LeBron, Cavs facing elimination after Game 5 loss to Celtics https://nyp.st/2KPfNh7

A vivid Harrison Lake sunset near Harrison Hot Springs, British Columbia, Canada. The distant mountains are Sasin Peak and Deroche Mountain.

More photos here: https://www.mrussellphotography.com/blog/harrison-lake-sunset/

#sunsets #landscapes #britishcolumbia

Memories of Italy, July 2017

#italy #digitalphotography #countryside #nature #nikon #nikonphotography #europephotography #landscape #landscapephotography #memoriesofitaly #europe #tuscany #coast #italy

https://www.instagram.com/marcobar975/

NIKON D700
f/16 1/125 28 mm

Earth-like planets with severe tilts and orbits could enter abrupt "snowball states," in which entire oceans freeze and surface life cannot survive, according to new research.

Researchers at the University of Washington (UW) have found a new reason why, just because a planet is located in a "habitable zone" — meaning it's close enough to its host star to sustain liquid water — it isn't necessarily habitable. The team found that the axial tilt and orbital dynamics of planets in the habitable zone around "G dwarf" stars like our own sun can lead to "snowball states," which are essentially extreme ice ages.

This new research looked at how a planet's obliquity, or the angle at which a planet's rotation axis tilts, and its orbital eccentricity, a parameter that determines the amount that an orbit deviates from a perfect circle, could affect that planet's potential to be habitable. [How Habitable Zones Around Stars Work (Infographic)]

Previous research suggested that planets in a habitable zone with a sun-like star that had a severe axial tilt or tilting orbit would be warmer, according to the statement. The team's research found that the opposite holds true, which was quite a shock, they said."We found that planets in the habitable zone could abruptly enter 'snowball' states if the eccentricity or the semi-major axis variations — changes in the distance between a planet and star over an orbit — were large or if the planet's obliquity increased beyond 35 degrees," Russell Deitrick, lead author of the new work and a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Bern who completed this research at UW, said in a statement.

Luckily, Earth's axial tilt varies ever so slightly, leaving Earth "a relatively calm planet, climate-wise," co-author Rory Barnes, an astronomer at UW, said in the statement. But, as it pertains to exoplanets, Deitrick "has essentially shown that ice ages on exoplanets can be much more severe than on Earth, that orbital dynamics can be a major driver of habitability and that the habitable zone is insufficient to characterize a planet's habitability," Barnes said.

A planet's position in the habitable zone is typically a major factor in considering whether it may be habitable. However, this new research shows that even if a planet seems Earth-like and is orbiting at the right distance from its star, if "its orbit and obliquity oscillate like crazy, another planet might be better for follow-up with telescopes of the future," Deitrick said.

With this research in mind, orbital dynamics should be considered an important part of determining a planet's habitability, Deitrick added.

The work will be published in The Astronomical Journal, according to the statement.  

Great value for money.

#Trump’s about-face also comes after days of heavy criticism from lawmakers and economists on both sides of the political spectrum. Democrats and Republicans in Congress alike took issue with the agreement. Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden said Trump was 'simply getting rolled on trade with #China,' while GOP Sen. Marco Rubio complained that China is 'out-negotiating the administration & winning the trade talks right now.'

Outside of Capitol Hill, trade policy specialists also criticized the agreement. Edward Alden, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations who specializes in economic issues, blasted the the limited scope and negotiating tactics used to reach the deal. Even more Trump-friendly trade experts took issue. Derek Scissors, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and one-time adviser to Trump on trade issues, said Trump had gone back on campaign promises.


#WorldEconomy #Protectionism #America #Globalisation #GlobalTrade #TradeWars #EconomicRisk #Economy #TradePolicy #InternationalTrade #TradeTariffs #Politics #Geopolitics #InternationalRelations #US
Trump is already backtracking on the China trade agreement, days after celebrating the deal
https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-backtrack-china-trade-tariff-list-zte-deal-2018-5/

Singles, here is something for you.

Rather than opening the economy, embracing new ideas and technologies, and welcoming competition, #Trump has pushed #protectionist gimmicks, currency manipulation and tax cuts aimed at the 1% - an approach that risks walling off the United States from a #globaleconomy racing forward. For all his chest-thumping about low unemployment and stock gains, Trump isn’t getting under the hood of an economy being challenged by nimbler upstarts such as #China, India and #SouthKorea. None of Trump’s policies will increase #US productivity, reduce inequality or pressure executives to raise salaries.

Moreover, none of Trump’s policies seeks to repair crumbling infrastructure, cap runaway government borrowing or stabilize health care markets. Washington isn’t doing much to invest in education, ensure that tech-heavy industries have their pick of global talent or prepare the workforce for the real threats to U.S. workers: automation and artificial intelligence. The jobs Trump seeks to claw back from China - lower-wage manufacturing slots that the workers can’t do competitively because of higher wage and benefit levels - are gone forever. To even try to get them back is futile.


#WorldEconomy #Protectionism #America #Globalisation #GlobalTrade #TradeWars #EconomicRisk #Economy #TradePolicy #InternationalTrade #TradeTariffs #Politics #Geopolitics #InternationalRelations #US
How Trump’s Obsession With China Could Turn America into Japan
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/05/23/how-trumps-obsession-with-china-could-turn-america-into-japan-218320

Yankees can’t make 10 runs hold up in shootout loss to Rangers https://nyp.st/2KPKr9V

#TripleTrouble #ChooChooCheers - Tennessee Titans Cheerleaders & T-Rac

#TripleTrouble 💙 #ChooChooCheers


#Sports #NFL #Cheerleaders

(Credit: Tennessee Titans Cheerleaders & T-Rac)

Evolution of brain size in humans is thought to have been born out of necessity to solve a combination of ecological and social challenges. A new study found one type of challenge increased brain size whilst the other decreased it. Can you guess which challenge they claim has which effect?

Finally.

FBI agents ... have seized control of a key server in the Kremlin’s global botnet of 500,000 hacked routers

"The move positions the bureau to build a comprehensive list of victims of the attack, and short-circuits Moscow’s ability to reinfect its targets.

The FBI counter-operation goes after “VPN Filter,” a piece of sophisticated malware linked to the same Russian hacking group, known as Fancy Bear, that breached the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign during the 2016 election. On Wednesday security researchers at Cisco and Symantec separately provided new details on the malware, which has turned up in 54 countries including the United States.

VPN Filter uses known vulnerabilities to infect home office routers made by Linksys, MikroTik, NETGEAR, and TP-Link. Once in place, the malware reports back to a command-and-control infrastructure that can install purpose-built plug-ins, according to the researchers. One plug-in lets the hackers eavesdrop on the victim’s Internet traffic to steal website credentials; another targets a protocol used in industrial control networks, such as those in the electric grid. A third lets the attacker cripple any or all of the infected devices at will."
https://www.thedailybeast.com/exclusive-fbi-seizes-control-of-russian-botnet

#VladHacks #VladSpies #VladΒοts

Cynthia Nixon didn’t stand a chance at NY Democratic convention https://nyp.st/2GIVeR1

Trump Admits His New Spygate Narrative Is A PR Stunt To Play The American People

North Korea calls Pence remarks ‘stupid,’ says it’s still willing to pull out of summit https://nyp.st/2GJeldm

Those best bits thankfully include Google Play Music's user uploads, which will carry over to YouTube Music at some point. #News #GooglePlayMusic #YouTubeMusic

New Wordpress & Jetpack Vulnerability

"Hackers have come up with a never-before-seen method of installing backdoored plugins on websites running the open-source WordPress CMS, and this new technique relies on using weakly protected WordPress.com accounts and the Jetpack plugin."

"The technique is highly complex, and to compromise a site, a hacker must go through different steps, during which multiple things can prevent the attack from being successful. Nevertheless, attacks have been happening since May 16, according to report from WordPress site security firm Wordfence and several posts on the official WordPress.org forums from site owners that had their sites hijacked by crooks."

#technology #security #wordpress #jetpack

US President Donald #Trump is backing away from the #tradeagreement the #US just announced with #China, under pressure from China hawks among his supporters and in Congress who have assailed the accord as a capitulation. After boasting of the deal's benefits for farmers in tweets on Monday (May 21), Trump first indicated on Tuesday he was having second thoughts as some of his loyalists publicly criticised the agreement. The president's misgivings open the prospect that a trade war Treasury Secretary #StevenMnuchin had declared 'on hold' is at risk of resuming.

Public criticism of the China deal by fellow Republicans and Trump supporters appears to be outweighing concern about a trade war among farm-state Republicans, retailers and others. Trump has also found himself under attack for retreating from penalties his administration announced against a large Chinese telecommunications company, ZTE, for violating US sanctions against Iran and North Korea.


#WorldEconomy #Protectionism #America #Globalisation #GlobalTrade #TradeWars #EconomicRisk #Economy #TradePolicy #InternationalTrade #TradeTariffs #Politics #Geopolitics #InternationalRelations
Trump backs away from China deal, trade war may not be 'on hold'
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/world/104168380/trump-backs-away-from-china-deal-trade-war-may-not-be-on-hold