Panic among spectators at soccer game kills at least 56 in the West African nation of GuineaSenior General Min Aung Hlaing stressed that the university’s objective is to equip agricultural producers with the knowledge and skills in food production technologies that are beneficial to them, the nation, and the environment, ensuring sustainable practices. Chairman of the State Administration Council Prime Minister Senior General Min Aung Hlaing attended the ceremony to inaugurate the centennial hall of Yezin University of Agriculture in conjunction with the centennial celebration at the university yesterday morning. Council Joint Secretary General Ye Win Oo, Union Minister for Agriculture, Livestock and Irrigation U Min Naung and Union Minister for Education Dr Nyunt Pe cut the ribbon to mark the 100th anniversary of Yezin University of Agriculture. The Senior General unveiled the stone plaque and signboard of the centennial ceremony. The Senior General and party visited the centennial multipurpose hall. Along the route to the convocation hall where the centennial celebration of the university would be held, students and ethnic people welcomed the Senior General and attendees. The Senior General and party watched a documentary video clip on the history of the university. Speaking on the occasion, the Senor General said that it is necessary to widely disseminate practical and scientifically-based agricultural knowledge that will bring about effective results to rural farmers, and turn out agricultural graduates, as well as mid-level agricultural technicians and basic-level skilled agricultural workers. Currently, the government is implementing the three main processes of ‘education, research, and technology dissemination’. In carrying out these processes, he underlined that priority should be given to ensuring that the benefits of these efforts are effectively supported for rural communities, who rely most on agriculture for their livelihoods. Therefore, in addition to the previous agricultural institutes that awarded agricultural diplomas, as of the 2023-2024 academic year, 85 high schools across the country have also been opened to offer agricultural subjects. Furthermore, he said that it is gratifying to learn that the universities are working hard to identify and train outstanding individuals from these agricultural institutes and high schools, to develop them into agricultural professionals. The university’s objective is to equip agricultural producers with the knowledge and skills in food production technologies that are beneficial to them, the nation, and the environment, ensuring sustainable practices. Moreover, the university aims to help individuals understand the strengths and weaknesses of the nation’s agricultural and human resource foundations, so that experts can effectively apply their expertise to improve and address any shortcomings. The total area of crops in the country, which is 33 million acres, is being prioritized for important crops to ensure domestic food security, expand exports, and increase the production capacity to substitute imports. Efforts are being made to achieve the target output rate. Over the course of a century, the university has produced a significant number of highly skilled and knowledgeable individuals who are trusted by the nation. These include 13,197 graduates with a degree in agricultural science, 673 with a master’s degree, 85 with a doctoral degree, 70 with postgraduate diplomas, and 11 with M Phil degree. Due to the ability to produce such graduates, the country has benefited greatly from their contributions. The Senior General presented an award for production of Yezin Super Rice (YSR-1) to the Director General of the Agricultural Research Department. The Union minister explained the centennial celebration of the university and presented a commemorative gift to the Senior General. The Senior General and party enjoyed song and dance entertainment of students from the university and presented a flower basket to them. He cordially greeted retired rectors, pro-rectors of the university. After the ceremony, the Senior General visited the exhibition to mark the centennial celebration of the university.—MNA/TTA
The nearly party-line votes came after Democrats had been pressing for the findings to be published even though the Florida Republican left Congress and withdrew as President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for attorney general. Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Calif., was the sole Republican to support the effort. Most Republicans have argued that any congressional probe into Gaetz ended when he resigned from the House. Speaker Mike Johnson also requested that the committee not publish its report, saying it would be a terrible precedent to set. While ethics reports have previously been released after a member’s resignation, it is extremely rare. Shortly before the votes took place, Rep. Sean Casten, D-Ill., who introduced one of the bills to force the release, said that if Republicans reject the release, they will have “succeeded in sweeping credible allegations of sexual misconduct under the rug.” Gaetz has repeatedly denied the claims. Earlier Thursday, the Ethics panel met to discuss the Gaetz report but made no decision, saying in a short statement that the matter is still being discussed. It's unclear now whether the document will ever see the light of day as lawmakers have only a few weeks left before a new session of Congress begins. It's the culmination of weeks of pressure on the Ethics committee's five Republicans and five Democrats who mostly work in secret as they investigate allegations of misconduct against lawmakers. The status of the Gaetz investigation became an open question last month when he abruptly resigned from Congress after Trump's announcement that he wanted his ally in the Cabinet. It is standard practice for the committee to end investigations when members of Congress depart, but the circumstances surrounding Gaetz were unusual, given his potential role in the new administration. Rep. Michael Guest, R-Miss., the committee chairman, said Wednesday that there is no longer the same urgency to release the report given that Gaetz has left Congress and stepped aside as Trump's choice to head the Justice Department. “I’ve been steadfast about that. He’s no longer a member. He is no longer going to be confirmed by the Senate because he withdrew his nomination to be the attorney general,” Guest said. The Gaetz report has also caused tensions between lawmakers on the bipartisan committee. Pennsylvania Rep. Susan Wild, the top Democrat on the panel, publicly admonished Guest last month for mischaracterizing a previous meeting to the press. Gaetz has denied any wrongdoing and said last year that the Justice Department’s separate investigation against him into sex trafficking allegations involving underage girls ended without federal charges. His onetime political ally Joel Greenberg, a fellow Republican who served as the tax collector in Florida’s Seminole County, admitted as part of a plea deal with prosecutors in 2021 that he paid women and an underage girl to have sex with him and other men. The men were not identified in court documents when he pleaded guilty. Greenberg was sentenced in late 2022 to 11 years in prison.
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Innovative HMC technique saves limbs of two patientsNo. 4 Penn State hosts Maryland in regular-season finale with CFP seeding in mindThere must be a billion photographs about Israel from the birth of photography to the present. I wondered how I could capture the sense of the place and cultures within it. How could I find a different and intriguing approach? I looked back to ethnographic research in Cali, Colombia and in projects in the U.S.-Mexico border region. I could buy a more expensive camera. I could also create my own art. Here is what I learned to see over nearly forty years. When I first traveled to Israel in 1985, I was a tourist. Many of my wife’s relatives lived there, having escaped or been forced to leave Iraq in the early 1950s. That was when I snapped photographs. I had yet to become a proficient digital artist. It wasn’t until the late 1990s that I would be able to repurpose my earlier photographs. An adventure in visual art and my relation to Israel began to emerge. I began to impose meaning on my travels to Israel. It was not just being there, but being there in multiple ways with the changing technology of photography and the digital darkroom. My photographs are often edited as digital art. In one photo from 1985, I deleted a view of the Kidron valley below the way up to the Temple Mount. There was a line of rabbis overlooking a low wall. I saw the valley as a distraction. I added clouds from my home in Poway. I now found a sense of awe in the image. I don’t know whether the rabbis had experienced what I imagined. But my image pictured it that way. Years later, I was surprised to see my image resonating with Exodus 24:10 — and they saw the God of Israel — under whose feet was the likeness of a pavement of sapphire. Perhaps I was now seeing what others had imagined in biblical times. In one way it became my just-so story. Places of Significance When I revisited Israel in 2007, I became intrigued with digital infrared photography, The structure of the photographic image remains the same, but the color and lighting sensibility changes. Israel became infrared. This was about using photography, and editing it, to pay attention — a way of mindfulness. Henry Miller captures what I was finding in Israel in blades of grass, about this sense of paying attention: “The moment one gives close attention to any thing, even a blade of grass it becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself.” So, too, I was finding the places and cultures in Israel. In the moment of taking photographs and inquiring into them with image editing. Israel in a Smartphone I was among those trading in their cameras for smartphones. Perhaps the loss in high resolution was not a loss at all. The photos could retain their structure while sacrificing a bit of sharp lines, texture and color. For most photos, the loss was barely noticeable and whatever was lost could be mostly regained with digital editing. Perfection continued to give way to good enough. But the technology was not static, it improved. It was now 2023 and I decided to rely on my smartphone camera. The important question for me was weighted toward the art and less the measures of technical accuracy. Could AI Model What My Camera Saw? Once more I went to Israel. COVID had delayed my travels. It was now 2023. I began to experiment with generative AI to create images. The most accessible platform was DALLE2 (an OpenAI technology). My plan was to take photos with my smartphone; then I would type words that described what I was seeing into the generative AI platform. My plan was to see if my words could capture what I saw. These two images — the actual photo and the AI replicant — would frame a conversation for me. How do these two realities gibe with each other? One seen and the other energized by my words and filtered through the layers, loops and algorithms that had a database of millions of images on which it had been trained. This was an experiment in “seeing” or understanding what it is that we tell ourselves what it is we are seeing. Often, I would have to change my wording to reach a more accurate approximation of what I was seeing. I admit this was a strange experiment. But it was an intellectual exercise that challenged how my words reflected what I perceived. What I was rewarded with was not what my photograph pictured so much as a surprise. Even when I found that the generative AI image was wrongheaded, it was a way to ask myself, What is Israel? The way these generative AI models crafted its versions of my text prompts was biased and puzzling, then and even now. I found myself in one moment having a coffee and pastry at a local café. As my wife and friends chatted, a woman got up. She was juggling her coffee, phone and cigarette. I tried to capture that moment with this text prompt: photorealistic image, middle aged woman, just finished her coffee outside outdoor cafe, cigarette in one hand, cell phone and coffee in her other hand. We have launched our year-end campaign. Our goal: Raise $50,000 by Dec. 31. Help us get there. Times of San Diego is devoted to producing timely, comprehensive news about San Diego County. Your donation helps keep our work free-to-read, funds reporters who cover local issues and allows us to write stories that hold public officials accountable. Join the growing list of donors investing in our community's long-term future. The original photo on the left is an example of street photography. The woman, outside a Tel Aviv café, is struggling to balance her coffee and cell phone (and possible her purse as well) while smoking a cigarette. The images to the right are examples of using a description of the woman as a prompt in two different generative AI models. The DALLE2 image lacks the near perfect rendition found in Epic Realism. Neither, though, capture the entire detail provided in the text prompt. As I tweaked the test, the generative AI models continued to improve. But an important question remained. In using AI, there is no human authorship unless one considers the text prompt sufficient to qualify as the human element. Still, there is potential benefit. If one could not access an unfolding reality, perhaps the AI platform could help imagine it. Picasso had imagined the horror of Guernica . Could AI do as well for the unfolding horror of Oct. 7? That was what wondered as we waited in our Tel Aviv apartment. Our thoughts tried to catch up to the unfolding horror. Imagining Oct. 7 I tried to imagine what was happening in our building. We were shown the stairs outside our apartment. There were already other residents sitting there. My text prompt to DALLE2 described an odd staircase with individuals oddly grabbing each other. The generative AI images often fail to picture the reality we can see; it may refuse to honor our words because of its algorithmic biases, company policies and guidelines; it may be unable to translate our words into what we perceive. In this sense, AI images fail to supplant our own creativity. I was determined to capture what I experienced on Oct. 7. Since coming back from Israel, I started working with other generative AI platforms including Stable Diffusion. This allowed me to keep the same structure of the image while adding a multitude of novel and unexpected elements. I returned to one of the photos I took on Oct. 7. We were shown our building’s bomb shelter by one of the other tenants. It was a basement room that appeared never to have been used. The photograph pictured a drab stairwell leading down to the building’s safe room. I wanted to bring that stairwell into the aesthetic that drove Picasso’s Guernica to Dali’s Premonition of Civil War to Goya’s The Third of May 1808. This stairwell was not the horror of the south of Israel ; it was a different fear — a tourist in Tel Aviv. I would be naïve to think that picturing reality would be better with a camera, AI or digital image editing. Or a paintbrush. Or with any tools an artist might choose. Our eyes center reality, but even then we are deceived. Still, we try to understand the reality in which we exist. Joe Nalven is a San Diego-based digital artist. He is the author of Going Digital: The Practice and Vision of Digital Artists (Thompson, 2005). He will be giving a public lecture at the Coronado Public Library on Jan. 15 at 10 a.m. The lecture is free and sponsored by the Center for Jewish Culture. For more information: Tel. 858-362-1150 or www.lfjcc.org . Get Our Free Daily Email Newsletter Get the latest local and California news from Times of San Diego delivered to your inbox at 8 a.m. daily. Sign up for our free email newsletter and be fully informed of the most important developments.
More than 99 Million Ballots Processed During 2024 General Election On Average, Ballots Were Delivered from Voters to Election Officials Within One Day WASHINGTON , Dec. 2, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, the United States Postal Service released its 2024 Post-Election Analysis Report, outlining the agency's steps to process more than 99.22 million ballots in the 2024 general election. The full report can be read here: 2024 Post-Election Analysis Report . " In 2024, the Postal Service once again admirably performed our role of efficiently and effectively delivering the nation's ballots," said Postmaster General Louis DeJoy . "As we continue to transform the nation's postal network to better meet the demands of the modern mailing and shipping customer, we stand ready to work with policymakers at all levels to make the nation's effective vote by mail process even stronger." The Postal Service's success in 2024 was the result of a deepened focus on operational precision and integrated communications, the engagement of the USPS Election and Government Mail Services team and execution of longstanding, proven operational processes and procedures, including extraordinary measures. As in previous general elections, the Postal Service deployed extraordinary measures in the final weeks of the election season to swiftly move Ballot Mail entered close to or on Election Day and/or the state's return deadline. Extraordinary measures began on Monday, Oct. 21 , continued nationwide through Election Day on Tuesday, Nov. 5 , and extended through the last day in each state that boards of elections accepted completed mail-in ballots as timely. In 2024, the Postal Service's extraordinary measures included but were not limited to: extra deliveries and collections; special pick-ups; specialized sort plans at processing facilities to expedite delivery to boards of elections; and local handling and transportation of ballots. Key 2024 Election Mail Performance Statistics As part of the nation's critical infrastructure, USPS is responsible for processing, transporting, and delivering the nation's Election Mail safely, securely, and on time. During the General Election, USPS processed more than 99 million ballots. On average, Ballot Mail sent from voters to election officials were delivered within one day. 99.22 Million Ballots Processed in the 2024 General Election: During the general election period of September 1 – November 15 , the Postal Service delivered at least 99.22 million ballots to or from voters.* 99.88 Percent of Ballots Delivered to Election Officials Within a Week: The agency successfully processed, transported and delivered 99.88 percent of ballots from voters to election officials within seven days, and 99.64 percent within five days.** 97.73 Percent of Ballots Delivered from Voters to Election Officials Within Three Days: The Postal Service successfully returned 97.73 percent of ballots from voters to local election officials in fewer than three days. 1 Day Average Delivery Time for Ballots from Voters to Election Officials: On average, the Postal Service delivered ballots from voters to election officials within one day. 3.37 Billion Pieces of Political and Election Mail Delivered in 2024: The total mail volume surpassed 3 billion mailpieces for both Political and Election Mail tracked. As an essential part of the nation's disaster response network, readiness and preparation for natural disasters are standard procedure for the Postal Service. In September and October 2024 , Hurricanes Helene and Milton devastated portions of Florida , South Carolina , and North Carolina just weeks before the election. However, through the deployment of extraordinary measures in the weeks before Election Day, voters in the impacted areas who chose to use the mail to vote received performance comparable with the rest of the nation. Recommendations To Improve the Nation's Vote by Mail System in Future Election Cycles The Postal Service is both a national service and a world-class logistics organization. As such, consistent policies are needed nationwide to ensure that operations run smoothly, that the 640,000 USPS employees understand what is expected of them, and the millions of customers can have trust in the Postal Service's ability to deliver for them. At the same time, when it comes to the delivery of Election Mail, there are 50 states and nearly 8,000 election jurisdictions that are far from uniform in their election laws and practices, and that often do not consider how the mail system works. This can result in a mismatch of timeframes, deadlines, ballot return suggestions and the practical reality of using the mail. Many of these laws and practices were not established with the Postal Service's operations in mind. As USPS continues to transform the nation's postal network to better meet the demands of the modern mailing and shipping customer, the organization stands ready to work with policymakers at all levels to continue educating them on how the mail works. While the Postal Service provides effective, efficient, and reliable service for all mail, including Election Mail, there are long-standing recommendations that policymakers should consider to help expedite the transport of mail-in ballots to and from voters including: Following and implementing USPS recommendations on mail piece preparation Applying visibility tools to Election and Ballot Mail Better understanding of Postal Operations Continuing voter education initiatives on state laws and reasonable mailing deadlines * Total volume reflects volume that was identifiable as Ballot Mail by the Postal Service. **Performance data for outbound Ballot Mail (sent from local boards of elections to voters) includes only those ballots that were properly identified as ballots and consistent with our service performance measurement rules. Performance data for inbound Ballot Mail (sent from voters to local boards of elections) includes both those ballots that were properly identified as ballots and consistent with our service performance measurement rules as well as the volume identified by a survey for which data is available from 10/21/2024 to 11/13/2024 . Please Note: The United States Postal Service is an independent federal establishment, mandated to be self-financing and to serve every American community through the affordable, reliable and secure delivery of mail and packages to nearly 169 million addresses six and often seven days a week. Overseen by a bipartisan Board of Governors, the Postal Service is implementing a 10-year transformation plan, Delivering for America , to modernize the postal network, restore long-term financial sustainability, dramatically improve service across all mail and shipping categories, and maintain the organization as one of America's most valued and trusted brands. The Postal Service generally receives no tax dollars for operating expenses and relies on the sale of postage, products and services to fund its operations. For USPS media resources, including broadcast-quality video and audio and photo stills, visit the USPS Newsroom . Follow us on Twitter , Instagram , Pinterest and LinkedIn . Subscribe to the USPS YouTube Channel and like us on Facebook . For more information about the Postal Service, visit usps.com and facts.usps.com . Contact: Martha Johnson [email protected] usps.com/news SOURCE U.S. Postal ServiceMADISON, Wis. — Wisconsin public worker and teachers unions scored a major legal victory Monday with a ruling that restores collective bargaining rights they lost under a 2011 state law that sparked weeks of protests and made the state the center of the national battle over union rights. That law, known as Act 10, effectively ended the ability of most public employees to bargain for wage increases and other issues, and forced them to pay more for health insurance and retirement benefits. Under the ruling by Dane County Circuit Judge Jacob Frost, all public sector workers who lost their collective bargaining power would have it restored to what was in place prior to 2011. They would be treated the same as the police, firefighter and other public safety unions that were exempted under the law. Republicans vowed to immediately appeal the ruling, which ultimately is likely to go before the Wisconsin Supreme Court. That only amplifies the importance of the April election that will determine whether the court remains controlled 4-3 by liberal justices. Former Gov. Scott Walker, who proposed the law that catapulted him onto the national political stage, decried the ruling in a post on the social media platform X as “brazen political activism.” He said it makes the state Supreme Court election “that much more important.” Supporters of the law have said it provided local governments more control over workers and the powers they needed to cut costs. Repealing the law, which allowed schools and local governments to raise money through higher employee contributions for benefits, would bankrupt those entities, backers of Act 10 have argued. Democratic opponents argue that the law has hurt schools and other government agencies by taking away the ability of employees to collectively bargain for their pay and working conditions. Union leaders were overjoyed with the ruling, which affects tens of thousands of public employees. “We realize there may still be a fight ahead of us in the courts, but make no mistake, we’re ready to keep fighting until we all have a seat at the table again,” said Ben Gruber, a conservation warden and president of AFSCME Local 1215. The law was proposed by Walker and enacted by the Republican-controlled Legislature in spite of massive protests that went on for weeks and drew as many as 100,000 people to the Capitol. The law has withstood numerous legal challenges over the years, but this was the first brought since the Wisconsin Supreme Court flipped to liberal control in 2023. The seven unions and three union leaders that brought the lawsuit argued that the law should be struck down because it creates unconstitutional exemptions for firefighters and other public safety workers. Attorneys for the Legislature and state agencies countered that the exemptions are legal, have already been upheld by other courts, and that the case should be dismissed. But Frost sided with the unions in July, saying the law violates equal protection guarantees in the Wisconsin Constitution by dividing public employees into “general” and “public safety” employees. He ruled that general employee unions, like those representing teachers, can not be treated differently from public safety unions that were exempt from the law. His ruling Monday delineated the dozens of specific provisions in the law that must be struck. Wisconsin Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos said he looked forward to appealing the ruling. “This lawsuit came more than a decade after Act 10 became law and after many courts rejected the same meritless legal challenges,” Vos said in a statement. Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, the state's largest business lobbying organization, also decried the ruling. WMC President Kurt Bauer called Act 10 “a critical tool for policymakers and elected officials to balance budgets and find taxpayer savings." The Legislature said in court filings that arguments made in the current case were rejected in 2014 by the state Supreme Court. The only change since that ruling is the makeup of Wisconsin Supreme Court, attorneys for the Legislature argued. The Act 10 law effectively ended collective bargaining for most public unions by allowing them to bargain solely over base wage increases no greater than inflation. It also disallowed the automatic withdrawal of union dues, required annual recertification votes for unions, and forced public workers to pay more for health insurance and retirement benefits. The law was the signature legislative achievement of Walker, who was targeted for a recall election he won. Walker used his fights with unions to mount an unsuccessful presidential run in 2016. Frost, the judge who issued Monday's ruling, appeared to have signed the petition to recall Walker from office. None of the attorneys sought his removal from the case and he did not step down. Frost was appointed to the bench by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers, who signed the Walker recall petition. The law has also led to a dramatic decrease in union membership across the state. The nonpartisan Wisconsin Policy Forum said in a 2022 analysis that since 2000, Wisconsin had the largest decline in the proportion of its workforce that is unionized. In 2015, the GOP-controlled Wisconsin Legislature approved a right-to-work law that limited the power of private-sector unions. Public sector unions that brought the lawsuit are the Abbotsford Education Association; the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Locals 47 and 1215; the Beaver Dam Education Association; SEIU Wisconsin; the Teaching Assistants’ Association Local 3220 and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 695.Art & culture on clubs’ menu this festive season