Alfonso Portela, abogado y consultor electoral, explicó en 10AM en qué consiste esta figura y cuáles son sus alcances dentro de la colectividad

I made a fused glass house number to post on a rock at the top of our driveway. I'm not super-satisfied with how it came out (so far?). I'd like opinions and advice on the three options I have from here.

Here's how it looks now. It's very roughly 10"x10".

If you're aesthetically picky, I'd love your honest opinion. Am I having house number dysphoria? Or am I right that the blobbiness makes it look too amateurish? The studio owner says it's already beautiful, and no one will notice the lumps when they're at viewing distance from the rock. Is she right and my perfectionism is just getting in my way? Or is it really as amateurish as it looks to me?

The top part of the 6 is nice and smooth, just how I wanted it. The rest isn't, and it's not going to get there at the studio where I made it. The studio owner has already fired it twice, with some work in between to smooth the edges. My amateur opinion is that it needs to be fired hotter for longer, but her professional practice is that she's not going to do that. So I have three options:
1. Pick it up and install it as-is.
2. Grind out some of the worst lumps on the edges, and have her fire it again to polish the ground edges. She will NOT be happy to do this, so I'd have to insist. She won't like it, and I won't like doing it (but also, I'm not planning to go back after this). I don't know if it'd end up enough better to be worth it. The surface will still be lumpy -- it's only some of the edges I could grind down a bit. I outlined those in pink on the second image, but I'm not sure if I even could fix all of them. The grinder might not fit inside the circle of the 6, or in the narrow space between the 2 and the 6.
3. Start over at another studio. I found one where I'm confident I could get the result I'd like. She spent time with me on the phone, shared lots of expertise, and suggested a different process (cutting a mold from 6mm fiber paper).

I'm not feeling psyched to start from scratch, but I'm also not sure whether this looks good enough to use as-is, or even with the grinding I could do. I do like the colors, and I'm not sure what color range the other studio will have in the scrap bins I'd be using. The other studio is a long drive away, and I'd have to make 2-3 trips. I'd have to spend more money to start over, and I've already spent what's verging on a silly amount for house numbers.

So I don't know: use it as-is, grind what I can, or bite the bullet and start over?

It's tricky, because I'm a newbie and the studio owner where I went is an experienced pro, but I think she's wrong about some of what she's telling me. Those details are collapsed

[here, but skippable.]

She says the lumpiness is because I used different thicknesses of glass. I did, but I think it should still melt smooth if held hot enough for long enough. The plan we'd discussed ahead of time was to just let it melt and puddle out unevenly, and then cut out the right shape with her ring saw, but now she doesn't want to do that. She says it already has spots that are devitrifying. It does, but my understanding is that we can address that with clear frit powder on top. She says it risks being more brittle each time we fire it, but I heard that bullseye glass was tested to five firings at 1500 degrees each -- which I think she's probably not even hitting.

En Familia conversamos con Belkys Arizala, Fabiola Posada y Samuel Mariño, quienes nos contaron cómo hicieron de su diferencia una gran ventaja en la vida.

Mauricio Olivera, expresidente de Colpensiones, habla con 6AM de Caracol Radio sobre la decisión de cotización de la Corte Constitucional sobre disminución de semanas cotizadas exigidas.

La decisión de Luis Gilberto Murillo de asegurar que no se firmará el contrato con Thomas Greg por situaciones que considera irregulares, tiene que ver con la radicación de un derecho de petición por parte de la UT.

El abogado Francisco Bernate, los expresidentes de la Corte Suprema Jaime Arrubla y Jaime Araujo, y la exfical Vivian Morales explicaron en 6AM los escenarios que se pueden presentar tras la renuncia de la ternada

En 6AM Hoy por Hoy, Alfredo Beltrán. Doctor en Derecho, cuestiona la precisión de la propuesta de Asamblea Constituyente en la ley de convocatoria, propuesta por el presidente Petro.

Héctor Palacios, mandatario del municipio antioqueño, se refirió a la mención del sumo pontífice a los hechos ocurridos en zona rural de esta localidad en el que se presentó el asesinato de una joven y un niño  14 años 

En Caracol Radio estuvo el alcalde Carlos Fernando Galán detallando los motivos por los que el Distrito no aplicará la medida del día cívico

Pablo Morán. jefe internacional de la Cadena Ser, explicó en 6AM las consecuencias que tiene la decisión del primer mandatario para mantenerse en el Gobierno

En Caracol Radio estuvo José Ismael Peña, rector Universidad Nacional

Gabriela Valentín, abogada de Earth-Rights International, explicó a 6AM cuáles son las consecuencias reales ante la decisión del tribunal de EEUU de declarar culpable a la empresa estadounidense por sus nexos con el paramilitarismo.

En Caracol Radio estuvo Nelson Menjura, abogado de Salvatore Mancuso, explicando la situación del exparamilitar en términos de justicia

A pesar de todos los desacuerdos, el gobierno decidió incrementar el precio del diésel.

En 6AM Hoy por Hoy de Caracol Radio estuvo Juan Alberto Londoño, exministro de Hacienda, para hablar sobre qué podría venir si el presidente Gustavo Petro sigue en pie con el monto del presupuesto que desea para 2025.

Armando Novoa, jefe del equipo negociador del Gobierno nacional con la Segunda Marquetalia de ‘Iván Márquez’, estuvo en 6AM para abordar las especulaciones sobre la muerte del guerrillero disidente.

Francisco de Roux se refirió en 6AM a los señalamientos de un padre de familia, quien lo acusa de presunto encubrimiento en un caso de abuso en la iglesia en la década de 1970.

Top local amateur boxer Adrian Roach paid a visit to Francis Patton Primary School to deliver an inspirational talk to students last Friday [May 17]. The 22-year-old said he spoke about his journey in the sport and the positive impact it has had on his life. He also demonstrated some of his skills on a […]

“We cannot direct the wind, but we can adjust the sails,” Dolly Parton once said. In the face of uncertainty and disruption, all we can do is adapt. This rings especially true for the logistics industry, which has been subject to major disruption over the last five years. Here, Dave Walsha, sales and marketing director at drive system supplier EMS, explores how robotics could streamline internal logistics operations.

The Supreme Court's decision on Thursday requiring sentencing factors to be proved beyond a reasonable doubt will create a surge in challenged sentences.

In 2020, pivotal events ushered in a season of antiracism rhetoric in the U.S. The brutal deaths of unarmed black Americans at the hands of police officers and white vigilantes, and the disproportionately harsh impact of COVID-19 in the black American community, launched the nation into a discussion about systemic racism. Unfortunately, it seems likely that the 2020 antiracism discourse was merely seasonal rather than enduring, and unlikely to result in meaningful change. 

Black American’s vulnerability in the face of systemic racism is not limited to death, sickness and injury as a result of COVID-19 or antiblack bias in police departments. Our vulnerability is precipitated by things like lack of access to nonpredatory financial services. This is just one of the contexts that compromise black Americans’ economic survival. Unacknowledged systemic racism destroys the wealth and wellbeing of black individuals, families and communities, sometimes causing working and middle-class black Americans to plummet into poverty. As 2020 comes to a close, an election that threatened democracy in the U.S. and the existential threats of an uncontrolled pandemic, eclipse a system of intentional antiblack racism on the part of the financial institutions that engaged in predatory mortgage lending in the years leading up to and beyond the 2008 recession. It is now well documented that lenders, brokers, and mortgage servicers engaged in conduct that was fraudulent and misleading. The mortgage market charged excessively high rates and fees, engaged in high-pressure sales tactics, imposed unnecessarily harsh prepayment penalties, and distorted loan structures to avoid the application of consumer protection statutes.  But, more than a decade later, many black Americans are still fighting to prevent financial institutions from taking away their homes. 

In a book I coauthored with Dr. Janis Sarra, a law professor at the University of British Columbia, Predatory Lending and the Destruction of the African American Dream (Cambridge University Press, 2020), we describe new iterations of predation that continue to target black consumers years after financial institutions settled litigation that alleged pervasive fraud on their part for steering black Americans into predatory subprime loans. But these renovated predatory practices are obscured by the nation’s focus on COVID-19 and a vitriolic election season. Meanwhile, more black Americans will lose their homes even after investing all or most of their wealth in attempts to keep them. This reality requires the calls for moratoriums on mortgage foreclosures to be answered in the affirmative.

No campaign promise will impose more mass oppression than the zero due process mass round-ups that Donald Trump touts at every rally. 

 

No President nor nominee in US history so openly and brazenly pursued a fascist dictatorship like Donald Trump does today. In fact, many of Trump's own handpicked senior advisers from his first term as President issue urgent warnings today about Trump's drive to dictatorship. For example:

1)    TRUMP'S LONGEST SERVING CHIEF OF STAFF MARINE GENERAL JOHN KELLY

John Kelly enlisted in the Marine Corps in 1970, and was discharged as a sergeant in 1972. Following college graduation in 1976, he returned to the Marines as an infantry officer. Kelly rose to Brigadier General and served in Iraq for the better part of 2 years. Kelly deployed again to Iraq in 2008 after promotion to Major General. Ultimately, in his last military post, from 2012 to 2016 he served as a four-star general leading the United States Southern Command, the unified combatant command responsible for American military operations in Central America, South America, and the Caribbean.

President Trump appointed Kelly the Secretary of Homeland Security in 2017. Trump promoted Kelly to Chief of Staff on July 31, 2017. At the time, Trump called Kelly a "great American" who has "done a spectacular job at Homeland Security" and "been a true star of my administration."

The New York Times published an interview with Kelly, on Oct. 22, 2024, available here. According to General Kelly: “Certainly the former president is in the far-right area, he’s certainly an authoritarian, admires people who are dictators — he has said that. So he certainly falls into the general definition of fascist. . . . He certainly prefers the dictator approach to government.” Further, the General said that "a very big surprise for him was that we were — those of us who were former generals and certainly people still on active duty — that the commitment, the loyalty was to the Constitution, without question, without second thought. That was a big surprise to him that the generals were not loyal to the boss, in this case him.” Trump apparently failed middle school history.

2)      TRUMP'S HANDPICKED CHAIR OF THE JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF MARK MILLEY

Four star General Mark Milley became the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on September 30, 2019, and served as the nation's highest ranking military officer for four years until September of 2023.  Milley first became a commissioned officer in 1980 after graduating from Princeton University. As chairman, General Milley acted as the principal military advisor to the President of the United States, the Secretary of Defense, the National Security Council and the Homeland Security Council.

When Milley took his oath as Chair, Donald Trump said of his appointee: "In his new role as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Milley will serve as my top military advisor. I have absolute confidence that he will fulfill his duty with the same brilliance and fortitude he has shown throughout his long and very distinguished career."

Today the retired General says of Trump: “He is the most dangerous person ever. [N]ow I realize he’s a total fascist. He is now the most dangerous person to this country, a fascist to the core.” In his retirement speech Milley stated: "“We don’t take an oath to a king, or queen, or tyrant or a dictator, and we don’t take an oath to a wannabe dictator. We don’t take an oath to an individual. We take an oath to the Constitution, and we take an oath to the idea that is America, and we’re willing to die to protect it.”

3)    13 FORMER TRUMP OFFICIALS IN SUPPORT OF THE GENERALS

In the wake of comments from General Kelly (and fully consistent with the comments of General Milley), 13 Trump appointees wrote a letter of support stating:

Donald Trump's disdain for the American military and admiration for dictators like Hitler is rooted in his desire for absolute, unchecked power. This is a man who threw his own Vice President – Mike Pence – at a violent mob in a desperate bid to hold on to power. When Donald Trump says he wants to be a "dictator" on "day one" and deploy the military against American citizens he deems “the enemy from within"--he means it. . . . We did not take the decision to come forward lightly. We are all lifelong Republicans who served our country. However, there are moments in history where it becomes necessary to put country over party. This is one of those moments.

All of these Trump Administration appointees, including many serving in senior positions, worked day-to-day with Trump and witnessed first hand how he governs and how he seeks to accumulate dictatorial powers.

4)     FORMER SECRETARY OF DEFENSE JAMES MATTIS

Four star Marine General James Mattis served as Trump's first handpicked Secretary of Defense, from Trump's inauguration through early 2019. Mattis previously served as a Marine officer starting in 1971, and saw combat in Operation Dessert Storm, Afghanistan and the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

General Mattis posits that Donald Trump is unfit because he places himself above the Constitution. More specifically, Mattis issued a statement after the J6 insurrection that said:

Today’s violent assault on our Capitol, an effort to subjugate American democracy by mob rule, was fomented by Mr. Trump. His use of the Presidency to destroy trust in our election and to poison our respect for fellow citizens has been enabled by pseudo political leaders whose names will live in infamy as profiles in cowardice. Our Constitution and our Republic will overcome this stain and We the People will come together again in our never-ending effort to form a more perfect Union, while Mr. Trump will deservedly be left a man without a country.

Mattis previously levelled serious objections to Trump's fitness as President due to his misconduct in the summer of 2020, in the wake of protests triggered by the police murder of George Floyd. He stated:

Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people—does not even pretend to try. Instead, he tries to divide us. We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort. We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership. 

5)    FORMER SECRETARY OF DEFENSE MARK ESPER 

After graduating from West Point, Mark Esper joined the United States Army and served during the 1990-91 Gulf War as an officer with the 101st Airborne Division. Former President Trump appointed him as the Secretary of Defense and he assumed office on July 19, 2019.

When asked about the former Generals assertions that Trump seeks to impose a dictatorship Esper stated: "It's hard to say that he doesn't. . . .he certainly has those inclinations. And I think it's something we should be wary about." Esper suggests voters look up the term "fascism" and determine on their own if Trump fits the bill. He also praised the Generals for raising the issue and gave them high marks for integrity and honesty.

The Esper interview with CNN is available here.

6)   FORMER VICE PRESIDENT PENCE

In an extraordinary development, Vice President Mike Pence refuses to endorse Donald Trump for President in election 2024. Pence stated that Trump should never sit in the Oval Office again because Trump put himself and his hold on power above the Constitution. The video above explains his position best.

CONCLUSION

The 18 patriots quoted above all say in unison that Donald Trump cannot rule our country again because he cannot adhere to the Constitution. Instead he will seek extra-Constitutional power and try to rule as a dictator. Trump himself promises to rule as a dictator on Day 1. These warnings come from life-long conservatives and from Trump's hand picked officials at the most senior levels of the Trump Administration. They saw Trump at work in the Oval Office daily--they know much more than us. They risk their lives and the lives of their family. We must heed these unprecedented warnings and take Trump at his word. The Constitution today demands that we all follow the distinguished leaders above and act courageously to protect our Great Constitutional Republic. History will judge us on this most important issue. We must not elect a dictator who promises to "terminate" the Constitution for power.

Republican is inaugurating a new era in US politics and perhaps for the world as a whole

When the Soviets called their enemies “fascists,” they turned the word into a meaningless insult. Putinist Russia has preserved the habit: a “fascist” is anyone who opposes the wishes of a Russian dictator. So Ukrainians defending their country from Russian invaders are “fascists.” This is a trick that Trump has copied. He, like Vladimir Putin, refers to his enemies as “fascists,” with no ideological significance at all. It is simply a term of opprobrium. Putin and Trump are both, in fact, fascists. And their use of the word, though meant to confuse, reminds us of one of fascism’s essential characteristics. A fascist is unconcerned with the connection between words and meanings. He does not serve the language; the language serves him. When a fascist calls a liberal a “fascist,” the term begins to work in a different way, as the servant of a particular person, rather than as a bearer of meaning

[Opinion column written by Glenn Fubler] The recent passing of Canon James Francis, marks a milestone of a ‘Life Well Lived’. He grew up in the A.M.E. Church in Bermuda and in the 1961 went off to Wilberforce University – an AME school in Ohio– to pursue a degree in Divinity. When he graduated, he […]

Acclaimed singer-songwriter-pianist Neal Francis returns today with his dance-ready new single, 'Back It Up,'

Several Colorado cities have been "zoom-bombed" by people making offensive remarks from afar while shrouded in anonymity.

"Donald Trump is not a politician who guards his words carefully to avoid offending anyone. But we don't need a politician now." -- Angie Many, Eckert

It's not that people admire Trump, most don’t. He won because a majority of Americans don’t trust the Democrats.

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Vice Chancellor Nefertiti Walker says she's investigating.

The Boogaloo Bois member fired shots at a police station.

The contractor says the company ignored racist behavior.

Who's it going to be, MJ?

Beau surprises Mary Jane with a life-changing request.

The 1996 champion understands the pressure.

The slur was heard during a broadcast of the game.

The game had to be ended early.

An email containing a racist trope had already leaked.