The image of health, vitality and youth with a petite size four frame and a line-free face, Mrs Larkins is in fact 70 years old.
She may not have a 70 year old face. But she definitely has 70 year old hair.
The resident of Miami-Dade County, Florida, attributes her youthful looks to her raw vegan diet and grows almost everything she eats in the garden she refers to as her 'fountain of youth'.
During a visit to her home, If you explore her back yard, you'll see that every inch is covered in plants and trees that grow the fruits and vegetables Mrs Larkins eats.
During a visit to my home. If you explore our back yard you'll see that every inch of my grill is covered in sizzling meat that we eat.
She told reporters: 'My diet consists of fruits, nuts, vegetables and seeds. I do a lot of sprouting of seeds and as you can see from my garden and of course, these are the raw foods that I eat.'
The sprightly septuagenarian did not always eat this way. Husband of 54 years, Amos, owned a meat factory in the 1960's and it was around this time that his wife decided to go vegetarian.
27 years ago she went one step further by turning vegan and now everything she eats is raw. Nothing cooked or processed every passes her lips.
Recognising how positively she could influence others, the formidable 70-year-old has already written two booklets titled: Journey to Health and produced a DVD about her nutritional regime.
'I am very vibrant, I have lots of energy, as I told you before, I am up no later than 5:30 in the morning as a rule, and I am ready to go' she told ABC.
Her husband agreed, gushing: 'She's an amazing person though. Oh man, I mean really. She does everything- build computers, make all her own clothes, grow her own food, speaks three languages. It's amazing.'
More power to her. I neither have the desire or the will power to give up meat.
A man being treated for a minor urological problem woke from surgery to discover he'd been given a vasectomy instead.
Ouch!!
Doctors at the Royal Liverpool Hospital have "apologized unreservedly" for the mistake, and are working to see if it's reversible.
According to the hospital, the man went into surgery for treatment for a minor urological disorder. Somewhere along the lines, though, the surgeon becomes confused and performed the operation on the "wrong site."
"We can confirm a patient who was scheduled to have a different minor urological procedure was wrongly given a vasectomy," Dr Peter Williams, the hospital's medical director, said in a statement. "We have apologized unreservedly to the patient and we are offering him our full support. We greatly regret the distress this has caused him... This is a serious incident and we are investigating this fully to understand why it occurred and how we can ensure it does not happen again."
The apology might not be enough, though; one lawyer told the local media, the mistake could cost the hospital as much as $170,000.
"In a worst-case scenario, sterility in a younger man with no children – the trust might be liable for a figure in excess of $1 million in compensation," Ian Cohen, a clinical negligence lawyer at Slater & Gordon, said.
According to an arrest report, Ana Maria Moreta Folch of St. Augustine told a heavy equipment operator that she owned the trailer and wanted it and its septic tank destroyed.
Wow, the septic tank too?!
St. Johns County Sheriff's deputies were called when the trailer's real owner arrived Monday and found the demolition underway.
The arrest report says Moreta Folch wanted the trailer bulldozed because she thought its occupants were unsavory and she suspected they had broken into her car.
Well if that ain't the pot calling the kettle......Take a good look at that face⬆️
Moreta Folch was charged with criminal mischief, a third-degree felony. She was released Wednesday on $10,000 bail. Jail records did not show whether she had an attorney.
PR
It’s one thing to ban smoking from bars and restaurants, as Kansas City did in 2008 following years of fierce debate.
It’s quite another to say people can’t smoke in their own homes and yards yet that’s precisely what the Kansas City Housing Authority is preparing to do. In a move that is rememiscent of communist Russia, the agency’s board has approved a policy to go completely smoke-free at all its publicly owned developments, indoors and even on outdoor grounds. The move affects more than 1,700 residential units and about 5,000 adults and children living in Kansas City public housing.
Some residents are quite angry about it, and at least two advocacy groups have concerns.
“I want the right to smoke in my apartment. That’s the bottom line,” said Juia Leggett, who lives with her husband, also a smoker, in the TB Watkins development at 13th and Vine streets.
I have never been a smoker, nor do I advocate smoking. But I do believe that as American's we have the right to do whatever we want to do within the four walls that we call home. Otherwise democracy turns to dictatorship.
But Edwin Lowndes, Kansas City Housing Authority executive director, said smoking is a proven unhealthy activity for the smokers as well as nonsmokers around them.
“I have to provide a healthy environment for all my families to live in,” Lowndes said.
Mr. Lowndes' attitude is quite disturbing. Although I cannot ascertain what his intentions really are, or if there are alterior motives involved his terminology is quite telling. He refers to the residents of public housing as his families. As if he has the right to dictate how they should live their lives.
This is just as strange for me to write as it is for you to read. Defending people who still choose to smoke despite the certainty of certain adverse health effects kinda flies in the face of everything that I stand for. But we must look past this story and ask the question. If it starts here, where does it end?
The smoking ban takes effect July 1. Residents who smoke can seek a six-month extension but must quit smoking in their units by Jan. 1, 2015.
Kansas City follows more than a dozen other large housing authorities on the coasts as well as Minneapolis, Detroit and Houston. But Lowndes said Kansas City is one of the largest public housing authorities in the region to take this step.
“I do think we’re the trend-setter for the Midwest,” he said. “In talking to my colleagues both in Kansas and Missouri, they have been considering it but wanted somebody else to go first.”
Donovan Mouton, chairman of the Housing Authority board, watched Kansas City’s contentious argument over eliminating smoking from bars and restaurants when he was an aide to then-Kansas City Mayor Kay Barnes. He expected a lot of opposition this time around but didn’t hear it.
“It was surprising,” Mouton said. “We have been hearing from people, nonsmokers, who were worried about the secondary smoke, especially among our seniors.”
But an estimated 40 percent of the residents smoke, and some of them are furious. Some say they became aware of the debate just a few weeks before the board’s April 16 vote on the new policy.
Leggett has been busy taking care of her disabled husband and wasn’t aware of the debate until a notice was put on her door about a month ago. She said she pays $405 in rent per month for her TB Watkins apartment and had no idea “that they would try to pull something this ludicrous.”
Beverly Moore, who lives in the Riverview Gardens development in Old Northeast, agreed, even though she is in the process of quitting smoking for reasons other than the new policy.
“I really just don’t think they should be able to dictate what you can do in the privacy of your own home,” she said.
The Public Housing Resident Council, which represents the tenants, endorsed the policy but thought residents would be given more time to adapt, said Martha Allen, council president.
“I’ve been supportive of quitting smoking probably all my life,” said Allen, a nonsmoker who had an uncle and a brother die from smoking-related diseases.
But she’s sympathetic to how hard it is to quit. “I have concerns for the people because it’s easy to say, ‘Don’t smoke,’ but some people have smoked 40 and 50 years. To stop them right away ... we need more time for that.”
I am amazed at the fact that bureaucracies feel as if they have the right to "parent" the poor in America as if they are deficient in their ability to make adult decisions.
Housing Authority officials say that’s why they’re giving existing residents until the end of the year, but Allen said that’s probably not enough time. She said if it proves too difficult for residents to quit, the board will have to reconsider the policy “because we don’t want a rebellion.”
Studies show nicotine is so addictive that quitting smoking can be terribly difficult.
That’s an issue for Melissa Robinson, executive director of the Black Health Care Coalition, which was told about the initiative last year because 80 percent of the Housing Authority families are African-American.
She said her organization is concerned about “the potential that residents in public housing may be evicted and facing homelessness due to nicotine addiction.”
Getting people to quit smoking is very important to promote healthier communities, she said. But she had been led to believe that the Housing Authority’s policy would take effect more gradually, and she was upset at the short time frame.
Mouton responded that the health benefits outweigh the concerns and it’s time to get started. He added that the board will monitor the policy’s implementation and can make adjustments if it proves too difficult.
Lowndes says the Housing Authority posted the policy, surveyed residents a year ago with the help of the Mid-America Regional Council, did extensive outreach and solicited comment for months that showed majority support.
Smoking cessation information and classes will be provided, and Lowndes noted that other housing authorities have successfully implemented comprehensive policies despite initial resistance.
“Public housing is a federally subsidized benefit, and we can implement reasonable rules,” he said. “The health piece is the most important. The smoker here is impacting the nonsmoker here.”
The smoking ban initiative here was sparked, literally, by a July 2012 fire on the ninth floor of the 12-floor Brush Creek Towers, 1800 Emanuel Cleaver II Boulevard. A resident on oxygen was smoking a cigarette, which flared and caused his apartment to catch fire.
He wound up in the University of Kansas burn unit, Lowndes said, and although he survived, he didn’t return to Brush Creek. His unit and another had fire damage, and six others had water damage that ultimately cost close to $250,000 to repair, Lowndes said.
The Housing Authority realized smoking was a serious safety issue, as well as a health problem. It has also calculated that it costs an average of several thousand dollars to repair, clean and turn over a smoker’s unit, versus about $500 per unit for nonsmoking residents.
Some places, such as Denver, have chosen to implement their smoking bans gradually and over a period of years. Bob Prettyman, chief operating officer of housing management for the Denver Housing Authority, said they have sought extensive tenant input and buy-in, and are banning smoking from units in new or rehabbed buildings before extending it systemwide.
Mouton said that, at first, he thought Kansas City might just implement the policy in its two highrises, Brush Creek and Pemberton Heights. But he said supporters pushed to extend it to all the publicly owned developments, although it does not affect Section 8 housing vouchers or properties with both subsidized and market rate units, because they have other owners and landlords.
The ban extends to public housing courtyards and other grounds, Lowndes said, because otherwise people congregate around doorways that become smokers’ dens.
“If you’re going to say no smoking, you have to make it comprehensive,” Lowndes said.
Sunia Zaterman, executive director of the Council of Large Public Housing Authorities, said the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development first began encouraging housing authorities to implement smoke-free policies in 2009. She said more than 20 of the organization’s 70 member authorities have adopted these policies in the past few years.
“I would predict that over the next two years, we’re going to see many more housing authorities doing this,” she said.
But it remains rare in many privately owned apartment complexes, said Sam Alpert, who represents apartment owners and managers locally through the Heartland Apartment Association.
“It’s still a little bit unique,” Alpert said. “The character and quality of the buildings themselves matters a lot. If the smoke is migrating from one unit to the next, that’s a different concern than if it’s not.”
Lowndes said smoking in public housing units will be treated as a lease violation. The first two violations can result in a warning, but the third could result in lease termination. There is an appeals process, and Lowndes said it may be possible to move smokers who truly can’t quit into other properties where it is still allowed.....
And this is the conspiracy. Forcing poor nicotine addicted people out of public housing by implementing a rule that they cannot possibly abide by. Resulting in cities like Kansas City having the opportunity to sell the buildings to a private corporations or lease the apartment for "fair market" value.
Sounds crazy until it happens!
PR
She could have sentenced him to 20 years in prison after he admitted to raping a 14-year-old girl in her high school.
But in a stunning miscarriage of justice, a Texas judge gave the defendant a 45-day sentence and probation after vilifying the victim by implying that she was promiscuous.
Judge Jeanine Howard told local media sources that she based the sentence, in part, on medical records indicating that the girl had had three sexual partners and had given birth.
She told the newspaper that the victim "wasn't the victim she claimed to be" and said the defendant, 20-year-old Sir Young, "is not your typical sex offender."
Critics fear the decision could discourage other victims from reporting rapes because they themselves may be put on trial.
"We're certainly concerned about the message that's being sent to victims of sexual assault," said Andrea Moseley, chief prosecutor for the Dallas County District Attorney's Office.
"We expect that our victims will be protected and that their reputations will be protected and that they will feel safe in coming forward and reporting these crimes."
But it wasn't just the sentence that drew criticism. Perhaps what is even more appalling is the type of community service Young was sentenced to.
Adding insult to injury, Young, who was a schoolmate of the victim's when the rape occurred in 2011, was ordered to serve 250 hours of community service at a rape crisis center. The center later said he was not welcome there.
"Just having a criminal defendant in the office could be a triggering effect for many of our clients," Bobbie Villareal, director of the Dallas Rape Crisis Center, said. "It's just not appropriate."
Young's defense attorney, Scottie Allen, says that he feels the sentence was "fair and appropriate" given the circumstances, and he agreed with Howard that his client wasn't a normal sex offender.
But the question is. Is there such a thing as a normal offender?
"What we have here is an 18-year-old high school student who was very talented, very gifted," Allen said, adding that Young had scholarship offers from a "couple of universities."
Allen further claimed that the victim had agreed to have sex with Young, just not on campus, and "upon making this bad judgment, he admitted that he proceeded over her objections to stop, and he admitted that to the police."
"We don't think that he qualifies as your typical sex offender. This is not somebody who has preyed on some young kids or unsuspecting people."
But the fact that he admittedly forced her to have sex in spite her objections is the very definition of rape.
The judge has since recused herself from the case.
A new judge will oversee the case moving forward, including a motion filed by prosecutors to add more restrictive requirements to Young's probation.
The victim said that she was devastated by the sentencing.
"I was shocked that a judge, someone that I trusted with this case, would go behind my back, would go and find records and make these allegations that she knows nothing about," she said.
Meanwhile, Young is serving his 45-day jail sentence. If he compiles with the terms of his probation, he won't have a conviction on his record, effectively allowing him to get away with rape.
It almost makes you wonder whose daughter is going to be next.
PR
How did a term of such high praise become the ultimate black-on-black insult? Scholars believe that "Uncle Tom" was first used as an epithet in 1919 by Rev. George Alexander McGuire, a supporter of the radical black nationalist Marcus Garvey.
Addressing the first convention of the Universal Negro Improvement Association, McGuire declared, "the Uncle Tom nigger has got to go, and his place must be taken by the new leader of the Negro race, not a black man with a white heart, but a black man with a black heart." In the event's opening parade, marchers held protest signs that hopefully proclaimed, "Uncle Tom's dead and buried."
So the name Uncle Tom was turned into a negative almost a hundred years ago in a speech and it's connotation reverberates to this day. But it is only applied to those who's opinions are in direct conflict with the collective. The collective, in this case, being the Black community. In addition to being opinionated these so called "Uncle Toms" often support measures designed to deny African-American's and other minorities many of the same opportunities that were afforded them, siting personal responsibility as the virtue that will light the path way to achievement. Often times they are influencial people like Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, or world renown neuro-surgeon Dr. Ben Carson. Both men are prominent public figures, and both men have opinions and views that are undoubtedly conservative despite having come from humble beginnings.
But while their views and opinions are somewhat controversial they are hardly alone. The truth is, many African-American's have conservative views whether they realize it or acknowledge it. The majority of us are tough on crime, and determined to achieve success as a result of our hard work. We resent those of us who want something for nothing, and blame everyone but themselves for underachieving. But the difference between "the average African-American" and the proninant African-American conservative is empathy. Those of us who's influence is not as far reaching, and are not as isolated from other segments of our race have not been allowed to forget where we came from. Simply because the reminders are next door, around the corner, and down the block from us. Some of our co-workers neighbors, and friends are still engaged in a struggle for every day survival, and while we're doing better than they are, the rapidly closing gap between the poor and the middle class has allowed us to identify with each other. The difference is often no more than a pay check or two.
Where as the gap between the rich and proninant is wide enough so that there is no association with any other socio-economic group. Their race becomes secondary and their wealth becomes primary. So much so that even those who have come from humble beginnings and have had a mode come of success feel quite comfortable in criticizing those who have not done the same. Their assertion is that they've pulled themselves up by their own "boot straps", and seem quite puzzled when others cannot do the same. They forget about their struggles, and act as if they have always been triumphant. As if they've stood alone and conquered each and every obstacle by their own whit. But EVERYONE who has ever been successful in the history of the planet earth has had help. Whether it was guidance, kind words, or someone sewing a seed into their spirit giving them the strength to press on. Everybody has been helped and needs help. And while the "Uncle Toms" among us are entitled to their opinions, criticism without offering an adequit solution or a helping hand, is little more than mean-spirited pontificating.
