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High-Ranking Connecticut Lawmaker Tells Teenager Testifying Before Legislative Committee He Has a 'Snake' Under His Desk for Her

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High-Ranking Connecticut Lawmaker Tells Teenager Testifying Before Legislative Committee He Has a 'Snake' Under His Desk for Her

A 17-year-old Connecticut Science Center representative was hoping to convince the Connecticut House of Representatives to maintain funding for the center's ambassador program when she testified before the Appropriations Committee on February 20th.

Instead, what she received was a lewd remark from Deputy House Speaker Rep. Ernest Hewett (D).

According to The New London Day, the teen told the committee that the program "helped her overcome her shyness and get over her fear of snakes."

After she was done speaking, Hewett told the girl, "if you're bashful I got a snake sitting under my desk here." (Skip to the end of the audio clip below.)

He was subsequently stripped of his deputy speaker title, but some Democrats have since rushed to Hewett's defense.

Rep. Edward Moukawsher said he'd known Hewett for years and "the last thing he meant to do was in any way make a comment that was lewd." Moukawsher explained that Hewett meant to say that the girl's shyness "was just as much a reality of me having a live snake under his desk."

For his own part, Hewett claims he fumbled his words, and was actually trying to say "if you are shy then I have an acre of land in the Everglades."

Calls for Hewett to resign were heard from Republicans who felt the punishment was not sufficient.

[screengrab via CT House Dems]


Why Did Bradley Manning Do It?

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Why Did Bradley Manning Do It?Yesterday, 25-year-old former Army intelligence analyst Bradley Manning admitted he gave all those documents to Wikileaks and attempted to explain why he did it. In the Wikileaks debate Manning is typically cast as either a a heroic whistleblower or a seditious traitor, or as a confused kid acting out in an emotional tantrum. What's remarkable about Manning's own account is how it fits none of those characterizations. We see Bradley Manning the curious analyst become Bradley Manning the world's most famous leaker through a very personal relationship with Wikileaks that is inseparable from his own motives and psychological situation.

Yesterday's hearing at Ft. Meade, Maryland was the first time the world heard at length from Manning, who has been imprisoned for nearly three years. His entire 10,000-word statement, transcribed the journalist Alexa O'Brien, is a fascinating and complex document. It descends into labyrinthine technical detail about his duties as an intelligence analyst in Iraq then soars into high-minded principles of transparency and justice, often in the same paragraph. The rhetorical strategy fits the message: This is not a groveling apology or a rousing call to arms but a careful effort to intellectualize and rationalize Manning's disclosure to Wikileaks of thousands of confidential documents, for which he faces life in prison.

The story begins with Manning's own disillusionment with U.S. foreign policy and its wars, sparked by his wide-ranging research as an analyst. "I began to become depressed with the situation that we found ourselves increasingly mired in year after year," he said. He wanted to give the public access to some of the same information he had seen, so they might come to a similar conclusion. Manning said he leaked a massive database of incident reports from Iraq and Afghanistan because he believed they might "spark a domestic debate on the role of the military and our foreign policy in general as it relates to Iraq and Afghanistan." He hoped people who saw the dramatic video of a 2007 Apache helicopter strike in Iraq he leaked would be outraged by the "delightful bloodlust" of the pilots. The U.S. State Department cables he gave to Wikileaks detailed shady deals and backroom intimidation and were "a prime example of a need for a more open diplomacy."

But Manning's ideas and actions did not develop in a vacuum. In walking us through the genesis of and rationale behind each leak, Manning's statement emphasizes they were not hit-and-run jobs. Wikileaks plays a pivotal role in this story, and not just as a passive leaking "platform." As Manning tells it, his relationship with Wikileaks was not unlike the relationship between a traditional journalist and their source. Manning said he was originally drawn to Wikileaks after their release in 2009 of half a million pager messages from 9/11. In January, 2010, Manning joined a chatroom linked on Wikileaks' official site out of curiosity. He wanted to know how Wikileaks got the pager messages. "I am the type of person who likes to know how things work," he said in his statement. "And, as an analyst, this means I always want to figure out the truth."

Over the years I've periodically visited that same, now-defunct chatroom to try to figure out how Wikileaks works. Whenever I dropped by it seemed pretty dead, a few Wikileaks fanboys idling during the work day. But in early 2010 Manning found a lively collection of geeks discussing stimulating topics:

"Over a period of time I became more involved in these discussions especially when conversations turned to geopolitical events and information technology topics, such as networking and encryption methods. Based on these observations, I would describe the [Wikileaks] organization as almost academic in nature."

This became Manning's social circle. Manning, who is openly gay and possibly transgender, told the court he was having troubles with his roommate in Iraq because of his "discomfort regarding my perceived sexual orientation." But the crowd in the Wikileaks chatroom were the same kind of non-judgmental geeks who hung out at the Boston hacker space Manning had visited in real life in early 2010. The chats "allowed me to feel connected to others even when alone," he said in his statement. "They helped pass the time and keep motivated throughout the deployment."

Throughout his leaking, Manning said he developed an online friendship with an anonymous Wikileaks associate whom he called "Nathaniel," after Nathaniel Frank, the author of a popular book on Don't Ask Don't Tell. Manning presumed Nathaniel was one of the higher-ups in Wikileaks, Julian Assange or one of his lieutenants. The conversations with Nathaniel gave Manning particular solace during his difficult time in Iraq:

Our mutual interest in information technology and politics made our conversations enjoyable. We engaged in conversation often. Sometimes as long as an hour or more. I often looked forward to my conversations with Nathaniel after work.

If intense loneliness brought him closer to Wikileaks, could a desire to impress his new acquaintances have kept him feeding documents to Wikileaks? Manning said he was never pressured to leak to Wikileaks and that he takes "full responsibility" for his actions. But Manning's other chats from the time show an emotional frailness and eagerness to please, which ultimately betrayed him when he confided about his leaking to the hacker Adrian Lamo, who turned him in. At the very least, Manning's chats suggest that any emotional explanation for his leaking stemmed as much from becoming close to this freewheeling community of geeks and hackers as from the isolation and dissatisfaction with the U.S. government and his job.

The question of motives is crucial not just to Mannning's image but to his freedom. Manning has pleaded guilty to 10 of the 22 charges against him, but he pleaded not guilty to the more serious espionage charges, including "aiding the enemy." To nail Manning on this, prosecutors will have to prove he was knowingly, albeit indirectly, communicating to America's enemies through his Wikileaks disclosures. The aiding the enemy charge is frightening, because it's a clear attempt at intimidating potential future whistleblowers who come to the press with evidence of government wrongdoing. As the Harvard law professor Yochai Benckler writes "What kind of country makes communicating with the press for publication to the American public a death-eligible offense?" (Manning's prosecutors aren't seeking the death penalty in his case.)

The unspoken message of Manning's statement is that he wasn't aiding America's enemy: He was helping his friends.

NBC Affiliate in Cleveland Airs 20-Year-Old Episode of Matlock In Lieu of Thursday's Primetime Lineup to Protest Andy Griffith Oscars In Memoriam Snub

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NBC Affiliate in Cleveland Airs 20-Year-Old Episode of Matlock In Lieu of Thursday's Primetime Lineup to Protest Andy Griffith Oscars In Memoriam Snub

Andy Griffith, who passed away last July, was unceremoniously absent from this year's Oscars "In Memoriam" tribute, so NBC's Cleveland affiliate WKYC-TV decided to make it up to him by giving Matlock most of their Thursday primetime block.

That's right: Regularly scheduled episodes of The Office, 1600 Penn, and Law and Order: SVU were canceled at the last minute to make room for the 20-year-old Matlock TV movie, The Legacy.

The preempted shows will instead air on Saturday night.

"The Academy did snub Andy Griffith," WKYC president and GM Brooke Spectorsky told The Hollywood Reporter. "We thought it would be a nice tribute."

Surprisingly, so did viewers, who stayed tuned for the legal drama starring Griffith as veteran criminal defense attorney Ben Matlock.

According to Showbuzz Daily, rating figures show the first hour of Matlock was just slightly below the latest figures for The Office (1.6 vs. 1.7), and it actually bested 1600 Penn with a 1.8 rating at 9:30 compared with 1.7 for the latest addition to NBC's Thursday comedy block.

Spectorsky says he plans to do the same thing again next week with the Matlock: The Heist, but that should wrap up the station's "fun experiment."

[screengrab via YouTube]

National Journal Writer Wants to Know Why the President Doesn't Just Murder John Boehner

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National Journal Writer Wants to Know Why the President Doesn't Just Murder John BoehnerNational Journal writer Ron Fournier wants President Obama to do something about the government sequestration going into effect today. "I have... faith in him and his off[ice]," he tweets. Fournier's sick of tired Obama excuses like "I'm not a dictator" and "I can't Jedi mind meld" and "I can't send a team of SEALs to murder John Boehner and his wife in their bedroom."

Yes. President Obama handled Osama Bin Laden, who refused to compromise, by sending a team of highly-trained military operatives into his house, at night, with guns. Why won't he do the same with Boehner?

Is Your Favorite 'Journalist' on the Malaysian Government's Payroll? Maybe

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Is Your Favorite 'Journalist' on the Malaysian Government's Payroll? Maybe BuzzFeed's Rosie Gray today drops news that a number of people writing for a whole host of websites across the political spectrum were doing so on behalf of the Malaysian government. And for their work they were paid handsomely. In other words, they were secretly pawning off talking points from the Malaysian government as their own in exchange for money. This is how some journalists get paid now.

In 2011, then-Politico political reporter Ben Smith accused conservative writer Josh Treviño of working on behalf of special interest groups in Malaysia. Trevino fired back, "I was never on any 'Malaysian entity's payroll,' and I resent your assumption that I was."

Fast forward two years, and today we have Treviño's Foreign Agent Registration Statement [PDF], filed in late January, which states clearly that from 2008 to 2011, Treviño received hundreds of thousands of dollars from "the Government of Malaysia, its ruling party, or interests closely aligned with either." In return, Treviño offered blogging services at a now defunct website, MalaysiaMatters.com, and the promise to "generate and secure placement of opinion pieces in US media." Also named in the filing as "independent contractors" were people like Ben Domenech and Rachel Ehrenfeld, who were paid $36,000 and $30,000, respectively, for "opinion writing." These independent contractors were tasked with writing freelance pieces that propagandized for the Malaysian government and attacked opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, and then publishing them in places like the National Review and the San Francisco Examiner and the Huffington Post.

Treviño lost a column with the Guardian last year for his ties to Malaysia, but both he and Domenech allege there was nothing too underhanded about what they were doing (emphasis ours):

"It was actually a fairly standard PR operation," Trevino told BuzzFeed Friday. "To be blunt with you, and I think the filing is clear about this, it was a lot looser than a typical PR operation. I wanted to respect these guys' independence and not have them be placement machines."

Trevino said neither he nor the client knew what the writers were going to write before it went up.
"I provided a stipend to support their work in this area and they would just ping me whenever something went up," he said.

Domenech, a former Washington Post blogger who runs a daily morning newsletter called The Transom, said he "was retained by Josh's Trevino Strategies and Media PR firm in 2010 with the general guidance to write about Malaysia, particularly the political scene there."

"I did not ever have anyone looking over my shoulder for what I wrote, and the guidance really was just to write about the political fray there and give my own opinion," Domenech said. "Of course, Josh picked me knowing what my opinion was—I stand by what I wrote at the time and I continue to be critical of Anwar Ibrahim, who I think is a particularly dangerous fellow."

And why wouldn't Domenech still maintain those old views? He's now got 36,000 reasons to hold a grudge.

Despite the fact that he thinks he's only guilty of operating a "fairly standard PR procedure," Treviño did find it important to apologize to Ben Smith, to whom he outright lied in 2011:

[Image by Jim Cooke]

Leviathan: A Documentary Made By People Who Hate Documentaries

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Leviathan: A Documentary Made By People Who Hate DocumentariesThe fish slide around the deck, mouths gaping, eyes about to pop. The POV dips from blurry water to above the surface, and every time we rise the screech of gulls hovering above the sea is more voluminous, a bigger shock. A thick, golden chain pierces the infinite darkness. Skates are elevated, their wings hacked off with a machete, their bodies discarded. Heaving nets give birth to a haul of sea life in an extended plop. Sea spray glistens against the night. A yellow light offsets the blue-black sky and highlights the chunky, red blood, and it's hard to recall a time when the primary color palette has seemed more menacing.

These are a few of the images in Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Véréna Paravel's horrific new documentary Leviathan, which focuses on life and especially death on a commercial fishing boat off the coast of New Bedford, Mass. Somewhere between the non-narrative documentary work of Frederick Wiseman, the artful experimentation of Stan Brakhage, and Deadliest Catch, the 87-minute Leviathan presents a borderline-abstract stream of imagery that is free of voiceover, narrative and emotionally manipulative musical cues.

Leviathan is meant to be felt, and what it feels like is a difficult movie about difficult work. It is appropriately chaotic, given its exploration of unpredictable, sea-based elements and it is infused with what feels like mundaneness from the perspective of an ADD-culture addict. It is not exactly enjoyable, but it's rarely less than admirable.

"People think most of the time that because it's not a film that's falling into the typical, conventional narrative genre that it would be more difficult to access, but on the contrary, we're trying to revive some emotional sensation that comes before it can even be turned into something more semiotic," Paravel told me a few weeks ago in the Midtown Manhattan office of the company that is distributing her film, Cinema Guild. "If people accept losing not only their bearings, if they accept being overwhelmed by feelings, it should be actually an imperative for film just to place you back into the experience, into the real."

Leviathan is not only about getting into the real, but turning away from the fake. Castaing-Taylor, who also heads Harvard's Sensory Ethnography Lab, described to me the inherent media-critical nature of his work, whose body also includes the acclaimed 2009 sheep-herding portrait, Sweetgrass.

"I hate most documentaries," he said. "The moment I feel like I'm being told what to think about something, I feel that I want to resist the authority of the documentarian. We're more interested in making films that are more open-ended, that ask the spectators to make their own conclusions. We're always implicitly, if not explicitly, fighting against how bad documentary is. Documentary claims to have this privileged purchase on a truthful version of reality – it's not fiction, this is the real – but most documentaries' representation of the real is so attenuated and so discourse-based and language-based. We lie and we mystify ourselves with words. Words can only take us so far. I think we want to get to a much more embodied, a much more corporeal representation of reality that's almost a presentation of reality. Reality that transcends our representation, so it's not reducible to a set of statements of what commercial fishing's about."

The irreducible quality of Leviathan is enough to drive people crazy. So far, the reviews have been mostly positive, but the negative ones tend to hit the same beat: There is no point here.

"How many points are there?" wondered Castaing-Taylor, motioning to the body of right angles that framed the skyscrapers surrounding us. "What does it mean to reduce something to a point? The best fiction films are never reducible to a point. Nobody asks them to be. They transcend points. But with documentaries, it's like, ‘What is the point? What is it saying?'"

"In a way, it's actually very sad because people expect the authority of the filmmaker to give them something to think or something to feel," added Paravel. "The moment when you give them freedom, you give them power to feel and think and experience something, some people are lost."

To be fair, even the most open-minded viewer could get lost in Castaing-Taylor and Paravel's depths. Assembling footage from cameras strewn about the boat – in their hands, attached to fishermen, dropped in the middle of a haul, attached to rod bobbing in and out of the water – the sequences sometimes go on for what feel like indeterminable amounts of time. The film ends with about five minutes of white bubbles in the black ocean. I wondered if there was a greater sense of logic or if Castaing-Taylor and Paravel's shots go on as long as they do because of artistic intuition.

"Logic is superficial and the gut is deep," is how Castaing-Taylor explained it. "When [Paravel] films, she films from the gut. She doesn't trust her eyes and that's why there's this incredible sense of fear and loathing and uncanniness. It's much more profound if you can't always articulate what your intentions are rather than having a set of logical propositions about the proper way to film and the proper way to cut."

"Sometimes we had these very clear discussions about the structure and something more conceptual about how much do we give about the fisherman, how much do we give to all the elements that are part of this symphony of the sea," said Paravel. "These are more conceptual things, but obviously the moment when you know it's working is because it resonates with the experience you had [as a filmmaker]."

Within the gut-driven assembly of their chaos, Castaing-Taylor copped to one element of direct messaging within Leviathan: The exaggerated, almost comically gothic font on the poster that's also used in the film's credits.

"It could be the moment where we can be seen as editorializing or winking," he said. "The soundtrack of the film, the aesthetic of the film is a kind of goth, heavy metal kind of thing. This is the one way in which we're acknowledging that."

Castaing-Taylor and Paravel told me that playing to an imaginary audience is low on their priority list – "We make films not for ourselves, but we make films that work for ourselves," is how Castaing-Taylor put it – but at the same time, he says he does strive to make films that accurately represent their subjects. To that end, I wondered if the fisherman who populate the screen saw this vérité art-film rendering of their lives and what they thought.

"I think they feel this moment of self-recognition: ‘This is our world and you caught it. Will this be of interest to anybody else?'" Castaing-Taylor said. "They're very much a scapegoated, marginalized subculture. They feel criminalized and detested by environmentalists and the government, which is trying to regulate them out of any livelihood at all. They're always worried about any media portraits of them. They might ask, ‘What is the value of this?' It's not a political puff piece that will change the fishing commissions' quotas tomorrow. But I think they also feel it's an heirloom for their families. The captain said to me, ‘Can you hurry up and finish? I want to show this to my father before he dies.' A generation ago, back to the beginning of time, all the fisherman wanted was for their kids to go into fishing. Now they just want to get the kids out. They know there's nothing left. It kills your body and there's no money in it. So this is some record of the end of the line for posterity."

Now there's a good, tangible point. It's but one in a sea of them.

Out of the Mouth of Babes: 11-Year-Old Kid Calls Dallas City Council Members Out for Being Rude to Constituents

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Out of the Mouth of Babes: 11-Year-Old Kid Calls Dallas City Council Members Out for Being Rude to Constituents

An 11-year-old boy stunned the Dallas City Council this week with a precociously astute remark about the members' disrespectful behavior.

David Williams attended the council meeting so he could express his concern about school teachers being allowed to bring guns to school.

"What is an alternative for teachers to keep their students safe in the DISD district without having to bring dangerous weapons to school?" David politely asked the council members.

But in waiting for a response, David's patience ran out after he noticed that members were not paying attention to questions from constituents and were instead distracting themselves with other matters.

So he approached the podium again.

"Do you feel it is acceptable for City Council members to be up and walking while their constituents are addressing them?" David chided the council.

That certainly got their attention.

Councilmember Dwaine Caraway immediately addressed David's comment with an apology, telling him he was correct in pointing out the members' disrespectful behavior, and promised to minimize his walking around "when visitors are speaking."

He also took the opportunity to encourage other residents to be like David and "come in with a subject, a message and positive criticism that other people can appreciate."

Shatara Mathis, David's mother, said her son's candid criticism surprised her as well.

"I was very proud because sometimes it's out of the mouth of a babe that you really get enlightened as an adult," she told KDFW.

The Fox affiliate asked David if he wanted to be a city council member when he grows up. David replied that he would be "more interested in being President of the United States."

[H/T: NewsOne, screengrab via MyFoxDFW]

Lindsay Lowdown: Lohan Wants to Become a Motivational Speaker; Judge Finds Her Lawyer 'Incompetent'

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Lindsay Lowdown: Lohan Wants to Become a Motivational Speaker; Judge Finds Her Lawyer 'Incompetent'The perpetual motion machine of Lindsay Lohan's legal saga groaned on this week as Lohan's new judge decried Lohan's new lawyer as "incompetent," and unfit to practice law in California. We also found out that Lindsay wants to become a motivational speaker.

The overall theme of The Week In Law with Lindsay Lohan was that Mark Heller is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad attorney who wouldn't know proficient legal representation if it walked up to him and filed a motion introducing itself in a timely, efficient manner in accordance with state procedure.

He tried to file a bunch of motions in her reckless driving case, all of which were denied. Then he kind of got yelled at.

The most important motion Heller filed was one to dismiss the charges against Lindsay, on the grounds that she was not properly Mirandized before police questioning. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge James Dabney rejected this motion because it was not filed during Lohan's arraignment, as required by California law. (Also, she allegedly lied to police officers at the scene of the collision before she was taken into custody. As TMZ reports, there's no need to Mirandize people who were involved in a car accident when questioning them about what happened.)

The weirdest detail from that motion (which you can read in full at Radar) is that officers present at the scene of Lohan's accident noticed a water bottle lying by the side of the road that they believed either Lindsay or her assistant (slash passenger slash EX-BFF Gavin) had thrown out of the car before cops arrived. At first the officer who picked up the bottle believed it was filled with urine. Upon smelling it, he decided it might be wine. The contents of the bottle were never tested. So Lindsay Lohan may have been cruising around in her Porsche with a water bottle filled with either urine or wine. Something to meditate on tonight before dreaming.

In another motion, Heller asked the judge to delay Lohan's trial, one, so that he might have more time to prepare his defense and, two, so that she could undergo "intensive psychotherapy" sessions and dedicate some time to public service.

In a rambling letter to the prosecution sent earlier this week, Heller explained that Lindsay intends to give "inspirational talks" at schools and hospitals, in which she will "[encourage] children to pursue positive goals and avoid bad habits."

Don't ever bite your nails; it's unattractive, Lindsay will growl. If you eat too many carrots, you'll turn into a carrot. And then on her way out of the building she'll steal something small, like markers from a dry erase board or someone else's Nalgene bottle, and the rush will feel like a hit of morphine.

Around the same time he sent the letter, Heller informed the press that Lohan had had an "epiphany" and was looking to change her life. (MAKEOVER!)

Judge Dabner denied Heller's request to postpone the trial, saying that what happens in the future won't "suddenly…change the history of this case." So, March 18th it is.

He also slammed Heller as incompetent, and stated that, on the 18th Heller will either have to show up with an attorney who "has some experience in California law and procedure" who can assist him for the remainder of the case or that Lohan will have to waive her right to have "attorneys who are competent in California law and procedure." (Heller is only licensed in New York.)

Lohan was charged with misdemeanor counts for reckless driving, providing false information to an officer and willfully resisting, obstructing or delaying an officer.

In order to avoid trial on these charges and a probation violation (stemming from a 2011 incident in which she was charged with stealing a $2,500 necklace from a Venice, CA jewelry store), the L.A. Times reports that Lohan will have to agree to serve at least 90 days in "a lockdown rehabilitation facility."

Until next time, #YOLOLiLo.

[L.A. Times // Image via AP]


A Lesson in Sexist Humor, Help Translating, Prison Time, and Other Suggestions This Week

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A Lesson in Sexist Humor, Help Translating, Prison Time, and Other Suggestions This WeekGawker has recently taken on an ebullient team of Swedish correspondents Hjalmar Sveinbjőrnsson and Alex who self-described their role as a "worthless hire." Regardless, they have completed their first assignment on the Onion / Quvenzhané Wallis debacle. While we have one overt letter criticizing these far-flung contributors, we also noticed an increase of people offering translation services, most of whom used questionable grammar, syntax, and vocabulary themselves.

Subj: Translation is my special world
Body: Dear Sir/Madam
I have an excellent record of accomplishment in translating legal (correspondence, contracts, certificates & documentation, consolidated financial statements), medical and technical documents. In the past I was supplying translation services for my employer (qualifications, contracts of employment, guidelines, etc.) then for my own company. My Portfolio includes companies in Germany, Dubai, Malaysia & India Feel free to ask for samples or references
Yours faithful.

Subj: MuchDo Translation Agency: Best Selection
Body: Dear Sir/Madam,
Do you spend long time searching for qualified translators? 
Do you like to have the best price?
Do you worry about the translators' commitment regarding deadlines? 
Why do you bear all this while we are ready to do it for you? 

Subj: Fast and accurate translations
Body: Dear Sir/Madam
This e-mail is to express my interest in applying for a French Translator Freelance position to the current collaboration you are offering.
The key strength that I possess for this position is to provide amply documented translations based on a high sensitive cultural approach and strong linguistic skills.
As a French native, I express the willing to get to work with you on several translation projects. You will find me to be specialized in tourism and the hotels industry but also in marketing, business, real-estate, technical translation, company creation, fashion, game industries (poker/gambling), communication and IT industry etc. I never hesitate to spend time making researches while translating a text in a special field.

And a letter directly addressing the creative spelling and active imaginations of the Nybro Action Team.

Subj: Cultural Diversity
Body: John,
Having spent considerable time in Scandinavia, I wanted to highlight for you something rather important given your choice of the "under employed" Nybro "action team."
Those dudes aren't "under employed." They are under-educated...and it shows. People in Sweden, ESPECIALLY IN THAT AGE GROUP, typically speak and write English well. They learn English as a core requirement throughout school in comprehensive English classes (that are remarkably important given that barely more people than live in New York speak Swedish worldwide). Those whose written English is as poor as the Nybro Action Team's are the ones who learned their English primarily from movies, music, and other popular culture. In other words, these two dudes (who I'm sure are very nice fellows) were awful students (and that's by American standards, leaving alone for a moment that Swedes have a higher educational standard for themselves). So, despite one of the best school systems in the world, they couldn't be bothered to pay attention. In the 50 year-old plus demographic, Hjalmar and Alex would have passable English skills. Among Swedish peers of their age, their English skills are atrocious. 
There is a large sample of Americans who are lazy and under-educated...and can't write cogently. If you were interested in capturing the post-bonghit, white trash perspective, you could have landed closer to home. If you were interested in the cultural perspective of those from Sweden, there is no shortage of intelligent, educated Swedes capable of conveying thoughts through words in the English language...with a sense of humor too. The Nybro Action team, I assure you, is at the bottom of the curve representing Swedish command of the English language. You may see it as quaint and admirable that they are communicating in their second language but I think most Swedes of their age would view their command of English as embarrassing to them and the English teachers that "educated" them.
As your standards continue to slip there at Gawker (not intended ironically at all), you may want to shore up your writer selection process lest you end up with two distinct classes of Gawker writers...those that steal content from Reddit and need not use their extant language skills...and those that have no language skills but are relied upon to write cultural analysis (yes, probably via Google Translate if a few indicators are accurate) nonetheless. 
Hjalmar and Alex are not amazing simply because they are from another country. They are, quite simply, lazy, under-educated, stoner bros who had the bad luck of living in horrid places like Malmø but the good fortune of finding the altruistic John Cook. But it's not likely that you will be paying them enough money to compensate for what their lazy asses bring from being on the Swedish dole. The freshness date on these two has already passed. Soon, they will find more entertaining, and less strenuous, post-bonghit activities (God, we can only hope).
But, hey, at least they don't have guns!
Go Sweden!

Moving right along to our other exploits—something for which we need prison time.

Subj: what were you thinking you need prison time for this
Body: Why would you allow criminals to have information on who and who does not own a gun...You a moron !!!!!!!!!! Your a criminal for doing this !!!!! Families are being exposed to violence, little old ladies homes are not exposed to a criminal knowing and not knowing if she owns a gun.... I hope you are prosecuted by the laws of our constitution for allowing this information to be released !!!!!! Your not an American GO HOME !!!

Questioning why we don't understand Seth MacFarlane. Because he's actually stellar and very humorous.

Subj: Re: Here are all of Seth MacFarlane's predictable...
Body: You're stupid. No reply necessary.

Subj: Seth MacFarlane
Body: Your article could not be more off base. I don't know what you have against Seth, but I thought he did a stellar job. There was nothing homophobic about his performance. Why don't we step off the anti-gay rants for a while and take his performance for what it was: anti-politically correct dark humor. No one in Hollywood is anti-gay, they wouldn't have a career if they were out touting that type of agenda.
The day we can stop being so sensitive to everything is the day we make a progressive step forward in social interaction. Otherwise, its articles like this that are making me dislike Gawker these days.

C. Everett Koop Obituary: four words.

Sub: C. Everett Koop died
Body: Asshole that he was.

In order to keep your audience over the 8th grade reading level, please avoid fecal matter. Or does this mean that we will lose anyone below an 8th grade reading level if we cease scatological musings?

Subj: Here's a tip: 
Body: Unless you are only interested in keeping 7th graders in your audience, please stop featuring stories about farts and eating your own poop.

A Few Men Who Begged Me Not to Write About Them

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A Few Men Who Begged Me Not to Write About Them"Just promise me one thing," my soon to be ex-husband says.

This essay begins at the Russian Samovar. My ex and I are discussing our divorce over carafes of vodka. We agree to split the Roth IRA, which is in his name. He tells me to keep the ring. He's a musician and I'm a writer. There's not much to divvy up.

We separated a year and a half prior. He wanted an open marriage and I didn't. We were married for five years and together for ten. Towards the end of our separation, he asked me to reconsider an open marriage and refused to give me a divorce. Maybe he wasn't really into polyamorism, he'd say. Maybe we could make it work. Just when I would begin to think this was a phase for two people who got married young, he'd say that he didn't think monogamy was for him.

Tonight he's showing off some new vocabulary—he talks about the life he'll have after we divorce and refers to himself as "poly." I feel like I'm watching a movie about someone else's life.

I slug the garlic vodka that's meant for sipping and pour another shot. Even in this moment, as my ex tells me about the life he's planning after I'm gone, I manage to feel intense love for him. I empathize with him and his struggle to define the kind of life he wants. I am grateful to have an ex I can drink vodka with. I'm feeling magnanimous.

"OK," I say, "what's the request?"

Full disclosure: As soon as my husband decided he wanted an open marriage, I got myself a married boyfriend. Other than that, I'd never cheated on my husband, except once when I gave a guy a blowjob. So, anyway, technically, I was poly, maybe, but one who believed in non-disclosure.

He stirs the horseradish vodka with his finger. "Just promise not to write about me," he says.

I leave The Samovar and meet up with my married boyfriend. In fact, that's really where the essay begins.

We're drinking wine in a hotel bathroom.

"I've got this idea for an essay," I say. I'm sitting on the sink with my feet on the toilet. The cork bobs inside the bottle, stopping the flow of wine as I pour. We always forget a wine opener. He pushes the cork into the bottle with a pen and a key.

"I've got all these men in my life telling me to be quiet," I say. "First of all, my husband has the audacity to string me along for a year and a half and then asks me not to write about it."

"I love it," he says. "You should call it, ‘My Manhood.' I think I even know where you could place it."

"Just one thing," he says. "I'm not in it, right?"

We've been continuing to see each other for the past year during my separation. He likes to call me his girlfriend. We talk about art when we're not having sex. Sometimes he tells me about the things he'll do when he's divorced. He is not a real boyfriend, and sometimes I wonder if these rendezvous actually happen.

I assure him that the essay won't be about him. In fact, it's not even about my ex-husband, it's actually about my former boss.

The essay definitely begins in a glass building on the far side of town—an Internet holding company where I worked as an assistant before graduate school. It's the summer of 2010, and I've just been accepted into the Sarah Lawrence writing program. I've given my notice and join the company for one last extravagant, summer soirée on the executive deck.

The former head of my department has been appointed CEO of a major dating site, which is owned by the corporation. He is the most senior person present at the soirée. Let's call him Jim.

Jim's voice booms and echoes even in the open air of the deck. He's known for his loud speaking voice and inappropriate advances. He shouts out an invitation for an after party at The Park-a bar around the corner.

Those of us left at the party follow Jim to The Park. Most of us work within the corporate structure—Human Resources, Legal, and assistants from the executive floor. I am ready to go home but have agreed to share a cab with my best friend who lives in the same neighborhood as me.

I sit tight at the bar, next to one of the newer assistants. She is a second assistant. Her job is to schedule appointments and pick up lunch for her boss. She works on the executive floor with Jim. She's getting pretty drunk. I watch over her like a big sister.

Jim saunters up to my little sister at the bar. He talks to her and puts his hands on her legs. I count three people from HR in the room.

Then, he puts his arms around her and elbows me in the process. I tap him on the shoulder and tell him to get out of my space and back off the girl.

"What's your problem?" he says, "You've always had a fucking problem." Jim can tell I don't respect him, and I most certainly don't want to fuck him.

"My problem is you," I say.

Now Jim is close to my face. The music is loud and everyone is talking. No one sees his fingers come inches from my face as he labels me, "You know what you are?" he says, "You're just a little fucking cunt." Each word—little-fucking-cunt—is punctuated by a jab of his fingers pointing closer and closer to my face.

The next day, I receive an email from Jim asking me to come down to his office to speak in private. Come down to my office means, I don't want anyone to know that I called you a cunt, and I want to make sure we're on the same page about it. I don't give him the satisfaction of listening to his private "apology," and manage to avoid him during my last two weeks at the office.

I resist writing about the cunt incident for years. "Isn't it bad karma to write an exposé?" I ask my friends and former colleagues.

Two years later I'm having coffee with my friend Anna. I tell her about my idea for the essay, but that I'm not sure I want to write it. Writing the essay means associating myself with a messy divorce, a married boyfriend, and a boss who called me a cunt. And what are the moral implications—what are the rules? Who am I to criticize an intercompany romance in the same essay I recount a conversation with my married boyfriend?

I call in sick to work and cook up a nice first draft. Afterwards, I take the train into the city to visit this editor I've been seeing, but, again, full disclosure: I'm omitting this section, because it was a short, not very interesting section, and he was the most insistent on being taken out of the essay. So anyway, he and I break up after a fight about the essay and something else I can't remember. I promise to go home and revise him out, but jump on the train to my friend Polly's reading series on the Upper West Side instead.

I arrive late—just in time to hear Gordon Lish heckle some poor kid, demand pot and Sweet'N Low, and then leave. Two men kiss me in the span of twenty minutes at this reading, which has become a party. Oh yeah, and it's all happening in Polly's parents' one-bedroom apartment.

I end up in the bedroom with the first one, sweet and kind. He asks if he can kiss me for just a minute. I let him, then push him away quickly. "I think it's been a minute," I say. Twenty minutes later, the second, a Scot, tells me he hasn't been able to stop looking at me all night, kisses me aggressively, and pushes me into the same bedroom I kissed the kid. He closes the door and tries to throw me down on the bed. I'm decently athletic, so I give him a nice shove into the closet and get back to the party.

An hour later the Scot slams some other girl against a wall and vanishes behind the bedroom door. They emerge sweaty and red. The girl tells my friend Polly, who is standing next to me, that she's going home with the Scot.

"He really likes me," she says. "He said he couldn't stop looking at me all night."

The Scot stands two feet back, eyeing me. He's either threatening me not to say anything or frightened that I'll throw him into another closet.

I go home and immediately revise the essay. I become obsessed with recording everything men don't want me to. Their motivation to quiet me seems to parallel, if not exceed, their motivation to be with, in, or around me. And why? Is it power, control, or simply bad behavior? I'll never know, so I might as well just speak for myself and say that the whole process is becoming a bit of an addiction. In fact, I'm really trying to quit, so I'll end here by saying that a few weeks ago, I was walking on the street with my married boyfriend. We saw Jim, the CEO who called me a cunt, standing beside his eight-pound West Village dog. Jim had a baggie in his hand. I don't work at Jim's company anymore, and when Jim saw me he had a look on his face just like his dog, who was taking care of business.

I kept walking, then turned back to make sure it was Jim. But Jim had vanished. And I'm sure he wouldn't want me to write this, but he hadn't even picked up his dog's poop.

N. Michelle AuBuchon holds an MFA in creative writing from Sarah Lawrence College and lives in Brooklyn.

In a project overseen by contributing editor Kiese Laymon, Gawker is running a personal essay every weekend. Please send suggestions to saturdays@gawker.com.

Image by Jim Cooke, source photo via Shutterstock.

Insane Philly Teacher Proposal Ends Seniority and Water Fountains

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Insane Philly Teacher Proposal Ends Seniority and Water FountainsBroke and looking to cut spending, the Philadelphia School District announced a list of demands of teachers this week that would cut back on seniority, extra pay for extra work, and access to water fountains. The givebacks include:

Schools with more than 1,000 students would no longer be required to have librarians or librarian assistants.

Schools would no longer be required to have counselors, and counselors' caseloads would no longer be capped.

Teachers could be assigned to unlimited classes outside their subject area, and high school teachers could be assigned an extra class without pay. There would be no limit on amount of consecutive time taught in a school day.

There would be no limit on class size. (Current limits are 30 for the lower grades and 33 for the upper grades, large class sizes by anyone's measure.)

This being the very first proposal towards a new contract, it's assumed that the School Reform Commission (a state-appointed board that controls the Philly school district and has pushed for Charter and business-friendly changes in the miserably underfunded school system) will budge on some of these points, but probably not on the larger ones, including eliminating elevated pay categories for teachers with advanced degrees and instituting a longer work day for less pay.

It's not known whether the School Reform Commission will actually negotiate with the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers (whose contract expires in August), or if they can simply impose these terms on them.

Philadelphia could very well be heading towards a teachers strike on the level of Chicago's last fall, except that the state suspended their right to strike after taking over control from the city in 2001.

China Turns Prisoner Executions Into Reality TV

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China Turns Prisoner Executions Into Reality TVChina broadcast the final moments of four foreign drug traffickers yesterday, right before they were put to death by lethal injection for the 2011 killings of 13 Chinese fisherman.

The coverage, which lasted almost two hours, showed the prisoners being led from their cells to a final check-up by a doctor. Commentators for CCTV (the state television network) remarked, "From the appearance of these criminals, you can clearly tell our prison has carried out humanitarian spirit. These criminals clearly look healthier ... with better skin complexion than when they were arrested." The drug traffickers were the subject of a multinational manhunt which ultimately led to their arrest in Laos last spring.

The coverage, which did not show the actual injections, but did include live images of the prisoners just minutes before their death, drew criticism from human rights advocates. Prominent blogger lawyer Liu Xiaoyuan (who defended Ai Weiwei) wrote, "This carnival on CCTV was a violation not only of ethics, but of the criminal code regulations that the death penalty not be carried out in public."

China executes 4,000 prisoners a year, although coverage of this kind is unprecedented. In an interview this week, also broadcast on Chinese television, trafficker ringleader Naw Kham said, "I am afraid of death. I want to live. I don't want to die. I have children. I am afraid."

State officials confirmed his death by lethal injection yesterday afternoon.

Sequester Frees Thousands of Immigrants Facing Deportation

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Sequester Frees Thousands of Immigrants Facing DeportationThe big winners in the enormous budget cuts that will gut the federal government: undocumented immigrants! The Department of Homeland Security has released from its jails more than 2000 immigrants who were facing deportation, well above the number that the Obama administration said would be (which is a shame for the Obama administration, which just loves deporting people).

The White House, which was not consulted about the releases, has asked Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano (pictured above, looking unhappy) to temporarily stop releasing the immigrants. There are currently 30,000 immigrants being held in federal detention waiting for deportation proceedings.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman Brian Hale left the door open for more releases. "As fiscal uncertainty remains over the continuing resolution and possible sequestration, ICE reviewed its detained population to ensure detention levels stay within ICE's current budget and placed several hundred individuals on methods of supervision less costly than detention," he said in a statement. "At this point, we don't anticipate additional releases, but that could change."

An extremely simple way to resolve some of America's fiscal woes would be to continue to reduce our massive Federal prison complex, which cost taxpayers $39 billion last year.

State Department Finds Keystone XL Won't Hurt Environment or Help Economy

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State Department Finds Keystone XL Won't Hurt Environment or Help EconomyThe State Department released its report yesterday on the environmental impact of constructing the controversial Keystone XL pipeline. It found that the massive pipeline is "unlikely to have a substantial impact on the rate of development in the oil sands," meaning that Canada will most likely proceed with developing the Alberta tar sands whether the pipeline is built or not, and it ultimately won't contribute to global warming.

Environmentalists disagree.

While the amount of carbon that will be released if the tar sands are fully developed is still a contested number, 350.org founder Bill McKibben expressed amazement that the State Department concluded that the pipeline wouldn't spur further development, "Everybody who reads the industry press in Canada, anyone who pays attention to the financials, knows that if they don't have it, they aren't going to be able to expand the tarsands the way they want to."

However, the report wasn't all great news for supporters of the pipeline — the State Department isn't really buying the idea that the project would create jobs:

The analysis also put a far more conservative estimate on the number of jobs that would be created by Keystone XL pipeline. Proponents of the pipeline have predicted a veritable hiring bonanza, with some Republicans suggesting hundreds of thousands of jobs are in the offing.

But the report said that while the pipeline's construction would support 42,100 jobs during the one- to two-year construction period, with total wages of about $2 billion, only 35 permanent and temporary jobs will remain once Keystone XL pipeline is fully operational.

The final decision, which is still months away, will be made by the President.

David Brooks Wishfully, Wrongly Believes the Chinese Have No Word for 'Nerd'

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David Brooks Wishfully, Wrongly Believes the Chinese Have No Word for 'Nerd'New York Times columnist and culture scholar David Brooks had some thoughts this week about the difference between hardworking Chinese students and lazy American students. The Chinese, he wrote, see education as a moral enterprise, built around the cultivation of discipline and other internal virtues, while Westerners focus on learning about things and are hung up on "critical inquiry" and "sharing ideas."

It's true that there are deep cultural differences between the Chinese and Western attitudes toward education. But it wouldn't be a David Brooks column if he didn't try to reduce those complexities to a glib and shaky factoid:

American high school students tease nerds, while there is no such concept in the Chinese vocabulary.

Speaking of critical inquiry: Whenever you hear someone explain that a concept is so foreign to this or that culture that people cannot even use their language to describe it, it is safe to assume your passport has just been stamped for entry into the Land of Bullshit. There are multiple dictionary entries for "nerd" in Chinese, including terms for a dull and tasteless person (乏味的人, fáwèi de rén) and for someone excessively enthusiastic about computers (电脑迷, diànnǎomí).

The word for "nerd" in the sense Brooks means—"pedant" or "bookworm"—is "书呆子" (shūdāizi). If you're too shiftlessly American to have an English-Chinese dictionary handy, you can literally type "nerd" into Google Translate and find it.


Florida Sinkhole Continues to Grow, Victim Might Never Be Recovered

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Florida Sinkhole Continues to Grow, Victim Might Never Be RecoveredThe Florida sinkhole that swallowed a man while he was sleeping Thursday night is still expanding as police evacuated several houses near the one that is sitting on the sinkhole.

"The hole took the entire bedroom," said Douglas Duvall, a county sheriff who tried to rescue the victim, Jeff Bush, as he was sucked underground. "You could see the bed frame, the dresser, everything was sinking."

Mr. Bush is most likely dead, and the family is beginning to come to terms with the idea that his body will never be recovered. "I really don't think they are going to be able to find him," Jeremy Bush, the victim's brother said on Saturday. He "will be there forever."

The sinkhole doesn't appear to be getting wider, however — only deeper. Unfortunately, no photos of the sinkhole have been taken yet.

Sinkholes are a common occurrence in central Florida. The Times reports that "more than 500 sinkholes have been reported in Hillsborough County alone since the government started keeping track in 1954, according to the state's environmental agency."

Engineers are confounded as to why the house has not collapsed yet.

It's So Hard to Be an Ambitious 20-Something New Yorker

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It's So Hard to Be an Ambitious 20-Something New YorkerThe New York Times Style section has logged another entry in its ongoing coverage of economic reality happening to young, pretty people. This time, the paper of record has focused on low-paying jobs with endless hours. Janitorial? No way, Jose — Creative! Look at these tired blue eyes stuck behind tortoise-shell glasses, hundreds of feet above the whimpering masses, stuck inside a small midtown office.

The plight of one young book publicist is typical of our ill-starred generation:

Ms. McIntyre is just one 20-something - a population historically exploitable as cheap labor - learning that long hours and low pay go hand in hand in the creative class. The recession has been no friend to entry-level positions, where hundreds of applicants vie for unpaid internships at which they are expected to be on call with iPhone in hand, tweeting for and representing their company at all hours.

Ah, pity the publicist. Wait. No, don't. Publicists are awful. Either way, enough talk, here comes the obligatory Girls reference:

The young are logging hours, too. In 2011, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, full-time workers ages 20 to 24 put in just 2.1 fewer hours a week than those 25 and over. That's not a big gap of leisure for the ostensibly freewheeling time in one's life. Or, to quote Lena Dunham's 24-year-old aspiring writer in "Girls," "I am busy trying to become who I am."

Now cue the smart guy in the room, Ross Perlin, who actually wrote a great book about how these jobs are really only available to those privileged enough to accept getting treated like shit by a media company:

"Particularly in some rock-star professions - film and TV and publishing and media - companies are pushing the envelope to see how much they can get out of young people for how low a stipend or salary," Mr. Perlin said. "And people are desperate enough to break in to do it."

And now let's ignore what he says and focus on the fact that this system still works out for overextended, underpaid, highly educated people because they are smart and will simply pull up the ladder behind them. But they are so, so tired!

Ms. McIntyre, the book publicist, estimated that she receives 300 to 400 e-mails a day and tries to answer at least 80 percent. How does she summon the energy for this incessant typing, not to mention 16-hour days traveling with authors on tour?

"I have coffee before I leave the house, there's a Dunkin' Donuts conveniently in the subway station when I get off, and I get another coffee during the day," she said. "And they're large coffees."

Style section! It's just fuckin' with ya!

[Image: Shutterstock]

Apple Doesn't Want You Emailing About "Barely Legal Teens"

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Apple Doesn't Want You Emailing About "Barely Legal Teens"Apple's iCloud email service has a neat trick: instead of relegating emails that contains phrases like "barely legal teens" to your spam folder, it simply doesn't deliver your message. Macworld, which might have been tipped off by someone who would like to remain anonymous, has found that emails containing that phrase simply disappear:

Through our own rigorous testing, we've managed to confirm that emails containing the phrase "barely legal teen" are simply never delivered to iCloud inboxes. In fact, we found that even emails with the offending phrase contained in an attached PDF-even a zipped PDF-were blocked.

Even if you, like us, would almost never receive a legitimate email with such a phrase, this could still be problematic. For example, had you emailed someone about the fact that Apple blocks emails with the phrase "barely legal teens," that email would itself never arrive. And if, as with the person who originally reported the issue to Infoworld, you were attaching a work of fiction with such a phrase, that too would be blocked.

Even though its probably a mechanism to deal with the overwhelming spam that accompanies that phrase, it does seem like Apple is being a bit "prudish" by not even letting the recipient sort through their spam folder to find these "barely legal teens."

Besides, these teens are legal. But just barely.

The Daily News Had to Have Known This Cover Was in Terrible Taste

Dennis Rodman Says Kim Jong Un Just Wants Obama to 'Call Him'

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Dennis Rodman Says Kim Jong Un Just Wants Obama to 'Call Him'In his first interview since his totally unbelievable trip to North Korea (where he, a bunch of Vice staffers, and the Harlem Globetrotters partied with brutal dictator Kim Jong Un), Dennis Rodman told George Stephanopoulos this morning that Kim Jong Un "wants Obama to do one thing: Call him."

Kim Jong Un said to the Hall of Famer Rodman, "If you can, Dennis – I don't want [to] do war. I don't want to do war."

Rodman was the first American to publicly meet the North Korean leader since Un assumed command of the country after the death of his father in 2011. Rodman says that while he doesn't condone what Kim Jong Un does (the death camps, massive starvation, etc.), he considers him "a friend for life."

Col. Steve Ganyard, a former deputy assistant secretary of state, told ABC News that the CIA was making a huge mistake in not debriefing Rodman after his trip to the DPRK, "There is nobody at the CIA who can tell you more personally about Kim Jong Un than Dennis Rodman, and that in itself is scary."

[Image courtesy of ABC]

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