This video says about itself:
Hydroplaning Dolphins – Planet Earth – BBC Earth
2 May 2017
These remarkable Dolphins in Western Australia display incredible ingenuity when hunting for fish in the shallows. With little room for error, it would appear fortune does indeed favour the brave.
This video from Ghana is called Teachers’ unions up in arms with managers of ‘Omega’ schools – 4/11/2015.
By Felicity Collier:
Fee-paying schools blight Ghana‘s rural communities
Thursday 4th May 2017
FELICITY COLLIER reports on the union fight against exploitative ‘pay-as-you-go’ education
A TEACHER’S union in Ghana is leading a campaign against the widespread privatisation of education in Africa.
Delegates to NASUWT’s annual conference in Manchester [in England] last month heard from David Ofori Acheampong, the general secretary of the Ghana National Association of Teachers about the worrying epidemic of fee-paying, profiteering “shack” schools.
Since 2009, these makeshift education factories have been set up throughout Ghana’s rural communities — by entrepreneurs.
This “pay-as-you-go” system of private schooling operates from people’s homes which, he says, the company Omega rents out.
There have been reports of similar schools across Africa which have been described as “squalid.”
In Kenya, 10 such schools were closed down for failing to meet basic educational standards.
Microsoft founder Bill Gates, along with Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg and eBay’s Pierre Omidyar run Bridge International Academies in Africa and India, which was condemned by global organisations Education International and Public Services International, as reported recently in the Star.
So troubled are teachers by the situation, they mobilised to urge the World Bank to stop funding the schools. Britain’s teaching trade unions NUT and NASUWT joined the Uganda National Teachers Union and Kenya National Union of Teachers to deliver a letter to World Bank President Dr Jim Yong Kim last week, calling for high quality public education to be a “primary responsibility of governments, not corporations and entrepreneurs.”
It added that the so-called “low fee” schooling was still unaffordable for most families.
Acheampong said that in Ghana, rural communities are being exploited for their lack of schools and that over the years, the government has not planned properly. The population has tripled, and there is not even enough space to build more schools.
He proclaims that Omega set itself up there without the government’s prior knowledge, offering “pay-as-you-go” schooling.
The idea is that if parents cannot afford school fees on any given day, children do not attend and they are not charged.
The schools run by Omega in Ghana work in secret. “When the union informed the Ghana Education Service,” Acheampong continues, “it had no knowledge of these schools.”
He pointed out that the company had been taking advantage of “the prestige of attending private schools and also where schools don’t exist.”
And while rural communities in Ghana with a population of 20,000 lack schools, the teachers employed by Omega are inexperienced and lack formal qualifications.
“These schools recruit anybody at all,” Acheampong says, which could be high school leavers with just four to six weeks’ training.
“The teachers are recruited from senior high schools students who are unable to make it into the universities. They have practically no training in teaching at all.”
Omega’s website is currently advertising for a Chief Operations Officer, which requires experience in “maintaining the highest operational efficiency and profitability,” which indicates much about its attitude.
Mr Acheampong says that the unions in Ghana work to “draw attention to the harmful effect of these schools on the education of pupils in the communities” — which, he says, has been welcomed by some parents.
The unions in Ghana regularly engage with the district assemblies and and MPs in areas where these schools operate, and encourage district assemblies to set up schools instead. It is gradually succeeding — numbers have dropped from 13,000 to 9,000.
He has also spoken to Ghana’s minister of education about how to regulate these schools. And there is the possibility of going to court to block Omega from starting up more schools, although negotiation with the district assemblies and the members of parliament is proving effective so far.
“We’re still carrying on with the campaign,” Acheampong says. “The real challenge is the absence of state schools in these communities to absorb these pupils should the schools be withdrawn.”
For NASUWT in Britain, the issue about privatisation of schools is the marrying of commercialisation.
Phil Kemp from its executive committee says: “We need to really oppose academisation and all the abuses.
“In 2015, there were 41 teachers [in Britain] earning more than the Prime Minister [£150,000] and it’s appalling.”
NASUWT said that the test for education is whether it promotes equality, transparency and value for money. It highlighted issues such as educational standards, class sizes and staff morale, as well as cost, pay and working conditions, and trade union recognition.
The union is calling for the effect of academisation to be investigated.
This photo from the small lakes north of the Wooldse veen nature reserve shows moss plants. Some people would call this ‘flowering’ moss. However, mosses are ‘primitive’ plants, which have no seeds or flowers, but spores.
The photo is from 2 May 2017; two days after 30 April 2017 in Winterswijk.
Earlier that day, we had heard a chiffchaff, a blackbird, a song thrush and a pheasant.
Near the farm, the tulips still flowering.
A buzzard flies.
In the Buskersbos, ragged-robin flowers.
A large earth bumblebee on a white nettle flower.
Great spotted woodpecker and green woodpecker sounds.
A whitethroat sings near the Oude Borkense baan bridge.
In the afternoon, we went to the Wooldse veen.
Willow warbler, chiffchaff, cuckoo sounds.
On the boardwalk, a big spider: a raft spider.
A tree pipit flying and singing.
A male stonechat on a shrub.
Two goldfinches in a tree.
As we go back, we arrive at the two small lakes.
In the northern lake, a female tufted duck.
At the southern lake: a grey heron. Barn swallows flying.
The two Egyptian geese come back; still much in love with each other.
Two starlings bathing.
This video from the USA says about itself:
LOL? This Activist Faces Jail for Laughing at Jeff Sessions
3 May 2017
An activist was convicted Wednesday on criminal misdemeanor charges for laughing during Attorney General Jeff Sessions‘ confirmation hearing. Desiree Fairooz, 61, a long-time member of activist group Code Pink, was arrested on January 10 during the hearing’s opening statements. Tighe Barry and Lenny Bianchi, also members of Code Pink — who were dressed as members of the Ku Klux Klan as commentary on what Code Pink describes as Sessions’ racist past — were also arrested for causing a disruption. Barry and Bianchi were escorted out of the Kennedy Caucus Room and arrested first.
From the Huffington Post in the USA today, with video there:
Woman Who Laughed At Sessions‘ Confirmation Hearing Convicted Of A Crime
Desiree Fairooz was found guilty on two counts: one for engaging in “disorderly or disruptive conduct” with the intent to disrupt congressional proceedings and a separate count for parading, demonstrating or picketing.
Hillary Clinton Does Not Belong in the Anti-Trump Resistance Movement. Posted on May 4, 2017. By Sonali Kolhatkar.
Trump Administration Hires Official Whom Five Citadel Students Accused of Sexual Assault. Posted on May 4, 2017. By Justin Elliott.
Trump’s new programme spuriously equates minority ethnic immigrants with criminals, writes Emile Schepers.
This video from the USA says about itself:
Press conference from the family of Jordan Edwards, the teen fatally shot by Balch Springs police
1 May 2017
The 15-year-old boy who was killed by a Balch Springs police officer was shot with a rifle, the Dallas County medical examiner’s office said Monday. Jordan Edwards, a freshman at Mesquite High School, was leaving a party over the weekend when he was shot through the passenger’s side window of a vehicle, attorney Lee Merritt said.
From daily The Morning Star in Britain:
US: Family of black teen killed by police prosecution
Thursday 4th May 2017
FAMILY members of black schoolboy Jordan Edwards are demanding that criminal charges be filed against the Dallas police officer who shot him dead at the weekend.
The police department in suburban Dallas has since sacked the officer, identified as Roy Oliver, who shot and killed 15-year-old Jordan as he was riding in a vehicle after leaving a party with his two brothers and two other teenagers Saturday night.
Mr Oliver was dismissed for violating department policies in the shooting, said police chief Jonathan Haber.
Police arrived at the scene of the party to investigate an underage drinking complaint and spotted the vehicle leaving.
Mr Oliver opened fire with his rifle as the teenagers were driving away, hitting Jordan in the front passenger seat.
Police originally claimed that the teenagers’ vehicle had been reversing “in an aggressive manner” toward officers, but Mr Haber admitted on Monday that video proved that the vehicle was actually driving away.
…
A family statement released on Tuesday night called for disciplinary action against other officers who “extended this nightmare for those children.”
“Our family is working hard to deal with both the loss of our beloved Jordan and the lingering trauma it has caused our boys,” it said.
Police in Balch Springs, Texas, shot and killed an unarmed 15-year-old African American boy Saturday night. Jordan Edwards was shot in the head through the driver’s side window of the vehicle he was in as he and several other teens were driving away from a party the police had been called in to break up: here.
Trump Justice Department: No charges in police murder of Alton Sterling: here.
This video from the USA says abot itself:
Two Male Broad-tailed Hummingbirds On Feeder – May 4, 2017
Watch live at http://allaboutbirds.org/texashummers for more information about hummingbirds and highlights from the feeders.
The West Texas Hummingbird Feeder Cam is nestled in the mountains outside Fort Davis, Texas, at an elevation of over 6200 feet. This site hosts a total of 24 Perky Pet Grand Master hummingbird feeders, and during peak migration can attract hundreds of hummingbirds from a dozen species that are migrating through the arid mountains.
This 18 August 2015 video is about a match in the Dutch football cup competition between two clubs from Winterswijk: FC Winterswijk and FC Trias.
FC Trias got its name because it is a fusion of three earlier clubs.
However, the club grounds are also not far from the Winterswijk quarry. Where muschelkalk stone from the Triassic, over 200 million years ago, is mined. The Triassic got its name from its three distinct rock layers. The Dutch word for Triassic is Trias. In the Winterswijk quarry, recently, a Triassic beetle was discovered; and,earlier, Triassic marine reptiles.
This 2016 video from Britain is called The Sun Newspaper Is Racist With Rupert Murdoch At The Helm
By Lamiat Sabin in Britain:
MacKenzie could face police quiz over Corbyn knife ‘joke’
Thursday 4th May 2017
SUSPENDED columnist and former editor of the Sun newspaper Kelvin MacKenzie could be reported to the police for inciting hatred and violence towards Jeremy Corbyn, Labour sources said yesterday.
The hack “joked” about the idea of the Labour leader being “knifed to death” in an interview with the New York Times.
He then contacted writer Katrin Bennhold in an attempt to change the quote and referred to the murder of Labour MP Jo Cox last June as the reason for his sudden change of mind.
Mr MacKenzie was quoted as having said: “I think the fake news headline that would give this country the most joy would be: ‘Jeremy Corbyn knifed to death by an asylum-seeker’.”
Ms Bennhold wrote: “The next morning, I got a text message from Mr MacKenzie: ‘Hi Katrin, Can you change that perfect headline from ‘Jeremy Corbyn knifed to death by asylum-seeker’ to ‘Jeremy Corbyn defrauded by asylum-seeker.’ In the light of Jo Cox murder mine is in tol [sic] poor taste.”
The Sun suspended Mr MacKenzie — who was in charge when the Sun published front-page lies about the 96 Liverpool fans killed at Hillsborough — for comparing mixed-race Everton footballer Ross Barkley with a gorilla last month.
He is also known for criticising Channel 4 for delegating the job of reporting the Nice truck attack last year to Muslim newsreader Fatima Manji, who wears a headscarf.
A Labour source confirmed to the Star that Mr MacKenzie could be reported to the police.
They said: “This sort of disgusting language should not be tolerated by anyone in the media, politics or any walk of life.
“We saw last year how overheated language in politics led to the murder of Jo Cox.”
I suspect that police may not treat MacKenzie as harshly as they might theat some hypothetical Muslim who hypothetically made some sick joke about knifing, eg, Conservative Prime Minister Theresa May to death.
Translated from Dutch NOS TV today; interviewing a spectator who, with others in Paris, had seen the debate yesterday between French presidential candidates Macron and Le Pen:
“First, I wanted to vote blank because I do not want to know anything about both candidates. It’s a choice between the plague and the cholera,” says [leftist candidate] Mélenchon voter Lea (25). “But now I’ll reluctantly go for Macron to stop the Front National.”
But Lea actually despises him [Macron]. “He is a puppet, but he has got the media behind him, that’s why he is in the second round.” …
Lea gets her coat on. She lasted for an hour watching the TV debate, but at 23:00 she thought enough was enough. She wants to get the metro right now.
Macron did not convince her. “He will get my vote and I think he will win.” But her heart is not in that. “It has become clear to me that I do not want to see Le Pen on TV.”
French election debate: Macron, Le Pen promote militarism, attacks on immigrants: here.
Paris youth speak to WSWS: “I don’t want to vote for the right just because I’m afraid of Le Pen”: here.
Dear Kitty. Some blog 