The secrets of girls' flirt and actress play

The novel "Wives and Daughters" of Elizabeth Gaskell, chapter 21.
The action takes place in England in the early 19th century.
One of the novel's characters, Cynthia is a very beautiful and graceful girl educated and polished in some French school.
The other character, Roger is a graduate of Cambridge University, the son of a big landowner. 

"The grave eyes that the latter (Cynthia) raised when she had to be presented to Roger had a sort of child-like innocence and wonder about them, which did not quite belong to Cynthia’s character. She put on her armour of magic that evening - involuntarily as she always did; but, on the other side, she could not help trying her power on strangers."
"...the animated tête-à-tête going on between Roger and Cynthia. Or rather, it would be more correct to say that Roger was talking in a most animated manner to  Cynthia, whose sweet eyes were fixed upon his face with a look of great interest in all he was saying, while it was only now and then she made her low replies."
(After the party) "When they got home Mr and Mrs Gibson (her parents) were sitting in the drawing-room, quite ready to be amused by any details of the evening.
Cynthia began,: ‘Oh! it wasn’t very entertaining. One didn’t expect that,’ and she yawned wearily.                 
(about Roger) ‘Oh! he’s nothing like so handsome as his brother; nor so polished; nor so easy to talk to. He entertained me for more than an hour with a long account of some examination or other; but there’s something one likes about him' "                

Disabled brain tumor patient is left bruised and bloodied after a violent scuffle with TSA agents at Memphis airport

  

By Associated Press and Kiri Blakeley For Dailymail.com

Hannah Cohen, 19, was returning from having her brain tumor treated at St. Jude's Children's Hospital when she set off a security alarm TSA agents wanted to search her more thoroughly but she was scared and disoriented. Her mother says the agents assaulted her daughter and is suing.

bloodied and terrified Hannah Cohen looks up at the camera after her mother and attorneys claim she was assaulted by TSA agents at the Memphis International Airport 

A disabled brain tumor patient got into a bloody scuffle with security workers at a Memphis International Airport checkpoint, a lawsuit alleges.

Hannah Cohen, 19, was flying home to Chattanooga on June 30, 2015, after receiving treatment at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis.

Hannah Cohen has an impairment from radiation and removal of a brain tumor, and she is limited in her ability to talk, walk, stand, see and hear, say her attorneys.

But when an alarm went off as she and her mother were going through a security checkpoint operated by the Memphis International Airport Police Department and the Transportation Safety Administration, the teen became disoriented and afraid by the security workers' attempts to search her, the lawsuit says.

Cohen had nothing on her that should have set off the alarm, says her mother, but security wanted additional screening anyway.

'She was very reluctant,' Shirley Cohen told WREG. 'She didn't understand what they were about to do.'

The security personnel failed to recognize that she was confused because of her obvious disability and was unable to cooperate with the search,' Cohen's lawyers, Kelly Pearson and William Hardwick, wrote in the lawsuit.

Her mother, Shirley Cohen, said she tried to tell TSA agents about her daughter's disability, but she was kept away by police.

'She's trying to get away from them but in the next instant, one of them had her down on the ground and hit her head on the floor. There was blood everywhere,' said Shirley Cohen.

The lawsuit alleges the security personnel assaulted Hannah Cohen at the checkpoint, 'causing her physical and emotional injury as well as emotional injury' to her mother.

Hannah Cohen was arrested, but the charges were later dropped. 

The family filed a federal lawsuit against the Memphis-Shelby County Airport Authority and the TSA for damages that include pain, medical expenses, personal and emotional injury, and embarrassment.

The lawsuit alleges that the TSA and airport police discriminated against Cohen because of her disability and failed to provide reasonable accommodation for screening her.

 Disabled Teen Beaten Bloody by TSA Agents

By Rick Moran 

For sheer stupidity and incompetence, this incident involving the TSA and a disabled teenage girl suffering from brain cancer who was savagely thrown to the floor when she became confused about a metal detector going off, can't be beat.
Why these bullies weren't thrown in jail is a mystery.
Seventeen-year-old Hannah Cohen was preparing to fly from Memphis to her home in Chattanooga with her parents last year. Hannah was going home following her annual treatments at St. Jude hospital for brain cancer.

When she passed through the metal detectors, setting off an alarm, what happened next will make your blood boil.
Hit and Run:

Her years of treatment left the teenager partially deaf, blind in one eye, and limited in her abilities to walk and talk. She also, according to her mother, can become easily confused.When Hannah went through the metal detector at the airport, an alarm went off. Disoriented by the noise, she did not immediately cooperate with TSA agents who asked to conduct further screening.
Shirley Cohen tried to inform the agents about her daughter's disabilities, she told television station WREG, but airport police kept her away. That's when the situation between Hannah and the TSA officials became violent:

"She's trying to get away from them but in the next instant, one of them had her down on the ground and hit her head on the floor. There was blood everywhere," said [Shirley].

Security personnel arrested Hannah (though all charges against her were later dropped), and what should have been a night of celebration with family and friends because a night of terror and confusion in a jail cell.
A year later, the family is suing the airport, its police, and the TSA for damages, including medical expenses and emotional injuries. According to the lawsuit, they are asking for a "reasonable sum not exceeding $100,000 and costs."

Hannah has been traveling through the airport to St. Jude's Hospital for 17 years to treat a brain tumor but this time ended in a brawl 

Hannah's mom, Shirley, says her daughter was disoriented and frightened by TSA agents who didn't understand how to treat a woman with a disability

One of the best hits of 2016

Putin’s Russia is a poor, drunk soccer hooligan

 
By Scott Gilmore    

Russia is not the country you think it is. Its economy is smaller than South Korea’s. Its people are poorer than Kazakhstan’s. It trails Finland in technology. And it has a smaller military budget than Saudi Arabia.
For most of the 20th century, what Moscow thought and did mattered from Havana to Hanoi. Then the collapse of the Soviet Union left behind a battered, broken shell of a country. When the Berlin Wall fell, so did Russia’s status in the world.
A boozy Boris Yeltsin was a fitting representative for a country whose average life expentency tumbled a staggering five years in the wake of the fall. There were the coups, industrial collapse, spreading corruption, and shrinking borders. After generations of fearing the Soviet Bear, the West patted it on the head, sent it some aid, and turned its eyes with expectation towards the emerging powers of Brazil, India, and China.
But Vladimir Putin’s rise to power marked a sea change in Russia’s fortunes. How the world sees Russia began to shift. The often bare-chested leader consciously cultivated a new brand, for himself, and for the country. Putin’s new Russia was a country that mattered again.
Russia hosted the Olympics, punched Georgia in the nose, took back the Crimea, invaded Ukraine, flew bombers through NATO airspace, built military bases in the Arctic, and generally flexed and posed like an oiled, aged, but still buff, body builder. And we’ve been paying increasingly rapt attention, not noticing the geriatric walker hidden just off stage. A closer look is almost shocking.
According to the International Monetary Fund’s most recent data, the Russian economy is approximately the same size as Australia and slightly smaller than South Korea. As an exporter, it is now less important than Belgium, Mexico, and Singapore.
And it is poor. The World Bank ranks Russia’s GDP per capita below Lithuania, Equatorial Guinea, and Kazakhstan. A larger proportion of its population lives below the poverty rate than in Indonesia, India, or Sri Lanka. It is ranked 67th in the world in the Global Competitive Index and 66th in the UN’s Human Development Index.
These economic woes are having serious social impacts. There are now fewer doctors than a decade ago. Life expectancy in Russia is nine years less than in the United States and is declining. Infant mortality rate is two to three times higher than most of the Western world. Its alcoholism rate is now the highest on the planet, three times North America’s; and consumption of alcohol has doubled in the past 20 years. Not surprisingly, the Russian statistical agency Rosstat has identified aging and shrinking demographics as the single biggest challenge facing the country over the next 30 years.
Intellectually, Russia is a distant speck in the rearview mirror. Once, esteemed Soviet universities educated the engineers and doctors of the developing world. Now, the United Nations ranks Russia’s education system behind nearly every other European country, and on par with the Pacific island of Palau. The technological leader that launched Sputnik now produces fewer patents per capita than Iceland. Its scientific publications are cited less often than Finland’s.
In nearly every indicator of health, wealth, and influence, Russia ranks below even the middle powers. What do they have left? Guns and bombs mostly. At 8,000 nuclear warheads, it still has 700 more than the United States. It ranks second globally for combat aircraft, military satellites, and nuclear submarines. Moscow’s military budget has increased every year since Putin’s arrival in 1999.
But even these numbers are misleading. According to data compiled by the Stockholm International Peace Institute, Russia’s defense budget is still less than China, and Saudi Arabia. It is roughly on par with India, France, and the United Kingdom. And it is nine times smaller than the Pentagon’s budget.
The fact is, if it wasn’t for Syria, the Crimea, and some ageing warheads, Russia would get as much global attention as Slovakia or perhaps Wales. Not coincidentally, those are two nations that recently played Russia in the ongoing European soccer championship. In both cases, the results were resounding defeats for the Russians despite their opponents being one-twentieth and one-fortieth its size, respectively. In spite of these resounding defeats, which have relegated them to the bottom of the league tables, the Russian team, and its fans, still dominated the news.
When we talk about the Eurocup, we talk about Russian hooligans rioting in the stands, attacking other spectators, and even assaulting tourists on the trains home. Or we marvel at the belligerent response from Moscow when Igor Lebedev, the Deputy Chairman of the Russian parliament and a senior official in the Russian soccer official tweeted “I don’t see anything wrong with the fans fighting. Quite the opposite, well done lads, keep it up!”
Lebedev understands a lesson that has been well taught by Putin: If you can’t compete on the field, make as much noise as you can off it. Russia is so far behind economically, technologically, socially, and politically, it just doesn’t matter anymore. But it can still get our attention, and it is.
When Russia next moves its tanks to the border, we should take it seriously. It has a lot of tanks (although less than Pakistan). But we should also remember that this is not a world power. By most indicators, it’s not even a middle power. Russia is a soccer hooligan: poor, drunk, and frustrated it can’t win anymore. It can only throw beer bottles from the bleachers.

Нечестивое скопище безбожных рабов - "россияне"

Большинство "россиян" жалеют о крушении тоталитарного режима

Большинство россиян жалеют о распаде Советского Союза и считают, что этого можно было избежать. Число ностальгирующих по СССР граждан стало самым высоким за последние пять лет. При этом становится все меньше тех, кого огорчил развал советского государства.
Более половины россиян считают, что распада СССР можно было избежать (51%) и сожалеют о том, что это случилось (56%), сообщили "Интерфаксу" в "Левада-Центре". Треть (33%) опрошенных заявила, что крах советского режима был неизбежен. Не смогли сформулировать ответ 17% респондентов.
Доля россиян, переживающих ностальгию по советским временам, оказалась самой высокой с ноября 2010 года. В то же время нынешний показатель не превысил исторический максимум: в декабре 2000 года о распаде СССР сожалели три четверти россиян (75%).
Кроме того, большинство опрошенных (58%) хотели бы возрождения Советского Союза и социалистической системы. Вместе с тем 44% отметили, что в настоящее время восстановление СССР нереально. Каждый третий (31%) не желал бы возрождения страны Советов и социализма.
По данным опроса, стало меньше тех, кого развал советского государства огорчил, - 28% против 37% в ноябре минувшего года. Затруднились с ответом 16% опрошенных.
Опрос был проведен 25-28 марта среди 1600 человек в 137 населенных пунктах 48 регионов РФ.
В марте текущего года социологи выяснили, что россияне все сильнее любят Иосифа Сталина, находя в его методах правления с годами больше позитивных черт. Эксперты связывали рост поддержки советского вождя с нынешним курсом российского руководства на противостояние с Западом, а также с кризисом, во время которого население ждет наказания провинившихся бюрократов от жесткого лидера.
Также социологи выяснили, что две трети россиян проголосовали бы за сохранение СССР, будь у них такая возможность. Лишь пятая часть опрошенных выступила против. В то же время по результатам опроса стало ясно, что доля выступающих за сохранение Советского Союза значительно выше среди людей старше 60 лет.
Кроме того, большинство россиян позитивно относятся к главным символам эпохи СССР и выступают против их запрета в России.

Freedom House: Россия в списке диктаторских режимов

Country ratings from Freedom House's Freedom in the World 2016 survey, concerning the state of world freedom in 2015.

 

  Free (86)   Partly Free (59)   Not Free (50)

2015 Freedom of the Press Classifications

  Not Free   Partly Free   Free   No Data
 

Экономические трудности могут дестабилизировать социальную ситуацию в ряде стран постсоветского пространства, а миграционный кризис провоцирует ксенофобию, национализм и тормозит реформы в странах Восточной Европы, считает правозащитная организация Freedom House.
Об этом говорится в опубликованном ежегодном докладе о "Странах переходного типа", в котором оценивается развитие демократии в 29 государствах бывшего Советского Союза, Балканского региона и Центральной Европы.
Самым деспотичным названо правление в семи республиках бывшего СССР, в которых не менее 10 лет у власти находятся диктаторы, это - Россия, Азербайджан, Белоруссия, Казахстан, Таджикистан, Узбекистан и Туркмения.
По оценкам Freedom House, из-за падения мировых цен на нефть и газ, а также в результате санкций США и ЕС против России и российских контрсанкций - экономика постсоветских стран оказалась на грани краха. Из-за этого растет потенциал социального протеста.
Как заявил в интервью радио «Свобода» Нэйт Шенккан - директор проектов Freedom House для стран переходного типа, в ответ на экономические трудности руководители таких стран стремятся ужесточить государственный контроль над всеми сферами жизни. В России, например, по словам Шенккана, резко усилился авторитаризм Путина, ширится наступление на гражданское общество.

The best hits of 2014-2016