Thursday, 18 May 2017
The Irish Language Rises
Duolingo was recognized by the President of Ireland last fall for helping revive the Irish language! Irish has fewer than 100,000 native speakers, but nearly 3 million people have studied it on Duolingo!
Duolingo is the world's most popular way to learn a language. It's 100% free, fun and science-based.
Duolingo due to high traffic is said to have become slower than normal...wow. Although the Duolingo team is working on this fix it gives an idea of the tools patronage. You can learn as much in 34 hours of Duolingo as in one semester of university language classes.
Wednesday, 17 May 2017
Trump allegedly pressed James Comey to close FBI inquiry into former adviser Michael Flynn
The White House is disputing a report that President Donald Trump asked former FBI Director James Comey to shut down an investigation into ousted national security adviser Michael Flynn. The New York Times says he made the request in February. (May 16) AP
Former FBI Director James Comey
WASHINGTON – President Trump pressed James Comey to shut down the agency's inquiry into former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, said a person who has reviewed the notes the now-fired FBI director took of the unusual encounter.
Trump asked to meet with Comey alone, following a February national security briefing involving Vice President Pence and Attorney General Jeff Sessions, said the person who is not authorized to comment publicly.
"I hope you can let this go,'' Trump told Comey in the White House meeting according to the person.
It was an apparent reference to the bureau’s counterintelligence inquiry into possible collusion between Trump campaign associates — including Flynn — and Russian officials accused of seeking to influence the presidential election. The incident was first reported Tuesday by the The New York Times.
Trump abruptly fired Comey last week, in a move Democratic lawmakers decried as an attempt to short-circuit the Russia investigation.
Comey kept his own log of all his discussions with Trump because he was suspicious of the president's motives, according to the source.
The meeting in question took place Feb. 14, the day after Trump fired Flynn because he had misled colleagues – including Vice President Pence – about the substance of phone calls he had with the Russian ambassador to the United States, Sergey Kislyak.
The FBI has been reviewing Flynn's contacts with Kislyak prior to Trump’s inauguration, in which he discussed sanctions the Obama administration imposed on Russia. Those conversations were secretly monitored by federal authorities, as are most communications involving foreign diplomats. Flynn initially denied discussing the sanctions, but later said the subject may have surfaced.
The White House strongly disputed the claims late Tuesday. "While the president has repeatedly expressed his view that General Flynn is a decent man who served and protected our country, the president has never asked Mr. Comey or anyone else to end any investigation, including any investigation involving General Flynn," the White House said in a statement.
"The president has the utmost respect for our law enforcement agencies, and all investigations," the White House said. "This is not a truthful or accurate portrayal of the conversation between the president and Mr. Comey.”
On Capitol Hill, meanwhile, lawmakers of both parties appeared ready to see evidence Trump might have tried to use his influence to shut down the FBI investigation into his campaign – whether voluntarily, or by subpoena.
Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, who leads the powerful House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, sent a letter to acting FBI director Andrew McCabe, asking for all notes, summaries, or recordings of communications involving Trump and Comey, by May 24.
"@GOPOversight is going to get the Comey memo, if it exists," tweeted Chaffetz. "I need to see it sooner rather than later. I have my subpoena pen ready."
Mercy Aigbe's estranged husband, Lanre Gentry fulfills his bail conditions, released from Prison
On May 9, Mercy Aigbe's estranged husband, Lanre Gentry was arraigned before an Ogba Magistrate court on a three count charge offence bordering on breach of public peace, assault and causing grievous bodily harm on his wife. He entered a not guilty plea and the presiding magistrate, Mrs O. Aje-Afunwa granted him bail in the sum of N500,000 with two sureties in the like sum.
Both sureties were to show proof of tax payment and own a verifiable house in Lagos with title documents.
Gentry was earlier remanded in Ikoyi Prison as he couldn't meet up with his bail conditions. He has now been released.
This he confirmed in a post on Instagram and has promised to grant an interview to reveal his experience in Prison.
Saturday, 6 May 2017
Country singer Loretta Lynn hospitalized after stroke
NASHVILLE — Country music legend Loretta Lynn suffered a stroke at her home in Hurricane Mills, Tenn. Thursday night and was hospitalized, according to a post on her official website.
Maria Malta, a publicist for Lynn, confirmed Friday that the 85-year-old singer and songwriter was admitted into a Nashville hospital after suffering the stroke at her home in Hurricane Mills, the Associated Press reported.
According to the Friday afternoon post on her website, Lynn is “currently under medical care and is responsive and expected to make a full recovery.”
Upcoming events on her tour schedule will be postponed; more information on those dates will be posted on Lynn’s website (LorettaLynn.com) in the coming days.
Friday, 5 May 2017
Kendall Jenner's month of media mishaps
Kendall Jenner has had a rough few weeks. First it was backlash from her Pepsi, then her involvement with the Fyre festival, now the reality star is facing backlash from her Vogue India cover.
Source:USA TODAY
Jonathan released N34bn for dredging of River Niger but Pres Buhari will get it done with N100m- Rotimi Amaechi claims
Minister of Transport, Rotimi Amaechi says the Goodluck Jonathan administration released N34 million for the dedging of River Niger but that the Buhari-led administration would get the job done for N100 million only.
Amaechi disclosed this at the opening of a conference on Fast-tracking Port Reforms hosted by The Nation in conjunction with the Federal Ministry of Transportation in Lagos yesterday.
Thursday, 4 May 2017
New biography claims :Obama considered gay fling, took cocaine & cheated on Michelle
A new tell-all book is making some scandalous revelations about the former president of the United States, Barack Obama.
In the Book, Rising Star: The Making of Barack Obama, which was written by Pulitzer-prize winning biographer David Garrow, it was revealed that Obama cheated on Michelle while they were still dating, that he considered having a gay relationship with one of his professors in school, had passionate sex with fellow students and took cocaine.
Though Barack had already admitted in his memoir to trying the drug in his teens, the new tell-all claims Barack's memoir was inaccurate.
The book, which is being described as an authoritative new biography of the ex-president, reveals that before Michelle, Barack had an Australian girlfriend named Genevieve Cook and they had sex on their first date. Obama and Cook met on New Year's eve in 1983 when he was 22 and she was 25. At the time, he was a journalist on a financial trade magazine. She visited him at his apartment in Manhattan which he shared with two others and he made her dinner, after which they had sex and she spent the night. She was so impressed with his passionate love making that she wrote him a romantic poem with the lines:
"B. That’s for you. F’s for all the f***ing that we do."
Cook also claimed in a private her memoir she wrote that they would smoke pot at parties. She claimed he would take cocaine with friends Hasan Chandoo, Imad Hussain and Sohale Siddiqi at Occidental College, Los Angeles, but nowhere near as much as the others.
"For every five lines that somebody did, he would have done half."
The 1,078-page biography also revealed that Obama dated another white lady called Sheila Miyoshi Jager and he proposed to her twice. He later met Michelle when he went to Law School but continued to see Jager. Jager, now 53 and the associate professor and director of the East Asian programme at Oberlin College in Ohio, said she “felt bad” because they were still seeing each other for the first year of his relationship with future First Lady Michelle.
The close relationship between Obama and his former openly gay professor, Lawrence Goldyn, was also detailed in the book. The former president stayed close to the assistant professor and he was even once pictured with him in the Oval Office. The book disclosed that Obama considered going into a relationship with the professor after they developed a friendship beyond the classroom and that Goldyn made a huge impact on Obama.
"Obama wrote somewhat elusively to his first intimate girlfriend that he had thought about and considered gayness but ultimately decided that a same-sex relationship would be less challenging and demanding than developing one with the opposite sex."
Obama is yet to respond to the allegations or acknowledge the book which will be released on the 9th of May.
The Duke of Edinburgh to step down from official duties beginning in August
LONDON — Britain’s Prince Philip, the husband of Queen Elizabeth II, will no longer carry out public engagements from this fall, Buckingham Palace announced Thursday.
The announcement followed frenzied speculation among the media and the public after staff working at royal buildings throughout the country were called to the palace in central London for an emergency meeting.
“His Royal Highness The Duke of Edinburgh has decided that he will no longer carry out public engagements from the autumn of this year. In taking this decision, The Duke has the full support of The Queen,” the palace said in a statement.
“Prince Philip will attend previously scheduled engagements between now and August, both individually and accompanying The Queen. Thereafter, The Duke will not be accepting new invitations for visits and engagements, although he may still choose to attend certain public events from time to time,” the statement added.
The palace said the queen, 91, would continue to attend her full program of official engagements, supported by other members of the royal family.
Prince Philip, 95, will continue to be associated with the more than 780 organizations of which he is currently the patron, president or a member, the palace said.
Amid speculation about the reason for the staff meeting earlier, The Sun newspaper erroneously published a story saying that Prince Philip had died, before taking it down. Both elderly royals have suffered a period of recent ill health.
The queen was not seen in public for weeks from early December after she and initially her husband were laid low by a "heavy cold.” She resurfaced in early January when she attended a church service on her Sandringham estate in Norfolk, eastern England.
Some media had also speculated that Thursday’s meeting could be about renovation work to the royal real estate.
In November, the queen was granted a 66% pay rise to fund 10-years of repair work to Buckingham Palace costing $475 million, including new plumbing and wiring, and asbestos removal. The 775-room building has not been refurbished since the queen became monarch in 1952.
Wednesday, 3 May 2017
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Hillary Clinton blames Comey
Hillary Clinton appeared to deliver a mixed message about her loss in the 2016 presidential election to Donald Trump.She said she was personally responsible – while also blaming the FBI director and Wikileaks.
"I take absolute personal responsibility," Clinton told CNN's Christiane Amanpour at the Women for Women International event. "I was the candidate; I was the person on the ballot."
But just a couple minutes later, Clinton said she "had a very strong assessment" that she was on the path to winning, until FBI Director James Comey publicly announced he might reopen the investigation into her use of a personal email server when she was secretary of State.
"I was on the way to winning until the combination of Jim Comey's letter on Oct. 28 and Russian Wikileaks raised doubts in the minds of people who were inclined to vote for me but got scared off," she said. "And the evidence for that intervening event is compelling, persuasive."
During her long-ranging interview with Amanpour, Clinton also blamed misogyny and Russian President Vladimir Putin's interference for her loss.
The U.S. intelligence community has blamed Russia for orchestrating a campaign of cyberattacks on Democratic political organizations with the goal of undermining public confidence in the democratic process and denigrate Clinton. During the campaign, anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks released the emails of Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta and other Democratic officials.
Clinton, whose answers were in line with what she has already said publicly about her loss, pointed out that she still won the popular vote by nearly 3 million votes.
Had she won, and became the first female president of the United States, "it would have been a really big deal," she said. "I am writing a book and it’s a painful process reliving the campaign."
Ivanka Trump describes transition to White House employee as 'a little challenging'
Ivanka Trump, daughter and adviser of US President Donald Trump, speaks at National Small Business Week event in Washington, DC, on May 1, 2017. (Photo: NICHOLAS KAMM, AFP/Getty Images)
Ivanka Trump called the transition from being an entrepreneur to working for the federal government “a little challenging.”
“Government does move at a different pace,” she said Monday during an event celebrating National Small Business Week. “But I think that tension is good. You push to try to get more done.”
After initially saying she did not want to work in the White House, Trump now serves in the unpaid position of assistant to the president. She’s put her eponymous fashion label in a trust controlled by two relatives.
Trump has said she will advocate “for the economic empowerment of women” and is also "very focused on the role of education." She also told CBS This Morning last month that she will “weigh in with my father on the issues I feel strongly about.”
Still, it's not exactly surprising Trump finds the pace of government a shift. The administration hasn’t developed a proposal for paid maternity leave – one of her top issues. And while the president’s tax overhaul outline released last week included “tax relief for families with child and dependent care expenses,” the outline included few details on how the tax subsidy would be applied.
Without mentioning any particular issues, the eldest daughter of the president said she's enthusiastic about the possibilities.
“This whole experience over the last several months, I’ve been throwing myself into with the hope that I can make a positive impact,” she said of her new position. “The opportunity for impact is enormous, just enormous. And that’s really exciting.”
Asked about the challenge of being a working mom, Trump said she long ago threw out the window trying to a balance between work and home because she didn’t want to set herself up for failure. “I don’t even strive for it anymore,” Trump said at an event with National Small Business Week award winners. “I’ve actually chilled out a bit on this front.”
Trump, who has three children under the age of 6, said she constantly felt guilty both personally and professionally after becoming a mother. Now, Trump said, she tries instead to focus on being present in each moment and focusing on enjoying what she’s doing either at work or at home.
She also said she’s “incredibly rigid” about spending time individually with each child.
“Since I don’t have a tremendous quantity of time to spend with them, I spend real quality time,” she said.
During the CBS This Morning interview last month, Trump said she’s been taking her children to a different Washington, D.C. museum or cultural institution each week since moving to the nation’s capital to help her father.
Tuesday, 2 May 2017
M. ANIFEST Feat. WORLASI
Donald Trump is ending Michelle Obama's girls education initiative
US President, Donald Trump's administration will not continue a signature girls education initiative championed by former first lady Michelle Obama.
According to an internal memo, the "Let Girls Learn" program, which she started in 2015 to facilitate educational opportunities for adolescent girls in developing countries, will cease operation immediately. While aspects of the initiative's programming will continue, employees have been told to stop using the "Let Girls Learn" name and also that as a program unto itself, "Let Girls Learn" was ending.
An email sent to Peace Corps employees this week by the agency's acting director Sheila Crowley reads,
'Moving forward, we will not continue to use the 'Let Girls Learn' brand or maintain a stand-alone program. The program provided a platform to showcase Peace Corps' strength in community development, shining a bright light on the work of our Volunteers all over the world. We are so proud of what 'Let Girls Learn' accomplished and we have all of you to thank for this success'.
According to CNN, "aspects of the initiative's programming will continue.
Monday, 1 May 2017
Lupita Nyong'o steps out with new hairstyle
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