Monday, 16 November 2015
Saturday, 14 November 2015
Leepu and Pitbull
Pitbull Steve is a successful Long Island mechanic who has built his business from the ground up. He counts every cent, never throws anything away and is always on the lookout for a new angle to make a buck. But Pitbull thinks he may have found the man who can help him turn his junk into gold.
Leepu Nizamuddin Awlia has become a household name in Bangladesh. Known simply as Leepu, this colourful creative takes junk automobiles and using nothing but old hammers, sheet metal and spare parts, he transforms these wrecks into stunning super-cars.
Now the fast talking Long Island mechanic is putting his money where his mouth is. He's asked the eccentric Bangladeshi car designer Leepu to join him in his next high risk, high octane and hijinks business venture - building affordable, American muscle cars for the average Joe.
Mission to moon
14 November - Apollo 12 lifts off on mission to the moon
Apollo 12, the second manned mission to the surface of the moon, is launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, with astronauts Charles Conrad, Jr.; Richard F. Gordon, Jr.; and Alan L. Bean aboard. President Richard Nixon viewed the liftoff from Pad A at Cape Canaveral. He was the first president to attend the liftoff of a manned space flight. On 19th November, the landing module Intrepid made a precision landing on the northwest rim of the moon’s Ocean of Storms. About five hours later, astronauts Conrad and Bean became the third and fourth humans to walk on the surface of the moon. During the next 32 hours, the two astronauts made two lunar walks, where they collected lunar samples and investigated the Surveyor 3 spacecraft, an unmanned U.S. probe that soft-landed on the moon in 1967. On 24th November, Apollo 12 successfully returned to Earth, splashing down only three miles from one of its retrieval ships, the USS Hornet.
Tuesday, 10 November 2015
Nigeria celebrates Africa's first English
Nigerians have been congratulating
countryman Wellington Jighere, who has become the first African to win
the English-language World Scrabble Championship.
Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari was among those to congratulate him, saying he has "done the country proud".
Mr Jighere said on his Facebook page that he felt he was playing with the "whole continent" behind him.
He added that it "still baffles" him that he managed to win, given how tired he felt as he had "not slept well in about a week".
Saturday, 7 November 2015
Science & Environment
US rejects Keystone XL pipeline from Canada
US President Barack Obama has announced he is rejecting an application to build the Keystone XL pipeline from Canada.
Speaking from the White House, he said it would not have served the "national interests" of the US.
Its construction has been hotly disputed for seven years, with environmentalists saying it would do irreparable damage.
But the president said the pipeline had taken on an "overinflated role" in the climate change debate.
The proposed pipeline would have run 1,179-miles (1,897km) taking 800,000 barrels of oil a day from Alberta, Canada, to Steele City, Nebraska.
But Mr Obama said it would not have:
- lowered petrol prices
- created long-term jobs
- affected energy dependence
"The pipeline would not make a meaningful long-term contribution to our economy," he said.
Republican presidential candidates condemned the news, with Jeb Bush calling it an attack on the US economy.
In February, the Republican-led Congress voted to begin construction immediately, but Mr Obama vetoed the bill to await environmental reports.
Analysis: Anthony Zurcher - North America politics reporter
It took more than seven years, but Barack Obama has finally got to "no".
Maybe it was the election of a Liberal government in Canada that is more suspicious of big energy projects. Maybe it was the sharp decline in oil prices over the past year. Or maybe it was Friday's announcement that the US unemployment rate has dropped to 5%, the lowest of Mr Obama's presidency.
Whatever the explanation, the president decided now was the time to finally strike the death blow to the controversial pipeline. It's a move that will be heralded by environmentalists, condemned by Republicans on the presidential campaign trail and - almost certainly - largely overlooked by an American public that was never really engaged on the issue.
The president's decision puts Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton in a comfortable spot. She had recently come out against the pipeline, and Mr Obama's move takes the issue off the table - at least for now.
The decision comes as world leaders plan to meet in Paris at the end of the month to finalise a major global climate agreement.
The agreement, which could be reached at the meeting known as the UN Climate Change Conference or COP 21, would be a major part of the president's legacy.
While the project is dead for now, the pipeline controversy will not end any time soon.
Proponents will almost certainly challenge the decision in court and if a Republican is elected president next year, construction could yet be approved.
The pipeline also generated controversy outside of Washington, souring relations between the former Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the US president.
President Obama said he had spoken to newly-elected Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and they agreed the issue of climate change trumped any differences of opinion over the pipeline.
George bush
George HW Bush slams Rumsfeld and Cheney in new biography
Former American President George HW Bush has publicly criticised Dick Cheney and Donald H Rumsfeld, key members of his son's administration, in a biography due out next week.
Mr Cheney, Mr Bush said, built "his own empire" and Mr Rumsfeld "served the president badly," US media report.
Mr Bush also called Mr Rumsfeld "an arrogant fellow" with "swagger".
Mr Cheney was vice-president and Mr Rumsfeld was defence secretary under George W Bush.
"I don't like what he did, and I think it hurt the president having [Mr Rumsfeld's] iron-ass view of everything," Mr Bush said, according to an article in The New York Times that cites the biography's author, Jon Meacham.
"There's a lack of humility, a lack of seeing what the other guy thinks. He's more 'kick ass' and 'take names, take numbers'. I think he paid a price for that."
Analysis - Anthony Zurcher, BBC News, Washington
Jeb Bush has had plenty of drama in his presidential quest recently, with poorly reviewed debate performances and sinking poll numbers leading to a recently unveiled "Jeb can fix it!" campaign reboot. Now, thanks to his father's new biography, he is likely to face questions once again about his family's tangled presidential dynasty.
Jeb has repeatedly asserted that he's his own man and is forging an identity distinct from that of his presidential relatives, but that hasn't stopped reporters from pressing him on his views of George W Bush's time in the White House, including the wisdom of the Iraq War. His answers, to put it kindly, have been less than clear and consistent.
It's only a matter of time before Jeb is asked whether he agrees with his father's view that George W occasionally used overheated rhetoric and relied too heavily on bellicose advisers like Vice-President Dick Cheney. No matter how he answers, questions like these will push him off his desired message at a critical time in his campaign.
Mr Cheney, Mr Bush said, changed in the time between serving him and his son.
"He just became very hardline and very different from the Dick Cheney I knew and worked with," Mr Bush reportedly said, attributing this to the 9/11 attacks.
He told author Jon Meacham that Mr Cheney was "iron-ass" and had acted too independently of his son in matters of national security.
Of his son, Mr Bush said he would often worry about the former president's rhetoric.
Citing the "axis of evil" reference in the 2002 State of the Union address, he said: "You go back to the 'axis of evil' and these things and I think that might be historically proved to be not benefiting anything."
Author Jon Meacham interviewed Mr Bush for the book Destiny And Power: The American Odyssey Of George Herbert Walker Bush.
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