Cleveland Orchestra sex abuse allegations

The Cleveland Orchestra has the reputation of being one of the best in the world. The city points proudly to it as one of its cultural crown jewels. But it too has been rocked by allegations of sexual abuse. Three women have accused the long-time concertmaster William Preucil of sexually abusive behavior. (In an orchestra, the concertmaster is a major figure, the leader of the first violin section and second in command of the orchestra after the conductor.) One allegation was made back in July by Zeneba Bowers about what happened to her in 1998 and two more women came forward just yesterday. (Massimo La Rosa, the principal trombonist of the orchestra, has also been suspended because of sexual abuse allegations.)
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The ugly entitlement culture of the affluent

The controversy surrounding Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the US Supreme Court opened the curtain on the life of the children of the affluent and what it revealed was not pretty. It seemed like those who attended these expensive private prep schools grew up with a sense of entitlement that, in the case of the boys, extended to feeling entitled to force themselves on women. The fact that his prep school had its own nine-hole golf course on the campus should tell you all that you need to know about what kind of money the parents who send their children there must have and what kind of person graduates from it.
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Is it immoral to watch American football?

Today is a Sunday in the fall season in the US and many millions of people will gather round TVs to watch professional football. It used to be the case that Sundays were the only days when they were shown but now you can also see games on Mondays and Thursdays while college games are shown on Saturdays and when their season ends in December, professional football takes those slots too. So basically, football fans can indulge their passions most days of the week.
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Some noteworthy aspects of the Nobel prize winners in chemistry

The Nobel prizes in Chemistry were awarded last week for discoveries that enabled scientists to speed up the process of evolution and thus produce treatments for various diseases.

For thousands of years, humans have been selectively breeding crops and animals to tinker with the genetic makeup of their future generations in humankind’s favor. The three new laureates have used modern molecular-based methods to re-create this process in the laboratory and therefore speed the process up considerably.

“This year’s prize in chemistry rewards a revolution based on evolution. Our laureates have applied the principles of Darwin in test tubes and used this approach to develop new types of chemicals for the greatest benefit of humankind,” said Claes Gustafsson, chairman of the Nobel committee for chemistry 2018 and a professor at the University of Gothenburg, in Sweden.
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The disappearance and forced exile of Saudi Arabian activists

As I have written several times before, the US media has fallen for the public relations campaign carried out by Saudi Arabian crown prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) who has assumed great power in that country and whose friendship with Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner seems to have bought him immunity from close scrutiny for the appalling and cruel war his country is waging in Yemen, a war that is being aided and abetted by the US and the United Arab Emirates. MBS’s charm offensive cunningly used the relaxation of some rules (allowing women some freedom to drive and allowing some cinemas to operate) that seemed designed to appeal to western sensibilities while retaining tight control on everything else.
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Why worry? We’re doomed anyway

It has become an article of faith among many conservatives in the US that fears of global warming are a hoax perpetrated on the world by a cabal of scientists who are using fake climate models and manufactured data in order to spread alarm and thus get money for grants or some such reason. The Trump administration seems to be fully invested in this belief. But then there was this curious news item about an environmental impact statement issued by the government that predicts that global warming will be even worse than some of the scenarios.
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Some good local news

To lift your spirits from the dreary news on the national and international scene, here is a bit of good news from my neck of the woods. Ohio is a pretty conservative, even reactionary state but I am lucky that the county I live in (Cuyahoga) has fairly progressive politics. An example of this is recent legislation passed by the County Council that provides protections against discrimination for the LGBT community, joining 20 Ohio municipalities that have passed similar legislation in Ohio, six of which are within Cuyahoga County already.
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Trust Amazon to act like a jerk

Amazon is a retail behemoth has been reviled for overworking and underpaying its workers, forcing them to depend on the government social services to supplement their income, as well as using its power in the retailing world to drive many small local firms out of business. Recently it got some good publicity by saying that it would pay all its workers at least the minimum living wage of $15/hour. But it turns out that there is a catch, that what Amazon gave with one hand, it partially took away with the other.
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