACT-PTD (Ensuring Access Through Collaboration and Technology Partnerships, Technology, and Dissemination) at Sonoma State University on a grant from the U.S. Department of Education.
SF State is the only master's-level public university serving the counties of San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin. The University enrolls nearly 30,000 students each year and offers nationally acclaimed programs in a range of fields -- from creative writing, cinema and biology to history, broadcast and electronic communication arts, theatre arts and ethnic studies. The University's more than 219,000 graduates have contributed to the economic, cultural and civic fabric of San Francisco and beyond.
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Video captions improve comprehension, professor finds
Public release date: 11-Oct-2013 [
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Contact: Jonathan Morales jmm1@sfsu.edu 415-338-1743 San Francisco State University
A simple change -- turning on captions -- can make a big difference in the classroom
A simple change -- switching on captions -- can make a big difference when students watch educational videos, an SF State professor has discovered.
Robert Keith Collins, an assistant professor of American Indian studies, found that students' test scores and comprehension improved dramatically when captions were used while watching videos. The tool is often utilized for students with learning disabilities, but Collins says his results show captions can be beneficial to all students.
Collins developed the idea while he was a member of a faculty learning committee focused on ways to make the classroom more accessible to all students. During the first year of a two-year case study, he showed videos without captions to establish a baseline of student comprehension. Once that baseline was established, he turned captions on and began to see improvements. Those improvements continued into the second year of the study.
"Not only were students talking about how much having the captions helped them as they took notes, their test scores went up," Collins said. "During the baseline year, there were a lot of Cs. In the second years, they went from Cs, Ds and Fs to As, Bs and Cs. It was really significant improvement."
That improvement didn't just manifest itself in grades. Class discussions also became livelier and more detailed, with students recalling specific information shown in the videos such as names of people and places.
"We're living in an age where our students are so distracted by technology that they sometimes forget where they should focus their attention when engaged with technology or media," he said. "Turning on captions seems to enable students to focus on specific information."
The study was unique, Collins added, in that it explored captions' impact broadly, as opposed to other studies that examined their effect solely on students with learning disabilities.
The study has particularly important implications for his academic field, American Indian studies, he said. Addressing the needs of Native American students with learning disabilities has recently come into greater focus at the same time as the field is beginning to move beyond the impacts of colonialism on Native American students and toward asking more specifically what those students need in higher education.
The results of Collins' case study were published Aug. 9 in the American Indian Culture and Research Journal in the article "Using Captions to Reduce Barriers to Native American Student Success." In addition to contributing the article, Collins also guest edited this edition of the journal, which was focused on reducing barriers to Native American student learning.
###
The study begun in 2007 as part of Collins' participation with the Ensuring Access through Collaboration and Technology -- Faculty Learning Committee (EnACT -- FLC) at SF State, funded through EnACT-PTD (Ensuring Access Through Collaboration and Technology Partnerships, Technology, and Dissemination) at Sonoma State University on a grant from the U.S. Department of Education.
SF State is the only master's-level public university serving the counties of San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin. The University enrolls nearly 30,000 students each year and offers nationally acclaimed programs in a range of fields -- from creative writing, cinema and biology to history, broadcast and electronic communication arts, theatre arts and ethnic studies. The University's more than 219,000 graduates have contributed to the economic, cultural and civic fabric of San Francisco and beyond.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Prepare to have your afternoon wasted. Lamborghini has opened up its Sant’Agata museum to the all-seeing eyes of Google Street View, and not only can you see 50 years of Lambo hotness, you can actually get inside some of the marque’s most legendary machines.
Covering 16,000 square feet over two floors, you’ll get an eyeful of everything Lamborghini has ever made, including the Miura SV, Countach, Diablo, LM002 SUV, and concepts. Even better, several vehicles have their interiors mapped, so you can get a 360-degree view of the insane interior of the Sesto Elemento concept, do your best Rocky impression inside the LM002, or bask in the carbon fiber glow of the Reventon. Scale models, V12s, and even a marine engine are included in the exhibit, and all it takes is a click — far cheaper than a round-trip ticket to Italy.
The 2DS doesn’t have 3D, as mentioned above, but its displays are worth drawing attention to if only to note that they’re the same as the ones in the 3DS in all other respects. The lack of 3D will be a feature to some, as it does seem to minimize somewhat any annoying visual artifacts left by the physical changes needed to make 3D possible on a display without glasses. And so long as your eyesight is good, the 2DS has better pixel density and therefore sharper resolution than the big-screened 3DS XL.
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