Home Builder Developer - Interior Renovation and Design

@jlo is designing footwear in her spare time. Jennifer Lopez's footwear range, being launched at @DSW stores and DSW.com today, includes sky-high sandals, sexy stilettos, boots, booties and sneakers.The shoe thing for me goes deep, it goes deeper than I love shoes,' Lopez said in an interview.When I was a little girl, I used to look to my idols and wish I could have their jacket or their outfit or their jewelry or their shoes, and it was always so expensive and we could never do that. At DSW, we can do that with quality and high fashion, she said. Her JLO Jennifer collection retails from $59 to $189.On the heels of Hustlers, her Super Bowl halftime performance and her role on World of Dance, where shes executive producer and a judge, along with being the face this season of Coach, Versace and Guess, Lopez was asked about any new projects and how shes dealing with the coronavirus outbreak.Its such a scary, tricky rime right now. Im going to be working from home the next few weeks, working on scripts and branding. In the meantime, trying to make lemonade out of lemons, and enjoy the time with the kids and just trying to stay positive and do all we can as a family to help in this situation and quarantine and set the right example, she said.Tap the link in bio for more of our interview with @jlo.Report: @lisajlockwood #wwdfashion#jlo#shoes#dsw

More:
LVMH Sets Plans for Cheval Blanc Hotel on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills - WWD

Yesterday, Tom Hanks shared with the world that he and his wife, Rita Wilson, had tested positive for the coronavirus. Of course, people started paying attention, because while most Americans don't yet personally know anyone affected by the global pandemic, everyone knows Tom Hanks. As an icon of Hollywood, Hanks is not only one of the most likable movie stars, he's also considered a role model for millions of Americans.

Hanks's measured response to his diagnosis is also a model for businesses of every size trying to keep going during this crisis.

Specifically, Hanks mentions his approach to what happens next. "Not much more to it than a one-day-at-a-time approach, no?" Hanks shared on social media. That'sa brilliant reminder that in a world where there are far more circumstances than what you can control, the best thing you can dois slow down the panic and focus on the next thing you need to do for yourself, your family, and your colleagues.

Binge-buying toilet paper and hand sanitizer donothing except point out the fact that, as Americans, we're probably not as good at washing our hands as we should be. Panicking about circumstances you can't control does nothing except create more panic.

Instead, create a plan. And when I say plan, I meanfocus on what you need to do today for your team and your business. Set them up for success so that they're able to be productive tomorrow. Then, tomorrow, do the same thing. Anything more than that isn't realistic when you have no idea what your business will face in three days or weeks or months.

Your goal is to keep things moving in the right direction even as the world feels like its lost its way. Things won't be the same, and your business might not be the same, but there is another side.Don't freak out. Make a plan.

Or, in the event that remote work isn't an option, determine how you will communicate what you expect of them directly and transparently.Even when you can't plan far into the future, a little honesty and humility goa long way. By the way, figuring out how to keep your team on your payroll might be costly, but if you're able, there are few better investments you can make than people. Fortunately, it looks like there will soon be help on this front as well.

As the wise manSolomononce said,Gam zeh ya'avor, or"This, too, shall pass." Your job, as a leader, is--one day at a time--to be sure you're in the best position possible when it does.

Published on: Mar 12, 2020

The opinions expressed here by Inc.com columnists are their own, not those of Inc.com.

Continue reading here:
Tom Hanks Tested Positive for Coronavirus. His 12-Word-Response Is a Lesson in Handling a Crisis - Inc.

Anybody who thought candidate Donald TrumpDonald John TrumpThe Hill's Morning Report - Biden commits to female VP; CDC says no events of 50+ people for 8 weeks This week: Senate balances surveillance fight with growing coronavirus concerns Juan Williams: Trump must be held to account over coronavirus MORE might scale back his war with the press once he got elected was sorely mistaken. Even with the pressures and daily challenges of the White House, Trump seems never to miss an opportunity to bash his media antagonists. From press sprays to rallies, media bashing is part of Trumps schtick. His devoted followers love it and expect it. The press doesnt like the savage critique, but most reporters recognize Trump anti-media rants are now baked into the relationship.

But the Trump machine has now taken things in a new direction, and the repercussions are much more serious.

The Trump 2020 campaign apparatus has filed defamation lawsuits against three major news organizations. The outlets CNN, New York Times, and Washington Post are being sued over commentaries published in the last year. Each of the commentary topics, as one might have guessed, dealt with Russian interference in the 2016 election and the Trump campaigns supposed connection to it.

Trumps criticism of the press hurts reporters feelings and may play a factor in the press low credibility ratings. It is one thing for media outlets to battle Trump in the public opinion arena, but taking the brawl into the courtroom is a new and dangerous escalation against the media.

There is little doubt this new anti-press strategy is designed to make news organizations pause and ponder before engaging in criticism of Trump. This is the classic example of the chilling effect. No news outlet wants to pay for lawyers and show up in court, even for lawsuits they suspect are frivolous. Libel lawyers are expensive, whether in the courtroom or in the newsroom, where they might now need to hang out so as to screen/pre-approve all copy with potential criticism of the Trump administration.

In addition to Trump, other politicians are now lining up to sue the press. Former Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is moving forward with a suit against the New York Times. Congressman Devin NunesDevin Gerald NunesNunes urges Americans to 'stop panicking': 'It's a great time to just go out' if you're healthy Sunday shows preview: Lawmakers gear up for another week fighting the coronavirus, seek to curb fallout Trump escalates fight against press with libel lawsuits MORE (R-Calif.) has sued CNN and a reporter for Esquire. Virginia Lieutenant Governor Justin Fairfax, a Democrat, just had his defamation suit against CBS dismissed, but promises an appeal.

Odds are the Trump campaign cant win in court and could evensee these suits dismissed outright. A public figure (and what figure could be more public than the president?) has to get over a high bar to win a defamation suit. The standards were established in a 1964 landmark Supreme Court decision in the case of New York Times v. Sullivan. The plaintiff must not only prove the piece of journalism was false and defamatory, but also that it was published recklessly and with malicious intent to do damage to the pubic figures reputation. Assessing a reporters maliciousness is mind-reading most courts are hesitant to do. Further, courts figure that politicians have avenues to battle back rhetorically and to set the record straight. And nobody has more direct access to these avenues than the president.

Public figures must be subject to careful scrutiny and criticism from the citizens free press surrogates. Todays Supreme Court, headed by Chief Justice John Roberts, has a well-earned reputation for supporting robust and rowdy free expression under the First Amendment.

But the press outlets involved arent so holy either. The journalistic pieces that prompted these defamation lawsuits were labeled as commentary/opinion. Each, however, seems to blend in an assumption about Trump-Russia connections in the election. Thats the rub. Opinions based on incorrect evidence might not get full protection in court. Labeling a column as opinion is not a free pass to push a potential falsehood. And the Trump campaign presents the Mueller report as proof there was no conspiracy with Russia during the election.

This all brings to mind a lyric from the 1960s protest song by Buffalo Springfield, Nobodys right if everybodys wrong. On one side, according to Trump's critics, is a thin-skinned president who doesnt like negative press coverage and runs to court with cage-rattling lawsuits. And then, according to the Trump campaign and other media critics, there are press outlets so determined to smear Trump with Russian collusion that their opinion writers out-kick their coverage.

Whatever gets decided on these lawsuits in lower courts, it would be helpful if the losing side pushed appeals all the way to the Supreme Court. Public figures and the press alike could use up-to-date clarification of what constitutes defamation in the year 2020. Much has changed in the public affairs landscape since the Sullivan decision over half a century ago.

Justice Clarence Thomas last year publicly called for the Court to take up a defamation case that would reconsider the standards established in the Sullivan decision. These Trump lawsuits could be the prompt the Court needs. It is time for the Court to provide more precise guidance on how to maintain free-wheeling public commentary while protecting high profile figures from being analyzed/criticized without a foundation in real evidence.

Jeffrey McCall is a media critic and professor of communication at DePauw University. He has worked as a radio news director, a newspaper reporter and as a political media consultant. Follow him on Twitter@Prof_McCall.

Original post:
Trump steps up intensity in battle with media | TheHill - The Hill

Local historian and genealogist, Brian Mitchell, has written a book called 'Derry: A City Invincible'. In the coming weeks, we will be publishing extracts from the book. In this first article, Brian outlines the forces of nature which created our local landscape.

Lough Foyle and the Foyle Basin reflect hundreds of millions of years of earth movements and moulding.Encompassed within the Antrim Plateau which culminates in the sheer cliffs of Binevenagh in the north; the rounded peat-covered summits and deeply dissected flanks of the Sperrins in the south; and the rugged series of hills and mountain ranges of the Donegal Highlands to the west, the Lough Foyle basin is a geological time scale.The Donegal Highlands and Sperrin Mountains represent the western end of a thick belt of sedimentary rocks, deposited in a sea trough, which stretched from what is now Ireland to Scandinavia.About 800 million years ago, under the weight of accumulating sediments of sand (sandstone) and black muds (shale), the trough began to subside.Then 500 million years ago this rock sequence, now 15 miles thick, was intensely folded, heated, crystalised and uplifted into rugged mountain ranges aligned north-east to south-west.This period of Caledonian mountain building reflected the collision of moving plates on which the earths crust is welded.These plates are constantly being regenerated by volcanic activity at mid-ocean ridges, spreading out and finally being consumed at ocean trenches, generating earthquakes and chains of volcanoes in the process.By the Carboniferous period, 325 to 370 million years ago, the old mountains of the Caledonian period had been worn away to lie beneath the waves.A warm, shallow sea, similar to the Caribbean today covered Ireland which now lay across the equator. In this sea, limey muds (limestone), sand and muds were deposited.What is now Lough Foyle represents a downfold or syncline of the ancient Caledonian rocks which became filled with sandstones and shales of Carboniferous age.Lough Foyle today submerges this basin of Carboniferous sandstone.Throughout this period the Foyle Basin was in the middle of a vast super-continent called Pangaea, destined to fragment into Africa, the Americas, Eurasia, Australia and Antarctica. Its surface changed continuously.

IntersectedAt various times the Foyle Basin was intersected by sea-filled troughs, submerged by shallow shifting seas, crossed by mountain ranges and subjected to climatic conditions ranging from desert heat to equatorial rain and arctic cold.About 150 million years ago Pangaea began to break up and drift apart. Eighty million years ago the North Atlantic Ocean began to form, as America and Greenland were pushed apart. By 60 million years ago the Atlantic was beginning to open right next to Ireland, as the British Isles separated from Greenland.This split was heralded with intense volcanic activity, as basalt lavas flooded out to form the Antrim Plateau, whose western limit now overlooks the Roe Valley and Magilligan.At the same time, the earth movements which formed the Alps (as Africa collided with Eurasia) caused the downfaulting and sinking of Lough Foyle along existing north-east to south-west structural lines.The River Foyle, in following the axis of this downfold, also flowed in a north-east direction. The Donegal Highlands and Sperrins, long eroded, were uplifted once again.By seven million years ago the Foyle Basin, owing to extensive erosion and drainage development, was beginning to look as it does today.If the general structure was now established, it was the quaternary ice advances, commencing about 2 million years ago and ending 12,000 years ago, which sculptured much of the present detail in the landscape.In fact, much of the detail results from the final retreat of the ice.During the Ice Age the Foyle Basin experienced climatic fluctuations which caused an alternation of glacial periods, during which the Donegal Highlands and Sperrins were submerged by considerable thicknesses of ice sheets, and interglacials during which temperatures were as high or higher than today.

During the last phase of the Ice Age the Irish ice sheet entered the Foyle Basin through the Glenshane Pass and down the Foyle Valley, while an ice sheet from Scotland advanced to the mouth of the Foyle.A variety of drift material was deposited, by both the ice sheets and by their meltwaters as the ice sheets decayed, to clothe and soften the landscape.Towards the close of the Ice Age a large glacier persisted in the Foyle Valley after the northern slopes of the Sperrins had become ice-free.The River Faughan, dammed by this glacier, became a massive lake.Likewise, the River Roe, in the stretch from Dungiven to Limavady, became a great lake in front of the southern limit of the Scottish ice. In these lakes extensive thicknesses of sand and gravel were deposited.Glacial drainage channels were carved out, acting as overflow channels for the ice-dammed lakes. The River Faughan was forced to turn northwards along the eastern margin of the valley glacier.As the Foyle glacier downwasted and retreated southwards its meltwaters carried large quantities of sand and gravel, which were deposited as extensive outwash terraces along the shores of Lough Foyle.

On the lower reaches of the Faughan, at Ardlough, kettle holes were left behind as masses of ice, buried under the outwash deposits, melted.With the ice gone, this outwash material became a 50 feet terrace along the shore of Lough Foyle, as the land level rose in adjustment to its lighter, ice-free load.The island of Derry owes its isolation to the Foyle glacier, as meltwaters flowing beneath it carved out the deep channel to the west of the hill.Culmore Point and Magilligan Point had their origins in post-glacial times.They are both sand spits. The latter is an enormous flat triangle of river-borne alluvium and wind-blown sand.When man first reached the Foyle Basin, perhaps in about 6000 BC, this was the landscape which confronted him.Only one piece of detail is missing.He would have found a land forested everywhere.As the climate improved, with the retreat of the ice, forests of willow and birch, followed by hazel, pine, alder, oak, elm and ash replaced the sparse alpine flora.This is the landscape which man in the Derry area had to deal with.Compared to the geological forces which created the Foyle Basin, man seems rather puny and very inexperienced.Man has been around these parts for 8,000 years which, in geological terms, is just a blink of the eye.

Link:
Local History: The landscape which shaped the Derry that we know today - Derry Now

It would have been in Scituate. Now it's virtually everywhere.

The 2020 Gardening Green Expo an annual event that spotlights organic and environmentally friendly growing choices for backyard gardeners was canceled after its organizers learned of government recommendations against holding large events.

In previous years the expo had drawn some 450 visitors. Citing concerns over the novel coronavirus, the events three sponsors the North and South Rivers Watershed Association, WaterSmart South Shore, and Kennedys Country Gardens (the planned venue) agreed to turn the live March 28 expo into a virtual event.

However, watershed association staff said, all the components of the event (aside from the crowd), including video talks by the scheduled speakers will become available http://www.nsrwa.org. Until then, virtual visitors can watch videos of last years presentations.

These resources offer a rich opportunity to learn about green gardening, said the groups communications director, Lori Wolfe, who raises monarch butterflies on milkweed leaves in her home.

I bring the eggs in, Wolfe said. They hatch. . . . Then I feed them leaves.

Acquiring seeds and growing milkweed are among the many environmentally strengthening garden choices promoted by the expo. This years videotaped speakers will include Kennedys Susan Leigh Anthony speaking on native and pollinator plants. Other experts urge the advantages of growing native plants, including entomologist Blake Dinius on native bees and Katie Banks Hone on re-landscaping.

Cape Cod preservationist Kristin Andres will address landscape choices for a changing climate, and Jon Belber of Cohassets Holly Hill Farm speaks on beneficial ecosystems.

Green gardening equipment rain barrels for water conservation and composters to turn kitchen scraps into fertilizer can be ordered from the website. And a $35 watershed association membership deal offers new members a $25 Kennedy Gardens gift card, plus a free map for finding nearby land preservers.

That map is an excellent source for finding green spaces to explore while avoiding crowds. Wolfe recommended Wompatuck State Park in Hingham. Ecologist Sara Grady pointed to the John Little Conservation Area near the North River in Marshfield.

Robert Knox can be reached at rc.knox2@gmail.com.

Continue reading here:
Make a virtual visit to the 2020 Gardening Green Expo - The Boston Globe

NEIL Doncaster, the SPFL chief executive, has described the coronavirus crisis as arguably the most challenging period in Scottish football history and pledged that future decisions will be made in the very best interests of the game as a whole.

The prospect of Celtic being declared Ladbrokes Premiership champions and Hearts being relegated based on their league placings on Friday when the SFA/SPFL Joint Response Group took the decision to suspend professional and grassroots football indefinitely has angered many clubs and fans.

Stewart Robertson, the Rangers managing director, yesterday issued a statement warning that finishing a season with a significant number of games to play would impact upon the integrity of sport in Scotland.

The joint response group provided an update on the ongoing crisis yesterday and revealed that decisions on the William Hill Scottish Cup semi-finals next month and Euro 2020 play-off semi-final against Israel at Hampden next week would be made following the UEFA conference call today.

The statement also contained a lengthy Q&A which addressed many of the concerns which their member clubs had raised with them including the prospect of the leagues not being completed and stressed that finishing the 2019/20 campaign in its entirety was their preferred option.

The statement read: The joint response group is engaged in a contingency planning phase that will assess all possible options for the remaining season and beyond. It would be inappropriate and unhelpful to speculate on any future decisions to be taken by competition organisers.

We will, however, commit to updating clubs, supporters and other key stakeholders when appropriate in this fast-moving landscape."

The statement continued: The preference remains that season 2019/20 will be played to completion. However, Scottish football has been suspended until further notice and the joint response group will continue to discuss the developments regarding the virus on a daily basis.

The Scottish FA will take guidance from governments, the UK Chief Medical Officers, the Scottish FA medical consultant, Dr John MacLean, and information provided by the World Health Organisation.

The Scottish FA will only lift the suspension when it is deemed safe to do so from the perspective of public health, but also the safety of all stakeholders including supporters, players, match officials and staff.

A UEFA conference call (involving all 55 associations, the European Clubs Association, the European Leagues and FIFPro, the world players union) will take place tomorrow.

"A decision on the William Hill Scottish Cup semi-finals and UEFA Nations League play-off against Israel will be made by the Scottish FA board after that conference call.

Doncaster said: The significant challenges being faced by people all over the country have put sport firmly in perspective. However, we have a responsibility to deal with the many difficult issues caused by this outbreak and are working hard with the Scottish FA, with our clubs, and with government departments to arrive at the best possible outcome for our game.

We are very conscious of the desire of all 42 Ladbrokes SPFL clubs and their fans to know, as soon as possible, of our plans for the league, but everyone recognises we are facing what is arguably the most challenging time in our sports history.

There are undoubtedly going to be further challenges ahead, but everyone involved is pulling together as one and we will continue to make decisions in the very best interests of the game as a whole.

SFA chief executive Ian Maxwell said: The focus of the Scottish FA remains the public health, the emergency services and the health and safety of players, match officials, and staff across the game.

Many thousands of fans are looking forward to the William Hill Scottish Cup semi-finals and the UEFA Nations League play-off against Israel.

We understand that they, and all fans of Scottish football, will want urgent clarity about those games. We expect to be in a position after tomorrows UEFA conference call, to make a further announcement.

The Tunnocks Caramel Wafer Cup final, due to be played between Inverness Caledonian Thistle and Raith Rovers at McDiarmid Park on Saturday, March 28, has been postponed.

See more here:
Neil Doncaster: Decisions will be made in the very best interests of the game as a whole - HeraldScotland

Universal Pictures says it will be making films including the upcoming "Trolls: World Tour" available for in-home rentals the same day they're released in theaters amid the coronavirus outbreak.

The latest "Trolls" movie from DreamWorks is poised to hit theaters in the United States on April 10. But in a Monday announcement, NBCUniversal and Universal Pictures said it would also be available on-demand the same day it premieres.

Current circumstances, the companies said in a news release, "have made it more challenging to view our films."

The children's flick, along with other titles, will be available for 48-hour rental periods for $19.99.

Other films that are already out, including "The Hunt," which debuted in theaters last week, "The Invisible Man" and "Emma," will be available on-demand earlier than they traditionally are released, beginning Friday.

"Rather than delaying these films or releasing them into a challenged distribution landscape, we wanted to provide an option for people to view these titles in the home that is both accessible and affordable, NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell said in a statement.

We hope and believe that people will still go to the movies in theaters where available, but we understand that for people in different areas of the world that is increasingly becoming less possible," Shell said.

The White House on Monday released new guidelines for curbing the spread of the virus, including avoiding gathering in public places or meeting in groups of 10 or more.

Multiple major film releases including the latest flicks in the James Bond and Fast and Furious franchises have been delayed amid the pandemic.

AMC Theatres said last week that it would reduce viewing capacity by 50 percent in order to increase the level of "social distancing" while moviegoers watch films.

Several states, including New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, among others, announced Monday that they would close all entertainment venues starting that night in an attempt to curb the spread of the coronavirus.

More than 3,800 cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed across the U.S., according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Continued here:
'Trolls: World Tour,' 'Emma' and other Universal movies available on-demand early amid coronavirus | TheHill - The Hill

Paul Ashton, head of biology, Edge Hill University, Ormskirk

WRITTEN on the final, frozen day of 1900, Thomas Hardys poem The Darkling Thrush describes a harsh, ice-blasted landscape devoid of life. Hardys depiction of a time when frost was spectre-gray evokes a winter that is beginning to exist only in memory.

The winter of 2019-2020 was fundamentally different from anything experienced in the northern hemisphere over a century ago. With its record warmth and heavy rain, this winter was fundamentally different from those of only a decade ago.

The extremes of this winter, if a one-off event, would have a small effect on wildlife in the long term. But such weather isnt a single event. It characterises what is likely to be the norm for future British winters. Its the winter that climate change science has long been predicting, where frost is a rarity and regular storms bring abundant rain. These are winters that we need to become familiar with and one that is already changing British wildlife.

Plants have evolved a variety of approaches for coping with the rigours of a cold British winter. Grasses typically ride it out above ground and simply tick over. This is why lawns stay green over winter but dont need cutting. These plants will benefit from the changed climate. You might even find that your lawn starts to need a winter cut.

For some plants, the recent winter never got cold enough to stop flowering. The 2020 New Year Plant Hunt organised by the Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland found a high number of autumn-flowering species that had simply carried on flowering into the new year. Other winners are the rushes. Like grasses, they maintain their above-ground form and can thrive in waterlogged soils. The biblical deluges of February 2020 will have been no problem for them.

An alternative strategy taken by many plants is to let leaves die back and spend winter below the ground as seeds or bulbs. Bulb plants respond to the onset of warmth with rapid growth the extensive early carpets of wild garlic leaves are testament to this.

But it isnt good news for all plants. Those that spend winter as seeds usually need some cold treatment to trigger germination. The relative warmth may mean that this cue was absent, ensuring some plants fail to sprout in spring. Those that do germinate may find their seedlings crowded out by plants that survived winter above ground and are already flourishing.

Plants on high ground also rely on the cold. These are some of Britains rarest species, including Snowdon lily and purple saxifrage. Theyve evolved to tolerate cold, usually through releasing a type of anti-freeze in their leaves. This comes at a cost to their metabolism, slowing their development. In times of extreme cold, this cost is justified as they survive while competitors dont. In warmer winters, the faster-growing competitors are at an advantage. My own research into upland meadows, one of Britains rarest and most biodiverse habitats, has shown significant losses of cold-adapted species like ladys mantle.

The recent winter weather fulfilled another scientific prediction increasingly fierce and frequent storms will open opportunities for new species to colonise. Storm surges and winds have battered sand dunes and salt marshes in recent years. Some of the gaps theyve created in salt marshes have been filled by one of Britains newest species, salt marsh sedge (Carex salina). First recorded from a single remote Scottish site in 2004, its now common on a handful of other sites across Scotland and its likely to spread further in the future.

The method by which plants have adapted to endure winter is likely to determine how successful they are in the future. The same is true for animals. Many soil invertebrates, such as earthworms, will benefit from milder weather and multiply, no longer struggling through frozen soil. This in turn will benefit the animals that are active all year round and feed on these, such as badgers and resident birds, like the blackbird. Thats providing the rain abates long enough to allow the birds to feed.

Many animals reduce their activity in winter as their metabolism slows down. This allows fat reserves accrued in summer and autumn to be drawn upon slowly. A rise in temperature for cold-blooded animals, such as insects, means that their metabolic rates increase and their fat reserves deplete quicker potentially meaning some cannot last the winter. For insects such as butterflies, wasps and bees, warmer, wetter winters may make them more prone to fungal attack.

Few British mammals undergo true hibernation in the way that bears do. Multiple sightings across Russia, Finland and the US suggest that many bears emerged to what they thought was spring in February a month earlier than usual.

Some British mammals, such as bats and hedgehogs, slow down their metabolism and only become active again if temperatures rise above a critical point. Typically this temperature rise occurs in spring and is a sign that winter is ending. But when these carnivorous mammals emerge in winter, its likely to be when their insect prey is absent, risking their precious fat reserves and potentially causing starvation.

Even for those species that do undergo true hibernation, such as dormice, the unseasonable warmth sees this come to a premature end.

While Hardys poem maintains its power in the joy illimited of the thrushs song, should he be writing it today, it would describe a land decidedly warmer, wetter and greener than any hed recognise.

Continue reading here:
How British wildlife greeted the warmest winter on record - Metro Newspaper UK

Leaders from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are set to testify on Capitol Hill Tuesday morning. The hearing itself is officially about the presidents 2021 budget request for the agency. But in the month or so since President Donald Trump sent that budget to Congress, the COVID-19 outbreak has completely changed the public health landscape.

The budget proposal for the CDC cut funding to the agency by about 16%. Now with an $8 billion funding package that was just signed into law, Jay Shambaugh at the Brookings Institution says youre seeing continued activity to try to make sure anything that needs to be funded from a public health standpoint is funded.

Right now, thanks to low interest rates, the government can borrow money cheaply, according to Desmond Lachman at the American Enterprise Institute.

It takes time to spend that kind of money efficiently, Lachman said. So I wouldnt expect an increase in the very near future.

Shambaugh said the money is good in the short term, but the conversation is different now.

But now theres a much broader conversation in Congress about an appropriate kind of fiscal response that stretches beyond the immediate funding the public health agencies as well, he said.

Such responses include tax cuts or paid sick leave that may address other consequences of the outbreak.

Related Stories

If youre a member of your local public radio station, we thank you because your support helps those stations keep programs like Marketplace on the air. But for Marketplace to continue to grow, we need additional investment from those who care most about what we do: superfans like you.

Your donation as little as $5 helps us create more content that matters to you and your community, and to reach more people where they are whether thats radio, podcasts or online.

When you contribute directly to Marketplace, you become a partner in that mission: someone who understands that when we all get smarter, everybody wins.

See the original post here:
CDC set to testify on Capitol Hill on its budget, as it responds to COVID-19 - Marketplace

There is a revealing moment in Isabel Hardmans book where the author, a political journalist who lives with post-traumatic stress disorder, joins a forest therapy session. The therapist encourages her to connect with herself and experience nature better. Hardman wanders through the wood and finds a small hornbeam, which is twisting up towards the light, struggling to make its way in the shade of a mature oak. She is attracted to its shape, admires its bark, and draws parallels with her own life: how long it takes to heal and grow, how the scars we gather can still be beautiful like the zig-zagging trunk of this young tree. She reaches up and snaps one of its twigs: the tree is dead.

Serves me right for being so dreadfully whimsical, Hardman writes. There seemed to be no neat life lesson here, nothing youd want to write on a fridge magnet or share on social media. Id come here hoping to connect with myself, and instead Id been drawn to a tree that was secretly dead.

It is a valuable lesson in Hardmans The Natural Health Service, a practical and self-aware account of the relief from mental illness to be found outside. Hardman, and the many people she meets, identify respite, recovery and resilience in walking, running, cold-water swimming, gardening, forest bathing, birdwatching, botanising, horse riding and caring for pets. The common denominator is what Hardman calls the great outdoors, that plangent, hearty Victorian-sounding cliche. But as she shows, other species and their ecosystems can be rebellious medics. At times, the natural world resembles the magic mirror that undercuts Snow Whites stepmother: rather than reflecting back ourselves, it is alive with its own agency, a challenge to our narcissism.

The Natural Health Service is one of a rapidly growing forest of new books that examine cures found in nature. This winter alone has brought the publication of The Wild Remedy by Emma Mitchell; Losing Eden by Lucy Jones; Rootbound by Alice Vincent; and Wintering by Katherine May. One of last years unexpectedly prominent books unexpected because it was rejected by publishers and crowdfunded via Unbound was Bird Therapy by Joe Harkness. Just as trend is followed by takedown, so this spring sees a potential debunking in the form of Natural: The Seductive Myth of Natures Goodness by American philosopher Alan Levinovitz.

The idea that human health can be salved by nature has been around for as long as we have regarded ourselves as a species apart from other living things. It truly arrived in Britain with the Romantics, for whom prosperity enabled a more reflective and worshipful relationship with the landscape that others had to toil in for a living. Keats and Byron loved swimming; sea-bathing was an upper-class health fad that inspired the first seaside resorts. The popularisation of natures healing power peaked after the industrial revolution, when later Victorians were beset by fears of the all-conquering machine. Fresh air, exercise and healthful hobbies, from collecting butterflies to finding fossils, were prescribed in much the same way as GPs today are experimenting with prescribing nature to patients. Hardman reminds us of the prescience of Octavia Hill, the social reformer and co-founder of the National Trust in 1895, who campaigned to save urban land for city parks. London commons that could make developers fortunes had greater value as outdoor space, Hill argued: To my mind they are even now worth very much; but they will be more and more valuable every year valuable in the deepest sense of the word; health-giving, joy-inspiring, peace-bringing.

In Losing Eden, Jones shows that, ahead of todays scientists, even Florence Nightingale was aware of how green space and plants can assist recovery from physical illness. In 1859, Nightingale wrote that when she had been ill, her recovery quickened after she received a nosegay of wild flowers. The nurse noticed in her patients that there was most acute suffering when [the] patient cant see out of the window; Jones and Hardman both cite a more modern scientific study by Roger Ulrich who examined the records of 46 patients recovering from gall bladder surgery between 1972 and 1981. Some patients were randomly assigned a hospital bed with a view of deciduous trees; others a view of a brick wall. Those with a view of trees had shorter post-operative stays, took fewer painkillers and had fewer minor complications. And yet 40 years on, hospitals are run as sterile environments without plants, as Levinovitz notes in Natural: An entirely unsuperstitious take on natural healing would recognise the importance of being around life of facilitating hospital garden walks, say instead of systematically excluding it.

As the climate and extinction crisis quickens, so there is a rush for a literary cure. In Britain it began with Richard Mabeys Nature Cure in 2005. In many of the most popular recent examples of nature writing, other species and wild places have played a healing role for bereavement in Helen Macdonalds H Is for Hawk, and alcoholism in Amy Liptrots The Outrun. Nature Cure (briefly) details Mabeys mental breakdown after completing his magnum opus, Flora Britannica, and the succour he found by forgoing his childhood home in the Chilterns for the bleaker plains of south Norfolk. When I ask Mabey if he regrets being midwife to the nature cure subgenre, an emphatic yes spills forth. I feel slightly guilty about the title, which was my idea and it was very euphonious, but I quite soon began getting letters from people saying they loved the book but that it was not much to do with nature curing me. If a pedantic scholar counted the paragraphs that were to do with the illness, it probably amounts to about six pages, he says. Really its a book about encountering and adapting to a quite new landscape, which you could say was a post-cure experience. Mabey had to reach a certain stage of recovery to write Nature Cure. As he, Hardman and other nature cure writers emphasise, they can be too ill to leave the house to imbibe the healing wild, and too ill to write, too.

Its wonderful when it occurs; people in distress find that encounters with the natural world do restore them, says Mabey. But two things concern him about the concept of a nature cure. Im worried that its become mooted as a kind of panacea green Prozac. And if theres anything wrong you just go out and look at the pretty flowers and youre going to be marvellous. Thats a tall order if the natural world is in a state of crisis with the insect apocalypse and British songbirds collapsing all around us. There is also a danger that therapeutic nature becomes another way in which nature is reduced to service provider. The foregrounding of us being the centre of attention, the central agents of change and growth, all form part of a mindset that I think is obsolete. We need to rethink where we stand in relation to all these other organisms and what the transactions are between us, and stop saying they are all for our benefit, even though most of them probably are.

In an insightful essay on nature cures, Richard Smyth quotes the poet Polly Atkin, who is diagnosed with chronic illnesses Ehlers-Danlos syndromes and genetic haemochromatosis, a metabolic disorder that leads to a toxic accumulation of iron in the body. Like Mabey, Atkin has misgivings about this literary blossoming. There is very little published work that points out how problematic it is largely because the people who understand the problem are mainly those with incurable conditions and theyre often too busy being incurable to write books about nature, she says. More importantly, mainstream UK publishing is so attached to the nature cure narrative that it cant imagine another story to tell about how we relate to the world around us.

The stage is set for a debunking of the literary nature cure but in Natural, it never quite arrives. At the end of the book, despite Levinovitz taking smart aim at the snake-oil salespeople of late capitalism those selling expensive natural remedies, natural cures for cancer, or loudly advocating wholly natural childbirth, sex or sport he concludes that there is something innately glorious about the non-human natural world.

Im worried its become mooted as a kindof panacea if theres anything wrong you just go out and look at the flowers

What Levinovitz critiques is what he sees as a religious attitude towards nature. An appeal to natural goodness with unnatural as its evil twin is among the most influential arguments in all human thought, ancient and modern, east and west. In fact, every human-made object is extracted from our planet; everything is natural. Levinovitz argues our veneration of nature is dangerous, citing former South African president Thabo Mbekis desire for Aids patients to take beetroot and other natural treatments. What Levinovitz does is help us to identify the propagandists, bigots, demagogues, and marketeers who wrap their rhetoric in the mantle of whats natural.

When it comes to making money from nature, the small, poorly renumerated band of writers proselytising for its health benefits do not enter Levinovitzs line of fire. While H Is for Hawk will long stand as a literary classic, nature cure writing has taken a practical turn. Hardman and Harknesss books are squarely self-help. Their qualities include brutal honesty and generous advice. Both authors, alongside others such as Jones and Mitchell, make clear that while time in the natural world has ameliorated their mental illnesses, so too have antidepressants and talking cures. These writers dont succumb to the requirement for a happy ending either: no one suggests they are cured.

We might wonder if a writing cure is also part of their wider recovery, but it is not always so. John Clare, who died in 1864, has long been the most notable nature writer with mental health problems. The Northamptonshire farm labourer, whose superb poems made him a literary sensation in the early 19th century, could be considered both evidence for and against the theory that nature makes us well. Did he only fall ill once embraced by literary London, psychically uprooted from his rural heartland? Or was he ill despite surrounding himself with nature? A country life is no guarantee of mental wellbeing: depression is a major problem in modern farming; plenty of farm workers endure it.

There is an echo of Clares experience in Harknesss account of life since the publication of his debut, Bird Therapy. I will never write about nature again, says Harkness bluntly. He has been diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder and generalised anxiety disorder mild medical terms for the crippling anxiety that Harkness vividly describes. After an attempted suicide and a breakdown, he began walking and discovered the exhilaration of encountering birds. Of all the therapies Ive tried, he writes, nothing has had the prolonged and positive impact that birdwatching has. He spotted that the requirements of birdwatching matched the five ways to wellbeing devised by a project endorsed by the charity Mind: to connect, to take notice, to give, to keep learning and to be active.

As Harknesss profile grew on social media, he decided to write a book, receiving high-profile endorsements, including an incisive foreword by the naturalist Chris Packham, who declared it an exceptional publication because it would save lives. Eight months on, Harkness recognises that his book has brought positive things: his honesty about mental illness has encouraged others to reciprocate. He has been told by readers that it has indeed saved their lives. Unfortunately, the online platform that enabled him to promote his book also damaged him. The more open I was on social media, the less people engaged with me. If youre already struggling with self-esteem, it is hell to be on it. The only way I could deal with it is not use Twitter any more, he says.

He has also shed his illusions about the guild of nature writers. He imagined this literary world would be an inclusive salon for the free exchange of ideas about nature and mental health; instead he found a workplace, a competitive market with a lot of emphasis on product and what youre selling, where people become very focused on themselves. One nature writer, he says, told him that Bird Therapy only sold well because of Packhams foreword. Harkness, who is a special educational needs co-ordinator working with vulnerable young people, says he is so glad that writing is not his job. His post-book cure has been to remove himself from social media and literary backslapping and simplify his birdwatching regimen. I dont drive to birdwatch any more. I walk from my house. Im under no pressure to see anything exciting. Ive stopped commodifying it. I just think of being out where I should be. Whenever I do that Im really thankful for it. Nature is not there to make me feel better. Its something we can use to help us but ultimately we have to be there for it as well. And weve got to make wholesale changes to how we live.

Most nature cure books, both literary triumphs and practical manuals, are overwhelmingly about us. Perhaps we should catch more glimpses of other species as we look into the mirror? Mitchells The Wild Remedy, a diary of a year with severe depression, throws welcome attention on natural medicines the thrilling dash of a sparrowhawk, or the cosy sight of ladybirds clustered together during winter in a knapweed seedhead. She recreates her encounters with other species around her home in Cambridgeshire in paintings, sketches, photographs and cabinets of curiosities. But, she says, Im not using my garden and the wood beyond my cottage as a sort of green Tesco, burgling myself some green serotonin and dopamine. Its much more of a two-way relationship. Mitchell, like Harkness, initially connected via social media with readers and others who lived with mental illness. She is not always well enough to visit a nearby wood every day. When she does, she monitors, observes and records the wildlife, and relays it to her audience. A biologist by training, Mitchell hopes her writing and art enlighten our increasingly urban society. Im trying to use the place where I live as a source of education for people who may not know what cherry plum blossom looks like This is coming into flower, go and see if youve got it on your patch, she says. Awakening readers to other species around us is a gift to those species, and it is bequeathed by almost every nature cure writer.

As humans reshape life on Earth, its hazardous to pin our wellbeing on the fragments of non-human life that remain

Last summer, an area of flowery meadowland in the wood near Mitchell exploded with life. The hot summer of 2018 must have produced a metric fucktonne of caterpillars she laughs: the following year there emerged hundreds of marbled white butterflies. The dose of dopamine was just off the scale. She filmed it for her social media followers. A few days later, in full flower, the meadow was scalped because of fears it contained ragwort, a flower that can in rare cases prove fatal to horses (and which landowners sometimes mistakenly believe they are obliged to control under an arcane injurious weeds law). An exquisite ecosystem was cut down at its peak. Alongside Mitchells enjoyment of this meadow emerged a deep connection with it, and a responsibility for it. My connection with this land is not as a commodity. This is not skincare I get from a beauty parlour. This is not a monthly subscription to sniff some dead-nettle flowers. This is something that has changed my ability to live with my depression, she says. In this case, she went into battle with her local council, at some personal cost Im a spokesperson for thousands of invertebrates because theyve got no voice, she says and succeeded in changing the cutting regime. The meadow wont be cut again this year until the flowers and invertebrates have finished flowering and flying.

Mitchells experience also reveals that in the Anthropocene, an era in which humans are reshaping all life on Earth, it is hazardous to pin our wellbeing on the fragments of non-human life that remain. Lucy Joness Losing Eden is a passionate and thorough exploration of the growing scientific evidence showing why humans require other species to stay well from a diversity of microbiota in our guts to a diversity of species in nearby green space. But she is aware that the medicalisation of nature also demonstrates that we still see ourselves as takers and overseers, the authority figures, rather than being on an equal footing with the rest of nature. Just as Mabey wonders if we can extract wellbeing from an environment we are traducing, so Jones considers the 21st-century challenge posed by ecological grief. Is the epidemic of mental illness in wealthy western societies in part because some part of our spirits [is] afflicted by the mass burglary humanity has committed on the Earth? Jones writes. I know that I feel rotten and out of sorts when I am selfish or hurtful to the people around me. The ecopsychologist and activist Chellis Glendinning diagnosed western culture as suffering from original trauma caused by our severance from nature and natural cycles. She noted that the symptoms were the same as PTSD: hyperreactions; inappropriate outbursts of anger, psychic numbing; constriction of the emotions; and loss of a sense of control over our destiny.

The Earth is our home and we are making ourselves homeless. Jones quotes the farmer-thinker Wendell Berry: We are involved in a kind of lostness in which most people are participating more or less unconsciously in the destruction of the natural world, which is to say, the sources of our own lives. Perhaps some of our lack of awareness, Jones thinks, is an instinctive denial of death; just as we block out our own mortality, so too we pretend our compulsive consumption is not hastening the premature end of our species enjoyment of the planet.

As Jones argues, despite all our writing about nature, we still lack the language to bring its jeopardy our jeopardy to the forefront of our troubled minds. Western consumption has made the planet ill, and now we are patients too. Grief and mental illness can be introspective and paralysing or they can inspire action. Which path will we as individuals, societies and as a species choose?

The rest is here:
Can nature really heal us? - The Guardian