Podcast appearances and mentions of mariana islands

Last time we spoke about the battle of Malacca strait. In the intense Battle of the Malacca Strait, Japanese forces undertook a desperate evacuation amidst relentless attacks by the Allies. After suffering heavy casualties from previous confrontations, the Japanese regrouped and attempted to maintain their defensive positions. However, under the pressure of determined Allied assaults and strategic maneuvers, they faced increasingly fierce resistance. As the Allies advanced, they successfully overwhelmed Japanese defenses, leading to significant losses for the opposing forces. The battle transformed into a pivotal moment in the Pacific War as Japanese resistance crumbled, ultimately shifting the tide toward Allied victory. This clash not only showcased the harsh realities of war but also underscored the relentless determination of both sides as they fought for dominance in the region, marking a crucial step towards the conclusion of the conflict. This episode is the Breakthrough on Okinawa Welcome to the Pacific War Podcast Week by Week, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about world war two? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on world war two and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel you can find a few videos all the way from the Opium Wars of the 1800's until the end of the Pacific War in 1945.  As of mid-May, General Buckner's forces had made steady, albeit slow, progress against the determined Japanese defenders on the Shuri defensive line. On May 16, the offensive continued. Colonel Schneider's 22nd Marines and Colonel Whaling's 29th Marines launched yet another unsuccessful assault on Sugar Loaf Hill, while Colonel Snedeker's 7th Marines exhausted their strength in a failed attempt to seize Wana Ridge. To the east, Colonel Coolidge's 305th Regiment advanced 200 yards closer to Shuri. Colonel Hamilton's 307th Regiment nearly captured Flattop and Chocolate Drop Hill but was ultimately pushed back. Colonel Dill's 382nd Regiment successfully cleared Dick Hill but came under intense fire from Oboe Hill. Meanwhile, Colonel May's 383rd Regiment made only minor gains on the southeastern slopes of Conical Hill and Love Hill, even as tanks broke through toward Yonabaru for the first time. The following day, the 383rd Regiment maintained pressure on Conical and Love Hills, prompting General Bradley to commit part of Colonel Halloran's 381st Regiment to the attack. To the west, the 382nd Regiment staged a hard-fought advance of 200 yards but was unable to capture Oboe Hill.  Slowly the 77th Division forces between Flattop and Route 5 were reducing enemy positions bearing on the area in front of the 307th Infantry. By 17 May this progress began to show in the advances of the foot troops around Chocolate Drop. Covered by company heavy weapons out on both flanks, infantrymen worked around both sides of the hill to the huge caves on the reverse slope. Inside were 4 antitank guns, 1 field piece, 4 machine guns, 4 heavy mortars, and a American 60-mm. mortars. By nightfall the caves had been partially sealed off. During the night an enemy force launched a counterattack against the American positions around the hill but was repulsed with the loss of twenty-five Japanese killed. On the 17th another bitter struggle raged on Flattop. The struggle swayed back and forth across the narrow crest of the hill. Company K, the assaulting unit, had been reduced to fourteen infantrymen by the end of the day; finally it was forced back off the top. Tanks tried to go through the road cut between Flattop and Dick Hill, but two of them were disabled by mines, leaving the cut blocked. The road cut was later blown along its entire length by seven tons of bangalore torpedoes to remove the mines. Company E continued to push toward Ishimmi Ridge, where they faced a series of heavy Japanese counterattacks. Coolidge's 3rd Battalion and the rest of Hamilton's 2nd Battalion dug in just a few hundred yards north of Shuri and Ishimmi in the highway valley. Meanwhile, Coolidge's 1st Battalion was halted by heavy fire from 110 Meter Hill and the extensive fortress houses in Shuri's suburbs. The intense fighting had nearly depleted the 22nd Regiment, prompting General Amamiya to direct the 32nd Regiment to take over the defense of Shuri along a line extending from Ishimmi to Oboe. Meanwhile, on Wana, the 7th Marines launched a renewed attack but were once again repelled. However, the 5th Marines succeeded in advancing to Hill 55. Further west, the bulk of the 29th Marines attacked toward Half Moon Hill, successfully reaching its forward slopes but later having to withdraw to more defensive positions overnight. Whaling's 2nd Battalion also mounted relentless assaults on Sugar Loaf, each time suffering heavy losses in repelled attacks. As dusk fell, Japanese planes targeted American shipping, successfully damaging the destroyer Douglas H. Fox. On May 18, tanks played a crucial role in a successful assault on Sugar Loaf, executing a double envelopment while securing the top of the hill. The 2nd Battalion then advanced to Horseshoe Hill, while the remainder of the 29th Marines managed to secure the forward slopes of Half Moon.After a night of sporadic bombardment from enemy artillery and mortars, 3/7 again attempted to gain a foothold on Wana Ridge. During the morning supporting weapons concentrated their fire on the forward slopes and crest of the objective and at noon Company I, followed by a platoon of Company L, jumped off and fought its way to the ridge. The assault troops' gains "were measured in yards won, lost, and then won again." Finally, mounting casualties inflicted by enemy grenade and mortar fire forced Lieutenant Colonel Hurst to pull back his forward elements and consolidate his lines on positions held the previous night. On the right flank of the division front the isolated platoon from Company E of 2/5 was unsuccessful in exploiting its hold on the western slopes of Hill 55. The men were driven to cover by intense enemy fire, and tanks again had to be called upon to supply ammunition and rations to the outpost. During the morning operations the 5th Marines laid protective fire with tanks and assault guns along Wana Ridge to support 3/7's advance. At noon, under cover of this fire, Company F sent one rifle platoon and an attached platoon of engineers into Wana village to use flame throwers and demolitions against the enemy firing positions in the ruins. Numbers of grenade dischargers, machine guns, and rifles were found in Wana and the tombs behind it and destroyed. Further advance into the draw was not feasible until the 7th Marines could occupy the high ground on the eastern end of the ridge and furnish direct supporting fire to troops advancing in the draw below. At 1700 the troops were ordered to return to their lines for the night. n the center, General Bruce pressed his attack deeper into the Shuri defenses, with Coolidge's 3rd Battalion gaining 150 yards along the Ginowan-Shuri highway and Hamilton's 2nd Battalion advancing up to 300 yards toward Ishimmi, although attacks against 110 Meter Hill and Flattop failed to gain ground. On the morning of 18 May, orders were given to stay at all costs. Lieutenant Bell said firmly, "We stay." The men resigned themselves to a last-ditch stand. Their grenades exhausted and their machine guns and mortars destroyed, the remaining men salvaged every clip of ammunition from the bandoleers of the dead. Spare workable rifles were loaded and bayonets laid alongside. Enemy pressure increased steadily during the day. Some Americans were shot at close range as they darted from hole to hole to escape grenades. At one time eight knee mortars were pounding the ridge, firing in pairs. Friendly artillery could to some extent keep off the charging Japanese but seemed unable to ferret out the enemy mortars, which were well protected. The moans of wounded men, many of whom were in pitiful condition from lack of water and of medical aid, added to the strain. All canteens had been emptied the previous night. Nevertheless, battle discipline remained excellent. The worst problem concerned the replacements, who were courageous but inexperienced. Thrust suddenly into a desperate situation, some of them failed at crucial moments. One man saw two Japanese attacking a sergeant thirty feet away, but his finger froze on the trigger. Another shouted wildly for a comrade to shoot some Japanese while his own rifle lay in his hands. Another saw an enemy soldier a few yards from his hole, pulled the trigger, and discovered that he had forgotten to reload. By the end of the ordeal, however, the replacements who survived were battle-hardened veterans. During the afternoon the 307th attempted to reinforce the small group. Elements of Company C tried to cross the open ground north of Ishimmi Ridge. Only the commander and five men reached Company E. The men scrambled safely into foxholes, but the commander, shot through the head while racing toward the command post, fell dead on the parapet of the command post foxhole. Spirits rose considerably when word came later in the afternoon that a litter-bearing unit of eighty men would try to get through in the evening. Enemy fire slackened after dark, and the first of the litter bearers arrived at about 2200. They immediately started back carrying casualties. Walking wounded accompanied them. The litter bearers moved swiftly and managed to avoid being seen in the light of flares. Through splendid discipline and good luck eighteen men were carried out in two and a half hours, and others walked out. The litter teams had brought some water and ammunition and the troops drank for the first time since the day before. The second sleepless night on the ridge passed. The 382nd Regiment continued to face heavy resistance from Oboe Hill but managed to secure the road cut between Flattop and Dick Hill. Meanwhile, Halloran's 3rd Battalion could only push about 400 yards south due to the relentless mortar and small-arms fire coming from Hogback Ridge. At sea, a low-flying kamikaze aircraft struck LST-808 off Iejima, resulting in the deaths of 17 men. The following day, while the 382nd and 383rd Regiments focused on neutralizing the cave positions and gun emplacements in the uneven terrain between Conical and Dick Hills, Halloran's 3rd Battalion launched an attack to the south and west toward Sugar Hill but made little progress due to the heavy defensive fire. In the center, the 307th Regiment systematically worked to eliminate enemy firing positions on the high ground in front of them, employing every available weapon for the task. Colonel Smith's rehabilitated 306th Regiment began moving up to replace the battered 305th, with its 3rd Battalion relieving Coolidge's 3rd Battalion and portions of Hamilton's 2nd Battalion along the low ground bordering the highway to Shuri, including the isolated men at Ishimmi Ridge.  On 19 May the enemy seemed to intensify his efforts to recapture Ishimmi Ridge. The besieged troops wondered whether his supply of men and ammunition was inexhaustible. The Japanese launched several attacks which were repulsed with great difficulty. Only the support of artillery and mortars, together with self-propelled mounts firing with precision on both flanks of Ishimmi Ridge, prevented the enemy from making an attack in strength which would have overrun the American positions. One enemy attack of platoon strength was dispersed by mortar and machine-gun fire and by a four-battalion time-on-target artillery concentration. Japanese mortar fire continued to fall on Ishimmi, however, and took its toll during the day. A message arrived during the morning that Company E would be relieved that evening. By noon the radio had become so weak that further communication with the company was impossible. The day wore slowly on. By 2100 there was still no sign of the relief. Shortly afterward, however, rifle fire intensified to the rear, a sign of activity there. At 2200 Company L, 3d Battalion, 306th Infantry, arrived. The relief was carried out in pitch darkness; each member of Company E left as soon as a replacement reached his position. As the haggard survivors were about to descend the ridge at 0300, a bursting shell hit two of the newcomers; one of them had to be evacuated on a poncho. Carrying its own wounded, Company E followed a white tape to the rear and arrived safely. Of the 204 officers and men of the reinforced company that had made the night attack on Ishimmi, 156 had been killed or wounded. There were 28 privates, 1 noncommissioned officer, and 2 officers left of the original 129 members of Company E. The platoon sent in relief by Company C had gone out with 58 effectives and returned with 13. Of the 17 men in the heavy weapons section only 4 came back. Company E had spearheaded a several-hundred-yard advance toward Shuri, however, and with the help of supporting weapons had killed hundreds of Japanese around Ishimmi. The 7th Marines launched one last unsuccessful assault on Wana Ridge before being relieved by Colonel Mason's rested 1st Marines. Meanwhile, after repelling a strong night counterattack, the exhausted 29th Marines were also relieved by Colonel Shapley's reserve 4th Marines, which made additional advances alongside the 22nd Marines, now under Colonel Harold Roberts. Four new regiments had been committed over the past few days to revitalize the offensive. On May 20, Shapley's assault battalions gained more ground on Horseshoe Hill but were still unable to reach the crest of Half Moon, though they successfully repelled another strong night counterattack. To the east, Mason's 2nd Battalion advanced rapidly to the base of 110 Meter Hill and captured part of Wana Ridge, while his 3rd Battalion secured a firm hold on the northern slope. Concurrently, the 5th Marines attacked southwest along the Naha-Shuri Road and successfully captured the high ground. Meanwhile, in coordination with the 1st Marines, Coolidge's 1st Battalion and Smith's 3rd Battalion made a slow, grinding advance of about 150 yards, positioning themselves within 200 yards of the outskirts of Shuri in the highway valley. At the same time, the 382nd Regiment expanded its hold on the reverse slope of Dick Hill but remained unable to penetrate Oboe Hill. The 307th Regiment consolidated and expanded its positions around Chocolate Drop, finally seizing Flattop. Reducing the tiny hill continued to be ticklish work because enemy positions to the south still overlooked the area. The fighting was still so confused that three wounded Americans lay south of Chocolate Drop for two days before relief arrived. By that time two had died and the third was so delirious that he thought he was still fighting Japanese and had to be forcibly subdued. By 20 May the caves were completely sealed off. The enemy made a final attempt to retake Chocolate Drop, attacking in company strength, but was repelled with the loss of half his force. On the same day the 3d Battalion, using tanks, flame throwers, and demolition teams, finally secured the crest of Flattop. The final American attack started with a saturation shower of grenades. A chain of men extending from the base of Flattop passed hand grenades to the troops lined up along the crest, who threw the missiles as fast as they could pull out the pins. Having seized the advantage, the infantry moved down the reverse slope blasting caves with satchel charges and flame throwers. Tanks along the road cut accounted for many of the Japanese. BY 1545 Flattop had fallen. More than 250 enemy bodies lay on the crest and reverse slope of the hill. Further east, Halloran's 3rd Battalion made a slow but steady advance down the eastern slopes of Hogback, reaching the foot of Sugar Hill despite constant grenade duels with an enemy fighting desperately to hold every inch of ground. Additionally, the 1st and 2nd Battalions of the 383rd Regiment fought their way to jump-off positions within 300 yards of Love Hill, destroying enemy strongpoints that had obstructed their advance for a week. Meanwhile, back at sea, Japanese aircraft managed to damage two destroyers and three transports. The following day, the 383rd again attacked Love Hill but was ultimately forced to withdraw from its base due to fierce defensive fire. Despite this setback, May's 2nd Battalion successfully supported the 381st Regiment in clearing Hogback and pushing to the top of Sugar Hill. To the west, the 382nd advanced quickly against moderate opposition toward Oboe Hill and Hen Hill, encountering retreating enemy units moving toward the high ground at Shuri. Concurrently, the 307th pushed 350 yards south of Flattop before being halted by enemy forces at the Three Sisters, while the 306th completed the relief of the 305th, with its 3rd Battalion advancing 200 yards unopposed to the eastern slopes of 110 Meter Hill. Meanwhile, the 1st Marines continued their assault along Wana Ridge, making only limited gains at the Draw, where the 5th Marines held out and aggressively patrolled forward. The 4th Marines began their push toward the Asato River, achieving a costly advance of about 200 yards on Horseshoe. By nightfall, heavy rains began to fall, significantly impeding efforts to resupply assault troops and replenish forward ammunition dumps. Amidst this torrential downpour on May 22, Shapley's 1st and 3rd Battalions slogged through the "gooey slick mud" to reach the bank of the rain-swollen river. This prompted the Japanese to evacuate Naha and establish new defensive positions on the Kokuba Hills. To the east, the continuous rain flooded Wana Draw with mud and water, transforming it into a makeshift lake. For the next few days, General Del Valle's Marines were forced to attack without support, leading to aggressive patrolling rather than organized assaults. The prospects of success for the infantry alone, slogging through the mud without the support of other arms, were not encouraging. Tanks bogged down, helplessly mired. Amphibian tractors were unable to negotiate the morass, and front-line units, which had depended on these vehicles for carrying supplies forward in bad weather, now had to resort to hand carrying of supplies and of the wounded. These were back breaking tasks and were performed over areas swept by enemy fire. Mortar and artillery smoke was used as far as possible to give concealment for all movement. Litter cases were carried back through knee-deep mud. Living conditions of front-line troops were indescribably bad. Foxholes dug into the clay slopes caved in from the constant soaking, and, even when the sides held, the holes had to be bailed out repeatedly. Clothes and equipment and the men's bodies were wet for days. The bodies of Japanese killed at night lay outside the foxholes, decomposing under swarms of flies. Sanitation measures broke down. The troops were often hungry. Sleep was almost impossible. The strain began to take a mounting toll of men. Under these conditions the Marine attack against Wana Ridge was soon at a standstill. The action degenerated into what was called in official reports "aggressive patrolling." Despite inactivity, enemy mortar and artillery fire continued to play against the American front lines, especially at dusk and at night. In the center, Bruce's 77th Division faced similar challenges, with the 306th Regiment stalled and the 307th Regiment again unsuccessfully attacking the Three Sisters. There, Company A became isolated at the base of the forward slope of Jane Hill, nearly cut off by intense enemy mortar and machine-gun fire. For the following week, the 382nd Regiment struggled to make headway on Hen and Oboe Hills, where fierce hand-to-hand combat erupted. Similarly, all attempts by the 383rd Regiment to breach the defenses of Love Hill on the western side of Conical failed, as the 381st was also unable to make any progress against Cutaway. General Hodge had also moved General Arnold's rehabilitated 7th Division to assembly areas just north of Conical Hill to spearhead the advance toward Yonabaru and the high ground south of the village. Strengthened by 1,691 replacements and 546 men returned to duty from hospitals since it left the lines on 9 May, the 7th Division moved up to forward assembly areas just north of Conical Hill and prepared to make the dash through the corridor. At 1900 on 21 May the 184th Infantry, chosen by General Arnold to lead the way, was in place at Gaja Ridge, at the northern base of Conical. The initial move of the envelopment was to be made in the dead of the night and in stealth. General Buckner felt that "if the 7th can swing round, running the gauntlet, it may be the kill." As part of this operation, the 2nd Battalion of the 184th Regiment moved out from Gaja Ridge during the night, swiftly and silently passing through Yonabaru in the early morning hours to capture Spruce Hill and Chestnut Hill in a surprise attack. Colonel Green's 3rd Battalion then followed the 2nd Battalion through Yonabaru, but their assault on Juniper and Bamboo Hills was unsuccessful as the surprised defenders regrouped. The following day, Green's two battalions continued to push toward these initial objectives, ultimately securing a solid line that stretched from the coastline across the southern slopes of Chestnut, and then over to Juniper and Bamboo by day's end. This success allowed Colonel Finn's 32nd Regiment to pass through Yonabaru and advance westward along the Naha-Yonabaru valley to assault the enemy's western hill defenses focused around Oak Hill.On the west coast, after a successful night reconnaissance of the Asato River, the 4th Marines rapidly crossed the river under cover of smoke, beginning their advance toward a low ridge 500 yards south of the Asato. However, as previously noted, the torrential rain had turned every draw and gully into a sticky morass of knee- and thigh-deep mud in the center. The steep slopes of the hills and ridges, treacherous under the best of conditions, became virtually unassailable. Consequently, full-scale coordinated attacks had to be canceled, and only localized gains could be achieved. Despite the breakthrough in the center, the Japanese command remained concerned about the threat posed to the flanks of the Shuri bastion by American advances along both coasts. While they believed the Naha breakthrough could be contained, every available soldier was deployed to establish a defensive line stretching from the southwest slopes of Conical Hill through Yonawa to the road junction village of Chan, aiming to eliminate Arnold's spearhead that had penetrated into the Naha-Yonabaru valley. General Ushijima feared that his forces were being gradually encircled in the Shuri fortress, where they would become “easy prey” to overwhelming American firepower. In light of this situation, Ushijima began planning a withdrawal to the Chinen Peninsula or the southernmost part of the island, the Kiyamu Peninsula. This decision was met with resistance from General Fujioka, who expressed concern that thousands of severely wounded men would have to be abandoned during the retreat.  Although the holding of the heights surrounding the city had been the keystone of the Japanese preferred plan, several factors now militated against its retention. There were an estimated 50000 surviving officers and men to be crammed into a final defense zone less than a mile in diameter. Once these troops were surrounded, the Japanese believed that they would be rendered ineffectual and become "easy prey" to overwhelming American fire superiority. In addition, Japanese long-range artillery pieces, many of which were still intact, could not be effectively utilized within the limited space that would be available. The best chance of prolonging the battle for Okinawa seemed to rest in defending the Kiyamu Peninsula region which was dominated by the Yaeju Dake-Yuza Dake Escarpment. Natural and artificial caves, sufficient to accommodate the whole of the surviving army, abounded in the area. The 24th Division, which had organized the terrain, had left a considerable amount of ammunition and weapons there when it moved north to the Shuri lines. The principal roads in southern Okinawa led directly to the proposed position, thus facilitating the movement of large bodies of men in the shortest possible time. These roads also gave American tanks an excellent route of advance, but only to the outposts of the defensive zone where cliffs, hills, and precipitous ridges barred the way. To add weight to his argument, General Amamiya indicated that his 24th Transport Regiment had preserved enough trucks to move the Shuri munitions reserve to the new position within five nights if weather conditions permitted. General Ushijima, after considering the respective positions of his staff and commanders, decided to order the move to Kiyamu.  Although General Suzuki preferred the Chinen Peninsula, which his brigade had fortified, most officials supported a move to the Kiyamu Peninsula, where Amamiya's 24th Division had previously established defenses in the natural and artificial caves of the Yaeju Dake-Yuza Dake Escarpment. Thus, transportation of wounded personnel and munitions reserves to the south commenced at midnight on May 23, with the bulk of the 32nd Army scheduled to begin their withdrawal six days later.  On the night of 25 May, the remnants of the 62d Division were to pull out of the Shuri line and move through Tsukasan to counterattack the Americans. The relatively strong 22d Independent Infantry Battalion, which had been in reserve throughout most of the fighting in April and May, was directed to hold the Shuri front in place of the division. The orders to General Fujioka were "to annihilate the enemy rushing from the Yonabaru area." Failing this, the division was at least to stop the American advance long enough to allow the main body of the Thirty-second Army to retire. In order to gain time to organize the new positions, the holding force left on the Shuri front was to fight on until 31 May. Withdrawing units were to leave behind strong rearguards which would defend a line along the Kokuba Gawa to the hills north of Tsukasan and Chan and then south through Karadera to the east coast until the night of 2 June. Then a second line centered on Tomusu, approximately 2,000 yards farther south, would be held until the night of 4 June. By that time the Thirty-second Army would be firmly set up within its Itoman-Yunagusuku-Gushichan outpost zone. Admiral Ota's naval force was directed to hold the west flank of the withdrawal corridor and begin its own retreat when ordered by 32nd Army. During the night, Admiral Ugaki initiated his seventh mass Kikisui attack, launching 165 kamikaze aircraft that inflicted only light damage on landing craft. On May 24, while engineers constructed a bridge over the Asato River to facilitate vehicle movement, the 4th Marines suffered heavy casualties as they attempted to advance through the muddy, flooded valley and low clay hills. Simultaneously, Shepherd's Reconnaissance Company crossed the lower Asato and roamed the streets of northwestern Naha without encountering any resistance. To the east, Dill's 1st Battalion faced a brutal counterattack that inflicted significant casualties and nearly drove the Americans from Oboe Hill. Following Ushijima's directives, the 32nd and 184th Regiments began to encounter increasing resistance as they sought to expand their control over the valley and the high ground to the south. This culminated in a series of aggressive nighttime counterattacks that ultimately slowed and halted the western advance of the 7th Division. During the night, Japanese forces conducted heavy raids on American airfields at Kadena, Yontan, and Iejima. However, these attacks were merely a diversion for Operation Gi-Gou, a suicide raid against Kadena and Yontan. In this operation, twelve Ki-21 heavy bombers, carrying Giretsu Kuteitai special airborne assault troops, aimed to crash land on the airfields to deploy commandos tasked with destroying aircraft stationed there.  After the start of B-29 attacks on Tokyo from bases in the Mariana Islands, the 1st Raiding Brigade of the Teishin Shudan was ordered to form a commando unit for a "special operations" mission to attack and destroy the bombers on the Aslito Airfield on Saipan. Captain Okuyama Michiro, commander of the brigade's engineering company and trained in sabotage and demolition was selected as mission leader. He selected an additional 126 men from his own team, the 4th Company of the 1st Raiding Regiment, to form the first Giretsu Airborne Unit. It was initially organized with a command section and five platoons and one independent squad, based at the Imperial Japanese Army's air academy at Saitama. The group unit also included eight intelligence officers and two radio men from the Nakano School. Giretsu operations were to be undertaken at night, beginning with air strikes by bombers. After this, commando units would be inserted onto the target airfield by crash landing their transports. The fact that there was no provision for extraction of the strike force, along with the rejection of surrender in Japanese military doctrine at the time, meant that the Giretsu ground operations were effectively suicide attacks. Though the Saipan attack was eventually cancelled, the 6th Air Army ultimately requested the deployment of the Giretsu Special Forces to neutralize the Okinawa airfields. The 6th Air Army accordingly began preparations for the attack in early May. Led by Captain Okuyama, the raid force moved from Nishitsukuba to Kumamoto as it continued to prepare for the assault, codenamed Operation Gi-Gou. Aircraft for the raid came from the 3rd Independent Air Unit based in the vicinity of Hamamatsu. The raid force consisted of 120 commandos broken up into a headquarters section and five flights, each containing twenty men. They were to be transported by twelve Mitsubishi Ki-21s stripped of their guns and with additional forward and rear exits added to assist raiders with exiting. The timing of the raid was also meant to coincide with the withdrawal of the 32nd Army from the Shuri Line in southern Okinawa. Of the twelve bombers dispatched, four encountered engine trouble and returned to base, while three were intercepted by American night fighters en route to Okinawa. The remaining five Ki-21 bombers approached Yontan Airfield at low altitude and engaged Marine anti-aircraft gunners from the 1st Provisional Anti-aircraft Artillery Group. As a result, four of the bombers were shot down or crash-landed; however, a small number of Giretsu commandos survived this wave and commenced their mission to attack aircraft on the airfield. The fifth bomber, however, successfully evaded anti-aircraft fire and belly-landed approximately 100 meters from the control tower. About 10 commandos disembarked and attacked aircraft and air personnel with grenades. In the ensuing chaos, the Japanese commandos killed two Americans, wounded 18, destroyed nine aircraft, damaged 29 more, and set a fuel dump ablaze, destroying 70,000 gallons of aviation gasoline. After twelve hours of mayhem, however, American troops hunted down the commandos and exterminated them to a man. Despite this partial success, the Japanese operation occurred against a backdrop of heavy losses, with American fighters and anti-aircraft fire claiming a total of 150 Japanese planes on May 24. During the course of three days, Ugaki committed a total of 387 Navy planes and 174 Army planes to his kamikaze attacks, which continued through May 25. These attacks successfully sank the destroyer Bates, one transport, and one landing craft, while further damaging two destroyers, one destroyer minesweeper, one minesweeper, one transport, and one Liberty ship. On the same day, Admiral Rawlings' Task Force 57 launched its final strikes in the Okinawa area before retiring late on May 25, having completed the Royal Navy's Iceberg mission. On land, while Shepherd's Reconnaissance Company occupied the deserted ruins of Naha, the 4th Marines fought to seize Machisi Ridge and continued pushing into the eastern outskirts of Naha. However, across the remainder of the 10th Army front, assault units struggled to make progress due to the havoc wreaked by the rain and the stiffened Japanese resistance. That night, in accordance with the withdrawal plan, the 62nd Division began moving its remaining 3,000 men to counter the advance of the 7th Division, hoping to delay the American advance long enough for the main body of the 32nd Army to retreat. The arrival of additional forces on the Ozato-Mura front had little significant impact, primarily serving to strengthen the covering and holding force. On May 26, the 184th Regiment successfully cleared the Hemlock-Locust Hill Escarpment. Meanwhile, the 32nd Regiment was brought nearly to a standstill in front of the Japanese defensive line across the Yonabaru valley. Looking west, Del Valle's Marines observed large numbers of enemy troops withdrawing from Shuri and were able to pinpoint their location for naval guns, artillery, and aircraft to bombard. However, despite penetrating the Shuri defensive line on both flanks, the day yielded minimal progress. At sea, further kamikaze attacks caused damage to one destroyer, one destroyer minesweeper, and a subchaser. In total, Ugaki's raids over the past three days resulted in the deaths of 103 sailors.  Believing the fast carriers' continued value off Okinawa had become dubious, back on May 18 Mitscher had requested that TF 58 be relieved from its Okinawa station. Spruance regretfully declined. A week later an increasingly weary Mitscher reported: “For two and a half months [Task Force 58] operated daily in a 60nm square area East of Okinawa, less than 350nm from Kyushu. This was necessitated by the restricted area available and the necessity for being able to cover [the] Amami Gunto airfields, intercept air raids before they could reach Okinawa, and still furnish air support to ground forces. There was no other location from which all these things could be done.” Reflecting on the months of unrelenting stress, tedium, and fatigue, TG 58.1's screen commander, Captain Tom Hederman, signaled Rear Admiral J.J. Jocko Clark: “See Hebrews 13, verse 8.” Consulting his Bible aboard Hornet, Clark read: “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and forever.” Amused, Clark forwarded the verse to his entire Task Group, adding, “No disrespect intended.” Clark then signaled Mitscher, “What the hell are we doing out here, anyway?” Mitscher's response: “We are a highspeed stationary target for the Japanese air force.” Indeed, TF 58 had already suffered over 2,000 Iceberg fatalities. I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. The brutal Battle of Okinawa was reaching a critical point as General Buckner's forces pressed against fierce Japanese defenses. Struggles unfolded over Sugar Loaf Hill and Wana Ridge, with Marines suffering heavy casualties but slowly gaining ground. By late May, the dire situation prompted Japanese commanders to plan a retreat to more defensible positions as American forces closed in. Despite challenging conditions, the Allies pushed forward, marking a decisive breakthrough in the Pacific War.

In Pacific Waves today: Two deaths in Tonga caused by dengue fever; Solomon Islands parliament adjourned until next week; Mariana Islands draws renewed attention from US military; NZ police providing assistance in Bougainville for 20 years. Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details

The real reason Wikileaks founder and self-styled freedom fighter Julian Assange was in self-imposed custody. Find out more about The Front podcast here. You can read about this story and more on The Australian's website or on The Australian’s app. This episode of The Front is presented by Claire Harvey, produced by Kristen Amiet and edited by Josh Burton with Jasper Leak. Our team includes Tiffany Dimmack, Lia Tsamoglou and Stephanie Coombes and our original music is composed by Jasper Leak. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Part I of a two-part conversation with Jermy Uolo, who was born and raised on the island of Fais in the State of Yap, in the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM). He received his bachelors degree from University of Hawai`i at Hilo and served as a conservationist for the Watershed Alliance in Hawai`i, the Mauna Kea Forest Restoration Project and is the President of the Micronesians United – Big Island (MU-BI) organization in Hawai`i. His knowledge spans the remote atols of his home state, to Guam, Palau, the Mariana Islands and beyond. He shares with us the prehistory and the recent immigration, military and colonial struggles in places like the Marshall Islands, and the challenge of preserving cultural practices and knowledge.

Emissions from anesthesia are one of the largest sources of greenhouse gases from hospitals. This anesthesiologist wants to change that. And, a cultural anthropologist discusses the Mariana Islands' long history of colonization and why demilitarization matters for climate progress.A Major Source Of Greenhouse Gases In Hospitals? AnesthesiaDid you know that some of the gases used in anesthesia are strong greenhouse gases? A few years ago, Seattle Children's Hospital analyzed its carbon footprint and found that the gases used in anesthesia made up about 7% of the hospital's total emissions, right behind emissions from heating and power and those from commuting.Faced with this problem, Dr. Elizabeth Hansen, a pediatric anesthesiologist at Seattle Children's, took matters into her own hands and slashed the operating room's emissions. She now helps other hospitals do the same with Project Spruce.Guest host Anna Rothschild talks with Dr. Hansen about how and why she took on the problem.Militarization And Environmental Injustice In The Mariana IslandsLet's take a trip to the Northern Mariana Islands, a string of islands in the Pacific just north of Guam. The islands were sites of major battles during World War II and were captured by the United States in 1944. The US established a military presence across the territory—including building the world's largest air force base at the time, on an island called Tinian.The US military never left, and in the 1980s, the Northern Mariana Islands became a US territory. A few years ago, the Pentagon proposed building a bombing range on an island called Pagan, but residents of the islands pushed back.Dr. Isa Arriola is a cultural anthropologist at Concordia University in Montreal and co-founder of the organization Our Common Wealth 670, based in Saipan, the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands. She's fought back against the militarization of her home islands, and she talks with guest host Anna Rothschild about how the military presence has affected the people and environment of the Marianas, and why demilitarization needs to be part of climate action.Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

The Daily Quiz - Geography Today's Questions: Question 1: What is the capital city of Sierra Leone? Question 2: Which country's flag can be described as 'Blue with a red cross outlined in white extending to the edges.'? Question 3: In which country would you find the UNESCO World Heritage site of Petra? Question 4: What is the name of the highest mountain in Japan? Question 5: What is the capital city of Kiribati? Question 6: What is the largest of the Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory located in the western Pacific Ocean? Question 7: Which of these countries borders Cameroon? Question 8: From what country did the U.S. buy the Virgin Islands in 1917? Question 9: What does the flag of United States look like? This podcast is produced by Klassic Studios Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We the People of This Show Has Everything, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare…you know the rest, maybe! With the 2024 campaign in full swing, TSHE is talking politics this week! What's our political history? Are we engaged citizens? Apathetic? Somewhere in the middle? And how many political offices did Bobby hold in high school?In small talk, Hillary is forced to be an involved parent. We also discuss the various states and territories we still need to visit. A trek to the Mariana Islands, anyone?TSHE RecommendsBatman: Caped CrusaderWhy Is This Happening: What Would a Fair Society Look Like? with Daniel ChandlerConnect with the show!This is your show, too. Feel free to drop us a line, send us a voice memo, or fax us a butt to let us know what you think.Facebook group: This Show Has EverythingFax Bobby Your Butt: 617-354-8513 Feedback form: www.throwyourphone.com Email: tsheshow@gmail.comAOL Keyword: TSHE

Last time we spoke about the fall of Guam and actions in New Guinea. General Shepherd's Marines had secured the Orote Peninsula, while General Turnage's Marines pushed the Japanese northwards. General Bruce's 77th Division prepared for an eastward assault, and engineers attempted, but failed, to build a supply road to Yona. Geiger's offensive began on July 31, with Marines quickly capturing Agaña and advancing despite dense jungle and resistance. The 77th Division faced tough terrain but liberated 2,000 Guamanians. The push north continued, facing logistical challenges and mined roads. By August 7th, coordinated attacks cleared key areas, culminating in the defeat of remaining Japanese forces by August 11. Guam was back in American hands although scattered Japanese forces continued guerrilla warfare until the war's conclusion. Thus the Marianas campaign had finally come to a conclusion, and now the allies were adding more bass of operation to hit the Japanese home islands.  This episode is the Fall of Myitkyina Welcome to the Pacific War Podcast Week by Week, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about world war two? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on world war two and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel you can find a few videos all the way from the Opium Wars of the 1800's until the end of the Pacific War in 1945.  This week we are diving back over to the northern Burma front. Despite holding Myitkyina through a rainy, muddy summer-long siege, by late July, the Japanese had been gradually cornered into a small perimeter, cut off from all supply lines and running short on ammunition. The situation worsened due to a leadership crisis, between the two Japanese leaders was a matter of semantics. Colonel Maruyama of the 114th Regiment who was in charge of the defense of the city, interpreted his orders to “facilitate the future operations of 33rd Army ‘by securing the vital areas in the vicinity of Myitkyina',” as a call to defend the city street-by-street, house-by-house. When General Minakami of the 56th Division arrived, he pointed out that all Maruyama had to do to satisfy his orders was simply to continue to deny the Allies access to the Ledo-Kamaing road. Minakami thus found himself in a rather difficult position in regard to the command of the Myitkyina Garrison. Maruyama had conducted an excellent defense, was fully familiar with the situation and, because of his position as former commander, exercised considerable authority. Shortly after Minakami's assumption of command, General Honda asked how long Myitkyina could stand. Minakami replied that the garrison might be able to hold out for as long as two months. A few days later, Honda was surprised to receive a second message stating, "The Myitkyina Garrison finds it difficult to hold with the poor defense facilities and meager supplies of ammunition." The Army staff concluded that the first message was undoubtedly Minakami's personal opinion as it reflected his determined character and that the second message incorporated the views of Maruyama who was more cognizant of the actual situation. In order that there should be no doubt as to the importance of holding Myitkyina, Honda sent the following message, "Maj. Gen. Minakami will defend Myitkyina to the death” — a message sent with deep regret and sadness according to the staff officers who wrote and dispatched the order. Heavy casualties had reduced the Japanese forces from around 3,000 to fewer than 1,500, further weakening the garrison's defensive capabilities. This number included the heavily wounded and hospital patients, who could only be evacuated by drifting down the Irrawaddy River on rafts, often intercepted by the unforgiving Kachin Levies. On July 24, eight rafts and a boat laden with Japanese were attacked on the Irrawaddy by Kachins of the OSS Detachment 101. Twenty-four Japanese were killed, two captured, and then it was learned these were hospital patients fleeing Myitkyina. Three more Japanese seized by friendly Burmans revealed that hospital patients were being evacuated by the simple expedient of letting them drift down the river on rafts. As these fierce defenders began to falter, General Wessels felt ready to launch his final push. Reinforced by the 149th and 90th Regiments, the American-Chinese forces made daily gains of several hundred yards during the last days of July, though at a significant cost. As the Japanese-held area shrank, counterattacks became less dynamic, captured positions were less fortified, and many Japanese dead were found to be severely wounded men returned to the line. Unbeknownst to the Americans, the desperate defenders had requested a withdrawal to the east by the end of the month. Though Minakami had intended to fight to the last, he ultimately agreed to preserve his men's lives. On the night of August 1, the Japanese began their escape, crossing the Irrawaddy east of the town. Weighing the many evidences that control of the situation was rapidly passing into their hands, Wessels and his colleagues drafted a new plan of attack. It included an ingenious device, credited to General Pan Yu-kun of the 50th Division. A raiding party, formed into fifteen heavily armed sections, was organized and briefed on infiltrating Japanese lines facing the 50th Division. Having made its way through the Japanese lines in darkness, it was to remain hidden until 0430 when the 50th would assault while the raiders spread confusion behind the Japanese lines. Meanwhile, air reconnaissance revealed many rafts moored against the Irrawaddy within the Japanese lines. "At 0300 hours (3 August), when the moon went down and rain and thunder set in, the raiding party of the 50th Division moved out. The approach was detected only once and some shots were fired at the raiders, who hit the ground. The Chinese did not return fire however, and after laying low for a while, moved out again quietly and cautiously." While the raiders created confusion behind Japanese lines, the 50th Division launched a full attack, quickly overwhelming the remaining enemy positions and capturing 187 prisoners, thus securing Myitkyina for the Chinese. However, about 800 Japanese managed to escape eastward and later rejoined their allies. Minakami was not among them. As the 3rd of August meandered on in a haze of gunfire, blood and rain, Minakami went to sit with his back against a tree. There came the sound of a pistol shot. Japanese officers nearby sprinted to the scene. The general's orderly was in tears. They found Minakami's body erect against the tree trunk, facing northeast, towards Japan. The ten-week siege resulted in approximately 3,000 Japanese killed or captured; 972 Chinese killed, 3,184 wounded, and 188 evacuated due to illness; and 272 Americans killed, 955 wounded, and 980 evacuated sick. Overall, the total American-Chinese casualties in 1944 amounted to 13,618 Chinese and 1,327 American casualties. A week later, the Galahad Unit, reduced to only 130 combat-effective men from the original 2,997, was disbanded. The fall of Myitkyina was General Stilwell's greatest victory, earning him a promotion to full general on August 1, two days before the city fell. The attack was costly in terms of suffering and losses, but the Mogaung-Myitkyina area was a significant prize. It allowed Ledo Road builders and American transport planes to move to Myitkyina and enabled ground forces to link up with other Chinese forces in neighboring Yunnan. As the fighting moved further south down the Hukawng and Mogaung valleys, it became safer for transports to use the lower, more southerly routes to China. This, in turn, increased Hump deliveries to China from 13,686 tons in May to 18,235 tons in June and 25,454 tons in July.  While the Allies celebrated victories in northern Burma, the situation in China was dire as the Ichi-Go offensive resulted in many Chinese casualties. By August 1, General Yokoyama had amassed 110,000 troops around Hengyang, equipped with five heavy artillery pieces, fifty mountain artillery pieces, and 40,000 shells. Conversely, General Fang's resilient defenders had dwindled to 3,000 exhausted troops, with their defenses largely destroyed. General Xue Yue's reinforcements had failed to reach Hengyang, leaving the Chinese forces to rely on the 46th Army to launch an attack along the railway. On August 4, Yokoyama initiated his main offensive. The 68th and 116th Divisions launched a significant assault from the south and southwest, while the 58th Division quietly positioned itself near the enemy's northern defenses. Initially, progress was slow. However, by August 5, Yokoyama's forces had captured Yoping and School Hill. The next day, the 116th Division secured part of the city's defenses. On August 6, the 58th Division breached the city walls from the north, forcing Fang to redeploy troops to counter this new threat. Intense street fighting broke out on August 7 as the defenders valiantly tried to repel the Japanese attacks. By nightfall, the 68th Division had overrun the southern defenses and entered part of the Walled City. Gradually, enemy troops began to surrender, and before dawn on August 8, after 48 days of fierce resistance, Fang was compelled to surrender. Following the capture of Hengyang, Yokoyama declared the successful completion of the initial phase of Operation Togo and promptly began preparations for the subsequent offensive. In this phase, the Japanese reported casualties of over 3860 killed, 8327 wounded, and 7099 sick, with an estimated Chinese casualty count exceeding 100,000, including 8400 killed and 5000 captured in Hengyang alone. To spearhead the next stage of Operation Togo targeting Guilin and Liuzhou, General Okamura Yasuji's 6th Area Army was established on August 25, comprising the 11th, 23rd, and 34th Armies, along with the 27th, 40th, 64th, and 68th Divisions, alongside additional support units. This allowed General Hata to focus on countering potential American landings on the Chinese coast while Okamura directed the offensives in eastern China. Ahead of this operation, Lieutenant-General Tanaka Hisakazu of the 23rd Army initiated a preliminary offensive in late June, positioning the 23rd Independent Mixed Brigade in the northeastern sector of the Luichow Peninsula, advancing the 22nd Independent Mixed Brigade to the Tanjiang River, securing the Jiangmen area with the 22nd Division, and capturing the Qingyuan sector with the 104th Division. By late August, Yokoyama had deployed six divisions along the Shuangfeng-Leiyang line, poised to eliminate the enemy in the district west of Hengyang. On August 29, he launched the offensive, with over 100,000 troops advancing southwest amidst heavy artillery bombardment. Intense ground and aerial combat ensued, resulting in the loss of 10 Japanese planes and 15 enemy aircraft. Despite fierce resistance from Chinese defenders over three days, their entire line collapsed on September 1, prompting a retreat towards Shaoyang, Qiyang, and Jiahe. However, the Japanese advanced relentlessly, covering nearly 100 kilometers in the following days without pause. By September 5, both Qiyang and Huochangpingzhen had fallen, followed by the seizure of Lingling Airdrome on September 8 by the 3rd Division. Progressing along a north-south axis, Japanese forces secured Shaoyang and Changning, while the 58th Division captured Dongan on the same day. With initial objectives achieved, Yokoyama ordered further pursuit, with the 3rd and 54th Divisions converging in the Quanzhou area by September 14. Meanwhile, Tanaka prepared for his offensive, with the bulk of the 104th Division moving towards Taipingzhen, and a raiding unit conducting a wide envelopment maneuver along the Zhukeng-Huaiji road towards Wuzhou by September 6. Subsequently, the 23rd Brigade began its northward march from Suixi. However, Tanaka's offensive wouldn't commence for a couple of weeks. Turning to the broader context of the Pacific War, General Stilwell celebrated a major victory with the fall of Myitkyina, while General Slim's successful defense against Operation U-Go further bolstered Allied morale in the CBI Theater. In Thailand, Prime Minister Phibun's regime faced a significant crisis as Japan struggled to meet the country's essential import needs, leading to inflation, rationing, shortages, black markets, smuggling, corruption, and profiteering. The anti-Japanese Free Thai underground movement, spearheaded by Regent Pridi Banomyong, infiltrated the government, stoking public discontent against both the Japanese occupiers and Phibun's administration. As a result, following the downfall of the Tojo government, Phibun found himself compelled to step down in late July. For his part, Phibun also was thinking of ways, he claims, to prepare to turn against the Japanese. Part of these preparations included proposals to move the capital to remote Phetchabun, north of Bangkok, and construct a “Buddhist City,” a sort of center for world Buddhism, near Saraburi—both grandiose projects in typically extravagant Phibun style. Moving to the isolated, mountain-ringed Phetchabun, Phibun later argued, would facilitate a Thai uprising against the Japanese. Yet on July 18, the Tojo government in Japan resigned, and only six days later the Thai National Assembly turned down both government bills and forced the resignation of Phibun as prime minister. The deputies in the assembly voted against these plans motivated in part by the fall of Tojo, who was closely associated in their minds with Phibun, in part by their feeling that the war was turning against Japan, and in part by their feeling that Phibun was too closely identified with an authoritarian past that must now be buried for the sake of improving relations with the Allies.  Politician Khuang Aphaiwong then assumed his position as Prime Minister on August 1. Serving as a compromise candidate, he navigated between Phibun's supporters and the opposition while maintaining cooperation with the Japanese and safeguarding Free Thai members who had collaborated with the Allies. Meanwhile, in China, the success of Operation Ichi-Go led to another leadership crisis. Despite the initial rejection of Stilwell commanding troops in China in 1942, the effective Japanese offensive posed a threat of defeat to the Chinese Government, reigniting the debate over command authority. This was especially significant as Chinese troops under Stilwell's command were achieving significant victories in northern Burma. However, Stilwell's vocal criticism of Chiang Kai-Shek's corrupt regime and incompetent generals strained their relationship. Chiang favored General Chennault, who proposed that with a monthly allocation of 10,000 tons for operations in northern China, his 14th Air Force could halt the Japanese offensive. Despite his strained relationship with Chennault, Stilwell redirected Hump allocations to increase the 14th Air Force's allocation to 8,425 tons, although he couldn't secure an additional 1,500 tons from the Matterhorn allocation. Chennault's aircraft managed to disrupt the Japanese advance, but failed to halt it completely. In late June, Stilwell faced criticism when Vice-President Henry Wallace visited Chongqing. While Wallace persuaded Chiang to allow a small American observer mission into Communist territory, he also recommended Stilwell's recall due to his perceived lack of diplomacy and strained relations with the Chinese leadership. Nonetheless, Stilwell maintained the backing of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and President Roosevelt eventually nominated him to lead the China Theater, on the condition that he make every effort to avoid upsetting the Generalissimo. In July, the President attempted to persuade Chiang to accept this arrangement, but the Generalissimo employed various diplomatic maneuvers to reject the proposal, agreeing "in principle" only after an unspecified period for his forces to adjust. He also requested the presence of a presidential representative to facilitate smooth relations between himself and Stilwell. Major-General Patrick Hurley was appointed to this role and arrived in China in August. Concurrently, the Dixie Mission arrived in Yan'an, where over the following months, American observers assessed Communist society, military tactics, and guerrilla operations, issuing reports that commended them and suggested increased collaboration. Following the fall of Hengyang, tensions escalated in China, with rumors swirling about potential coup plans involving Marshall Li Zhongren and General Xue Yue against the Generalissimo. Meanwhile, Chennault urged Stilwell to divert Hump airlift capacity to supply ground forces in eastern China, a move opposed by Chiang, who feared supporting potential insurgents with lend-lease equipment. Stilwell, anticipating his imminent assumption of leadership in the China Theater, refrained from challenging Chiang's stance. With significant developments looming, the intensifying rift between Stilwell and Chiang foreshadowed the downfall of one of them. Elsewhere in the South Pacific, General MacArthur's troops had finished their final offensive in New Guinea and were preparing to return to the Philippines by way of an intermediate stop at Halmahera Island. To the east, Rabaul was completely surrounded, enduring heavy bombardment from Allied air forces. Meanwhile, on Bougainville, the remaining forces of the 17th Army had retreated to the island's southern region, unable to launch further counterattacks. The living conditions of the Japanese soldiers, never good under the best of circumstances, became increasingly desperate. Added to the dangers that forward troops always faced, such as contact with large American combat patrols, was the growing specter of starvation. Sealed off from regular supplies from New Ireland or New Britain, General Hyakutake's army had to depend entirely on its own laborers to acquire food. The normal rice ration of 750 grams of rice for each soldier was cut in April 1944 to 250 grams, and beginning in September there was no rice ration. A large portion of the available army and naval personnel had to be put to work growing food. Allied pilots took delight in dropping napalm on these garden plots whenever possible. The native workers who had been impressed into service were the first to defect, but soon many soldiers also just walked away from their units, taking the chance of surviving in the jungle on what could be gathered. After the failure of the March attack, morale in most units became deplorably low. There were instances, normally unimagined in the Japanese army, of open insubordination and even mutiny. Although General Hyakutake dreamed of a midsummer offensive, it became obvious that no operations as large as that smashed in March could be undertaken for months, if ever. Thus, almost as if by agreement, both sides adopted a defensive posture that minimized the conflict in the no-man's-land between them. In the Central Pacific, significant progress had been made over the past year, marked by the complete capture of the Gilbert, Marshall, and Mariana Islands, strengthening the Allied presence and providing a launching point for future offensives into the heart of the Japanese Empire. The next target for Admiral Nimitz was the Palaus, to be invaded concurrently with Halmahera. However, the architect of this southwestern advance was not Admiral Spruance, who had been overseeing operations with the 5th Fleet. Instead, it was Admiral Halsey's 3rd Fleet, known as the "Department of Dirty Tricks," that had been strategizing the next moves from Hawaii. Now, Admiral Halsey was set to assume command of the Pacific Fleet, leading the charge to the Palaus and the Philippines. This rotation in leadership between Halsey's 3rd Fleet and Spruance's 5th Fleet was orchestrated by Nimitz to maintain operational tempo and confuse the Japanese. The alternating command structure allowed for continuous planning of future operations while the active fleet conducted current ones. However, Tokyo was apprehensive about a potential invasion of the Philippines and sought to bolster its defenses. Following the surrender of the US Army Forces in the Philippines, the 14th Army, led by Lieutenant-General Tanaka Shizuichi, worked to establish military administration, secure cooperation from civilian institutions, and quell guerrilla groups across the countryside. Despite their endeavors, their control over certain regions, particularly in the Visayas and Mindanao, remained fragile. Allied submarines and aircraft from Australia and New Guinea also delivered supplies like signal equipment, weapons, explosives, propaganda materials, and counterfeit currency to support the guerrilla forces, further impeding Japanese efforts. Additionally, with the deteriorating situation in the South and Central Pacific, more troops were redirected from the Philippines' garrison to other areas, weakening the 14th Army, now commanded by Lieutenant-General Kuroda Shigenori since May 19, 1943. Undermanned and stretched thin, the Japanese halted their suppression operations in August, hoping that the imminent declaration of independence by the Second Philippine Republic would lead guerrillas to surrender. However, this strategy backfired, as the guerrillas only grew stronger during the pause. Consequently, Kuroda restarted intensive suppression operations in 1944, but guerrilla activities escalated in anticipation of the imminent liberation by American forces. As a result, the guerrillas gained strength in the following months, providing valuable intelligence to MacArthur's forces in preparation for their eventual return. Given this context, it was evident that the 14th Army would be ill-equipped to withstand an American invasion under the current circumstances. Due to its crucial strategic location bridging Japan and the southern region rich in natural resources, Japan couldn't risk losing the Philippines. It served as their primary rear base supporting the main defense perimeter. The Philippines were also to play the role of a rear base of operations–an assembly and staging area for troops and supplies and a concentration area for air reserves, to support operations at any threatened point on the main defense perimeter from the Marianas south to Western New Guinea and the Banda Sea area. To implement these plans, IGHQ in October 1943 directed the 14th Army to complete the establishment of the necessary base facilities by the spring of 1944. Major emphasis in this program was laid upon the construction of air bases. The Army alone planned to build or improve 30 fields in addition to 13 already in operational use or partially completed. The Navy projected 21 fields and seaplane bases to be ready for operational use by the end of 1944, expanding its total number of Philippine bases to 33. Line of communications and other rear­ area base installations were also to be expanded and improved. Of the 30 Army airfields projected in October 1943, six had been generally completed by May 1944, and 24 under construction. Of the 21 projected Navy fields, 15 were still incomplete by then. Consequently, in early 1944, the decision was made to strengthen the garrison in the Philippines. Initially, this involved reorganizing and expanding existing garrison units to establish four new independent mixed brigades. These brigades were primarily tasked with suppressing guerrilla activity, while infantry divisions were assigned to defend against potential enemy landings. However, despite the estimation that at least seven divisions were necessary for the defense of Luzon, the Visayas, and Mindanao, only the 16th Division was available. Additionally, it was deemed crucial to bolster air strength with at least two air divisions, anticipating Allied invasions in Halmahera and Palau before advancing to the Philippines. Plans were formulated in March to deploy reinforcements within eight months. In mid-May, General Terauchi relocated his headquarters to Manila to oversee operations more closely. Concurrently, efforts were made to transport the 30th Division to Mindanao and bring the 4th Air Army to Manila. Furthermore, the Philippines were reinforced with the 2nd and 4th Air Divisions, the latter being tasked with constructing 30 new airfields. In June, approximately 20,000 inexperienced replacements were transported to the Philippines to bolster the recently-formed independent mixed brigades, filling them up to division strength. Subsequently, in July, the 100th, 102nd, 103rd, and 105th Divisions were activated, along with the establishment of the 54th and 55th Independent Mixed Brigades. It's ironic that despite this reinforcement, the main Japanese forces were as inexperienced as the Philippine Army during MacArthur's defense. Nonetheless, Terauchi was resolute in further fortifying the Philippines to prevent its fall, unlike MacArthur's situation. By mid-July, the reinforced 58th Independent Mixed Brigade arrived at Lingayen. Later that month, the 14th Army underwent reorganization into the 14th Area Army, with units directly under its command tasked with defending the northern Philippines. Meanwhile, the 35th Army, led by Lieutenant-General Suzuki Sosaki, was established under the 14th Area Army to defend Mindanao and the Visayas. Additionally, Tokyo finalized plans for decisive battle operations, codenamed Sho-Go, covering the Philippines-Formosa-Ryukyus-Japan-Kuriles area. This determined the disposition of Army and Navy air forces across the Pacific, with the Philippines receiving the reorganized 1st and 2nd Air Fleets and the 4th Air Army. The Philippine garrison was strengthened to a total of nine divisions and four brigades, with the 1st Division at Shanghai and the 68th Independent Brigade at Formosa designated as general reserves. Defenses and fortifications were constructed at Luzon in preparation for the decisive battle there.  Known as the Combined Fleet Top Secret Operations Order No. 84,  issued on 1 August, this fixed the new tactical grouping of naval forces for the Sho-Go Operations. Almost the entire surface combat strength of the Fleet was included in a Task Force placed under the overall command of the First Mobile Fleet Commander, Vice­Adm. Ozawa Jisaburo. This force was broken down into three tactical groups: (1) the Task Force Main Body, directly commanded by Vice­Adm. Ozawa and consisting of most of the Third Fleet (carrier forces): (2) the First Striking Force, commanded by Vice Adm. Kurita Takeo and made up of the Second Fleet with part of the 10th Destroyer Squadron attached: (3) the Second Striking Force, commanded by Vice Adm. Shima Kiyohide and composed of the Fifth Fleet plus two destroyer divisions and the battleships Fuso and Yamashiro. The First Striking Force would be stationed at Lingga Anchorage, while the Task Force Main Body and the Second Striking Force would be stationed in the western part of the Inland Sea. However, if an enemy attack was expected, the First Striking Force would advance from Lingga Anchorage to Brunei, Coron or Guimaras while the Task Force Main Body and the Second Striking Force remained in the Inland Sea and prepared to attack the north flank of the enemy task force. During August, the Navy Section of Imperial General Headquarters also took action to give the Combined Fleet more unified operational control of naval forces in order to facilitate the execution of the Sho-Go plans. On 9 August the General Escort Command and units assigned to naval stations were placed under operational command of the Combined Fleet, and on 21 August the China Area Fleet was similarly placed under Combined Fleet command. On 10 August the 1st Carrier Division, reorganized around two newly-commissioned regular carriers, was added to the Task Force Main Body. Vice Adm. Ozawa, Task Force Commander, meanwhile set 15 October as the target date for completion of the reorganization and training of the 3d and 4th Carrier Division air groups. Concurrently with these preparations, steps were taken to strengthen the antiaircraft armament of combat units. Accordingly, the Japanese sought to deploy the 8th and 26th Divisions, the 2nd Tank Division, and the 61st Independent Mixed Brigade to the Luzon region for a decisive battle. However, enemy submarines posed a constant threat. Since February, they had been patrolling the South China Sea, targeting the Hi Convoys supplying Japanese territories in Southeast Asia and Japan itself. During these engagements, Admiral Ijuin was killed aboard the patrol boat Iki. Between August 18 and 25, Admiral Kajioka's Hi-71 convoy, carrying the 26th Division, was attacked by six American submarines. The escort carrier Taiyo, destroyers Yunagi and Asakaze, two oilers, four transports, and three kaibokans were sunk, with 7420 soldiers of the 26th Division lost. The submarine Harder was the only American vessel sunk in retaliation. Kajioka's Hi-72 convoy, returning from Luzon, was also attacked, resulting in the sinking of his flagship, the kaibokan Hirato, and the loss of the destroyer Shikinami, three transports, and one oiler. Despite these setbacks, advance units of the 8th Division, 2nd Tank Division, and 61st Independent Mixed Brigade successfully reached the Philippines in September. I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. After months the siege of Myitkyina had finally ended. The Japanese had held out as long as they could, but lack of supplies and rather terrible leadership lost them the fight. Meanwhile, in China, Japanese offensives intensified, challenging Chinese defenses and leadership. It seemed war was coming to the Philippines, where the Japanese prepared to fight to the death.

Hundreds of people gathered at the Bishop Museum on June 15th, 2024 for a ceremony around latte stones taken from the Mariana Islands in the 1920s and 1950s.For this episode of Fanachu some of those who organized and attended the event share their thoughts on the history of these latte and their hopes that they be brought home. This ceremony took place during the 13th Festival of Pacific Arts and Cultures in Hawai'i and also represented a powerful moment of unity amongst Chamorus from across the Marianas and the diaspora. This episode originally aired on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter on June 26, 2024 and was hosted by Michael Lujan Bevacqua. Support the Show.

Find me and the show on social media. Click the following links or search @DrWilmerLeon on X/Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube! Our guest this week, Steve Poikenon can be found at his website here.  FULL TRANSCRIPT: Dr Leon (00:00): Now, usually I start this part of the show with a question or a few questions, but today I have to make a statement. After 13 years of either being held up in the Ecuadorian Embassy in Britain, or being in Belmar Prison in solitary confinement, Julian Assange walks free. Why does this matter what led the Biden administration to finally come to its senses and accept a deal? Why should this matter to you? Announcer (00:42): Connecting the dots with Dr. Wilmer Leon, where the analysis of politics, culture, and history converge. Dr Leon (00:49): Welcome to the Connecting the Dots podcast with Dr. Wilmer Leon. I'm Wilmer Leon. We have a tendency to view current events as though they happen in a vacuum, failing to understand the broader historical context in which most events take place. During each episode, my guests and I have probing, provocative, and in-depth discussions that connect the dots between the events and the broader historical context in which they take place. This enables you to gain a better understanding and to analyze events that impact the global village in which we live. On today's episode. The issue before us is what's the significance of WikiLeaks and what's the impact on the freedom of the press? My guest for today's conversation is the host of AM Wake Up and Slow Newsday, which you can watch live on Rock Fin and Rumble, and you can listen anywhere. Podcasts are served. Steve Poin and Steve, welcome. Steve Poikenon (01:51): Thank you very much, Wilmer. It's good to see you not on the radio, Dr Leon (01:57): Man. Well, I have the perfect face for radio from what they tell me, and it's great to see you to be able to put a face with a voice. We've been talking for a couple years now, and it's finally great to be able to put a face with a voice. So footage tweeted by WikiLeaks, I think Julian Assange's wife showed him walking up the stairs onto an aircraft bound for Sipan in the US administered Mariana Islands. He has agreed to plead guilty to one count under the espionage act of conspiracy to disseminate national defense information. Steve, what were your thoughts when you first heard the news that Julian Assange was free? Steve Poikenon (02:44): I was a little stunned. This is something that we've discussed on and off over the last couple of years, and certainly in the last couple of months there have been substantiated rumors that the Biden Justice Department was preparing some sort of plea deal, whether or not the Assange team was going to accept it. That was the thing that we didn't have any certainty about whatsoever. They obviously have gone forward with accepting the deal. He should be, at this point, touching down or walking into the courtroom in the Marianas Islands says a lot about the state of the US empire that we even have a district courthouse in the Mariana Islands. That's just wild to me to begin with, but from the best that I can tell, and Wilmer, you may correct me if I'm wrong, from the best that I can tell, there's nothing in the initial plea agreement that says Julian won't be allowed near a computer or won't be able to access the internet. (03:51) Can't give speeches or interviews or can't have documentaries made about a situation. So by all accounts, up to this point, it appears that when he walks out of the courtroom later in the next couple of hours, he will be a legitimately free human being, and that is a win in and of itself. I'm a father. I can't imagine being taken away from my kids for making the US government angry and then having to know that they're growing up without me. And so the ability for him to take part in raising his own children, I think is the biggest godsend out of all of this. And then we can get into the implications and the impact that this is going to have on press freedom and citizen journalism and everything else going forward. But the huge win here is that he's no longer an inmate in the Guantanamo Bay of the United Kingdom where he was being held with the worst criminals on the island, having never once committed any crime of any sort of significance that would warrant that cell. Dr Leon (05:12): Do you have any idea in terms of why the Mariana Islands other than is the closest space that will enable him then to go from there to his home of Australia? Steve Poikenon (05:25): I think that was the ultimate deciding factor was proximity to Australia. It's not like the US can't construct a kangaroo court anywhere, and it's not like if they didn't have a different provisional, different courthouse, they wouldn't be going through the same sort of performative motions in the eyes of the Biden administration. I think the guilty plea is the thing that they were looking for, something that they could make at least a political, if not a legal for, and then also to not have it be an election issue going forward. Dr Leon (06:04): And from what I understand, this is not precedent setting because this was the result. This is the outcome of a plea deal. This did not actually come as the result of a trial. Steve Poikenon (06:17): If they would've gone to trial and evidence presented and a conviction was rendered and then upheld by a judge, then it would establish a legal precedent because he pled and pled out to time served for what he'd already done. The only thing that it can be used to set a precedent for is politically, or I guess emotionally or spiritually, where people are more hesitant to approach national security reporting or classified information, talk about it, disseminate any of that. And that is I think the real ultimate goal of not just the Biden administration, but the Trump administration and ultimately the Obama administration from where all of this stems is to redefine journalism in the future. Dr Leon (07:10): I want to read from the paragraph from the Washington Post as they reported out this story, Julian Assange's plea deal, sparks global celebration and condemnation reactions were divided as WikiLeaks. Julian Assange heads to a US Pacific territory to cement a plea deal that could soon set him free. WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange's tentative plea deal with the United States, which could soon bring an end to his years long international legal legal saga, drew celebration and criticism reflecting the divisive nature of his role in obtaining and publishing classified military and diplomatic documents. A couple of things. One is the condemnation side of this. The only folks that I can see that would be condemning this deal are people that are tied to the Trump administration, people that are tied to the Biden administration. I don't understand where they get this idea that there's all this divisiveness and condemnation. Steve Poikenon (08:23): There were the usual, the people you just spoke of, but Mike Pence was one of the loudest. There have been a number of former Trump administration officials and a number of former Obama administration intelligence apparatus and national security apparatus officials who have expressed distaste. This now and again, realize that to be opposed to this means you wanted to see a 50-year-old man, 51-year-old man get effectively tortured to death in a US prison for the rest of his life. That's what being in opposition to this effectively means. The reasoning behind it though is because information is currency. Assange and WikiLeaks were a broker of this information that wasn't part of the sanctioned club, and so Pompeo called them a hostile rogue intelligence agency, non-state intelligence agency. If you are viewed like that amongst the apparatus that's making the national security decisions, it doesn't matter what the end result is, if it's not your wholesale destruction, they're going to be displeased. Dr Leon (09:43): There's another paragraph. While Assange supporters saw him as a courageous whistleblower of government misdeeds, his critics saw him as a self-promoter oblivious to the harm that his leaks might cause, oblivious to the harm that his leaks might cause. There has not been one shred of evidence presented to show that any harm other than embarrassment by Hillary Clinton and some of the other government officials who were identified through these WikiLeaks releases, maybe their egos were damaged. But short of that, there's been no harm. WikiLeaks publication of the Afghan War logs did not obscure the names of Afghan civilians who provided information to the US military and omission that dismayed human rights groups and national security officials. Who are they talking about? Steve? Steve Poikenon (10:49): Okay, so when they say that the harm that they're talking about, it's not just their ego, it's their ability to continue to spy on their friends and allies that was harmed. It was the harm that was done by letting people know what the US government is doing with our tax dollars and our names. But Wim Dr Leon (11:07): Steve, it's not as though the allies did not know that they were being spied on. Remember what happened with Bill Clinton and Angela Merkel's? I think it was the Clinton administration and Angela Merkel's cell phone. I mean, it's not as though we don't know. We don't know Israel. It's not as though we don't know that Israel is spying on us. I mean, it's the game that they play. Steve Poikenon (11:31): It is the game that they play, but we're not supposed to know. And the rest of the diplomatic core is all that operates on the pretense and the fiction that it's not happening. That everybody's there to politely try to sort out the ills of the world and that all of the espionage going on in the background is never to be brought up. It doesn't have to stop. You just can't talk about it. If you bring it to light, then the whole operation gets blown up. And that's why WikiLeaks is parent company is called the Sunshine Press. The whole point of it is to bring it into the daylight, that kind of stance from a political point of view, from a journalistic point of view that's going to get you targeted, which is as we saw exactly what happened leading to 13 years of illegal and arbitrary detention. (12:29) Just one quick point to what you were talking about though, when you see major press outlets come out now in defensive Assange, these are, and you had mentioned it, I think even this morning, some of these instant outlets that are reporting on it are outlets that shared the same information. Are these guys then going to look at the plea agreement and go, golly, if Julian Assange isn't being charged as a journalist, does that mean that everyone who has ever shared a piece of classified information can be charged under the Espionage Act? Because Wilmer, I don't know about you. When I read the plea, when I read the plea deal, they're charging Assange as a private citizen. They're not charging 'em as a publisher. They're not charging 'em as a government contractor or a government employee. And those are prior to this, the only people that could get a charge for conspiring to disseminate classified information in this manner. So is that saying that Nick, the janitor or Dan the trucker or whoever your English teacher is now susceptible to Espionage Act charges? Dr Leon (13:48): Well, I think one of the reasons why they're not charging him as a journalist, because that was one of the issues that was being presented in his defense, is that as a journalist, he has the right to disseminate this information. So if they charged him as a journalist, then I think that would probably throw a wrench in their own argument. But to your point, one of the ironies here is when you read the Washington Poll story and the New York Times reporting out on this is that they were complicit in disseminating the information that he made available. Hence during the Obama administration, they called it the New York Times conundrum, and many say that the reason the Obama administration didn't charge him is because Barack Obama didn't want to open up that can of worms. Steve Poikenon (14:45): Well, certainly the idea that the Biden administration would try to with less competent people than were in the Obama administration is somewhat ridiculous. The only reason they could get a plea deal out of the guy is because they'd been torturing him for five years on top of the seven and a half, eight, almost eight years of being confined to one and a half rooms in the most spied on building in London, which is saying a lot because London has more cameras per capita than any other major city. But more cameras were pointed at the Ecuadorian Embassy than anywhere else in London for a very long time. That kind of constant surveillance is going to wreak havoc on an individual. And I got to tell you, Wilmer, it really did surprise me seeing the video, the very brief videos that we have seen of Julian, the last I had heard, he had been in very poor health. He had suffered a stroke or a mini stroke 18 months ago, 20 months ago, something like that. So to see him moving that rapidly, being able to stand walking Dr Leon (15:59): Up the stairs to the plane, Steve Poikenon (16:01): Being able to stand that upright when we had all been told that his back was wrecked and stuff like that, I'm really, really taken away by that. And I can only hope that he remains in that good of health or gets a little bit better shape from here on out because I was imagining the worst I was. And we haven't seen that. So that's very heartening. Dr Leon (16:32): This some will say is a very obvious question, but I think it still needs to be asked and answered Why this deal? Why now? Because when I look at, when I read the plea, when I see what the Biden administration got out of this, could have done this five years ago, he's out on bond. They could have allowed bond five years ago. He could have, instead of being tortured in solitary confinement in Belmar prison, he could have been walking the streets of Piccadilly Circus. So why now? Steve Poikenon (17:14): There's a number of different factors, and one is that it does get eliminated as an election year issue. Trump, regardless of the reality that he's the guy who had Julian arrested was able to successfully run on, we love the WikiLeaks. Have you seen the WikiLeaks? Can't get enough of the WikiLeaks. He was able to gain a lot of ground with that. So it is popular among Americans to want to at least think you have some sort of transparency with your government or think you might be able to have some sort of citizen accountability with your government, which is one of the benefits that WikiLeaks provided. So that's off the table, the Biden administration, because people have goldfish, brain can try to spin it as well. Donald Trump's the guy who had 'em thrown in jail and we're the guys who let him out. Well, you didn't let him out. (18:11) You made him plead guilty to something he didn't do after torturing him for five years and threatening every one and everything that he held dear, that's coercion. That's not a liberation. That's coercion. That's not a victory in any way, shape or form. And I've seen some on the progressive left already try to be like, Hey, man, Trump locked him up, bite him, let him out because he forced him to plead guilty to something that he didn't do. I think we all just need to keep circulating that last part until it sinks in. But we discussed for a number of years on the critical hour how it is a huge problem for the Biden administration or any administration to have Julian Assange on American soil even if the trial takes place behind closed doors in the Eastern District of Virginia, because then you are really putting the press on trial in America for everyone to be forced to pay attention to. And that's something that not Joe Biden, not Donald Trump, definitely not Merrick Garland is capable of dealing with or quelling in a manner that doesn't look like a total brutal dictatorship. And that's what it was going to turn into. Dr Leon (19:35): We have been saying for a couple of years, the one thing, the Biden, for all of the discussion about extradition and all these appeals and the United States sending attorneys to London and going through the barrister and all of that stuff that they were doing, we kept saying, they do not want this man on American soil. They were trying to kill him through the process. Let's drag this thing out for as long as we possibly can and hope the man dies in Belmar prison. We were saying the last, in fact, I remember having a very extensive conversation with you where I was saying, I think the time has come for the Assange Camp to flip the script and take the deal. Tell Merrick Garland, we want to come to the United States. Please extradite us. We want to be on American soil. And we kicked that around for a while. Steve Poikenon (20:41): Yeah, you're absolutely right. And the last thing that any government wants to deal with is having all of its media suddenly turn against it. And in the US, even though the mainstream media is a wholly owned subsidiary of the state, there are people who are allowed to operate with a little bit more freedom. And those are the people who usually command the largest audiences because they're allowed to show a little bit of authenticity on mainstream airwaves, and people are desperate for that. So they don't want their press turning on 'em. They don't want free Assange banners every time they pan into the crowd at a sporting event. They don't want free Assange banners signs every time they go do a man on the street interview. They were in the worst possible position you could be having to make up your case entirely. And having a still somewhat engaged public to where they could mount not just a resistance, but a real jury nullification campaign and a real on the ground, real time education of exactly what their government is trying to do. Via the prosecution of Julian Assange, again, under the Espionage Act of 1917, we're going to take an Australian citizen with a publishing company, publishing outlet, registered in Iceland, give him fake charges in Sweden, imprison him in London and have a Icelandic FBI snitch, make up a whole bunch of stories about him, then recant his testimony. I think Aile, because that's the thing that happened. Pedophile. Yeah, a convicted, convicted pedophile. Dr Leon (22:40): And you haven't even gone through what we did as it relates to Ecuador and what we did in terms of the Ecuadorian election to be, now I'm drawing a blank on the president. Steve Poikenon (22:51): Lennon Moreno was more Moreno. Yeah. Dr Leon (22:55): We didn't even go through what the machinations that the United States went through to get Assange out of the Ecuadorian Embassy. Steve Poikenon (23:05): Yeah. Or touch on the security company that was there at the embassy, uc Global, which was hired first by the Ecuadorian government to provide security then by the CIA via a spook convention effectively at one of Sheldon Adelson's casinos, who was one of Trump's biggest donors at the time, where the head of the security company wound up getting arrested, trying to flee the country after it was discovered that he had had this double dealing with the CIA. And then it was revealed that because of the illegal spying equipment morales's company had placed in assange's rooms at the embassy that led to a planning session with the American CIA where they were plotting out how to kidnap and murder Julian Assange. That was Mike. Dr Leon (23:56): They Steve Poikenon (23:56): Came to, Dr Leon (23:57): That was Mike Ell at the time. And so what folks, and you laying this out, what folks really need to understand is this is not some tinfoil hat conspiracy theory. All you got to do folks is Google it. It's there in mainstream press that this is what the United States went through trying. These are the illegal machinations that the United States government went through in order to try to get this guy. Steve Poikenon (24:28): Absolutely. And people feel certain ways about the gray zone or what, you don't have to read the initial reporting that Max Blumenthal did based off of the reporting that the Spanish outlet El Pais did. Michael Isikoff, two years later, 18 months later, Michael Isikoff through Yahoo News, did the same story, picked it up and took out some of the more poignant points so that he could fit it into a Yahoo story and put out that version of it. But it's there in several mainstream outlets everybody should know. Mike Pompeo tried to have a journalist and publisher assassinated or kidnapped and then assassinated just to prevent him from being able to testify in his own defense is all you can really assume at that point. You're trying to take him out while you have him basically captured. You want to make sure he never works a day in his life again, and you damn sure want to make sure that he doesn't testify because then it becomes part of a court record and then somebody can sue to have that court record or it'll be public Dr Leon (25:40): As a wrap up to this part of the conversation. So I never thought I'd see, this day I thought Julian Sal was going to die in Bell Marsh. What do you see as being the more immediate impacts to this as it relates to press freedom and journalism and some of the longer term impacts? And some of that, I know we won't really know until we hear from him, but your thoughts, Steve Poikenon (26:10): I hope it inspires people to kind of see where the new limits are, because most journalists have just been not necessarily holding back, but the amount of leak based journalism has basically vanished the amount of journalists truly going out there and trying to bring to light some major problems. Boeing comes to Dr Leon (26:35): Mind. Investigative journalism. Steve Poikenon (26:37): Yeah. I want to believe that Julian Assange breathing air again will be a beacon to people to do investigative journalism more often, better than they have been, however you want to frame it. I want that to be a spark that pushes the current boundaries and hopefully pushes 'em back a little bit because it's been relatively restrictive over the last several years. Dr Leon (27:08): There's another issue related to this. It was in consortium news, help us fight theocracy Psychological operations or PSYOPs are operations to convey selected information and indicators to audiences to influence their emotions, motives and objective reasoning, and ultimately the behavior of governments, organizations and groups and individuals. William Casey, the CIA director under Ronald Reagan said, we'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false. And what happened with Julian Assange, I think is a perfect example of this type of behavior by the American government. Steve Poikenon (28:02): It is. And if you look at the amount of government shenanigans that have occurred in the last four, five years since they yanked Julian out of the embassy, there we're seeing more and more lawsuits being brought against major pharmaceutical companies for vital information that they withheld during the last several years were we found out that a lot of what we were originally told about the January 6th incident, and a lot of what happened then was not necessarily true. There's been multiple court cases that have kept political parties from taking part in the American political process. They've kept, Lawfare has been levied against everyone from the aru, the Aru fellas, Dr Leon (29:07): Mali. Yes. Steve Poikenon (29:09): Yeah, I can never, I know, yes. Ella is something that is just not chambered for me. It's not. But from those guys to, like Alex Jones has been a victim of lawfare. Donald Trump has been a victim of Lawfare, and the entire time there hasn't been a really adversarial reporting outlet with the international foundation that WikiLeaks has with the international audience, that WikiLeaks has to mount a citizen and open source intelligence challenge to any of this and the myriad ways, not just through the restrict Act or the new antisemitism bill or a number of the different laws in Europe and Europe, has the internet been shrunk down significantly? But Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter stating that he wants to turn it into WeChat where your entire internet based existence is on through this one app. I would imagine that Julian Assange would have a lot to say about what Elon Musk has been up to. (30:24) He'd have a lot to say about what happened with the WHO or the NIH over the last several years, but we haven't had that opportunity. And that to me is something that the US government can put as a Big W in their column. That's something that MI six could put as a Big W in their column and really goes right back to those forward documents where they were outlining the plan for what they wanted to do with WikiLeaks. They didn't get to scatter the organization to the winds the way they necessarily described 14 years ago. But when's the last time we got a WikiLeaks drop? Dr Leon (31:07): Well, and for folks that may not understand the significance of this, of course, it was the shooting of the civilians, the murder of the civilians in Iraq and the journalists in Iraq that were shot during the war. And WikiLeaks put that footage out for everybody to see the war crimes that were being committed. So if WikiLeaks had been allowed to continue to operate, I would think our understanding of Ukraine would be different. Our understanding of what's being done in Taiwan would be different. Our understanding of what's being done or trying to be done in North Korea would be different. We would have a lot more insight and information into the illegalities, whether they be international law, whether they be American law, whether they be war crimes, that the United States and its allies have been engaging in these various engagements around the world. Steve Poikenon (32:15): You're correct. And let's also recall that WikiLeaks and WikiLeaks alone disclosed the transpacific partnership. They were the outlet that that agreement came to. They published it, people looked at it and went, no, you want to do what? No, no. And those kinds of trade agreements being disclosed that were done in the dark, away from the eyes of the American public with zero opportunity for public comment or any sort of pushback that made WikiLeaks more dangerous in my opinion, then disclosing video of something that according to even the guys in the helicopter was like a three times a day event in Iraq. And it's something that people in the military kind of shrugged off like, well, yeah, that's what we do. But to the average citizen, it's shocking and horrifying, but not as shocking and horrifying as the United States government wants to set up a corporate court, and it will be a couple of CEOs that determine your future. And if you say something untoward about them on the internet, then they're appointed magistrates from the corporation will decide your faith. That's what the TPP was promising. And any outlet that is going to disclose information like that is suddenly become the most dangerous organization on the planet. Dr Leon (33:49): And when you said that, that I'm drawing a blank on his name, the attorney that sued ExxonMobil in Brazil, Steve Poikenon (33:58): Steven Inger, Dr Leon (33:59): Steven Inger, and how Mobil ExxonMobil was able to use a judge. I mean, they just flipped that whole thing. Don Zinger on behalf of the Indians in Brazil, sues ExxonMobil wins an ungodly amount of money, and he winds up going to jail and ExxonMobil because of what they were able to do with the judicial system in New York, it was criminal. So when you talk about a corporate magistrate, Don Zinger is what popped into my head. Steve Poikenon (34:42): And it was because of an agreement that happened during the Trump administration that that was even possible. And they basically dismantled the TPP, they put certain parts of it into different trade agreements and provisions, and then they got the quasi corporate court because the judge, I believe had been a former Chevron attorney. Correct. And that's how that may even be how he got his judgeship was Chevron bought his way into the judgeship. And that is kind of ordinary corruption, but it's ordinary corruption that also has multinational trade agreements codifying it. And again, in the absence of a WikiLeaks or an organization like it, disclosing these kinds of agreements on the regular, you're not going to get the rapid dissemination of that information amount, a successful pushback in time to stop it. You're not going to be able to get people on the same page understanding it because there's no trust with a number of these. (35:48) All of these other outlets are so disparate, nobody's really consolidated in a way that will lend the immediate mass public trust in what you're doing. Like Lit WikiLeaks had built up over a number of years to the point that when 2015, they disclosed the tpp, people from all over the world held rallies immediately, and there were people out in the streets immediately, and it became an election year issue and it wasn't. And people had to change their tone on it and say to the point where Donald Trump even won a lot of people over by saying, it's a bad deal. It's bad. I don't want to be any part of it. Hillary Clinton had to answer for it. They all had to answer for it. On that debate stage back in 2016, it became a real issue. And so if we don't have these kinds of things moving forward, we're going to be in a significantly less informed spot than we were a decade ago. And in the internet age, that should not be how information is progressing. Dr Leon (36:51): And final point here, and I want to go back to this William Casey quote, and this is the former director of the ccia A and Ronald Reagan will know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false. And that takes me, you've heard me say this too many times, Edward Bernas and the book Propaganda folks, you need to get a copy and you need to read Propaganda by Edward Bernas because that's to a great degree what Bill Casey was talking about. And this whole idea, the whole idea of psychological operations, PSYOPs and the PS ocracy. Steve Poikenon (37:47): Yeah. And fifth generation warfare is an asymmetrical warfare conducted on the citizenry, and that's conducted via all elements of propaganda. We're 12 years into living in a reality, a post Smith month modernization act reality. When the Smith Modernization Act passed and went into effect, government propaganda, military propaganda, and government analysts and experts became part and parcel of the media the better part of a halfway through a generation's worth of 24 hour, seven day a week asymmetrical warfare where the vast majority of the people walking around don't even know that they're at war, let alone with their own government, nor that their own government openly declared war on them. That's how good the propaganda is. Everybody should study Bnes. Everybody needs to internalize that the United States is the most propagandized country on the planet. And the only way that we can get out of that is if we understand the landscape that we're standing on and we start to look at how not necessarily individual people that make up that landscape operate, but the institutions that allow for those people to move freely on that landscape operate. And those institutions, we've been shown over and over and over again to be untrustworthy, to be acting not in our interest, to be acting at the behest of not even people in their own country. And yet for some reason, we still get Berna back into thinking that you can vote your way out of an oligarchy Dr Leon (39:44): And so quickly am wake up slow news day. Where do people go? What do they get when they listen to it? Steve Poikenon (39:50): You can go to am wakeup show.com for absolutely everything. We are live Monday through Thursday from 7:00 AM to 10:00 AM Pacific us. There's content on the channel pretty much all the time. We stream out live on Rock fin and Rumble, and then you can catch them pretty much anywhere and everywhere else. And yeah, just thank you so much for having me on. I really have always enjoyed our conversations. Very glad to do your show. Dr Leon (40:22): Well, I got to thank you my guest, Steve Kin, for joining me today. I greatly, greatly appreciate you giving me time out of your schedule, and I always look forward to the conversations that we have and look forward to having many more with you here on Connecting the Dots. Thank you, Steve. Steve Poikenon (40:37): Thank you, Wilmer. Dr Leon (40:39): And thank you so much for listening to the Connecting the Dots podcast with me, Dr. Wilmer Leon, and Steve mentioned the Smith Mut Act, M-U-N-D-T Act. You all can Google that. Look it up. But simply put, for about 60 years that act prohibited the United States Department of State and the broadcasting Board of Governors from disseminating government produced programming within the United States over fear that these agencies would propagandize the American people. However, in around 2013, Congress abolished the domestic dissemination ban, which now has led to this big heated debate about the role of the federal government in free public discourse. Folks, stay tuned for new episodes every week and follow and subscribe. Leave a review, share the show, make a contribution. We would greatly, greatly, greatly appreciate it. Doing this every week is not an inexpensive venture. Your assistance is greatly appreciated. Follow us on social media. You can find all the links below to the show. And remember that this is where the analysis of politics and culture and history converge talk without analysis is just chatter, and we don't chatter here on connecting the dots. See you again next time. Until then, I'm Dr. Woman Leon. Have a great one. Peace. I'm out Announcer (42:20): Connecting the dots with Dr. Wilmer Leon, where the analysis of politics, culture, and history converge.

As the Wikileaks founder heads for Australia, we go back to the start - two women's allegations they were raped by Julian Assange.  Find out more about The Front podcast here. You can read about this story and more on The Australian's website or on The Australian's app. This episode of The Front is presented by Claire Harvey, produced by Kristen Amiet and edited by Josh Burton. The multimedia editor is Lia Tsamoglou and original music is composed by Jasper Leak.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On this episode of Battleground '44 Saul speaks to friend of the show Evan Mawdsley about the subject of his new book -The Battle of the Philippine Sea. The often overlooked battle was one of the major naval battles of World War II that eliminated the Imperial Japanese Navy's ability to conduct large-scale carrier actions. It took place during the United States' amphibious invasion of the Mariana Islands during the Pacific War. If you have any thoughts or questions, you can send them to - podbattleground@gmail.com Producer: James Hodgson X (Twitter): @PodBattleground Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

April 2024 - Week 4 - DAR Today PodcastNational Society Daughters of the American RevolutionPresident General Pamela Edwards Rouse WrightBrooke Bullmaster Stewart, National Chair DAR Today PodcastClick for more information about the Daughters of the American Revolution!CLICK HERE to visit our YouTube (video) version of this podcastTo support the goals and mission of the DAR, please visit our web site at DAR.org/GivingIn This Episode:Units Overseas Chapter Activities - link to the Units Overseas Committee Page: https://www.dar.org/members/committees/special-committees/units-overseas/units-overseas-committee Story written by Sherrie Stein, Video, graphics by Brooke StewartStatue Unveiled of Bernardo de Galvez! A statue commissioned by our National Society was unveiled in March of 2024 In Texas! Story copy provided by the President General's Blog (this post written by Texas State Regent Marcy Carter-Lovick) Link: https://blog.dar.org/honoring-general-bernardo-de-galvez-veterans-war-memorial-texasLafayette! A Series, Part Deux; the Marquis Comes to America - Link to the Franco-American Memorial Committee Page on our Members website: https://www.dar.org/members/committees/special-committees/franco-american-memorial-committee/franco-american-memorial Video, graphics Brooke Stewart Some Important Links:DAR State Forests  www.dar.org/national-society/dar-forests Plastic Ocean Project http://www.plasticoceanproject.org/DAR Conservation Committee Ideas: Conservation “Minutes”: https://www.dar.org/sites/default/files/members/committees/conservation/2023/Conservation_Conservation%20Minutes_%202023_09_25.pdfShop DAR!Link to the Units Overseas Associate pin for Members: https://shop.dar.org/units-overseas/Link to the Units Overseas pin to aid the work of the chapters during the Wright administration: https://shop.dar.org/units-overseas-wright-pin/Link to the pin "Celebration of the Bicentennial of Lafayette's Farewell Tour, 1824-1825": https://shop.dar.org/bicentennial-lafayette-1824-25/Link to the pin: “Legacy of Bernardo de Galvez” https://shop.dar.org/legacy-of-bernardo-de-galvez/Items Brooke was wearing:ITEM: “Celebrate Stars & Stripes Forever” 20”x70” Scarfhttps://shop.dar.org/dar-stars-stripes-scarf/ITEM: Firework Pinhttps://shop.dar.org/member-celebrate-fireworks-pin/ITEM: 18” Gold Figaro Necklacehttps://shop.dar.org/17-figaro-necklace/ All music is copyright free and provided by Epidemic Sound All music free of copyright and provided through Epidemic Sound! Check out this amazing source for music at https://share.epidemicsound.com/xr2blv For more information about the Daughters of the American Revolution, please visit DAR.orgTo support the goals and mission of the DAR, please visit our web site at DAR.org/Giving

Join Ellen & corvid scientist Dr. Kaeli Swift for a review of the clever little goths rummaging through a trash can near you: American crows. We discuss the twists and turns of a career in science, what crows can learn from funerals, how to tell a crow from a raven, and lessons in crucial skills like cheeto thievery and pizza crust gardening.Links:Learn more about Dr. Kaeli Swift and her work on her blog, corvidresearch.blog!Follow Dr. Kaeli Swift on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook or Twitter!Follow Marianas Nature to learn more about the wildlife of the Mariana Islands!For more information about us & our podcast, head over to our website!Follow Just the Zoo of Us on Threads, Facebook, Instagram & Discord!Follow Ellen on TikTok!

Join Ellen & corvid scientist Dr. Kaeli Swift for a review of the clever little goths rummaging through a trash can near you: American crows. We discuss the twists and turns of a career in science, what crows can learn from funerals, how to tell a crow from a raven, and lessons in crucial skills like cheeto thievery and pizza crust gardening.Links:Learn more about Dr. Kaeli Swift and her work on her blog, corvidresearch.blog!Follow Dr. Kaeli Swift on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook or Twitter!Follow Marianas Nature to learn more about the wildlife of the Mariana Islands!For more information about us & our podcast, head over to our website!Follow Just the Zoo of Us on Threads, Facebook, Instagram & Discord!Follow Ellen on TikTok!

"But if you think about where nature is, you know, nature is far away. Nature is on the fringes of our society. Well, who lives in those places? It's Indigenous peoples. So, you know, a lot of these tribes are the longtime stewards of nature. So my work has really changed to be from a science focus to...more about the who and the how than that what."Today on "As Spiders Do," Angelo Villagomez, '00 shares about his work as an ocean conservationist and the power of creating human connection to enact change. Angelo grew up in the Mariana Islands and tells us a little about his family and how his experiences have impacted his life and work.Editing by Charlotte Pfamatter, Assistant Director of Student and Young Grad Programming. Episode music by FASSounds from Pixabay.Nominate someone to be on our show by emailing alumni@richmond.edu.

This week Seth and Bill dive into the preparation for Operation FORAGER, the American invasion of the Mariana Islands in June 1944. The team discusses the absolutely massive amount of materiel, men, ships and logistics involved as the largest amphibious operation mounted thus far in the Pacific, kicks off.

GB2RS News Sunday the 10th of September 2023 The news headlines: RSGB 2023 Convention RSGB 2023 outreach and buildathons National Coding Week     The RSGB 2023 Convention will be held this year from the 13th to the 15th of October. It is an action-packed weekend of amateur radio and includes the AMSAT-UK Colloquium which will be held during the Convention again. You can chat to the Special Interest Groups and RSGB Committees over a coffee, browse the latest amateur radio equipment and maybe even win a great prize if you buy a ticket in the DXpedition Fund raffle. There will also be two interesting forums on Saturday run in partnership with ICQPodcast. For the first time, the Convention will also have a clear focus on outreach and practical activities as the RSGB provides opportunities for individuals and clubs to ‘have a go' and be inspired to try new things in their local areas. The draft programme will be available in the October RadCom but is also available now on the RSGB website to give you an idea of the fantastic range of talks that will be happening over the weekend. Find out more and take advantage of the early-bird booking price which is available until the 14th of September – go to rsgb.org/convention As part of the RSGB's commitment to the growth of amateur radio, Regional Representative David De La Haye, M0MDB will be giving a presentation at the RSGB Convention in which he will explain more about the Regional Team and how its members can support you to do amateur radio outreach in your local area. A particular focus will be on organising the ever-popular buildathon events. Once you've picked up some tips, you can then have a go at building one of a range of kits provided by Kanga Products. The RSGB Convention buildathon is a drop-in event on Saturday the 14th of October which runs from 10.30am to 5pm. You can also confirm your preferred time by pre-booking a slot for a deposit of £5, which is refundable against the cost of the kit you choose to build. Pre-booked time slots will be allocated as first-come, first-served, so make sure to book now! For full details and to book your slot, visit the RSGB website at rsgb.org/buildathon National Coding Week runs from the 18th of September, but the RSGB is dedicating the whole of September to a focus on amateur radio and coding. There is a range of activity sheets on the RSGB website and we know of schools and amateur radio clubs that are getting involved. Whether you'd like to try the BBC:Microbit, have a go at Node RED or find out more about GNU Radio, this is a great way to try something new, extend your skills, or share your knowledge with your local club, school or community group. If you'd like some support or advice, contact RSGB volunteer John Hislop, G7OHO via g7oho@rsgb.org.uk, and if you're planning an event let the RSGB know – email comms@rsgb.org.uk so the Society can share your stories and photos to inspire others! Air Ambulance Week 2023 is finishing today, the 10th of September. Lots of amateur radio stations are active on the air to help raise awareness of the lifesaving work that is carried out by the UK's air ambulance charities. Please give them a call! More information about Air Ambulance Week 2023 can be found by visiting airambulancesuk.org Amateur radio has been mentioned in the mainstream media twice this week. RSGB President John McCullagh, GI4BWM, was interviewed in a BBC news feature about the demise of longwave radio. You can read it online by searching for “Long wave radio fans mourn fading frequencies”. Secondly, Helen Sharman, the first person from the UK to go into space, was chatting on The Naked Scientists podcast about using amateur radio on the International Space Station to talk to school pupils. Search for “Helen Sharman: chatting with Mikhail Gorbachev” and skip to three minutes and 49 seconds into the podcast.  And now for details of rallies and events Caister Lifeboat Radio Rally is taking place today, Sunday the 10th of September. The venue is Caister Lifeboat station, Caister on Sea, NR30 5DJ. The doors are open from 9 am to 2 pm. Access for traders is available from 8 a.m. Admission is free. Inside tables cost £10 each. The outside tables cost £5 each. For more information, contact Zane, M1BFI via email on m1bfi@outlook.com or phone 07711 214 790. The Angel of the North Amateur Radio Club Rally will be held on Saturday the 16th of September. The venue will be Whitehall Road Methodist Church, Whitehall Road, Bensham, Gateshead, NE8 4LH. The doors will be open to traders from 7.30 am and tables cost £6. The event will be open to the public from 10 am to 2 pm and admission will be £2.50. Bacon butties and hot drinks will be available to purchase. There will be a bring-and-buy and a raffle on the day. Please contact anarc.club@gmail.com for further information.   Now the Special Event News Rustington Amateur Radio Group and Worthing and District Amateur Radio Club will be active with Special Event Station GB1SCW on Saturday the 16th of September. Working between 10.30 am and 4.30 pm, operation will take place on HF, VHF and UHF bands using various modes including SSB, FM and digital modes. The station will be operating to celebrate the work of coastal communities, in particular the National Coastwatch Institution and Royal National Lifeboat Institution. More information is available via QRZ.com OO35ATH is the special callsign in use by members of the Radio Club de Ath, ON4ATH, in Belgium, to celebrate the club's 35th anniversary. The station will be active until the 30th of September.   Now the DX news John, W5JON is active as V47JA from St. Kitts, NA-104, in the West Indies, until the 12th of September. He is operating SSB and FT8 on the HF and 6m bands. QSL via Logbook of the World, or direct only to W5JON. Mike, DG5LAC is active as OZ/DG5LAC from Romo Island, EU-125, in Denmark, until the 13th of September. He will operate using FT8, FT4 and some SSB. QSL via Club Log's OQRS, Logbook of the World and eQSL.   Now the contest news Today, Sunday the 10th of September, the UK Microwave Group 24 to 76GHz Contest runs from 0900 to 1700UTC. Using all modes on 24 to 76GHz frequencies, the exchange is signal report, serial number and locator. The Worked All Europe DX SSB Contest started at 0000UTC on Saturday the 9th of September and ends at 2359UTC today, Sunday the 10th of September. Using SSB on the 80 to 10m bands, where contests are permitted, the exchange is signal report and serial number. On Tuesday the 12th of September, the 432MHz FM Activity Contest runs from 1800 to 1855UTC. Using FM on the 70cm band, the exchange is signal report, serial number and locator. Also on Tuesday the 12th of September, the 432MHz UK Activity Contest runs from 1900 to 2130UTC. Using all modes on the 70cm band, the exchange is signal report, serial number and locator. On Wednesday the 13th of September, the Autumn Series CW Contest runs from 1900 to 2030UTC. Using CW on the 80m band, the exchange is signal report and serial number. On Wednesday the 13th of September, the 432MHz FT8 Activity four-hour Contest runs from 1700 to 2100UTC. Using FT8 on the 70cm band, the exchange is report and four-character locator. Also, on Wednesday, the 13th of September, the 432MHz FT8 Activity two-hour Contest runs from 1900 to 2100UTC. Using FT8 on the 70cm band, the exchange is report and four-character locator. Stations entering the four-hour contest may also enter the two-hour contest. On Thursday the 14th of September, the 50MHz UK Activity Contest runs from 1900 to 2130UTC. Using all modes on the 6m band, the exchange is signal report, serial number and locator. On Sunday the 17th of September, the 70MHz Affiliated Societies Contest runs from 0900 to 1200UTC. Using all modes on the 4m band, the exchange is signal report, serial number and locator. On Sunday the 17th of September, the IRTS 70cm Counties Contest runs from 1300 to 1330UTC. Using SSB and FM on the 70cm band, the exchange is signal report, serial number and locator. EI and GI stations also give their county. Also on Sunday the 17th of September, the IRTS 2m Counties Contest runs from 1300 to 1500UTC. Using SSB and FM on the 2m band, the exchange is signal report, serial number and locator. EI and GI stations also give their county. On Sunday the 17th of September, the British Amateur Radio Teledata Group Sprint PSK63 Contest runs from 1700 to 2100UTC. Using PSK63 on the 80 to 10m bands, where contests are permitted, the exchange is serial number. Now the radio propagation report, compiled by G0KYA, G3YLA, and G4BAO on Thursday the 7th of September 2023 The propagation team was caught out last week by two coronal mass ejections, or CMEs, that came off the edge of the Sun. The arrival of those CMEs on the 3rd of September eventually pushed the Kp index to 5.67. In its report, Spaceweather.com said that it was possible that a CME arrived on the 2nd of September, but its weak impact was masked by a chaotic stream of solar wind already blowing around Earth at the time. At this time of year, even weak CMEs can do a good job of sparking auroras as a result of the Russell-McPherron effect, which boosts geomagnetic activity around the equinoxes. So much for saying that we could expect quiet geomagnetic conditions last week! The Solar Flux Index declined to 131 but has since recovered to reach 147 on Thursday the 7th, with eight active regions visible. We had a number of M-class solar flares last week, but nothing too damaging. With the Kp index back to one on the 7th, we saw daytime MUFs rising again, heading above 24.9MHz over a 3,000km path. There were lots of Chinese and Japanese stations on 21MHz FT8 around 1100UTC on Thursday. And up on 12m FT8, even more of the same. DX stations included Thomas, KH0/KC0W on the Mariana Islands in the Pacific. While the 10m band was just about open as well, it offered slim pickings compared with the 12m band. Next week NOAA predicts that the Solar Flux Index will increase over the week to hit perhaps 155 by next weekend. Geomagnetic conditions remain variable with a Kp index of three or four forecast for the 12th to the 16th. This weekend the geomagnetic forecast is that it will be quiet although, with so many sunspots visible at the moment, it wouldn't take much for a CME to disrupt things. As always, keep an eye on solarham.net for near real-time updates. And now the VHF and up propagation news The RSGB 144MHz Trophy produced good DX on 2m into Poland and Sweden, so we guess that Tropo performed for us this week. This spell of hot sunny weather, due to high pressure, does mean Tropo was the mode of choice for the end of this current week, ending today the 10th, especially across the North Sea. However, unsettled weather is gradually encroaching from the west, introducing some thundery rain into western areas, and this will spread east. Although the Tropo will cease, Gigahertz bands rain scatter is a likely replacement although very isolated rather than the widespread nature of a good Tropo event. It should be noted that next week is not fully determined by all models with quite a spread of outcomes. Either way, it's Tropo or rain scatter for most areas next week. It's always possible that meteor scatter and aurora could show during this period. The early morning, around dawn, is usually the best time to look for random meteor scatter activity in the absence of any major meteor showers. For aurora, it's best to follow the solar data from spaceweather.com to pick up early alerts and an increasing Kp index. For EME stations, Moon declination is at its highest this weekend but with apogee, the Moon's furthest point from Earth, next Tuesday, path losses are high. 144MHz sky noise is low for most of the week except for Thursday and Friday when the Moon and Sun are very close, meaning high solar noise in the beamwidth of antennas.    And that's all from the propagation team this week.

In the heart of the Pacific, as World War II raged on, the serenity of the endless azure sea belied the tensions simmering just beneath its surface. It was 1944—a critical year that would mark a turning point in a conflict that had consumed nations, altered lives, and left indelible marks on human history. As the fiery sun set on the western horizon, the whispering winds carried an air of anticipation. The stage was set for one of the greatest naval engagements ever to unfold—the Battle of the Philippine Sea. Halfway across the world, two of the most formidable naval forces ever assembled were preparing for a decisive showdown. On one side, the United States, under the shrewd and resolute Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, was gradually reclaiming its lost territories in the Pacific. On the other side, Japan, led by the stalwart Admiral Soemu Toyoda, was readying its last, desperate bid to halt the relentless American advance. Both sides were locked in a precarious chess game, with the strategic Mariana Islands serving as the grand prize. In this clash of titans, strategies would unravel, heroes would rise, and destinies would be forever changed. The Battle of the Philippine Sea was not just a battle between fleets—it was a contest of wills, a test of human resilience, and a measure of national resolve. As we delve into this extraordinary story, we witness a turning point that reshaped the Pacific theatre and the world at large, leaving behind a legacy that continues to echo in the annals of military history. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ww2-stories/support

In the grand tapestry of human history, wars often serve as the junctures where the fate of nations is decided. World War II, with its vast theater and unparalleled scale, is a particularly striking example of such a defining period. This monumental clash of powers, ideologies, and human spirit led to battles whose names still echo through time, their stories written and rewritten by the pens of historians. One such battle, though not as globally renowned as Stalingrad or Normandy, was nevertheless a crucial pivot in the Pacific Theatre, bearing heavy implications for the progression and ultimate outcome of the war. This was the Battle of Saipan. Saipan – a speck of land in the vast Pacific Ocean, part of the Mariana Islands, was a critical strategic stronghold for both the Empire of Japan and the United States. To Japan, it was a bulwark of its inner defense line, a shield to protect the mainland from the encroaching Allied forces. To the United States, it was a stepping stone, a launchpad for their Island Hopping campaign designed to take the fight directly to the heart of the Japanese Empire. From the tranquil Pacific waves that belied the tension beneath to the infernal battle cries amid the pandemonium of war, from the meticulously calculated military strategies to the raw, untamed bravery of soldiers, the Battle of Saipan was more than just an engagement between two armies; it was a pivotal moment that shaped the future course of World War II. As we delve into this epic saga of valor, desperation, strategy, and sacrifice, we will journey from the quiet planning rooms of the United States military command to the frantic defense preparations of the Japanese Imperial Army. We'll witness the human side of this colossal clash, the hopes and fears of those who were not merely players but humans whose lives were irrevocably altered by the battle. The tale of Saipan is one of heroism and tragedy, of victory and defeat, of the indomitable spirit of humanity amid the harshest trials. This is the story of the Battle of Saipan, an unforgettable chapter in the annals of World War II. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ww2-stories/support

In today's episode, Christine talks with Lieutenant Junior Grade (LT. J.G.) Alice Beittel, who is a commissioned officer for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Corps (NOAA Corps), currently serving as the Advanced Survey Technology Officer at the NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center in San Diego. She shares what the NOAA Corps does, the incredible history of the first women who worked for NOAA, and shares how she stays passionate about the industry. Alice says if you are interested in adventure, science, or teamwork, you will want to check out NOAA for possible work because they have it all, and it is very rewarding work. They have great benefits like longer parental leave, station change reimbursement, pet reimbursement, other well-being reimbursements, travel allowance, and increased health/wellness benefits. Previously, Alice served on the NOAA Ship Rainier as a deck watch officer and hydrographic surveyor. During her time with NOAA Ship Rainier, she conducted ship seafloor mapping operations throughout southeast Alaska, Kodiak, and coral reef habitat surveys in the Mariana Islands archipelago. As an NOAA Corps officer, she wears many hats, including deck watch officer, ship navigator, hydrographer, diving officer, damage control officer, public affairs officer, and NOAA working SCUBA diver. Prior to joining the NOAA Corps, Lt. j.g. Beittel completed a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science and Management and a minor in Geographic Information Systems from the University of California, Davis. If you are interested in learning more, head to the NOAA website and learn more: https://www.noaa.gov/Have a Listen & SubscribeThe Women Offshore Podcast can also be found on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, and most podcast apps. Make sure to subscribe to whatever app you use so that you don't miss out on future episodes.What did you think of the show?Let us know your thoughts by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also reach out by sending us an email at hello@womenoffshore.org.

US National Weather Service in Guam have announced people in Mariana Islands need to have all preparations for typhoon Mawar completed by sundown tomorrow at the latest.

US National Weather Service in Guam have announced people in Mariana Islands need to have all preparations for typhoon Mawar completed by sundown tomorrow at the latest; Port Moresby, PNG was a hive of activity on Monday with the likes of the Indian Prime minister Narendra Modi, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and 15 Pacific leaders; Pacific scientists are trialling a new biodegradable Fish Aggregative Device in the hopes it will help reduce the environmental footprint of commercial fishing in the region.

This is Garrison Hardie with your CrossPolitic Daily News Brief for Friday, April 21st, 2023. CrossPolitic Email List: Are you subscribed to our CrossPolitic email list? If you’re not you really should be. Being subscribed to our email list means you won’t miss any updates about CrossPolitic or the Fight Laugh Feast Network! You’ll hear about what’s on the schedule for the week, live events, conference updates, Rowdy Christian Merch, updates from other shows within the Fight Laugh Feast Network, and you’ll hear from sponsors on the show, as they seek to take dominion for God’s Kingdom in the business world. To subscribe, simply enter your email address at the bottom of the page at fightlaughfeast.com. Again, that’s fightlaughfeast.com. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/space/spacexs-largest-rocket-explodes-after-launch SpaceX's largest rocket ever built explodes four minutes after launch SpaceX's Starship, the largest rocket ever launched, exploded four minutes after takeoff. The spaceship exploded above the Gulf of Mexico shortly after takeoff, failing to achieve its ambitious goals, according to the New York Times. However, the explosion was only described as "A setback for Elon Musk and SpaceX, but not a fatal one." SpaceX described the event as a "rapid unscheduled disassembly before stage separation" on Twitter as the launch and short flight played out. SpaceX still saw the test flight as a partial success, with some employees busting open a bottle of champagne amid cheers of “Go Starship!” https://www.dailyfetched.com/dom-lemon-loses-it-on-gop-candidate-gets-spooked-by-whats-said-in-earpiece/ Don Lemon LOSES IT on GOP Candidate Business executive and the author of “Woke Inc,” Vivek Ramaswamy, who is vying for the 2024 presidential slot, appeared on “CNN This Morning” where he bumped heads with Lemon over whether the Civil War was fought to give blacks their constitutional rights. Lemon became angered when Ramaswamy connected the Civil War, where gun rights were extended to freed blacks. Ramaswamy argued the Democratic Party wishes to put black people “back in chains” with gun-control laws. Don Lemon argues with Vivek Ramaswamy over the Civil War- Play Video Elsewhere… https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/apr/20/north-carolina-shooting-girl-parents-basketball-yard Man shoots girl, six, and her parents after ball rolls into his backyard A six-year-old girl and her parents were allegedly shot by a neighbor after a basketball that the child was playing with rolled into the attacker’s yard, according to authorities and local media reporting. The shooting occurred on Wednesday in North Carolina when several young children were playing with a basketball which rolled into the yard of Robert Singletary, who neighbors say was new to the area and often mad at the local children, the news outlet WSOC-TV reported. It continued a recent spate of shootings across the US involving a property owner who fired at young people who approached them either by mistake or for an innocent reason. Witnesses told the station that Singletary ran out of his home upset after the ball rolled on to his yard and started firing a gun at a neighbor. William White and his six-year-old daughter Kinsley were seriously hurt during the shooting. White had his own gun and tried to shoot back at Singletary, who witnesses say unloaded an entire magazine at White and his daughter. White was seriously injured after being shot in the back. Hilderbrand was grazed by a bullet and was back home on Wednesday after being discharged from a hospital. Singletary remained at large as of Thursday morning. Police warned local residents that he is armed and dangerous. Wednesday was not the first time Singletary was accused of acting violently. He was separately charged in December with assaulting his girlfriend with a miniature sledgehammer and keeping her in their apartment for two hours as she was bleeding, ABC News reported. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/energy-environment/berkeley-ruling-threatens-gas-stove-bans Berkeley ruling threatens gas stove bans all over the country The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision to overturn Berkeley's ban on natural gas stoves could threaten dozens of similar restrictions nationwide. A three-judge panel sided with the California Restaurant Association in voting unanimously that the city's 2019 ban on gas stoves ran afoul of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975, which they said preempted a local gas stove ban — a ruling that now puts into doubt the scores of similar bans advanced across the nation in recent years. The appellate court decision may have "ripple effects" for gas appliance restrictions nationwide and provide a road map of sorts for industry and consumer groups looking to halt such policies, said Rob Rains, a senior vice president at the independent research firm Washington Analysis. The ruling "does provide a playbook for opponents of these policies to kind of 'storm the walls,' so to speak, and seek for them to be thrown out as well," he said in an interview. More than 100 U.S. cities and localities have moved to restrict gas-powered appliances, including 75 cities in California alone. Monday's ruling only technically applies to states that fall under the 9th Circuit's jurisdiction: California, Alaska, Arizona, Hawaii, Idaho, Nebraska, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington, as well as Guam and the Mariana Islands. But it sets the stage for a challenge to regulations in other states. Even if bans are upheld by courts, any such ruling would create a split between circuits, raising the prospect of the Supreme Court weighing in for the whole country. The court's decision hinged on its reading of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975, which gives the Department of Energy the legal right to set conservation standards for certain building appliances, including hot water heaters, furnaces, and HVAC systems — and preempts local laws in those areas. The California Restaurant Association argued that gas-powered stoves are crucial for chefs to prepare food the way they are classically trained. In California, more than 75 cities and counties have modeled Berkeley's ordinance in crafting their own gas bans. Major cities, including San Francisco, Oakland, Los Gatos, and Sunnyvale, as well as Marin County, have adopted similar bans, either banning or restricting natural gas appliances, including gas-powered stoves. It is possible that gas stove critics may regroup and rework policies to sidestep the 9th Circuit ruling. Notably, the California Air Resources Board approved a plan last September to ban the sale of new natural gas-fired furnaces and home water heaters in the state by 2030. But it doesn't include gas stoves, though its final rules will not come up for a final vote until 2035. Beyond the Golden State, cities in New York, Washington, Massachusetts, and Maryland have passed ambitious plans to phase out or ban natural gas appliances in new buildings. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/courts/alito-extends-administrative-stay-on-abortion-pill-case-till-friday Justice Samuel Alito extends administrative stay on major abortion pill case until Friday Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito extended an administrative stay over a lower court ruling that threatened to limit access to a common abortion pill until Friday, giving the justices more time to mull their decision. The move to extend an administrative stay is procedural and comes just days after Alito froze a lower judge's decision to reverse the government's 2000 approval of the common abortion drug, muh - fuh - pri - stown. The decision means that all of District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk's April 7 ruling that threatened to revoke the Food and Drug Administration's approval of the drug will not go into effect until at least Friday at 11:59 p.m. Eastern time. Days after the district judge's decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit unwound some of the lower court's decision but kept in place a block on a seven-year effort by the agency to widen access to the drug. Ahead of Alito's decision, the manufacturer of the generic version of mifepristone, GenBioPro, filed a lawsuit against the FDA in Maryland federal court to maintain its ability to market the drug. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals halted some of the Texas decision while maintaining stays on more recent FDA changes that expanded access to the pill through telemedicine, mail, and retail pharmacies. With Alito's decision, no part of that appeals court ruling would go into effect until the late-Friday deadline. Alito, who is also the author of the opinion last summer that allowed states to impose laws severely restricting abortion access, is handling the matter because he is tasked to oversee requests stemming from the Louisiana-based 5th Circuit. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court must consider a separate district court ruling, issued less than an hour after Kacsmaryk's initial decision, that complicated the matter with a conflicting decision. Washington-based District Judge Thomas O. Rice, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, blocked the FDA from limiting the availability of mifepristone in much of the country. That ruling, also issued April 7, applies to just 17 liberal-leaning states and Washington, D.C., which filed a lawsuit in February challenging the FDA’s regulations over the drug. As of Wednesday, mifepristone is lawful and remains available in some form in 37 states, even some states with abortion restrictions. https://www.foxnews.com/politics/save-womens-sports-bill-passes-house-zero-votes-dems-transgender-bullying 'Save women's sports' bill passes House with zero votes from Dems, who call it transgender 'bullying' The House on Thursday passed legislation aimed at preventing biological males from competing as transgender athletes in girls’ and women’s sports at schools across the country, after a debate in which several Democrats accused Republicans of "bullying" transgender students by calling up the bill. The Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act passed in a 219-203 vote Thursday morning — all the "yes" votes came from Republicans, and all the "no" votes came from Democrats. Republicans defended the bill as an attempt to spare women and girls from having to compete against transgender women and girls — biological males who can sometimes dominate these sports and prevent some female athletes from making the team. But several Democrats argued in debate that the GOP bill is an extension of the bullying that transgender students are already facing at school. Rep. Mark Takano, D-Calif., said the bill would make school sports "less safe for women and girls," and argued that even discussing the legislation on the House floor was doing harm to transgender students. Republicans rejected these arguments and said they are trying to protect girls’ and women’s sports from being taken over by biological males. Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., said Democrats are ignoring the "physical advantages" that men have over women and rejected Jayapal’s argument that the GOP is waging a "hate" campaign against transgender students. Republicans also accused Democrats of pursuing transgender rights to an illogical end that goes against the intent of Title IX, which most credit with dramatically expanding participation in women’s sports. "Congress in 1972 created Title IX to protect women's sports to enable women to have an equal playing field in athletics," said Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., who sponsored the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act. "In worship to their trans idols, the administration wants to flip that on its head. It is insane." Under Steube’s bill, educational institutions that receive Title IX funding from the federal government would not be allowed to "permit a person whose sex is male to participate in an athletic program or activity that is designed for women or girls." The bill adds that the sex of an athlete is defined only by their "reproductive biology and genetics at birth." Steube has said he introduced his bill in order to "save women’s sports" from transgender women and girls who are denying biological women and girls spots on the team’s roster, and sometimes dominate these sports. He said a dangerous shift in U.S. culture requires a defense from Congress. Speaking of women’s sports… a win for Australia today! https://www.breitbart.com/sports/2023/04/19/trans-female-nixed-from-competing-as-woman-in-semi-pro-basketball-league/ Trans ‘Female’ Nixed from Competing as Woman in Semi-Pro Basketball League An application to become a player submitted by a man claiming to be a transgender female has been rejected by Australia’s WNBL 1 South women’s semi-pro basketball league, a report says. The application was submitted by a biological man calling himself Lexi Rodgers, who wanted to play for the Kilsyth Cobras in Kilsyth, Australia, a town in the western suburbs of Melbourne. The request, though, was denied by Basketball Australia, the governing body for the sport there, Fox News reported.

This is Garrison Hardie with your CrossPolitic Daily News Brief for Friday, April 21st, 2023. CrossPolitic Email List: Are you subscribed to our CrossPolitic email list? If you’re not you really should be. Being subscribed to our email list means you won’t miss any updates about CrossPolitic or the Fight Laugh Feast Network! You’ll hear about what’s on the schedule for the week, live events, conference updates, Rowdy Christian Merch, updates from other shows within the Fight Laugh Feast Network, and you’ll hear from sponsors on the show, as they seek to take dominion for God’s Kingdom in the business world. To subscribe, simply enter your email address at the bottom of the page at fightlaughfeast.com. Again, that’s fightlaughfeast.com. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/space/spacexs-largest-rocket-explodes-after-launch SpaceX's largest rocket ever built explodes four minutes after launch SpaceX's Starship, the largest rocket ever launched, exploded four minutes after takeoff. The spaceship exploded above the Gulf of Mexico shortly after takeoff, failing to achieve its ambitious goals, according to the New York Times. However, the explosion was only described as "A setback for Elon Musk and SpaceX, but not a fatal one." SpaceX described the event as a "rapid unscheduled disassembly before stage separation" on Twitter as the launch and short flight played out. SpaceX still saw the test flight as a partial success, with some employees busting open a bottle of champagne amid cheers of “Go Starship!” https://www.dailyfetched.com/dom-lemon-loses-it-on-gop-candidate-gets-spooked-by-whats-said-in-earpiece/ Don Lemon LOSES IT on GOP Candidate Business executive and the author of “Woke Inc,” Vivek Ramaswamy, who is vying for the 2024 presidential slot, appeared on “CNN This Morning” where he bumped heads with Lemon over whether the Civil War was fought to give blacks their constitutional rights. Lemon became angered when Ramaswamy connected the Civil War, where gun rights were extended to freed blacks. Ramaswamy argued the Democratic Party wishes to put black people “back in chains” with gun-control laws. Don Lemon argues with Vivek Ramaswamy over the Civil War- Play Video Elsewhere… https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/apr/20/north-carolina-shooting-girl-parents-basketball-yard Man shoots girl, six, and her parents after ball rolls into his backyard A six-year-old girl and her parents were allegedly shot by a neighbor after a basketball that the child was playing with rolled into the attacker’s yard, according to authorities and local media reporting. The shooting occurred on Wednesday in North Carolina when several young children were playing with a basketball which rolled into the yard of Robert Singletary, who neighbors say was new to the area and often mad at the local children, the news outlet WSOC-TV reported. It continued a recent spate of shootings across the US involving a property owner who fired at young people who approached them either by mistake or for an innocent reason. Witnesses told the station that Singletary ran out of his home upset after the ball rolled on to his yard and started firing a gun at a neighbor. William White and his six-year-old daughter Kinsley were seriously hurt during the shooting. White had his own gun and tried to shoot back at Singletary, who witnesses say unloaded an entire magazine at White and his daughter. White was seriously injured after being shot in the back. Hilderbrand was grazed by a bullet and was back home on Wednesday after being discharged from a hospital. Singletary remained at large as of Thursday morning. Police warned local residents that he is armed and dangerous. Wednesday was not the first time Singletary was accused of acting violently. He was separately charged in December with assaulting his girlfriend with a miniature sledgehammer and keeping her in their apartment for two hours as she was bleeding, ABC News reported. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/energy-environment/berkeley-ruling-threatens-gas-stove-bans Berkeley ruling threatens gas stove bans all over the country The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision to overturn Berkeley's ban on natural gas stoves could threaten dozens of similar restrictions nationwide. A three-judge panel sided with the California Restaurant Association in voting unanimously that the city's 2019 ban on gas stoves ran afoul of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975, which they said preempted a local gas stove ban — a ruling that now puts into doubt the scores of similar bans advanced across the nation in recent years. The appellate court decision may have "ripple effects" for gas appliance restrictions nationwide and provide a road map of sorts for industry and consumer groups looking to halt such policies, said Rob Rains, a senior vice president at the independent research firm Washington Analysis. The ruling "does provide a playbook for opponents of these policies to kind of 'storm the walls,' so to speak, and seek for them to be thrown out as well," he said in an interview. More than 100 U.S. cities and localities have moved to restrict gas-powered appliances, including 75 cities in California alone. Monday's ruling only technically applies to states that fall under the 9th Circuit's jurisdiction: California, Alaska, Arizona, Hawaii, Idaho, Nebraska, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington, as well as Guam and the Mariana Islands. But it sets the stage for a challenge to regulations in other states. Even if bans are upheld by courts, any such ruling would create a split between circuits, raising the prospect of the Supreme Court weighing in for the whole country. The court's decision hinged on its reading of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975, which gives the Department of Energy the legal right to set conservation standards for certain building appliances, including hot water heaters, furnaces, and HVAC systems — and preempts local laws in those areas. The California Restaurant Association argued that gas-powered stoves are crucial for chefs to prepare food the way they are classically trained. In California, more than 75 cities and counties have modeled Berkeley's ordinance in crafting their own gas bans. Major cities, including San Francisco, Oakland, Los Gatos, and Sunnyvale, as well as Marin County, have adopted similar bans, either banning or restricting natural gas appliances, including gas-powered stoves. It is possible that gas stove critics may regroup and rework policies to sidestep the 9th Circuit ruling. Notably, the California Air Resources Board approved a plan last September to ban the sale of new natural gas-fired furnaces and home water heaters in the state by 2030. But it doesn't include gas stoves, though its final rules will not come up for a final vote until 2035. Beyond the Golden State, cities in New York, Washington, Massachusetts, and Maryland have passed ambitious plans to phase out or ban natural gas appliances in new buildings. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/courts/alito-extends-administrative-stay-on-abortion-pill-case-till-friday Justice Samuel Alito extends administrative stay on major abortion pill case until Friday Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito extended an administrative stay over a lower court ruling that threatened to limit access to a common abortion pill until Friday, giving the justices more time to mull their decision. The move to extend an administrative stay is procedural and comes just days after Alito froze a lower judge's decision to reverse the government's 2000 approval of the common abortion drug, muh - fuh - pri - stown. The decision means that all of District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk's April 7 ruling that threatened to revoke the Food and Drug Administration's approval of the drug will not go into effect until at least Friday at 11:59 p.m. Eastern time. Days after the district judge's decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit unwound some of the lower court's decision but kept in place a block on a seven-year effort by the agency to widen access to the drug. Ahead of Alito's decision, the manufacturer of the generic version of mifepristone, GenBioPro, filed a lawsuit against the FDA in Maryland federal court to maintain its ability to market the drug. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals halted some of the Texas decision while maintaining stays on more recent FDA changes that expanded access to the pill through telemedicine, mail, and retail pharmacies. With Alito's decision, no part of that appeals court ruling would go into effect until the late-Friday deadline. Alito, who is also the author of the opinion last summer that allowed states to impose laws severely restricting abortion access, is handling the matter because he is tasked to oversee requests stemming from the Louisiana-based 5th Circuit. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court must consider a separate district court ruling, issued less than an hour after Kacsmaryk's initial decision, that complicated the matter with a conflicting decision. Washington-based District Judge Thomas O. Rice, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, blocked the FDA from limiting the availability of mifepristone in much of the country. That ruling, also issued April 7, applies to just 17 liberal-leaning states and Washington, D.C., which filed a lawsuit in February challenging the FDA’s regulations over the drug. As of Wednesday, mifepristone is lawful and remains available in some form in 37 states, even some states with abortion restrictions. https://www.foxnews.com/politics/save-womens-sports-bill-passes-house-zero-votes-dems-transgender-bullying 'Save women's sports' bill passes House with zero votes from Dems, who call it transgender 'bullying' The House on Thursday passed legislation aimed at preventing biological males from competing as transgender athletes in girls’ and women’s sports at schools across the country, after a debate in which several Democrats accused Republicans of "bullying" transgender students by calling up the bill. The Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act passed in a 219-203 vote Thursday morning — all the "yes" votes came from Republicans, and all the "no" votes came from Democrats. Republicans defended the bill as an attempt to spare women and girls from having to compete against transgender women and girls — biological males who can sometimes dominate these sports and prevent some female athletes from making the team. But several Democrats argued in debate that the GOP bill is an extension of the bullying that transgender students are already facing at school. Rep. Mark Takano, D-Calif., said the bill would make school sports "less safe for women and girls," and argued that even discussing the legislation on the House floor was doing harm to transgender students. Republicans rejected these arguments and said they are trying to protect girls’ and women’s sports from being taken over by biological males. Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., said Democrats are ignoring the "physical advantages" that men have over women and rejected Jayapal’s argument that the GOP is waging a "hate" campaign against transgender students. Republicans also accused Democrats of pursuing transgender rights to an illogical end that goes against the intent of Title IX, which most credit with dramatically expanding participation in women’s sports. "Congress in 1972 created Title IX to protect women's sports to enable women to have an equal playing field in athletics," said Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., who sponsored the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act. "In worship to their trans idols, the administration wants to flip that on its head. It is insane." Under Steube’s bill, educational institutions that receive Title IX funding from the federal government would not be allowed to "permit a person whose sex is male to participate in an athletic program or activity that is designed for women or girls." The bill adds that the sex of an athlete is defined only by their "reproductive biology and genetics at birth." Steube has said he introduced his bill in order to "save women’s sports" from transgender women and girls who are denying biological women and girls spots on the team’s roster, and sometimes dominate these sports. He said a dangerous shift in U.S. culture requires a defense from Congress. Speaking of women’s sports… a win for Australia today! https://www.breitbart.com/sports/2023/04/19/trans-female-nixed-from-competing-as-woman-in-semi-pro-basketball-league/ Trans ‘Female’ Nixed from Competing as Woman in Semi-Pro Basketball League An application to become a player submitted by a man claiming to be a transgender female has been rejected by Australia’s WNBL 1 South women’s semi-pro basketball league, a report says. The application was submitted by a biological man calling himself Lexi Rodgers, who wanted to play for the Kilsyth Cobras in Kilsyth, Australia, a town in the western suburbs of Melbourne. The request, though, was denied by Basketball Australia, the governing body for the sport there, Fox News reported.

This is Garrison Hardie with your CrossPolitic Daily News Brief for Friday, April 21st, 2023. CrossPolitic Email List: Are you subscribed to our CrossPolitic email list? If you’re not you really should be. Being subscribed to our email list means you won’t miss any updates about CrossPolitic or the Fight Laugh Feast Network! You’ll hear about what’s on the schedule for the week, live events, conference updates, Rowdy Christian Merch, updates from other shows within the Fight Laugh Feast Network, and you’ll hear from sponsors on the show, as they seek to take dominion for God’s Kingdom in the business world. To subscribe, simply enter your email address at the bottom of the page at fightlaughfeast.com. Again, that’s fightlaughfeast.com. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/space/spacexs-largest-rocket-explodes-after-launch SpaceX's largest rocket ever built explodes four minutes after launch SpaceX's Starship, the largest rocket ever launched, exploded four minutes after takeoff. The spaceship exploded above the Gulf of Mexico shortly after takeoff, failing to achieve its ambitious goals, according to the New York Times. However, the explosion was only described as "A setback for Elon Musk and SpaceX, but not a fatal one." SpaceX described the event as a "rapid unscheduled disassembly before stage separation" on Twitter as the launch and short flight played out. SpaceX still saw the test flight as a partial success, with some employees busting open a bottle of champagne amid cheers of “Go Starship!” https://www.dailyfetched.com/dom-lemon-loses-it-on-gop-candidate-gets-spooked-by-whats-said-in-earpiece/ Don Lemon LOSES IT on GOP Candidate Business executive and the author of “Woke Inc,” Vivek Ramaswamy, who is vying for the 2024 presidential slot, appeared on “CNN This Morning” where he bumped heads with Lemon over whether the Civil War was fought to give blacks their constitutional rights. Lemon became angered when Ramaswamy connected the Civil War, where gun rights were extended to freed blacks. Ramaswamy argued the Democratic Party wishes to put black people “back in chains” with gun-control laws. Don Lemon argues with Vivek Ramaswamy over the Civil War- Play Video Elsewhere… https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/apr/20/north-carolina-shooting-girl-parents-basketball-yard Man shoots girl, six, and her parents after ball rolls into his backyard A six-year-old girl and her parents were allegedly shot by a neighbor after a basketball that the child was playing with rolled into the attacker’s yard, according to authorities and local media reporting. The shooting occurred on Wednesday in North Carolina when several young children were playing with a basketball which rolled into the yard of Robert Singletary, who neighbors say was new to the area and often mad at the local children, the news outlet WSOC-TV reported. It continued a recent spate of shootings across the US involving a property owner who fired at young people who approached them either by mistake or for an innocent reason. Witnesses told the station that Singletary ran out of his home upset after the ball rolled on to his yard and started firing a gun at a neighbor. William White and his six-year-old daughter Kinsley were seriously hurt during the shooting. White had his own gun and tried to shoot back at Singletary, who witnesses say unloaded an entire magazine at White and his daughter. White was seriously injured after being shot in the back. Hilderbrand was grazed by a bullet and was back home on Wednesday after being discharged from a hospital. Singletary remained at large as of Thursday morning. Police warned local residents that he is armed and dangerous. Wednesday was not the first time Singletary was accused of acting violently. He was separately charged in December with assaulting his girlfriend with a miniature sledgehammer and keeping her in their apartment for two hours as she was bleeding, ABC News reported. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/energy-environment/berkeley-ruling-threatens-gas-stove-bans Berkeley ruling threatens gas stove bans all over the country The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision to overturn Berkeley's ban on natural gas stoves could threaten dozens of similar restrictions nationwide. A three-judge panel sided with the California Restaurant Association in voting unanimously that the city's 2019 ban on gas stoves ran afoul of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975, which they said preempted a local gas stove ban — a ruling that now puts into doubt the scores of similar bans advanced across the nation in recent years. The appellate court decision may have "ripple effects" for gas appliance restrictions nationwide and provide a road map of sorts for industry and consumer groups looking to halt such policies, said Rob Rains, a senior vice president at the independent research firm Washington Analysis. The ruling "does provide a playbook for opponents of these policies to kind of 'storm the walls,' so to speak, and seek for them to be thrown out as well," he said in an interview. More than 100 U.S. cities and localities have moved to restrict gas-powered appliances, including 75 cities in California alone. Monday's ruling only technically applies to states that fall under the 9th Circuit's jurisdiction: California, Alaska, Arizona, Hawaii, Idaho, Nebraska, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington, as well as Guam and the Mariana Islands. But it sets the stage for a challenge to regulations in other states. Even if bans are upheld by courts, any such ruling would create a split between circuits, raising the prospect of the Supreme Court weighing in for the whole country. The court's decision hinged on its reading of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975, which gives the Department of Energy the legal right to set conservation standards for certain building appliances, including hot water heaters, furnaces, and HVAC systems — and preempts local laws in those areas. The California Restaurant Association argued that gas-powered stoves are crucial for chefs to prepare food the way they are classically trained. In California, more than 75 cities and counties have modeled Berkeley's ordinance in crafting their own gas bans. Major cities, including San Francisco, Oakland, Los Gatos, and Sunnyvale, as well as Marin County, have adopted similar bans, either banning or restricting natural gas appliances, including gas-powered stoves. It is possible that gas stove critics may regroup and rework policies to sidestep the 9th Circuit ruling. Notably, the California Air Resources Board approved a plan last September to ban the sale of new natural gas-fired furnaces and home water heaters in the state by 2030. But it doesn't include gas stoves, though its final rules will not come up for a final vote until 2035. Beyond the Golden State, cities in New York, Washington, Massachusetts, and Maryland have passed ambitious plans to phase out or ban natural gas appliances in new buildings. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/courts/alito-extends-administrative-stay-on-abortion-pill-case-till-friday Justice Samuel Alito extends administrative stay on major abortion pill case until Friday Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito extended an administrative stay over a lower court ruling that threatened to limit access to a common abortion pill until Friday, giving the justices more time to mull their decision. The move to extend an administrative stay is procedural and comes just days after Alito froze a lower judge's decision to reverse the government's 2000 approval of the common abortion drug, muh - fuh - pri - stown. The decision means that all of District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk's April 7 ruling that threatened to revoke the Food and Drug Administration's approval of the drug will not go into effect until at least Friday at 11:59 p.m. Eastern time. Days after the district judge's decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit unwound some of the lower court's decision but kept in place a block on a seven-year effort by the agency to widen access to the drug. Ahead of Alito's decision, the manufacturer of the generic version of mifepristone, GenBioPro, filed a lawsuit against the FDA in Maryland federal court to maintain its ability to market the drug. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals halted some of the Texas decision while maintaining stays on more recent FDA changes that expanded access to the pill through telemedicine, mail, and retail pharmacies. With Alito's decision, no part of that appeals court ruling would go into effect until the late-Friday deadline. Alito, who is also the author of the opinion last summer that allowed states to impose laws severely restricting abortion access, is handling the matter because he is tasked to oversee requests stemming from the Louisiana-based 5th Circuit. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court must consider a separate district court ruling, issued less than an hour after Kacsmaryk's initial decision, that complicated the matter with a conflicting decision. Washington-based District Judge Thomas O. Rice, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, blocked the FDA from limiting the availability of mifepristone in much of the country. That ruling, also issued April 7, applies to just 17 liberal-leaning states and Washington, D.C., which filed a lawsuit in February challenging the FDA’s regulations over the drug. As of Wednesday, mifepristone is lawful and remains available in some form in 37 states, even some states with abortion restrictions. https://www.foxnews.com/politics/save-womens-sports-bill-passes-house-zero-votes-dems-transgender-bullying 'Save women's sports' bill passes House with zero votes from Dems, who call it transgender 'bullying' The House on Thursday passed legislation aimed at preventing biological males from competing as transgender athletes in girls’ and women’s sports at schools across the country, after a debate in which several Democrats accused Republicans of "bullying" transgender students by calling up the bill. The Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act passed in a 219-203 vote Thursday morning — all the "yes" votes came from Republicans, and all the "no" votes came from Democrats. Republicans defended the bill as an attempt to spare women and girls from having to compete against transgender women and girls — biological males who can sometimes dominate these sports and prevent some female athletes from making the team. But several Democrats argued in debate that the GOP bill is an extension of the bullying that transgender students are already facing at school. Rep. Mark Takano, D-Calif., said the bill would make school sports "less safe for women and girls," and argued that even discussing the legislation on the House floor was doing harm to transgender students. Republicans rejected these arguments and said they are trying to protect girls’ and women’s sports from being taken over by biological males. Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., said Democrats are ignoring the "physical advantages" that men have over women and rejected Jayapal’s argument that the GOP is waging a "hate" campaign against transgender students. Republicans also accused Democrats of pursuing transgender rights to an illogical end that goes against the intent of Title IX, which most credit with dramatically expanding participation in women’s sports. "Congress in 1972 created Title IX to protect women's sports to enable women to have an equal playing field in athletics," said Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., who sponsored the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act. "In worship to their trans idols, the administration wants to flip that on its head. It is insane." Under Steube’s bill, educational institutions that receive Title IX funding from the federal government would not be allowed to "permit a person whose sex is male to participate in an athletic program or activity that is designed for women or girls." The bill adds that the sex of an athlete is defined only by their "reproductive biology and genetics at birth." Steube has said he introduced his bill in order to "save women’s sports" from transgender women and girls who are denying biological women and girls spots on the team’s roster, and sometimes dominate these sports. He said a dangerous shift in U.S. culture requires a defense from Congress. Speaking of women’s sports… a win for Australia today! https://www.breitbart.com/sports/2023/04/19/trans-female-nixed-from-competing-as-woman-in-semi-pro-basketball-league/ Trans ‘Female’ Nixed from Competing as Woman in Semi-Pro Basketball League An application to become a player submitted by a man claiming to be a transgender female has been rejected by Australia’s WNBL 1 South women’s semi-pro basketball league, a report says. The application was submitted by a biological man calling himself Lexi Rodgers, who wanted to play for the Kilsyth Cobras in Kilsyth, Australia, a town in the western suburbs of Melbourne. The request, though, was denied by Basketball Australia, the governing body for the sport there, Fox News reported.

Around the world, wildlife is in decline. We know that animals play important roles in their environments, but it's often difficult to know how exactly the natural world would change if any particular type of wildlife no longer existed. In this episode, Scott speaks with Dr. Haldre Rogers, an ecologist working on the island of Guam, where invasive snakes have eliminated nearly all of the island's native birds. By comparing the forests on Guam with forests on nearby islands that still have birds, Dr. Rogers' work is helping reveal the importance of birds in the Mariana Islands and elsewhere. Dr. Rogers is also an avid rugby player who helped establish Guam's first female rugby team. She is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Fish and Wildlife Conservation at Virginia Tech University. Learn more about Haldre Rogers' research at https://www.haldre.orgTo see photos and hear records of the calls of the native forest birds of Guam and the Mariana Islands, visit: https://www.guampedia.com/a-native-forest-birds-of-guamThis episode of Wild World was produced by 3WireCreative.Mentioned in this episode:Lindblad ExpeditionsThe Rice Alumni Traveling Owls program offers exciting intellectual itineraries to destinations across the globe. Traveling Owls trips serve as a catalyst for lifelong learning and strengthen bonds between Rice University alumni and friends. You don't have to be a Rice alum to participate in Traveling Owls programs. Visit alumni.rice.edu/travelingowls to see a list of upcoming trips. Rice Traveling OwlsLindblad Expeditions

Loni Kai was a vibrant, friendly, well-liked young woman.  She has also graced the 5 of Hearts in a cold case deck of cards.  Loni was born Lorenzo Okoruru in the Mariana islands, but by 2001 she was living in the Hillsboro/Aloha area of Oregon with some of her extended family that lovingly supported her whole heartedly.  This one hits close to home, quite literally.  On August 26th as she tried to make her way home in the early morning hours after a fun night out on the town the unthinkable would happen.  Across the country, tragedy would strike again just a few days later and though she's not been forgotten by those that loved her, Loni's case made very little progress.  All these years later Loni's family still have no answers and have yet to see justice done for the heinous crime.  This week we're lucky to have special guest, Kate Wallinga the host of Ignorance was Bliss join us today, bringing her unique perspective as a forensic psychologist.  We may not have solved the case but we have to believe that it's never too late.  If you have any information about this case, please reach out to the Washington County Sheriff's Office at (503) 846-2500  or call Crime Stoppers Oregon (503) 823-4357. This week we share a promo for The Sirens Podcast! In addition to the Patreon, remember you can support the show via Apple Podcast Subscription, and drum roll please - our new Buzzsprout Subscription Feature for a shoutout in a future episode!  If you're enjoying our podcast, please consider leaving a rating & review on Apple Podcasts.  It helps get us seen by more creepy people just like you!  Find us on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Patreon,  & more!  If you have any true crime, paranormal, or witchy stories you'd like to share with us & possibly have them read (out loud) on an episode, email us at pnwhauntsandhomicides@gmail.com or use this link.  Another great way to support the show is by making a one time donation through BuyMeACoffee.AD Music from Uppbeat License YWG9BPO0I7XYQBBQ. Cover art by The Three Cs.Pastebin: for sources.  Support the show

What you'll learn in this episode:   How Beatriz discovered and catalogued the 2,600 rings in the Alice and Louis Koch Ring Collection at the Swiss National Museum How Covid lockdown changed how people wear jewelry Beatriz's tricks for making a jewelry exhibit more engaging What it's like to work with jewels uncovered from shipwrecks How global trade has influenced how jewelry is designed and made   About Beatriz Chadour-Sampson   Beatriz Chadour-Sampson studied art history, classical archaeology and Italian philology at the University of East Anglia, and at the University of Münster, Germany. Her doctoral thesis was on the Italian Renaissance goldsmith Antonio Gentili da Faenza. In 1985 she published the jewelry collection of the Museum für Angewandte Kunst, Cologne. Since 1988 she has worked freelance as a jewelry historian, curator of exhibitions and academic writer in Britain. Her numerous publications on jewelry, ranging from antiquity to the present day, include the The Gold Treasure from the Nuestra Señora de la Concepción (1991), and 2000 Finger Rings from the Alice and Louis Koch Collection, Switzerland (1994). She was the consultant curator in the re-designing of the William and Judith Bollinger Jewelry Gallery at the Victoria & Albert Museum (opened in 2008), London and was guest curator of the ‘Pearl' exhibition (2013-14). She is an Associate Member of the Goldsmiths' Company, London. Today Beatriz Chadour-Sampson works as a freelance international and jewelry historian and scholarly author. Her extensive publications range from Antiquity to the present day.    Additional Resources: Instagram Museum Jewellery Curators - Goldsmiths' Fair Photos available on TheJeweleryJourney.com Transcript:   Working in jewelry sometimes means being a detective. As a freelance jewelry historian and curator of the Alice and Louis Koch Ring Collection at the Swiss National Museum, Beatriz Chadour-Sampson draws on her wealth of knowledge to find jewelry clues—even when a piece has no hallmark or known designer. She joined the Jewelry Journey Podcast to talk about how she creates jewelry exhibits that engage viewers; how she found her way into the niche of shipwreck jewelry; and what it was like to catalogue 2,600 rings. Read the episode transcript here.  Sharon: Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Jewelry Journey Podcast. This is the second part of a two-part episode. If you haven't heard part one, please head to TheJewelryJourney.com. My guest is Beatriz Chadour-Sampson. She's been the curator of the Alice and Louis Koch Ring Collection at the Swiss National Museum for almost 35 years. Welcome back.   Beatriz: You asked about the catalogue. We didn't know if the exhibition was going ahead at one point, but I was asked by V&A Publishing to do a book on pearls, which I did. So, yes, we did a book which was for sale during the exhibition. That was in 2013. We redesigned the jewelry gallery, and 2008 was the end of that. The pearls exhibition was in 2013, the beginning of 2014.   Sharon: Why was it redesigned, the gallery?   Beatriz: The jewelry gallery. With all galleries, there comes a point where they need to be refreshed and renewed, and the previous design needed it. You even had gates you had to get through, and if you weren't quite as slim as myself, you would have problems getting through the gates. When it was redesigned, it was a completely different aesthetic. As I said, the boards have to tell the story, so when the visitor walks in, they have to understand the story and go from one to the other. Some people say the gallery is very full, but it is a study collection. We asked the education department artists to do certain things.    I was very keen on going “from cradle to grave.” The gallery is chronological, so you want a display before you start to know why you wear jewelry. A child wears jewelry or a mother wears jewelry to protect them at childbirth, or they wear it for status or religion or whatever it is. Jewelry is multitasking, multifunctional. Today we think of jewelry as decorative, but that is not the case. Jewelry was made for an occasion and a reason. With status, you always have the big diamonds and the big stones. That has always existed, in recently centuries definitely. But there are so many more reasons for jewelry, for mourning and birth and good luck. That sort of exists today, probably with charms. So, jewelry is multifunctional.    Then we have a screen with pictures from different centuries showing portraits because, at a jewelry gallery, you can't see the pieces on someone. They need the body, but they don't have the body. So, it's good to have a screen showing how the jewelry was worn through the centuries, which is very important. Also in the display, each board—let's say you had earrings, a necklace and a bracelet. The concept was that what you wear on the top of the head goes on top. What you wear around your neck comes next and then the base, so you have a feeling of an abstract body in a way. It's not always obvious, but I try to think of it logically.    Of course, with the contemporary, we couldn't do that. It is all chronological until you get to about the 1950s, and that's it. You have to find a completely different concept. So, we decided to do it by materials. Good chronology at the beginning, but then it comes into materials. Natural materials, new metals, techniques. You couldn't do decades. That couldn't work. So, we did it by materials, which is an interesting aspect because you have all the different materials they use in comparison to all the gold and silver you see throughout the gallery. Suddenly, you're seeing a whole wall of completely different materials.   Sharon: What is your role as co-curator? You're curator and co-curator of so many places. What's your role as a co-curator? What do you do? What do they call in you for?   Beatriz: It's an advisory role. The Victoria and Albert Museum is a bit more than just an advisory role. You're working with the team, with the architect. It's a team procedure, but as I say, everybody has their own role to play. It intermingles, of course.    Sharon: At other times, you've talked about a different museum in Switzerland where you came, and it looked just—was it at eye level? Was it low? Was it too high?   Beatriz: Oh, that one, no. You remembered that detail. The eye level, that was the Victoria and Albert Museum. That is in the center of the gallery because we did a display for a tourist who goes to the museum and only has 10 minutes to look at jewelry history. So, in the center you've got these curved glass cases. The jewelry is on special mounts. You remember that. I asked my colleagues of different heights, from four foot something to six foot something. In the storage room, we had glass doors where there was a lot of storage space with artifacts in it, and I used Post-it Notes to put the different heights of people to see what a good eye level is. So, if you're looking at a broach or a tiara or something, you want it on the level where you more or less visualize it on your body so you can see it well. So, yes, that's the Post-it Notes. I used not only double-sided tape and pieces of paper, but also Post-it Notes, trying to find the right height for the pieces.    Eye level is hugely important, but the other museum you're thinking of may be something I'm current advising on. This is really an advisory role. It is a museum that will open next year, the Dubedeen, a German museum. Of course, there are gemologists there that are very specialized, but their museum experience is missing. So, I'm giving a little bit of advice on the background of things. Don't put a plinth that you can fall over. Don't make drawers that a child can get their fingers caught in. You learn these things from places like the Victoria and Albert Museum. There's health and safety. There's also the height of displays, the attention span of visitors. Text shouldn't be too long. It's more of an advisory role than an active role.   Sharon: I'm thinking about attention span. You must have seen that really go down. It seems nobody has more than two seconds for attention anymore.   Beatriz: There is an element of that. I think the Koch Collection of rings in the Jewelry Gallery is one of the most visited in the England museums. When you get to sparkle and glitter, there's more attention span, but not so much on the text.   Sharon: Yeah, that's probably true. You've also done a lot of work on shipwrecks. That's very interesting.   Beatriz: That goes back to 1989. By sheer coincidence, I came to work on shipwrecks. I was in New York when I was working on the Concepción Collection. I met Priscilla Muller of the Hispanic Society of America in New York, and I helped her with some Spanish and Portuguese jewelry. When she was asked, she just didn't have the time to work on the shipwrecks. She thought with my Spanish and Portuguese knowledge, I would be suited for that, so I was asked by Pacific Sea Resources in 1989 to work on an incredible shipwreck called the Nuestra Señora de la Concepción from 1638 that sank. It was the usual thing, mutiny and the wrong person taking care of the ship. That's a private story, not a jewelry story, but the interesting thing is that the jewelry was basically made for Spaniards in the Philippines. The jewelry was made in the Philippines, the majority of it for Spaniards. It was a Spanish colony at the time.   When I was first went through it, I thought, “It looks quite European. It looks O.K.” I signed the contract, and little did I know how much research was involved for the material, which I hardly knew. It was because of the influence. The Spaniards definitely had European design books they brought with them. By then, you had printed books with designs in them, and they must have had them there. Chinese craftsmen were working for them in the Philippines, and of course the Chinese had great skills with outside countries. Some of it looks very European, and some of it is Indian influences, Siamese influences, and influences from Java, Sumatra. The chains, heavy gold chains, were certainly Chinese filigree. In fact, I told the Ashmolean Museum it belonged to Sir Elias Ashmole, whose portrait and chains still exist in the Ashmolean Museum, and I told them that one of the gold chains he had was Chinese. It was given by the Kuffners from Brandenburg, and I happened to find out that the Kuffners from Brandenburg travelled to China. So, that all fit. That was a little like detective work. That was published in 1990.   I've recently been working again on shipwrecks, just a few pieces of absolutely fascinating jewelry found off the shore of the Bahamas, which has now been in the Maritime Museum on the Bahamas for only a few months. I also worked on the Atocha in Key West. I organized an exhibition in Hanover for them, where we did a display of the Atocha and Santa Margarita events. But what's so fascinating about shipwrecks is that we see so many portraits of beautiful jewelry from the Renaissance, the 16th, 17th centuries, where they really documented beautifully painted jewelry in paintings. Thanks to that we can study them in detail. All this jewelry doesn't exist anymore, especially gold chains, because gold chains were the easiest thing to melt and reuse for more modern jewelry. As I have said, I have a smile when somebody talks to me about recycled gold being something new. Well, it's nothing new. Recycling gold goes back centuries.    Sharon: I'm surprised because in the pictures, you always think it's a straightforward gold chain with no Chinese engraving or anything. You think of it as a gold chain.   Beatriz: Some of it is simple, what they called a P-chain. You saw loads of it, especially on Dutch paintings. But in the Atocha there was a spiral. You can see they're very tidy on the portraits, but it looks as if they had a spiral at the back holding the chain so they flowed down properly. Some of those chains we had were definitely Chinese filigree because those chains are filigree. In the 1655 shipwreck from the Bahamas, there's a chain like that, and that's mainly why they asked me to look at it. That certainly reminded me of some of the Concepción work, which was Chinese craftsmanship.    The trade was amazing. You had trade happening in the Philippines. Even the Dutch were trading with the Spaniards. The Dutch were trading silks and spices from China and so on. These big galleons went from the Philippines to Acapulco and Vera Cruz and then to Havana. They went on a route around South America, loading and offloading things from Europe. It's interesting because in Seville, there's the Archivo General de Indias, and there they have all the books on the shipping material. Like with the Atocha, they found out which ship it was because the gold bars have a text mark on them, and that coincided with the documents they have in Seville. It's fascinating. It's a fascinating field.   Sharon: It seems like it.   Beatriz: It's a mystery and it's global, of course. Made in Asia; there's nothing new. It's hundreds of years. There would not be any porcelain in 18th century Europe the other way around.   Sharon: Do you get to see the ship right away? When it comes up, do you see it when they pull it from the ocean?   Beatriz: No. When I was asked to work on the Concepción, I had to travel to Singapore where it was being cleaned and conserved. In one instance I had to say, “Stop cleaning because I think there's enamel underneath, black and white enamel. Stop.” You have to be careful because you have to get rid of the marine dirt. No, I got to see it after it was cleaned or while it was being cleaned.    Sharon: Wow! And then what? It goes to the museum? What happens afterwards?   Beatriz: It nearly got split up and sold at auction. I'm glad it didn't because it's a historical find, but unfortunately you have to go the Mariana Islands to see it. You can't see it always. The material is put together, and it was published in a black and white archaeological report. It was published in 1990, so at least it's documented. National Geographic did a beautiful spread with color, so you know what it's like.   Sharon: What have you learned from parsing these shipwrecks, from researching the shipwrecks?   Beatriz: The extent of influence in Europe of some motifs and how far they went. It was made in the Philippines and sold in Europe because everything that was made and transported on this galleon, the Atocha, at some point went to Seville and then it was traded on. We definitely know that the emeralds the emperors were after came from Colombia and then went through Havana to Seville. It's a fascinating trade, but the trade is something we never think about. In Roman times, the Roman emperor wanted pearls, so they traveled to southern India to get pearls. History does amaze one.    Sharon: It does. You're working on many projects now. What can you tell us about some of them?   Beatriz: I can tell you what's half-finished and what's coming. I've had a year of three books. I co-edited a book with Sandra Hindman, founder of Les Enluminures. I need to add Les Enluminures because for many years, I've been their jewelry consultant. They're based in Chicago, New York and Paris and are specialized mainly in Medieval and Renaissance jewelry, but this has nothing to do with the book we did. It just happened to be that we worked together again. Sandra and myself did something called a liber amicorum in honor of Diana Scarisbrick, a leading jewelry historian. It was for her 94th birthday, and we kept it a secret until her birthday. It had 20 authors in three languages all writing in her honor. That has come out. It's now available. It was published by Paul Holberton. It's on varied topics, from archaeology to today, really. 20 authors contributed towards that.    Today I received my copy of a book I worked on for the Schmuckmuseum, so it's now published. The launch is on Sunday, but I won't be traveling to Germany for that, unfortunately. It has to be a Zoom celebration for me. It's to do with the humanist Johann Reuchlin. He was from Pforzheim. He lived in the late 15th to the 16th century, and it's about script and jewelry from varying periods. It's a lot of contemporary jewelry as well. The cover doesn't really tell you that because it was the 500th anniversary of, I think, his death date. So, he was honored in this book, which has just come out, with essays from many people. Lots and lots of jewelry. That was published by Arnoldsche, and it's called—I have to think of it—German sounds so much easier in this case. It means script and pictures worn on the finger. I worked on rings with script on them.   Sharon: With writing you mean?   Beatriz: Yeah, writing, that's it. There are a lot of other topics in the book as well, but jewelry is certainly the dominant. Yes, they are rings. Mary Queen of Scotts is somebody who wrote her inscription inside the ring and was loyal to the queen. Had that been seen, her head would have gone to the chop. It's rings with prayers on them or rings with some sort of amuletic inscriptions. It's all inscriptions on rings in my case, and it's about Josiah Wedgwood who gave this ring to John Flaxman. You've got a whole history behind it. It's rings with script on them, highly visible on the bezel, either visible on the bezel or inside the hoop.   Sharon: In English or German?   Beatriz: It's basically German, I'm afraid to say, but with lots of good pictures with excellent captions, which are international. I am bilingual in German and English, but I haven't written German for a long time.    I've actually written a third book that's coming out, but that won't come out until January. That was a huge task. It's on jewelry from Bossard from Lucerne. It started in the early 19th century, but the two I worked on were a father and son from 1869 until 1934. That was the period of historicism. It was also a time of fakes of Renaissance jewelry being made, because there were so many collectors who wanted Renaissance but couldn't afford the real Renaissance jewelry. So, it was very tempting for fakers to make fake jewelry. When I started, I didn't know what I was in for, but I have come to the conclusion that it's pure historicism, what Bossard made. I had very little jewelry to go on, just a few pieces in private hands, but I did find by sheer coincidence a drawing, and I found the bishop who it belonged to. You have a hundred drawings by the Bossard Company over this whole period, and it's very interesting material to see their designs they were making. In some instances, it's real Renaissance. I don't know if they were Renaissance or if it was actually made later. Then it gets critical. It's a very complex period, but a very interesting archive in the Swiss National Museum in Zurich.   Sharon: For next year, do you have other projects going on?   Beatriz: Yes, the coming projects. I mentioned the gem museum, which is opening next year. I'm in the midst of advising. I'm going to be working very shortly—I've already started a bit—on the jeweler Eileen Coyne from London. She's been working on jewelry since the 1970s and continues to make jewelry very, very different to anything I've worked on before. What I find so fascinating is that her imagination and inspiration come from the material. It comes with the material and the tools. She also uses interesting gemstones and beads that come from ethnic backgrounds. She uses the most amazing materials. Also jades, carnelians, all kinds of things. So, we're going to do a book. She had a shop in the 80s and into the 90s. Her jewelry was displayed in Harvey Nichols in London, and she had a shop where all the celebrities and royals went shopping. It was quite an interesting clientele. We'll see if we get photographs or if they allow us to show some of the things they bought. It's very much about discretion in such cases. So, that's interesting, a completely different type of jewelry.    I'm really excited about it, but at the same time, I've also been involved, and am more involved now, in an artificial intelligence project. That is a ring that has been designed by Sylvia Reidenbach and John Emeny in England. Sylvia Reidenbach is German, but she teaches in Glasgow and London and all over Europe as well. She has created, with John Emeny, a ring with artificial intelligence based on one or two rings from the archaeological museum in Munich, a few rings from the  Germanisches Nationalmuseum in Nuremburg, and 150 rings from the Koch Collection. There's one design. The machine makes the design, mixes it all and combines it into one design. The ring is now being made. The stone is labradorite. It's been on display since Wednesday last week in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum but will be coming to Zurich afterwards. So, I'll be learning a lot about AI and design. That is completely different from anything. I like the natural materials and history, and then the contrast is the AI.   Sharon: The AI is the dimensions of all these hundreds of rings?   Beatriz: Yes, the images are put into the machine, the AI. Don't ask me the technology of it because I haven't got a clue about AI technology. I'm at the beginning of it all. I'm learning, but I have seen how it develops. The images are fed into the machine, like the 150 rings from the Koch Collection and the others, and the machine designs one ring out of that.   Sharon: Wow! So, it's already made and in the museum.   Beatriz: Only just now. It's hot off the press, but there's more to come on that. There will be more to come on that, yes.   Sharon: You've written several other books. You wrote “A Life in Jewels.”   Beatriz: That is the book we did for Diana Scarisbrick, honoring her. I've written books since 1981, so it's added up quite a bit. Sometime I can give you a list.    Sharon: How about the influence of women on 20th century jewelry? Has it changed jewelry? Has it made it more feminine?    Beatriz: It's an extremely complex story, the role of women in design. You have to see it from the role of the woman in history. Just recently by coincidence, I've seen some material on women painters from the 16th and 17th centuries. In Bologna, for example, there were quite a few, and it's only now coming to the fore. You also have to see high jewelers' workshops in the field of jewelry. You don't have a Renaissance piece of jewelry and know, “So-and-so made it.” That didn't exist. It's only in the 19th century that we start that. The hallmarking system in England goes back to the 13th century, but jewelry was considered smallware, so they didn't consider putting a hallmark on it.    That changed later on, the but the name of the designer is something that we very often don't know. The high jewelers of the 19th century, when you knew the name of who made it in Paris or New York, you never know the name of the designer. That is something that came in in the 20th century. You have some classical examples. With Cartier, it was Jeanne Toussaint. She designed some of the iconic pieces for Cartier and the Duchess of Windsor. She worked for I don't know how many decades designing jewelry. She was a very important female designer. Then you've got Coco Chanel. She designed jewelry, mostly costume jewelry, but she also designed diamond jewelry. Not that she wanted to, but it was for the nation and probably the economy that she did it. Elsa Schiaparelli, with her fantastic surrealist jewelry, made that incredible neckpiece with beetles in plastic. If you had to date that as a jewelry store and you didn't know the background, you'd easily say 1970s or 80s. It's so amazing. In that period, you also had Suzanne Belperron with her really unique designs in jewelry.    Of course, the role of the woman changed after the First World War. You had millions of widows, and they had to work. The whole society was changing. After the Second World War, it became even more evident that women were working. I was very cheeky. I did a lecture. It was in the British Museum, and I was talking about the changing role of men and women buying jewelry. You can imagine the shock of some of them. I said, “Women go out and buy their own jewelry.” Before it was classical: the husband bought the jewelry for the wife. They were the earners, so they bought it. There were a few examples in the early 1900s, like the Duchess of Manchester, whose tiaras are in the Victoria and Albert Museum. She was one of these Dollar Princesses and quite a character. She liked smoking cigars and all. She went off with the family diamonds to Cartier and said, “Make me a tiara, and use up the garments.” You have Lady Mountbatten, who, after the birth of her daughter, Pamela, decided to go to Cartier and buy herself a nice bracelet that she could also wear in her hair in the 1920s.    There are a few examples. On the whole, it was always the husband buying the jewelry, but past that, you have women earning money and buying their own jewelry. The 60s sets off in that direction, and then it becomes jewelry that's more affordable. Jewelry has never been so diverse as in the last decades. It's never been so diverse in all its history. If you look at the Royal College of Art, I think you'll find that, in general, there are a lot more women in training to become jewelers. You find so many names of women designers, now one doesn't even talk about it. Whether it's a man or a woman, it's just become a norm.    Sharon: That's interesting. If you stop to think about it, I don't even know if there are that many male designers. I'm thinking about when I go to studios. You see more women than you do men.   Beatriz: It's more and more, yes. There are more and more women, absolutely.   Sharon: What would you advise? What piece of advice would you give emerging jewelers or people who want to follow in your steps?   Beatriz: Remember that if you're a jewelry historian, you're an academic. Remember that. You have to really enjoy what you're doing. In my case, I was very lucky. I've worked for so many different projects and so many different jewelers internationally. I've specialized in that, but it's very difficult. Maybe, depending on the economic situation, people can volunteer in a museum to learn the trade. I think what you really have to know is do you want to work in a gallery, or do you want to work in an auction? Do you want to work in a museum? They don't always mingle, so you have to learn where you want to go. It depends on what your interests are. If you have anybody, send them to me privately. I'm happy to talk it through.   Sharon: Thank you for being with us.   Beatriz: My pleasure.   Sharon: Well will have photos posted on the website. Please head to TheJewelryJourney.com to check them out.   Thank you again for listening. Please leave us a rating and review so we can help others start their own jewelry journey.

Dive deep with Kristen about the Mariana Trench or Marianas Trench. It's located in the western Pacific Ocean about 200 kilometres east of the Mariana Islands; it is the deepest oceanic trench on Earth. It is crescent-shaped and measures about 2,550 km in length and 69 km in width.   https://starmints.live  

On the Stoppage Time Agenda this week: Arsenal surge ahead atop the Premier League table after a 3-2 win over Liverpool, Melbourne Victory got their season off to a cracking start with the same scoreline, and Sergio Ramos finds himself in familiar hot water for the 28th time!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

News items read by Laura Kennedy include: Maya cremation remains used to create balls for ritual games (details) Researchers discover world's oldest example of octopus lures on Mariana Islands (details) Butchered remains of mammoths point to possibility of oldest humans in North America (details) Archaeologists may have cracked the code of ancient Elamite script (details)

Photo:  Map of the Mariana Islands by Alonso Lopez,  #Guam: Hardening the Marianas against the PRC assault. Tyler Rogoway The War Zone. https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/four-b-1b-bone-bombers-have-arrived-at-andersen-afb-in-guam Tyler Rogoway, The WarZone at The Drive.  @Aviation_Intel

The Taotao Mona are ancestral spirits that walk among the living. They are protectors of mountains, jungles and the land of the Mariana Islands, but if you disrespect them, you are in for a bad time. Our guest Six joins us, to tell us about the Taotao Mona, in honor of AAPI month. If you have spooky stories you want us to share on the podcast, please email Espookytales@gmail.com. Listen to Canceled for Maintenance: https://cancelledformaintenance.com/ (https://cancelledformaintenance.com/) For more spooky stories, watch us on Tiktok https://www.tiktok.com/@espookytales (https://www.tiktok.com/@espookytales) For pictures on the places we discuss each episode, check out our Instagram page: https://www.instagram.com/espookytales/ (https://www.instagram.com/espookytales/) Tweet us https://twitter.com/EspookyTales (https://twitter.com/EspookyTales) Like us on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/EspookyTalesPodcast/ (https://www.facebook.com/EspookyTalesPodcast/)  https://www.espookytales.com/support/ (Support Espooky Tales) on Patreon and receive bonus episodes, shoutouts, stickers and more! https://www.patreon.com/Espookytales (https://www.patreon.com/Espookytales) Music Credit:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REk9Ia6eYXk (Silent Night (Dark Piano Version)-Myuu)       I, Crime Scene (Piano Version)-Ghost Stories Incorporated   Link for https://www.espookytales.com/blog/ (sources) Art: "https://www.flickr.com/photos/56796376@N00/376422514 (India - Sights & Culture - 010 - Banyan Tree)" by https://www.flickr.com/photos/56796376@N00 (mckaysavage) is licensed under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/?ref=openverse (CC BY 2.0). Mentioned in this episode: Susto Listen to Susto podcast (one of Cristina's favorite podcasts), every other week! https://pod.link/1458901880

All people deserve to be seen and heard. Those who are not often feel invisible, from their cultural heritage to their material circumstances and societal contributions. This reality led a group of young Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders in 2009 to found Empowering Pacific Islander Communities (EPIC) a nonprofit dedicated to advancing social justice for Native Hawaiians, Chamorros (indigenous people of the Mariana Islands), Samoans, Tongans, Marshallese, and Fijians who call Washington, California, Utah, and Arkansas home. EPICS's executive director Tavae Samuelu leads with deep respect for the lived experience and wisdom of her elders and with an explicitly pro Black and indigenous framework. EPIC connects NHPIs with policy makers to call for data disaggregation, which has identified disproportionate gaps in access to education, health, and immigration services. It also illuminates the devastating and under-reported impacts of the pandemic on Pacific Islanders. EPIC's community leaders begin each meeting, even at the White House, with stories, their personal and most compelling data. As a result, Pacific Islanders are being seen and heard by government at all levels and policy makers are starting to prioritize their needs.

Welcome to the Instant Trivia podcast episode 400, where we ask the best trivia on the Internet. Round 1. Category: Islands 1: Material for the giant statues on this Chilean island was quarried from a crater called Rano Raraku. Easter Island. 2: It's home to Europe's highest active volcano. Sicily (Mt. Etna). 3: West Indian island that's the home of the limbo dance and calypso music. Trinidad. 4: You'll find this island nation about 95 miles due south of Cuba, mon. Jamaica. 5: Largest of the Mariana Islands, we acquired it in 1898. Guam. Round 2. Category: Nicknames 1: This nickname of Mrs. Gore comes from a song recorded by Jan August and The Harmonicats. Tipper. 2: "The Peanut President". Jimmy Carter. 3: Baseball player Jay Hanna Dean was known by this giddy moniker. Dizzy Dean. 4: "Dark" nickname shared by Jackie Onassis' father, John Bouvier, and General Pershing. "Black Jack". 5: Superstar Wilt Chamberlain was "The Big" one. "Dipper". Round 3. Category: Did You Notice? 1: On a piano, the high-pitched keys are at this end of the keyboard. right. 2: The 1st names of your 2 opponents. Meg and Sue. 3: This album's cover was the 1st on which all 4 Beatles sported mustaches. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. 4: 6 of these animals are found on the Cadillac crest. birds. 5: Only current U.S. coin to have a "likeness" of the same man on both the face and back. penny. Round 4. Category: Nature 1: Safes, a type of these desert formations, are often many miles long and several hundred feet high. sand dunes. 2: Some of the fanciest of these reptiles are beaded, horned, or frilled. lizards. 3: Although these smallest birds are known for drinking nectar, they eat insects as well. hummingbirds. 4: This cotton pest 1st reached the U.S. at Brownsville, TX around 1892. boll weevil. 5: Mor and mull are 2 types of this black decayed organic matter in soil. humus. Round 5. Category: "Teen" Scene 1: Numerically speaking, read up on "Fun Stuff", "Fashion", "Health" and "Stars" at this magazine.com. seventeen.com. 2: If you're triskaidekaphobic, you're afraid of this number, and not just on a Friday. thirteen. 3: A holder for liquid, or a military base's general store. a canteen. 4: Golfing "hole" with a bar (where you can't go), or the amendment granting women's suffrage. 19th. 5: Number of lines in Shakespeare's poem that starts "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?". 14. Thanks for listening! Come back tomorrow for more exciting trivia!

In our first episode, we talk to UFC Fighter Frank The Crank Camacho about his martial arts journey. He talks to us about the history of Mixed Martial Arts in the Mariana Islands, his journey from an Island Boy to fighting on the grandest stage - the UFC, and other crazy stories such as the time he fought his uncle in a professional fight. Follow us on Instagram to stay updated @blackbeltnutrition_ and check us out at www.blackbeltnutrition.com Enjoy

Join us for a discussion of white supremacy, the human rights crisis, and public policy in the twenty years since 9/11. The Institute for Policy Studies, Haymarket Books, and the Center for Constitutional Rights present “Grasping at the Root: White Supremacy and the so-called “War on Terror”, the second event of a 4-part series marking the 20th anniversary of 9/11. The conversation with scholars, lawyers and journalists is an invitation to reflect and interrogate the pillars of white supremacy upon which the U.S. constructed the last twenty years of policy. The post-9/11 human rights crisis is but the latest chapter in over half a millennium of colonialism, capitalism and war. Only in situating today's injustices within a history of U.S. domination, exceptionalism and impunity, can we begin to chart a new future rooted in accountability, solidarity and interdependence. To mark the 20th anniversary of 9/11, the Center for Constitutional Rights, Haymarket Books and our partners are pleased to present a 4-part series, "Just Resistance: 20 years of global struggle against the post-9/11 human rights crisis." The series is an opportunity to bring together our colleagues and comrades from impacted communities across the world, to center stories of survival, and to contextualize the last two decades of U.S. policy within a history of imperialism, domination and impunity. Speakers: Nana Gyamfi is the Executive Director of Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI), the largest Black-led social justice organization representing the nearly 10 million Black immigrants, refugees, and families living in the U.S. A Movement attorney for the past 25 years, Nana is co-founder of Justice Warriors 4 Black Lives and Human Rights Advocacy, both dedicated to fighting for human rights and Black liberation. She is the current President of the National Conference of Black Lawyers, and a member of the Movement for Black Lives Policy Table. Nana is a former professor in the Pan African Studies Department at California State University Los Angeles, and has long been a sought after voice for legal and political insight into issues affecting Black communities. Tiara R. Na'puti is a Chamoru scholar (Guåhan/Guam) who focuses on issues of Indigenous movements, colonialism, and militarism in the Mariana Islands archipelago. She is currently a 2021 Mellon/ACLS Scholars and Society Fellow working with Independent Guåhan a community organization educating the island's public about sovereignty and addressing climate change as an urgent challenge brought about by the island's colonial political status. She is also a new faculty member in the Department of Global & International Studies at University of California Irvine. Dr. Maha Hilal is a researcher and writer on institutionalized Islamophobia and author of the forthcoming book Innocent Until Proven Muslim: Islamophobia, the War on Terror, and the Muslim Experience Since 9/11. Her writings have appeared in Vox, Al Jazeera, Middle East Eye, Newsweek, Business Insider, and Truthout, She is also Co-Director of Justice for Muslims Collective where she focuses on political consciousness and narrative shifting programming. Dr. Hilal earned her doctorate in May 2014 from the Department of Justice, Law and Society at American University in Washington, D.C. The title of her dissertation is “Too damn Muslim to be trusted: The War on Terror and the Muslim American response." Moderator: Khury Petersen-Smith is the Michael Ratner Middle East Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies, where he researches and discusses the War on Terror, the militarization of borders, and the Palestinian freedom struggle. Khury is a student of Black internationalism, researches US militarization and resistance in the Pacific, and builds solidarity against US empire. Watch the live event recording: https://youtu.be/WRhcwcJiuEk Buy books from Haymarket: www.haymarketbooks.org Follow us on Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/haymarketbooks

Guam is a United States territory located within the Mariana Islands. The island was occupied by humans starting around 4,000 years ago. Guam IS the Chamarro people. This indigenous group has endured hundreds of years of conquest and occupation of their island and yet their culture has survived. A wonderful culture that embraces the spirit world. On this episode, we are going to share the history, legends and hauntings of Guam! The Moment in Oddity was suggested by Duey Oxberger and features a Colonial ship found under World Trade Center and This Month in History features Scientific American reporting on radios coming into homes. Our sponsor for this episode is HelloFresh. Go to HelloFresh.com/bump14 and enter code bump14 for 14 free meals, plus free shipping! Check out the website: http://historygoesbump.com Show notes can be found here: https://historygoesbump.blogspot.com/2021/10/hgb-ep-405-haunted-guam.html Become an Executive Producer: http://patreon.com/historygoesbump Music used in this episode: Main Theme: Lurking in the Dark by Muse Music with Groove Studios (Moment in Oddity) Vanishing by Kevin MacLeod Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4578-vanishing License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license (This Month in History) In Your Arms by Kevin MacLeod Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/3906-in-your-arms License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Outro Music: Happy Fun Punk by Muse Music with Groove Studios All other music licensing: PODCASTMUSIC.COM License Synchronization, Mechanical, Master Use and Performance Direct License for a Single Podcast Series under current monthly subscription.

After their overwhelming victories at the Philippine Sea and the Mariana Islands, American military leaders faced several options for their next target. Due in large part to lobbying by General MacArthur, they chose the Philippines. Japan's leadership knew that losing the Philippines would mean the severing of the supply line from the Dutch East Indies to the home islands, so they were determined to stop the American invasion. Join James and Scott as they discuss the Japanese navy's attempt to destroy the American invasion fleet in a “decisive battle.”

Don't miss the conclusion to our four-part interview series with Mr. Larry Kirby, United States Marine Corps, Third Division.  This episode focuses on the last chapter of Mr. Kirby's amazing memoir.  Mr. Kirby was born and raised in the northeastern United States.  In the spring of 1942, Mr. Kirby walked out of St. Mary's high school and joined the Marine Corps.  With a massive physique of 5'6” tall and 135 lbs, Mr. Kirby was not your prototypical Marine.  He suffered through boot camp in Paris Island, SC, where his first encounter with a Drill Sergeant resulted in a punch to Mr. Kirby's face.  Following boot camp, Mr. Kirby travelled west across the United States making stops in Camp Lejeune, Nebraska, and Camp Pendleton, for various types of training.  He was trained as a scout, which meant he would move ahead of the Infantry to observe the enemy and provide intelligence back to the Marines.  Upon arrival in the South Pacific, Mr. Kirby was assigned to Easy Company of the 2nd Battalion, 9th Marine Regiment, 3rd Marine Division.  The young Marines wasted no time, landing in Bougainville,  Mr. Kirby's first combat.  After Bougainville, Mr. Kirby and the Marines from 3rd Division invaded the Mariana Islands, with Guam as the objective for Mr. Kirby's unit.  Mr. Kirby faced heavy combat in Guam, including one of the largest and most vicious Bonzai attacks of the war.  Mr. Kirby was wounded by a Japanese hand grenade during a one-on-one confrontation with a young Japanese soldier.  He also lost his best friend, who died in Mr. Kirby's arms.  After being wounded, Mr. Kirby was evacuated for a short period, but he refused to leave his men.  He rejoined his unit shortly after being wounded and following the conclusion of a ‘successful' campaign in Guam, 3rd Division made Guam home base while preparing for the fateful invasion of Iwo Jima.  In February 1945, Mr. Kirby landed on Iwo Jima and began fighting for 22 straight days in some of the most brutal combat our nation has ever faced.  Of the 230 Marines who landed with Easy Company, only Mr. Kirby and six other men walked off that island.  Mr. Kirby has documented many of his experiences by writing a book, ‘Stories from the Pacific:  The Island War 1942-1945.'  His book can be purchased on Amazon, and we HIGHLY recommend it.  Not only are his combat stories phenomenal, he has so many hilarious stories about life as a young Marine.  Most fascinating (to us) are his perspectives on the combat, the military, and war in general.  For those of us who have been in combat, Mr. Kirby was able to put into words what many of us feel but can't say.  His perspectives really resonated with us, and we sincerely hope you'll order his book.  It's a must read, in our opinion, especially if you're interested in World War II, the Pacific Theatre, or you've never served but would like a small taste of what combat is really like.We want to thank Mr. Kirby for sharing his story.  He discussed some very difficult topics, and we believe his words are enlightening for those who served in the military, or those who never served at all.  This is our first four-part series.  Part 1 (Episode 22A) will cover his childhood, joining the Marine Corps, boot camp, and deployment overseas.  Part 2 (22B) will dive into Mr. Kirby's first combat in Bougainville and then Guam (some of Mr. Kirby's most difficult memories were experiences he faced on Guam).  Part 3 (22C) will focus on Iwo Jima, and Part 4 (22D) will cover the final chapter in his book, which is simply amazing.God Bless men like Mr. Kirby.  None of us would be here today without Mr. Kirby, and the millions of young men who sacrificed their lives to provide us with the greatest privilege in the world, FREEDOM.Thank you, Shreyas Ganesh,

Don't miss part three of our four-part interview series with Mr. Larry Kirby, United States Marine Corps, Third Division.  This episode focuses primarily on Iwo Jima, one of the most difficult battles our military has ever experienced.Mr. Kirby was born and raised in the northeastern United States.  In the spring of 1942, Mr. Kirby walked out of St. Mary’s high school and joined the Marine Corps.  With a massive physique of 5’6” tall and 135 lbs, Mr. Kirby was not your prototypical Marine.  He suffered through boot camp in Paris Island, SC, where his first encounter with a Drill Sergeant resulted in a punch to Mr. Kirby’s face.  Following boot camp, Mr. Kirby travelled west across the United States making stops in Camp Lejeune, Nebraska, and Camp Pendleton, for various types of training.  He was trained as a scout, which meant he would move ahead of the Infantry to observe the enemy and provide intelligence back to the Marines.  Upon arrival in the South Pacific, Mr. Kirby was assigned to Easy Company of the 2nd Battalion, 9th Marine Regiment, 3rd Marine Division.  The young Marines wasted no time, landing in Bougainville,  Mr. Kirby’s first combat.  After Bougainville, Mr. Kirby and the Marines from 3rd Division invaded the Mariana Islands, with Guam as the objective for Mr. Kirby’s unit.  Mr. Kirby faced heavy combat in Guam, including one of the largest and most vicious Bonzai attacks of the war.  Mr. Kirby was wounded by a Japanese hand grenade during a one-on-one confrontation with a young Japanese soldier.  He also lost his best friend, who died in Mr. Kirby’s arms.  After being wounded, Mr. Kirby was evacuated for a short period, but he refused to leave his men.  He rejoined his unit shortly after being wounded and following the conclusion of a ‘successful’ campaign in Guam, 3rd Division made Guam home base while preparing for the fateful invasion of Iwo Jima.  In February 1945, Mr. Kirby landed on Iwo Jima and began fighting for 22 straight days in some of the most brutal combat our nation has ever faced.  Of the 230 Marines who landed with Easy Company, only Mr. Kirby and six other men walked off that island.  Mr. Kirby has documented many of his experiences by writing a book, ‘Stories from the Pacific:  The Island War 1942-1945.’  His book can be purchased on Amazon, and we HIGHLY recommend it.  Not only are his combat stories phenomenal, he has so many hilarious stories about life as a young Marine.  Most fascinating (to us) are his perspectives on the combat, the military, and war in general.  For those of us who have been in combat, Mr. Kirby was able to put into words what many of us feel but can’t say.  His perspectives really resonated with us, and we sincerely hope you’ll order his book.  It’s a must read, in our opinion, especially if you’re interested in World War II, the Pacific Theatre, or you’ve never served but would like a small taste of what combat is really like.We want to thank Mr. Kirby for sharing his story.  He discussed some very difficult topics, and we believe his words are enlightening for those who served in the military, or those who never served at all.  This is our first four-part series.  Part 1 (Episode 22A) will cover his childhood, joining the Marine Corps, boot camp, and deployment overseas.  Part 2 (22B) will dive into Mr. Kirby’s first combat in Bougainville and then Guam (some of Mr. Kirby’s most difficult memories were experiences he faced on Guam).  Part 3 (22C) will focus on Iwo Jima, and Part 4 (22D) will cover the final chapter in his book, which is simply amazing.God Bless men like Mr. Kirby.  None of us would be here today without Mr. Kirby, and the millions of young men who sacrificed their lives to provide us with the greatest privilege in the world, FREEDOM.&nbs

Don't miss part two of our four-part interview series with Mr. Larry Kirby, United States Marine Corps, Third Division.We are honored to welcome Larry Kirby, United States Marine Corps, as our guest for episode 22.  Mr. Kirby was born and raised in the northeastern United States.  In the spring of 1942, Mr. Kirby walked out of St. Mary’s high school and joined the Marine Corps.  With a massive physique of 5’6” tall and 135 lbs, Mr. Kirby was not your prototypical Marine.  He suffered through boot camp in Paris Island, SC, where his first encounter with a Drill Sergeant resulted in a punch to Mr. Kirby’s face.  Following boot camp, Mr. Kirby travelled west across the United States making stops in Camp Lejeune, Nebraska, and Camp Pendleton, for various types of training.  He was trained as a scout, which meant he would move ahead of the Infantry to observe the enemy and provide intelligence back to the Marines.  Upon arrival in the South Pacific, Mr. Kirby was assigned to Easy Company of the 2nd Battalion, 9th Marine Regiment, 3rd Marine Division.  The young Marines wasted no time, landing in Bougainville,  Mr. Kirby’s first combat.  After Bougainville, Mr. Kirby and the Marines from 3rd Division invaded the Mariana Islands, with Guam as the objective for Mr. Kirby’s unit.  Mr. Kirby faced heavy combat in Guam, including one of the largest and most vicious Bonzai attacks of the war.  Mr. Kirby was wounded by a Japanese hand grenade during a one-on-one confrontation with a young Japanese soldier.  He also lost his best friend, who died in Mr. Kirby’s arms.  After being wounded, Mr. Kirby was evacuated for a short period, but he refused to leave his men.  He rejoined his unit shortly after being wounded and following the conclusion of a ‘successful’ campaign in Guam, 3rd Division made Guam home base while preparing for the fateful invasion of Iwo Jima.  In February 1945, Mr. Kirby landed on Iwo Jima and began fighting for 22 straight days in some of the most brutal combat our nation has ever faced.  Of the 230 Marines who landed with Easy Company, only Mr. Kirby and six other men walked off that island.  Mr. Kirby has documented many of his experiences by writing a book, ‘Stories from the Pacific:  The Island War 1942-1945.’  His book can be purchased on Amazon, and we HIGHLY recommend it.  Not only are his combat stories phenomenal, he has so many hilarious stories about life as a young Marine.  Most fascinating (to us) are his perspectives on the combat, the military, and war in general.  For those of us who have been in combat, Mr. Kirby was able to put into words what many of us feel but can’t say.  His perspectives really resonated with us, and we sincerely hope you’ll order his book.  It’s a must read, in our opinion, especially if you’re interested in World War II, the Pacific Theatre, or you’ve never served but would like a small taste of what combat is really like.We want to thank Mr. Kirby for sharing his story.  He discussed some very difficult topics, and we believe his words are enlightening for those who served in the military, or those who never served at all.  This is our first four-part series.  Part 1 (Episode 22A) will cover his childhood, joining the Marine Corps, boot camp, and deployment overseas.  Part 2 (22B) will dive into Mr. Kirby’s first combat in Bougainville and then Guam (some of Mr. Kirby’s most difficult memories were experiences he faced on Guam).  Part 3 (22C) will focus on Iwo Jima, and Part 4 (22D) will cover the final chapter in his book, which is simply amazing.God Bless men like Mr. Kirby.  None of us would be here today without Mr. Kirby, and the millions of young men who sacrificed their lives to provide us with the greatest privilege in the world, FREEDOM.  

#MyzLulu welcomes a true cultural avant-garde to Episode 11 of #EveryoneLovesLulu, HEIDI CHARGUALAF QUENGA aka "Aunty Heidi." #HeidiChargualafQuenga is an Accounting/Operations Manager who holds a B.S. in Business Management. Her involvement and efforts to preserve Pacific Islander heritages stem from her tenured Directorship with the award-winning Kutturan Chamoru Foundation (KCF), a tuition-free 501(c)3 non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation of the Chamoru culture through song and dance from the Mariana Islands in Micronesia since 1993. Aunty Heidi is the 1st Pacific Islander to receive the California Arts Council Artist-In-Residence from 2000 -2002 and was bestowed the title of Fafa’någue by the Master of Chamorro Dance, Saina Frank Rabon of Tao Tao Tano, Guahan in 2019. She continues her efforts to ensure the inclusion of all Pacific Islanders as a Cultural Advisor to countless community groups, projects, universities, and initiatives across the Continental US and the Mariana Islands to include her work with the SoCal Pacific Islander COVID-19 Response Team as the Community Engagement Lead and the Pacific Islander Health Partnership’s current Vice President. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/islandblockpodcasters/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/islandblockpodcasters/support

We are honored to welcome Larry Kirby, United States Marine Corps, as our guest for episode 22.  Mr. Kirby was born and raised in the northeastern United States.  In the spring of 1942, Mr. Kirby walked out of St. Mary’s high school and joined the Marine Corps.  With a massive physique of 5’6” tall and 135 lbs, Mr. Kirby was not your prototypical Marine.  He suffered through boot camp in Paris Island, SC, where his first encounter with a Drill Sergeant resulted in a punch to Mr. Kirby’s face.   After boot camp, Mr. Kirby travelled west across the United States making stops in Camp Lejeune, Nebraska, and Camp Pendleton, for various types of training.  He was trained as a scout, which meant he would move ahead of the Infantry to observe the enemy and provide intelligence back to the Marines.  Upon arrival in the South Pacific, Mr. Kirby was assigned to Easy Company of the 2nd Battalion, 9th Marine Regiment, 3rd Marine Division.  The young Marines wasted no time, landing in Bougainville,  Mr. Kirby’s first combat.   After Bougainville, Mr. Kirby and the Marines from 3rd Division invaded the Mariana Islands, with Guam as the objective for Mr. Kirby’s unit.  Mr. Kirby faced heavy combat in Guam, including one of the largest and most vicious Bonzai attacks of the war.  Mr. Kirby was wounded by a Japanese hand grenade during a one-on-one confrontation with a young Japanese soldier.  He also lost his best friend, who died in Mr. Kirby’s arms.  After being wounded, Mr. Kirby was evacuated for a short period, but he refused to leave his men.  He rejoined his unit shortly after being wounded and following the conclusion of a ‘successful’ campaign in Guam, 3rd Division made Guam home base while preparing for the fateful invasion of Iwo Jima.   In February 1945, Mr. Kirby landed on Iwo Jima and began fighting for 22 straight days in some of the most brutal combat our nation has ever faced.  Of the 230 Marines who landed with Easy Company, only Mr. Kirby and six other men walked off that island.   Mr. Kirby has documented many of his experiences by writing a book, ‘Stories from the Pacific:  The Island War 1942-1945.’  His book can be purchased on Amazon, and we HIGHLY recommend it.  Not only are his combat stories phenomenal, he has so many hilarious stories about life as a young Marine.  Most fascinating (to us) are his perspectives on the combat, the military, and war in general.  For those of us who have been in combat, Mr. Kirby was able to put into words what many of us feel but can’t say.  His perspectives really resonated with us, and we sincerely hope you’ll order his book.  It’s a must read, in our opinion, especially if you’re interested in World War II, the Pacific Theatre, or you’ve never served but would like a small taste of what combat is really like. We want to thank Mr. Kirby for sharing his story.  He discussed some very difficult topics, and we believe his words are enlightening for those who served in the military, or those who never served at all.  This is our first four-part series.  Part 1 (Episode 22A) will cover his childhood, joining the Marine Corps, boot camp, and deployment overseas.  Part 2 (22B) will dive into Mr. Kirby’s first combat in Bougainville and then Guam (some of Mr. Kirby’s most difficult memories were experiences he faced on Guam).  Part 3 (22C) will focus on Iwo Jima, and Part 4 (22D) will cover the final chapter in his book, which is simply amazing. God Bless men like Mr. Kirby.  None of us would be here today without Mr. Kirby, and the millions of young men who sacrificed their lives to provide us with the greatest privilege in the world, FREEDOM.  Mr. Kirby is a hero of the highest degree, and we are proud to call him our friend.  A huge ‘thank you’ to Shrey

An MFA-sponsored trip to the Mariana Islands allowed Danielle P. Williams of George Mason University to reconnect with her ancestral culture. She sits down with Jared to discuss exploring Chamorro history through poetry, learning ancient language through translation, and meeting mentors and allies through her program. Danielle P. Williams is a Pushcart-nominated poet, essayist, and spoken-word artist from Columbia, South Carolina. She strives to give voice to unrepresented cultures, expanding on the narratives and experiences of her Black and Chamorro cultures. She is an Editorial Coordinator for Poetry Daily, the Poetry Editor for So To Speak, and a 2019 Alan Cheuse MFA Travel Fellow. Danielle is a 2020 Writing Workshop Fellow for The Watering Hole and 2021 Langston Hughes Fellow for Palm Beach Poetry Festival. Her poems were selected for the 2020 Literary Award in Poetry from Ninth Letter. Her writing appears or is forthcoming in Hobart, Juked Magazine, The Pinch, Barren Magazine, JMWW, The Hellebore, and elsewhere. She is the author of a self-published collection of poetry, The Art in Knowing Me, and two spoken-word EP's, At My Own Risk and We Fall Down. Find her at daniellepwilliams.com, on Twitter @dpwpoetry, or on Instagram @daniellepwilliams. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com

For this episode of War News Radio, we’re taking a closer look at two of the Pacific territories, Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands, whose historical relationships to the United States are defined by conflict and colonialism. This has drastically disrupted the lives of the native Chamorro people who have inhabited Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and the rest of the Mariana Islands archipelago for the past 4-5,000 years. There are cultural and historical differences between Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands, which led to Guam rejecting reunification with the Northern Mariana Islands in 1960. But both territories still face many of the same challenges today. The U.S. acquired Guam from the Spanish in 1899 after winning the Spanish-American War. The Northern Mariana Islands has a more complicated colonial history, and was passed more or less from the Spanish Empire to Germany, then Japan, then the United Nations, and was officially established as a commonwealth in political union with the United States in 1986. Although the pasts of the two territories differ, the relationship between the U.S. and both territories has been historically characterized by intense militarization, a trend that continues to this day. But increasing calls for decolonization and self-determination could be changing this dynamic. In order to understand this shift happening in the pacific territories, we talked to residents of Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands about colonial history, militarism, political representation, and more. This episode of War News Radio was written and produced by Lucas Meyer-Lee, Anya Slepyan, Max Winig, and Sophia Becker.

The Mariana Trench or Marianas Trench is located in the western Pacific Ocean about 200 kilometres east of the Mariana Islands; it is the deepest oceanic trench on Earth. It is crescent-shaped and measures about 2,550 km in length and 69 km in width.

Season 2 of Plum Radio is here! Rachel Ramirez (@rachelreports), an environmental justice reporter and Saipan native, joins us to talk about her home, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), its history of colonization, and how the U.S. military is making COVID-19 worse on the islands while opening new live-fire training bases on indigenous burial grounds. The U.S. Department of Defense is the biggest greenhouse gas emitter of any government agency on the planet, and Guam and CNMI, as faux colonies that are largely used as U.S. military bases, suffer from both health and climate issues as a result of their presence. As we more openly question the militarization of U.S. police, we must ask ourselves: how has the U.S. military impacted our Asian communities, especially the Pacific Islands? -- We pride ourselves on being independent media at Plum Radio. Follow us on Instagram (@listentoplumradio), and support us on Patreon (patreon.com/plumradio) if you’re here for the culture and want to be part of the vision.

Traveler Sam lives and works at the Pacific Islands Club in the tropical US Territory of the Northern Mariana Islands. While there, he meets friendly locals, makes some unusual trades, and experiences a tropical storm that causes heavy damage to the island.

Japan's “Meiji Restoration”—which spelled the end of the country's isolation from the West during the reign of the Tokugawa Shoguns--allowed it to embark upon a campaign of modernization and westernization. Within the scope of a few decades, Japan modernized and became the most powerful country in East Asia, with that result cemented in blood by the First Sino-Japanese War and the Russo-Japanese War. Thereafter, Japan decided to emulate the Western Powers that colonized or subdued most of the non-Western world in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; in other words, Japan became an imperial power in East Asia. It annexed Formosa (Taiwan) in 1895, Korea in 1910, and the Caroline and Mariana Islands after World War I. Book Siamese Sovereignty: Thailand's Strategy of Political Duality During World War II Philippines' Resistance: The Last Allied Stronghold in the Pacific Pinay Guerrilleras: The Unsung Heroics of Filipina Resistance Fighters During the Pacific War Fall of Singapore: The Undefeatable British Fortress Conquered --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/pacific-atrocities-education/support

Even with victory in sight, soldiers, sailors, and airmen continued to die in the Pacific theater. The USS Indianapolis, for example, was torpedoed by Japanese submarine I-58 while transporting parts of the atomic bomb “Little Boy” from San Francisco to Tinian in the Mariana Islands. Three hundred men went down with the ship as she sank. For the other nearly 900 sailors in the water, clinging desperately to their life rafts, the ordeal had just begun.

Tony Barratt in the UK reports on the VOA Bethany Closedown transmission. There are updates on KHBI, the Christian Science Monitor Station which took over KYOI in the Mariana Islands. There are changes going on at Radio Berlin International. In PUBSPOT we look at new Fine-Tuning Group's Proceedings 1989 which contains 27 articles from real specialists. John Bryant is one of the editors and explains why they went into so much detail. This edition is both for beginners and advanced alike. Bryant wrote a very practical article on the Beverage antenna. John Fisher has an excellent article on broadcasting in Brazil and Hans Johnson on broadcasting in the Middle East. A lot of information may be “dated” in 2020, but for someone who travels and wants to kill some time reading about SWL, they are a great resource. It's like sitting down with a veteran DXer and picking his/her brain. The authors were “giants” of the hobby back in the day. All the books were available on a single CD-ROM for US$10 from Harold Sellers of the Ontario DX Association.. () There are earlier interviews with John Bryant of Fine tuning in these editions of Media Network: plus two other programmes with John Bryant which we did:  covered the Zenith Transoceanic  which went into some depth about the Drake R-8. In another publication “Latin America by Radio” Swedish DXer Henrik Klemitz has made a study of Latin American broadcasting. We report on the Ulysees mission from the European Space Agency. Roy Neal reports that in the wake Hurricane Hugo, Puerto Rico and Virgin Islands have asked amateur radio operators for help.

Jim welcomes to the broadcast Alex Ugorji, founder of Crypto Frontier. Crypto Frontier is a movement to bring cryptocurrency focused businesses to the U.S. Northern Mariana Islands. On this episode Alex shares the remarkably low cost of living in the Mariana Islands, what it is like to live there, and the unique tax arrangement as a territory of the United States. He also shares his vision for creating a cluster of cryptocurrency focused businesses and entrepreneurs in the largest of the islands, Saipan. 

On today's broadcast, Arthur and Pauline Frommer discussed the innovations of the new cruiseship from Virgin Voyages. Then Nick Gray, founder of tour company Museum Hack, gave his top strategies for actually enjoying museum visits—some will surprise you. Next up was Brett Snyder, AKA The Cranky Concierge, discussing new types of business class fares. And Priscilla Iakopo shed light on why one would visit the Mariana Islands.(Please note that this show was recorded in early February)

I had the pleasure of being interviewed on "Free Man Beyond the Wall" with Pete Quinones. We covered various topics, including the history of Free Talk Live, activism in Keene, the New Hampshire Freedom Migration, Free Talk Live's audience, the FBI raid, and the Crypto Frontier project in the Mariana Islands. Here's the original file link on Pete's site: http://freemanbeyondthewall.libsyn.com/episode-382

With over a quarter of Guam being solely occupied by U.S. military bases, a legacy of nuclear bomb droppings throughout the Marshall Islands, and the military’s lease of Kwajalein Atoll, much of the Pacific remains silently condemned to serve as a sacrifice zone in the name of U.S. empire. The implication of ongoing military presence in the Pacific Islands has profound consequences for all facets of life. However, rarely do we hear about the struggles faced by these communities. On this episode, we are joined by Cinta Kaipat to learn how the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. commonwealth, are impacted by said militarization. In the Northern Marianas, communities are resisting a future in which aerial bombardments become the norm, where amphibious-assault trainings sever communities from key fishing grounds and decimate aquatic ecosystems, and shelling, artillery, and mortars destroy sacred land. Cinta M. Kaipat, of Refaluwash-Chamorro descent, is an advocate for Indigenous Refaluwash (Carolinian) rights; preservation of Indigenous cultural practices and beliefs; and promotion of responsible environmental stewardship in the Marianas. Cinta is an attorney, a former Assistant Attorney General; a former Congresswoman; and a former Hearing Officer, as well as a former Deputy Secretary for the Department of Labor. She founded Beautify CNMI!, co-founded PaganWatch, and co-founded the Alternative Zero Coalition, which was newly formed in 2015 to advocate for and protect the Mariana Islands, especially Pagan and Tinian, from irreparable destruction at the hands of the U.S. military and its allies. Should the military barge through with its plans, Tinian and Pågan could expect to be battered with almost 100,000 grenades, rockets, mortars, and artillery rounds. The fight to save Pagån is critical, should the military occupy the island it would ban the public from living on the island – “coincidentally” during a time in which Indigenous Chamorro and Refaluwash communities have been trying to return to Pågan via agricultural settlements. We share Cinta’s story in the hopes that you take time to both listen to and take action with this community that is facing down the world’s largest military ♫ Music by Pura Fé and traditional recordings from The Mariana Islands

If you think you like sea turtles, get ready to become wildly obsessed with them. Cheloniologist Dr. Camryn Allen met up with Alie on a tropical island (ok, in a hotel room on a tropical island) to chat about flipper slappings, turtle rodeos, nesting BBs, current surfing, endangered statuses, field work, sleeping under water, world records, boopable noses, male:female ratios, mind-boggling navigation, what you can do to help them, and the many mysteries that still remain. Take a deep dive into the world of seartles. Or is it surtles? Follow Dr. Camryn Allen on Twitter This week's donation was made to Hawaii Marine Animal Response Sponsor links: kiwico.com/ologies, zola.com/ologies, & trueandco.com/ologies More links at www.alieward.com/ologies/cheloniology Become a patron of Ologies for as little as a buck a month: www.Patreon.com/ologies OlogiesMerch.com has hats, shirts, pins, totes! Follow @Ologies on Twitter or Instagram Follow @AlieWard on Twitter or Instagram Sound editing by Steven Ray Morris & Jarrett Sleeper Theme song by Nick Thorburn Support the show.

U.S. Pacific territories: What are they? Why do we have them? And why is the U.S. Navy trying to drop bombs on a tiny, inhabited, volcanic island? Producer Chris discusses territorial activism on the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and resisting the Navy running amok there, with journalist Sophia Perez. Go Fund Me for Super Typhoon Yutu Relief: https://www.gofundme.com/super-typhoon-yutu-relief-campaign More info about the Navy's plans to increase militarization in the Pacific (and where to donate to the resistance): http://chamorro.com Sophia's podcast, The Alternative Zero Project: https://m.soundcloud.com/alternativezeroproject or wherever you get your podcasts

点击每期节目可以看到具体文稿内容Three New Fish Species Found in Pacific OceanBy Hai DoScientists say they have discovered three new species of fish in one of the deepest places on Earth.All three species were found in the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of Chile and Peru. They were deep in the Atacama Trench -- 7,500 meters below the surface.Researchers from Britain's Newcastle University say the new species have been given temporary names based on their coloring. They are known as ‘the pink, the blue and the purple Atacama Snailfish.'The three snailfish species are different from most other fish. Their unusual bodies are built to deal with the cold water and extreme pressure deep in the ocean.All three are small and translucent, meaning light can pass through their skin. They also have no scales on the skin for protection.Thomas Linley is with Newscastle University. He said in a statement, "the hardest structures in their bodies are the bones in their inner ear which give them balance and their teeth. Without the extreme pressure and cold to support their bodies they are extremely fragile and melt rapidly when brought to the surface."A team of 40 scientists from 17 nations captured video of the fish in their natural environment.Other scientists say the "blue" Atacama Snailfish appeared to be a rare "winged" snailfish. But it has long fin and big head similar to the Ethereal Snailfish off the coast of Mariana Islands.The "pink" was closer in appearance to the Mariana Snailfish, a species found in the deepest part of Mariana Trench on the other side of the Pacific.The third species is a small purple snailfish. It is similar to fish living at the depth of 3,500 meters. One of the purple snailfish, about 9 centimeters long, was brought to the surface for further study.In addition to the discovery of the new species of snailfish, scientists also captured rare video of long-legged isopods, known as Munnopsids. The shellfish has a small body, about the size of a human hand. It can swim backwards and upside down using its extremely long legs.The scientists say what they have found in the deep sea is an environment rich with many species in large numbers.From the video shot by the Newcastle scientists, Linley said, "There is something about the snailfish that allows them to adapt to living very deep. Beyond the reach of other fish they are free of competitors and predators."He added, "they seem to be quite active and look very well-fed."I'm Anna Matteo.Hai Do adapted this story for Learning English based on The Conversation. George Grow was the editor.968重庆之声每周一至周五8点56分每天三分钟养成良好英语听说习惯

I met Monika Egerer through Colby Anton (previous podcast interviewee about studying cougars in Yellowstone) , both are PhD candidates in the Environmental Studies at University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC). I am excited to share Monika's work with urban garden ecology because urban gardening can bring quality food and quality of life to neighborhoods where affordable fresh food is not readily available. This is so important in our world of conservation and the world's growing population.   Monika's research with Dr. Stacy Philpott's team at UCSC on urban ecology and biodiversity of urban gardens in the California central coast encompasses many fields of study including the human experience. This research is conducted in 25 gardens that vary in local management practices and landscape. The goal is to understand the ecological interactions and processes in urban gardens such as pest control, pollination and climate regulation.   Monika is also actively involved with the creation of a film along with Small Pumpkin Production's, Michelle E. Aquilar (and team), called "No Place to Grow" which she talks about in the podcast. This documentary follows a group of Latino farmers who find themselves representing a movement to save green space in a fast growing neighborhood.   And did you know that bird loss on the Mariana Islands is leading to the loss of fruit production, specifically chili peppers? Ms. Egerer also discusses her work with this project about how the loss of birds on Guam is leading to this ecosystem service loss because birds are no longer dispersing the seeds. Here is a link to the paper about this topic published in the journal, Ecological Applications this year.    *introduction and closing by Dale Wilman and music provided by www.bensound.com

Today we talk to Annie Marie Rivera Montes, who is a native of Guam and a teacher (retired) of the Chamorro culture. Guam is a territory of the United States in the western Pacific Ocean. It is the westernmost point (in terms of jurisdiction) and territory of the United States, along with Northern Mariana Islands. The inhabitants of Guam are called Guamanians, and they are American citizens by birth. Indigenous Guamanians are the Chamorros, who are related to other Austronesian natives to the west in the Philippines and Taiwan. (source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guam) USCIS 100:91. Name one U.S. territory. Puerto Rico U.S. Virgin Islands American Samoa Northern Mariana Islands Guam Learn more about Guam, the Mariana Islands, and the Chamorro at Guampedia: Guam’s Online Encyclopedia https://www.guampedia.com/ Although Guamanian serve in the military at a rate that is three times higher than the rest of the country, their vets' struggle to receive medical services WATCH: America By the Numbers: Island of Warriors https://www.pbs.org/video/america-numbers-island-warriors CONTACT: VA.gov or your U.S. congress members. Tell them that you support increased healthcare services for vets, especially those from Guam and the U.S. territories. This interview was recorded in the Kaiser Vallejo Rehabilitation Center, where Annie Marie's husband and my father where recovering from their strokes. Unfortunately my father passed away the next day. PLEASE learn more about strokes at http://www.stroke.org/

...During the final stage of World War II, the United States dropped nuclear weapons on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and 9, 1945, respectively. The United States had dropped the bombs with the consent of the United Kingdom as outlined in the Quebec Agreement. The two bombings, which killed at least 129,000 people, remain the only use of nuclear weapons for warfare in history. In the final year of the war, the Allies prepared for what was anticipated to be a very costly invasion of the Japanese mainland. This was preceded by a U.S. conventional and firebombing campaign that destroyed 67 Japanese cities. The war in Europe had concluded when Nazi Germany signed its instrument of surrender on May 8, 1945. The Japanese, facing the same fate, refused to accept the Allies' demands for unconditional surrender and the Pacific War continued. The Allies called for the unconditional surrender of the Imperial Japanese armed forces in the Potsdam Declaration on July 26, 1945—the alternative being "prompt and utter destruction". The Japanese response to this ultimatum was to ignore it. By August 1945, the Allies' Manhattan Project had produced two types of atomic bombs, and the 509th Composite Group of the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) was equipped with the specialized Silverplate version of the Boeing B-29 Super fortress that could deliver them from Tinian in the Mariana Islands. Orders for atomic bombs to be used on four Japanese cities were issued on July 25. On August 6, the U.S. dropped a uranium gun-type (Little Boy) bomb on Hiroshima, and American President Harry S. Truman called for Japan's surrender, warning it to "expect a rain of ruin from the air, the like of which has never been seen on this earth." Three days later, on August 9, a plutonium implosion-type (Fat Man) bomb was dropped on Nagasaki. Within the first two to four months following the bombings, the acute effects of the atomic bombings had killed 90,000–146,000 people in Hiroshima and 39,000–80,000 in Nagasaki; roughly half of the deaths in each city occurred on the first day. During the following months, large numbers died from the effect of burns, radiation sickness, and other injuries, compounded by illness and malnutrition. In both cities, most of the dead were civilians, although Hiroshima had a sizable military garrison. Japan announced its surrender to the Allies on August 15, six days after the bombing of Nagasaki and the Soviet Union's declaration of war. On September 2, the Japanese government signed the instrument of surrender, effectively ending World War II. The justification for the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is still debated to this day. Information Link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki

The Fighting Lady: The Lady and the Sea National Archives and Records Administration Department of the Navy. Office of the Chief of Naval Operations. Naval Observatory. (1942 - 09/18/1947) ARC Identifier 12834 / Local Identifier 80-MC-5298. This podcast is a military documentary told from the point of view of the crew of the aircraft carrier the Fighting Lady -- a pseudonym for the Yorktown. Scenes highlight the functions and duties of The Fighting Lady and crew activities, and maps illustrate the movement of the Pacific fleet and its engagement with the Japanese in 1943 and 1944. Footage shows the following: A-24 Dauntlesses, TBF Avengers, Hellcats and other aircrafts as they flew out to the carrier, and the August 30, 1943, strafing and bombing mission over Japanese - held Marcus Island -- from preparation on the carrier to debriefing. Later scenes cover 1944, when the U.S. forces took Kwajalein Island, the Marshall Islands, Truk Islands, and Caroline Islands through air assaults and troop landings. Mitsubishi Zero-Sens (Zekes) engaged the U.S. Navy assault force and the ship squadron returned to the Marshall Islands for repairs, munitions, and rest and recreation. En route to the battle area, the Fighting Lady encountered and downed a Japanese reconnaissance plane. On the eve of battle, sailors attended church services. Prior to the U.S. assault, the Japanese attacked the U.S. squadron and U.S. planes took off for the Marianas and the Guam Islands where they successfully fought at the Tinian and Mariana Islands. The Japanese and U.S. task forces then fought in the Philippine Sea, where planes engaged in dogfights while ships performed evasive maneuvers. Final scenes show U.S. casualties buried at sea. Source link https://archive.org/details/gov.archives.arc.12834 Copyright link https://creativecommons.org/licenses/publicdomain/

Lt. Col. Allen West calls the show and talks about what we need to do to stop loosing 22 Veterans a day to suicide. Also he gives his comments on the attack in Brussels. Mike and the guys have an update in the Mariana Islands, there is some political shenanigans going on. Kirk Chelberg from Ideal Conceal calls in talking about politicians now calling for a federal investigation about his new handgun. Can you say there is no such thing as bad publicity? This weeks Fallen Hero is a close personal friend of the show. Staff Sergeant Jeffery Collins. Open carry may be the result of an ongoing lawsuit in FL. Mike gives a list of 9 reasons why veterans have trouble finding jobs in the civilian world.

Brevard County FL Sheriff Wayne Ivey calls the show talking about how his video calling for citizens to carry firearms to protect themselves. With over 5 million views that video is making him the face of "Pro 2nd Amendment Law Enforcement". The Mariana Islands US Federal Court strikes down a restrictive gun law. Mike and the guys talk about how to "not act" on social media for gun owners. They also give a breakdown guide to the common "Anti-Rights" statements.

Before the House (finally) agreed to give recovery money to Hurricane Sandy victims, they made new rules for the 113th Congress, including more private jets for themselves and less rights for gays. Then, despite Republican efforts to short them, the House finally voted to give Hurricane Sandy victims the $60 billion they asked for... Well, sort of. THE RULES FOR THE 113TH CONGRESS: H.RES. 5 Changed the Nepotism rule to include grandchildren. Allows members to take private jets using official funds. Starts to open the door to using campaign funds (which Senate members can do) but a statute still prohibits that from members of the House. Eliminates a portion of ObamaCare that prevents the House from repealing authority for IPAB. Enacts the Ryan budget until a budget for 2014 is adopted. Prohibits lobbyists from trolling the Congressional gym. Authorizes the continuation of the "Fast and Furious" investigation. Authorizes the Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group (the five members are John Boehner as Speaker of the House, Eric Cantor as House Majority Leader, Nancy Pelosi as House Minority Leader, Kevin McCarthy as Majority Whip, and Steny Hoyer as Minority Whip) to direct the House Office of General Counsel to defend the Defense of Marriage Act -the gay marriage ban- to "protect the interests of the House." Karen Golinski has been fighting the House for four years to get her wife health insurance. HURRICANE SANDY RECOVERY October 29, 2012: Hurricane Sandy hits the Northeast, devastating the coastlines of New Jersey, New York, and Connecticut and causing widespread damage to the surrounding states. (Amazing before and after pictures from NOAA)   December 2012: The Senate passed a $60 billion aid package and sent it to the House of Representatives. January 2, 2012: After voting on the fiscal cliff bill on the last day of the 112th Congress, Speaker Boehner had promised a vote on the Senate's Sandy bill. He lied. There was no vote. The bill died when the 112th Congress adjourned. January 4, 2012: The House passed HR 41, a piece of the dead Senate bill which authorized FEMA to borrow about $9.5 billion to make payments to victims insured through the National Flood Insurance Program. January 15th, 2012: The House passed HR 152, a bill which, after being heavily amended by a Republican congressman from New Jersey, finally authorized the remaining $50.5 billion requested by the states damaged by Hurricane Sandy. HR 152: "Disaster Relief Appropriations Act of 2013" The original bill, written by Hal Rogers of Kentucky, gave the Northeast $17 billion, which was $33 billion short of what was requested. An amendment by Rodney Frelinghuysen of New Jersey gave the Northeast states the rest of the money. TITLE I DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE $6 million from Rogers (Kentucky) bill + $218 million from Frelinghuysen (New Jersey) amendment to be spent on: Food for victims of Hurricane Sandy Floodplain protection Forest Restoration Money to help farmers from drought TITLE II (Completely replaced by Frelinghuysen amendment) ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS $20 million  $50 million for a study of flood risks to coastal populations affected by Hurricane Sandy (due 2 years after bill is signed). $9 million $3.461 billion for repairs to projects that were under construction and damaged by Hurricane Sandy. $7.42 million $8.21 million to dredge navigation channels damaged by Hurricane Sandy. $500 million $1 billion for emergency operations and repairs. TITLE III (Completely replaced by Frelinghuysen amendment) SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION $10 million $20 million for grants to organizations helping with disaster recovery, response, and long term recovery to small businesses damaged by Hurricane Sandy. $1 million $5 million to the Inspector General to perform oversight on the grants. $100 million $520 million for direct loans for disaster recovery. $50 million $260 million for "direct administration expenses" of loan making TITLE IV DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY - COAST GUARD $144 million $274 million for expenses caused by Hurricane Sandy FEDERAL EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AGENCY - DISASTER RELIEF FUND $5.4 billion $11.5 billion for national disaster relief (not limited to Hurricane Sandy). SCIENCE AND RESEARCH $585,000 $3.2 million available until September 30, 2013 2014 TITLE V DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR $50 million $78 million for construction expenses of the Fish and Wildlife Service $234 million $348 million for construction by the National Park Service TITLE VI DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES - PUBLIC HEALTH AND SOCIAL SERVICES EMERGENCY FUND $100 million (Rogers of Kentucky bill) + $800 million (Frelinghuysen of New Jersey amendment) for the Head Start program and the costs of repairing and rebuilding health care facilities, child care centers, or other social services facilities. The money is only available to victims of Hurricane Sandy. TITLE VII DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE   $24.2 million, available until September 30, 2017, for construction by the Army National Guard. "...such funds may be obligated to carry out military construction projects not otherwise authorized by law." "CONSTRUCTION, MAJOR PROJECTS" $207 million, available until September 30, 2017 for renovations and repairs as a consequence of Hurricane Sandy. "...such funds may be obligated and expended to carry out planning and design and major medical facility construction not otherwise authorized by law." (Added by the Frelinghuysen of New Jersey amendment) Money that must be spent on "operations and maintenance" expenses caused by Hurricane Sandy by September 30, 2013: $40 million for the Navy $8.5 million for the Air Force $5.8 million for the Air National Guard $5.3 million for the Army + $1.3 million to buy ammunition $3.1 million for the National Guard and $24.2 million for "Defense Working Capital Funds"... whatever that means. Department of Defense will be getting $348 million from the Sandy relief bill. TITLE VIII (Completely replaced by Frelinghuysen amendment) DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION - FACILITIES AND EQUIPMENT $14.6 million $30 million available until September 30, 2013 for expenses due to Hurricane Sandy FEDERAL HIGHWAY ADMINISTRATION $2.022 billion for an emergency fund for the repair of highways, roads, and trails, in any part of the United States, including Indian reservations, that have suffered serious damage as a result of a natural disaster. No more than $100 million can be spent on any single disaster. The Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, and the Mariana Islands can not be given more than $20 million. The Secretary of Transportation is allowed to spend up to $500 million on Hurricane Sandy repairs. AMTRAK $32 million $86 million for expenses related to Hurricane Sandy. PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION EMERGENCY RELIEF PROGRAM $5.4 billion $10.9 billion for repairs to the public transportation system most affected by Hurricane Sandy. DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT $3.85 billion $16 billion for disaster relief, long-term recovery, and repairs to infrastructure and housing damaged due to Hurricane Sandy and other disasters in 2011, 2012, and 2013. Funds will go directly to the state or local government. TITLE IV... Doesn't appear to exist. TITLE X NATIONAL OCEANIC AND ATMOSPHERIC ADMINISTRATION (NOAA) $140,000,000 available until September 30, 2014, which includes: $50 million for mapping and charting of debris from Hurricane Sandy $50 million for weather and ocean research programs $25 million to improve weather forecasting $7 million to repair/replace ocean monitoring equipment damaged by Sandy $5 million to fisheries damaged by Hurricane Sandy $3 million to states for their own damage assessments $186,000,000 available until September 30, 2015, which includes: $111 million to get the polar weather satellites $44.5 million to repair and upgrade hurricane reconnaissance airplanes $13 million to speed up NWS ground readiness (Rep. Broun of Georgia tried to remove this one) $9 million to repair NOAA facilities damaged by Hurricane Sandy $8.5 million to improve weather forecasting equipment and supercomputers TITLE XI (Added by Rep. Bishop of Utah) Prevents the Federal government from buying any land with Sandy relief money.

The Mariana Trench is part of the Izu-Bonin-Mariana Arc convergent boundary system that forms the boundary between two tectonic plates. In this system, the western edge of one plate, the Pacific Plate, is subducted beneath the smaller Mariana Plate that lies to the west. Because the Pacific plate is the largest of all the tectonic plates on Earth, crustal material at its western edge has had a long time since formation (up to 170 million years) to compact and become very dense; hence its great height-difference relative to the higher-riding Mariana Plate, at the point where the Pacific Plate crust is subducted. This deep area is the Mariana Trench proper. The movement of these plates is also indirectly responsible for the formation of the Mariana Islands (which are caused by volcanism as a result of subduction of water trapped in minerals). Enjoy. Yours Mr.Retalin. aka Psyholirik. Tracklist : 1. James Creed - Top Pocket 2. Finnebassen feat. Gundelach - Footsteps 3. Lessovsky - Spend Some Time 4. Casino Times - I Wanna Know 5. James Creed - Undone 6. Glenn Astro, Imyrmind - KDIM 7. Moodwax - Somebody Loves You 8. Audio Junkies - Allright 9. Crotia Squad - Talisman 10. Danny Murphy, Piem - My First Time 11.Fabien Kamb - Water Takticz 12. Lessovsky - Cherish The Day Time 13. Baarregaard & Briem - Love With You 14. Lonya - Fairy 15. David Kassi - Get Down (Fer Ferrari Remix) 16. Fernando Opera - Your Time is Now 17. Dj Le Roi - Shot Out (Cosmic Cowboys Remix) 18. Icke - One Day (Robert Solheim Remix) 19. Fideles - Outcry (Dirty Culture Remix) 20. Tim Richards & Fiord - 309 Road (Sunday Drive Edit) 21.Jay Haze - Soul In A Bottle (feat. Big Bully & Sven TV) 22. Kozber - LateComer 23. Nikosf. - Sensual Colors (Nikosf. End Of Summer Colors Remix.)

In July 1942, American prisoners of war were performing Julius Caesar on a makeshift stage in Burma at the same time that the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra played the Hippodrome Theatre on Eutaw Street. In June 1944, more than 3,000 U.S. Marines died capturing the Mariana Islands in the western Pacific Ocean while fans back in Baltimore were cheering the International League Orioles in their successful bid for a championship.These are just two of the startling juxtapositions that Gilbert Sandler writes about in his account of life on the home front in Baltimore during World War II. Rarely seen photographs from the Baltimore Sun, the News-American, and the Afro-American bring to life the rich, personal anecdotes of wartime Baltimoreans and transport readers back to an indelible era of Baltimore history.Born and raised in Baltimore, and a service member in the Navy during WWII, Gilbert Sandler is author of Jewish Baltimore: A Family Album and the award-winning Small Town Baltimore: An Album of Memories. Sandler hosts the popular "Baltimore Stories" series on WYPR-FM. Recorded On: Tuesday, September 27, 2011