Shaun White‘s return to the Winter X Games ended before he could take his first competition run in nearly three years.
White tweaked one of his knees in practice in the week leading up to Sunday night’s snowboard halfpipe event in Aspen, Colo., according to his social media.
“After talking with the medical staff, decided that pushing through would only make things worse,” was posted on White’s Instagram about four hours before the contest. “It’s a difficult decision to make, but just need to give my knee some time to recover and I’ll be back soon.”
White, 34, last competed in snowboarding at the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics, taking his third gold medal. He returned to riding after an aborted attempt to qualify for the Tokyo Olympics in skateboarding.
“Every time it just feels like a new go at it,” White, who next year will be older than any man to compete in an Olympic snowboard halfpipe, said in an X Games video interview last week. “I don’t really, like, let off the gas. You may not see me, but I’m still doing all the things that I need to.”
White’s anticipated return to X Games, his first time at the biggest annual snowboard competition since 2017, was billed as a showdown with Australian Scotty James. James took bronze in PyeongChang and won three of the last four X Games titles.
But Japanese 19-year-old Yuto Totsuka prevailed in Aspen, beating James for a third consecutive head-to-head and stamping himself as the early 2022 Olympic favorite. Totsuka, 11th in PyeongChang as the youngest entrant, ranked first on Sunday based on overall impression instead of any of his four runs being scored.
He had a pair of 1440s in one of his runs, according to commentators.
James took second, followed by another Japanese, Ruka Hirano. Taylor Gold was the top American in fourth. At least one American man made the halfpipe podium at the first 23 editions of the X Games in the U.S., but none have done so the last two years.
Earlier on the last day of competition Sunday, snowboarder Jamie Anderson earned her eighth X Games title, but her first in big air.
Anderson, the two-time Olympic champion and seven-time X Games champion in slopestyle, beat a big air field that included every medalist from the last three X Games, plus every 2018 Olympic medalist, led by Austrian Anna Gasser (who was seventh on Sunday).
Anderson, 30, is already the only female snowboarder with multiple Olympic titles. She said after winning Friday’s slopestyle crown that she thought this might be her last competitive season, but now doesn’t know when she will retire.
Anderson is one Winter X Games medal shy of the record 20 held by Canadian snowboarder Mark McMorris and two golds shy of the female record held by American snowboarder Lindsey Jacobellis.
American men won snowboard slopestyle (Dusty Henricksen) and ski slopestyle (Nick Goepper).
Henricksen, a 17-year-old X Games rookie, became the first U.S. male snowboarder to win an X Games Aspen slopestyle since White in 2009. Previously, his biggest title was the 2020 Youth Winter Olympics.
He beat a field that included Olympic champion Red Gerard (seventh on Sunday). It lacked five-time X Games champ McMorris, who missed X Games for the first time since his 2011 debut due to a positive coronavirus test.
Goepper, an Olympic silver and bronze medalist, earned his fourth X Games ski slopestyle title and first since a three-peat from 2013-15.
What’s next for snowboarders and freeskiers is unclear. The biennial world championships set for China in February were canceled, but could be rescheduled.
The Burton U.S. Open, usually a season-ender in late February or early March for snowboarders, was also canceled due to the pandemic.
President Biden joked around when a reporter asked about his first phone call with Vladimir Putin.
USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — After Joe Biden signed another raft of executive orders Tuesday, a reporter deviated from the day’s theme – racial equity – to ask the president what he talked to Russian President Vladimir Putin about earlier in the day.
“You,” Biden replied with a smile as he walked away from a desk in the White House State Dining Room. “He sends his best.”
The exchange offered a rare off-script moment during the first days of Biden’s administration that have brought rigid scheduling and routine back to the White House after four years of unpredictability under former President Donald Trump.
While Trump was known to keep adversaries, reporters and even allies on edge into the wee hours of the night – all wondering when the next tweet might come and what it might say – Biden has returned the White House to a schedule that resembles banker hours. The new president’s tweets, always on message, are few and far between.
The drumbeat reflects Biden’s push to restore a sense of normalcy in the White House amid turmoil, weeks after the Capitol came under siege by pro-Trump supporters and as the death toll from a raging pandemic surpasses 435,000.
More: Undoing Trump’s policies and other things Biden did his first week as president
But it’s unclear how long Biden can stick to his routine amid rising partisan conflicts in Congress and a slew of monumental challenges. Lawmakers are battling over Trump’s impeachment trial, Biden’s $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill and calls from Democrats to boot far-right Republican members from Congress.
“It will require constant work. Many forces of commerce and human nature are arrayed against him, and countless obstacles stand in his path,” journalist John Dickerson, among those who welcomes “boring” again in the White House, wrote in The Atlantic. “But if the country is lucky, entire days will pass without the president’s activities agitating the public mind.”
40 executive orders, carefully mapped out
The routine is intentional. It’s purpose: Portray Biden as a problem-solving president focused on a convergence of crises, uninterested in not much else.
Biden’s schedule has started with daily presidential intelligence briefings – something Trump famously neglected on occasion – during the 9 a.m. hour. He’s then used most days to tout one of his core priorities – climate change, the federal government’s COVID-19 response, health care and racial equity – before taking executive action on the topic.
Each rollout has been carefully choreographed.
More: Joe Biden rejoins Paris Agreement, requires masks on federal property in swift Day 1 directives
After orders are announced in the morning, aides specialized in the subject matter, including climate change envoy John Kerry and Susan Rice, director of Biden’s Domestic Policy Council, have taken questions from reporters. In the afternoon, Biden has spoken on the latest topic, rarely ad-libbing from prepared remarks on a teleprompter. He has then sat down at a desk to sign a record first week of executive orders and directives – 40 so far with more on tap for next week.
Perhaps the biggest variation has been where he’s signed the orders: the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office some days, an undersized desk in the State Dining Room on others.
By executive pen, he’s rejoined the Paris Agreement on climate, ended Trump’s travel ban from predominantly Muslim countries, canceled the Keystone XL Pipeline’s permit and ended the nation’s withdrawal from the World Health Organization.
The tight ship appears to have given the White House the early narrative it hoped.
“It’s as if for the last four years, the country was left in the hands of an irresponsible teenage babysitter, where the mother and father leave and say, ‘Don’t call boys. Don’t have alcohol,'” said Barbara Perry, director of presidential studies at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center. “And now the parents are back. The father runs the household on a strict schedule with a plan.”
More: Here are all the executive orders President Joe Biden has signed so far
Perry said it feels like a return of the “No-drama Obama years,” a reference to eight years under Biden’s former boss, President Barack Obama. She likened the White House’s discipline thus far to the early days of President Ronald Reagan’s term, as his administration carefully worked to show him addressing a recession.
Biden, too, is trying to send a message, Perry said: “Let’s get the government working again as a well-oiled machine because if we don’t the crises are going to take us out.”
Press briefings, Dr. Fauci return
Continuing an approach that allowed him to stay on message in the campaign, Biden has taken questions from reporters only a handful of times, limiting opportunities for gaffes as he’s been prone to make over the years.
Questions are mostly confined to the return of daily White House press briefings, led by Press Secretary Jen Psaki. The White House also re-launched regular briefings from public health officials including Dr. Anthony Fauci, who was effectively shut out of White House appearances in the waning months of the Trump administration.
In between the president’s brief speeches and signings of orders, Biden has taken calls with foreign leaders of Japan, India, Germany, France and Russia’s Putin. In another shift from Trump, Biden reportedly raised areas of contention with Putin, according to the White House. Those issues include reports of Russia placing bounties on United States soldiers in Afghanistan, interference in the 2020 United States election and the poisoning of Putin opponent Alexei Navalny.
More: After Putin’s initial snub, Biden talks nukes, cyberattack and poisoning with Russian leader
Biden has had “many conversations” with members of Congress, including Republicans, according to Psaki, as he seeks bipartisan passage of his $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill, the American Rescue Act. But she declined to say which members of Congress, nor would she speculate on the location of Biden’s first foreign and domestic trips.
Jay Carney, former press secretary for Obama and for Biden as vice president, credited the fast start on executive action to preparation as Trump contested the election.
“They knew they wanted to come out big early to demonstrate the change that they were bringing and their seriousness and purpose to keep their promises and act on important things early,” he said.
Carney said Biden’s team – which includes several former Obama aides including Biden’s chief of staff Ron Klain – and the president himself have benefited from their experiences confronting a financial crisis in 2009 when Obama entered office.
“It has that feel, but I’d say it’s even better executed and higher volume. They’re doing more,” he said, while admitting the “pace is hard to sustain.”
Republicans say Biden has abandoned inauguration pledge
White House “lids” – the White House term for no more official news for the day – typically come in the late afternoon or early evening. The president held no public events last weekend, nor did he have any on tap for this weekend.
Lacking the unpredictability of the Trump years, even the smallest of disruptions and detours have been magnified. As Biden spoke about his administration’s plans to purchase 200 million more COVID- vaccinations, a log toppled off the fireplace, causing a loud bang.
At another event, Biden’s two German Shepherds were heard barking outside the Oval Office as he signed an executive order lifting Trump’s ban on transgender people serving in the military.
More: Amid calls for unity, President Biden and Republicans don’t agree what that looks like
U.S. Rep. Jim Cooper, D-Tenn., said Biden’s approach is “night and day” from how Trump ran the White House, applauding “the organization, the efficiency, the sincerity” compared to Trump, who he said was “mainly in it for himself.”
“It’s kind of like the old Rolaids commercials. How do you spell relief? B-I-D-E-N,” Cooper said. “The tricky thing will be, it’s not enough to return to normal. Now we have to start making sure we improve on normal because government has not been working well enough for working folks.”
That challenge is trickier because Biden’s central message of “unity” is so far proving elusive. He told Americans in his inaugural speech that “politics doesn’t have to be a raging fire” as he called on both parties to “start afresh.” Not only a push for bipartisanship, it was also an appeal to return to civility and democratic norms.
Biden’s disciplined start is meant to underscore those themes. But Republicans have slammed Biden’s heavy use of executive action on progressive causes, arguing it will do more to divide than unite.
“Mr. President, we all watched your inauguration and took your words about unity and putting yourself in other people’s shoes to heart,” Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and 23 other Republicans senators wrote Friday in a letter to Biden, slamming his orders aimed at the fossil fuel industry.
Arguing that Biden has put “thousands of good-paying jobs at risk,” the senators said his orders have “the potential to further the divide between rural and urban America.”
Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, tweeted Friday: “The Senate is divided 50/50. The House is almost equally divided. President Biden promised he’d work with Republicans. But he’s signed 40 executive orders and actions in nine days.”
Hands-off on impeachment
The White House wants to portray Biden as focused on what it calls four “overlapping and compounding crises” – the COVID-19 pandemic, the resulting economic damage, climate change and lagging racial equity – not engaged in the political fights in Congress.
But the president’s ability to stick to his routine will be tested as those pick up, particularly when Trump’s impeachment trial in the Senate begins the week of Feb. 8.
Biden has taken a hands-off approach with Trump’s impeachment trial, declining to say how senators should vote. He said the Senate can balance its “constitutional responsibilities on impeachment” while addressing “other urgent business of the nation.”
After Biden, in an interview with CNN, predicted that the Senate lacked two-thirds majority to convict Trump, Psaki sought to make clear that he will defer to Senate leadership on the pace of the impeachment.
“And I can promise you that we will leave the vote counting to leaders in the Senate from now on,” she said.
More: As the numbers suggest a Donald Trump acquittal, senators explore censure and brace for impeachment trial
As Biden seeks congressional approval of his signature COVID-19 relief bill, support is mounting among Senate Democrats to pass the legislation via budget reconciliation if they can’t find 60 votes, which would require support from 10 Republican senators. The reconciliation process would need just a simple majority.
Although such a maneuver would open him up to criticism for abandoning his campaign pledge of bipartisanship, Bidden appears open to the idea. The president’s priority is the bill’s approval, according to the White House, not the process.
“I support passing COVID relief with support from Republicans if we can get it,” Biden told reporters Friday when asked whether he supports reconciliation. “But the COVID relief has to pass. There’s no ifs, ands or buts.”
More: $15 minimum wage? Another round of checks? Resistance to key pieces could derail Biden’s COVID-19 relief plan
One area the White House won’t be baited into: the controversy surrounding QAnon sympathizer Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Georgia, who Democrats have increasingly condemned for past incendiary remarks.
Pressed on the matter, Paski said the White House doesn’t have a response to possible disciplinary action for the congresswoman.
“And I’m not going to speak further about her, I think, in this briefing room.” Asked again the next day, Psaki said, “We don’t want to elevate conspiracy theories further in the briefing room.”
Contributing: Associated Press. Reach Joey Garrison on Twitter @joeygarrison.
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Carlos Rodon will return to the Chicago White Sox after the team reached a one-year, $3 million deal with the left-hander, a source told ESPN on Saturday, confirming multiple reports.
Rodon, who was selected by the White Sox with the No. 3 overall pick in the 2014 amateur draft, became a free agent after he was not tendered a contract after the 2020 season.
He broke into the majors in 2015 and looked as if he could be a key member of the team’s rotation for years to come before he was hampered by a series of injuries.
Rodon, 28, is 29-33 with a 4.14 ERA in 97 career major league games, including 92 starts. He made four appearances last season, going 0-2 with an 8.22 ERA.
Her husband Darrell Semien, a sheriff’s deputy for Allen Parish, Louisiana, died on January 24 after being diagnosed with cancer in December, CNN affiliate KPLC reported.
Semien went to Oaklin Springs Cemetery in Oberlin earlier this week to inquire about laying her husband to rest there. But a woman at the cemetery turned her away because her husband was African American.
“I met with the lady out there and she said she could NOT sell me a plot because the cemetery is a WHITES ONLY cemetery,” Semien wrote on Facebook. “She even had paperwork on a clipboard showing me that only white human beings can be buried there. She stood in front of me and all my kids. Wow what a slap in the face.”
CNN has reached out to Semien for comment.
Creig Vizena, president of the Oaklin Springs Cemetery Association, told CNN affiliate KATC that he was ashamed to learn about how the Semien family had been treated. The woman who turned them away was in her 80s and has since been “relieved of her duties,” he told the Washington Post.
CNN was unable to reach Vizena for comment.
Vizena told KPLC that he hadn’t been aware of the language contained in the cemetery’s sales contracts, which date back to the 1950s and included the phrase “the right of burial of the remains of white human beings.” The issue hadn’t come up before, he said.
“I take full responsibility for that,” Vizena told KPLC. “I’ve been the president of this board for several years now. I take full responsibility for not reading the by-laws.”
Board members of the cemetery held an emergency meeting on Thursday to remove the clause from the contract, KPLC reported.
Vizena apologized and said he offered the family one of the plots that he owns so that Darrell Semien could be buried there. But the damage had been done, and they declined.
Segregated cemeteries have a long history in the US, and remnants from those dark chapters persist to this day.
In 2016, the city of Waco, Texas, ordered the removal of a chain-link fence from a public cemetery that was used to separate the White section from the Black section. A similar fence at a cemetery in Mineola, Texas, came down last year.
The ACLU of Louisiana urged the Oaklin Springs Cemetery Association to remove any “Whites only” references from its bylaws, citing the Supreme Court’s 1948 decision in Shelley v. Kraemer that outlawed racial covenants in housing.
“It is unconscionable and unacceptable that the Semien family—or anyone else—should face such blatant racial discrimination, especially during a time of mourning and grief,” the organization wrote in a letter.
“Nothing about this news says we can’t defeat this thing,” the White House Senior Advisor for Covid Response Andy Slavitt told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer. “It just means we need more tools, and we need to be more united in doing it.”
“We’re going to have to stay one step ahead of these mutations,” said Slavitt. “We’re going to need processes to keep developing tests, therapies and vaccines to make sure that as and if the virus mutates a little bit, like the flu does, we’re able to stay ahead of it.”
Experts say they believe current vaccines will still be effective against the variants, but officials are still working to close the gap between the available doses and the number administered to Americans.
“We’re changing the laws to allow more people to vaccinate. We’re sending shipments directly to pharmacies,” Slavitt said. “We are invoking the Defense Production Act and have done so to get more syringes and more other gear available to people. We’re working with states hand in glove every day to find more vaccines.
“There’s not an idea that we won’t consider,” he added.
States work to get over the distribution hurdle
On the state level, leaders have taken different tracks in approaching lags in vaccine distribution and administration.
For example, officials in Connecticut have administered 364,255 total doses — meaning 35% of people 75 and older have been inoculated in the state.
“Connecticut continues to be a leader in getting people vaccinated,” Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont said during his Covid-19 press briefing on Thursday, adding that the promise from the Biden administration to increase state allotment by 16% means more people will be vaccinated faster.
Next week, Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington will become Kentucky’s first regional vaccination site, Gov. Andy Beshear said Thursday. The site will vaccinate 3,000 residents the first week, prioritizing those 70 and older.
But in Ohio, officials will have to change plans because the state wants students back to school in March.
While vaccine supply in the state is limited, Ohio has pulled vaccines from its allocation to set aside around 55,000 for the state’s K-12 school staff every week, Gov. Mike DeWine said.
Meanwhile Idaho is calling for more transparency in how its current distribution plan is going, Gov. Brad Little said.
“Quite frankly, we need a clearer picture to shine more light on vaccine administration,” Little said during a Thursday press conference in Boise.
His new order requires both private healthcare companies and public health districts to tell the state on a weekly basis how many doses it has received, how many doses have been used, and how many doses are still in inventory. The numbers will be posted to the state’s public online Covid-19 dashboard.
Part of the goal is to make sure providers are meeting the state’s goal of having each available dose used within seven days of delivery.
Symptoms can last months, experts say
As the pandemic nears one year in the US, health experts say they are learning more about “long Covid,” a condition in which some patients experience symptoms months after contracting the virus.
“Persons with long Covid often present reporting persistent, severe fatigue, headaches and brain fog, which is defined as mild subjective cognitive and cognitive impairment, approximately four weeks after acute illness,” Dr. Alfonso Hernandez-Romieu, a member of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Covid-19 response team, said during a CDC briefing Thursday.
Doctors have reported that the severity of Covid-19 illness may have little impact on whether patients experience long Covid symptoms, Hernandez-Romieu said. He noted that the CDC is working to better understand long Covid.
Dr. Allison Navis, an assistant professor at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City, said brain fog is one of the most common symptoms. She said doctors have observed these symptoms in younger patients — including children and adolescents — who had mild coronavirus and were previously healthy.
She said patients can benefit from “symptomatic and supportive” treatment, including specific medications, cognitive rehab, increased hydration and limited exercise. She stressed that patients should get enough sleep and look after their mental health.
“While we don’t know what’s causing these symptoms, they’re very real for patients, and we are seeing patients get better,” said Navis.
CNN’s Lauren Mascarenhas, Maggie Fox, Sahar Akbarzai, Rebekah Riess, Andy Rose contributed to this report.
On International Holocaust Remembrance Day, this 92-year-old survivor said it’s a special, but somber occasion for him.
“It’s kind of a celebration and the fact that those of those of us who did survive were able to make a pretty nice life for themselves and continue,” Ben Lesser told CBS News in a Zoom video call on Wednesday.
“But of course, we can’t forget our dear departed ones,” he said.
Wednesday marked 76 years after the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp. Lesser was familiar with the atrocities there.
He said that he survived the work and death camps in Auschwitz-Birkenau and Dachau, Poland, two death marches and the infamous Dachau death train — where dozens of train cars carried the corpses of thousands of prisoners to Dachau near the end of World War II. Lesser is believed to be the last known survivor of the latter.
Ben Lasser seen in a Zoom call with CBS News.
During the attack at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, some rioters were wearing “Camp Auschwitz” sweatshirts and holding up white supremacist signs.
“It gave me a taste of the past when I was a young boy,” he told CBS News, in reflecting on the Capitol assault.
The recent images — combined with years of rising anti-Semitic attacks — doesn’t make Lesser “happy with the current state of events.” However, Lesser, who is the founder of the Zachor Holocaust Remembrance Foundation, has been dedicating his time on helping future generations understand the extent of the Holocaust as a way to combat hate. He often gives talks in Germany and even developed a curriculum for schools.
“I tell the people that education is very important, because only if you’re really knowledgeable, can you realize that we’re all the same,” he said. “They’re all part of humanity. God created all of us. So, why can’t we live side by side and appreciate our differences, rather than hate them?”
“Hitler and the Nazis did not start with killing,” he said. “It all started with hate.”
Anti-Semitism on display in Capitol riot
20:09
A survey unveiled in 2020 showed more than 60% of millennial and Gen Z respondents didn’t know that 6 million Jews were killed during the Holocaust. Even though Lesser acknowledged there may always be anti-Semitism in the U.S., he said his biggest concern is “what’s going to happen after the survivors are gone?”
“Who is going to speak up and teach these children to let them know the future generations that there was a Holocaust and how it happened and how bad it was,” he said.
“When I see that, when most many kids don’t even know what the word Holocaust means, that bothers me,” he said. “And that has to change. So, we’re doing our best to try to change that.”
When black holes swallow down massive amounts of matter from the space around them, they’re not exactly subtle about it. They belch out tremendous flares of X-rays, generated by the material heating to intense temperatures as it’s sucked towards the black hole, so bright we can detect them from Earth.
This is normal black hole behaviour. What isn’t normal is for those X-ray flares to spew forth with clockwork regularity, a puzzling behaviour reported in 2019 from a supermassive black hole at the centre of a galaxy 250 million light-years away. Every nine hours, boom – X-ray flare.
After careful study, astronomer Andrew King of the University of Leicester in the UK identified a potential cause – a dead star that’s endured its brush with a black hole, trapped on a nine-hour, elliptical orbit around it. Every close pass, or periastron, the black hole slurps up more of the star’s material.
“This white dwarf is locked into an elliptical orbit close to the black hole, orbiting every nine hours,” King explained back in April 2020.
“At its closest approach, about 15 times the radius of the black hole’s event horizon, gas is pulled off the star into an accretion disk around the black hole, releasing X-rays, which the two spacecraft are detecting.”
The black hole is the nucleus of a galaxy called GSN 069, and it’s pretty lightweight as far as supermassive black holes go – only 400,000 times the mass of the Sun. Even so, it’s active, surrounded by a hot disc of accretion material, feeding into and growing the black hole.
According to King’s model, this black hole was just hanging out, doing its active accretion thing, when a red giant star – the final evolutionary stages of a Sun-like star – happened to wander a little too close.
The black hole promptly divested the star of its outer layers, speeding its evolution into a white dwarf, the dead core that remains once the star has exhausted its nuclear fuel (white dwarfs shine with residual heat, not the fusion processes of living stars).
But rather than continuing on its journey, the white dwarf was captured in orbit around the black hole, and continued to feed into it.
Based on the magnitude of the X-ray flares, and our understanding of the flares that are produced by black hole mass transfer, and the star’s orbit, King was able to constrain the mass of the star, too. He calculated that the white dwarf is around 0.21 times the mass of the Sun.
While on the lighter end of the scale, that’s a pretty standard mass for a white dwarf. And if we assume the star is a white dwarf, we can also infer – based on our understanding of other white dwarfs and stellar evolution – that the star is rich in helium, having long ago run out of hydrogen.
“It’s remarkable to think that the orbit, mass and composition of a tiny star 250 million light years away could be inferred,” King said.
Based on these parameters, he also predicted that the star’s orbit wobbles slightly, like a spinning top losing speed. This wobble should repeat every two days or so, and we may even be able to detect it, if we observe the system for long enough.
This could be one mechanism whereby black holes grow more and more massive over time. But we’ll need to study more such systems to confirm it, and they may not be easy to detect.
For one, GSN 069’s black hole is lower mass, which means that the star can travel on a closer orbit. To survive a more massive black hole, a star would have to be on a much larger orbit, which means any periodicity in the feeding would be easier to miss. And if the star were to stray too close, the black hole would destroy it.
But the fact that one has been identified offers hope that it’s not the only such system out there.
“In astronomical terms, this event is only visible to our current telescopes for a short time – about 2,000 years, so unless we were extraordinarily lucky to have caught this one, there may be many more that we are missing elsewhere in the Universe,” King said.
As for the star’s future, well, if nothing else is to change, the star will stay right where it is, orbiting the black hole, and continuing to be slowly stripped for billions of years. This will cause it to grow in size and decrease in density – white dwarfs are only a little bigger than Earth – until it’s down to a planetary mass, maybe even eventually turning into a gas giant.
“It will try hard to get away, but there is no escape,” King said. “The black hole will eat it more and more slowly, but never stop.”
The research has been published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
A version of this article was first published in April 2020.
The bulk of the headlines coming out of UFC 257 will center around Dustin Poirier’s upset victory over Conor McGregor (as well they should) but in the co-main event, Michael Chandler did everything he could to steal the show. And though he might not have quite pulled it off, Chandler did impress his new boss, Dana White.
The former three-time Bellator lightweight champion signed with the UFC last year and made his promotional debut to much fanfare against Dan Hooker on Saturday. Going into the fight, much was made of the jump in competition between Bellator and the UFC and even Chandler himself called Hooker one of his toughest matchups in the organization, one he took because Hooker was the only top guy who would even agree to fight him. But when the cage door closed on Saturday, Chandler made quick work of Hooker, knocking him out halfway through the first round. Afterwards, Chandler jumped on the microphone and cut a promo on the two main event fighters and current lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov. It was an all-around sensational debut and one that got Dana White’s attention.
“When guys come into the UFC for the first time, they usually have a rough first time on the big stage,” White said at the post-fight press conference. “He didn’t. He came out and it almost seemed like Hooker froze in that first round. Chandler was just all over him and put on an incredible performance. Listen, man, when you get the platform we had tonight, you make the most of it, and that kid did. Some people did tonight and some didn’t.”
So impressive was Chandler’s debut that immediately afterwards the MMA community began questioning if it was the most impressive one in UFC history and when asked the question, White struggled to think of one better.
“That kid fought like he’s been here for years,” White said. “So yeah, off the top of my head I can’t remember a better one.”
Whether or not it’s the best debut ever is a matter of opinion but Chandler has certainly put himself in the conversation with guys like Anderson Silva, Junior dos Santos, Ronda rousey, and Joe Lauzon. It wasn’t, however, perfect. At least not to White.
Following his victory, Chandler climbed to the top of the cage and performed a backflip off of it, nearly missing his landing and stumbling across the cage.
It was a celebration that White lamented when discussing Chandler’s debut.
“Do you guys hate the backflips as much as I hate the backflips?” White asked, unprompted. “They just f*cking — the kid gets his fight in the UFC and then does a backflip that looks like it’s gonna blow out both f*cking ankles, knees, and his spine. I just, I don’t get the backflip thing and I don’t like it. Somebody’s gonna get f*cking hurt doing that.”
Fortunately, Chandler did not injure himself and now will look to build off the momentum of his sensational debut, either with a title shot or another big fight. Now that he has a top-10 win inside the UFC, there will be no shortage of options.
Results. Dustin Poirier and Michael Chandler scored big knockouts at UFC 257.
Leg kicks. Conor McGregor’s leg ‘completely dead’, ‘like an American football’ after Dustin Poirier’s kicks at UFC 257.
Guarantee. After UFC 257 triumph, Dustin Poirier guarantees ‘I won’t be fighting Michael Chandler’ next.
Fire meme. Dana White downplays UFC 257 live streaming issues, calls event ‘a really good night’.
Schadenfreude. Khabib Nurmagomedov reacts to Conor McGregor’s knockout loss to Dustin Poirier at UFC 257.
Beef. Conor McGregor fires back at Khabib Nurmagomedov over ‘disrespectful comments’ made after UFC 257.
Next. Dana White on Conor McGregor’s future after knockout loss: ‘There’s two ways this goes … hungrier, or I’m done’.
UFC 257 Post Show.
UFC 257 Post-Fight Press Conference.
Backstage with Poirier post fight.
BJJ Scout drops a breakdown.
Road to Knucklemania.
On to the Next One. Matchmaking for the UFC following UFC 257.
Rani Yahya (26-10-1, 1 NC) vs. Ray Rodriguez (16-7); UFC Fight Night, Mar. 13.
Demetrious Johnson (30-3-1) vs. Adriano Moraes (18-3); ONE Championship, April 7.
Eddie Alvarez (30-7, 1 NC) vs. Iuri Lapicus (14-1); ONE Championship, April 7.
There is not a person in MMA who deserved that more than Dustin Poirier. One of the really good guys in the sport and that was a great win. Shame it wasn’t for the belt.
Thanks for reading and see y’all tomorrow.
Poll
Who should Dustin Poirier fight for the lightweight title?
76%
Oliveira
(218 votes)
6%
Gaethje
(18 votes)
12%
Chandler
(35 votes)
4%
Other
(13 votes)
284 votes total
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There is a lot riding on Conor McGregor’s main event clash with Dustin Poirier later tonight (Sat., Jan. 23, 2021) at UFC 257 live on ESPN+ PPV from inside Etihad Arena on Fight Island in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. Not only is this a rematch six years in the making but the outcome of the PPV headliner could map out the lightweight division moving forward.
McGregor, who is making his return to 155 pounds for the first time since losing to current UFC champion Khabib Nurmagomedov back in 2018, is hoping to use a win over “Diamond” to put himself in line for another title shot this year. With Khabib on the fence with retirement the promotion would love the idea of “Notorious” taking control in the lightweight division and actually trying to create a title reign unlike he did at featherweight.
However, McGregor isn’t guaranteed to win this weekend against Poirier. And with Khabib’s future in doubt it has cast a shadow over the lightweight division for the time being. The Irishman is close to a 3-1 favorite for his rematch with “Diamond,” but Poirier is a different fighter than the first time they fought and is looking to lock down his own title shot in 2021.
With the stakes growing and UFC 257 sure to attract millions of PPV buyers, McGregor’s need for a win may be at an all-time high. UFC president Dana White recently sat down with TMZ Sports to discuss the possibility of McGregor losing to Poirier at UFC 257 and what that might mean for the stacked lightweight division.
“People lose, man,” said White. “It happens. It’s part of the sport. Nothing happens. If he loses he goes back to the drawing board and comes back and fights another day.”
If McGregor happens to lose this weekend at UFC 257 it could mean the end of a potential rematch with Khabib. “Notorious” has been angling for another shot at the Russian champ ever since Khabib submitted McGregor back at UFC 229.
“I’m sure Poirier would like a rematch with Khabib, too,” said White. “Think about it. Charles Oliveira just came off an incredible win over Tony Ferguson, right? You got Poirier and McGregor fighting on Saturday and the co-main event is No. 6-ranked Dan Hooker versus Michael Chandler, who is making his debut in the UFC. This guy has been fighting everywhere outside of the UFC and is one of the all-time greats in the division. He wants to prove himself now here in the UFC. So anyone of these guys can end up fighting Khabib.”
What do you think, fight fans? How does the lightweight title scene play out if McGregor loses to Poirier at UFC 257?
Sound off!
MMAmania.com will deliver LIVE round-by-round, blow-by-blow coverage of the entire UFC 257 fight card RIGHT HERE, starting with the early ESPN+ “Prelims” matches online, which are scheduled to begin at 7:00 p.m. ET, then the remaining undercard balance on ESPN+ and ESPN at 8 p.m. ET, before the PPV main card start time at 10 p.m. ET on ESPN+.
Overheated, confusing and laden in the end with blatant racism, the case of the White House bust of Winston Churchill still persists.
An Oval Office redesign brought in new busts instead: Latino civil rights leader Cesar Chavez, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., Robert F. Kennedy, Rosa Parks and Eleanor Roosevelt.
In another era, the same decision caused outcry. American conservatives and even some British politicians declared it a major snub.
Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor, said it was because President Barack Obama “probably grew up hearing that the British were a bunch of imperialists who persecuted his grandfather.”
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, claimed the decoration decision “foreshadowed everything that was to come the next six years.”
Boris Johnson, who was then mayor of London and is now prime minister, went furthest. He blamed the swap on the “part-Kenyan President’s ancestral dislike of the British empire.”
The attacks were blatantly racist and also misleading. Obama officials were infuriated.
There are actually two identical Churchill busts, both by the British modernist sculptor Sir Jacob Epstein. One has been in the White House collection since Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration. Another was lent by Prime Minister Tony Blair to the George W. Bush White House when the other one was being restored.
The one from Blair sat on display in the Oval Office until Bush departed. It was returned to the British government.
Under Obama, the White House-owned version was not displayed in the Oval Office; instead, Obama kept it outside the Treaty Room in the Residence, where he walked past it when he wanted to watch basketball on the weekends and evenings. He chose to put it there so he would see it during his personal time. He had a bust of King in the office.
He addressed the situation during his final year in office.
“I love the guy,” he said during a visit to London, adding later: “There are only so many tables where you can put busts. Otherwise, it starts looking a little cluttered.”
When Trump arrived, he returned Churchill to the Oval Office, much to the (proclaimed) pleasure of the Brits. Then-Prime Minister Theresa May, who was Trump’s first foreign visitor to the Oval Office, came armed with the UK version of the bust to present to Trump. Officials said the Trump team had requested it.
“We were very pleased that you accepted it back,” May told him.
Now, the bust is gone again. But Johnson, who is now Prime Minister and is hoping to cement strong ties with the new administration, does not appear to have the same reaction.
“The Oval Office is the President’s private office, and it’s up to the President to decorate it as he wishes,” a Downing Street spokesman said on Thursday. “We’re in no doubt about the importance President Biden places on the UK-US relationship, and the Prime Minister looks forward to having that close relationship with him.”
