Falling meteor lights up sky over Florida

Social media was lit up by a falling meteor that lit up the skies over northern Florida on Saturday night. The sight was so astonishing that one driver’s dashboard camera captured him shouting “What the f— was that!” after the blazing space rock plummeted to Earth.

Videos posted by witnesses who happened to be out driving — and who had their dash cams turned on— showed the meteor streaking down over the Florida sky at about 11:55 Saturday night.

The National Weather Service’s Tallahassee forecast office tweeted images of the meteor showing up on a lightning map. Forecasters explained that the meteor is not the bright line of light extending in a northeast-southwest diagonal line in the map image. The meteor is actually a quick and easy-to-miss purple dot that briefly blinks in the Panhandle just slightly east of the upper portion of the Big Bend area. While the meteor appears to have fallen between Tallahasee and Live Oak, the “What the f— was that?” witness reported seeing the meteor in Gainesville, Florida.

https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/florida/fl-ne-meteor-florida-20190331-story.html

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>>6000328

Indeed!

Pope defends decision to keep French cardinal after cover-up

ABOARD THE PAPAL PLANE (AP) — Pope Francis defended his decision to reject French Cardinal Philippe Barbarin’s resignation after he was convicted of covering up for a predator priest, saying Sunday the appeals process must run its course before a final decision is made. Francis also explained why he rejected proposals by U.S. bishops to respond to the sex abuse scandal there, saying they neglected the spiritual dimension required for a true reform. The pope referred to both cases during an in-flight news conference en route home Sunday from Morocco.

Francis’ papacy has been thrown into turmoil by the eruption of the scandal on multiple continents and his own handling of cases at the Vatican. Currently, two of his cardinals — Barbarin and Australian Cardinal George Pell — have criminal abuse-related convictions hanging over them, though both are appealing. Asked Sunday about Barbarin, Francis said the archbishop of Lyon was entitled to the presumption of innocence as long as the case remained open. “He has appealed, so the case is open. After the second tribunal decides, we’ll see what happens,” he said. Francis said that presumption of innocence was necessary to guard against a “superficial media condemnation.”

Barbarin offered his resignation to Francis last month after a court in Lyon gave him a six-month suspended sentence for failing to report the Rev. Bernard Preynat to civil authorities when he learned of his abuse. Preynat, who is scheduled to be tried on sexual violence charges next year, confessed to abusing Boy Scouts in the 1970s and 1980s. His victims accuse Barbarin and other church authorities of covering up for him for years. After Francis declined to accept the resignation, Barbarin decided to take a leave and turned over the day-to-day management of the archdiocese to his deputy.

In the news conference, Francis also defended his tendency to blame the devil for the abuse scandal, saying the crisis is of such magnitude and scale of filth that it cannot be understood without referencing the “mystery of evil.” “It’s not washing your hands (of the problem) to say the devil did it,” Francis said. “We have to do battle with the devil. Just as we have to battle human things.”

Francis explained that it was precisely the spiritual dimension of the scandal that he asked U.S. bishops to reflect on when he sent them on spiritual retreats at the beginning of the year. The U.S. church hierarchy has suffered a credibility crisis over its repeated failures to protect children from predator priests, as evidenced by the Pennsylvania grand jury report and the scandal over ex-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, found guilty by the Vatican of sexually abusing minors and adults. At their November general meeting, the U.S. bishops had planned to vote on proposals to hold themselves accountable for sexual misconduct or negligence in handling abuse cases. But the Vatican blocked them from taking up the measures, which included a third-party confidential reporting system and a code of conduct. “The proposals were too much about organization, about methodology,” Francis said Sunday. “But they had neglected this second, spiritual dimension.”

The head of the U.S. bishops’ conference, Houston Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, stunned the bishops when he opened the assembly Nov. 12 by announcing that “at the insistence of the Holy See” the bishops wouldn’t be voting on the measures after all. He said the Vatican wanted them to delay a vote until after Francis’ February abuse summit. The Associated Press later reported that the Vatican had demanded the delay because the U.S. conference had waited until four days before the meeting began to share the legally problematic proposals with the Holy See. A letter from the head of the Vatican’s bishops’ office said the proposals required further consultation before they could be approved. The U.S. bishops are expected to take up the revised proposals at their June meeting.

https://apnews.com/1c4d89e0bd3a499eaedc33bc25c22977

>>6000363

Okay must have been after I left.. I saw the post from the individual who witnessed it ..but didn't see the news post. Thanks for the heads up.

China to add fentanyl-related substances to controlled narcotics list

BEIJING (Reuters) - China will add fentanyl-related substances to a supplementary list of controlled narcotic drugs from May 1, the government said on Monday. The statement was jointly issued by the Ministry of Public Security, the National Health commission and National Medical Products Administration.

U.S. Trade Representative Lighthizer said in March he would prefer to include China’s commitments to curb fentanyl in any trade agreement. A senior China diplomat said in December China and the United States had agreed to action in the control of narcotics including fentanyl.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trade-china-fentanyl/china-to-add-fentanyl-related-substances-to-controlled-narcotics-list-idUSKCN1RD137?il=0

Murder at the airport: the brazen attack on Kim Jong Nam

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Early on a February morning last year, a balding man in a gray suit entered Malaysia’s Kuala Lumpur airport, glanced up at the departures board and walked to check in for his flight to Macau. Moments later, his killers struck. A few steps away from a Starbucks cafe and a Puffy Buffy Malaysian food stall, a woman stood in front of Kim Jong Nam, estranged half-brother of North Korea’s leader, to distract him. Her partner approached from behind, pulled from her handbag a cloth drenched in liquid VX, a chemical weapon, reached around his head and clamped it onto his face. That was enough to deliver deadly poison to the portly 46-year-old relative of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

Carrying a backpack containing $100,000 and four North Korean passports, Kim Jong Nam had been traveling under his pseudonym “Kim Chol”, police said. After the attack, he approached a help desk and explained that someone seemed to have grabbed or held his face and now he felt dizzy. He was taken to the Menara Medical Clinic, a small glass-fronted surgery one floor down near the arrivals area. It was too late. Kim Jong Nam died aged 46 in an ambulance on the way to the hospital.

The assassination has captivated the world due to its audacious nature and lasting geopolitical implications, with South Korean and Western officials accusing North Korea of a state-sponsored hit. Pyongyang denies any involvement. The brazen murder was caught on grainy CCTV footage that was broadcast around the world, yet many details remain a mystery.

On Monday, Malaysian prosecutors dropped a murder charge against Doan Thi Huong, the 30-year-old Vietnamese woman who smothered Kim Jong Nam, after she pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of causing harm using dangerous means. Huong was sentenced to three years and four months in prison but could be released as early as May for good behavior, her lawyer Hisyam Teh said. He said Huong was not a criminal but by pleading guilty she had taken responsibility for her actions on Feb. 13, 2017.

Huong’s Indonesian accomplice, Siti Aisyah, 26, was freed on March 11 after a Malaysian court dropped charges against her. Both women say they believed they were playing parts in a TV prank. Huong was wearing a t-shirt emblazoned with “LOL”, or “laugh out loud”, at the time of the attack.

Their lawyers have maintained that the women were pawns in an assassination orchestrated by North Korean agents. Four North Koreans who were identified as suspects by Malaysian police and had left the country hours after the murder remain at large.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-malaysia-kim-murder/murder-at-the-airport-the-brazen-attack-on-kim-jong-nam-idUSKCN1RD185?il=0

>>6000602

Malaysia reduces charge against Vietnamese suspect in airport murder

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - A Malaysian judge on Monday sentenced a Vietnamese woman accused of killing the half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to more than three years in prison for causing harm, after prosecutors dropped a murder charge against her. Doan Thi Huong, who has already served two years in jail, could be released as early as next month in accordance with Malaysian law, her lawyers said. Huong, 30, and an Indonesian woman, Siti Aisyah, were charged with killing Kim Jong Nam by smearing his face with VX poison, a lethal chemical weapon, at Kuala Lumpur’s main airport in February 2017. Prosecutors on Monday offered Huong an alternative charge of ‘causing hurt by dangerous weapons or means’. The reduced charge was offered after receiving representations from the Vietnamese embassy and the woman’s lawyers, they said.

Huong pleaded guilty to the alternative charge, which carries a jail term of up to ten years, a financial penalty or whipping. She would have faced a mandatory death penalty if found guilty of murder. Judge Azmi Ariffin sentenced Huong to three years and four months in prison for the reduced charged of causing harm. The judge told Huong she was “a very, very lucky person indeed” that the prosecutors offered her the alternative charge.

Wearing a red baju kurung, a traditional Malay dress, with a headscarf, Huong stood and nodded as the judge delivered the sentencing. Vietnamese officials in court broke into applause after the ruling. Prosecutors sprung a surprise last month by dropping the murder charge against Siti Aisyah. They later declined to do the same for Huong without giving a reason for the decision and despite appeals from Vietnam’s government.

Four North Korean men have also been charged, but they left Malaysia hours after the murder and remain at large. Defense lawyers have maintained the women were pawns in an assassination orchestrated by North Korean agents. The women said they thought they were part of a reality prank show and did not know they were poisoning Kim.

Kim Jong Nam was living in exile in Macau before the killing, having fled his homeland after his half-brother Kim Jong Un became North Korea’s leader in 2011 following their father’s death. South Korean and American officials have said the North Korean regime had ordered the assassination of Kim Jong Nam, who had been critical of his family’s dynastic rule. Pyongyang has denied the allegation.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-malaysia-kim-court/malaysia-reduces-charge-against-vietnamese-suspect-in-airport-murder-idUSKCN1RD13R?il=0 >0e22b3