Federal Aviation Administration chief Mike Whitaker said his agency is partly responsible for the safety problems at Boeing, admitting that it had been “too hands off” in its oversight of the troubled aircraft manufacturer. In testimony Thursday before the Senate Commerce Committee, Whitaker said that his agency now had far more inspectors on the ground at Boeing factories and the factory of its primary supplier, Spirit AeroSystems. He said it will continue to push Boeing to improve its...

U.S. Capitol Police at last night’s Congressional Baseball Game didn’t take any chances, security-wise, when climate activists stormed the field. Within 60 seconds of rushing the field, the perps were lying facedown in the dirt. Eight Climate Defiance activists were arrested, and though none were injured, the group posted on social media, “We were brutalized tonight — beaten and bruised as we took over the Congressional Baseball Game. Our bodies are bloodied but our spirits are unmoved...

A record-breaking 120 million people have been forced to flee their homes by war, violence and persecution – the 12th year in a row the number has increased, the UN refugee agency said. The global displaced population is now equivalent to that of Japan, the agency said. New conflicts in Sudan and Gaza contributed to the rise, which the UN refugee agency chief Filippo Grandi called a “terrible indictment on the state of the world”.

A record-high 32% of U.S. voters say they will only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion, according to a new Gallup poll released Thursday. The result is up 4 points since the question was surveyed last year and 8 points since 2020, according to Gallup. That surge is attributed to abortion-backing voters in the aftermath of the Supreme Court's 2022 Dobbs ruling that struck down Roe v. Wade, according to the survey.

By 1973, the Bee Gees’ career had hit a low. After a series of hits in the late 1960s and early 1970s, including "To Love Somebody," "How Can You Mend a Broken Heart," and "I Started a Joke," the band was in a rut. Their latest album, “Life in a Tin Can,” and single “Saw a New Morning" sold poorly, and the band’s popularity declined. On April 6, 1973, the Gibb brothers (Barry, Robin and Maurice) appeared on “The Midnight Special,” a late-night TV show that aired on Saturday mornings at 1 a.m. after “The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.” Given the lukewarm reception to their recent releases, the Bee Gees decided to change things up and play a medley of hits from their idols, The Beatles, who had broken up 3 years before. The performance, which featured 5 of the Fab Four’s early hits, including “If I Fell,” “I Need You,” “I'll Be Back,” “This Boy,” and “She Loves You,” was a stripped-down, acoustic performance that highlighted the Bee Gees' trademark harmonies. “When you got brothers singing, it’s like an instrument that no one else can buy. You can’t go buy that sound in a shop. You can’t sing like The Bee Gees because when you got family members singing together, it’s unique,” Noel Galagher, who sang with his brother Liam in Oasis, said according to Far Out.Beatles Medley - Bee Gees | The Midnight SpecialA year later, the Bee Gees performed in small clubs, and it looked like their career had hit a dead end. Then, at the urging of their management, the band began to move in a new direction, incorporating soul, rhythm and blues, and a new, underground musical style called disco into their repertoire. Barry also adopted a falsetto singing style popularized by Black singers such as Curtis Mayfield and Marvin Gaye.This unlikely change for the folksy vocal group catapulted them into the stratosphere and they became the white-satin-clad kings of disco.In the late ‘70s, the band had massive hits, including songs featured on the 40-million-selling “Saturday Night Fever” soundtrack: “Stayin’ Alive,” How Deep is Your Love,” More Than a Woman,” Jive Talkin’,” and “Night Fever.”In 1978, the band made a significant misstep, starring in a musical based on The Beatles' music called “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” produced by Robert Stigwood, the man behind “Saturday Night Fever” and “Grease.” The film was a colossal bomb, although the soundtrack sold well.Beatle George Harrison thought the Bee Gees film was about what happens when you become successful and greedy."I just feel sorry for Robert Stigwood, the Bee Gees, and Pete Frampton for doing it because they had established themselves in their own right as decent artists,” Harrison said. "And suddenly… it's like the classic thing of greed. The more you make the more you want to make, until you become so greedy that ultimately you put a foot wrong."Even though the Bee Gees’ Beatle-themed musical was a flop, former Beatle John Lennon remained a fan of the group. He sang their praises after the public’s growing distaste of disco resulted in a significant backlash."Try to tell the kids in the seventies who were screaming to the Bee Gees that their music was just the Beatles redone,” he told Playboy magazine in 1980. “There is nothing wrong with the Bee Gees. They do a damn good job. There was nothing else going on then."The Bee Gees historic career ended when Marice passed away in 2003 at 53. Robin would follow in 2009 at 62. Barry is the final surviving member of the band.

Sometimes there is just no pleasing people. It seems like no matter what you do short of become a literal unicorn that hands out bags of money, some people will find a way to fault you. This sort of disgruntled behavior is generally experienced by people in the service industry, particularly retail. But it turns out medical staff are not above reproach when it comes to the hard to please customer. Dr. Mark Lewis, a gastrointestinal oncologist went viral recently for a review of his services he shared on X went viral. The review is glowing...sort of. It simply reads "Dr Lewis saved my life," complete with an exclamation point to drive home their excitement. But the amazing news was attached to a four star review.One would think saving someone's life would generate a five star review moment, but perhaps Dr. Lewis missed something while caring for the patient. Did the doctor remember to offer a complimentary deep tissue massage? Having your life saved is likely extremely stressful. Maybe it was the scratchy sheets and one ply toilet paper that knocked a star off of the doctor's review. Since HIPAA exists and the doctor cannot confirm, deny or acknowledge the identity of the patient that left the review, chances are we will never know. This didn't stop the doctor and others from hilariously speculating.One commenter asked, "did you do jazz hands afterwards?" Somehow, jazz hands seems like a fitting celebratory move after saving someone's life. "Dr Lewis saved my life! However, no good coffee in the hospital. 4/5 stars," one person jokes.The doctor is taking the review in stride. He even suggested that since his hospital is across the street from a Costco, maybe the two can team up so the next time he saves someone's life he has a small bargaining chip. — (@) Someone asks the important question, "saving a life is so overrated. Have you tried resurrection," to which Dr. Lewis claims to know a guy that performs such miracles. The tweet has made its way to the front page of Reddit where it is having another moment of virility leaving more people wondering what the doctor had to do in order to secure the fifth star. These commenters might be on to something that Dr. Lewis should take note of. "Make me immortal and I'll toss another half-star your way. But all 5 stars? I'm gonna need you to create me my own universe where I'm an invincible god. I really don't think wanting to rule an entire universe is too much to ask from my surgeon," one person writes."For 5 star Review I would recommend a small amount of necromancy," another says.Dr. Ari Elman commiserated with Dr. Lewis by seeing his four stars and raising the two star review he received after curing someone of cancer. I have this one beat. pic.twitter.com/YWToOo4Dtu— Ari Elman, MD (@AriObanMD) April 2, 2024 Yikes, what do these doctors have to do to get a five star review around here? All humor aside, chances are the reviews have nothing to do with the particular doctor and more to do with their experience at the hospital. That doesn't stop people from raising an eyebrow and wondering if a tap dancing routine should be included with the discharge news in order to bump the rating up a bit. The best news about this particular X thread is that you get to celebrate that two patients were saved, even if they might have withheld their stars for crappy hospital food.

In 2024, the idea of racially segregated schools sounds ridiculous, but it was the standard practice for most of American history. White Americans often refused to accept their children being educated alongside children of other races and ethnicities, and lawsuits over the matter ultimately rose all the way to the Supreme Court, culminating in the famous Brown vs. Board of Education ruling. That landmark 1954 case marked the end of legal school segregation, as the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that segregating students by race was unconstitutional, a violation of the 14th amendment. But another segregation case reached the California Supreme Court 70 years prior, and it revolved around an 8-year-old Chinese American student named Mamie Tape. According to History.com, Mamie's parents, Joseph and Mary Tape, had each come to the U.S. as children and had fully integrated into American life and culture. They took English names, wore Westernized clothing and lived by standard American customs. They were married in a Christian ceremony and named their three children Mamie, Emily and Frank. Joseph operated a delivery service and was a successful, well-respected businessman among both Chinese and white communities in San Francisco. However, despite their extreme assimilation, when they tried to enroll their 8-year-old daughter in the all-white Spring Valley Primary School in 1884, Principal Jennie Hurley flat out refused to admit her. Unsurprisingly, the school-board had a policy against admitting Chinese children. The Chinese Exclusion Act, which placed a 10-year ban on Chinese workers immigrating to the U.S., had just been passed in 1882 and anti-Chinese prejudice was commonplace. But that did not deter the Tapes from their mission to get the best education for their child. California had passed a law in 1880 that entitled all children in the state to partake in public education. However, school boards ignored the ruling and social custom kept the schools segregated. Chinese children attended the mission-run schools in Chinatown, while white children attended their local neighborhood schools. The Tapes wanted Mamie to attend her neighborhood school. So they fought the administration's refusal to admit their daughter by filing a lawsuit on her behalf against Hurley and the San Francisco Board of Education. The Tapes' lawyer, William Gibson, argued that not only did Hurley barring Mamie from the school violate California's existing law, but it also violated the 14th amendment of the U.S. Constitution—the basic argument that would eventually ban segregation nationwide in the Brown v. Board verdict. Tape vs. Hurley never went to the highest federal court, however, because both the Superior Court and the California Supreme Court agreed with Gibson's interpretation of the Constitution. On January 9, 1885, Superior Court Judge McGuire wrote in the court's decision, “To deny a child, born of Chinese parents in this State, entrance to the public schools would be a violation of the law of the State and the Constitution of the United States.”Despite their success in court, that unfortunately wasn't the end of the Tapes' struggles to get Mamie into the Spring Valley school. The court's ruling did not address the "separate but equal" doctrine, which was not yet legally binding (that would come with Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896) but was the prevailing justification for segregation. The "separate but equal" idea held that segregation was okay as long as it affected all races equally. For instance, white people and non-white people could have separate drinking fountains, as long as everyone had access to a drinking fountain.What that meant in the Tapes' case was that the San Francisco school board quickly and successfully pushed to pass a new state law authorizing the creation of separate public schools for “children of Chinese and Mongolian descent.” The new Chinese school wasn't ready yet, so the Tape still tried to enroll Mamie into the white school, but Hurley still denied her, citing there being too many students already and claiming that Mamie didn't have the required vaccinations. Having already exhausted legal avenues, Mary Tape published a scathing letter in the Daily Alta California newspaper. “Dear sirs,” she wrote. “Will you please to tell me! Is it a disgrace to be born a Chinese? Didn’t God make us all!!!” She railed against her daughter's treatment, saying she was more American than many people reading it. No matter how Chinese people live and dress, they are hated simply for being Chinese, she pointed out. "There is not any right or justice for them," she wrote.”Indeed, Mamie and the Tapes didn't see justice in their case, despite winning their legal case in court. But Tape vs. Hurley has gone down in history as a landmark case in the fight for ending segregation, one stepping stone toward true equality under the law.