These are the top maybe-not headlines from the past 36-hours presented by The Conversation Project from raw engagement data from our social media to the headlines posted over the past day.
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The 8 topics that our followers ranked as the most conversational are:
EDDIE JOHNSON, CHICAGO’S TOP COP, FIRED FOR ‘INTOLERABLE’ ACTIONS
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot fired retiring Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson Monday, saying Johnson lied about an October incident in which he was found sleeping in his car after supposedly having drinks with dinner. “It has become clear that Mr. Johnson engaged in a series of actions that are intolerable for any leader in a position of trust, particularly the head of the Chicago Police Department,” she said in a news conference. “Mr. Johnson failed the hardworking members of the Chicago Police Department, he intentionally misled the people of Chicago and he intentionally misled me. None of that is acceptable.” Lightfoot met with Johnson on Monday to deliver the news, and he was “accepting,” she said. Johnson’s actions on the night of October 16 and morning of October 17 demonstrated “a series of ethical lapses and flawed decision making,” she said, adding that he then went on to promptly hold a news conference after the incident in which he was dishonest with the public.
[SOURCE: cnn.com]
OLIVIA JADE RETURNS WITH FIRST YOUTUBE VIDEO IN MONTHS, MUM ON LORI
Lori Loughlin’s daughter, Olivia Jade, has officially broken her silence about the college admissions scandal … and basically says she can’t talk about it. The social media influencer posted her first YouTube vlog in a long time — about 8 months, more or less — and she titled “hi again.” Her last post was on March 10 … just a couple days before her mom and dad, Felicity Huffman and others were indicted by the feds. OJ’s mostly been off the radar online since then — although she hasn’t shied away from going out in public at all. Now, she’s ready to talk about it — and her first words are basically … mum’s the word on the case, which is still very much pending for Lori and Mossimo. In her video from Sunday, Olivia says … “Obviously, I’ve been gone for a really long time. And, as much as I wish I could talk about all of this … it’s really hard for me to say this, just because I know that it’s something that needs to be addressed.” Unfortunately for all those who thought she was ready to spill the tea … no dice.
[SOURCE: tmz.com]
LISA PAGE BREAKS SILENCE, SAYING TRUMP’S ‘FAKE ORGASM’ FORCED HER TO SPEAK OUT
In an interview published late Sunday, Lisa Page, the ex-FBI lawyer who carried on an extramarital affair with former FBI head of counterintelligence Peter Strzok as the two exchanged anti-Trump text messages, said she was breaking her silence. The 39-year-old Page was referring to Trump’s comments about her and Strzok at an October rally. During the event, Trump performed a passionate, dramatic reading of Strzok and Page’s August 2016 text messages, including Strzok’s conspicuous promise to Page that “we’ll stop” Trump from becoming president. At the time, Strzok was overseeing the Hillary Clinton email investigation and the probe into the Trump campaign. At one point, Trump screamed out, “I love you, Lisa! I love you so much! Lisa, she’s going to win one-hundred-million-to-nothing. But just in case she doesn’t win, we’ve got an insurance policy!” (Conservative commentators have disputed that Trump was mimicking an orgasm.) Page spoke exclusively to The Daily Beast Sunday in a highly sympathetic profile authored by Molly Jong-Fast, who called Strzok “hawt” in a tweet last year. In the interview, Page said Trump’s remarks had forced her to confront the president publicly.
[SOURCE: foxnews.com]
ALABAMA KICKER JOSEPH BULOVAS PENS HEARTFELT LETTER AFTER MISSING GAME-TYING FIELD GOAL VS. AUBURN
Alabama lost a heart-breaker to rival Auburn in their Iron Bowl matchup on Saturday and Crimson Tide kicker Joseph Bulovas received some flak for missing a field goal that would have tied the game. Bulovas’ field goal attempt hit the left upright in the middle of a 48-45 game. Alabama would eventually lose the game and potentially any chances of making the College Football Playoff. A disappointed Bulovas penned a letter to Crimson Tide fans apologizing for the missed kick. “After reflecting on the game, I just wanted to express my apologies to the entire Crimson Tide nation,” he wrote. “Nobody was more disappointed than myself. Regardless of the circumstances, that is a kick I should make in my sleep and nobody is as big of a critic as I am of myself. To the fans, my coaches, and my teammates; I promise you will never see a guy work as hard as I will for the entirety of my career because I owe that to all of you. I refuse to let this be anything more than a bump in the road and I’m confident I will come back better because of it. I wear my emotions on my sleeve and this one was hard to take to say the least, but I have confidence in this team and in myself and that’s what’s motivating going forward. I have and will always give it everything I’ve got for this team which is something that will never change. God Bless and Roll Tide.”
[SOURCE: foxnews.com]
REUSABLE PLASTIC SHOPPING BAGS ARE ACTUALLY MAKING THE PROBLEM WORSE, NOT BETTER
Over the past few years, reusable plastic shopping bags began showing up in grocery stores in many parts of the world. They are sturdier than the flimsy plastic bags that have become a symbol of the global movement against disposable plastics, and so can be used many times, lending to their marketing as the ethical choice for the environmentally conscious shopper. But of course, these thicker bags require more plastic to make. That means they could only improve the overall situation if they led to stores handing out overall less plastic, by volume, than they would without them—by, say, replacing thousands of single-use plastic bags a shopper might otherwise use over the years. Because no matter the style of plastic bag, it will still contribute to the global problem of forever-trash entering the environment, and the greenhouse gases associated with manufacturing the bag from fossil fuels in the first place. But it seems they haven’t. A new report from the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) and Greenpeace looking at grocery stores in the UK suggests that the plastic “bags for life” utterly failed to do the one thing they were ostensibly meant to. So far in 2019, the top 10 UK grocery stores reported selling 1.5 billion of these bags, which represents approximately 54 “bags for life” per household in the UK. For comparison, the top eight UK grocery retailers—representing over 75% of the market—sold 959 million such bags in 2018. Some supermarket chains have seen particularly big spikes in sales. The frozen-food store Iceland sold 10 times more plastic “bags for life” this year, 34 million, than last.
[SOURCE: qz.com]
A COLLEGE FOOTBALL PLAYER’S PARENTS DIED BEFORE HIS SENIOR DAY. SO HE WALKED ONTO THE FIELD WITH HIS TWO DOGS
It’s tradition in college football for seniors to emerge from the tunnel for the final game of their collegiate career and run onto the field to one last ovation, an event players usually celebrate with family. Michigan State University cornerback Josh Butler lost both of his parents before they could meet him on the field one last time on Senior Day. But he didn’t walk out alone on Saturday. The 23-year-old fifth-year made his final roaring entrance into Spartan Stadium accompanied by two dogs, Roxy and Remi. Butler’s father, Steven, died in November 2017, hours before Butler was set to play in a game against Penn State. His mother, Ladrida Bagley, died in April 2019 after being diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer, the Lansing State Journal reported. In between their deaths, he adopted Roxy and Remi, sister boxer-pit bull mixes and Butler’s best canine friends. The dogs have become stars in their own right. On an Instagram account, Butler documents the daily lives of 2-year-old Roxy and his little sister Remi, still a puppy at 7 months old, often decked out in Spartan gear. Roxy even posed patiently with Butler in his graduation photos, wearing her own cap.
[SOURCE: cnn.com]
APPLE ‘TAKING A DEEPER LOOK’ AT MAP POLICIES AFTER CALLING CRIMEA PART OF RUSSIA
Apple Inc is “taking a deeper look at how we handle disputed borders” after it referred to the Russian-annexed Crimean Peninsula as part of Russia in its Maps and Weather apps for Russian users, a company spokeswoman told Reuters on Friday. Apple spokeswoman Trudy Muller told Reuters that Apple has not made any changes to its maps outside of Russia and made the change for Russian users because of a new law that went into effect in that country. “We review international law as well as relevant U.S. and other domestic laws before making a determination in labeling on our Maps and make changes if required by law. We are taking a deeper look at how we handle disputed borders in our services and may make changes in the future as a result,” Muller told Reuters. Russia and Ukraine have both been highly sensitive to the way global companies identify Crimea, since Russian troops seized the territory and Moscow annexed it in March 2014 after a referendum that Kiev and its Western allies say was illegal.
[SOURCE: reuters.com]
DISNEY PARKS TO LIVESTREAM STAR WARS: RISE OF THE RESISTANCE DEDICATION CEREMONY AT DISNEY’S HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS ON DECEMBER 4TH
This Thursday, December 5th marks the official grand opening of the Rise of the Resistance attraction at Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge in Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Select members of the media are invited to a special preview event on December 4th, but that doesn’t mean the rest of us have to miss out. Disney Parks will be live streaming the attraction’s dedication ceremony on YouTube for all to see. The dedication ceremony for the attraction is set to take place at 6:55 PM (EST). A placeholder is already live on YouTube, complete with a countdown. It is during this dedication ceremony that we expect to see the highly-anticipated X-wing drones (and possibly more) fly over the land as part of the grand opening spectacular. Cast Member parking lot closures tied to the X-wing drone project are scheduled to take place on the 5th and 6th of December as well, indicating that these may fly a second or third time throughout the attraction’s opening week.
[SOURCE: wdwnt.com]
Eight Things To Talk About uses the raw engagement data from the social media engagement from The Conversation Project to generate the top-ranking headlines over the course of a weekend.
A full weeks’ data (from Friday to Friday) is compiled, weighed, and sorted to produce the content for the Wrap-Up Show with J Cleveland Payne, published every Saturday as a podcast available at ThisIsTheConversation.com or wherever your favorite podcasts are found.
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