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‘Queen of the Ring’ Review: Fighting for Respect ‘Queen of the Ring’ Review: Fighting for Respect A waitress becomes a wrestler in this sports drama, based on the true story of the champion Mildred Burke. Source link #Queen #Ring #Review #Fighting #Respect Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Unseasonably warm week in Central Indiana could close with storms Friday Unseasonably warm week in Central Indiana could close with storms Friday An unseasonably warm week across Central Indiana could close out with thunderstorms. Daily high temperatures will gradually climb throughout the week to the upper 60s by Wednesday and the mid-70s by Friday, according to National Weather Service forecasts. Monday and Tuesday will be mostly sunny and clear, but clouds will move in toward the week’s end with rain possible Thursday and Friday. Average max temperatures in Indianapolis are typically 49 to 51 degrees Fahrenheit this time of year, historical data for March 9-14 shows. The city’s record high for March 14, recorded in 2012, is 81 degrees. This week’s weather forecast for Indianapolis Sunday: Sunny with highs in the upper 50s. West winds 5 to 10 mph. Monday: Sunny with highs in the mid-60s. Southwest winds 5 to 10 mph, with gusts up to 20 mph in the afternoon. Tuesday: Mostly sunny with highs in the upper 60s. Southwest winds 10 to 15 mph. Wednesday: Partly cloudy with highs in the upper 60s. Thursday: Party cloudy with highs in the lower 70s and a 20% chance of showers. Friday: Highs in the mid-70s, but partly cloudy with a 70-80% chance of showers through midnight. Email IndyStar Reporter Jordan Smith at *****@*****.tld. Follow him on X: @jordantsmith09 This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Unseasonably warm weather in Central Indiana could end with storms Source link #Unseasonably #warm #week #Central #Indiana #close #storms #Friday Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Trump downplays concerns about his tariffs and higher prices Trump downplays concerns about his tariffs and higher prices U.S. President Donald Trump attends the White House Crypto Summit at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., March 7, 2025. Evelyn Hockstein | Reuters President Donald Trump is dismissing business concerns over the uncertainty caused by his planned tariffs on a range of American trading partners and the prospect of higher prices, and isn’t ruling out the possibility of a recession this year. After imposing and then quickly pausing 25% tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada that sent markets tumbling over concerns of a trade war, Trump said his plans for broader “reciprocal” tariffs will go into effect April 2, raising them to match what other countries assess. “April 2nd, it becomes all reciprocal,” he said in a taped interview with Fox News Channel’s “Sunday Morning Futures.” “What they charge us, we charge them.” Asked about the Atlanta Fed’s warning of an economic contraction in the first quarter of the year, Trump seemingly acknowledged that his plans could affect U.S. growth. Still, he claimed, it would ultimately be “be great for us.” “There is a ******* of transition because what we’re doing is very big,” Trump said. “It takes a little time. It takes a little time.” On Wall Street, it was a tough week with wild swings dominated by worries about the economy and uncertainty about what Trump’s tariffs. Trump brushed aside concerns from businesses seeking stability as they make investment decisions. He said that “for years the globalists, the big globalists have been ripping off the United States” and that now, “all we’re doing is getting some of it back, and we’re going to treat our country fairly.” “You know, the tariffs could go up as time goes by, and they may go up and, you know, I don’t know if it’s predictability,” the Republican president said. Trump last week lifted the Mexico and Canada tariffs on American car manufacturers, and then virtually all imports to the U.S., but kept them on goods from China. More tariffs are coming this week, with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick telling NBC’s “Meet the Press” that 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum imports will take effect Wednesday. Lutnick said Trump’s threatened tariffs on ********* dairy and lumber though would wait until April. “Will there be distortions? Of course,” Lutnick said. “Foreign goods may get a little more expensive. But American goods are going to get cheaper, and you’re going to be helping Americans by buying American.” Source link #Trump #downplays #concerns #tariffs #higher #prices Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

The 5 Best Teas to Drink for Better Blood Sugar, According to Dietitians The 5 Best Teas to Drink for Better Blood Sugar, According to Dietitians Reviewed by Dietitian Karen Ansel, M.S., RDN Getty Images. EatingWell design. If you’re living with diabetes, you likely spend a lot of time planning what goes on your plate. But what about what you pour into your glass or mug? Drinks are easy to overlook. Yet, they can also have a big impact on your blood sugar. On the flip side, not drinking enough can also be a problem, as dehydration may contribute to high blood sugar. Luckily, there are plenty of blood sugar-friendly beverages out there. One of our favorite sugar-free beverages is tea, which happens to be the second most popular beverage in the world after water. Tea offers loads of health benefits, and better blood sugar is one of them. With all the different types of teas to choose from, you may be wondering what are the best ones to drink for blood sugar management. To find out, we asked dietitians. Here’s what they told us. Related: The 5 Best No-Added-Sugar Drinks for Better Blood Sugar, According to Dietitians 1. Green Tea Delicate, earthy green is consistently linked to a host of health benefits, including better blood sugar. In fact, research has found that it may help reduce fasting blood glucose and improve insulin sensitivity in people with diabetes. What makes it so effective? “The gut houses trillions of microbes that influence blood sugar levels,” says Kimberley Rose-Francis RDN, CDCES, LD, a registered dietitian and certified diabetes educator in private practice in Florida. “An imbalanced gut microbiota can lead to decreased glucose tolerance and insulin resistance. Green tea is rich in polyphenols, which are small plant-based compounds associated with various health benefits, including improvements in gut health.” For a healthy afternoon pick-me-up, brew some soothing Orange-Ginger Tea. Or, enjoy a cup of our no-sugar-added ginger-lemon tea. Related: What Happens to Your Body When You Drink Green Tea Every Day 2. ****** Tea Although green and ****** tea look and taste quite different, they both come from the Camellia sinensis plant. So, it makes sense that they share many of the same health benefits. That includes better blood sugar. While there is not as much research on the benefits of ****** tea for blood glucose management, one review study reports that it may aid in glucose metabolism and improve the body’s sensitivity to its own insulin. Researchers aren’t sure exactly why. However, they note ****** tea’s abundant polyphenols may slow the digestion and absorption of sugars from food. This, in turn, may protect against weight gain, which is a powerful trigger for type 2 diabetes. We don’t have to tell you how comforting a cup of ****** tea is. But it’s also our favorite tea for energy. For an afternoon pick-me-up, try it iced in this zippy peach iced tea. 3. Ginger Tea “Ginger is well-known for its ability to relieve nausea, but it may also help improve blood sugar levels when crushed and brewed into a fragrant tea,” says Rose-Francis. “Research indicates that ginger contains nearly 40 antioxidant compounds, which can be beneficial for treating various inflammatory conditions and may positively impact blood sugar levels over time.”, “Since chronically elevated blood sugar can lead to inflammation, ginger’s anti-inflammatory compounds could be considered a beneficial functional food for achieving better blood sugar balance,” she adds. Beyond the anti-inflammatory properties of ginger, this flavorful root may also help inhibit the absorption of carbohydrates, regulate glucose metabolism and protect the insulin-producing cells of the pancreas. You may have noticed that ginger already plays a starring role in several recipes in this article. However, if you’re a purist, try our simple ginger tea. All you need is water and a few slices of fresh ginger. Related: What Happens to Your Body When You Drink Ginger Tea Regularly 4. Cinnamon Tea Cinnamon is more than a beloved baking spice. It can also be brewed into a delicious tea. “Cinnamon has been studied for its potential benefits of enhancing insulin function and supporting blood sugar,” says Vandana Sheth RDN, CDCES, FAND, a registered dietitian and certified diabetes educator specializing in plant-based nutrition. “It’s a naturally sweet flavored tea without added sugar, and a good option for those with diabetes.” Like ginger, cinnamon is rich in antioxidants that tackle the chronic inflammation that can make it harder to manage your blood sugar. In fact, several studies have shown that cinnamon powder may help lower blood glucose in people with and without diabetes. And one older study found that cinnamon tea may help reduce blood glucose in people without diabetes. You can easily brew a cup by steeping cinnamon sticks in water. Or, if you’re craving ******* comfort, combine it with ****** tea and other spices in a spicy cup of chai tea. 5. Turmeric Tea From better brain health to less heart disease, turmeric boasts a long list of health benefits. Research reveals that it may also reduce blood glucose and help with weight management. What makes it so powerful? Turmeric contains an active compound called curcumin, which is a potent anti-inflammatory and antioxidant. And, as you’ve already learned, inflammation and higher blood sugar often go hand-in-hand. No wonder researchers credit curcumin’s blood sugar-managing powers to its anti-inflammatory action. While you can always brew a simple bag of turmeric tea, there are all kinds of creative ways to use it, like this iced Anti-Inflammatory Golden Tonic. It does contain a touch of honey, but you can feel free to omit it for a sugar-free, blood-sugar-friendly drink. Related: What Happens to Your Body When You Take Turmeric Regularly Tips for Enjoying Tea Limit Added Sugars. Switching to unsweetened tea can be a useful strategy for ditching sugar-sweetened beverages, especially since the flavor options are endless. “Enjoy tea as is or with naturally sweet flavors like cinnamon, vanilla or ginger instead of added sugar,” says Sheth. “You can also consider using a low-no-calorie sweetener in place of sugar to sweeten your tea.” Watch the Caffeine. Some teas, like green and ****** tea, naturally contain caffeine. So, if you’re sensitive to caffeine, you might be better off with an herbal tea like ginger, cinnamon or turmeric tea. Even if caffeine isn’t a problem for you, stick with caffeine-free tea later in the day so you can get a good night’s sleep. Choose Herbal Teas Carefully. While the teas in this list are safe to consume with diabetes, there are some herbal teas you should avoid, especially aloe vera, chamomile and fenugreek tea. These and other herbal teas may interfere with diabetes medications. When in doubt, it’s a good idea to check with your healthcare provider. The Bottom Line Relaxing with a cup of tea isn’t just a healthy, flavorful way to hydrate. Research reveals that some types of tea can do good things for your blood sugar. And dietitians agree! According to dietitians, green, ******, ginger, cinnamon and turmeric tea are the best teas to drink for better blood sugar. For optimal blood sugar management, choose unsweetened teas or add a squeeze of citrus for natural **********. So, what are you waiting for? Get your teapot ready. It’s time to start sipping! Read the original article on EATINGWELL Source link #Teas #Drink #Blood #Sugar #Dietitians Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Jake Heggie’s Adaptation of ‘Moby *****’ Comes to the Metropolitan Opera Jake Heggie’s Adaptation of ‘Moby *****’ Comes to the Metropolitan Opera When “Moby-*****” opens at the Metropolitan Opera this week, audiences will experience a deeply American story of unchecked ambition, fomented grievances and a self-destructive desire for revenge. Based on Herman Melville’s 1851 novel, the opera delivers an economical and resolute retelling of the fateful tale of the Pequod, a ship in pursuit of a vengeful white whale. The libretto, by Gene Scheer, hits the book’s main conflicts without losing track of the action. The score, by Jake Heggie, is graceful and propulsive. The opera’s ending is certain and clear. It’s probably fair to say that more people know the story of the white whale from parodies or synopses than from reading “Moby-*****.” But an adaptation is not just a summary of the book’s major events. A society obsessed with efficiencies can be overly focused on directness. Skillful though it is, the opera, which had its premiere at the Dallas Opera in 2010, has a kind of scrubbed and airless storytelling that leaves the singularity of the novel behind. This is the sort of adaptation that audiences have long responded to — a simplification of the book’s billowy structure to emphasize its plot. But can a tidy adaptation truly represent this unruly book, with its dramas born of endless uncertainties? Or is the purpose of adaptation something different? A composer decides what aspects of the narrative can be told through music, while a librettist shapes the story through words that can be thrown out into the air by way of song. An aria reveals a character’s singularity and ambition. Characters sing them to announce what they want and what lengths they must pursue to get it. Each creative turn adds distance from the book. Certainly, there are advantages to adapting a work as well known as “Moby-*****.” There’s a beginning, middle and end that have met the approval of readers, and that can serve as the ballast for any number of creative reinterpretations. There’s less risk for a production, too. While Melville’s original publisher, Harper and Brothers, considered the book a commercial failure when it came out, few works compare in influence and longevity. There are also distinct disadvantages to adapting “Moby-*****.” Melville’s language can be difficult. The book has hundreds of pages of exposition. And much of the story’s foreshadowing comes through subtle cues, metaphors and allegories. The novel, at its heart, is a moral tale about how people deal with what they most fear, how they confront what they despise, and how they make sense of defeat. These are abstract agonies played out through a cast of characters who don’t really evolve. Instead, they press on becoming archetypes of unrealized ambitions. Though Ishmael (called Greenhorn in Scheer and Heggie’s opera) narrates the book, Captain Ahab (the tenor Brandon Jovanovich at the Met) is the star of the opera, an apt, dramatic choice: He is the novel’s most complex and developed character. In the novel, Ahab is most tender, though inconsistently, in his interactions with Pip, a 14-year-old cabin boy. In the opera, Pip’s story serves as the turning point that reveals Ahab’s heartlessness. Pip is an innocent, and his naïveté stands in contrast to the sailors’ confidence. His survival is in the hands of the crew, and his presence raises the stakes of the voyage. After a mishap, Pip (sung by the soprano Janai Brugger) suffers immensely; his resulting fear is a harbinger of troubles to come. Pip’s transformational moment occurs earlier in Scheer’s telling than in the book, a dramaturgical choice that speeds the narrative along, while keeping all the novel’s essential notes. Setting Melville’s thorough and moody prose to music seems a natural. Its lyrical quality invites music that reaches for harmonies: The text is full of open vowel sounds, made when the tongue doesn’t obstruct the flow of air. That can be useful to singers when they harmonize, especially in choral performances. Melville’s diction can also be oratorical, organized with the driving energy of a sermon. In “The Lee Shore,” a funerary chapter offered as testimony for a sailor who will be lost to the sea, the narrator weighs the disappointment of a life unfulfilled against the finality of death, “Better is it to perish in that howling infinite, than be ingloriously dashed upon the lee, even if that were safety!” There’s a natural lyricism in Melville’s sentences, even as the narration drifts between pessimism and optimism. Often, he attempts to name feelings that reside someplace deep and unseen. He does this by embracing rhythmic patterns used in poetry. Consider the narrator’s need to reckon with “a damp, drizzly November in my soul.” This frequently cited passage in the book’s opening paragraph carries a pattern of stress and intonation. But Melville’s sentences are often lengthy as they wind through multiple ideas. This makes them difficult to sing. Scheer’s libretto is forthright in its characterizations. Its lines, many lifted right from the book, are deceptively simple, written with great control. Some are as short as one or two words. Through the muscular interpretation of the chorus, these monosyllabic utterances — “Aye!,” “Ding!” — become brief, euphonious hollers. Not all adaptations of “Moby-*****” are faithful to the disposition of the novel. The British composer Robert Longden and the librettist Hereward Kaye created a bawdy musical about the staging of “Moby-*****” by the girls of St. Godley’s Academy for Young Ladies. (It opened on the West End in 1992, was widely panned, and closed after just a few months.) The performance artist Laurie Anderson created an avant-garde version of “Moby-*****” in 1999, called “Songs and Stories From Moby *****.” The book is really about “enormous heads,” she says in the show — specifically Melville’s, which was “full of theories and secrets and stories,” and the whale’s, which was monstrously large. Some more conventional adaptations could be interpreted as acts of devotion to Melville’s messiness. Dave Malloy’s 2019 version, performed at A.R.T. in Cambridge, Mass., reckoned with the eclectic style of each chapter. It also explores the ways gender and race create their own subplots in the narrative. Another recent adaptation, created by the English actor Sebastian Armesto and simple8, a production company that specializes in minimalist productions, told many of the story’s crucial moments through sea shanties. But perhaps it’s a bad idea to assume that a retelling of “Moby-*****” should do anything other than honor the adapting artists’ commitment to it. At best, their vision will just as discernible as Melville’s is. At worst, one could always pick up the book. One thing that distinguishes Heggie and Scheer’s adaptation is the frequency with which it has been performed (a distinction that is also rare for a contemporary opera). Before coming to the Met, it was performed by opera companies in Salt Lake City, Los Angeles, Dallas, San Francisco and more. You could argue that it has become canonical, despite being only 15 years old. Are there too many adaptations of “Moby-*****”? Probably not. Hard times breed bitter men like Captain Ahab, and there is always another one filled to his hat’s brim with grievances; always another who feels more than justified in his anger; always another who is ready to drown those around him in his misery. Wendy S. Walters is a professor of nonfiction in the writing program at the School of the Arts at Columbia University. Source link #Jake #Heggies #Adaptation #Moby #***** #Metropolitan #Opera Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content] For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

‘There’s Still Tomorrow’ Review: An Updated Italian Heroine ‘There’s Still Tomorrow’ Review: An Updated Italian Heroine “There’s Still Tomorrow” is set in Rome after World War II, but it unfolds with timeless verve and romanticism. It’s the directorial debut of the Italian singer and comedian Paola Cortellesi, who also stars. This feminist dramedy tells a story about domestic abuse — echoing still-timely concerns about violence against women and toxic masculinity in Italy — in captivating, unexpected ways. Shot in silky ******-and-white and paying homage to the stylized working-class films of Federico Fellini, “There’s Still Tomorrow” follows Delia (Cortellesi), a doting mother of three who is regularly beaten and surveilled by her husband Ivano (Valerio Mastandrea). The cash she gets from her various odd jobs goes straight into Ivano’s pocket, and should she drop a dish, leave the house without asking, or accept favors from the American soldiers stationed around town, there’s hell to pay. The film never shows the batterings directly. In one scene, it’s choreographed with the drama of a tango, and in most others, we take the perspectives of Delia’s children or the group of gossiping housewives perpetually stationed in the courtyard. Cortellesi, as both director and performer, doesn’t sink into miserabilism. The beautifully built-out sense of place, populated by memorable personalities (Ivano’s bedridden father; Delia’s best friend, who runs a vegetable stand; the mechanic with whom Delia is in love), demonstrates the richness of Delia’s life in an effortless balance of humor and tragedy. Bursts of slick contemporary pop music give an edge to her plight. Crucially, the plot revolves around the future of Delia’s teenage daughter Marcella (Romana Maggiora Vergano), who dreams of getting married to her wealthy boyfriend and leading a life unlike her mother’s. Delia, whom Cortellesi plays with weathered charm, strives to save Marcella — and ultimately herself. This struggle is carried out with larger-than-life dramatics and touches of fantasy that make the film, for all its grim, real-life parallels, something of an escapist pleasure. There’s Still Tomorrow Not rated. In Italian, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 58 minutes. In theaters. Source link #Tomorrow #Review #Updated #Italian #Heroine Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Built to entertain Built to entertain Every so often, a home comes along which feels like it is meant to be yours forever – and this is one of those rare finds. Source link #Built #entertain Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Review: A ‘Moby-*****’ Opera at the Met Cuts the Blubber Review: A ‘Moby-*****’ Opera at the Met Cuts the Blubber The opening line of Herman Melville’s “Moby-*****” is one of the most famous in literature. But Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer, whose moody, monochromatic 2010 adaptation arrived at the Metropolitan Opera on Monday, conspicuously avoid placing those classic three words at the start. It’s an early declaration of independence, the kind that artists have always had to make when turning a well-known novel — especially one as sprawling and shaggy as Melville’s — into singing. Heggie, who also composed the well-traveled opera “Dead Man Walking” (2000), and Scheer, an experienced librettist, have narrowed one of the canon’s most overflowing works to its core plot. For readers who enjoyed “Moby-*****” but yawned through the rambling digressions about whaling, do I have an opera for you. The compressed adaptation is direct and clear, at least. Some contemporary operas, of which the Met has offered a burst over the last few seasons, lean heavily on confusing devices: complicated flashbacks; characters shadowed by doubles; singers playing metaphorical qualities like Destiny and Loneliness; split-screen-style scenes crossing place and time. “Moby-*****” wants none of that. It stretches across a year or so, but in a linear way. It never leaves the ship Pequod and its salty surroundings. Its characters are flesh-and-blood people. Yet the opera only rarely takes on flesh-and-blood urgency. While the story is streamlined and straightforward — a ship’s crew struggles with the demanding whims of a vindictive captain — Heggie and Scheer also want to capture Melville’s brooding grandeur, philosophical profundity and portentous language. So the prevailing mood is a dark, ponderous blue — a lot of stern, turgidly paced musings directed straight at the audience. The goal seems to have been to create a piece that’s lucid and vibrant, but also dreamlike and meditative. A piece, in other words, much along the lines of “Billy Budd,” Benjamin Britten’s opera based on another seafaring Melville tragedy in which a ship becomes a petri dish for archetypal struggles. This is where the ambitions of Heggie’s “Moby-*****” adaptation run up against his limitations as a composer. “Billy Budd” fascinates because of the haunting complexities of Britten’s music, but the meditations in this “Moby-*****” end up feeling dully one-note, as shallow as a tide pool. Even the circumscribed world of the opera includes a storm, a mast lit up by St. Elmo’s fire, intimations of the South Seas, night and day, stillness and dance, vast expanses of sky — yet the music fails to meet the demand for these textures and colors. Heggie doesn’t have many ideas beyond squarely undulating minor-key references to Philip Glass, John Adams and Britten himself. Every composer’s work has influences, but these quotations are startlingly unadorned, even if played with spirit by the Met’s orchestra under the conductor Karen Kamensek. Lovers of traditional operatic forms will find much to admire here, as Heggie and Scheer have embraced the kind of ensembles — duets, trios, quartets — that allow this art form to present multiple perspectives at once. But the variety in the text is not matched by variety in the score, and the conflicts that should energize the story don’t always feel vital. The real tension is — or should be — between Captain Ahab, whose obsessive pursuit of the whale Moby ***** has drowned his humanity, and Starbuck, the sensible first mate who tries to steer the whole operation clear of disaster. But the opera gets distracted by a side plot about finding brotherhood amid racial and religious difference: Greenhorn — the name the opera gives the novel’s narrator — first fears and then befriends Queequeg, the Polynesian harpooner. It’s not until nearly an hour and a half into the three-hour opera that it really holds your attention for the first time. In a ruminative aria, Starbuck mulls whether to ******* the sleeping Ahab to save himself and his shipmates. In the end, he can’t bring himself to do it, and he slinks out as Ahab softly moans and the curtain falls. The sequence is riveting — but we’ve waited until the end of the first act for it. For the other highlight, we have to wait again, until late in the opera, when Ahab finally lets down his guard with Starbuck and confronts the cost of his single-minded mania. It is the calm before the final, doomed hunt, and Heggie endows it with real tenderness. Ahab, though, primarily expresses himself through drearily similar monologues, grounded in Melvillean diction and given a similarly antiquated musical feel through robustly shaking Handel-style coloratura. The tenor Brandon Jovanovich, stalking the stage with a belted-on peg leg, conveys a sense of Ahab’s weariness more than of his intensity. The cast is entirely male, with the exception of the soprano who plays the young cabin boy Pip; Janai Brugger captures the boy’s otherworldly purity. The baritone Thomas Glass was a solid Starbuck and acted with remarkable confidence, given that he was announced as a replacement for an ill Peter Mattei just a few hours before the opening on Monday — a performance that began with the orchestra playing the Ukrainian national anthem, the Met’s latest gesture of solidarity with that country. While the tenor Stephen Costello was a plangent Greenhorn, the bass-baritone Ryan Speedo Green sounded underpowered as Queequeg, with little to do except intone native prayers. The sweet-toned tenor William Burden was piquant among the smaller roles. Leonard Foglia’s handsome production, with sets by Robert Brill, costumes by Jane Greenwood and lighting by Gavan Swift, is dominated by masts and rigging. The deck cleverly curves up into a backdrop that cast members can climb up and tumble down, seeming — with the help of Elaine J. McCarthy’s projections — to be lost at sea as their boats are broken in the whale hunts. It is a clear staging of a clear piece. But that piece lacks the ingenuity and depth to hold its own with its source material, let alone break free. And it turns out that Heggie and Scheer’s opening salvo of independence was just a coy deferral until the opera’s closing moment. As Greenhorn, the Pequod’s only survivor, is rescued by a passing ship, the captain asks his name. Costello answers, singing low and mournful: “Call me Ishmael.” Moby-***** Continues through March 29 at the Metropolitan Opera, Manhattan; metopera.org. Source link #Review #MobyDick #Opera #Met #Cuts #Blubber Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content] For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

Geraldton leads regional price growth in December 2024 quarter Geraldton leads regional price growth in December 2024 quarter REIWA data shows Geraldton was the top-performing regional centre for the December 2024 quarter. Its median house ***** price rose 5.8 per cent to $455,000. Source link #Geraldton #leads #regional #price #growth #December #quarter Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Transcript: ********* ambassador Kirsten Hillman on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” March 9, 2025 Transcript: ********* ambassador Kirsten Hillman on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” March 9, 2025 The following is the transcript of an interview with Kirsten Hillman, U.S. ambassador to Canada, that aired on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” on March 9, 2025. MARGARET BRENNAN: That was our Ed O’Keefe in Ottawa. We’re joined now by Canada’s Ambassador to the United States, Kirsten Hillman. Ambassador, it’s good to have you here. ********* AMBASSADOR TO THE U.S. KIRSTEN HILLMAN: Thanks for having me, Margaret. MARGARET BRENNAN: You just heard the Homeland Security Secretary say there are conversations with your government. She seemed optimistic that there would be follow through on fentanyl. Does that make you think the threat of tariffs on April 2 is something that can be managed and avoided? HILLMAN: Well, I hope so. I mean, I think that we are in a very good place in our discussions with the U.S. administration on fentanyl. We have invested a lot of new resources, we have given our law enforcement new powers and we have responded to the requests of the Trump Administration with respect to cooperative effects in getting at the sources, so the organized crime, the precursors coming from China. We’ve had some really, really good discussions, so we’re optimistic. And, you know, I just would say, and I think it’s important for your viewers to know fentanyl is a very serious problem in Canada too. On some days we have more deaths per capita than you have here in the United States. So we take this very seriously. It is not a big issue between our two countries. Less than 1 percent of the fentanyl that is seized in the United States is coming from Canada, but every ounce can kill families and people. So we’re taking it very seriously, MARGARET BRENNAN: But, you are indulging the premise that that is the actual motivation for the tariffs, rather than leverage for a free trade deal, or just because President Trump believes in them? HILLMAN: Well, I think that this set of tariffs, the 25 and 10 percent set of tariffs, are- we have been told repeatedly that it is about fentanyl and security at the border. There are other tariffs that have been discussed and the President has raised other issues as motivations for other tariffs, reciprocity and fairness, and you know, maybe some changes that he’d like to see to our USMCA, our trade agreement. So those conversations are going to have to happen as well. MARGARET BRENNAN: So, President Trump said Friday he may put tariffs on ********* lumber and dairy Monday or Tuesday. Here’s what he said. Take a listen: SOT DONALD TRUMP: Canada has been ripping us off for years on tariffs for lumber and for dairy products. 250 percent, nobody ever talks about that. 250 percent tariff, which is taking advantage of our farmers. So that’s not going to happen anymore. We’re going to be- they’ll be met with the exact same tariff unless they drop it. And that’s what reciprocal means. MARGARET BRENNAN: On another network, the Commerce Secretary said, no, that’s actually on hold till April 2. It’s confusing for us to follow this along. Is the clarity with the two governments any better? HILLMAN: You know we are in active discussions with Secretary Lutnick, and those discussions are heading towards April 2, and that, I think, is we are putting our energy in the substantive discussions that we are having with the secretary, with USTR, with the White House. And you know, that is, I guess, how I can answer that question. The President- the President does have a variety of concerns, and I think also sees tariffs as a tool for a variety of policy objectives, but really, all we can do is focus on the real work at hand, which is to get at these issues. Like, for example, lumber, Canada doesn’t have a tariff on lumber. It’s zero. U.S. lumber can come into Canada duty-free. On dairy, the U.S. sells three times as much dairy into Canada as we sell into the United States. So what’s more, I think productive for us is to talk about the facts around the actual trading relationship and try and get at where the concerns are. MARGARET BRENNAN: But, Canada does put a tariff as high as 241 percent on dairy imports, but it’s a sliding scale that only kicks in at a certain level, and that’s under the free trade deal. HILLMAN: That’s right, and it’s like the United States. In agriculture, the United States is the same in sugar and dairy. You allow a certain amount of product in, and then after that level is hit, you put restraints in on imports. And we do the same to protect our farmers and families and you know, small family farms that- that need to be sure that they can have a bit of the market. MARGARET BRENNAN: So there was this 50-minute phone call Wednesday with the Vice President, the Commerce Secretary and President Trump, with your Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau. Afterwards, the president posted that Trudeau was unable to tell him when the election was taking place, which made him curious. Like, quote, “what’s going on here? I then realized he’s trying to use this issue to stay in power.” Do you think this is like a personal issue here? Do you think it’ll change when your leadership changes? HILLMAN: It’s hard for me to- hard for me to say. I think that the prime minister and the president- Prime Minister Trudeau and the president, they’ve done big things together, right? They did renegotiate NAFTA together– MARGARET BRENNAN: They have a history together. HILLMAN: Right. They have a long history. They did good things together. They managed our 6,000- practically 6,000 mile border during COVID very successfully, in my opinion. So it’s a long relationship, and has many- has had many phases to it. We will have a new prime minister this week. Today, the Liberal Party will elect a new leader. That new leader will be sworn in in the coming days, and that person will become Canada’s Prime Minister. Those are facts that are not going to change. MARGARET BRENNAN: Do you think it will stop the vows from the president to talk about threatening to annex Canada? HILLMAN: You know, I guess– MARGARET BRENNAN: What is that? HILLMAN: I- I’m not sure what that is. What I can say is that Canadians don’t really appreciate it. They’re getting a little bit frustrated with that kind of rhetoric. But more importantly, Canadians are frustrated with our neighbors. You know, the country that we feel closest to, the country that is partners, allies, often family that we’ve gone to war with, that we’ve died with, that we come to each other’s aid, most recently in LA, but obviously 9/11. You’ve come to our aid over the years so many times, and we feel- Canadians feel under attack, under economic attack, and that is causing some challenges, for sure, across ********* society. I think our new prime minister, when that person comes in, will prioritize trying to have a good and- and healthy and productive relationship with the present. I am sure that that’s going to be possible. Relationships go both ways, but I know that on our side, that’s going to be a priority. MARGARET BRENNAN: Ambassador, thank you for joining us, and we’ll be right back with a lot more Face the Nation. Stay with us. Face The Nation Transcripts More More Source link #Transcript #********* #ambassador #Kirsten #Hillman #Face #Nation #Margaret #Brennan #March Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content] For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

‘Picture This’ Review: Five Dates Away From Love ‘Picture This’ Review: Five Dates Away From Love Did the casting call for “Picture This” state that those without dimples needn’t apply? Most of the actors in this British rom-com — directed by Prarthana Mohan — have them. Especially the men orbiting Pia (Simone Ashley of “Bridgerton”), a talented photographer in London who is the hard-pressed business owner at the film’s center. There’s Jay (Luke Fetherston), her “gay bestie,” he says by way of an introduction, the co-owner of the 9th Mandala portrait studio; cardigan-wearing Akshay (Nikesh Patel) who works for Pia’s mother (Sindhu Vee) and Pia’s ex, Charlie (Hero Fiennes Tiffin). The former couple meet again when Charlie is included in the wedding party of Pia’s sister, Sonal (Anoushka Chadha). Written by the novelist Nikita Lalwani and based on the *********** movie “Five Blind Dates,” this twisty film finds Pia navigating her wish for independence and her business’ need for a cash infusion. Her mother promises a safety box of jewels for when she gets married, but Pia wasn’t planning on that possibility. The transactional and the traditional are wed when a jolly medium prophesies Pia will meet the love of her life in her next five dates. The title asks us to consider the film’s visuals. The palette here is vivid. Screens split — sometimes vertically, other times horizontally — all in the spirit of playfulness, while the music is a mix of international pop grooves. For all the potentially crushing challenges Pia faces — losing her business, not living out her dream of being a photographer, alienating her beloved younger sister — “Picture This,” keeps it light, never letting the sharp edges of potential failure come into focus. Picture This Not rated. Running time: 1 hour 39 minutes. Watch on Prime Video. Source link #Picture #Review #Dates #Love Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Trump isn’t alone in his geopolitical aspirations. Some in Illinois and Oregon want change too Trump isn’t alone in his geopolitical aspirations. Some in Illinois and Oregon want change too As President Donald Trump floats grand ideas like reacquiring the Panama Canal and taking over Greenland, some rural residents of Illinois and Oregon are promoting geopolitical change of their own: They want to break away from their states, and perhaps unite with Indiana and Idaho. Proponents say they have more in common with their rural brethren across state lines than they do with urbanites in Chicago and Portland, Oregon. And they contend the Democratic-led cities have so much clout in state government that rural, Republican voices get drowned out. In the last five years, voters in 33 Illinois counties have been asked if they want to consider separating from Chicago’s Cook County to form a new state. Each time, a majority said yes. Trusted news and daily delights, right in your inbox See for yourself — The Yodel is the go-to source for daily news, entertainment and feel-good stories. Some politicians in neighboring Indiana seem up for the idea. The state’s House of Representatives recently advanced legislation that would welcome Illinois counties into Indiana’s fold. Such a deal would mark the first major realignment of states since West Virginia separated from Virginia to stick with the Union during the Civil War. Despite a bit of local momentum, there are major obstacles to rejiggering state lines within the U.S. For starters, the states relinquishing counties would have to agree to it, which is a long shot. Congress would have to approve, too. State boundaries have changed at least 50 times throughout U.S. history, according the National Center for Interstate Compacts at The Council of State Governments. Many changes have been relatively minor, accounting for shifting rivers or reestablishing markers from long-ago surveys. But organizers in Illinois and Oregon hope to capitalize on the current political environment. “With this polarization,” said G.H. Merritt, chair of the pro-breakaway group New Illinois. “I don’t know, man, it might just reach a tipping point.” Why do some in Illinois want to separate? At least three organizations are pushing for some reconfiguration of Illinois counties to separate from Chicago and its closest suburbs. Cook County contains about 40% of the state’s population, including the majority of ******, Asian and Hispanic residents, and is known for its cultural treasures, deep pension debt and a history of crime. Democrats dominate Chicago-area legislative districts, while Republicans represent most other parts of the state. To Merritt, the problem is that ever since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1964 that all legislative seats should be allocated based on population rather than counties, Chicago has had all the political clout. “What we experience in Illinois is very similar to what the founders in Colonial times were complaining about,” she said. “We have taxation without representation.” The ballot measures voters favored would allow officials in each county to work with those from other counties to form a new state. But the proposals stop short of declaring independence. Indiana lawmakers responded to those votes by advancing a bill that could start state-level talks. “Instead of seceding, we think we have something to offer over here,” Indiana House Speaker Todd Huston, a Republican who sponsored the measure, said in an interview. He noted that his state has lower taxes and higher economic growth than Illinois. But don’t count on Illinois being receptive: Earlier this year, Gov. J.B. Pritzker, a Democrat, called the Indiana legislation “a stunt” that would never amount to anything. What’s going on in Oregon? For several years, residents in rural, Republican-leaning eastern Oregon have been laying the groundwork to separate from the Democratic-dominated counties on the western side of the Cascade Mountains. Their goal is to join reliably red Idaho. The Greater Idaho movement has won nonbinding elections in 13 counties. Supporters have been holding town halls, selling hats and T-shirts and erecting billboards with messages such as “Release Eastern Oregon.” Idaho’s House passed a measure two years ago inviting Oregon to enter into discussions. But similar measures remain buried in committees in the Oregon Legislature, with scant prospects. “At this point, the state of Oregon is holding us captive,” said Matt McCaw, executive director of Greater Idaho. State boundaries do shift, but not often, or by much It has been over 150 years since entire counties have shifted states. After Virginia seceded from the U.S. in 1861, union loyalists formed the new state of West Virginia. The fate of two counties remained in dispute until the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1871 that they belonged to West Virginia. Since then, there have been numerous failed attempts at realignment. Writer Norman Mailer ran for mayor of New York in 1969, calling for the city to become the 51st state; five southern New Jersey counties voted to secede in 1980; and California has withstood several proposals to split the state. Earlier this year, an Iowa lawmaker proposed buying nine southern Minnesota counties. Geographer Garrett Dash Nelson once proposed redrawing all state lines to organize them around metro areas. But he acknowledges the challenges. “I don’t see much evidence that there’s a lot of real political will or interest in redrawing state lines,” said Nelson, president and head curator of the Leventhal Map & Education Center at the Boston Public Library. “It would be such an enormous lift.” ___ Associated Press writer Claire Rush contributed to this report. Source link #Trump #isnt #geopolitical #aspirations #Illinois #Oregon #change Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content] For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

Layoffs at Department of Veterans’ Affairs will begin early as June Layoffs at Department of Veterans’ Affairs will begin early as June A person walks past the Department of Veterans Affairs headquarters a block from the White House on March 06, 2025 in Washington, DC. Chip Somodevilla | Getty Images News | Getty Images The Department of Veterans Affairs will begin mass layoffs at the politically sensitive agency as early as June, according to a memo reviewed by Reuters. The memo, which is dated March 6, directs the department’s human resources team to begin reviewing the agency’s operations with an eye toward firing civil servants. It said it expects the review to be done by June, after which “VA will initiate Department-wide RIF actions,” using an acronym for “reduction in force.” In a response to a request for comment, the VA sent Reuters a link to VA Secretary Doug Collins’ recent opinion piece in The Hill in which he defended the cuts as “thorough and thoughtful.” Veterans groups, Democrats, and some Republicans have already voiced concern over the planned reductions at the department, which is seeking to cut more than 80,000 workers from the agency. The scale of the layoffs at the VA is greater than proposed cuts at other agencies and will hit a department that looks after a group that typically garners wide bipartisan support in the U.S., its military veterans. Patty Murray of Washington, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee, said last week that the job cuts marked an escalation of a “full-scale, no-holds-barred assault on veterans” by President Donald Trump that would put veterans’ health benefits in “grave danger.” Republican U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who said he learned of the cuts from the media, called it “political malpractice” not to consult Congress about the measures. The cuts are part of Trump and billionaire adviser Elon Musk’s efforts to dramatically slash the size of the federal government. Source link #Layoffs #Department #Veterans #Affairs #early #June Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Texas May Rename the New York Strip Texas May Rename the New York Strip Nobody knows exactly how long ago a marbled and tender boneless short-loin steak came to be known across the United States as a New York strip. Everybody agrees, though, that the nomenclature wasn’t the least bit controversial until last Friday, when Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick of Texas proposed a new name: the Texas strip. Noting that Texas leads the nation in heads of cattle, Mr. Patrick announced in a post on X that he was working with the State Senate on a resolution that would officially rebrand the cut. Mr. Patrick was clear in his post that he hoped the Texas-centric name would give a boost to his state’s cattle ranchers. At the same time, the way he framed the issue carried more than a whiff of red-meat politics. “Liberal New York shouldn’t get the credit for our hard-working ranchers,” he wrote. Meatpackers and steakhouses in New York seem disinclined to follow Texas’s lead. “Oh my God, its so ridiculous,” said Harry Sinanaj, president of Ben & Jack’s Steakhouse on East 44th Street. “Even if they change it, I’m going to leave it as the New York strip.” The term’s exact origins are obscure, but it is often tied to Delmonico’s, which was founded in 1827 and claims to be “the first fine dining restaurant in America.” The cut known as a Delmonico steak may have once referred to a strip steak, although on the current menu it’s used to mean a rib-eye. In any case, the cut caught on around the city. “I don’t think there’s room for politics in this,” said Dennis Turcinovic, the owner and managing partner of Delmonico’s Hospitality Group. “It’s American culinary history.” Mr. Patrick is not the first politician to attempt a rebranding of a popular food item. Before the invasion of Iraq in 2003, cafeterias in the House of Representatives began selling “freedom fries” to protest France’s opposition to an attack. Anti-******* sentiment during World War I led to “liberty cabbage” for sauerkraut. Neither name outlasted its political moment. The term New York strip is so well established that it is enshrined in “The Meat Buyer’s Guide,” a longstanding industry ****** put out by the Meat Institute, a trade group based on Washington. The book lists “Lomo, Strip Loin (New York), Deshuesado” as synonyms for the boneless strip loin. “When restaurants call you on the phone and say, ‘Give me one New York strip,’ I know they mean the boneless strip loin,” said Mark Solasz, vice president of Master Purveyors, a wholesaler in the Bronx. “Maybe the Texans will change it to the Texas strip, but I don’t think New York is going to change,” Mr. Solasz said. “I don’t think this one is going to cross the border.” Marc and Greg Sherry, who own the longest-running steakhouse in the city, the Old Homestead on Ninth Avenue, are so proud of the cut that they call it “Sherry Brothers 16 oz. New York prime sirloin” on their menu. “I guess the lieutenant governor is looking for some P.R., but a New York steak is a New York steak,” Greg Sherry said. Mr. Sinanaj, who was raised in Montenegro when Yugoslavia was still under ********** rule, recalled his mother’s telling him about a man in their village who went to jail for criticizing the government after he complained that a loaf of bread he’d bought was stale. Putting a partisan spin on a steak’s name rubs him the wrong way, he said. “In my personal opinion it’s ridiculous to call it liberal or conservative,” he said. “The people’s stomach has nothing to do with politics.” Follow New York Times Cooking on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok and Pinterest. Get regular updates from New York Times Cooking, with recipe suggestions, cooking tips and shopping advice. Source link #Texas #Rename #York #Strip Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Rental crisis could worsen under foreign investment clampdown Rental crisis could worsen under foreign investment clampdown With both major parties set to slam the door on international purchases of established homes following the Federal Election, it’s time to ask what we might be giving up, along with what we hope to gain. Source link #Rental #crisis #worsen #foreign #investment #clampdown Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Open: This is “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” March 9, 2025 Open: This is “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” March 9, 2025 Open: This is “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” March 9, 2025 – CBS News Watch CBS News This week on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” after a whiplash week of on-again, off-again tariff announcements, ********* ambassador to the U.S. Kirsten Hillman joins to discuss the costs and consequences of a trade war. Plus, former White House Russia expert Fiona Hill discusses President Trump’s diplomatic pivot on Ukraine. Be the first to know Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting. Not Now Turn On Source link #Open #Face #Nation #Margaret #Brennan #March Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Clues and answer for Sunday, March 9 Clues and answer for Sunday, March 9 Hey, there! Happy Sunday. We hope you remembered to change your clocks if daylight savings started for you today. One downside of the change is that there’s one hour less to solve today’s Wordle. In case you’re in a rush, here’s our daily Wordle guide with some hints and the answer for Sunday’s puzzle (#1,359). It may be that you’re a Wordle newcomer and you’re not completely sure how to play the game. We’re here to help with that too. What is Wordle? Wordle is a deceptively simple daily word game that first emerged in 2021. The gist is that there is one five-letter word to deduce every day by process of elimination. The daily word is the same for everyone. Trusted news and daily delights, right in your inbox See for yourself — The Yodel is the go-to source for daily news, entertainment and feel-good stories. Wordle blew up in popularity in late 2021 after creator Josh Wardle made it easy for players to share an emoji-based grid with their friends and followers that detailed how they fared each day. The game’s success spurred dozens of clones across a swathe of categories and formats. The New York Times purchased Wordle in early 2022 for an undisclosed sum. The publication said that players collectively played Wordle 5.3 billion times in 2024. So, it’s little surprise that Wordle is one of the best online games and puzzles you can play daily. How to play Wordle To start playing Wordle, you simply need to enter one five-letter word. The game will tell you how close you are to that day’s secret word by highlighting letters that are in the correct position in green. Letters that appear in the word but aren’t in the right spot will be highlighted in yellow. If you guess any letters that are not in the secret word, the game will gray those out on the virtual keyboard. You’ll only have six guesses to find each day’s word, though you still can use grayed-out letters to help narrow things down. It’s also worth remembering that letters can appear in the secret word more than once. Wordle is free to play on the NYT’s website and apps, as well as on Meta Quest headsets. The game refreshes at midnight local time. If you log into a New York Times account, you can track your stats, including the all-important win streak. How to play Wordle more than once a day If you have a NYT subscription that includes full access to the publication’s games, you don’t have to stop after a single round of Wordle. You’ll have access to an archive of more than 1,300 previous Wordle games. So if you’re a relative newcomer, you’ll be able to go back and catch up on previous editions. In addition, paid NYT Games members have access to a tool called the Wordle Bot. This can tell you how well you performed at each day’s game. Previous Wordle answers Before today’s Wordle hints, here are the answers to recent puzzles that you may have missed: Yesterday’s Wordle answer for Saturday, March 8 — NAVEL Friday, March 7 — TROOP Thursday, March 6 — ALERT Wednesday, March 5 — SCRUM Tuesday, March 4 — CHECK Today’s Wordle hints explained Every day, we’ll try to make Wordle a little easier for you. First, we’ll offer a hint that describes the meaning of the word or how it might be used in a phrase or sentence. We’ll also tell you if there are any double (or even triple) letters in the word. In case you still haven’t quite figured it out by that point, we’ll then provide the first letter of the word. Those who are still stumped after that can continue on to find out the answer for today’s Wordle. This should go without saying, but make sure to scroll slowly. Spoilers are ahead. Today’s Wordle help Here is a hint for today’s Wordle answer: This is good, or so Michael Douglas’ character Gordon Gekko famously claimed in the movie Wall Street. Are there any double letters in today’s Wordle? There is a pair of repeated letters in today’s Wordle answer. What’s the first letter of today’s Wordle? The first letter of today’s Wordle answer is G. The Wordle answer today This is your final warning before we reveal today’s Wordle answer. No take-backs. Don’t blame us if you happen to scroll too far and accidentally spoil the game for yourself. What is today’s Wordle? Today’s Wordle answer is… Today’s Wordle answer for Sunday, March 9 – GREED GREED Not to worry if you didn’t figure out today’s Wordle word. If you made it this far down the page, hopefully you at least kept your streak going. And, hey: there’s always another game tomorrow. Source link #Clues #answer #Sunday #March Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Apple’s rumored smart home hub has reportedly been delayed Apple’s rumored smart home hub has reportedly been delayed It may be a while still before we see the smart home hub Apple is rumored to be working on. According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, the company has postponed the announcement of the upcoming product due to the issues it’s run into developing its “smarter” Siri. Gurman reported last month that the release of Apple’s upgraded Siri may be delayed, and Apple confirmed as much in a statement to Daring Fireball last week, saying it expects to roll out Siri’s more personalized features “in the coming year.” The smart home hub, according to Gurman, “to an extent, relies on the delayed Siri capabilities.” Gurman previously reported that the first version of the smart home display could be revealed as soon as March. It would be a competitor to Amazon’s Echo line of devices and Google’s Nest Hub. While a March release is looking unlikely, Gurman reports that Apple is now allowing some employees to test it at home. Source link #Apples #rumored #smart #home #hub #reportedly #delayed Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

TEFAF Turns From the Classic to the Contemporary TEFAF Turns From the Classic to the Contemporary The European Fine Art Fair in Maastricht describes itself as a fair that spans 7,000 years of art history. For a long time, those 7,000 years mainly encompassed pre-20th-century objects: Egyptian figurines, Roman busts, African masks and Rococo clocks. In the last decade, responding to a major shift in collecting patterns, TEFAF has embraced contemporary art in a big way. This year, a quarter of its more than 270 exhibitors are galleries of 20th- and 21st-century art. They include the first-time exhibitor Marianne Boesky, a New York-based contemporary-art gallerist whose roster of artists includes Frank Stella, who died last year at 87; the artist and filmmaker John Waters; the Egyptian-born artist Ghada Amer; and the American painter Suzanne McClelland. Why TEFAF? “It’s a fair that I’ve always been really intrigued by and heard amazing things about and never attended, so it’s been on my bucket list to get there,” Boesky, the gallery’s founder, said in an interview. “It’s not as big a lift as Art Basel, for example, in terms of expense, and it’s an audience that we wouldn’t otherwise be able to present this work to.” Boesky said TEFAF’s much broader collector base and its deeply European identity made it “scary for us,” but added, “I’m in my 29th year of the gallery, and every day has required bold moves to survive in this business.” Her gallery’s maiden TEFAF booth will feature eight new paintings by the American artist Danielle McKinney. They will be paired with watercolors and etchings by another American painter of atmosphere: Edward Hopper. Boesky said she chose 43-year-old McKinney — a ****** artist who started painting five years ago after beginning her artistic career as a photographer — because of her “reverence” for painting and for European painting. Showing her alongside Hopper is not to compare the two, but to demonstrate that “these two artists are able to create a mood through color and light,” she said, adding that there were already more interested buyers than there were McKinney paintings headed for TEFAF (their price range: from $60,000 to $150,000). Boesky grew up surrounded by art. Her father, Ivan Boesky — a Wall Street financier who served time in prison for insider trading in the late 1980s — was deeply interested in culture, she recalled: He collected the sculptors Alberto Giacometti (at one point acquiring an edition of the famous “Le Nez”) and Auguste Rodin, as well as the 19th-century painter Édouard Vuillard. “He responded to very gutturally tough work, so he would come home with a really challenging Giacometti sculpture,” she recalled. “My mother would want to put it in the closet. And that was the only thing that I’d want to look at.” She became a primary dealer in 1996, with a mission to represent and nurture emerging artists. Today, her clients are wealthy art lovers who will spend the equivalent of “what they might buy a watch for, or a fancy coat” on a work by an emerging artist, she explained. While some of her artists have stayed with her, Boesky noted, others — such as Takashi Murakami, Yoshitomo Nara, and Lisa Yuskavage — have moved on to ******* galleries. A few of her current artists — including McKinney — were being courted by ******* galleries. One modern and contemporary gallerist who is a TEFAF regular is the French dealer Kamel Mennour. He first exhibited at TEFAF Maastricht in 2019. “It’s the only fair in the world with such an exhaustive offering,” he said, adding that he enjoyed having his stand “positioned across from an exhibitor of antique statuary, or of Japanese porcelain.” TEFAF collectors spend not just one afternoon, but three or four days at the fair, and have “a much wider spectrum,” he said. “They stroll around and dig into very, very different things.” He noted that Mennour’s sales at TEFAF had “crescendoed” over the years and that the 2023 booth — a face-off between artists Daniel Buren and Anish Kapoor — did very well. This year at TEFAF, Mennour is showing a small bronze Giacometti figurine, a gouache on paper by the American painter Joan Mitchell, and a sculpture by the Kosovar contemporary artist Petrit Halilaj. The question is whether TEFAF’s identity — as the only major international fair dedicated to antiquities, old masters and ******* furniture — is being eroded by its embrace of the contemporary. Mennour said the transition to newer art was “necessary for the health and survival of the fair, because otherwise, it would have become much too niche.” Alexander Dorey Flint, a director at the White Cube gallery, concurred. “I don’t think that one damages the other,” said Dorey Flint, who is overseeing White Cube’s booth at TEFAF Maastricht for the second year in a row. He said he did not believe that TEFAF’s scholarly profile and the “breadth of knowledge and expertise” of its exhibitors were “affected by the participation of further contemporary galleries.” White Cube’s booth at TEFAF Maastricht this year will feature paintings by Georg Baselitz and Tracey Emin (priced at about $1 million each), and a work by the Vietnamese-born artist Danh Vo, which incorporates two fragments of ancient Roman marble statuary (priced at about $400,000). TEFAF’s particular appeal is that “we meet a lot of new people,” said Dorey Flint: collectors from Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and other parts of Europe, but also “a large number of American collectors who travel in,” he said. Maastricht is “not geographically convenient for them to attend. The quality of what is there draws Americans to it.” This is not a particularly prosperous time for the art market, which is in a two-year downturn. Sales at the world’s three biggest auction houses in New York in November were down 40 percent from 2023 and 60 percent from the market peak in 2022. A number of prominent names have shut down, including the Marlborough Gallery, a postwar art dealer; Cheim & Read; and Simon Lee. Soaring inflation and operating expenses are very much to blame. Boesky said the cost of crating and shipping artworks had risen 30 percent every year since the start of the pandemic, making participation in art fairs — which typically cost her gallery $150,000 to $200,000 each — exorbitant. Still, statistics show that of the $65 billion in annual sales generated by the global art market each year, art dealers and galleries account for a 55 percent share. And they happen to do an increasing proportion of their business at art fairs. Mennour described fairs as “a necessary evil,” because although his gallery was one of Paris’s most visited, there was less visitor traffic at the four physical spaces he runs in the French capital, which host a regular rotation of carefully curated exhibitions. Boesky had a similar assessment. She explained that in the post-Covid era, travel had certainly resumed, but clients were remote-working and not living in cities full time — so there were fewer New Yorkers going on Saturday afternoon gallery crawls, for example. At her peak, Boesky recalled, she was doing 12 fairs a year, meaning an average of one a month. Now, she’s doing half as many — including the three Art Basel fairs, and no longer including any of the Frieze fairs. TEFAF is her newest addition to the mix. “We need to bring the art to people more than ever,” she said. Source link #TEFAF #Turns #Classic #Contemporary Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content] For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

Migrant who called for slaughter of all Jews arrives in *** on small boat Migrant who called for slaughter of all Jews arrives in *** on small boat Abu Wadei is a ************ who reportedly supports ****** A ************ migrant who previously called for all Jews to be killed has said he has arrived in Britain on a small boat. The young man, who goes by the name of Abu Wadei – with various spellings – shared footage from what appeared to be an inflatable dinghy on social media platform TikTok on Friday. Wearing a keffiyeh, a head covering, he showed dozens of lifejacket-clad asylum seekers with him on the small boat. The video caption, written in Arabic, translates as: “Thank God, we arrived in Britain after a difficult journey.” On the same day he posted on a Facebook account: “By the grace of ****** Almighty I reached Britain after a long and difficult journey at sea.” Yet an investigation by Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) revealed the man had attended an event addressed by Yahya Sinwar, the former ****** leader and mastermind of the October 7 massacre. He is also said to have told crowds he would die “for the sake of ******” and appears to have posed with guns on his Facebook page. Abu Wadei shared footage from what appeared to be an inflatable dinghy – X The revelation has led to calls for the migrant’s immediate arrest and deportation to Palestine. Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, described reports of the man’s ******** entry into Britain as “deeply disturbing” and told The Telegraph he should be immediately deported. It comes as Coastguard and Home Office workers are likely to be preparing for a seasonal increase in migrants attempting to cross the Channel over the summer months. A total of 29 small boats carrying 1,664 migrants have already been recorded as attempting ******** crossings in the first seven days of March, according to Government figures. Abu Wadei, who boasted of more than 172,000 followers on TikTok before his account was taken down on Saturday, describes himself as being a “digital creator” on his Facebook page and being from Gaza City. Several of those commenting on the TikTok clip that appears to show his crossing, which has received more than 350 likes, expressed relief for his safety. An image posted by Abu Wadei on social media – Facebook Yet an investigation by the CAA found the migrant appeared to show support for the Gaza-ruling group ******, which has been proscribed as a terror organisation by the *** Government. In one video – which appeared to date back to around 2018 – the man was seen telling crowds at a rally that his “loftiest aspiration” was to “die for the sake of ******”, according to a translation by the CAA. Posting on Facebook on September 18 last year, the man filmed himself praying. A translation by the CAA of the prayer read: “Oh ******, punish the Jews and those who are in league with them. “Oh ******, kill them all ,and do not leave a single one of them. “Oh ******, destroy them completely, scatter them completely, and make the earth fall from under their feet.” He added: “Oh ****** give us strength against the criminal Jews. Give us strength against them, Oh Lord of the worlds.” Wadei has authored social media posts supporting ****** – Facebook Speaking to The Telegraph, Mr Philp said: “If these reports are true, they are deeply concerning. The Home Office must investigate. “Our country is our home, not a hotel. Those entering the *** illegally should not be able to stay here, least of all those suspected of espousing violent anti-Semitism. “Under Keir Starmer we have become the soft touch of Europe on immigration. He must get a grip and back Conservative proposals to toughen up the borders Bill next week. This man should be immediately returned to Palestine.” A spokesperson for CAA said: “We consider that this man poses a threat to public security and are asking the Home Office for urgent assurances that he is in secure custody pending further investigation. “The fact is that he has brazenly posted not only these views, but also his involvement in a ******-endorsed unit in Gaza on social media accounts with hundreds of thousands of followers.” A Home Office spokesperson said: “We are committed to ending small boat crossings which undermine our border security, and restoring order to the asylum system to ensure that the rules are respected and enforced. “While it is a long-standing rule that we never comment on individual cases or operational matters, the British public can be reassured that we take all steps necessary at all times to protect the nation’s security.” Source link #Migrant #called #slaughter #Jews #arrives #small #boat Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

A ‘Greatest Showman’ Musical Is Coming to the Stage, in Britain A ‘Greatest Showman’ Musical Is Coming to the Stage, in Britain “The Greatest Showman,” a hit 2017 film about the circus impresario P.T. Barnum, is being adapted for the stage by Disney Theatrical Group and will have an initial production in early 2026 in Bristol, England. The project is Disney’s first stage adaptation of a 20th Century Fox film since the Walt Disney Company acquired Fox’s assets in 2019. The musical has a credentialed creative team. The songs — a combination of those featured in the film and new ones written for the stage — are by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, the duo behind “Dear Evan Hansen” who last year became EGOT winners — meaning they have won Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony awards. The director and choreographer is Casey Nicholaw, a prolific Broadway theatermaker who won Tony Awards for directing “The Book of *******” and for choreographing “Some Like It Hot.” Nicholaw has become a favorite Disney collaborator — he also directed and choreographed the long-running “Aladdin” as well as the company’s most recent show, “Hercules,” which will have a West End production in June. The book is by Tim Federle, best known for television’s “High School Musical: The Musical: The Series.” The film had a starry cast, led by Hugh Jackman; the stage musical does not yet have a cast, and Disney said it would hold open auditions in Britain and Ireland. The show will be staged at the Bristol Hippodrome in the spring of 2026; if all goes well, Disney will then determine whether to transfer it to London, and, eventually, New York. Source link #Greatest #Showman #Musical #Coming #Stage #Britain Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

‘Chaos: The Manson Murders’ Review: All You Ever Knew is Suspect ‘Chaos: The Manson Murders’ Review: All You Ever Knew is Suspect Most likely you know the outline of the case: Charles Manson, the failed musician and wild-eyed hippie, ordered his “family” — drug-addled runaways, mostly, who had been living with him at a ranch full of old movie sets — to carry out a series of gruesome murders on the evenings of Aug. 8 and 9, 1969. Among the victims was the actress Sharon Tate, then eight and a half months pregnant with her first child. Her husband, the director Roman Polanski, was out of town at the time. The story includes all kinds of weird spiky bits, well-documented, from accidents and coincidences (who was there that night, who wasn’t) to Manson’s connections to Dennis Wilson of the Beach Boys and his worship of the Beatles to the bizarre behavior he and his acolytes exhibited during the sensationalized trial. O’Neill, in his book, goes deeper, raising the specter of various conspiracy theories about potential covert government operations that seem, with the space of time and some well-placed Freedom of Information Act requests, to at least have the potential of maybe being linked to the case. O’Neill, a dogged reporter who pursued the story for decades, is well aware in the book that he appears to be a bit deranged — but that’s because, he insists methodically, the whole thing is kind of deranged. There’s no strict evidence but the distinct possibility that Manson crossed paths, and maybe more, with United States covert operations that intersected eerily with the sort of mind control he was able to enact on his followers. The C.I.A., through initiatives like Project MK-Ultra and Operation CHAOS, for instance, spied on citizens and experimented with initiatives aimed at controlling minds and creating, as Morris puts it in cinematic terms, a Manchurian candidate. Similarly, the F.B.I.’s Cointelpro projects aimed to disrupt groups viewed as subversive, such as the antiwar movement, civil rights movement, ********** and socialist organizations, the women’s movement and in particular the ****** Panthers, on whom Manson’s family explicitly tried to pin the murders. These covert operations on citizens are familiar territory for Morris, including his 2017 six-part series “Wormwood,” of which he inserts a tiny clip into “Chaos,” with little explanation. It’s seemingly a way to remind his more dedicated viewers this isn’t his first go-round on this topic. “Chaos: The Manson Murders” features O’Neill, who says much the same thing onscreen — look, I’m not saying it did happen this way, we just can’t say it didn’t — but brings in other voices, too. The most notable is Bobby Beausoleil, a young musician whose path intersected with Manson’s in unfortunate and grim ways, and who insists that Manson’s motives in conducting the murders were much more pedestrian than people like O’Neill made them out to be. There’s also archival footage of Manson himself, both during the trial and in several later interviews, and of several of his followers decades after their convictions. Yet the most significant other voice in the film is Morris’s, both stylistically and literally — in typical style, we see and hear him interviewing O’Neill (on camera) and Beausoleil (on the phone). There are remnants of the now-established Netflix true crime style in “Chaos,” most notably the irritating little introduction to what’s about to happen in this documentary, a kind of mini-trailer for itself, that starts the film, perhaps the most visible indication that streaming has altered the way we not only watch but structure movies. But Morris has clout that exceeds most documentary directors, and this is mostly his movie: curious, skeptical, dependent on interviews conducted by the director. And it’s obsessed with that single question: Why do we keep returning to this story? Source link #Chaos #Manson #Murders #Review #Knew #Suspect Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Garcia cleans up in LIV Hong Kong as Herbert flourishes Garcia cleans up in LIV Hong Kong as Herbert flourishes Sergio Garcia has carded a seven-under 63 to capture a double victory at LIV Golf Hong Kong, winning both the individual and team titles. Australia’s Lucas Herbert also enjoyed an excellent final day at the Hong Kong Golf Club on Sunday as his 64 enabled him to grab fourth place, five shots behind the winner. In a three-way tie for the lead entering the final round, Garcia started fast with an eagle on the 551-yard third, before recording four consecutive birdies between the eighth and 11th holes and adding a birdie on 16 to finish the tournament on 18-under 192. His co-leaders couldn’t keep pace with England’s Paul Casey shooting a 69 to finish in fifth place at 12 under while Peter Uihlein’s 70 left him in a tie for sixth, seven strokes adrift. South Africa’s Dean Burmeister had the round of the day, firing a 62 to move into second place at 15 under, while Phil Mickelson shot a 64 to finish in third and stand on his first LIV podium. Approaching the 18th green, Garcia had a big individual lead but needed to par the hole for the Fireballs to stave off a playoff with Stinger GC in the team competition. Staring down what he called an “easy 55-footer down the hill,” he left his putt close to the hole, tapping in for a birdie and the team win at 37 under. It was the sixth LIV Golf team title ever for the Fireballs, who also won last week in Adelaide. Herbert’s stirring effort, along with 12th-placed Marc Leishman’s 65, 20th-placed Cameron Smith’s 66 and 35th-placed Matt Jones’ 67 ensured the all-*********** Ripper GC finished third in the team event on 34 under. “It was nice to see not only that I was doing well and leading the tournament, but my teammates were playing great,” said Garcia, whose teammate, Abraham Ancer, took the individual championship in Adelaide. “They were keeping us there with a chance to win. Obviously when you can pull the double, it’s a lot sweeter than if it’s just one of them. Very proud of them.” Garcia seemed to cherish the latest win with his team — fellow Spaniards David Puig and Luis Masaveu, as well as ******** Ancer. At 45, Garcia has assumed the role as elder statesman of golf in Spain, serving as a mentor the way Seve Ballesteros and Jose Maria Olazabal were for him as a youngster. “It’s fun,” Garcia said. “I really love this format. I really love the team aspect of it and trying to put my arm around them and give them advice if they need it or if they want it and try to help them be the best version of themselves on another golf course.” Another veteran, the 54-year-old Mickelson, said he feels good about his game heading into the Masters Tournament, set for April 10-13. Source link #Garcia #cleans #LIV #Hong #Kong #Herbert #flourishes Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]

Peter Sichel, Wine Merchant With a Cloak-and-Dagger Past, Dies at 102 Peter Sichel, Wine Merchant With a Cloak-and-Dagger Past, Dies at 102 Refugee, prisoner, wine merchant, spy: Peter Sichel was many things in his long, colorful life, but he was probably most often identified as the man who made Blue Nun one of the most popular wines in the world in the 1970s and ’80s. At its peak, in 1985, 30 million bottles of this slightly sweet ******* white wine — its label featuring smiling nuns holding baskets of grapes in a vineyard — were sold. By the time Mr. Sichel (pronounced sea-SHELL) took charge of his family’s wine business in 1960, he had lived a long, clandestine life. For 17 years, first in the Office of Strategic Services during World War II, and then in the Central Intelligence Agency — from its formation in 1947 until he resigned in 1959 — he played a crucial role in gathering intelligence for the United States. He died on Feb. 24 at his home in Manhattan, his daughter Bettina Sichel said. He was 102. As a 19-year-old ******* émigré to the United States who volunteered for the U.S. Army the day after Pearl Harbor, Mr. Sichel was recruited to join the O.S.S. as part of an effort to build an American intelligence-gathering force where none existed. He served in Algiers in 1942 and ’43, and then as head of the O.S.S. unit attached to Gen. George S. Patton’s Third Army as it drove from Southern France toward Alsace in late 1944. Among his jobs were interrogating ******* prisoners of war and recruiting volunteers to infiltrate the ******* lines and report back to him. One of Mr. Sichel’s O.S.S. colleagues, George L. Howe, wrote a novel about one such case, made into the highly regarded 1951 film “Decision Before Dawn,” directed by Anatole Litvak, with a screenplay by another of Mr. Sichel’s colleagues, Peter Viertel. After Germany surrendered, Mr. Sichel became the O.S.S. station chief in postwar Berlin. He was 23 and known as “the wunderkind.” As the O.S.S. evolved into the C.I.A., and the Allies’ wartime united front deteriorated into the international standoff that became the Cold War, he oversaw espionage operations. The Allies had divided Germany into four zones, each administered by one of the four occupying powers: the United States, the Soviet Union, Britain and France. Berlin, the ******* capital, which was in the middle of the Soviet Zone, was likewise divided among the four powers. It was Mr. Sichel who synthesized the intelligence that revealed that the Soviet Union had no intention of permitting the residents of their zones to determine their own political future, as the Allies had agreed to do. As tensions rose, culminating in 1948 with the Soviet Union’s blockade of all rail, road and water access to Allied-controlled areas in Berlin — a crisis that was relieved only by what became known as the Berlin Airlift — it was Mr. Sichel who determined that the Soviets were not planning to invade western Germany, as many in the West had feared. He returned to the United States in 1952, posted to Washington to take charge of the C.I.A.’s Eastern Europe operations. There he worked in rickety temporary quarters, erected alongside the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, while the C.I.A. awaited a permanent home. In 1956, Mr. Sichel was sent to Hong Kong to be the agency’s station chief there, monitoring what was then called Red China as well as other Asian countries. Hong Kong, then administered by Britain, was the Asian counterpart to Berlin, a sliver of democracy on the vast ********** mainland. He remained in Hong Kong until he resigned from the C.I.A. in 1959. A ‘Quiet American’ Mr. Sichel’s espionage exploits were recounted in a number of books, including “The Quiet Americans: Four C.I.A. Spies at the Dawn of the Cold War — a Tragedy in Three Acts” (2020), by Scott Anderson, and Mr. Sichel’s 2016 memoir, “The Secrets of My Life: Vintner, Prisoner, Soldier, Spy.” He is the subject of a documentary film, “The Last Spy,” directed by Katharina Otto-Bernstein, which is to be released this year. In gathering intelligence, Mr. Sichel’s job was to detect any shifts in the leanings of nonaligned countries and to figure out whether perceived disagreements between the Soviets and the ******** were real or fictitious. Both in Hong Kong and in overseeing intelligence-gathering in Eastern Europe, he ran into a conflict that ultimately caused him to resign. The C.I.A. had two significant parts: One included intelligence gatherers like Mr. Sichel; the other planned and executed covert operations, like the coup in Iran in 1953 that overthrew the elected prime minister, Mohammad Mosaddegh, and reinstalled the Shah of Iran, who had abdicated during World War II. Mr. Sichel encountered these covert operators directly, as efforts to parachute so-called freedom fighters into Albania and later China, aimed at fomenting resistance to the ********** regimes, failed dismally. He was especially dismayed, he said, because the intelligence he had collected showed that these operations had no chance of success. “If the intelligence doesn’t fit, they don’t believe the intelligence,” he said in “The Last Spy.” Covert actions like the Iran coup, he added, were “not only ********, but ill-advised,” with long-term consequences, including the rise of the Islamic theocracy in Iran, that ran counter to American interests. Such covert efforts were repeated in 1954 in Guatemala, when the Guatemalan president Jacobo Árbenz Guzmán was deposed in a C.I.A.-backed coup, and again in 1961 with the Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba. “There’s no attempt to learn from the past,” he said. “It’s an institutional mistake of this country.” Mr. Sichel spoke openly about his opinions in the film, though he was less candid in his memoir, which was subject to C.I.A. censorship. He recalled asking C.I.A. officials why he could not discuss subjects that had been well documented. “When journalists say it, it’s speculation,” he was told. “When you say it, it’s confirmation.” Son of a Wine Merchant Peter Max Ferdinand Sichel was born on Sept. 12, 1922, in Mainz, Germany, a commercial hub southwest of Frankfurt, near the leading ******* wine regions. His father, Eugen Sichel, was a third-generation wine merchant. His mother, Franziska (Loeb) Sichel, oversaw the home. The Sichels were members of a large and prosperous secular Jewish family. They owned vineyards and made wine, but the bulk of their business was as négociants, merchants who bought wine from farmers, blended it to meet their specifications, and then bottled and sold it. The family company, H. Sichel Söhne, sold wine throughout Germany and exported it, as well as importing wine from France. Outposts of the Sichel company were established by members of the extended family in the late 19th century in London, New York and Bordeaux, France. World War I destroyed those businesses, and it separated the extended family. The businesses were rebuilt, but the family came together again only after World War II, Mr. Sichel said. Soon after the Nazis came to power, Franziska Sichel saw what was to come and urged her husband to prepare to leave Germany while they could. He was not alarmed until the Nuremberg Laws were passed in 1935, depriving Jews of their civil rights. At that point, 12-year-old Peter and his older sister, Ruth, were sent to England. They didn’t speak English, but learned the language quickly, and at 14 Peter was able to enroll at Stowe, a private boarding school, on the condition, the headmaster said, that he change the pronunciation of his surname from “seashell” to “sitchel” so he would fit in better. Mr. Sichel continued to use that pronunciation until he left the C.I.A. His parents were not initially permitted to leave Germany, as the government needed the foreign currency that their wine business brought in. But they managed to flee in 1938 and settled in Bordeaux, in southwest France, where Mr. Sichel took over that branch of the family enterprise. Peter and his sister were visiting their parents in Bordeaux during the summer of 1939 when Germany invaded Poland and war was declared. Considered enemy aliens by the French, they were not allowed to leave France, and when Germany invaded the country in May 1940, the Sichels were sent to French internment camps. Peter would not return to school. With the Germans meeting little resistance, his father was able to talk a camp administrator into releasing the family, pointing out that as Jews, they were not disposed to aid the Nazis and were most likely to be sent back to Germany, given that the parents had fled illegally. The Sichels, along with refugees from Nazi-occupied areas of northern France, found shelter at a château in the Pyrenees. A relative in New York managed to get visas for the family, as well as transit visas through Spain and Portugal, and in March 1941 they left for Lisbon, where they boarded the steamer S.S. Siboney. They arrived in New York in April 1941. Inheriting a Business The family eventually settled in Kew Gardens, Queens. Peter was working at a shoe supply company when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. While working for the C.I.A. in Berlin, Mr. Sichel met and married a ******* art student, Cuy Höttler; they later divorced. In 1961, he married Stella Spanoudaki, a financial analyst and real estate broker; she died in 2022. In addition to their daughter Bettina, an owner of Laurel Glen Vineyard in Glen Ellen, Calif., Mr. Sichel is survived by another daughter, Sylvia Sichel, a director and screenwriter, and five grandchildren. Their daughter Alexandra Sichel died in 2014. When Mr. Sichel took over his family wine business in New York in 1960, he found it antiquated and disorganized. He streamlined it, partly by merging with Schieffelin & Company, an alcohol and pharmaceutical company that could handle importing and distribution, allowing him to concentrate on promoting the company’s brands. The focus, he decided, would be Blue Nun, a wine that blended riesling and other white grapes, including Müller-Thurgau, silvaner and gewürztraminer. It was called liebfraumilch, meaning the milk of the Holy Mother, a generic term for Rhine wine. Mr. Sichel traveled around the world promoting the wine and arranged print, radio and TV advertising. A particularly memorable series of radio ads in the 1970s employed a young comedy team, Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara, touting Blue Nun as “the wine that’s correct with any dish.” Mr. Sichel tried to repeat his success with other branded wines. Wan Fu was a slightly sweet wine intended to go with ******** food: “To eat ******** without Wan Fu is to eat with but one chopstick,” the slogan went. It was moderately successful, Mr. Sichel said. Others, like My Cousin’s Claret, a basic Bordeaux, and Après Ski, a mulled wine, were not. By the late 1980s, as the world’s appetite for wine increased, interest in branded wines like Blue Nun waned. To an aspirational audience, varietal wines like chardonnay and cabernet sauvignon seemed more sophisticated. Mr. Sichel sold off the American company in 1995. In 1971, he used his contacts in Bordeaux, including his cousin Peter Allan Sichel, an owner of several chateaus, to put together a group of investors to buy Château Fourcas Hosten, an underperforming Bordeaux producer in Listrac. By the 1980s, Fourcas was in financial trouble, and Mr. Sichel invested personally, taking charge of the company; soon he was improving and modernizing equipment and renovating the château. He sold the company in 2006, as his children were not interested in the wine business. When he left the C.I.A., his colleagues there had insisted that as a wine merchant he would never find the passion for the work that he had experienced in intelligence, and that sooner or later he would be back. In “The Last Spy,’’ his wife, Stella, recalled how high-ranking C.I.A. officials would ask her, “When is Peter coming back?” “They didn’t think he would survive outside,” she said. “He might not have survived if he had not fallen immediately into his new passion, which was the wine business.” Source link #Peter #Sichel #Wine #Merchant #CloakandDagger #Dies Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content] For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

French research groups urged to welcome scientists fleeing US French research groups urged to welcome scientists fleeing US French officials are urging their country’s research institutions to consider welcoming scientists abandoning the United States due to President Donald Trump’s funding cuts, AFP learned on Sunday. Since Trump returned to the White House in January, his government has cut federal research funding and sought to dismiss hundreds of federal workers working on health and climate research. “Many well-known researchers are already questioning their future in the United States,” France’s minister for higher education and research, Philippe Baptiste, wrote in a letter to the country’s institutions. “We would naturally wish to welcome a certain number of them.” Baptiste urged research leaders to send him “concrete proposals on the topic, both on priority technologies and scientific fields”. The government is “committed, and will rise to the occasion”, he added, in a statement sent to AFP on Sunday. This week, Aix-Marseille University in the south of France announced it was setting up a programme dedicated to welcoming US researchers, notably those working on climate change. It announced a new programme to welcome scientists who “may feel threatened or hindered” in the United States and want “to continue their work in an environment conducive to innovation, excellence and academic freedom”. Besides the cuts overseen by Trump’s billionaire tech tycoon ally Elon Musk, the US leader has withdrawn Washington from the World Health Organization and the Paris Climate Agreement. In protest, scientists rallied in cities across the United States on Friday, with many of their French counterparts in the southwestern city of Toulouse attending a demonstration in solidarity. – ‘Opportunity’ for French research – In an editorial published in Le Monde newspaper, French academics including Nobel Prize winners Esther Duflo, an economist, and Anne L’Huillier, a physicist, denounced “unprecedented attacks” on US science, saying they undermined “one of the pillars of democracy”. The director of France’s Pasteur public health institute, Yasmine Belkaid, told French newspaper La Tribune in an interview published Sunday that she received “calls every day” from US-based European and American scientists looking for jobs. For French research, “you might call it a sad opportunity, but it is an opportunity all the same,” Belkaid, who once worked as an immunology researcher in the United States, was quoted as saying. “It is time for us to position ourselves as central players in this research ecosystem, which is necessary for our economic independence.” The suspension of some grants has led some US universities to reduce the number of students accepted into doctoral programs or research positions. Other targets for cuts include the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) — the leading US agency responsible for weather forecasting, climate analysis and marine conservation — with hundreds of scientists and experts already let go. The United Nations’ World Meteorological Organization said NOAA and the United States were essential for providing life-saving data to monitor weather and the climate globally. Trump’s appointment of noted vaccine sceptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr as the head of the Department of Health and Human Services has also angered many scientists. bur-vac-lby/rlp/rmb Source link #French #research #groups #urged #scientists #fleeing Pelican News View the full article at [Hidden Content]