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Trump: We cannot aid Puerto Rico ‘forever’

Washington (CNN)President Donald Trump suggested Thursday that Puerto Rico is going to have to shoulder more responsibility for recovery efforts from Hurricane Maria, saying the federal government’s emergency responders can’t stay there “forever.”

His comments — in which he also blamed the beleaguered island for a financial crisis “largely of their own making�� and infrastructure that was a “disaster” before the hurricane — come as Puerto Rico still reels from a lack of electricity, public health access and a rising death toll. The remarks quickly prompted cries from Democratic lawmakers, who argue that Puerto Rico still needs a lot of help, as well as the mayor of San Juan, who said they were “unbecoming” and appeared to come from a “hater in chief.”

Meanwhile, Texas and Florida — two states Trump won during last year’s presidential election — also were struck by severe hurricanes recently, but the President has made no public indication that the federal government is pulling back on its response there.

The President wrote in two separate tweets, “‘Puerto Rico survived the Hurricanes, now a financial crisis looms largely of their own making.’ says Sharyl Attkisson. A total lack of……..accountability say the Governor. Electric and all infrastructure was disaster before hurricanes. Congress to decide how much to spend…”

He continued in a third tweet: “We cannot keep FEMA, the Military & the First Responders, who have been amazing (under the most difficult circumstances) in P.R. forever!”

Attkisson is a journalist who works for conservative Sinclair Broadcasting.

White House chief of staff John Kelly said at the White House briefing Thursday that Trump’s tweet was “exactly accurate” because first responders “are not going to be there forever.”

“The minute you go anywhere as a first responder, and this would apply certainly to the military, you will try really hard to work yourself out of a job,” he said. “There will be a period in which we hope sooner rather than later, the US military and (the Federal Emergency Management Agency), generally speaking, can withdraw because then the government and people of Puerto Rico are recovering sufficiently to start the process of rebuilding.”

A FEMA official told CNN the agency has “no hard deadline” on when it plans to pull resources from the island.

“It all will be determined by the conditions on the ground,” the official said.

The official said once things are “stabilized” in Puerto Rico, FEMA will “pull back resources as appropriate,” adding that’s the “natural progression of a response to a disaster.”

FEMA’s focus, the official said, is to “move from the response phase to recovery,” adding the recovery phase often takes years.

Dire situation

Trump’s tweets come three weeks after the hurricane first struck the island, which remains largely without power. The death toll from the storm has risen to 45, authorities have said, and at least 113 people remain unaccounted for, according to Karixia Ortiz, a spokeswoman for Puerto Rico’s Department of Public Safety.

Paul Ryan leading bipartisan delegation to Puerto Rico on Friday

The recovery has moved slowly since Maria struck the US territory on September 20, leaving most of the island without basic services such as power and running water, according to residents, relief workers and local elected officials. Hospitals throughout the cash-strapped island of 3.4 million people have been running low on medicine and fuel, and residents and local elected officials have said they expect the death toll to rise.

The water situation is so dire, the Environmental Protection Agency said in a news release Wednesday, that residents on the island have reportedly been trying to obtain water from Superfund sites — which are bodies of water contaminated by hazardous waste. The EPA advised against “tampering with sealed and locked wells or drinking from these wells, as it may be dangerous to people’s health.”

Administration officials sought to downplay Trump’s comments Thursday morning.

Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson, testifying before the House financial services committee, said that he has “no intention” of abandoning recovery efforts in Puerto Rico.

“They’re a very important part of who we are,” he said, later adding: “(Puerto Rico) should not be abandoned.”

And White House press secretary Sarah Sanders reaffirmed federal support to the island.

“Our job in any disaster affected location is to help the community respond and recover from that disaster. We continue to do so with the full force of the US government and its resources in Texas, Florida, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands and other affected areas,” she said. “Successful recoveries do not last forever; they should be as swift as possible to help people resume their normal lives.”

Democrats, however, pounced on Trump’s tweets.

“Puerto Ricans are Americans, and we don’t abandon each other. The federal government should stay in Puerto Rico as long as necessary,” Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-California, tweeted.

Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren tweeted, “Puerto Rico is still facing a humanitarian crisis. @realDonaldTrump seems more worried about blaming hurricane victims than helping them.”

And San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz, who has feuded publicly with the President over the federal response, said on Twitter that Trump was incapable of fulfilling the moral imperative to help the people of PR. Shame on you.!”

Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Rosselló said in a news conference Thursday that he called the White House looking for clarification on Trump’s tweets.

“The law establishes that the aid we are getting from FEMA has to be established for the duration of emergency efforts,” he said. ‘It’s not a decision as is, it’s a law that all the resources must be available for Puerto Rico.”

However Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pennsylvania, who is a member of the House foreign affairs committee, told CNN’s Chris Cuomo Thursday there’s only “so much” the US can do to help Puerto Rico.

“I would then again say, ‘What is enough?’ What is the right amount to satisfy whoever says we’re not doing enough,” he said on “New Day.” “It’s regrettable and it’s sad for those people but there only is physically, humanly possible so much that any nation could do in the wake of devastation.”

He continued: “I lived through it myself, a victim of floods on numerous occasions, had to clean it up, and I will tell you, nobody came to help us, we handled it ourselves.”

House to vote on disaster relief

Acting Department of Homeland Security Elaine Duke will make her second trip to the island on Thursday.

House Speaker Paul Ryan will lead a bipartisan delegation visiting Puerto Rico on Friday, according to the speaker’s office.

Ryan will travel to the island with House Appropriations Chairman Rodney Frelinghuysen of New Jersey and Rep. Nita Lowey of New York, the top Democrat on the panel. Puerto Rico’s sole representative in Congress, Jenniffer Gonzalez-Colon, and House GOP Conference Chairwoman Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers also will be part of the congressional delegation.

The House of Representatives approved a $36.5 billion disaster aid package Thursday to help victims struggling to recover from a string of devastating hurricanes and wildfires. The measure now heads to the Senate, which returns from a weeklong recess next week.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/12/politics/donald-trump-puerto-rico-tweets/index.html

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How Trump can become one of America’s greatest presidents

(CNN)President Donald Trump argued this week that he wants America’s nuclear stockpile in “tiptop shape,” while denying a report that he planned to increase the US arsenal tenfold.

Last month at the United Nations, Trump said that if forced to defend itself, the United States “will have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea,” with its 25 million citizens. A week ago, he summoned reporters to the State Dining Room, where he was holding a dinner for military commanders and their spouses. To the guests, he stated that this could be “the calm before the storm.” And when asked, “What’s the storm?” he responded ominously, “You’ll see.”

The North Korean foreign minister jabbed back, describing his nation’s nuclear weapons as a “sword of justice.”

The exchange of threats with North Korea is helping no one.

Trump has established himself as a proponent of nuclear weapons. However, anyone can change, and he could become the unconventional leader he promised during the presidential campaign. As unlikely as it seems today, Trump could reinvent himself by reversing decades of American policy. By providing leadership in the campaign for a nuclear ban treaty, Trump would catapult himself into the record books as one of the greatest presidents in US history.

Trump should take a cue from the Nobel Peace Prize, which was awarded on October 6, to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, or ICAN, a coalition of nongovernmental organizations in more than 100 countries.

The organization received the award for its heroic work to “draw attention to the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons and for its groundbreaking efforts to achieve a treaty-based prohibition on such weapons,” to quote Berit-Reiss-Andersen, the chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee.

The anti-nuclear group helped organize the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, adopted by 122 UN member states and signed by 53 countries. The treaty argues for the abolition of the 15,000 nuclear weapons that already exist, nearly7,000 of which are in the US nuclear arsenal.

Trump ought to initiate a series of meetings rotating between the nuclear weapons states. Diplomats should assemble regularly in Washington, Moscow, Beijing, Pyongyang, Paris, London, New Delhi, Karachi and Jerusalem to develop plans to draw down nuclear arsenals.

But nuclear weapons states won’t change course and support the nuclear ban treaty unless enormous public pressure is raised. The public needs to understand how dangerous nuclear weapons are, that they are the greatest threat to our survival.

Americans need to be calling the White House and our congressmen and congresswomen. We need to be withdrawing money from banks that support nuclear weapons producers. Sustained global attention to the issue and support for joining the ban treaty is desperately needed. To help bring this about, we need cultural change — for example, through grass-roots organizing and the arts.

Join us on Twitter and Facebook

My 2-year-old son loves music. Recently, before saying goodnight, he sang an appropriate song, “You are my sunshine/my only sunshine/you make me happy/ when skies are gray.”

All children deserve a peaceful world free of nuclear weapons. A world of sunshine.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/13/opinions/trump-vs-kim-nuclear-weapons-opinion-lederer/index.html

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Singing with another woman’s lungs

(CNN)This fall, renowned soprano Charity Sunshine Tillemann-Dick will inhale deeply, filling her new transplanted lungs with air, and sing. Performing alongside her will be Esperanza Tufani, a 24-year-old restaurant manager in Ohio. Tufani’s mother was the donor for Tillemann-Dick’s lungs.

“It will be a coming together for what was and what is,” Tillemann-Dick said. She received the lungs of Tufani’s mother, an immigrant from Honduras, in a transplant operation in 2012. Tufani’s mother died of a stroke at 48.

The transplant sparked a friendship between the opera singer and the young woman she met a year after her surgery.

“Singing with Charity … it’s just something I can’t really describe. The thought of me singing with my mother would be amazing, but since that’s not possible, still in a way getting to do that through Charity is just … it’s just an incredible feeling,” Tufani said.

Overcoming the odds

Now 34, Tillemann-Dick has gotten fame and acclaim alongside the physical and emotional toll of two separate double lung transplants.

In 2004, she was diagnosed with advanced idiopathic pulmonary hypertension, a rare and potentially fatal condition that affects the heart and lungs. At the time, she was studying at the renowned Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, Hungary. Her doctors told her to stop singing, but Tillemann-Dick refused. She attempted to avoid a transplant by having a prescribed liquid medication pumped directly to her heart through a tube in her chest, 24 hours a day.

Tillemann-Dick wanted to keep the lungs she had worked tirelessly for years to train. Her vocal cords could be damaged in surgery, and there was a very real chance she would never sing again. Even if the procedure went perfectly, she would have to learn how to sing with the new lungs.

But in 2009, her condition deteriorated drastically, and Tillemann-Dick could no longer avoid a transplant. In the nearly 14-hour surgery, she had 40 quarts of blood transfused into her body. She was put in a medically induced coma for 34 days.

“After I woke up from my first surgery, I had this tremendous guilt and sadness for my donor,” Tillemann-Dick said of her first transplant in 2009. “I felt terrible for their family and for everything that they had endured.”

Then, her body rejected the transplant after years of brutal recovery. Tillemann-Dick was almost certain she was going to die. “Second transplants are very rare,” she said. Six months in the hospital waiting for a donor were excruciating, and she started having conversations with God as she prepared to die.

“I didn’t feel like my life was ready to be over,” she said.

But in 2012, she matched with another registered donor: Tufani’s mother, Flora Brown. This time, the lungs took, and within a week of the procedure, she was breathing on her own.

“But when I woke up from the second transplant, it was different,” she said. “I felt this intense, all-encompassing gratitude for this family and these people and this woman whose life I was carrying forward.”

She was out of the hospital in March 2012 and had her first performance at the Indianapolis Opera in May, just months later.

Despite doctors telling her she would never sing opera again, her debut album, “American Grace,” reached No. 1 on Billboard’s traditional classical charts in 2014.

Finding friendship and family

In 2012, she wrote a letter to Brown’s family, telling them what the new lungs meant to her.

At first, she didn’t hear anything back. Her letter went through the hospital and then the United Network for Organ Sharing and Lifebanc, which gave Brown’s family the option of collecting the letter. Per network regulations, Tillemann-Dick could sign the letter with only her first name and couldn’t include information about where she lived, how old she was, the name of her surgeon or hospital, or any contact information.

Later that year, Tufani hosted a group of people from her church for a retreat at her home. She took out the letter and read it aloud to everyone. Unknown to Tufani at the time, one of the women in the group was also a friend of Tillemann-Dick’s.

The letter began, “Dear family, it may seem awkward for me to address you as family, but I feel related to you in a very literal way.” Before Tufani finished reading the letter, their mutual friend recognized who it had to be from. She immediately connected the two over Facebook Messenger.

Tillemann-Dick and Tufani have since become close friends, and Tillemann-Dick attended Tufani’s wedding in 2015. “We talk on Instagram all the time,” she said.

Recently, they reunited in Ohio and sang “The Star-Spangled Banner” and “O Holy Night,” recording themselves to see how their voices sound together. Tufani works full-time managing a fast food restaurant, but she loves to sing at her church.

Tillemann-Dick comes from a big Mormon family in Denver. She is the fifth of 11 children, just like Brown was, she said. “She also had five sisters, just like I do,” Tillemann-Dick said.

Tufani, who was born in Ohio, said she only remembers her mother from when she was very young, before her parents split. When her mother died of a stroke, Tufani met family members she had never seen before at the hospital when they all received the call.

“Like any girl who doesn’t have a mom, you want to know them,” Tufani said. “It was overwhelming when she passed because it was the first time (in a long time) that I had even seen her, at the hospital.”

See the latest news and share your comments with CNN Health on Facebook and Twitter.

Tillemann-Dick’s health struggles have continued. Transplant patients, because of years of immunosuppressant medications, are at significantly increased risk for all types of cancers. Last year, Tillemann-Dick had a cancer of the parotid gland, which led to chemotherapy, radiation and doctors removing the gland, along with part of the facial nerve. The cancer has not returned.

Tufani said she has read Tillemann-Dick’s letter to many people, to show them what organ donation can do. She said, “Organ donation gives people like Charity a second chance at living their life.”

Now, Tilleman-Dick is singing with a new purpose in life and has partnered with Donate Life to launch a social media campaign called the Donate Life #MyEncore Challenge. The goal is to encourage organ donor signups and have people share their stories of being given second chances at life.

Her memoir “The Encore” is about the second chances she’s been given. It was published in October.

Tufani is always encouraging people to sign up to be an organ donor.

“To me, it’s just been such a blessing, because it’s almost as if she didn’t die for nothing. She died but gave people life, and it’s such a beautiful thing to see life come from a situation like that,” Tufani said.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/13/health/turning-points-opera-singer-lung-transplant/index.html

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Iraq ousted ISIS, but ‘Mosul can never be the same again’

(CNN)A few days ago, Mahmoud Saeed boarded a plane for a trip that is sure to be filled with trepidation.

Still, he knew what he might find. And at the same time, he couldn’t fully prepare for the scenes of devastation that would await him.

The acclaimed Iraqi author had not seen his beloved hometown in six long years. And while Mosul had been freed from the so-called Islamic State, it would never be the same.

He knew that when he finally arrived, the city that shaped him from a young boy to manhood would be unrecognizable. Mosul had survived thousands of years of myriad rulers and cultures, but ISIS dealt it a death knell.

RELATED: In biblical lands, Christianity is in peril

It captured Mosul in June 2014, butchered thousands of people and prompted an exodus from Iraq’s second largest city. Harrowing accounts of suffering and survival surfaced in the ensuing months.

A year ago, Iraqi forces launched a military campaign to oust the hardline extremists from Mosul and surrounding Nineveh province. By the time Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi arrived in the city in July to declare victory, nearly 900,000 people had been displaced from their homes.

And Mosul was destroyed.

In the eight hard months of fighting, more than 500 buildings were obliterated and thousands others damaged, United Nations satellite imagery shows. Hardly a structure went unscathed in the historic Old City on the west bank of the Tigris River, where the fighting was fiercest. Nothing was left of Mosul’s heart and soul except charred and mangled structures.

ISIS burned books and bombed ancient sites, including the famed al-Nuri mosque and its leaning al-Hadba minaret that had graced the Mosul skyline for decades and engendered a sense of belonging for its native sons and daughters. The mosque was to Moslawis what the Eiffel Tower is to Parisians. Now residents say they hail from the city of the bombed mosque.

The destruction was apocalyptic, far greater than anyone had expected.

Saeed and his fellow Moslawis had watched from near and far. With their own eyes or through the eyes of their relatives. On television and in newspapers.

Saeed knew what to anticipate, and yet he braced himself. How can anyone prepare for something like this?

In Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, Saeed had been persecuted for his words. He eventually fled and found freedom as a writer. But he was forced into the hard life of a refugee in Chicago, and the longing for home grew.

He felt helpless as Daesh, the Arabic name for ISIS, took hold and his family in Mosul cowered under militant rule. Earlier this year, he says, his sister’s grandson was beheaded.

“I cannot fully feel until I see it for myself,” he told me before embarking on his long journey home. “Maybe then, I can write about it.”

But the forces that destroyed Mosul are unlike wildfires that can be doused, hurricanes that eventually stop churning or even guns that finally fall silent.

Beyond the herculean task of rebuilding that lies ahead, Iraqis cannot be certain ISIS is gone forever. I spoke recently with Saeed and several other Moslawis who I had interviewed last year as the battle for Mosul began.

I heard two main themes in what they told me. A return to normalcy would be a long and laborious undertaking. And, beyond the deaths and destruction, the hardline extremists had put a firm end to something critical that had already been eroding in Iraq: trust.

RELATED: Minorities on the edge of extinction

Lack of trust

Mohammed Al Mawsily was already fighting ISIS when Iraqi forces launched their assault on October 17 last year. Except Al Mawsily never picked up a gun. His war consisted of two things ISIS hated: music and truth.

He and two partners started a pirate radio station for the million or so people trapped in Mosul after ISIS began its tyrannical reign. They called it Alghad, or Tomorrow, in hope of a better future.

I met Al Mawsily in Iraq last October when everything about the radio station had to be kept underground, including his identity — Al Mawsily is not his real name; it means “from Mosul.” He risked his life so Iraqis around the world could listen to the otherwise silenced voices of Mosul.

Mosul is now free of Daesh, Al Mawsily tells me over the phone, but he has not stopped telling stories from his hometown, one that is still in chaos.

He describes a city that has no rule of law, no coordinated traffic flows. A city that is divided — all the bridges linking the west and east banks were destroyed. Although some temporary bridges have been put up, they are not enough for Mosul, which once boasted 2 million people. It can take hours to cross the Tigris these days.

East Mosul is a paradise compared to the west, where people lack clean water, electricity and access to health care. The need to handle traumatic injuries has shifted to rehabilitation and longer-term care, but few hospitals and medical facilities have the resources to step in.

And then there is that word again. Trust.

People don’t trust that hundreds of millions of dollars of UN aid is being spent to rebuild Mosul, Al Mawsily tells me. They’re aware of high levels of corruption in Iraq and see little evidence of progress.

They lack confidence in the Shiite-controlled Baghdad government to do right by them. They question the allegiances of the Popular Mobilization Forces, the Shiite militias controlling their Sunni-majority city. For the first time in his life, Al Mawsily says, he is routinely witnessing Shiite parades, which have the potential to stoke ethnic tensions.

The lack of trust permeates and taints every aspect of life.

“Under Daesh, people were betrayed by their relatives and neighbors,” he says. “And what of the Daesh supporters and their families? How will they be treated?

“Today, we have a city that is semi-paralyzed.”

People are looking for work, he says, but where are the jobs? Meanwhile, rents in East Mosul have skyrocketed as the western half remains in darkness.

“We are facing quite an impossible mission to return to normal,” Al Mawsily says. “We need an extraordinary effort to heal the city.”

If that effort is not mounted, if the problems are not addressed, then ISIS will be back. That is Al Mawsily’s fear.

‘We can’t cry. We can’t complain’

Others I speak with agree with Al Mawsily’s dire prediction. One, a historian and blogger from Mosul who also risked all by publishing words that were anathema to ISIS, made a list of tasks he says need to be tackled immediately. Among them:

• Build a local police force with training and expertise and prevent other forces with sectarian agendas from exercising authority in Mosul.

• Turn over reconstruction to private and foreign companies.

• Establish a security and judicial system in conjunction with government ministries, civil institutions and the UN. Ensure fair trials for those charged with ISIS crimes.

• Rehabilitate the Old City in accordance with its previous style.

• Establish a council to oversee all religious sects and monitor discourse to prevent hate speech or extremism.

“It will take years to finish the basics,” the historian tells me over the phone. His blog is called Mosul Eye. He still wants his identity shielded for fear of repercussion.

“All our lives were destroyed in front of our eyes and we are unable to do anything. We can’t cry. We can’t complain. We can’t move. We just watch the destruction.”

There is silence on the phone.

I try to imagine how it must feel to see a cherished hometown demolished before you. It is, he says, as though your mother died.

“Mosul can never be the same again,” he says.

But perhaps it can be better.

The Mosul Eye blogger refuses to stop dreaming of the day that his beloved city will be alive again with music, art, libraries, markets and festivals. He looks into the future and sees a modern and developed Mosul growing from the ashes — one that attracts tourists from around the globe.

More than anything, he sees a city that is free.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/16/middleeast/iraq-battle-for-mosul-anniversary/index.html

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‘Star Trek: Discovery’ needs to find its moral heart

After episode 4, I’m no longer sure that Discovery‘s heart is in the right place.

War and moral ambiguity are nothing new to Star Trek, but Discovery is unnecessarily cold and brutal. No one in the U.S.S. Discovery’s crew seems to like each other, and the show gives no screentime to the casual side of their lives. It forgets that no matter how grim the setting, life still goes on. What do these characters do for fun? What are their relationships? Why does Tilly and Burnham’s bedroom look like a featureless prison cell? Following the plot-heavy introduction of the first three episodes, we need more downtime to relax into these characters.

Photo via Star Trek: Discovery/CBS

In the lead up to Discovery’s premiere, I often thought about the unspoken contract between fans and creators of a long-running franchise. People have certain expectations for something like Star Trek, but after 50 years, you can’t just repeat what came before. A new show must forge ahead, building fresh material around the heart of what makes Star Trek work.

Discovery made excellent choices with its casting, production values, and overall concept. It just doesn’t fill Star Trek’s cultural niche because it increasingly appears to be a show about miserable people being unpleasant. Even during the darkest periods of Deep Space 9 and Voyager, the main characters still shared the frivolity and warmth of day-to-day life. Discovery needs this. It needs to find an appropriate equivalent to The Next Generation’s poker games or Voyager’s silly holodeck adventures—not to replace its core story about the Klingon war, but to balance out the tension.

Instead of seeing Michael Burnham emerge from her loneliness and guilt, she’s sinking further into a pit of troubling moral decisions. This week, she received her first proper assignment from Captain Lorca. Her job was to experiment on the monster (“Ripper”) they captured on the U.S.S. Glenn, and figure out how to weaponize it. She quickly realized it was actually a herbivorous tardigrade with a symbiotic link to Stamets’ fungus spores, making it much more useful than a weapon. After plugging Ripper into the fungus-based stardrive, they were able to save a civilian base from Klingon attack. Then instead of setting Ripper free in the fungus forest, they locked it back inside Lorca’s creepy lab.

By dropping a cast of scientists into an unexpected war, Discovery created an interesting conflict for Starfleet’s core values. Characters like Burnham and Georgiou believe deeply in the Federation’s diplomatic ethos, while Lorca is a warrior. He transformed a scientific research vessel into a battleship, forcing his crew to obey ruthless orders that Kirk or Picard would never give. It’s a thoughtfully complex scenario, with one key problem: Our heroes fail to rebel. There’s no sense of moral unity against Lorca’s cruelty, and this episode supported his belief that ends justify the means.

Photo via Star Trek: Discovery/CBS

I suspect Burnham will free Ripper eventually, but this week she just watched it suffer in quiet sorrow. We don’t even see a full reaction from Saru, who must sympathize as a sensitive, herbivorous “prey” alien himself. He and Burnham are now in the distasteful position of “just following orders” from a bully. Even if they’re unwilling to disobey a direct order, they should at least voice their objections to Lorca’s methods—or work together to find a better way.

We actually see more friendship onboard the Klingon ship, where the outcast Voq has built a religion around his dead mentor, T’Kuvma. Set apart from the less idealistic Klingons, Voq bonded with his right-hand woman L’Rell (Mary Chieffo), hampered slightly by their rather immobile facial prosthetics. (I’m very much enjoying the poetic, formal speech patterns of the Klingon subtitles, but if their faces can’t move, the actors should probably introduce some more body language.)

Without sounding too much like a stuck record, it’s troubling to see Burnham be so isolated compared to her Klingon counterparts. While L’Rell abandoned her post to join Voq in exile, Burnham spent most of her time with the antagonistic Commander Landry. They represent a classic conflict between open-ended research (Burnham) and a desire for actionable results (Landry), with Landry dying a hubristic death at the claws of the tardigrade. It’s hard to see why she had to die at all. An injury would serve the same narrative purpose, and her death confirms an unfortunate trend. Three prominent characters have died so far—Georgiou, T’Kuvma, and Landry—and all were played by people of color.

Burnham sympathizes with the tardigrade, a lonely creature that was judged by a single violent action. Yet at the end of the episode, Burnham locks Ripper back in its cage. This lack of self-confidence makes sense, yet it’s also unsustainable in the long term. We need to see more moral certainty from Burnham and more warmth from her crewmates, and it needs to happen fast. I’d be more forgiving if it was a 20-episode season, but we only have four to go before the mid-season hiatus.

Star Trek Discovery introduces a deadly mystery in episode 3

The Star Trek: Discovery credits are packed with symbolism

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Read more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41597857

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The top 20 female superheroes of all time

Superhero comics are hardly sexism-free these days, but there’s no denying this is a great time for female superheroes. Wonder Woman made a huge comeback this summer, Kamala Khan is one of the most popular new superheroes of the decade, and everyone seems to be obsessed with Harley Quinn—despite the Suicide Movie movie being kind of a mess.

To help you get acquainted with some of the best female superheroes, we’ve put together a list of our favorites. They run the gamut from weird vintage characters (Ma Hunkel) to modern fan-faves (America Chavez), and several of them have their own screen adaptations in the works.

The best female superheroes of all time

20. She-Hulk

Why isn’t there an Ally McBeal-style legal dramedy about She-Hulk? Seriously, she’d be perfect for it. She-Hulk is an irresistibly fun character with a unique role in Marvel comics: lawyer to the superhero community. She shares her cousin Bruce Banner’s Hulk powers, but unlike him, she retains her original personality after hulking out. Her power manifests as super strength, green skin, and a confident personality, and her legal career fills an interesting niche in a universe where many heroes “solve” their problems with physical fights.

Photo via Marvel Wiki

19. Zatanna

Tuxedo-wearing magician Zatanna has the capacity to be funny, weird, and deeply charming, and while she mostly exists as a team player, she definitely deserves more solo comics. She’s a stage magician with actual magical powers and acts as an entertaining foil for the seriousness of Batman.

Photo via DC Comics

Zatanna in her signature tuxedo

18. Supergirl

Supergirl‘s role overlaps a lot with Superman, and that’s just fine. She represents a kind of cheerful, optimistic heroism that’s kind of rare in modern superhero media, and her ongoing TV show celebrates that legacy. It’s arguably a better adaptation of the Superman mythos than the Justice League movie franchise, benefiting from a healthy dose of family-friendly feminist themes. As for her role in the comics, Supergirl’s vintage back-catalog includes some delightfully wacky storylines, like that one comic where her horse turns into a dude and they fall in love.

Photo via CBS

17. Ma Hunkel

Golden Age Z-lister Ma Hunkel is an early superhero parody, and she’s completely awesome. She’s a sturdy middle-aged mom who dons thermal underwear and a helmet made out of a cooking pot, adopting the name “Red Tornado” to fight petty criminals in her neighborhood.

Photo via Sheldon Mayer/DC Comics

Ma Hunkel in ‘The Red Tornado and the Cycone Kids.’

16. Elektra

This deadly assassin exists on a knife’s edge between hero and villain, not exactly evil but hardly an altruistic role model either. Armed with her trademark sai—a pair of triple-pronged daggers—she often appears alongside Daredevil, with whom she shares a tumultuous love story. She’s one of the few female superheroes to get her own solo movie, although we prefer her depiction in Marvel’s Netflix franchise, both due to Elodie Yung’s sensitive yet menacing performance and her thoughtfully redesigned costume.

Photo via Netflix

15. Negasonic Teenage Warhead

Negasonic Teenage Warhead is on this list because her name is NEGASONIC TEENAGE WARHEAD, a truly world-class superhero name. She’s goth as hell, and she’s in the Deadpool movie; that’s all you need to know.

Photo via Fox Movies

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14. Kate Kane (Batwoman)

Batwoman has a rather ironic origin story, given her later role in the comics. She first appeared as Batman’s love-interest in the 1950s, shortly after the publication of Seduction of the Innocent, a book that accused Batman of homosexual propaganda. In recent years she was rewritten to be gay herself, a controversial decision that led to some problems of its own. While her comic’s creators wanted her to marry her girlfriend, DC Comics nixed the decision by saying heroes “shouldn’t have happy personal lives,” a dubious statement that sounds pretty ridiculous in the context of, say, Superman. Despite all this, she’s undoubtedly the most high-profile lesbian superhero around, with a key role in the Bat-family.

13. Squirrel Girl

Squirrel Girl is officially the most powerful character in the Marvel universe, and unofficially one of the most fun. Born with squirrel-related powers, Doreen Green has a giant, bushy tail and can communicate with squirrels. Her recent solo comics are a cult favorite due to their genre-savvy humor, and she’s about to star in a an ensemble TV sitcom called New Warriors.

Photo via Marvel

12. Fantomah

This one’s a deep cut from the very early days of superhero comics, but we’d love to see some kind of modern reboot. Fantomah is a jungle ghost superhero whose face turns into a skull when she uses her super-strength. What’s not to love?

Photo via Jungle Comics #15/Wikimedia (Public Domain)

Fantomah, a super-strong jungle ghost

11. Ayo and Aneka

These fearsome freedom-fighters met and fell in love as members of the Dora Milaje, the all-female squad of highly trained warriors who guard the king of Wakanda. They act as antagonists in the current Black Panther series, but they’re definitely not the bad guys. It’s a complex story that positions them as vigilante heroes, protecting civilians during a time of political upheaval. And while they aren’t technically acknowledged as superheroes, they definitely qualify due to their heroic role, distinctive costumes, and nickname: the Midnight Angels. It’s just too bad their solo series, World of Wakanda, was canceled in 2017.

Photo via Black Panther #1/Marvel

Ayo and Aneka from the Black Panther comics.

10. America Chavez (Miss America)

America Chavez had a slightly awkward start in a limited series called Vengeance, portrayed in a ludicrously skimpy costume. Her real breakthrough happened in the cult favorite 2013 Young Avengers comics, where she got a cosplay-friendly makeover from artist Jamie McKelvie. She has a bunch of superpowers: strength, flight, interdimensional travel, and the power to punch something and make it dissolve into stars. This made her one of the heavy-hitters of the Young Avengers team, and this year she finally got a long-awaited solo series.

Photo via America #1/Marvel

9. Black Widow

Natasha Romanov (or Romanoff, or Romanova, depending on the comics writer’s familiarity with Russian naming mechanisms) is an enigma, a black-clad Soviet spy whose Cold War storylines sometimes overlap with the Winter Soldier. Her roles range from femme fatale to pragmatic S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, operating with opaque motives and using psychological manipulation to handle her enemies. Unlike most comic book heroes, who remain within the same static age range for decades, Black Widow has a canonical explanation for her eternally youthful appearance. In some versions of her story, she benefits from bioengineering that slowed the aging process—meaning she could actually be in her 60s or 70s. This doesn’t seem to be the case in the MCU, but who knows? They haven’t made a Black Widow movie yet, so her backstory is kind of a mystery.

Photo via Marvel Entertainment/YouTube

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8. Barbara Gordon (Batgirl/Oracle)

Looking at the DC contributions to this list, the Bat-family’s impact is impossible to ignore. Barbara Gordon is one of the most influential examples, as the daughter of Commissioner Jim Gordon and protégé to Bruce Wayne. She was the original Batgirl, changing her callsign to Oracle after the Joker infamously broke her spine in The Killing Joke. It’s a dark and controversial moment in Batman canon, but it led to a unique recovery arc for Barbara, as she forged a new role for herself as the information center of Batman’s team. Since she’s one of the only well-known superheroes to use a wheelchair, fans weren’t pleased when DC rebooted her to her pre-Killing Joke state as Batgirl in 2011.

Photo via DC Comics

Barbara Gordon, who has been both Batgirl and Oracle

7. Jean Grey

Jean Grey arrived on the original X-Men team in 1963, and since then she’s gone through a rollercoaster of plot twists and transformations. Introduced as a teenager with telepathic and telekinetic powers, she’s one of the most powerful mutants in Marvel canon, and she plays a central role in decades of iconic X-Men storylines. Along with ongoing friendships with Storm and Charles Xavier, and romances with Cyclops and (kind of) Wolverine, she starred in one of the most influential X-Men storylines: the Dark Phoenix Saga, which is being adapted into a movie starring Sophie Turner.

Screengrab via 20thCenturyFox/YouTube

Sophie Turner as Jean Grey

6. Kamala Khan (Ms. Marvel)

Kamala Khan is one of the biggest breakout superheroes of the 21st century, following in the footsteps of teen heroes like Kitty Pryde and Peter Parker. She’s a lovable, dorky kid who just wants to do the right thing, but finds it hard to juggle her newfound shapeshifting powers with her obligations to friends, family, and school. Her comics blend classic superhero themes with a contemporary tone, and they’ve been widely praised for bringing a Muslim hero into the mainstream.

Photo via Ms. Marvel/Marvel

Kamala Khan, the teen superhero Ms. Marvel

5. Captain Marvel

Carol Danvers used to be known as Miss Marvel, holding the title before Kamala Khan took over. While Danvers played a background role in Marvel team comics since the 1970s, her popularity exploded when writer Kelly Sue DeConnick and artist Dexter Roy rebooted her as Captain Marvel in 2012. Her sporty jumpsuit is now a cosplay staple, and her fans are known as the Carol Corps. Her actual powers are pretty conservative—super-strength, flight, and energy projection—but her real strength lies in the quality of her solo comics. Captain Marvel arrived at a time when fans were crying out for a simple, high-quality superhero book about an admirable female hero, and DeConnick and her collaborators delivered. Danvers is now on Marvel’s A-list, featuring heavily in recent crossover events (for better or worse), and soon to appear in a movie franchise starring Brie Larson.

Photo via Marvel

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4. Harley Quinn

Devised as a side-character in Batman: The Animated Series, no one could have predicted that Harley Quinn would become one of DC’s most recognizable characters. As a quirky sidekick and lover to the Joker, she’s a controversial character whose role means different things to different people. To some she’s just a sexy pin-up; to others she’s a sensitive portrayal of mental illness and survival in an abusive relationship. Her star power is such that when Suicide Squad came out last year, she became the main selling point of an otherwise disappointing movie. She’s basically DC’s Deadpool: a queer and unpredictable antihero with a weird sense of humor and a dark past.

Screengrab via Warner Bros. Pictures / Youtube

Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn

3. Storm

Ororo Munroe is a queen, a weather goddess, and a mutant leader. She’s also unequivocally cool, from her punk look in the ’80s to her badass lightning powers. While Storm doesn’t have as many solo comics as she should (and wasn’t treated very well by the movie franchise), she remains one of the most beloved X-Men characters. Along with all her adventures as a member and leader of X-Men teams, she also has an epic romance with Black Panther, the superhero king of Wakanda.

Screengrab via 20th Century Fox/YouTube

2. Catwoman

While Marvel leads the field in terms of mainstream superheroines, DC wins in the category of female villains. Catwoman and Harley Quinn both enjoy worldwide popularity as engaging, morally ambiguous characters with a wide range of canonical interpretations. Originating as a burglar, Catwoman is one of Batman’s most well-known antagonists—as well as being a sometimes love-interest.

Superhero comics being what they are, almost every superheroine wears a skin-tight costume and frequently gets drawn in weirdly sexualized poses. However, Catwoman is one of the few characters for whom performative sexuality is a legitimate aspect of her role. This sometimes leads to insultingly exploitative depictions (shout out to the Halle Berry movie), but plenty of creators get the balance right. Michelle Pfeiffer and Eartha Kitt created iconic depiction onscreen, and Catwoman maintains a timeless appeal as a woman who takes what she wants and doesn’t care what other people think.

Screengrab via Mindd Kidzag/YouTube

1. Wonder Woman

The A-list of the A-list. A literal goddess. A feminist icon, to the extent that when her solo movie came out in 2017, people debated whether it somehow “failed” because she couldn’t represent every feminist viewpoint on Earth. (She obviously can’t, but that’s kind of the point.) Created in 1941 as a combination of utopian hero and fetish character, her long career covers everything from Greek mythology to political allegory to conventional superhero team adventures with the Justice League. She’s also canonically queer—something it took DC Comics several decades to admit out loud.

Photo via Wonder Woman/Warner Bros.

Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman

Read more: https://www.dailydot.com/parsec/female-superheroes/

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The NRA thinks you’re stupid

(CNN)The National Rifle Association thinks you’re stupid.

Realizing the outrage of the American public that someone could take a cheap device known as a “bump stock” and convert a killing machine, an AR-15 rifle, into a weapon of mass destruction on the streets of Las Vegas or Anytown, USA, they’ve decided to throw us all a big bone. Drum roll please … the NRA has announced and told their supporters in Congress that it is OK to support “some regulation” of bump stocks!

It is an amazing display of disingenuous and cynical political sleight of hand that, in a week in which America has seen death and maiming delivered rapid-fire in the most deadly mass shooting of Americans in modern history, the NRA grudgingly agrees that some regulation of these devices is OK.

And, you should best believe and know that they will be at the negotiating table with Congress trying to make those regulations as lenient as possible, because that’s what they do! Let us not be fooled that this is a breakthrough or a change in behavior on the part of the NRA or its water-carrier, the Republican Party.

This is a political pivot designed solely to make you believe that they are rational champions of the 2nd Amendment, even as they simultaneously block every reasonable effort to make Americans any safer from gun violence.

Will Trump back bump stocks ban?

You have the right to bear arms, but you don’t have that right in the state capital, the buildings of Congress, an airplane and many other places, all reasonable because we all want to be safe.

We accept personal restrictions in our daily lives: you basically can’t buy two packs of a powerful prescription decongestant in one week; if you withdraw more than $10k in cash of your own money from a bank, you have to fill out a form and explain why; if you make multiple purchases with your credit card out of town and don’t tell your bank, they may put a hold on your card. If you drive without a seat belt, you can get a ticket and a fine.

But, when someone buys and slowly accumulates 47 guns and rifles (12 with bump stocks), scopes, explosives and thousands of rounds of ammunition, no red flags go up. No questions asked. No preemptive investigation is conducted. And a man sits in a window on the 32nd floor of a hotel, 400 yards away from a concert — a domestic sniper with military type weapons — and shoots down in cold blood nearly 60 people in nine to 11 minutes. Hundreds more were injured.

The death and destruction from Las Vegas sounds like a military report from the war in Afghanistan. The response from many elected officials? “Thoughts and prayers” … again.

Tell me: What is the argument for anyone having more firepower than the SWAT team members who came to make him stop shooting?

Trump open to discussing ban on ‘bump stocks’

If you are one of the many elected officials in America who can only offer words and not meaningful action, shame on you.

Spare us your hypocrisy — don’t attend any funerals or services for the deceased if you are not prepared to rebuke your master, the NRA.

Sandy Hook, Pulse Nightclub, the Century 16 movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, the AME church in Charleston, a country music concert in Las Vegas, and so many others. All of that blood and death is on the collective hands of a do-nothing, majority-Republican Congress and President.

Let’s do this instead: Make America Safe Again

Nearly 330 million Americans are waiting to hear your answer.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/06/opinions/nra-and-gops-bump-stock-ruse-nutter/index.html

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Police don’t know why Las Vegas gunman fired — or why he stopped

(CNN)Police on Monday said the Las Vegas gunman shot a hotel security guard six minutes before he began shooting concertgoersfrom his hotel room at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino — a striking change from an earlier police timeline detailing what happened.

Given that revised order of events, Clark County Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said investigators do not yet know what made Stephen Paddock stop shooting, and they remain perplexed as to why he meticulously planned the shooting in the first place.

Here’s what we learned about the investigation and the questions that remain unanswered in the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.

Security guard was shot before mass shooting

Authorities said last week that security guard Jesus Campos had approached Paddock’s room as the shooting was underway, diverting the gunman’s attention. Authorities also said that after Paddock shot at Campos through the door of his room on the 32nd floor, the gunman didn’t fire any more shots into the crowd.

However,Lombardo said Monday that Campos was shot in the leg at 9:59 p.m. on October 1. Six minutes later, Paddock began firing into the crowd at the Route 91 Harvest Festival, authorities said. Fifty-eight people were killed and nearly 500 were hurt.

He continued firing for nine to 11 minutes, and his final shots were fired at 10:15 p.m., according to police.

Officers reached the 32nd floor at 10:17 p.m., according to Lombardo’s timeline. By the time a SWAT team used an explosive charge to enter the room at 11:20 p.m., Paddock was dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Lombardo said that Campos, upon being shot, immediately notified security of his situation, and his action helped identify the location of the suspect. In addition, Campos prevented a maintenance worker on the same floor from suffering injuries, the sheriff said.

Police did not know Campos was shot until they met him in the hallway of the 32nd floor after getting off the elevator, Lombardo said.

What exactly happened in the six minutes between Campos’ getting shot and the mass shooting on concertgoers? Who did the security guard alert, and what was their response? Why did it take officers 18 minutes from that point to reach the gunman’s floor?

And why did Paddock stop firing?

Lombardo said that the revised timeline constituted “minute changes” and is based on new information that emerged over the course of the ongoing investigation.

“As I have conveyed to you from the very beginning — and your zest for information and my zest to ensure the public’s safety, and the calming of their minds — is some things are going to change,” the sheriff said.

In a statement Tuesday, MGM Resorts, which owns the Mandalay Bay, said: “We cannot be certain about the most recent timeline that has been communicated publicly, and we believe what is currently being expressed may not be accurate.”

A law enforcement source close to the investigation disputed the MGM statement. “Our timeline is pretty accurate with all the facts known,” the source said Tuesday.

Security guard heard drilling

New video shows concertgoers fleeing scene

Campos had been investigating an alarm that went off in another room on the same floor, signaling that a door had been left open, Lombardo said.Once there, the guard heard a drilling sound in Paddock’s room, and he was then shot through the door.

The gunman had been drilling into the adjacent wall to the doorway, according to Lombardo. His assumption was that Paddock intended to place either a camera or a rifle there, but the drilling was not completed, Lombardo said.

Did the gunman’s firing at the security guard speed up the timeline of the shooting?

“I would not make that assumption,” Lombardo said. “I’m not privy to that.”

Gunman hid his prep work

Why did Paddock open fire on the crowd at the outdoor music festival, an attack that seems to have been meticulously planned? And why did he stop shooting?

Lombardo admitted that he was “frustrated” by the speed of the investigation in answering those questions.

“It isn’t because nobody is not doing their job,” he said. “It’s because this individual purposely hid his actions leading up to this event and it is difficult for us to find the answers to those actions.”

Investigators are still piecing together evidence left behind in the hotel room and probing Paddock’s background to determine why the retired accountant did what he did.

“As I’ve said from day one, we want to figure out why — the why to this and we’d like to know the motive,” Lombardo said. “That is our most important goal — to prevent any further action associated with another individual who is contemplating this or what exactly went in the suspect’s mind to enable him to pull off such a complicated event.”

Investigators said Paddock acted alone, and Lombardo said they have found “no evidence to show there was a second shooter.”

The sheriff said authorities have received 200 accounts of Paddock traveling throughout Las Vegas, and that he “has never been seen with anyone else.”

Lombardo said the FBI is still evaluating Paddock’s mental state.

“Currently, we do not believe there is one particular event in the suspect’s life for us to key on,” the sheriff said. “We believe he decided to take the lives he did and he had a very purposeful plan that he carried out.”

Suspect’s family members interviewed

Investigators have interviewed the suspect’s brother, Eric Paddock, and other family members, according to Lombardo. He declined to discuss the interviews, but said each one was another piece in the puzzle in this case.

“I’m here to help them move forward with their investigation. I want to help them understand what they’re seeing,” Eric Paddock told the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

He did not describe what investigators asked him during their conversations over the weekend, according to the Review-Journal.

“I’m trying to get them to understand Steve’s mindset,” Paddock told the newspaper. “I don’t want them to chase bad lead.”

Lombardo said on Monday that law enforcement is also talking to Marilou Danley, the shooter’s girlfriend.

“We are still speaking with Ms. Danley about the suspect’s movement, gun purchases, and anything else we need to know about him and how he planned his assault — and who he came in contact with during the planning the phase,” the sheriff said.

Authorities first interviewed Danley, who was in the Philippines at the time of the shooting, last week. In a statement released through her attorney, Danley said she did not know about Paddock’s plans ahead of time, and she saw no signs that she understood to be a warning that “something horrible” would occur.

Danley’s sisters told CNN affiliate Seven Network Australia that Paddock bought a ticket for Danley to leave the United States last month.

“She was sent away. She was sent away so that she will be not there to interfere with what he’s planning,” one of Danley’s sisters said from their home in Australia.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/09/us/las-vegas-shooting-suspect/index.html

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Las Vegas police: Security responded to door alarm, drew fire from killer

(CNN)An open door a few rooms away from the Las Vegas suite of the man who was gunning down concertgoers at a music festival set off an alarm that prompted a response from a security guard, Clark County Undersheriff Kevin C. McMahill said Friday.

Authorities believe that the guard drew the attention of mass murderer Stephen Paddock away from the chaos below and toward the hallway outside his room.

The guard, Jesus Campos, was shot in the leg while checking on the alarm and according to a police-reported timeline, Paddock never fired on the crowd below again.

The alarm from a room “a number of doors down” from Paddock’s likely was a coincidence, McMahill told CNN’s “The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer.” The door was not forced open, had been open for a while, and Paddock didn’t have the keys to that room. McMahill said that door either had been left open or didn’t shut completely.

Paddock took his own life, authorities have said, after killing 58 people and causing injury to about 500 more.

McMahill spoke to CNN after telling reporters at a news conference that investigators looking into Sunday’s massacre have found no known nexus to terror or connections to ISIS.

They have no credible information as to Paddock’s motive, despite more than 1,000 leads and tips, McMahill said at the news conference.

McMahill said authorities are confident there was not another shooter in Stephen Paddock’s room, but are still trying to determine whether anyone else knew of Paddock’s plans.

Other developments from the media briefing and McMahill’s interview with CNN:

— Authorities do not believe another person used Stephen Paddock’s room key at the Mandalay Bay hotel

— McMahill called Campos a “true hero.”

— Investigators have reviewed “voluminous amounts of video” from many different locations including Mandalay Bay and have not seen any other person they think at this point is another suspect.

— Asked about video on which Paddock might have discussed motive, McMahill said: “I am not aware that we have recovered any such video.”

— McMahill said police don’t know what the killer was going to do with 50 pounds of explosives that were found in his car.

— Paddock brought the guns and ammunition he had in his hotel suite over the course of several days, the undersheriff told CNN.

— The FBI said it was going to put up billboards around Las Vegas seeking witnesses and people who might have interacted with the gunman.

— Paddock’s girlfriend, Marilou Danley, continues to cooperate with investigators, her lawyer and McMahill each said Friday. Attorney Matthew Lombard said Danley wouldn’t be making any more public statements in the near future.

Source: Shooter tried to buy tracer rounds

Paddock tried to buy tracer ammunition at a gun show in the Phoenix area in recent weeks, a law enforcement official briefed on the investigation tells CNN.

Paddock bought other ammunition at the show, but he couldn’t obtain the tracer ammunition — bullets with a pyrotechnic charge that, when the round is fired, leaves an illuminated trace of its path — because the vendor didn’t have any to sell, the official said.

Paddock did not use tracer bullets when he fired into the crowd at the Route 91 Harvest Festival from his suite on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel, hundreds of yards away.

Las Vegas gunman’s gambling under scrutiny

The official explained that if Paddock had tracer ammunition, he could have had a more precise idea of where his shots were going in the darkness, and could have been more accurate.

Shooters wanting greater accuracy often mix tracer rounds with non-tracers — perhaps having one tracer every fifth round in a magazine, said Art Roderick, a CNN law enforcement analyst.

“It allows you to keep your weapon on not necessarily a specific target, but a specific area. … There would have been a lot higher casualty rate if he had tracer rounds,” said Roderick, a former assistant director of the US Marshals Service.

33 gun purchases, no red flags

But tracer rounds also could have allowed police to see more quickly where Paddock was firing from, CNN law enforcement analyst James Gagliano said.

Without the tracer ammunition, Paddock’s location was difficult to determine from the outside, said Gagliano, a retired FBI supervisory special agent.

“The barrel of the rifle — we could not see muzzle flashes, from the angles I’ve seen on videos, which meant that he was … pulled back inside,” Gagliano said.

A source close to the investigation told CNN on Friday that authorities think Paddock might have fired at massive jet fuel tanks at McCarran airport near the Mandalay Bay before firing on the crowd at the concert.

At least 88 of the injured still were in Las Vegas-area hospitals on Friday morning, 37 of whom were in critical condition, representatives of the facilities said.

Did Paddock want to escape?

Five days after the mass shooting, authorities still are trying to determine the motivation of the retired accountant, who had no criminal record and did not raise any flags while purchasing an arsenal of weapons.

In addition to the 23 weapons in his hotel suite, Paddock had more than 50 pounds of exploding targets and 1,600 rounds of ammunition in his car in the hotel parking lot, police said, fueling suspicion that he intended to survive the massacre.

McMahill said several times Friday that there was no evidence yet that Paddock intended to use the target material for a homemade bomb.

What we know about the Las Vegas gunman

Escape, in this case, might have meant using the equipment in the car for further assaults until he got caught, said John Sheahan, a former Las Vegas SWAT team member.

“There’s one of three ways it’s going to end for an active shooter, and they pretty much all know this. You’re either going to commit suicide; you’re going to … shoot it out with (police) and you’re going to be killed; or you’re going to continue on a preplanned rampage at locations b, c, d and e until the police finally stop you,” Sheahan said.

“He rented the room in his own name. He’s already on video coming in and out. We know who he is. He’s going to be the most wanted man in the world if he does try to leave here,” he added.

Authorities: Paddock acted alone

There was initial speculation that Paddock had outside help in perpetrating the shooting spree, but authorities now say there is nothing to suggest he had assistance.

Law enforcement officials briefed on the investigation told CNN they have seen no indication so far that Paddock had an accomplice or that anyone was aware of his attack planning.

McMahill told CNN: “We didn’t see anything that caused us to have concern that another individual would have been with him during (his time in the hotel).”

Authorities piecing together Vegas digital trail

Lombardo, the sheriff, had previously expressed skepticism that the gunman carried out his plan by himself.

“Do you think this was all accomplished on his own? You’ve got to make the assumption he had to have some help at some point,” he said.

New video shows concertgoers fleeing scene

As the investigation grinds on, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department officers led the funeral of LVMPD officer Charleston Hartfield Thursday, who was among those gunned down at the Route 91 Harvest Festival country music event.

His body was escorted to Palm Downtown Mortuary and Cemetery, and a memorial was held for the slain police officer at Police Memorial Park in the northwest of the city — one of several vigils in Las Vegas on Thursday evening.

Gun debate continues

In the wake of the deadly attack, the Eastside Cannary Casino Gun Show that was expected to be held in Las Vegas this weekend has been canceled, David Strow of Boyd Gaming Corporation tells CNN.

Politicians from both sides of the aisle and lobbyists are now saying the controversial devices, which sell for under $200, should be subject to additional regulation.

US President Donald Trump is open to considering legislation that would ban bump stocks but wants to hear more information on the matter before making a final determination, the White House said Wednesday.

‘Numbers’ found on note

A note with numbers written on it was found in Paddock’s room, a source close to the investigation told CNN on Friday. The New York Times reported that authorities are trying to analyze its meaning, but Lombardo, the sheriff, didn’t elaborate on whether they are significant or not.

“Lombardo said that it contained numbers that were being analyzed for their relevance, and that it was not a manifesto or suicide note,” the Times reported.

Paddock had rented rooms at other festivals

Before checking into the Mandalay Bay days before the massacre, Paddock rented a room at a Las Vegas condo complex that overlooked the September 22-24 Life is Beautiful music festival.

In addition, in August, a person named Stephen Paddock reserved a room at Chicago’s Blackstone Hotel during the city’s Lollapalooza music festival, said Wagstaff Worldwide, which represents the hotel.

But that person never checked into the hotel, which overlooked the festival, Wagstaff Worldwide spokeswoman Emmy Carragher said.

It was not immediately clear whether the Stephen Paddock who booked the room was the same Stephen Paddock behind the Las Vegas massacre.

The Chicago Tribune, citing an anonymous law enforcement source, reported that it was the shooter Stephen Paddock who booked the room at the Blackstone Hotel.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/06/us/las-vegas-shooting-investigation/index.html

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Russians’ lawyer says new documents show Trump Tower meeting not about dirt on Clinton

(CNN)An attorney for the Russian billionaire who allegedly pushed for the June 2016 meeting between senior members of Trump’s team and a Russian lawyer says he has documents showing the meeting wasn’t really about dirt on Hillary Clinton.

The new information stands in contrast with the initial email pitching the meeting to Trump Jr., which promised damaging information on Clinton.

The emails provided to CNN between Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya and publicist Rob Goldstone — who arranged the meeting with Trump Jr. — show Veselnitskaya asked the morning of the meeting for a Russian-American lobbyist to be added because of his knowledge of the Magnitsky Act, the legislation that put in place US sanctions discussed at the meeting.

And a five-page talking points memo also provided to CNN shows Veselnitskaya’s case to repeal the Magnitsky Act to improve US-Russia relations, with a passing reference to a possible financer of Clinton’s campaign.

The June 2016 meeting with Trump Jr., President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and then-Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort has attracted intense interest because Trump Jr. was told he would get damaging information on Clinton amid allegations of possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian officials.

The documents were provided by Scott Balber, who represents Aras and Emin Agalarov, the billionaire real estate developer and his pop star son who requested the June 2016 meeting.

Balber, who went to Moscow to obtain the documents from Veselnitskaya, said in an interview with CNN that the emails and talking points show she was focused on repealing the Magnitsky Act, not providing damaging information on Clinton.

The message was muddled, Balber said, when it was passed like a game of telephone from Veselnitskaya through the Agalarovs to Goldstone.

Balber also suggested that Goldstone “probably exaggerated and maybe willfully contorted the facts for the purpose of making the meeting interesting to the Trump people.”

Goldstone declined to comment for this story.

“The documents and what she told me are consistent with my client’s understanding of the purpose of the meeting which was from the beginning and at all times thereafter about her efforts to launch a legislative review of the Magnitsky Act,” Balber said.

The emails between Goldstone and Trump Jr. tell a different story.

In the email exchange between Goldstone and Trump Jr., which was made public earlier this year, Goldstone wrote: “The Crown prosecutor of Russia met with his father Aras this morning and in their meeting offered to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father.”

“I love it,” Trump Jr. responded.

Goldstone, a music publicist who worked on the 2013 Miss Universe pageant with the Trump family, has said after the meeting was disclosed that he was exaggerating to Trump Jr. to secure the meeting.

Balber also provided CNN with new details about a phone call between Trump Jr. and Emin Agalarov after Goldstone initially emailed Trump Jr. and before the meeting took place. Balber says that “Emin remembers vaguely some brief call saying, ‘Look, I know Goldstone is emailing you if you can do this, that would be great.’ But Emin doesn’t remember anything substantive discussed.” Trump Jr. said in a recently released statement that phone records show three brief phone calls or voicemail exchanges with Emin Agalarov but that he had no memory of speaking with him.

Trump Jr. has said Veselnitskaya started the meeting talking about “individuals connected to Russia” funding Clinton but provided no details to support her claims and then moved on to focus on the US sanctions under the Magnitsky Act and the adoption of Russian children.

“To the extent they had information concerning the fitness, character or qualifications of a presidential candidate, I believed that I should at least hear them out,” Trump Jr. said in a statement to the Senate Judiciary Committee.

But the meeting between the Russian lawyer and Trump Jr. has become of significant interest to the congressional Russia investigators. And President Trump’s role in drafting his son’s misleading initial statement — which claimed the meeting was about Russian adoptions — has prompted special counsel Robert Mueller’s team to approach the White House about interviewing staffers aboard Air Force One when the statement was drafted.

Non-disclosure agreements signed

The emails between Veselnitskaya and Goldstone also add intriguing new details into the genesis of the meeting.

In the exchange the morning of the meeting, Veselnitskaya asked Goldstone if Russian-American lobbyist Rinat Akhmetshin could be brought along, saying he was “working to advance these issues with several congressmen.”

Veselnitskaya also said that both Akhmetshin and her translator, Anatoli Samochornov, has signed non-disclosure agreements.

“Mr. Akhmetshin has signed an NDA with us as did Mr. Samochornov,” she wrote.

It’s not clear why they had signed the agreement. Typically, a non-disclosure agreement would be crafted by a lawyer for the participants to sign. Two sources familiar with the Trump campaign said NDAs were not common requirements for general meetings.

A person familiar with the Trump Organization said the organization, as well as Trump Jr., had no knowledge that NDAs were signed before the meeting by some of the participants.

The source said it was odd that a non-disclosure agreement would have been necessary for the meeting.

Akhmetshin’s attorney, Michael Tremonte, said his client “has no recollection of an NDA in connection with the meeting and was unaware of the communications between Veselnitskaya and Goldstone.”

Balber said Ike Kaveladze, an Agalarov representative who was the eighth person in the Trump Jr. meeting, did not sign a non-disclosure form.

Veselnitskaya did not answer CNN questions about why the forms were signed. The lawyer for Akhmetshin declined to comment.

Talking points

The five-page memo, marked confidential and dated May 30, 2016, accuses US lawmakers of falsifying the story of attorney Sergei Magnitsky, who was killed while in Russian custody in 2009. US lawmakers passed the Magnitsky Act in 2012 to punish the Russians allegedly responsible for his death.

As part of her explanation, Veselnitskaya’s talking points accuse the “Ziff brothers” — three billionaire brothers who had run a hedge fund company together — of violating Russian law, as well as their connections to Democratic politics.

“Ziff brothers participated in financing both Obama presidential campaign, American press dubs them as ‘main sponsors of Democrats,’ ” the memo states, according to a translated version. “It’s entirely possible they also take part in financing Hillary Clinton’s campaign.”

Ziff Brothers Investment spokesperson Michael Freitag declined to comment.

Update: This story has been updated with the Ziff brothers’ spokesman declining to comment.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/09/politics/russia-trump-tower-meeting-new-documents/index.html

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There was a ‘giant picnic’ at the US-Mexico border

Mexico City (CNN)As the Trump administration eyes the border wall, so does an elusive French street artist.

In a post on his Instagram, people are sitting on benches at the “giant picnic,” as he calls it. “[P]eople eating the same food, sharing the same water, enjoying the same music (half of the band on each side) around the eye of a dreamer,” he says.

Thanks to all the daydreamers that joined us yesterday 🙏 #PicNicAtTheBorder 📷 @marc

A post shared by JR (@jr) on Oct 9, 2017 at 3:43pm PDT

President Trump rescinded the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program in September. The program was enacted through an executive order by President Barack Obama in 2012. However, the administration also has given Congress a six-month window to find an alternative to protect those 800,000 Dreamers, undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children, to remain in the United States.

JR expected the dining table to be brought down, saying he thought the picnic “was clearly forbidden.” Instead, one of his co-artists, Mia Maestro, posted a video of herself bringing tea to a US Federal Agent on one side and JR on the other side. The two stand with the copper-toned pillars of the wall between them. JR asks the border agent, “Will you share tea with me now?” The agent replies with a small smile as the two clink their cups with a “salud” from the artist.

Over the many bowls of tea I’ve served this has been one of the most memorable ones. Tea at the border of México & USA. A Bowl for the Dreamers 👁 THANK YOU @JR for making us part of this incredible day ✨ #migrationisahumanright ・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・ #Repost @jr For the last 10 years, I have been working in conflict zone, jails, borders and I always found an « angel » that helped us make the impossible possible … The picnic today was clearly forbidden, and yet it was not shut down. It’s always worth trying 👁 📷 Roberto De Angelis & Tea by @miamaestro

A post shared by miamaestro (@miamaestro) on Oct 9, 2017 at 9:38am PDT

The neighbors at the both sides of the border broke bread together Sunday, the same day the White House released an aggressive list of asks, including tough border security and immigration enforcement measures, for a DACA deal.

The street artist is known for his oversized installations, most recently of a 1-year-old named Kikito who overlooks the US-Mexican border from the Mexican side. During the 2016 Rio Olympics, large installations of swimmers, divers and other athletes popped up across the city.

“Thanks to all the dreamers that joined us yesterday,” JR said on Instagram in his last post from Tecate.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/10/us/border-wall-picnic-trnd/index.html

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Jay Park: from K-pop to Jay-Z

(CNN)When Jay Park became one of the first and only Asian artists signed to Jay-Z’s label, Roc Nation, earlier this summer, the hip-hop world was rattled.

Not that Park, who was born to Korean immigrant parents in Seattle, was overly concerned. In fact, it’s the type of thing he’s grown accustomed to.

“Me, being Asian-American, I was always looked at as an outsider. I always had to fight for my place,” Park told CNN during a recent interview.

For an outsider, Park is very much “in” at present. The 30-year-old rapper has seen his celebrity status soar in recent months. In addition to working on his debut Roc Nation album, he’s also preparing to join the second season of “Asia’s Got Talent” as a judge. The popular show premieres October 12 across 27 countries in Asia.

It’s Official @RocNation This is a win for the Town This is a win for Korea This is a win for Asian Americans This is a win for the overlooked and underappreciated This is a win for genuine ppl who look out for their ppls This is a win for hard work and dedication This is a win for honesty and authenticity Thank you for the acknowledgement and recognition🙏🙏 Just gettin’ started 10년차가수인데 이제부터시작이네 🙌 🙌🙌#RocFam #RocNation

A post shared by $hway BUM Park 박재범 (@jparkitrighthere) on Jul 20, 2017 at 10:49pm PDT

“Jay Park has clearly become an icon for those struggling to make a name for themselves,” said Flowsion Shekar, CEO of Koreaboo, a popular content platform specializing in K-pop with a reach of over 50 million.

“It shows that Asia is not being ignored … You can be an R&B singer, a rapper, a singer from Asia and have ambitions to takeover a global market. You can be recognized by the greats.”

One can’t spin a better comeback story

But success didn’t come easy to Park.

Like many Asian families, Park’s mom had aspirations for him to be a doctor or lawyer.

“That wasn’t happening, because I was skipping school and going breakdancing,” said Park who joined a b-boy crew named Art of Movement.

Park was curious about hip-hop since the second grade, convincing an older cousin to share music despite the bad words. Counting West Coast gangsta rapper Warren G and the sitcom “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” as inspirations, he started rapping by the fourth grade.

Fortunately for Park, his mom eventually relented and suggested he enter into a locally advertised talent audition, which turned out to be organized by one of the biggest K-pop labels, JYP Entertainment.

Not thinking much would come of it, Park, then 17, skipped out of the audition early to grab fast food at Taco Bell.

It was left up to his mom, who had stayed behind after Park had preformed, to relay the news that he had been selected to travel to South Korea.

And so began Park’s entry into the music industry, as the face of K-pop boy band, 2PM.

“I thought I’ll go for a couple of years and help my family out,” said Park.

“At that time, it was just me, and mom and my brother, having money problems. We couldn’t pay the electric and water bill.”

But his new life in Seoul proved difficult. Today Park is near fluent in Korean, but back then was only a beginner.

“It was really hard to sacrifice my life in Seattle and do this thing I knew nothing about,” said Park over the phone from Seoul.

“It was a culture shock, the seniority system, the food and the way they did things. … For me, it was a hobby and fun, but there, it was training, almost like a job, where you have to practice from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.”

Park complained about the challenges of life in the boy band on his MySpace page. The offensive comments were leaked publicly in 2009 and facing a fan backlash, he left the group.

“We parted ways, and I went back to Seattle … It is what it is,” says Park.

New Beginnings

After leaving the K-pop world, Park moved back home to the Seattle area and started working at a used car shop.

While there, he uploaded a cover video of B.o.B’s hit “Nothin’ on You” onto YouTube, inserting his own lyrics and rap.

The video went viral, with more than two million views in less than a day.

“I don’t give up,” said Park. “I wasn’t attached to the fame or the lifestyle … The main point in the beginning was to support my family.”

The video’s success helped him to return to the music business, creating his own label, AOMG. His fourth solo album “Everything You Wanted” was released last October, and rose to No. 3 on Billboard’s World Album Chart and No. 3 on the iTunes US R&B Chart.

“Me being in the system in a group with the company, I didn’t have much to express myself,” said Park. “(Now) I finally have the freedom to do what I wanted to do.”

His new album — representing his style of rap, R&B and electronica — is set to come out next year.

“They (Roc Nation) like the image I have now,” said Park. “I’m just me.”

In addition to AOMG, he’s launched a second label, H1GHR Music Records, with artists from the US and Asia. Through his music, he hopes to reform the image of the Asian male, from being seen as “people who are good at math” to be “sexy too.”

He also dreams of working with Rihanna and knows it may be “farfetched” to work directly with Jay-Z, but he’s “willing to put in the work to make that happen and one day we’ll see.”

“It’s still crazy to me that he knows who I am,” said Park, a longtime Jay-Z fan.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/08/asia/jay-park-jay-z-roc-nation/index.html

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What happened inside the shooter’s suite at the Mandalay Bay hotel

(CNN)When retiree Stephen Paddock checked into his 32nd-floor suite at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino last Thursday, nothing appeared unusual.

Paddock had booked room 32135, described by Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Sheriff Joseph Lombardo as one large suite with uninterrupted views of the Las Vegas Strip.

The former accountant would’ve had a clear view of the Route 91 Harvest festival, a three-day country music event taking place in an open-air, ground-level venue across the Strip, some 400 yards away from his hotel.

On Sunday night, as the crowd of about 22,000 people listened to headliner Jason Aldean below, Paddock smashed two windows of his suite — one in the front and one on the corner — and fired into the crowd, ultimately killing 58 and injuring hundreds of others.

The attack was the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.

The latest revelation came Tuesday afternoon when police said Paddock set up cameras inside his hotel suite and in the hallway. Police are not aware whether the devices were transmitting — the FBI is investigating their use — but Lombardo told reporters he thinks the shooter might have used them to watch for people approaching his room.

The hotel suite

Housekeepers said they “saw no signs of anything” suspicious in the two-room suite, Nevada Rep. Dina Titus told CNN.

Paddock had 23 guns inside the suite, as well as hammers, Assistant Sheriff Todd Fasulo said. The arsenal “was pretty well hidden,” Titus said.

The gunman had brought “in excess of 10” suitcases to his room over several days, Lombardo told reporters Monday. Authorities believe Paddock brought the weapons into the hotel by himself, but they did not provide specifics.

Room 32135, the suite from which Paddock fired, has striking, unobstructed views of the Las Vegas Strip, according to videos from two guests who stayed in the room last year. Windows that nearly stretch to the ceiling wrap around the room. There is a separate bedroom and a living room, which has a bar.

Photos published by the UK’s Daily Mail showed a body purportedly inside Paddock’s hotel room, along with semiautomatic rifles, including one with a scope and a barrel support mount. A stack of magazines and shell casings were seen near the guns. So was a hammer.

Police tape covers the room’s double doors, one of which appears to have been broken down, video of inside the room showed.

Portraits of the victims of the Las Vegas shooting

The raid

As the first shots rang out Sunday, first responders realized that the gunfire was raining down on the crowd from a vantage point up high. “It’s coming out a window,” a first responder shouts on dispatch audio obtained by CNN.

Attention soon focused on the Mandalay Bay hotel, several floors up and several hundred feet away.

CNN law enforcement analyst Art Roddick said he was struck by the planning that went into the attack.

“Firing from an elevated position is always what you want to do, so I would not be surprised if we have some video of him actually standing in that venue looking up at Mandalay Bay and trying to figure out which room is going to give him the best advantage.

“You can see those windows are knocked out, one in the front and one in the corner, which gave him two different angles to shoot from and that’s all part of this planning,” Roddick said.

The presence of other hotel guests in the rooms surrounding Paddock’s meant that police couldn’t return fire from the ground, he explained.

Officers hear gunfire approaching killer’s room

Police entered the hotel to begin working their way to the shooter’s sniper nest.

“A team of six officers that approached security, they went up the elevators after discussing the situation with the security and obtaining intelligence,” Lombardo said.

“And they checked each floor by floor until they located where they believe to be the room,” the sheriff said.

High up on the hotel’s residential floors, a first responder radioed in: “I’m inside the Mandalay Bay on the 31st floor, I can hear automatic fire coming from one floor ahead… one floor above us.”

“Subsequently they approached the room, received gunfire, they backed off and SWAT responded,” Lombardo said.

Undersheriff Kevin McMahill said once the first responders had “isolated this individual to the two rooms, our SWAT team used the explosive breaching to go in and confront the individual.”

Shooter’s angle prevented people from escaping

A SWAT officer is heard on police radio: “We need to pop this (door) and see if we get any type of response from this guy. See if he’s in here or if he’s actually moved somewhere else.”

Once inside the room, police found the shooter dead, apparently from a self-inflicted gunshot. Lombardo said police believe Paddock “killed himself prior to our entry.”

The attack was a threat police could not have prepared for, McMahill said.

“These folks were attacked by a man from 32 stories up with automatic rifle fire and so I don’t really know how you plan for that. We just didn’t see it coming.”

This article has been updated to reflect a change in the victim death toll.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/03/us/mandalay-bay-hotel-room-what-we-know/index.html

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Florida Gov. Rick Scott tells residents: ‘You need to go right now’

(CNN)Gov. Rick Scott implored Floridians on Saturday to heed their local evacuation orders.

“If you have been ordered to evacuate, you need to leave now,” he said at a morning news conference. “Do not wait. Evacuate. Not tonight, not in an hour. You need to go right now.”

Scott told residents of southwest Florida they needed to leave by noon. If they weren’t on the road at that point, he said, “Do not get on the road.”

An estimated 6.3 million people have been ordered to evacuate, according to the Florida Division of Emergency Management.

Residents of the Miami area and the Florida Keys streamed north in packed vehicles Friday, anxiously rushing to dodge Hurricane Irma as the deadly storm took aim at their state after devastating the Caribbean.

The dramatic mass exodus from South Florida could become one of the largest evacuations in US history, CNN senior meteorologist Dave Hennen said. Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties are home to about 6 million people combined.

But by Saturday, Irma’s path had shifted toward Florida’s west coast, threatening the lower Florida Keys and cities such as Naples, Fort Myers and Tampa, and the clock is ticking for those who haven’t left, officials warned.

Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn told CNN’s Chris Cuomo on Saturday morning that 14 shelters are opening in the area to take in evacuees.

“Obviously, there will be people who think they can ride this out. We hope they will be OK,” Buckhorn said. “I will tell you that if the winds are consistently at 40 mph or greater, our police and firefighters cannot come to get you. So if you’re going to stay, hunker down.”

After battering Cuba, Irma was expected to strengthen again before it hits the Florida Keys.

“Based on what we know, the majority of Florida will have major hurricane impact and deadly winds. We expect this along the entire east coast and west coast,” the governor said at a Friday news conference. “All Floridians should be prepared to evacuate.”

Thousands line up outside shelter

Thousands of evacuees waited in line outside the Germain Arena shelter in Estero, on the southwest side of Florida, on Saturday, hoping they could ride out the storm inside.

“We had nowhere else to go,” one said when asked what made him come to the shelter.

Some of the families told CNN’s Drew Griffin they had been waiting for up to five hours to get in.

“We’ve been here for a while and I know it’s very hard,” one woman named Alex told Griffin about waiting. “But it’s also very encouraging to see how many people are serving to help us get inside.”

“We really thank God that we have a shelter, that we have a safe place,” she said.

The demand for shelters in parts of the state suddenly increased Saturday morning as residents woke to find Irma’s expected path had changed.

Anthony Clarizio, the director of ElderCare of Alachua County in Gainesville, Florida, — which has become a special needs shelter — told CNN’s Kaylee Hartung just a couple of dozen people arrived when the shelter opened Friday.

“And then this morning, when everybody woke up and saw the storm had shifted more to the west. … It’s just been registration all day,” Clarizio said. “Vans have been pulling up all day long and they have been registering people.”

More than 54,000 residents were in 320 shelters across Florida, the governor’s office said Saturday. More shelters were expected to open throughout the day.

On the road

On Friday, motorists braved clogged roads, backups and slowdowns to get out. Drivers waited for hours at gas stations, some of which ran out of fuel.The Florida Highway Patrol escorted fuel tankers so they could reach and resupply gas stations, the agency said.

Travel hot spots included Interstates 10, 95 and 75, and Florida’s Turnpike. Troopers monitored roadways, stepping in to help after fender benders and with disabled cars and trucks.

Yesenia Rivera left the Jacksonville Beach area on Friday and, 3½ hours later, was traveling west on I-10 near Lake City. “There is still severe congestion and stop-and-go traffic all the way to Tallahassee,” she said.

Transportation officials said Friday that there were long areas of congestion on segments of I-75 northbound and I-95 northbound.

There was bumper-to-bumper traffic late Friday in the northbound lanes of I-95 south of Savannah, Georgia, CNN senior producer Bill Kirkos reported.

He said the parking lots of gas stations and truck stops were filled with parked cars, although it appeared stations had gas supplies and short lines.

Heading in the opposite direction, toward Florida, were utility trucks with out-of-state license plates, Kirkos said.

By Saturday morning, the Florida Department of Transportation said traffic had lessened.

The Georgia Department of Transportation suspended construction on interstates and state routes due to the expected surge of traffic.

In Florida, mandatory evacuation orders covered parts of Miami-Dade County, Broward County east of US 1, Palm Beach County, low-lying parts of Brevard County, coastal and low-lying areas of Jacksonville and Duval County, and Monroe County, home to the Florida Keys.

The evacuation of Miami-Dade County was the largest in its history, with an estimated 660,000 people asked to leave, Mayor Carlos Gimenez said Friday.

‘You could die’

Some people heard officials’ dire admonitions loud and clear.

“If you don’t heed the warning, you could die,” Don Anderson of Key Largo told CNN on Friday. “This is your life. What’s it worth? You can always party later.”

Craig Fugate, former administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said on Saturday morning that going just a few miles inland could be beneficial for those in coastal areas.

“Go to friends, go to families, go to the shelters that are open,” he said. “But if you are planning to go long distance, leave early and give yourself time. And that is running out.”

Flying out of the storm zone

Some Floridians opted to fly instead of risking chaos on the highways. Delta Air Lines added flights out of Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Key West to Atlanta, its largest hub, and allowed passengers affected by Irma to rebook flights free, the airline said.

American and United also waived change fees for passengers affected by Irma, the airlines said.

Pets, pets, pets!!! Every second passenger has pet on flights today 🤗🙏🐶🐱#miami #southbeach #hurricane #irma #СNNweather

A post shared by Elena Yampolskaya (@ellenworldwide) on Sep 7, 2017 at 8:25am PDT

But Irma’s impending landfall forced airlines serving some of the nation’s largest airports to begin to shut down operations this weekend.

By late Saturday, Miami, Orlando and Fort Lauderdale — home to the 12th, 13th and 21st largest US airports, respectively — were expected to be largely dormant, and will halt operations through Sunday. Jacksonville and Tampa international airports both announced they would cease operations Saturday night.

Stranded at the airport

Kevin Brokbals, who hails from Germany, was among several dozen people who spent the night on cots at the Miami airport. He planned to be stuck for a while and said airport officials hadn’t given much sense of his options.

“The airport didn’t tell us anything,” he said Friday. “We asked some police officers to give us any information because there was no one officially from the airport.”

First, he and others were told they had to leave the airport and head to a shelter. Then they were told all shelters were full.

“And we have to stay here,” he said. “We can’t stay upstairs because there are too many windows, too (much glass) which can break. And that’s why they want all the people in one area, even though it’s not a shelter.”

Leila Traversoni of Argentina was visiting Miami to shop for a wedding dress and a tuxedo for her fiancé. The couple are desperate to get back home; they’ve never been through a hurricane.

“I am very afraid,” Traversoni said on Friday. “I am terrified. I don’t know what to do. We don’t have any place to go. We are looking for a shelter.”

Traversoni said she’s hoping for an answer from American Airlines or airport staff.

“We don’t know what to expect,” she said. “We are really, really terrified because we don’t know what to do, where to go — just praying at this point.”

Hunkering down

Others planned to stay put to protect their homes.

“I evacuated Matthew,” one Merritt Island resident said, referring to last year’s hurricane. “I feel this is going to be a Category 2 or 3 by the time it hits us. I’ve got a pretty strong home, so I’m pretty confident it will survive.”

Wary of tornadoes, though, he said he could change his plans if it looks like Irma is strengthening.

“I’m watching the weather and the news and keeping track with the storm,” he said.

Scott Abraham, who lives on the 11th floor of a building in Miami Beach, said he is prepared to ride it out.

“I have been here 15 years and been through so many storms. We have been told many times to evacuate,” Abraham said. “I don’t think it’s going to hit us directly. If it does, I think we are safe. We have food. We have supplies. We have everything we need.

“We are ready to rock ‘n’ roll with the storm,” he said.

Another South Floridian, Linda Blackshear, also planned to stay. She doesn’t live in an evacuation zone, she said, and her grandson lives with her.

“I feel safe,” she said, adding she has no place to evacuate to. “I have all the supplies and all the essentials.”

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/08/us/hurricane-irma-evacuation-florida/index.html

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There’s A Trailer For The Final Fifty Shades Of Grey Movie, And It’s Sexy AF

If you’ve been anxiously awaiting the final Fifty Shades of Grey movie, well… your wait isn’t done, but there’s something to tide you over now. The teaser trailer for Fifty Shades Freed, the final movie in the trilogy, was released on Sept. 10, and it’s looking true to form. Which is to say, sexy as hell and kind of over the top about it.

The trailer opens, of course, with ominous music, and a shot of… a wedding dress? Hanging from a chandelier? The voiceover recites a romantic wedding vow, as two people, a man and a woman, put on their wedding finery. Why? Because the two main characters, Anastasia Steele and Christian Grey, are getting married, of course! The trailer shows them exchanging vows, rings, the whole nine yards, all complete with a beautiful dress, because what’s a wedding scene without the fashion porn? (Don’t worry, the regular porn comes later.)

The trailer shows the happy couple on what looks like their honeymoon, in some beautiful, tropical location, complete with blue water and sunny skies, and sultry glances exchanged over the top of sunglasses. But then, there’s a gun? And a car chase? And people shooting at each other? And yes, yes, a lot of sexy shots of riding crops and bodies and heads tossed back with close-ups on the lips. Also, an apparent kidnapping?

Which is all to say, there is definitely some drama coming in this final installment of the Fifty Shades Of Grey trilogy.

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Of course, one should expect nothing else from the sexified homage. The trilogy of books the movies are based on, by British author E.L. James, started life as a fanfiction, which James then reworked as an original piece with original characters. In 2011, she self-published the original work, and in 2012 it was picked up by a subdivision of Random House. And after that… well, it kind of blew up, as evidenced by the fact that we all just watched the trailer for the third movie based on the series.

You can totally see the little nods to as well, including in the trailer. For one thing, Ana’s wedding dress has kind of a lot in common with heroine Bella Swan’s, down to the line of little buttons down the back and the long sleeves.

Need a closer look?

Mrs. Grey will see you now. #HappyBirthdayAnastasia #FiftyShadesFreed pic.twitter.com/Aa2gHW4W61

— Fifty Shades Freed (@FiftyShades) September 10, 2017

OK, I’m going to admit, this dress is kind of selling me on the movie. I can sympathize with a good fantasy indulgence in general, and I’ve got nothing against a sexy movie, but TBH, a pretty, extravagant dresses will always get my butt in a seat. Someone get the popcorn going.

And if you’re looking at your screen, thinking that you hardly needed a pretty dress to convince you to see this unapologetically sexy movie, well, you’re not alone.

Twitter was shook after the trailer dropped on Sunday afternoon.

The #FiftyShades fandom right about now pic.twitter.com/bFoOEWJxqp

— Dakota Johnson | EDJ (@DakotaJohnsonEN) September 10, 2017

Oh my God, her dress, her makeup, her hair, the background, I will die happy now

— Mary (@marylou1se) September 10, 2017

ASSDFGGHJJLLL HOLY FECK SHIT BALLS I NEED THIS LIKE YESTERDAY AHHHHHHHH ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤

— Kendra Steele (@miss_steele89) September 10, 2017

pic.twitter.com/BDPnKWTbUU

— ㅤpaola ;; (@calzwna) September 10, 2017

pic.twitter.com/bR5zahUEYg

— janay (@jayfruity) September 10, 2017

pic.twitter.com/kyMQ6N0Zet

— annette (@___anet) September 10, 2017

This is ostensibly the final movie in the series, which was written as a trilogy. However, it’s not certain that it’s gonna be the last film that fans get. Mashable points out that E.L. James also wrote a companion book from Christian Grey’s perspective back in 2015, so there’s a very real possibility that we could get a fourth movie? Hey, the series’ inspiration, , pioneered the art of squeezing an extra movie out of a series.

But if you’re too excited about this next film to bother thinking about a possible fourth, don’t get too ahead of yourself. The movie isn’t coming out until Valentine’s Day of 2018. So this is just a little taste to keep everyone’s interest up.

Though by the looks of Twitter, it doesn’t look like it was strictly necessary. Twitter is

Read more: http://elitedaily.com/entertainment/film/theres-trailer-final-fifty-shades-grey-movie-sexy-af/2066440/

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