Nominee...

Pete Buttigieg, the 37-year-old, two-term Democratic mayor of South Bend, Indiana, who could make history as the nation's first openly gay presidential nominee of a major party, took a significant step toward a run for the White House, announcing he is forming a presidential exploratory committee, the precursor to an official campaign. 

But despite the history that his candidacy could make, Buttigieg says the 2020 race should not solely be about candidate identities. 

Support...

Three Michigan residents were arrested  for conspiring to support ISIS, federal authorities said. 
All three men are naturalized U.S. citizens who were born in Kenya and currently reside in Lansing, Michigan.  

The family first came to the attention of the FBI in April 2016 when a review of Mohamud Abdikadir Muse's public Facebook page "revealed frequent posts of photos, videos, and statements and commentary that were pro-ISIS in nature and what can be described as violent, extremist propaganda," the complaint states.

An undercover FBI employee posing as an ISIS recruiter began communicating with the former Nebraska resident via Facebook in June 2017.  Muse said he wanted to join the terrorist group, was saving his money to travel to Syria and that he "planned to die with a gun in his hand fighting for ISIS." 

Let us hope to tie the Immigration status with the prosecution.

Collective...

Collective responsibility refers to responsibilities of organizations, groups and societies. By which individuals who are part of such collectives to be responsible for other people's actions and occurrences.

Collective responsibility is widely applied in corporations, where the entire workforce is held responsible for failure to achieve corporate targets, irrespective of the performance of individuals or teams which may have achieved or overachieved within their area.

Collective punishment actually further harm the prospect of achieving organization goals and targets. In addition it violates the individual workers' rights, creat low moral, and clearly shows lack of qualified managers.

Bias...

Age bias can be subtle, or it can show up in more overt behaviors such as hiring discrimination.

New research shows that age bias doesn't affect men and women equally. In fact, older men face harsher discrimination than older women. 

The stereotypical version of worker past retirement age, sowing discord among younger employees who covet the senior position  is usually male.

This "intersectional escape," the phenomenon by which older women seem to escape age-based penalties, is actually rooted in sexism.

Younger employee view older, dominant women as maternal or caring, even if they behave in an assertive way. But these same employees instead see older men as overly aggressive and hostile to younger workers' success. Just a thought.

Border...

House Democratic leaders are drafting a letter to President Donald Trump that would propose $5 billion in border security if he agrees to reopen the government, but Trump warned  that the partial government shutdown could drag on for a while.

The Democrats' proposal does not include money for any “new structures” along the southern border as the president demanded, so it is unlikely to move as is. It is still significant because it's the first time Democratic leaders will broadly lay out what they might accept in a compromise to end the government shutdown, which is in its 33rd day.

“It’s a starting point. You know, I think we all want border security. There is no question about it," said Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee. "It’s just that some of the things that are being pursued in the name of border security we disagree with.”

Dominated...

Dumped...

A study published in the Journal of Neuroscience to the brains of 40 “socially rejected” volunteers, people who’d gotten dumped in the last six months. They were asked to bring two photos to the brain-imaging lab: one of an ex, another of a friend. 

The participants looked at these photos while a temperature-controlled device applied pressure to their arms. While their brains were being scanned, the participants were asked to rate the amount of pain they felt.

Researchers found that the parts of the brain that light up when a person is in physical pain are similar to the parts of the brain that feel emotional pain. Put simply, heartbreak hurts.

So researchers put a twist on the experiment, offering half of heartbroken souls a nasal spray that they told the participants was a “powerful analgesic effective in reducing emotional pain.” The other half were told the truth. 

That white lie might have seemed like magical thinking, but it worked: Not only did the “magical spray” participants feel less physical and emotional pain, the neural activity in areas linked to controlling emotion spiked, with areas connected to feeling rejected simmered down.

The power of expectations in shaping your future, no matter how difficult it is, can be powerful for helping to deal with a breakup, more so when it’s bad.

Equality...

The End...

Speaking at an event commemorating Martin Luther King Day, Ocasio-Cortez asserted that climate change constituted "our World War II" and added: “Millennials and people, you know, Gen Z and all these folks that will come after us are looking up and we’re like: ‘The world is gonna end in 12 years if we don’t address climate change and your biggest issue is, how are we gonna pay for it?'"

A United Nations report on climate change warned late last year that the world will face several consequences from climate change – extreme drought, food shortages and deadly flooding – unless there’s an “unprecedented” effort made to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.  Just a "bad" thought.

Economy...