Louisville Business First | ReSurfaced returns with new summer schedule Louisville Business First ReSurfaced The Liberty Build will open on Thursday, June 15, from 6 to 10 p.m. with a soccer tournament between the front-office staff of Louisville FC, including head coach James O'Connor, and the Louisville Coopers, a supporter group for the team. |
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ReSurfaced returns with new summer schedule - Louisville Business First
June 9, 2017
By: Sierra Emilaire, North American Division News
More than 150 diplomats, religious liberty advocates, and guests gathered on June 1 for the 15thannual Religious Liberty Dinner held in the Religious Freedom Center of the Newseum Institute in Washington, D.C. The annual event is held to celebrate and bring attention to a central human right: the freedom of religion or belief.
U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson delivered the keynote address. In his message, Carson made the clear distinction between simply being free to worship and being free to exercise religion not only in the public sphere, but in private businesses and institutions. Carson praised the United States stance on religious liberty.
The Founding Fathers were very aware of the sectarian strife that affected Europe, Carson said. They thought of a better way, they instituted a better way. A government that would not establish a single religion. They left the choice of religion up to each individual person. This was more than tolerance, it was religious liberty.
Carson further encouraged attendees to promote mercy and compassion, rejecting hateful speech and actions in response to the recent murders of two heroic Portland, Oregon, men who were killed by a white supremacist for intervening when the supremacist attacked two Muslim women with hate speech and biased language.
While he represented the worst in humanity, his victims represented the best, Carson said.
Two awards and a special recognition of service were presented during the dinner to honor national and international religious liberty pioneers and advocates.
Secretary Ben Carson addresses attendees at the annual Religious Liberty Dinner organized by the Seventh-day Adventist Church. [Photo: Maria Bryk]
Kimberlee Colby, director of the Christian Legal Society's Center for Law and Religious Freedom, accepting the national award for dedicating more than 35 years to domestic religious liberty cases. [Photo: Maria Bryk]
Thomas Farr, president of the Religious Freedom Institute, accepting the international award for more than 20 years of advancing the cause of religious liberty, with Melissa Reid, executive director of the North American Religious Liberty Association, an entity of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. [Photo: Maria Bryk]
Attendees at the Religious Liberty Dinner listen as Dwayne Leslie, associate Director in the Department of Public Affairs and Religious Liberty and Director of Legislative Affairs for the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists introduces an honoree. [Photo: Maria Bryk]
Secretary Ben Carson together with his wife Candy and honoree Thomas Farr at the annual Religious Liberty Dinner. [Photo: Maria Bryk]
Bert Beach, long-time religious liberty leader for the Seventh-day Adventist Church, displaying the award he received at the Religious Liberty Dinner. [Photo: Maria Bryk]
Kimberlee Colby, director of the Christian Legal Society's Center for Law and Religious Freedom, was awarded the national award for dedicating more than 35 years to domestic religious liberty cases.
I think if you are wanting religious freedom for everyone, the golden rule is the religious freedom you wish for yourself, you must extend to others.
Colby commented on the importance of religious freedom and the recent cultural lack of respect for religious freedom, voicing concerns regarding the repercussions this shift in mindset may have on the capacity at which people may be free to live according to their religious conscience.
I think if you are wanting religious freedom for everyone, the golden rule is the religious freedom you wish for yourself, you must extend to others, Colby said. [Religious freedom] is really the basis for tolerance.
Thomas Farr, president of the Religious Freedom Institute, was awarded the international award for more than 20 years of advancing the cause of religious liberty.
Farr believes religious liberty is the first freedom of not only the Constitution, but of the human soul. He shared concerns about the currently skewed perception of religious liberty both domestically and internationally. Farr then proposed ways to become involved in the fight for religious liberty.
Individuals can live their lives and do what they do as citizens by protecting religious liberty, said Farr. If they happen to be religious people, exercise religious liberty publicly not just in your church, synagogue, or house of worship. If you are an entrepreneurial type or working in an allied field, get involved either with your church or religious organization or with a separate NGO that advocates religious freedom. Finally, if you're an American, push your own government to do what its required by law to do, but is not doing very well; and that is advance religious freedom in our foreign policy.
The third person honored is long-time religious liberty leader for the Seventh-day Adventist Church Bert Beach. Nearly 90, the man who is known to have defined his churchs interdenominational relations, responded with self-effacing humor to the well-deserved honor.
The annual religious liberty dinner is sponsored byLibertyMagazine, the International Religious Liberty Association, North American Religious Liberty Association, the Seventh-day Adventist Church and the Religious Freedom Center at the Newseum Institute.
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Ben Carson, Keynote Speaker at Annual Religious Liberty Dinner - Adventist Review
In a previous article we wrote about how we found Formula One Group (NASDAQ:FWONK) an attractive investment opportunity now that the company had new management. However, we did not present a valuation of the company. Given the complex nature of what assets and liabilities are attributed to the Formula One Group tracking stock we thought it would be helpful to share our valuation and also our reasons for viewing the stock as undervalued.
What Does Formula One Group Own?
For starts, the Formula One Group tracking stock contains more than just Formula 1. From Liberty Media's 10-K "including Liberty's interests in Live Nation, minority equity investments in Formula 1, Time Warner, Inc. ("Time Warner") and Viacom, Inc. ("Viacom"), the recovery received in connection with the Vivendi lawsuit and cash, as well as Liberty's 1.375% Cash Convertible Notes due 2023 and related financial instruments and Liberty's 2.25% Exchangeable Senior Debentures due 2046." And "representing a 15.5% intergroup interest in the Braves Group at December 31, 2016."
So let's start with the easiest parts first. Both Live Nation Entertainment (NYSE:LYV) and Liberty Braves Group (NASDAQ:BATRK) are publicly traded. Formula One Group's stock contains the groups 34% interest in Live Nation worth $2.45B at current market prices and Group's 15.5% interest in Liberty Braves Group worth $185M at current market prices. The group also has approximately $416M in Time Warner (NYSE:TWX) stock and $86M in Viacom (NASDAQ:VIAB) stock.
The Vivendi settlement mentioned in the 10-K appears to have already been paid to the group and so would appear in the cash balance on the latest 10-Q. Below is the language showing the suit has been settled and the payout received.
Vivendi Settlement. In connection with a commercial transaction that closed during 2002 among Liberty, Vivendi Universal S.A. ("Vivendi") and the former USA Holdings, Inc., Liberty brought suit against Vivendi and Universal Studios, Inc. in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, alleging, among other things, breach of contract and fraud by Vivendi. On June 25, 2012, a jury awarded Liberty damages in the amount of 765 million, plus prejudgment interest, in connection with a finding of breach of contract and fraud by the defendants. On January 17, 2013, the court entered judgment in favor of Liberty in the amount of approximately 945 million, including prejudgment interest. The parties negotiated a stay of the execution of the judgment during the pendency of the appeal. Vivendi has filed notice of its appeal of the judgment to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. During the first quarter of 2016, Liberty entered into a settlement with Vivendi which resulted in a $775 million payment to settle all claims related to the dispute described above. Following the payment of a contingency fee to our legal counsel, as well as amounts payable to Liberty Global plc, an additional plaintiff in the action, Liberty recognized a net pre-tax gain on the legal settlement of approximately $511 million. This settlement resulted in a dismissal of all appeals and mutual releases of the parties.
The group also has a total of $1.07B in cash and approximately $5.8B in long term debt attributed to it.
So, with the easy pieces of the valuation out of the way let's look at what the implied valuation for just the Formula 1 part of the group is.
The tracking stock has a total market cap of $6.71B. So, plugging in our numbers we get an implied valuation of $8.3B for Formula 1. The table below shows the math for the calculation.
Implied Formula 1 Group Value
$8284.0M
Liberty Braves Group (15%)
$184.6M
Live Nation Entertainment (34%)
$2448.0M
Viacom & Time Warner stock
$502.0M
Add: Cash
$1071.0M
Less: Debt
-$5780.0M
Current Equity Value of FWONK
$6710M
What is a Fair Value for Formula 1?
Last year Formula 1 generated $1,829M in revenue and earned $479M in adjusted EBITDA. That means that Formula 1 is trading at 4.5 times revenue. There is approximately $3.4B in net debt attributed to Formula 1 which would mean the EBITDA multiple is approximately 26 ($8,284M equity value plus $3400M net debt divided by $479M in adjusted EBITDA).
Formula 1 is a unique business and probably the best way of valuing it is looking at other comparables in the sports world, especially recent transactions. We looked at valuations for the recent sale of the UFC, publicly traded World Wrestling Entertainment (NYSE:WWE) and Manchester United plc (NYSE:MANU). We also looked at premier North American sports franchises like the New York Yankees, and the Dallas Cowboys.
UFC was recently sold for $4B, which valued the company at approximately 6.6 times revenue and 22 times EBITDA. However, the buyers believe that the UFC's current media deal, which is up in 2018, can be renegotiated for a substantially higher amount. If that does happen, people peg the valuation closer to 13 to 14 times EBITDA.
WWE and Manchester United are publicly traded so it's easy to get valuation figures for them. WWE trades at 2.1 times sales and 20.5 times EBITDA. MANU trades for 3.9 times sales and 14.5 times EBITDA. For the Dallas Cowboys and New York Yankees we used Forbes valuation figures. The franchises trade at 6 times revenue and 7 times revenue respectively.
The table below shows the average valuation multiples.
Business/Team
Price/Sales Multiple
EBITDA Multiple
UFC
6.6
13/14 to 22
WWE
2.1
20.5
Manchester United
3.9
14.5
Dallas Cowboys
6.0
NY Yankees
7.0
Average
5.1
17.6
We are included to exclude the WWE from our comparables because of the "sports" demographic problem. During the past 16 years the median age for a WWE viewer has risen 26 years compared to other sports like the NBA and MLB which have seen age increases of just 2 years and 5 years respectively! An aging demographic is obviously less attractive for advertisers and thus lowers the value of the franchise.
Manchester United, while close to a global franchise like Formula 1, has much higher labor costs. As we've shown in a previous article European soccer (football) clubs pay out almost half their revenue in player salaries. In terms of economics Formula 1 is much closer to American major league sports franchises that have much lower labor costs.
If the new ownership group at Formula 1 can broaden the sports appeal, and we believe they can, a valuation multiple more in line with North American sports franchises would be more appropriate. That could mean up to a 50% increase in value over the next few years.
Disclosure: I/we have no positions in any stocks mentioned, but may initiate a long position in FWONK over the next 72 hours.
I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
Excerpt from:
Formula One Group Could Be Undervalued By 50% - Seeking Alpha
The citys only Girl Scout troop made up solely of homeless girls got treated to a surprise Girls Night Out with NYCs womens basketball team Thursday night.
Troop 6000 started its night with a dinner at Planet Hollywood in Times Square, but the girls didnt know players from the New York Liberty team would be joining them.
The players showed up to tell them they were taking them to see Wonder Woman and that theyd get to go to the NY Liberty game at Madison Square Garden on Sunday, June 11, where they will be recognized on the court.
Ta'Shauna "Sugar" Rodgers, a guard for NY Liberty, said she was moved by the girls because she had also been homeless when she was a teenager.
"It's just motivating to see that they started something thatI never had, even though I was in the same situation as them," she said in a statement. "Just giving back and justseeing the smiles on their faces. It means a lot to me."
Karina, an 11-year-old in Troop 6000, said she looks up to the players.
"I love basketball, and they just make me keep moving forward and keep on doing what I do best, which is basketball. They inspire me so much," she said in a statement.
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NY Liberty players surprise homeless girls in Girl Scout Troop 6000 with night out - amNY
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Theaters New York has always been known for its rich heritage of theatre and performing arts culture
Day Camps before getting the summer blues, make sure to check out some of the great Day Camps that Long island has to offer
Vineyard Tours One of the most renowned attractions on Long Island has been the vast expanse of vineyards
Kids Entertainment Have fun 365 days of the year when you plan a day at these indoor fun centers
Fishing Long Island Marinas are also the home base for fishing charters and party boats
Things To Do Whether you're looking for indoor or outdoor fun, there is always something to do no matter where on Long Island
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Check the status of an existing NYC311 Service Request
You can check the status of your Service Request using your confirmation number. Most confirmation numbers begin with C1-1 and you should enter them using the format C1-1-XXXXXXXXX. If your confirmation number does not begin with C1-1, enter it without spaces or dashes.
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What if I get a Service Request Not Found message?
Try again later. It may take several hours for your status to be available. If you cannot get your status online, call 311.
What if I am not satisfied with my Service Request status or the agency's response?
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There is a reason that families choose islands over the mainland when they seek their summer sun.
Of course, the beaches running from the Costa del Sol to the Cte d'Azur, curving around Puglia and along the miles of Croatian and Greek coastline, have their charms. But a family escape to an island offers something different.
First, theres the sense of physical separation from the mundanities of work and school life. Then theres the fact that the island is finite: you can cross its main attractions and activities off your list at a leisurely pace - travel time to and from these events will be minimal.
Then, just gaze out at the sea, happily marooned and safe in the knowledge that nothing else is visible on the horizon. But which is the right island for your family?
Let our experts be your guides through the five stages of family travel to find the perfect island for you...
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The 25 greatest Mediterranean islands for a family holiday - Telegraph.co.uk
China is no long making more artificial islands to bolster its territorial claims in the South China Seait has moved on to developing them, adding aircraft hangars, communications equipment, and weapons positions. That's one conclusion of the Pentagon's annual report on the Chinese military, and it's a finding that contradicts Chinese leader Xi Jinping's pledge to not militarize the contested region, which is also claimed by many of China's neighbors.
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In 2009, Beijing set off alarm bells by circulating a map in which it appeared to claim up to 90 percent of the South China Sea. The territorial claim intruded on competing claims by neighbors including Taiwan, the Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam, Brunei, and Malaysia. Starting in 2014, China began using dredging equipment to expand existing reefs and shoals in the region into full-fledged "islands," adding 2,300 acres of new "land" to the Spratly Islands.
Satellite photo of Chinese occupied Subi Reef showing new runaway. Subi Reef has added 976 acres of new dry land.
Getty NASA/USGS photo.
In early 2015, Chinese leader Xi Jinping vowed not to militarize the islands, saying, "Relevant construction activities that China are undertaking in the island of South Nansha [Spratly] Islands do not target or impact any country, and China does not intend to pursue militarization." China has claimed its activities in the South China Sea are strictly limited to safety, tourism, and scientific research.
Despite this pledge, outside observers have noted several military facilities, including anti-ship missile systems, surface to air missiles, and communications facilities. The new Department of Defense report (available here) states China has built advanced runways and 24 fighter-sized hangars on three of the "islands." That's enough for a regiment of People's Liberation Army Air Force fighters, an organization broadly comparable to a U.S. Air Force wing of 48 to 72 aircraft. China has said the aircraft runaways are in part necessary for tourism flightsbut it is unclear why a single island would need 24 hangars too small for civilian airline aircraft.
Woody Island -- known as Yongxing Island to China. China has deployed advanced surface to air missiles and J-11BH fighters to the island.
Getty Visual China Group
China claims that while it has pledged not to militarize the South China Sea, it does reserve the right to maintain enough military facilities to guard the territory. Whether or not China has any right to this territory to begin aside, China's statement begs the question as to what exactly constitutes "defensive military facilities." The United States, Australia, and Japan have all conducted so-called "freedom of navigation" operations in the South China Sea in defiance of China's claims, sailing warships there in a gesture of defiance. Beijing promptly uses those incidents as justification to increase the level of military forces it maintains in the islands.
Source: DefenseOne
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China Breaks Promise, Starts Arming Its Fake "Islands" - Popular Mechanics
BBC News | SNP holds and Lib Dem gain in Highlands and Islands BBC News The SNP have held all but one of their four Highlands and Islands seats in the election. Angus MacNeil was re-elected in the Western Isles' constituency Na h-Eileanan an Iar. Drew Hendry was returned as MP for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey ... |
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SNP holds and Lib Dem gain in Highlands and Islands - BBC News
Marine protected areas, set up to conserve marine ecosystems and species, accumulate pollutants swept in from mainland shores by ocean currents.
It would be natural to assume that remote and sparsely inhabited islands in the middle of the ocean are surrounded by crystal clear, clean waters. Unfortunately, such locations can be affected by marine pollution originating from thousands of kilometers away.
Human populations living at or near the coast are the main source of pollution in the oceans, particularly plastic debris. Once at sea, floating, suspended, and dissolved pollutants are carried by ocean currents and can move great distances over months, years, and decades. Robinson et al. introduce the concept of the connectivity footprint to demonstrate how remote oceanic areas are connected to continental coastlines via a flow of pollutants.
Their research focuses on marine protected areas (MPAs), a form of designation used internationally that seeks to conserve important ecosystems and protect threatened marine species, particularly by restricting human activities in the area.
The MPAs around four island groups (all of them British Overseas Territories) were selected for the study: Pitcairn Island in the South Pacific, South Georgia and the Sandwich Islands in the Southern Ocean, Ascension Island in the South Atlantic, and British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT, also called the Chagos Islands) in the Indian Ocean.
Using a global ocean general circulation model, the researchers released virtual particles from within the borders of the MPAs. The particles were released into the model at fixed time intervals and at a grid of locations (horizontal and vertical) over the period 2000 to 2009. Then, researchers followed the particles backward in time to assess their upstream origins to assess if, where, and when they had previously come into contact with land.
The researchers gathered data on human population density at those coastal locations to use as a proxy measure of the quantity of pollutants released into the ocean. Put together and taking into account seasonal and interannual variability in ocean currents, the data were used to calculate the annual connectivity footprint for each MPA.
The results show that the Pitcairn MPA has very low connectivity to land (0.06%) through ocean currents and faces no discernable risk from pollutants originating on the mainland. The South Georgia MPA has a low (2%) connectivity to land and a low exposure to pollutants. The Ascension MPA has medium connectivity (34%) to land and faces a significant risk. The BIOT MPA has high connectivity (71%) to land and faces high risk.
Marine protected areas represent a concerted effort to conserve valuable marine habitats and biodiversity. This study shows that granting protection from harmful human activities being carried out within the boundaries of a zone does not prevent the waters being polluted from upstream locations often many thousands of kilometers away. The connectivity footprint has the potential to be a useful tool in managing MPAs and in planning new ones. (Earths Future, https://doi.org/10.1002/2016EF000516, 2017)
Jenny Lunn, Contributing Writer
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Ocean Currents Push Mainland Pollution to Remote Islands - Eos
Islands account for only 5% of landmass on Earth, but their protection is vital for preserving biodiversity and preventing extinctions. On many small islands around the world, invasive rats threaten ecological healthby eating eggs and hatchlings of native species. Once introduced to one island, invasive rats can travel to the nearest land mass and quickly spread. In New Zealands Hauraki Gulf, a series of small, rocky islands has become a potential stepping stone pathway for the spread of invasive rats.
Sprinkled throughout the Hauraki Gulf are small rock stacks that host a broad range of species, but because rats can swim, these islands are often faced with a serious problem. James Russell of University of Auckland recently visited these small rocks to see if any unwanted predators made their way to these small rocks.
The tiny Frenchmans Cap islet in the Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand. Credit: James Russell
On many of the smaller islands, rats do not have enough resources to establish a robust population, but they can still do significant damage to native species as they pass through. Endemic species such as the Stack H. Stag Beetle, native reptiles, and seabirds are often of highest concern when rats are introduced in the Hauraki Gulf.
Maria Island in the Hauraki Gulf was one of these small islands where rats caused substantial damage, but this invasion also marked New Zealands first rat eradication project and is now predator free. Now conservationists are concerned about Rororoa Island where rats swam to, but efforts are underway to remove them before they cause substantial damage.
A spotted shag colony on a tiny rock stack in the Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand. Credit: James Russell
Biosecurity is New Zealands first line of defense in protecting these small islands. Further out in the Gulf, the tiny islands are home to seabirds such as Gannets and Spotted Shags, which would be at risk if invasive predators came ashore. Protecting these hotbeds of biodiversity requires frequent evaluations. Conservationists and scientist much regularly check to see if rats have made their way from one island to another. Luckily, Russells latest trip did not turn up any such surprises, but the monitoring will continue.
Featured photo: Spotted Shag. Credit: Bernard Spragg. NZ Source: National Geographic
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Protecting Native Wildlife of the Hauraki Gulf Islands - Island Conservation News
Updated June 09, 2017 12:00:46
The West Australian Government has abandoned plans to develop the state's newest national park within a coral archipelago, drawing ire from local tourism bodies.
The Houtman Abrolhos is a group of more than 120 windswept coral cays scattered off the coast of Geraldton, 400 kilometres north of Perth.
At a Liberal Party state conference in August, former premier Colin Barnett unveiled a plan to create a national park that would stretch across 90 per cent of the islands.
Twenty-one islands which house fishers' shacks, private jetties and Department of Fisheries infrastructure would have been excluded.
Camping would also have been offered for the first time under the project, in the hope of expanding tourism to the region.
At the time, Mr Barnett said the port city of Geraldton would reap significant economic rewards, as it was the ideal base for visitors to the Abrolhos.
But in a statement, new Environment Minister Stephen Dawson said the project would not be pursued by the McGowan Government.
"Plans to create the Abrolhos Islands National Park were announced by the former premier Colin Barnett before the 2017 state election as an election commitment," he said.
"While the McGowan Government is committed to the protection of world-class natural assets and the creation of national parks, our priorities for this term of government are the delivery of the commitments we brought to the election."
Since its inception as a commercial fishing zone, lobster and fishing permit holders have been the only people permitted to stay on the islands.
Jay Cox has owned and operated a cruise and charter business at the islands for 14 years and has long been pushing to boost tourism in the area.
He said the Government had made the wrong decision.
"All it's going to hurt is Geraldton and the Mid West," he said.
"There are a lot of businesses in Geraldton that are struggling.
"Tourism would go a long way to helping those businesses get more people into town.
"As it is now everyone just drives past Geraldton.
"We're not known as a tourism town and unless something happens in the tourism industry that gets people to stay for a while, everyone's going to keep passing it by.
"The Abrolhos would be a major attraction."
The Opposition has accused the Government of not offering an adequate justification for pulling the pin on the project.
Shadow minister for tourism Libby Mettam said the proposal had progressed through Cabinet, with fishing and tourism boundaries established prior to the March state election.
"The commitment wasn't made during the election campaign," she said.
"It was well and truly outside the election cycle.
"What has happened here is we've seen a new Government come in and withdraw the support for something that was clearly progressing."
The area is the site of several shipwrecks, including the infamous Batavia, which was carrying gold, silver and 180 people when it went off course in 1629, and the Zeewijk which was wrecked in 1727.
Topics: government-and-politics, environment, environmental-management, houtman-abrolhos-6530-6530, wa, geraldton-6530
First posted June 09, 2017 08:36:23
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WA Government abandons national park plan for Abrolhos Islands - ABC Local
A sex tape starring one of this year's Love Island stars has emerged online.
Contestant Jessica Shears can be seen performing a sex act on a man in the video that was leaked on website PornHub yesterday.
It has, however, since been removed from the site.
It is believed that the video was leaked by the Devon glamour model's ex-boyfriend.
The 23-year-old has already caused a stir on the ITV2 dating show.
After going into the villa as a late arrival, Jessica upset Islander Montana Brown after stealing Dominc Lever from her and leaving her single.
Montana and Dom were coupled up during the first night at the villa until Jessica arrived and was given the power to split up one pairing.
Despite that, Montana and Dom later shared some steamy kisses in private and Dom assured Montana he wasnt interested in Jess.
Montana had thought they were a strong couple.
But that all changed after he was sent on a romantic date with Jess and realised how much he likes her, which meant having to break the news to Montana that things were over .
And viewers weren't happy, branding him a "snake".
Dom admitted to Jessica on Wednesday night he was feeling really torn about things, explaining: "I didnt get myself into this. You got me into this. I never thought Id be in this position.
"Do I play it safe and go with Montana or do I take a risk and enjoy myself with you?
"In the 24 hours Ive spent with either one of you, Ive had more fun with you. You surprised me, massively surprised me. Theres more to you than meets the eye."
ITV refused to comment when contacted by Mirror Online.
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Banks and other financial institutions all over the world have seen their fair share of computer glitches and errors. Bank of the Philippine Islands suffered from a recent glitch which could have had severe repercussions if not solved quickly. It turns out some users were complaining about how their bank accounts were suddenly missing a fair amount of money. This is never a positive development for any bank whatsoever.
Having customers complain about money in their bank accounts gone missing is a PR nightmare for any financial institution. News like this immediately creates a lot of speculation, which only makes the situation worse. For the Bank of the Philippine Islands, this nightmare scenario became very real two days ago. With multiple customers missing funds in their accounts, it quickly became evident an investigation had to be conducted to rectify this situation as quickly as possible.
Things only got worse when the bank was forced to suspend ATM withdrawals and online transactions a few hours later. Some people started spreading rumors about the bank being hacked, although it does not appear that was ever the case. However, not allowing customers to withdraw their own money from bank ATMs or complete online transactions only fuels these rumors even further, rather than address the problem at hand.
It didnt take long until a lot of bank customers publicly voiced their concern on social media. More complaints started coming in about missing money, and the rest of the customers were unable to access their funds. It turns out the bank was hit by a major software glitch, which caused user balances to display an incorrect amount. While such situations are still problematic, it is much better than having to deal with a potential hack.
More specifically, the Bank of Philippine Islands acknowledged their IT system caused a few issues. Some transactions were double-posted between April 27 and May 2. As a result, some users saw their account balances adjusted to make sure there were no discrepancies. This is a rather troublesome development for any banks IT infrastructure, but it looks like the institution is addressing the situation as we speak. The IT system has been kept offline for the remainder of last night and this morning, as engineers are working hard on manually restoring affected user accounts.
It is expected online transactions and bank ATM withdrawals will be resumed later this day, which is good news. For now, it remains unclear what caused the transition double-posting in the first place. It is evident the engineers have to go through the entire IT system to see what caused the problem and ensure it can never happen again. Not allowing customers to access their own funds is never the right course of action by any means.
Situations like these are a bank managers nightmare scenario come true. Technical glitches can affect any company at any given time, that much is evident. However, when things like these occur, all hell breaks loose pretty quickly. It will take some time until Bank of the Philippine Islands will regain customer trust after this PR nightmare. Thankfully, the bank was not hacked, which will put a lot of peoples minds at ease.
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Bank of the Philippine Islands Suspends ATM Withdrawals After IT Glitch - The Merkle
A biology professor at the University of Washington in Seattle believes the stress caused by President Donald Trumps time in office will lead to a permanent change in human genetics.
Peter Ward, a professor who works in the earth and space sciences department of UWs College of the Environment, offered his bizarre prediction to Gizmodo earlier this weekwhen the publication asked a handful of evolutionary biologists, Can superhuman mutants be living among us?
Ward argued that significant traumas like abuse or military combat cancause permanent change to the human genome. He went on to suggest Trumps presidency is akin to those traumas and will have an evolutionary consequence on humanity.
Were finding more and more that, for instance, people who have gone through combat, or women who have been abused when you have these horrendous episodes in life, it causes permanent change, which is then passed on to your kids, he said. These are actual genetic shifts that are taking place within people.
Those shifts, Ward contended, can cause huge evolutionary change.
He added: On a larger scale, the amount of stress that Americans are going through now, because of Trump there is going to be an evolutionary consequence.
Earlier in his statement, the professor also predicted the U.S. military willmanipulate genetics to create some sort of superhuman soldiers.
A soldier whos much harder to bleed to death, or a soldier that doesnt need to drink as much water, or doesnt need to eat for five or six days, or doesnt need to sleep any one of these things would be an enormous advantage in warfare, he said.
This isnt the first time Ward has raised eyebrows for his ideas.
In his 2009 book The Medea Hypothesis: Is Life on Earth Ultimately Self-Destructive? Wardargued that life on earth will cause its own destruction in order to save the planet.
He argued at the time, The Christian Science Monitor reported, that life will self-destruct prematurely, many years before the sun, which he believes will begin to expand in roughly one billion years, burns the biosphere away.
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Biology professor: Trump's presidency will permanently alter human ... - TheBlaze.com
New York Times | Republicans' Secretive Plan for Health Care New York Times Republicans in the Senate will need 50 votes to pass their version of the American Health Care Act. Several senators have expressed reservations about the House version of the bill, which withdraws federal support for Planned Parenthood and rolls back ... Parliamentarian threatens deadly blow to GOP healthcare bill McCaskill uses facts to slam Senate Republicans' health care process Senate GOP vows to continue doomed health care effort in secret |
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Republicans' Secretive Plan for Health Care - New York Times
Rep. John Conyers and Sen. Bernie Sanders in Washington, D.C., on June 4, 2015. Sanders and Conyers have both supported single-payer.
Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images
Single-payer health care is all the rage. At the start of the Obama presidency, the push for a Canadian-style, single-payer, taxpayer-funded universal health system was widely seen as a cause championed only by the hopelessly nave. Now, as the New York Times reports, support for single-payer is emerging as the consensus position among congressional Democrats, with 112 of 193 members of the House Democratic caucus co-sponsoring Rep. John Conyers Expanded and Improved Medicare for All Act. In New York and California, meanwhile, Democratic lawmakers are pressing for state-based single-payer systems, and were seeing similar efforts pop up in other states as well. Bernie Sanders deserves much of the credit. Creating a single-payer system for all Americans was the centerpiece of his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, and Id honestly be surprised if the next Democratic nominee didnt take up the cause. Elizabeth Warren, to name one potential 2020 presidential candidate, is open to single-payer health care, and shes not alone.
Granted, support for single-payer is not quite as widespread among rank-and-file voters as it is among influential lefties. A Pew survey from January found that while 60 percent of Americans favored universal coverage in some form, only 28 percent supported single-payer per se. But other polls have found more favorable results, and my guess is that support for single-payer will keep increasing in the months and years to come. This is despite the fact that I believe creating a single-payer system would be a costly mistake, for reasons ably outlined by Chris Pope in National Review and Megan McArdle in Bloomberg View.
Why do I think single-payer health care will keep growing more popular? Part of it is the availability heuristic. The more familiar the idea of a single-payer health care system becomes, and the more mainstream Democratic politicians embrace it, the safer it will be for people to support the idea. A single-payer system is no longer seen as a crazily socialistic idea relegated to the fringes of the political debate. Its an idea that is taken seriously by serious people.
Indeed, a key part of the new push for single-payer health care is branding it Medicare for all. Medicare is a single-payer system that offers coverage to every American over the age of 65. Though no one would describe Medicare as perfect, its pretty popular. So naturally the idea of opening Medicare to everyone has a lot of appeal. Of course, theres a case to be made that Medicare has in some ways made Americas health system worse by serving the interests of politically powerful hospitals over those of patients, but I digress.
The single-payer cause also benefits from the fact that Obamacare has been a mixed bag. While coverage expansion via Medicaid appears to have gone fairly smoothly in the states that have signed up for it, the move to expand coverage via Obamacares new state-based insurance exchanges has been far rockier. If the exchanges represent the best managed competition can do, its no wonder many have concluded that the smarter move is to further expand public insurance programs, as weve been doing for decades under Democratic and Republican administrations alike. Medicare for all is, according to this line of thinking, simply the next logical step. Here too there is another way of looking at things: Had Obamacare used the exchanges more narrowly as a vehicle for insuring the uninsurable, not as a means of transforming the entire individual insurance market, it might have proven more popular and effective.
The most important reason for the single-payer boomlet is the health policy failures of Republicans.
But the most important reason behind the single-payer boomlet, I believe, is the health policy failures of Republicans. While the GOP has spent years attacking Obamacare, it has proven utterly incapable of offering an attractive alternative. If the GOP had such an alternative, it would nudge centrist Democrats in its direction. But as long as the right doesnt have a workable plan for fixing Americas health system, it should come as no surprise that the center of gravity on health policy is shifting left.
Lets say you buy the idea that Obamacare-compliant private insurance plans are way too expensive for the healthy and way too stingy for the sick, an argument Republicans have been making since the advent of the Affordable Care Act. Do you really trust the GOP to fix those problems? Or, given the parameters of the GOPs American Health Care Act, do you suspect theyll just slash subsidies for the poor and the sick and use the money to cut taxes for the rich? At the moment, the latter belief is an entirely rational one.
If faced with a choice between the AHCA and Medicare for all, Republicans shouldnt be surprised if swing voters wind up going for the latter. The AHCA is an inchoate mess that evinces no grander philosophy for caring for the sick and vulnerable. Single-payer health care is, if nothing else, a coherent concept that represents a set of beliefs about how health care should work. If Republicans want the single-payer dream to go away, theyre going to have to come up with something better than the nothing they have now.
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By Andrew Siddons and Sandhya Raman, CQ Roll Call
Moderate Republicans on Thursday said they were getting closer to supporting an emerging Senate health package but are continuing to press for a slower phaseout of the Medicaid expansion than the House-passed bill set out.
The Medicaid expansion question seems to remain the biggest unresolved issue as Republicans try to finalize a bill they can vote on before the end of June. To meet their timeline, they would have to send a bill to the Congressional Budget Office for a cost estimate by early next week, according to a Republican aide.
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has proposed phasing out higher federal payments for people who sign up for Medicaid under the health laws expansion in three years. Ohio Republican Rob Portman and others such as Nevada's Dean Heller are pushing for a seven-year phaseout ending in 2027. Senators also are debating how much to reduce federal funding for Medicaid as compared to current law.
Portman told reporters Thursday that he was not ready to take a position on the Senates health care proposal, but said the fact that there was a plan at all made it easier to negotiate.
Were closer because theres a proposal out there, and this gives everybody the opportunity to weigh in, including me, whereas when it was just a wide-open discussion it was hard to come up with any consensus, he said.
While he wouldnt predict the ultimate length of time states would have to phase down the expansion of their Medicaid programs, Portman said he was pushing for a dedicated funding stream to help people struggling with drug addiction.
Medicaid, he said, is the major payer for the kind of drug treatment that is necessary right now with the opioid crisis and so many people being addicted. The alternative is bad for those individuals and their families but also more expensive for all taxpayers. He said he had an amount in mind, but wouldnt specify it.
Heller, another lawmaker from a state that expanded Medicaid who wants a longer phaseout, signaled that the Senate discussions were moving in the right direction. When asked if Senate leaders were receptive to a seven-year phase-out, he said, Theyre listening.
Heller also said he would oppose lowering the Medicaid growth rate beneath the level set out in the House-passed health care bill (HR 1628).
I just dont want to do worse than what the House did. And theres a push to bring it below the House, so thats an issue, Heller said.
Heller, who is up for re-election next year, also said he opposed language in the House bill that could allow states to loosen any protections for those with pre-existing conditions and opt out of providing the essential health benefits required by the 2010 law.
Sen. John Hoeven, R- N.D., told reporters that tax credits to help lower-income people pay for insurance were also still up for discussion.
Weve got to get a more robust refundable tax credit in place so you make sure that folks have coverage and you also need federal reinsurance for folks with chronic care and pre-existing conditions, he said.
Hoeven, responding to questions about whether some of the health laws taxes would remain in place for a longer time than the House bill in order to pay for a more generous package, said it would likely depend on the CBO estimate.
Groups that have pushed for the tax repeal upped their lobbying on Thursday in response to the uncertainty. Scott Whitaker, president of the Advanced Medical Technology Association, which represents the makers of medical devices, urged the Senate to immediately end the medical device tax.
Will device manufacturers spend hundreds of millions seeking next-generation technologies to improve patient lives? Or will they instead be forced to set those funds aside to pay the job-killing device tax? We need to bank on American innovation and kill this tax, he said. Not delay it. End it.
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Senate Moderates Say They Are Closer on Health Care - Roll Call
In his session at America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) Institute & Expo 2017 Institute & Expo, in Austin, Texas, Kaveh Savafi, MD, senior managing director for the health industry at consulting firm Accenture, discussed some of the biggest technology trends that are happening in the business world and drawing relevance to the world of healthcare.
Here, Safavi discusses his talk, Technology for People: The Era of the Intelligence Digital Health Enterprise.
Managed Healthcare Executive (MHE): Discuss some of the trends youre tracking for healthcare.
Safavi: The first trend is AI is the new UI, where AI means artificial intelligence and UI stands for user interface. Thats the concept of the actual experienceor the way that people interact with technology itselfis going to become smarter.
Ecosystem powerplace is the next trend were paying attention to. That means its really becoming clear that the amount of technology being used in healthcare today can never come from a single entity or company. Thus, its likely that people are going to work with technology platforms that are created with parts from multiple different companies and the companies themselves are going to have to figure out how to cooperate.
The third trend is what we call The workforce marketplace, which broadly refers to the fact that the distributed workforceand the ability to go out and find people you need to do workis no longer going to be limited to the traditional marketplace of your own employees. This is an extension of whats been talked about for a long time, but this is describing the technology as making it inevitable that the workforce you seek will come from different places than you normally would find them.
Design for humans is the fourth trend. Thats essentially the recognition that technology has to be designed to fit the way that humans live their livesas opposed to making people fit the technology. There are obviously healthcare examples, but in other cases there are lots of examples of where the technology has found its way much more easily into the way that you do workas opposed to you having to go figure it out.
The last one is a topic that we call The uncharted. By that, we mean that the technology is creating business and regulatory challengesand maybe ethical and social challengesthat we have no concept of; other than that we know that were opening up Pandoras box. Were going to see more and more that organizations are going to have to get together and think about how they want to address some of these unintended consequencesor even the necessary frameworks theyre going to needin order to be able to take full advantage of the technology.
MHE: Tell me more about what youre referring to with The uncharted.
Safavi: These issues go from very simple thingssuch as standard setting around blockchain, all the way to whats the responsible use for real artificial intelligence.
MHE: Make the connection for healthcare with The workforce marketplace.
Safavi: It ranges from clinical to non-clinical, and its all different parts of the business. We use a term called the liquid workforce, which is present everywhere. We did some surveys that showed that 71% of healthcare executives report that theyre already using on-demand labor platforms. That could be to a limited extent, but its not totally foreign in healthcare. And 80% said that they have to re-think their business model based on these types of technologies.
We see this on the delivery system side and on the provider side. You see examples of this with radiologists and pathologists and with home-based nursing. On the health plan side, youre starting to see nurses in utilization management; theyre call center employees. Other organizations have done the same thing; theyre gone to a distributed call center model.
You generally see people go to a liquid workforce in areas where youre looking for a highly-specialized skill or a very generalizable skill.
Whats complicated is the fact that, while this is going on, the artificial intelligence trend is going on. Thats where automation and artificial intelligence are being substituted for a certain amount of labor. And that impacts the nature of the work of your own workforce.
For example, say you have an employed workforce and they show up at your facility. The step may not be that were going to have a model where we can work with independent contractors and we can take them wherever theyre located, to a technology is going to replace a big part of what they do. Then the remaining people are going to have a very differentiated skill set.
Theres an ebb and flow here, in terms of how this works. The technology allows you to distribute your labor. At the same time, the technology begins to complement the labor in a different way.
MHE: Whats challenging about this particular trend?
Safavi: This will be a challenging trend to manage. Thats based on the pace of the technology replacing the work that people do. Youll see this in call centers and customer service on the payer side. On the provider side, youll see this with medical case management or utilization management, where nurse managers will be doing some of this work.
Some subset of nurse managers work is actually relatively routine. Thats information intake or the proving routine medical advice. Still another part of their work requires clinical judgment. Were already beginning to develop alternatives that can be a substitute for some part of these experts labor. That means the nurse managers spend all of their time doing the things for which theyre licensed. The things theyre not licensed for get done by a machine.
Thus, youre going to be looking for a higher-level of skill. Not only will this be a distributed workforce, but it will also be a higher-skilled workforce.
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What to make of the seeming momentum for aRepublican health-care bill in the Senate?
On the one hand, a bit of caution might be in order. There still isn't a bill. There isn't a Congressional Budget Office score. Republicans must keep their relative moderates on board without losing the most conservative senators; they may be achieving that, and they're still a few steps away from that. It wouldn't be the first time that a bill seemed to have momentum only to fall short once the actual votes werecounted.
That said, it's also quite possible that Mitch McConnell and other Republican leaders have threaded the needle.
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Jonathan Bernstein's Early Returns
I continue to see the bill's progress not as a case of Republican politicians having enthusiasm for what they are passing, but a real fear of receiving the blame for killing off the repeal of Obamacare, the party's biggest legislative agenda for the last sevenyears. Right now, Paul Ryan and House Republicans overall are winning because they passed something (it doesn't matter what). It remains quite possible that congressional Republicans will wind up backing their way into actually enacting a law despite many, perhaps even most, believingthere's a good chance it will backfire on them.
In other words, this is not a case like the passage of the Affordable Care Act, in which most Democrats who supported it really wanted the bill to pass even if they understood the electoral danger involved. If any Republicans in Congress strongly support the bill they've been working on, they're doing a very good job of hiding that enthusiasm. This time, it's all about ducking blame.
1. Dan Drezner was ... not impressed with my case for how Donald Trump could reach adequacy. I of course agree with everything he says about Trump, and we're not actually likely to get a trial run for this one (because it won't be imposed on him), but I still think many people are vastly underestimating how much of a difference a first-rate chief of staff can make.
2. Dave Hopkins on the James Comey hearing. As he says, perhaps the most notable thing was that Senate Republicans were hardly eager to defend Trump.
3. Diana B. Greenwald and Mark Tessler at the Monkey Cage on Palestinian public opinion about institutions.
4. My Bloomberg View colleague Noah Feldman on new trouble for Trump from Comey's testimony.
5. Alyssa Rosenberg on Comey's performance.
6. And Kevin Kosar on the U.S. Post Office.
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This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.
To contact the author of this story: Jonathan Bernstein at jbernstein62@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Brooke Sample at bsample1@bloomberg.net
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Republicans Aim to Win the Health-Care Blame Game - Bloomberg