President Jacob Zuma gestures as he addresses parliament in Cape Town, South Africa, November 2, 2017. Picture taken November 2, 2017. REUTERS/Sumaya HishamJOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africa’s main opposition party said on Sunday it had asked the High Court to force President Jacob Zuma to disclose how much the state has spent on legal fees to fight corruption allegations against him. Democratic Alliance (DA) Federal Council Chairperson James Selfe said in a statement the opposition party had asked the court to direct the President to write to parliament within five days confirming the total amount spent. The DA walked out of a parliamentary session addressed by Zuma on Nov. 2 in protest over the potential cost to the public purse of his legal fees. Zuma had failed to answer a question about how much had been spent since May 1, 2009 to defend 783 corruption charges against him that were dropped by the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) before he ran for the presidency. “By avoiding the question, the DA believes that both the President, and the Deputy Speaker, Lechesa Tsenoli, presiding at the time who allowed President Zuma to avoid the question, acted unlawfully and unconstitutionally,” Selfe said. “Given that the taxpayer has most likely footed the bill for the President’s legal costs, the full amount spent should be revealed, in the public interest.” South Africa’s High Court reinstated the 783 charges last year and the Supreme Court upheld that decision in October, rejecting an appeal by Zuma. The 75-year-old president is still trying to prevent the NPA from filing the charges. Reporting by Nqobile Dludla; Editing by Catherine EvansOur Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

This morning, Apple took a shot at Google’s dominance of the education market with its announcement of a new low-priced iPad and a series of new and upgraded software for both teachers and students. The question is whether or not Apple sweetened the deal enough for educators to regain some of the ground it’s already ceded to Google and the Chromebook.Many schools, especially ones in less affluent districts, have been attracted by Google’s free apps and inexpensive Chromebooks. Google first offered schools a suite of Google Docs collaboration and productivity apps, then provided an affordable hardware element with the low-cost laptops.iPad, Still $299Looking at the hardware after today’s announcement, school administrators may be deciding between Chromebook laptops that cost around $300 and iPad tablets that cost $299. That’s pretty much the same deal as before (9.7-inch iPads were reduced to $299 for schools last year), except that now the iPad supports a Pencil stylus that costs another $80. And the new iPad has a faster chip, a better display, and some other normal upgrades.Apple may still have a hard time convincing budget-strapped schools to choose iPads over Chromebooks.“While the new Apple introductions are a good step forward, they ignore the basic fact that iPads—especially with the addition of the Pencil—are still pretty expensive for most schools,” said TECHnalysis Research analyst Bob O’Donnell in an email to Fast Company on Tuesday.IDC analyst Tom Mainelli said something similar. “My biggest concern with today’s announcement is around hardware price,” he said in an email to Fast Company. In the lead up to today’s event, many people had speculated that Apple would announce an iPad with a more aggressive price drop–at least for educators.Mainelli points out that Apple began winning back share in the education market (and returning to growth in the iPad business, generally) after it reduced the price of the 9.7-inch iPad to $329 last year ($299 for schools). Apple itself had indicated it would like to get the price point down to $259.[Photo: courtesy of Apple]“They are likely to maintain that momentum with this new product, which brings better performance as well as new features (including support for Apple Pencil),” Mainelli said. “I think many schools would probably skip this version of the iPad if they could get last year’s version for less than $299 (say $249 or less),” he added.When looked at as a school-wide initiative, iPad costs could quickly add up. “I can see Apple improving its position, but I don’t see many wholesale school-wide trade outs of Chromebooks or Windows PCs for the new iPads,” said Moor Insights & Strategy principal analyst Patrick Moorhead. “I can see some departments adopting the new iPads for some creative applications in AR, VR, and coding.”An EcosystemOver the long-term it might be the software Apple announced in Chicago that makes the difference. With the new authoring, class management, and creative apps, the company is putting forward a more complete ecosystem for education. “Apple now has a solution to manage the classroom, but also the work, so teachers can see in an effective way if the apps they are using give good returns,” said Creative Strategies analyst Carolina Milanesi in a message to Fast Company. “Most importantly it t really feels like Apple has a solution rather than a series of features.”Today’s announcements could be the start of a more gradual repositioning of the Apple ecosystem offering for schools, says Mukul Krishna, global practice head of digital media at Frost & Sullivan. It may start with schools that can afford to buy a premium Apple experience. “They are looking at chipping away at the inroads Google has made in affluent schools,” Krishna said.New Management ToolsApple wisely addressed one of the most important issues for administrators and teachers–device management and security. The new School Manager gives school IT people one central web portal where they can keep track of users, devices, and content. Importantly, students can now use a unique Apple ID to log onto any iPad managed by the school.The device management component has long been one of the strong suits of the Google ecosystem. “The new software tools are important for helping to manage devices in the classroom,” says TECHnalysis’s O’Donnell, “but it still feels like Apple is playing catch-up with Google’s Chromebook offerings and management tools.”Long GameFrost & Sullivan’s Krishna points out that education tech was a $17.1 billion market worldwide last year–not very big compared to many of Apple’s other businesses. But, he says, there’s much more at stake than just iPad sales.Earlier on in Apple’s history, the company was the first to show many users the huge improvement from DOS environments to colorful graphical user interfaces, Krishna said. That positive experience, he said, created many lifetime Apple customers.That’s part of the reason schools are so important to Apple now. It wants to get people used to the Apple Way early in life. “You’ve got to grab them while you can–before they get out into the world and become influencers.”Krishna explains that when students leave the education system and enter the workforce, they often have to adjust to a whole new ecosystem–often a Microsoft ecosystem. “An Apple computer is considered a rogue machine on many enterprise networks,” he said. Apple would eventually like to change that dynamic, and it’s working with partners like IBM and SAP to begin establishing the Apple ecosystem in the enterprise. But it will take years. The people most likely to witness that shift tomorrow are sitting in grade school classrooms today. Krishna believes that for Apple, schools are just the start of a “very, very long-term plan.”

A controversial investment by one of Canada’s biggest pension funds in a company which operates private prisons in the United States is larger than initially thought, recent securities filings have revealed.The Guardian and Documented reported last month that the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) – which manages $366.6bn in pension funds on behalf of some 20 million Canadian retirees – holds stock in Geo Group.But the most recent regulatory filings show the CPPIB has added to its holdings in Geo Group by 90,000 shares since June – an increase of nearly 50% – bringing the total investment value to $6.1m. It is not known if the fund still holds the shares; the investment board did not respond to multiple requests for comment.Facilities operated by Geo Group have been used in recent months to detain families in the United States, following Donald Trump’s “zero tolerance” crackdown on immigration by the American government.Meanwhile, the CPPIB decreased its holdings of CoreCivic, another private prison company, by 5,900 shares, valuing the investment at $1.65m at the time of filing.The CPPIB is one of the largest funds in the world, and although the investments in American private prisons companies represent a narrow slice of the overall fund, they have prompted an angry reaction from campaign groups and politicians.“I’m very surprised to hear that number is significantly higher than we had previously thought,” said Emma Pullman of SumOfUs, an advocacy group that started one of two online petitions calling on the fund to divest its holdings. Between them, the two petitions have received more than 45,000 signatures.Selling the investment would mark a significant move for the CPPIB, which prides itself in resisting external lobbying attempts.But public outcry appears to have rattled the board. On 14 November, the board convened a meeting with activists from two separate groups, both petitioning the investment board to divest its holdings.“I think the reason they’re looking into these options is because the writing is on the wall,” said Logan McIntosh, a campaigner with the Leadnow advocacy group, who attended the meeting. “It’s an unnecessary and shameful investment and it’s undermining the confidence of Canadians that they can manage our retirement savings responsibly.”Every two years, the CPPIB hosts legally mandated presentations across the country to outline its investment strategy and allow the public to ask questions.“I don’t think Canadians are interested in profiting from the abuse of humans and the caging of children,” said Darcie Lanthier, a former financial advisor who attended one such event in Charlottetown. “I know, with what little savings I have, I go out of my way to ensure my investments are doing no harm.” Topics Canada Trump administration US immigration Americas news

Enlarge this image Homeowner Phil Rush is confronted by the remains of his home that was destroyed by wildfire in Santa Rosa, Calif. He says he and his wife and dog escaped with only their medication and a bag of dog food when flames overtook their neighborhood. Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images Homeowner Phil Rush is confronted by the remains of his home that was destroyed by wildfire in Santa Rosa, Calif. He says he and his wife and dog escaped with only their medication and a bag of dog food when flames overtook their neighborhood. Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images The Two-Way 'Public Calamity' As California Wildfires Leave Apocalyptic Scenes In Wine Country Updated at 11:40 p.m. ETIn the outbreak of powerful and destructive fires that have struck California since Sunday, there are now 22 large wildfires burning in the state. They've caused at least 23 deaths and scorched nearly 170,000 acres, officials said Wednesday.The fast-moving Tubbs Fire is now considered the 6th deadliest such blaze in California's history — it has killed 13 people in Sonoma County and two in Napa. Six others have been killed in Mendocino County and two in Yuba County.Sonoma County officials said Wednesday they had reports of some 300 people still missing."We have had big fires in the past. This is one of the biggest, most serious, and it's not over," Gov. Jerry Brown said in a news conference on Wednesday.Brown has declared an emergency in eight counties: Napa, Sonoma, Yuba, Butte, Lake, Mendocino, Nevada and Orange. President Trump has issued a major disaster declaration; the Federal Emergency Management Agency is providing federal disaster assistance to California to bolster state, tribal and local recovery efforts.Still largely uncontained, the blazes have destroyed at least 3,500 homes and other buildings, many of them in the wine country region of Napa, Sonoma and Mendocino counties. More than 20,000 people have been evacuated. YouTube "Make no mistake," Cal Fire Director Ken Pimlott said in an update at midday Wednesday. "This is a serious, critical, catastrophic event."Pimlott said there are close to 8,000 firefighters working to combat the fires, along with numerous helicopters and other aircraft. He added that the National Guard and other assets are also being called on to help, as first responders have been battling flames for more than 36 hours.The Tubbs Fire is one of at least two of the fires have each burned more than 25,000 acres, propelled to explosive growth by strong winds Sunday night. Conditions eased somewhat Tuesday — but the National Weather Service says high winds could return to the area beginning late Wednesday night, with gusts over 50 mph. The North Bay is under a critical fire alert, the agency says. On Wednesday afternoon, officials ordered a mandatory evacuation in the small Napa Valley city of Calistoga. The sheriff's office said residents were to leave as soon as possible, but no later than 5 p.m. local time.The fires produced shocking scenes of destruction in the tourist-friendly stretch north of San Francisco, where many green landscapes have been replaced by charred trees, cinders and thick smoke. The ferocity of the flames was captured in a video released by the Sonoma County Sheriff's Office, showing a deputy driving through Franz Valley Road, near where a raging fire entered from Napa County. In the brief footage, glowing cinders litter the road as flames consume trees and structures lining the street.In posting the video, the sheriff's department told residents, "This is but one moment in a series of moments that will end up defining the strength of our community through what will be a pinnacle moment in Sonoma County history."With heavy smoke posing a health risk, people have been rushing to buy face masks. As member station KQED's Mina Kim reports, "North Napa Target sold out of face masks" on Monday. Federal officials also warn that dust masks aren't sufficient to protect against fine particles from wildfire smoke. Enlarge this image An aerial image from Tuesday shows a neighborhood that was destroyed by an intense and fast-moving wildfire in Santa Rosa, Calif., this week. Newly homeless residents of California wine country are beginning to get details about the damages. Nick Giblin/AP hide caption toggle caption Nick Giblin/AP An aerial image from Tuesday shows a neighborhood that was destroyed by an intense and fast-moving wildfire in Santa Rosa, Calif., this week. Newly homeless residents of California wine country are beginning to get details about the damages. Nick Giblin/AP The air quality in the Bay Area on Monday was the worst it has been since officials began collecting data in 1999. "The pollution is so high it's comparable to high pollution days in China," Bay Area Air Quality Management District's Lisa Fasano told KQED.The intense fires are being described as unlike anything fire officials recall seeing in the area."One of the fires moved more than 16 miles in less than than six hours," says Jonathan Cox, a battalion chief with Cal Fire, "all the way from the Napa Valley over to Santa Rosa. Jumped a six-lane highway and was indiscriminate in its destruction of residential and commercial structures."Speaking to NPR's David Greene, Cox said, "Late season fires are always difficult, because you're contending with very dry fuel moistures. And along with that, you have the wind event that came through on Sunday through Northern California. For some perspective, it was 50- to 70-mile an hour winds that were in the fire area."Describing the fight against a multidimensional event, Cox laid out firefighters' priorities: "To protect people's lives and get them out of harm's way, to protect the structures and also to build containment lines where we do have the opportunities of engagement."The McClellan Reload Base, an airstrip that is used to support aerial firefighting efforts, "pumped over 266,000 gallons of fire retardant Monday. Shattering the previous record," says Cal Fire.Here's a rundown of some of the largest fires, as of midday Wednesday: In Sonoma and Napa counties, the Tubbs Fire was at 28,000 acres with no containment level cited. In Napa and Solano counties, the Atlas Fire was at 42,349 acres and was only 3 percent contained. In Mendocino County, the Redwood Complex Fire was at 29,500 acres with 5 percent contained. In Yuba County, the Cascade Fire was at 12,349 acres and was 20 percent contained.As of Tuesday evening, Pacific Gas and Electric Company said that some 75,000 customers were without power, including 50,000 in Santa Rosa and 15,000 in the Napa area. In some cases, the utility has purposefully cut power to prevent lines from endangering first responders. It also cut gas service to more than 44,000 customers, because of the quick-spreading fires.Officials are telling residents who are under mandatory evacuation orders to stay away until an all-clear order is given. In Santa Rosa, which saw neighborhoods and swaths of land overrun by fire, a curfew remains in effect from 6:45 p.m. to 7:15 a.m. Fire Evacuees Want To Know What Happened To Their Homes Listen · 1:58 1:58 Toggle more options Download Embed Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/557070097/557073153" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player"> Among those who lost their homes in Santa Rosa: Paula McCallister, who had moved to the area along with her husband less than a year ago. They're safe — but as seen in photos McCallister shared on Facebook, fire destroyed their house. Her husband snapped the pictures after walking 2 miles to check on their house, beyond security barricades.McCallister tells NPR's Morning Edition that she posted the images in part because it has been hard to find details about damage in specific neighborhoods."They're not reporting anything. They're not telling us, your street from here to here is gone," she said. "And so I wanted all my neighbors that know me on Facebook to see what happened, and what was gone and what wasn't gone so that they have some kind of idea what to do next."McCallister said that some of those neighbors are the reason she and her husband were able to grab necessities and get out. She says they fled their new house after neighbors walked the streets and knocked on doors, telling people the fire was coming.

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The latest victim of US politics? The index, with Michelle Obama’s bestselling memoir Becoming noticeably lacking one. “What were her publishers thinking?” wrote Ann Treneman in the Times. “Why in the world wouldn’t they want to provide what amounts to a road map for readers?”Looking at recent memoirs, those by Stormy Daniels, Omarosa Manigault Newman and Joe Biden also go without. The pro-index camp include Hillary Clinton (What Happened has listings for both Benghazi and Bon Jovi, Jon), James Comey (featuring Group B streptococcus to The Godfather, part II) and Michael Wolff’s Fire and Fury (which lists 20-odd pages dedicated to Trump, Donald, “personality and behaviour of”).Ruth Ellis, professional indexer, executive board director of the Society of Indexers and probably the best person to have on your pub quiz team, says they are becoming more rare, particularly in US political memoirs. “We do get quite a lot of people complaining about it.”She says one of the main reasons a publisher might skip an index is sensitivity, especially with a big release such as Becoming. While UK indexers strictly observe a code of ethics that bars sharing sensitive material before publication, in the US publishers will slap anyone who sniffs the manuscript with a non-disclosure agreement. “If they don’t want to fuss over putting an NDA together, they just won’t hand it over to an indexer at all.”Indexes tend to be organised at the very end of the publishing process; Ellis says a week before the manuscript goes to the printers is typical. But the state of US politics means publishers are turning over political memoirs at unprecedented speed. “Everyone wants to cash in on Trump, so these books are coming out faster than ever before, and it is likely they’re running out of time.”There is also the matter of cost, although with a blockbuster such as Becoming, money is less likely to be a concern than preventing what Ellis calls “the Washington read” – where any DC hobnobber can go straight to the index to see if they are mentioned and skip the rest. But the real tragedy is not that Obama was unwilling to flag up the Trumpy bits but the blow to an artform. See: Partridge, Alan’s memoir Nomad for a glorious example: “Phalanx, nice use of the word” – easily located on page 73. Topics Michelle Obama Shortcuts Politics books features

A storm over artistic freedom and censorship has erupted in Brazil after an art exhibition at a multinational bank’s cultural centre was cancelled following a campaign by rightwing protesters.The controversy broke out when the Queermuseu – Queer Museum – exhibition at Santander Bank’s cultural centre in Porto Alegre was abruptly closed on Sunday, a month ahead of schedule.Supported by evangelical Christians, protestors from the Free Brazil Movement accused the exhibition – which included 263 works from Brazilian greats such as Candido Portinari and Lygia Clark – of promoting blasphemy, paedophilia and bestiality, charges its curator vigorously denied. “They are passing the limits of tolerance and we are giving them a response,” said Silas Malafia, a leading evangelical pastor.Brazil’s artistic community has attacked the protest as dangerous censorship in a country that lived through 21 years of military dictatorship. “It is an exhibition that deals with issues of identity,” the curator Gaudêncio Fidelis told the Guardian. “This is a frightening moment in Brazilian life.”The exhibition had been open almost a month when protestors from the Free Brazil Movement – a group of free market liberals known for organising street demonstrations calling for the impeachment of leftist President Dilma Rousseff – began picketing its doors.A video by protesters that has been watched over a million times described one of the works, one of two paintings by artist Bia Leite from a series called ‘Criança Viada’, or ‘Gay Children’, as “practically child prostitution”.The children are fully clothed in the painting and the accusation that it promotes paedophilia is unfounded, Fidelis said.“Thework is about bullying, about prejudice,” he said.Fidelis said that a painting which protestors said depicted an act of bestiality was actually a work about colonialsm. Another work by Fernando Baril called ‘Crossing Jesus Christ Goddess Shiva’ was also accused of being blasphemous by the protestors.Fidelis found out the exhibition had been cancelled when Santander published a notice on its Facebook page on Sunday.“We sincerely apologise to anyone who felt offended by any work that was part of the exhibition,” the bank said. Santander had previously fully approved all the works, Fidelis said.The Free Brazil Movement has grown in influence since helping to oust Rousseff on charges of breaking budget rules and has adopted increasingly rightwing positions, such as advocating freeing up gun ownership laws.Kim Kataguiri, one of its leaders, said he saw no contradiction in free-market liberals attacking an art exhibition, arguing that they had called for a boycott of the exhibition, not censorship.“We did the boycott because the exhibition involved public money in the promotion of bestiality, paedophilia and offences to the Christian faith,” Kataguiri told the Guardian.Kataguiri said gay friends of his had also objected to the Queer Museum. “The exhibition shows gays as bestial and aggressive beings,” he said. “Brazilians always had Christian values, but now they have the courage to defend them against the noisy minority who attack us.” Supporters of the exhibition have organised a counter-attack, and 34,000 have signed a petition demanding it reopen. A demonstration was organised for Tuesday afternoon by LBGT groups.“The mobilisation is important because it shows that Porto Alegre will not be a backwards community,” said Luciano Victorino, 23, a law student and organiser of the Porto Alegre Without Prejudice Facebook group, one of the organisers.Alvaro Clark, son of the late Lygia Clark, a prominent Brazilian artist who had three works in the exhibition, was flying down from Rio de Janeiro to take part.“Lygia would detest it,” he said of the closure. “Civilised Brazil is much more than this.” Topics Brazil Americas LGBT rights news

Apple Inc. said it is updating its entry-level iPad with capabilities designed to appeal to students and new software for teachers, as the company tries to recharge sales of the tablet and shore up its dwindling share of the U.S. education market. The company Tuesday said its new 9.7-inch iPad includes a faster processor and works with the Apple Pencil stylus, which previously worked only with higher-end iPad Pro models. The...

For two hours Monday, internet traffic that was supposed to route through Google's Cloud Platform instead found itself in quite unexpected places, including Russia and China. But while the haphazard routing invoked claims of traffic hijacking—a real threat, given that nation states could use the technique to spy on web users or censor services—the incident turned out to be a simple mistake with outsized impacts.Google noted that almost all traffic to its services is encrypted, and wasn't exposed during the incident no matter what. As traffic pinballed across ISPs, though, some observers, including the monitoring firm ThousandEyes, saw signs of malicious BGP hijacking—a technique that manipulates the web's Border Gateway Protocol, which helps ISPs automatically collaborate to route traffic seamlessly across the web.ThousandEyes saw Google traffic rerouting over the Russian ISP TransTelecom, to China Telecom, toward the Nigerian ISP Main One. "Russia, China, and Nigeria ISPs and 150-plus [IP address] prefixes—this is obviously very suspicious," says Alex Henthorne-Iwane, vice-president of product marketing at ThousandEyes. "It doesn’t look like a mistake."Malicious BGP hijacking is a serious concern, and can be exploited by criminals or nation state actors to intercept traffic or disrupt a target service—like Google. But the technique also has a dopey, well-intentioned cousin known as a prefix leak, or sometimes "accidental BGP hijacking."In both cases, rerouting occurs when an ISP declares that it owns blocks of IP addresses that it doesn't actually control. This can be an intentional deception, but can also simply come down to a configuration error that, while disruptive, is not intentional. On Monday, a Google spokesperson said that the company didn't see signs of malicious hijacking, and instead suspected that the Nigerian ISP Main One had accidentally caused the problem."The problem here is a failure to apply basic best current practices to these routing sessions."Roland Dobbins, NetscoutThere are minimum best practices that ISPs should implement to keep BGP routes on the up and up. These are important, because they apply filters that catch errors in the event of a route leak and block problematic routes. Not all ISPs implement these protections, though, and in a prefix leak like the one that affected Google, traffic will flow chaotically across networks, not based on efficiency or established paths, but based on which networks haven't put the BGP safeguards in place and will therefore accept the rogue routing.Indeed, on Tuesday morning Main One said in a statement that, "This was an error during a planned network upgrade due to a misconfiguration on our BGP filters. The error was corrected within 74mins."In this case, it appears that the Russian and Chinese ISPs, and perhaps others as well, offered a path to the Google traffic because they hadn't implemented protective configurations.The protocols underlying the internet were written decades ago, in a different era of computing, and many have needed major security overhauls and additions to improve trust and reliability around the web. There was the effort to encrypt web traffic with HTTPS, and the growing movement to secure the internet's Domain Name System address lookup process so it can't be used to spy on users, or for malicious rerouting.Similarly, ISPs and internet infrastructure providers are starting to implement a protection called Resource Public Key Infrastructure that can virtually eliminate BGP hijacking, by creating a mechanism to cryptographically confirm the validity of BGP routes. Like HTTPS and DNSSEC, RPKI will only start to provide true customer protection when a critical mass of internet infrastructure providers implement it."This incident had a non-trivial impact because Google and some other prominent network routes were accidentally leaked," says Roland Dobbins, a principal engineer at the network analysis firm Netscout. "But the problem here, as it is in most of these cases, is a failure to apply basic best current practices to these routing sessions. The key is for network operators to participate in the global operational community, get these kinds of filters put in place, and move to implement RPKI."While Google's incident wasn't a hack and instead gets into obscure internet protocol drama, the impact for users on Monday was apparent—and shows the pressing need to resolve issues with BGP trust. The flaw has been maliciously hijacked before, and could be again.The privacy battle to save Google from itselfLearn to fly Sikorsky's new helicopter in just 45 minutesiPads are officially more interesting than MacBooksHow does gaming affect your body? We tried to find outThe AI cold war that threatens us allLooking for more? Sign up for our daily newsletter and never miss our latest and greatest stories

Enlarge this image On Thursday, Andrew Lelling, U.S. attorney for the District of Massachusetts, revealed federal charges against a Massachusetts judge and a former court officer for allegedly preventing an immigration official from taking custody of an undocumented immigrant defendant. Steven Senne/AP hide caption toggle caption Steven Senne/AP On Thursday, Andrew Lelling, U.S. attorney for the District of Massachusetts, revealed federal charges against a Massachusetts judge and a former court officer for allegedly preventing an immigration official from taking custody of an undocumented immigrant defendant. Steven Senne/AP Updated at 8:02 p.m. ETA Massachusetts judge and a former court officer are facing federal charges for allegedly helping a defendant in a Newton, Mass., courtroom avoid arrest by an immigration officer last year.Judge Shelley Richmond Joseph and the now-retired court officer, Wesley MacGregor, are accused of helping the defendant, an undocumented immigrant, slip out the back door of Newton District Court while an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent waited to arrest him on a federal detainer in April 2018.Joseph and MacGregor are facing three obstruction charges: conspiracy, aiding and abetting, and obstruction of a federal proceeding. MacGregor, a trial court officer from 1993 until his retirement last month, was additionally charged with perjury for allegedly lying to the grand jury when he said he wasn't aware of an ICE officer in the courthouse that day.The two defendants pleaded not guilty to all charges at appearances in Boston federal court Thursday afternoon, and were released.Massachusetts' Supreme Judicial Court ordered Joseph be suspended without pay."This Order is based solely on the fact that a sitting judge has been indicted for alleged misconduct in the performance of her judicial duties. It in no way reflects any opinion on the merits of the pending criminal case," the court wrote.Speaking to reporters, U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling said this case neither is an indictment of the state's trial court system nor is about immigration policy."It is about the rule of law," he said.Lelling said that throughout the investigation he has heard gasps from certain quarters from people surprised his office would pursue charges against a sitting judge."We did not bring this case in response to the public debate over immigration enforcement. There are reasonable arguments on both sides of that debate," Lelling said. "But this isn't a policy seminar — it's a law enforcement action."Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey, a Democrat, issued a strong rebuke in response to Lelling's indictment, writing: "Today's indictment is a radical and politically-motivated attack on our state and the independence of our courts. It is a bedrock principle of our constitutional system that federal prosecutors should not recklessly interfere with the operation of state courts and their administration of justice. This matter could have been appropriately handled by the Commission on Judicial Conduct and the Trial Court. I am deeply disappointed by U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling's misuse of prosecutorial resources and the chilling effect his actions will have." Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker, who nominated Joseph to the bench in 2017, said back in December, when the federal investigation was first revealed, that he wanted Joseph removed from the bench during the investigation.Susan Church, a Cambridge immigration attorney, said the case would worsen fears for undocumented immigrants about the court system."We have witnesses who won't come to court. We have defendants who don't get tried. We have people who can't get divorced — women who can't seek restraining orders because they are terrified by ICE interference," she said.The defendant isn't named in the indictment but has been previously identified as Jose Medina-Perez, 38, from the Dominican Republic. In April 2018, he was facing drug charges and a fugitive warrant out of Pennsylvania for drunken driving. Immigration officials say the defendant's real name is Oscar Manuel Peguero. According to Lelling's office, Peguero has been deported from the U.S. twice — in 2003 and 2007 — and a federal order had been issued prohibiting him from reentering until 2027.The incident was first reported by The Boston Globe last December. Courtroom recordings allegedly caught the judge, state prosecutor and defendant's attorney talking about the ICE agent looking for Peguero.Peguero was later picked up by police in April 2018.Joseph and MacGregor are scheduled to make initial appearances in federal court in Boston on Thursday.With additional reporting from WBUR's Ally Jarmanning and Lisa Creamer.

It wasn’t long ago that Amazon and Apple share prices seemed to defy gravity, and were pulling the rest of the stock market up with them. But what goes up tends also to come down, and the biggest technology companies plunged as jittery investors cashed out today (Oct. 10), sending the tech sector to its worst day since 2011, according to the Wall Street Journal (paywall).Tech stocks in the Standard & Poor’s 500 index tumbled 4.85%, and pulled the entire market down with them. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 831 points, which sounds scary, but since the Dow was soaring above 26,000, it was only a 3% drop and just the 80th biggest one-day fall in history, according to the Journal.While it’s way too early to say the US economy is moving toward a long-overdue recession, tech stocks were in line for a correction after their gains this summer.A sell-off is also buying opportunity, and it won’t be a surprise if the market rallies tomorrow. But investors looking for reasons to bail out of the nine-year bull market may not wait for a second warning.

The months leading up to a general election in India are almost always marked by competitive populism.As the country prepares to elect a new government in 2019, political parties are in a race to woo anguished farmers reeling from widespread agrarian distress. And their favourite card is also an old one: large-scale loan waivers.In the past week alone, newly elected state governments led by the Indian National Congress in Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, and Madhya Pradesh have announced massive relief on the farm-loan front, fulfilling one of the party’s key poll promises.Prime minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has made similar moves in the states it rules. In the northeastern state of Assam, for instance, authorities waived off farm loans of Rs600 crore last week. Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra made similar moves last year.Not surprisingly, the clamour for a reprieve is growing in other states as well. Congress president Rahul Gandhi took to Twitter earlier this week to announce that he “won’t let the prime minister sleep” till a nationwide waiver is announced.However, such waivers are a stop-gap measure at best. In the long run, they will have a debilitating impact on all parties involved—banks, politicians, the economy, and even the farmers themselves.The first major nationwide farm-loan waiver was announced in 1990 and then again it came back into vogue in 2008, a year before the general elections.This relief, however, didn’t reach the most needy. Nearly 90% of the farmers had taken loans from private money lenders and, therefore, the impact of this largesse was limited, according to P Sainath, a veteran journalist covering rural India.That’s because loan waivers apply only to formal credit.“If you look at the percentage of farmers who have any outstanding loans from institutional sources, it is not even 50%. So, you are spending lakhs and crores of rupees and not even half of the farmers are benefiting. In some of the states, not even 25% of farmers avail institutional credit,” Ramesh Chand, a member of Niti Aayog, the government’s policy think tank, was recently quoted as saying by various media organisations.A Niti Aayog study had also revealed that, in some states, about three-fourths of the crop loans ended up being used for consumption purposes and not to meet agricultural needs, Chand said.“There is no evidence of improvement in agricultural productivity, rural wages or household consumption (from loan waivers),” a paper by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) released last year had also said.Therefore, banks are wary of lending to farmers.“There have been instances when farmers have told bankers that they are delaying payments as they are expecting another round of waiver and, therefore, banks go on a backfoot,” VG Kannan, CEO of the Indian Banks’ Association, told Quartz.While farmers’ distress is acute and help is warranted, remedial measures must go beyond debt waivers.Lenders have loaned over Rs10.6 lakh crore to farmers for agriculture and other allied activities, according to RBI data as of Oct. 26, 2018. The loan waivers announced till now account for nearly 16% of these outstanding loans.Farm-loan waivers are usually followed immediately by a dip in banks’ bad loans as they are compensated by the state governments. However, the credit culture gets affected as the farmers take government intervention for granted. This leads to increased borrowings and, later, a rise in banks’ non-performing assets (NPAs).Take the case of the State Bank of India (SBI), the country’s largest lender. Its NPAs stood at 6.4% before June 2017 when farm-loan waivers were announced in UP and Maharashtra. By September 2018, this rose to 11.4%, according to a report by Macquarie Research. For the sector as a whole, before the 2008 loan waivers, agricultural NPAs had stood at 2%. This shot up to 6% in 2017.“The other problem is that at times money to the banks (from the government) reaches later (as seen in waivers in Maharashtra and Karnataka) which affects their balance sheets. It shouldn’t happen that the banks don’t have money to lend to other borrowers as they wait for the state to compensate them,” added Kannan.Most importantly, economists warn that these measures are only temporary and come at a huge cost.“Loan waivers…have delirious consequences on bank NPAs, agri-credit growth, and public investment in agriculture,” Soumya Kanti Ghosh, chief economic advisor for SBI, said in a report. “We must endeavour to create domestic and export markets for farmers. Otherwise we will land up in a vicious cycle year after year!”The RBI has been repeatedly sounding warning bells.In a report on the fiscal health of state governments released earlier this year, it had cautioned that their finances can go for a toss due to farm-loan waivers.Overall, revenue from the new goods and services tax (GST) regime still remains low. At such a time, waivers can come as a double whammy.In order to foot the loan-waiver bills, the states will have to cut down on capital or social expenditure, which doesn’t augur well for the economy, a report by the credit ratings agency India Ratings pointed out.“The…waivers could widen the fiscal deficit (the difference between expenditure and revenue) of Assam, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh to 3.2%, 8.0%, and 4.4%, respectively, in financial year 2019,” the report said.Instead, the governments have to come up with more effective measures such as insurance schemes with better value propositions, a higher minimum support price, and ways to improve crop productivity, economists say.As for the political parties perpetuating the waiver culture, it only saves them temporarily from a backlash. Persistent structural problems in the economy won’t help them in future elections.

Squirrel Hill, of course, is not a utopia, and it doesn’t represent all of Pittsburgh. There were places in Pittsburgh I could not go to as a child, and where I still would not go as an adult. A fellow Pittsburgh native, Brentin Mock, pointed out in a recent CityLab column, “Squirrel Hill is the change that Pittsburgh wishes to be.” The rest of Pittsburgh can learn from Squirrel Hill that diversity is a crucial part of any thriving local economy.Today the schools in Pittsburgh are less integrated than they were in the 1980s. That means there are fewer opportunities for teachers, or even students, to have meaningful discussions about the violence that is victimizing all of us. On Oct. 25, two black shoppers were killed in a Kroger supermarket, in Louisville, Ky. Two days later, 11 Jews were massacred at the Tree of Life synagogue. If our communities and schools are less integrated, less inclusive, how can teachers or anyone else hope to make the connections for us?Instead, we have a president whose loose and divisive language sets the table for violence.My classmates and I may have lived in separate communities, but we learned how to study, play, eat and shop together. We had teachers, schools and synagogues that, in word and deed, made everyone feel welcome and included. Places like Squirrel Hill, Tree of Life and others like them are powerful, but they are not protected. And they will not be as long as President Trump and his followers continue to stoke the white nationalist’s greatest fear — inclusion.Andre Perry is a fellow in the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram.

Omar pressed Dorsey to explain why Twitter didn’t remove Trump’s tweet outright, according to a person familiar with the conversation who spoke on condition of anonymity because the call was private. Dorsey said that the president’s tweet didn’t violate the company’s rules, a second person from Twitter confirmed. Dorsey also pointed to the fact that the tweet and video already had been viewed and shared far beyond the site, one of the sources said. But the Twitter executive did tell Omar that the tech giant needed to do a better job generally in removing hate and harassment from the site, according to the two people familiar with the call.

Rosa Colón, 70, said she was “100 percent” in support of Mr. Rodríguez, the candidate of Mr. Maduro’s United Socialist Party of Venezuela. She said the party had done a much better job over the years of showing support for the poor.Beginning with the drafting of the Constitution in 1999 under Mr. Maduro’s predecessor, Hugo Chávez, she said, “we found that the people in working-class neighborhoods can be included.”Ms. Colón, a retired personnel analyst with the defense ministry, acknowledged that living conditions had worsened under Mr. Maduro. But she blamed right-wing parties collaborating with the United States to undermine the government.“It’s all in order to bring Mr. Maduro down,” she said.Matilde Bautista, 48, a kitchen assistant in a restaurant, also said she intended to vote for Mr. Rodríguez. But she said no party on its own could rescue the country from its crisis.“The sides have to unify,” she said.Despite everything, Ms. Bautista said, she still has faith in Venezuela’s democratic process. If an elected official fails in his or her duty to improve the country, she said, “We vote for another.”“As the saying goes,” she continued, “Quítate tú pa’ ponerme yo”: You had your chance; now it’s my turn.

His name may not be as familiar as William J. Bratton, Charlie Beck or even the civil rights lawyer Connie Rice.But when it comes to police reform in Los Angeles, John Mack was “one of L.A.’s most influential black figures,” The Los Angeles Times wrote recently. Mr. Mack, who, over a decades-long career, ran the city chapter of the Urban League and spent eight years on L.A.’s Police Commission, died of cancer last week at 81, the newspaper said.He entered the fray soon after the Watts riots of 1965, led the city through and past the Rodney King beating and 1992 riots, and, as recently as last month, got Mayor Eric M. Garcetti’s ear for 30 minutes. He used the time — and the influence he has long wielded — The Los Angeles Times said, to advocate for Michel Moore as Chief Beck’s replacement.And as we reported earlier this month, Chief Moore got the job.California Today goes live at 6 a.m. Pacific time weekdays. Tell us what you want to see: [email protected] Today is edited by Julie Bloom, who grew up in Los Angeles and graduated from U.C. Berkeley.

(Reuters) - Four wildfires burned in Northern California on Tuesday, threatening hundreds of homes, while another blaze in an area of New Mexico hard hit by drought will force most of a sprawling national park to close, fire officials said. FILE PHOTO: The Pawnee Fire, which broke out on Saturday, in Northern California. Courtesy CAL FIRE/via REUTERS The most damaging blaze, the Pawnee Fire, burned in Lake County near the Mendocino National Forest, 70 miles (110 km) northwest of Sacramento. It had destroyed 22 buildings and charred 11,500 acres (4,654 hectares) by Tuesday afternoon, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire). The fire has forced about 1,500 people to evacuate, said Lieutenant Corey Paulich of the Lake County Sheriff’s Department. California Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency for Lake County on Monday, freeing up resources. By Tuesday more than 1,400 firefighters battled the blaze, Cal Fire said. The blaze was 5 percent contained, unchanged from Monday. Lake County has now had at least one damaging wildfire each of the last four years, Paulich said. “I don’t recall any fires as big in my first 19 years that we’ve had in the past four years,” said Paulich, a 23-year sheriff’s department veteran. The fire’s growth on Tuesday was away from populated areas, Paulich said, adding that if that trend continues, residents may soon be allowed to return to their homes. In New Mexico, most of the Carson National Forest will close on Wednesday. This will be the first time the 1.4 million acre (566,600 hectares) forest, larger than the state of Delaware, will close because of drought since 2011. The closure is “strictly precautionary” and called due to the area being in the highest level of drought. The New Mexico fire is not expected to threaten any structures, the Carson National Forest said. The Pawnee is one of four major wildfires burning in California as temperatures rise across the state. None are reported to have caused injuries. Of the four, two were more than 50 percent contained by Tuesday afternoon, Cal Fire said. The Lane Fire in Tehama County, 140 miles north of Sacramento and east of the Pawnee Fire, had blackened 3,800 acres and threatened 200 buildings, fire officials said. It was 45 percent contained. Reporting by Bernie Woodall in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. and Andrew Hay in Taos, New Mexico; Editing by James DalgleishOur Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Enlarge this image The Food and Drug Administration says that a large body of research "does not support a cancer warning for coffee," a statement at odds with a California court ruling earlier this year. Daniel Augusto/Flickr hide caption toggle caption Daniel Augusto/Flickr The Food and Drug Administration says that a large body of research "does not support a cancer warning for coffee," a statement at odds with a California court ruling earlier this year. Daniel Augusto/Flickr The Food and Drug Administration has stepped into a simmering debate in California as to whether coffee should come with a cancer warning label.In March, a judge sided with a nonprofit organization called the Council for Education and Research on Toxics that argued that coffee contains high levels of acrylamide, a cancer-causing chemical compound produced as beans roast.Coffee companies didn't deny acrylamide's presence but argued that it was found at low levels that posed no significant health risk and was outweighed by other health benefits. That argument wasn't compelling to Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Elihu Berle.He ordered coffee companies in California to carry a cancer warning label under Proposition 65, the state's Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act. The law, which requires the state to maintain a list of harmful substances and businesses to notify customers of exposure, has led to both a reduction in carcinogenic chemicals and quick settlements over labels on foods. The Salt Coffee Drinkers Are More Likely To Live Longer. Decaf May Do The Trick, Too On Wednesday, FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said in a statement that "if a state law purports to require food labeling to include a false or misleading statement, the FDA may decide to step in."He added that a large body of research has found little evidence that coffee causes cancer and instead suggested that it might reduce the risk of some cancers: "Strong and consistent evidence shows that in healthy adults, moderate coffee consumption is not associated with an increased risk of major chronic diseases, such as cancer, or premature death, and some evidence suggests that coffee consumption may decrease the risk of certain cancers."The cancer label warning, he said, may "mislead consumers to believe that drinking coffee could be dangerous to their health when it actually could provide health benefits."The agency also announced that it sent a letter of support to the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, which proposed a regulation to exempt coffee companies like Starbucks from putting the warning label on their products.Attorney Raphael Metzger, who won the court case in March on behalf of the Council for Education and Research on Toxics, told CBS that he was shocked that the state would annul the judge's decision. "The takeaway is that the state is proposing a rule contrary to its own scientific conclusion. That's unprecedented and bad," Metzger said. "The whole thing stinks to high hell."National Coffee Association President and CEO Bill Murray embraced the state regulator's proposal earlier in August. "Any outcome other than that which OEHHA proposes would frustrate the scientific, legal and policy rationale upon which Proposition 65 is based," he said.Murray also welcomed the FDA's actions. "Now that science has so comprehensively established the facts on coffee, we believe it is incumbent on regulators to give citizens confidence in what they are consuming," he said in a statement emailed to NPR.The federal regulator's involvement also received some praise from a leading cancer institute. Dale Shepard, an oncologist at Cleveland Clinic, said in a tweet, "Whew! My cup is nearly empty, so happy to see the @US_FDA is weighing in with some common sense on the judicial ruling in California that #coffee is a #cancer risk. Best to rely more on the science."

NEW DELHI—Amit Rajput, who runs a counter selling iPhones in a busy electronics shop here, cuts a lonely figure. He is lucky to sell one device a day, compared with the 10 or more smartphones his colleagues at desks for Samsung Electronics Co., Nokia Corp. and China’s Oppo sell daily in the same store.As customers walk past his display, he recalls a different time in 2013 when he sold as many as 80 iPhones a day. Now most people want to pay less than $300 for their devices—a fraction of what Apple Inc.’s newer models cost....

北京时间 2017 年12 月 20 日晚上10点整，Magic Leap 正式发布了其首款硬件产品——MR 眼镜 Magic Leap One。成立 2011 年，Magic Leap 在未发布任何产品的情况下，已获得 19 亿美元巨额融资。此次产品的发布备注关注，这款被命名为 Magic Leap One “创造者版”的MR眼镜，带来的是惊喜还是失望？36氪邀请混合现实公司 nreal.ai 的 CEO 徐驰（曾就职于 Magic Leap）为我们带来解读。全文如下：Magic Leap One目前发布的是开发者版本的机型，所以，我们预测，等到真正发布消费者版本时，机体会更小。从目前释放出的信息来看，我们关注的是：外观设计风格、技术与场景三个部分。首先说外观设计风格。Magic Leap One的外观设计具有争议性，它几乎完全颠覆了以往VR／AR眼镜的设计思路。这款眼镜的设计大胆抛弃了当下的极简设计风，采用了蒸汽朋克风格，可谓独树一帜。其中，镜片采用了圆形设计，环形头箍向上弯曲，解决了不借用头顶来固定头部的问题，比 HoloLens 的折叠方式节省了体量感。另，头箍部分还是可以打开的。其次来说技术方案。最引人注目的是它的光场显示技术。之前困扰 Magic Leap 的负面新闻终于能平反了。舆论一度指责这家神秘的公司热衷于展示 demo，但不能够将自己的光场显示技术小型化。从目前发布的这款开发者版本来看，Magic Leap并没有食言，它让我们看到了实物，且体积比同为开发者版本的 HoloLens 小了很多。我们估计，Magic Leap One的视场角应该在50°以上，同样大于 HoloLens 不到 35° 的视场角。大视场角的光场，绝对已经是业界领先，这里可能只有圈内人才知道其中的难度 ... 另外直观的感觉就是很多传感器（sensor），四个用来做空间定位的（这个跟 HoloLens 一样），双摄+深度摄像头（发射+接收），再加上眼动追踪，已经10多个了。如此多的传感器不可能直接通过线连在下面的计算单元上，我们估计 Magic Leap 在眼镜端上， 也会有自研的视觉处理单元（VPU）。Magic Leap 的创始人 Rony Abovitz 表示，在视觉呈现上，Magic Leap One 的两个核心设计原则是：无显示是最好的显示，外面的东西实际上应该在里面。声场的设计也非常值得一提。要知道，增强现实不仅是视觉的增强，同时也是声音的增强。简单来说，随着空间的转换，声音应该在声场里呈现强弱变化，并定位声源位置。Magic Leap One 这一次就做的很好，这次开发者版本包含了 4 个麦克风阵列，它可以重建声场，能够实现更好的语音识别，能够识别发声源，分清语音究竟是佩戴者说的，还是旁边的人说的。最后，配以高质量的立体声喇叭，可以实现听觉的混合现实体验。交互方面，用户不仅可以通过手势识别来完成指令，还乐意通过头部位置的识别、语音识别以及眼动追踪来实现交互。我们应该注意到，这一代开发者版本是分体式的设备，除了Magic Leap官方号称的，性能功率可以与MacBook Pro 或 Alienware 相匹敌的计算单元，还有一个手柄控制器。其中控制器的圆形塑料位，是一个具有六自由度运动感应（6DoF）的触摸板，这是一个交互上显著的进步。技术方面，Magic Leap 当然也有所保留。这一次，Rony Abovitz 拒绝透露设备的图形处理器（GPU）或其他硬件规格，也没有提及电池的寿命