Hugh Plante

Damaged castaway, lovelorn cynic, book lover and editor posing the dreaded question, “What are you writing these days?”

[Channel 4 News @Channel4News]

A death row inmate in the United States has survived two attempts to execute her by lethal injection.

Christa Pike’s execution, in the state of Tennessee, was halted and she was taken to hospital when she was still alive after two injections.

Now 50-years-old, Pike was sentenced to death in 1996 aged 18 for murdering her 19-year-old schoolmate Colleen Slemmer.

The Tennessee Department of Correction said it followed every step of the state’s lawful, established execution protocol.

Lawyers and human rights experts had heavily opposed Christa’s execution, given her age at the time of sentencing. Just an hour before her scheduled death, the US Supreme Court ruled that the execution was allowed to take place.

Tennessee Governor Bill Lee has now halted the one remaining execution for the rest of the year.

Warning: this video contains content some viewers may find distressing.

#News #Channel4News #ChristaPike #US #DeathRow #Tennessee

[Asymptote Journal @asymptotejrnl]

"How can a poem that explores a universal aspect of the human condition […] be less comprehensible to a reader in the United States just because it takes place in a country like Serbia?"

Uroš Bojanović and Ajla Dizdarević on resisting exoticism: https://t.co/3tMIOMBKWN

[The New Yorker @NewYorker]

This week in Paris, the temperature soared to 113 degrees Fahrenheit. Hundreds of schools have shut their doors. The Louvre has closed early, as has the Eiffel Tower. Moist towels soothe neck, mist bottles spray short relief, motorized fans are held up to strangers at cafés. Meanwhile, air-conditioning has become the linchpin of an intensifying political debate in the country. “The stereotype is that acclimatization to any weather has been a source of cultural pride,” Doreen St. Félix writes. But a decade of prolonged flashes of extreme heat makes it clear that the stakes may be deadly. As of Friday, dozens have died in the heat wave, including at least 50 people who drowned, mostly while seeking relief in the water. Is air-conditioning an essential protection? St. Félix reports from the recent Paris heat wave: https://t.co/KhGXvR0SLX

[New York Magazine @NYMag]

The photographer Richard Avedon entertained a lot of interest in his home in Montauk, a modest cedar-shingle house sitting on eight acres of land overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. One tech mogul asked if the harbor could accommodate mooring a 100-foot sailboat. Jerry Seinfeld looked at it. Harrison Ford did too, calling ahead before dropping by.

“‘Listen, I am going to land the helicopter on the lawn, and I am breaking some laws, so don’t tell anyone,’” Ford apparently said, according to caretaker Ed Johann, whose wife, Dawn Roman, has overseen the property since 1990. “Dick did not want to sell it to somebody whose first question was ‘If I tear this down, how big of a house can I build?’ ”

In 1998, a North Haven couple, the architect Frederick Stelle and his wife, Bettina, learned of the house after Bettina came across a story Wendy Goodman wrote about it in ‘W’ Magazine. “The images hit me like a lightning bolt,” ­Bettina says. When she and Frederick drove out to meet Avedon, they were greeted in the kitchen by the aroma of “Dick’s coffee cake,” as well as a spread of freshly baked bread, goat cheese from the estate’s goats, eggs from its chickens, and apples from an orchard Avedon had planted.

“I fell even more in love with the magic and mystic spirit of the place,” says Bettina.

Read more about the cliffside Montauk home: https://t.co/7hWQu1M4FD

[Gianni Skaragas @GianniSkaragas]

"At a time when our sense of common humanity sounds so disturbing in the ears of the world’s most powerful men, it’s important to remember that our point of view is the length we can go to claim our own story and shape our destiny."
https://t.co/eY1R4LK4Ho

[Artists for Palestine UK @Art4PalestineUK]

UPDATE: 1,000 programme-makers now condemning censorship and racism after BBC pulls Gaza documentary

“We are extremely alarmed by the intervention of partisan political actors, and what this means for the future of broadcasting in this country.”
https://t.co/HI168hCFz5

[Channel 4 News @Channel4News]

This new footage shows how mice use CPR-like techniques to revive each other.

In a series of experiments, scientists observed them performing mouse-to-mouse resuscitation - pawing at them, licking them and even clearing their airways, using techniques reminiscent of human first-aid.

[Hugh Plante @hugh_plante]

https://t.co/QtoSyCAg4O

[PEN International @pen_int]

In the face of the escalating Israel’s war on Gaza, the voices of Palestinian writers have been deliberately silenced. From today we will share a collection of stories that will honour those killed in Gaza since 7 October 2023, ensuring their stories are told and remembered.

Explore the collection:https://t.co/NPDgKvEbbM

[AJ+ @ajplus]

Listen to the words of this surgeon who broke down in tears at a UN hearing as she recalled what she saw in Gaza.

[AJ+ @ajplus]

"You can pretend that falafel and hummus and zaatar are your ancient cuisines. But in the recesses of your being, you will always feel the sting of this epic forgery."

Palestinian writer and activist Susan Abulhawa delivered this passionate speech at the Oxford Union.

[Paul Williams @freemonotheist]

How the west reports the news

[Casual Geopolitics @Casualgeopol]

This is from 2002…

[Channel 4 News @Channel4News]

“The drones would come down and pick off civilians – children.”
A former NHS surgeon, Nizam Mamode, who spent a month working in Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza, broke down while testifying about children in Gaza being shot by drones.

[Casual Geopolitics @Casualgeopol]

BREAKING: 🇳🇱 AMSTERDAM POLICE CONFIRM ISRAELIS STARTED IT

[United Nations Geneva @UNGeneva]

Human rights expert @FrancescaAlbs: "Time is running out. A genocide and a man-made humanitarian catastrophe are unfolding in front of us and in #Gaza. I regret to see so many member states are avoiding acknowledging the suffering of the Palestinian people & instead look away."

[Double Down News @DoubleDownNews]

The film you won't see on the BBC or CNN @PulaRJS

[CODEPINK @codepink]

🚨 NETFLIX HAS DELETED 19 PALESTINIAN FILMS FROM ITS CATALOG THIS MONTH

After previously launching a "Palestinian Stories" section, only one film from it remains visible on the streaming platform.

[Jewish Voice for Peace @jvplive]

Many of us have parents, grandparents and great-grandparents who survived or perished in Nazi death marches and we have all grown up in the shadow of the Nazi holocaust.

The state of Israel is currently perpetrating a holocaust, the deliberate mass slaughter of Palestinian people, with weapons provided by the US.