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:
UPS WORKER PLANNING MASS SHOOTING HAD 20,000 ROUNDS OF AMMO AND WEAPONS CACHE
Thomas Andrews, 32, was arrested on suspicion of evading police, driving under the influence and several weapons violations, police in Sunnyvale said in a statement. Authorities said they received a report Sunday night that Andrews was planning a mass shooting at the UPS facility in the city of Sunnyvale, near San Jose. When officers tried to stop him three hours later, shortly after 11 p.m. PT, a pursuit on one of the state’s main thoroughfares, Highway 101, followed. After officers stopped Andrews, they searched his Sunnyvale apartment and found thousands of rounds of ammunition, high capacity magazines, five tactical rifles, a shotgun, three handguns, body armor and tactical backpacks with ammunition. The backpacks were “staged” at the apartment’s front door, the statement said. Jail records show that Andrews is being held at the Santa Clara County Jail in lieu of $500,000 bail.
[SOURCE: nbcnews.com]
EMIRATES AIRLINE ASKS STAFF TO TAKE ONE MONTH UNPAID LEAVE OVER CORONAVIRUS
Emirates has canceled flights to Iran, Bahrain and to most of China because of the virus, and countries around the world have placed strict restrictions on entry of foreigners.The airline has more resources than it needs as a result of cutting frequencies or cancelling flights to some destinations, said Chief Operating Officer Adel al-Redha in a statement on Tuesday. Emirates Group, the state-owned holding company that counts the airline among its assets, has asked staff to consider taking paid and unpaid leave as it seeks to manage a “measurable slowdown” in its business, Reuters reported on Sunday, citing an internal company email. The group had more than 100,000 employees, including more than 21,000 cabin crew and 4,000 pilots, at the end of March 2019, the end of its last financial year.
[SOURCE: msn.com]
MIKE BLOOMBERG, TULSI GABBARD WIN AMERICAN SAMOA DELEGATES
Former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg and Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii have won their first delegates thanks to American Samoa. The island has six Democratic delegates and their caucus awarded five to Bloomberg and one to Gabbard, who hails from Hawaii. Bloomberg got nearly half the votes, followed by Gabbard’s 29%. Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden and Elizabeth Warren all were below the 15% threshold, said island party executive director Andrew Bergquist.
[SOURCE: fox6now.com]
‘ER’ ACTRESS VANESSA MARQUEZ WAS SHOT DEAD BY POLICE IN ‘LAWFUL SELF-DEFENSE,’ SAYS DA, AS BODYCAM FOOTAGE RELEASED
Two police officers acted in “lawful self-defense” in the fatal shooting of former ER actress Vanessa Marquez, who was shot and killed in her home in South Pasadena, California, in 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office has ruled. Marquez, who was 49 at the time of her death, played nurse Wendy Goldman in the first three seasons of ER on NBC, appearing alongside George Clooney and Julianna Margulies. The district attorney’s office said in a February 25 memo that South Pasadena Police Department officers Gilberto Carrillo and Christopher Perez will not face any charges over the shooting and the case has now been closed. The South Pasadena Police Department also released body camera footage of the fatal incident that took place on August 30, 2018, after the officers attended a welfare check on Marquez. Marquez was shot multiple times by the officers after pulling what appeared to be a handgun on them, the memo from the district attorney’s office said. It was later determined to be an “all-black BB gun resembling a Beretta 92FS firearm.”
[SOURCE: newsweek.com]
JAMES FRANCO FIRES BACK AGAINST #METOO LAWSUIT
James Franco is firing back against an October lawsuit in which two of his former acting students accused him of sexual misconduct. The plaintiffs, Sarah Tither-Kaplan and Toni Gaal, accused Franco and his partners of “sexualizing their power as a teacher and an employer by dangling the opportunity for roles in their projects.” On Friday, the actor’s legal team filed a demurrer in Los Angeles Superior Court calling for the dismissal of three causes of action against their client. In the demurrer, obtained by USA TODAY, Franco’s lawyers Debra Ellwood Meppen, Laurie DeYoung and Gene F. Williams praise the #MeToo and Time’s Up movements, but slam the women’s lawsuit as “a travesty of justice.” They assert the “salacious allegations” in the lawsuit “have made great tabloid fodder, but like most tabloid stories, they are false and inflammatory, legally baseless and brought as a class action with the obvious goal of grabbing as much publicity as possible for attention-hungry Plaintiffs.”
[SOURCE: usatoday.com]
IRAN TEMPORARILY FREES 54,000 PRISONERS TO COMBAT SPREAD OF CORONAVIRUS
Iran has temporarily released more than 54,000 prisoners in an effort to combat the spread of the new coronavirus disease in crowded jails. Judiciary spokesman Gholamhossein Esmaili told reporters the inmates were allowed out of prison after testing negative for Covid-19 and posting bail. “Security prisoners” sentenced to more than five years will not be let out. There have been more than 90,000 reported cases of Covid-19 worldwide and 3,110 deaths since the disease emerged late last year – the vast majority in China. The outbreak in Iran has killed at least 77 people in less than two weeks.
[SOURCE: bbc.com]
A MAN BROUGHT A LLAMA IN A TUXEDO TO HIS SISTER’S WEDDING, AND THE PHOTO OF HER UNAMUSED EXPRESSION IS GOING VIRAL
Five years, ago, Mendl Weinstock made a promise to his sister Riva. “My sister was talking about her wedding as if it were tomorrow, when she wasn’t even dating anyone at the time,” he told Insider. “Just to make her mad and get a reaction, I told her if she makes me come to the wedding, I am bringing a llama with me. After a few minutes of arguing, she tried to use reverse psychology on me and said, ‘OK, the llama is invited to the wedding.'” In true little brother fashion, Mendl made sure she never forgot about the invitation.
[SOURCE: msn.com]
BMW GETS NEW LOGO
While the circular shape and basic architecture are the same, the middle still has the blue and white colors of the Bavarian state from which BMW hails. Yes, we’re aware that the blue and white is often thought to be a spinning propeller, to honor BMW’s aircraft-engine beginnings, but BMW historians and the public relations department agree that the blue and white is a tribute to Bavaria. What’s new is the retro font that spells out BMW, and that the outer circle is no longer white but clear. So the new badge will take on a different appearance depending on what color of car it’s on. When it’s stuck to a car, the logo looks entirely new, as the outer section will take on the car’s color. Of course, if it’s on a white car it will look like the classic badge, but even then, the new font gives it a new and different appearance.
[SOURCE: msn.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 the past day.
A full weeks’ data (from Friday to Friday) is compiled, weighed, and sorted to produce the content for the Weekly Wrap-Up 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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