The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) emerged triumphant in the Maharashtra state elections, capturing five of the six assembly seats in the Chandrapur district. This signifies a robust show of strength from the BJP, with Congress managing to retain just one seat through Vijay Wadettiwar in Brahmapuri. Notably, Sudhir Mungantiwar, a senior BJP figure and former minister, marked his continued dominance by securing his fourth consecutive term in the Ballarpur constituency. Additionally, BJP candidates Deorao Bhonge, Kirtikumar alias Bunty Bhangdiya, Kishore Jorgewar, and Karan Deotale further fortified the party's stronghold by winning in Rajura, Chimur, Chandrapur, and Warora respectively. Overall, the BJP is leading in 132 out of 288 state assembly seats, as per the latest from the Election Commission. The Mahayuti coalition partners Shiv Sena and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) are on track to claim 57 and 41 seats. In contrast, the Congress-led Maha Vikas Aghadi alliance is seeing only moderate success, with expectations of just 16 seats won. (With inputs from agencies.)
The ridiculous clown car that is the second Trump administration just gained another clown. He just named Dr. Jay Bhattacharya of Stanford to lead the National Institutes of Health. Eight weeks ago, when Stanford held a strange conference on future pandemic policy planning featuring a number of highly questionable "experts" who were basically COVID deniers and vaccine naysayers, several people surmised that this was just a performative exercise. What better way to audition, as it were, for a potential second Trump administration than to make a big show of your medical wisdom when it comes to pandemics, and what you would have done differently if another COVID came along. Stanford being a conservative institution and home to the right-wing Hoover Institution , they have on their faculty some folks who were more aligned with Trump and his anti-masker cohort, because of course Republicans had to make the pandemic political. One of those is physician and economist Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, who co-authored a manifesto embraced by the right called the Great Barrington Declaration , a document that was penned out of fears for the economic collapse of the country under early-pandemic public health policies. The manifesto argued that young people should be allowed to roam free get infected, in order to achieve herd immunity and keep the economy humming, while the elderly and vulnerable should stay locked down. Setting aside the logistical problems of such a policy — what do families with elderly members do? — many other public health experts contended that such a policy would result in a half-million or more unnecessary deaths, with some young people having underlying conditions they may not even be aware of. It should also be noted that Dr. Bhattacharya, in an incredibly irresponsible move for a physician, jumped out ahead of the scientific community, which had not even reached a consensus at that point about how the virus was even spreading, to pen an opinion essay in March 2020 in the Wall Street Journal titled "Is the Coronavirus As Deadly As They Say?" In that essay, Dr. Bhattacharya predicted that the total death toll from the virus in the US might top out at 40,000, when it's actually been 1.2 million to date. Now, Dr. Bhattacharya has been nominated to be director of the NIH, where he would be in charge of a $48 million budget, answering to another jackass in the field of public health, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump's pick for secretary of Health and Human Services. "Together, Jay and RFK Jr. will restore the NIH to a Gold Standard of Medical Research as they examine the underlying causes of, and solutions to, America’s biggest health challenges, including our Crisis of Chronic Illness and Disease," writes Trump on Truth Social, about his latest pick. As the New York Times reports , Dr. Bhattacharya is not a practicing physician, and he has previously "called for overhauling the N.I.H. and limiting the power of civil servants who, he believes, played too prominent a role in shaping federal policy during the pandemic." People like Dr. Bhattacharya have been getting more attention recently, as the Times notes, as public health officials continue to debate how the government's handling of the pandemic both succeeded and failed. Notably, many experts now agree that schoolchildren should not have been kept locked down at home as long as they were. But nonetheless, most experts remain firm in the belief that the only way to handle the uncertain early days of a pandemic like we had is through social distancing and masking, and ultimately a vaccine — something that RFK, if he's confirmed, finds suspect. A colleague of Dr. Bhattacharya's at Stanford, Dr. Pantea Javidan of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, called it "a platform for discredited figures who continually promote dangerous, scientifically unsupported or thoroughly debunked approaches to COVID." And Martha Louise Lincoln of San Francisco State University told Bay Area News Group last month, regarding the Stanford symposium and Bhattacharya's ilk, "It’s an election year, and [people are looking to prove themselves as potential advisors to a Trump administration who would] likely advocate weaker, cheaper public health protections that tolerate disease, ask little of government, and leave it to individuals to protect their own health.” Meanwhile, healthcare policy advocacy group Protect Our Care has come out saying Kennedy would be a danger to our healthcare system. Rep. Arvind Venkat, MD, a Pennsylvania congressman and a doctor who is a member of the group, put out a statement Monday saying of Kennedy, "Simply put, he is wholly unqualified and, frankly, dangerous to the public health and well-being of our country." Dr. Venkat added, "His comments and his activities in American Samoa that led directly to a drop in the number of individuals who received measles vaccinations, and as a result, 83 of our fellow Americans, primarily infants and children, died from a vaccine-preventable disease, measles." Speaking to Bay Area News Group, Dr. Bhattacharya sounded magnanimous about his views and differences of opinion with the mainstream scientific community. "Seeing people in public health discussing their different points of view honestly with each other, rather than trying to create an illusion of consensus,” he said, “is a step forward toward restored restoration of trust in public health.” Top image: Jay Bhattacharya speaks during the 2023 Forbes Healthcare Summit at Jazz at Lincoln Center on December 05, 2023 in New York City. (Photo by Taylor Hill/Getty Images)Sitting around a North Hollywood rehearsal studio on a recent Wednesday evening, the members of the Hard Quartet are taking a break from prepping for the first concert by this indie-rock supergroup by recounting the first gigs they played with some of their other bands. Drummer Jim White volunteers a recollection of his first show with Dirty Three, which formed in Melbourne in the early 1990s because “this guy had a bar, and he wanted a band,” as White puts it. “We played three sets for three people, and we got 60 bucks.” “Each?” asks singer and guitarist Matt Sweeney, known for founding New York’s Chavez around the same time. “Total,” White answers. “Plus all you can drink.” Says Stephen Malkmus , indie-rock famous as the frontman of Pavement: “That’s a f— deal in Australia.” Does White reckon the Dirty Three downed more than $60 worth of booze? “Oh yeah,” the drummer says. “We left our gear there and came back again the next day. The drinks were still flowing.” Given their established-veteran status — the Hard Quartet’s fourth member is Emmett Kelly, who’s played with the Cairo Gang and with Will Oldham for years — these guys ranging in age from mid-40s to early 60s seem not in the least bit anxious about the fact that, 24 hours from now, they’ll make their debut in front of an audience at the Belasco in downtown Los Angeles. Sweeney passes around a tray of brie and raspberries as we chat; Malkmus is wearing tennis shorts and tennis shoes, having come here straight from an afternoon match at a friend’s place. Yet their laid-back attitude is accompanied by an endearing excitement about the music they make together. “It’s good, right?” Malkmus asks. “Some of the lyrics are kind of blah-blah-blah. But I get a kick out of the songs.” As he should: The band’s self-titled debut, which came out last month, is a tuneful blast of fuzz-bomb pop — glammy, folky, a little psychedelic — with great riffs and a loping, late-Beatles-era groove. Malkmus, Sweeney and Kelly take turns singing lead, evoking memories of each of their past projects (especially Pavement). Yet the pleasingly off-kilter way they combine these familiar parts feels fresh. The Hard Quartet came together after Malkmus and Sweeney worked on Malkmus’ 2020 solo album “Traditional Techniques.” Nobody in the band pushes back particularly hard on the term “supergroup,” though it does seem slightly embarrassing to all of them. The way Sweeney sees it, each member’s ample experience just meant “we didn’t have to talk about a lot of stuff” in order for everyone to find common ground. The Hard Quartet having more than one lead singer and songwriter was part of the deal from the get-go; Malkmus says that setup puts the band in a lineage that also includes the B-52’s , Sonic Youth, X and Royal Trux. “It adds this communal element,” he explains. Adds Sweeney: “Different points of view from the same spaceship.” So far, at least, the guy playing bass on any given Hard Quartet song is one of the guys who didn’t write the song — which shouldn’t lead anyone to conclude that bass is an undesirable instrument. In fact, Kelly says, “it’s the one that everyone wants to play the most — even Jim.” (Sitting behind his drum kit, White nods in agreement.) “There’s all these weird myths about rock ’n’ roll, but maybe the weirdest is that nobody wants to play bass,” Sweeney says. “Back in the hardcore days, it was a rite of passage that the new guy would be on bass,” Malkmus points out. “People wanted to move up to guitar. I don’t know why. I guess Johnny Thunders was cooler,” he adds of the famously dissolute New York Dolls member. “The guitar hero and all that.” “Which is hilarious now because nobody cares about the guitar anymore,” Sweeney says with a laugh. “Young people come up to me and ask how I do what I do, and it’s like they’re saying: ‘Oh, it’s so cool that you still sew your clothes by hand while everybody else wears real clothes.’ ” The Hard Quartet started recording its album in New York before finishing it at the storied Shangri-La studio in Malibu owned by producer Rick Rubin, for whom Sweeney has worked frequently as a session player, including on albums by Adele, Johnny Cash and Neil Diamond. (Fun fact involving the well-connected Sweeney: The rehearsal space where the Hard Quartet is practicing in North Hollywood is owned by Bob Brunner, whose father was a writing partner on TV’s “Happy Days” with the late Garry Marshall, whose son Scott played bass in Chavez.) For the sweetly shuffling “Rio’s Song” — which Sweeney wrote about his friend Rio Hackford , the actor and bar owner who died in 2022 — the band filmed a music video in the form of a shot-for-shot remake of the Rolling Stones’ charming early-MTV-era clip for “Waiting on a Friend.” Asked whether the Stones’ endurance is inspiring, Kelly says, “I think it’s cool that rock ’n’ roll still seems vital to them. They’re still trying to tap into it instead of being like, ‘I’m too old for this s—.’ ” Sweeney recalls seeing the Stones in 2002 at Chicago’s Aragon Ballroom. “I went with [David] Pajo,” he says, referring to the prolific indie-rock musician with whom Sweeney played in Billy Corgan’s short-lived Zwan. “We were joking beforehand like, ‘Wouldn’t it be cool if they did “Turd on the Run”?’ And then they did like every song we wanted to hear. They started ‘It’s Only Rock ’n’ Roll,’ and the crowd’s going apes—. I’m like, ‘What’s going on?’ It was because Bono came out onstage. We had to leave in protest.” Speaking of the U2 frontman, has anyone in the Hard Quartet been to Sphere in Las Vegas ? “I know about it because Phish played there,” Malkmus says. “And I’m in the Phish hive. Accidentally. I clicked on something one time in my ‘For you’ feed, and now if I look over there...” “This is Twitter-related?” Sweeney asks. “Yeah, there’s this ‘For you’ thing — this dark, weird, instant algorithm that makes you regret your decisions immediately,” Malkmus says. “You know how you try heroin once and then your whole life’s over? It’s like that, except in a social-media way.”
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The standard Lorem Ipsum passage, used since the 1500s "Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum." Section 1.10.32 of "de Finibus Bonorum et Malorum", written by Cicero in 45 BC "Sed ut perspiciatis unde omnis iste natus error sit voluptatem accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae vitae dicta sunt explicabo. Nemo enim ipsam voluptatem quia voluptas sit aspernatur aut odit aut fugit, sed quia consequuntur magni dolores eos qui ratione voluptatem sequi nesciunt. Neque porro quisquam est, qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit, sed quia non numquam eius modi tempora incidunt ut labore et dolore magnam aliquam quaerat voluptatem. Ut enim ad minima veniam, quis nostrum exercitationem ullam corporis suscipit laboriosam, nisi ut aliquid ex ea commodi consequatur? Quis autem vel eum iure reprehenderit qui in ea voluptate velit esse quam nihil molestiae consequatur, vel illum qui dolorem eum fugiat quo voluptas nulla pariatur?" Thanks for your interest in Kalkine Media's content! To continue reading, please log in to your account or create your free account with us.Despite doom and gloom surrounding the console market, the PS5 is still trending around 8% ahead of the PS4 launch aligned in USA, despite its higher price point and pandemic-induced stock shortages. Given the challenges of the global economy, Sony will consider this a success. Mat Piscatella confirmed the tidbit as part of a Q&A session on the sales-centric Install Base forum, where he added that the Xbox Series X|S is now tracking 11% behind the Xbox One in USA. To balance the discussion, it must be stressed that higher prices have impacted the PS5 in Europe, where it’s selling slower than the PS4. It means that, overall, there’s a sense the console market has stagnated – especially following the obscene highs of the pandemic period.
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