The Weather Report - w.e.29.09.17

the weather in Baghdad this week will be mostly sunny with one cloud on Tuesday and another similar, but not the same, probably, cloud on Friday afternoon. here and there you may see a threat of moisture in the air but mostly it’ll be perfect, unbroken sunshine, again. the temperature will be falling over the week from 45C(114.8F) degrees to 38C(100F) as winter approaches though, and there will be barely perceivable winds of 2-5mph, with 0% chance of precipitation and humidity bouncing between a very manageable 5% - 18%. get your coats ready though, dearest Baghdadianii, as there are two clouds forecast for the start of October.

Meanwhile…

MIDDLE EAST - Saudi Arabia: ban on female driving lifted as a part of a wider concession of reforms necessary to diversify its current export list of crude oil and posh dates in time for 2040 (and the death of the internal combustion engine). when Saudi Arabia say “lift ban” though they don’t mean soon, they mean not before 2018. even that was considered progressive - when the idea was first mooted in the royal court everyone thought it the most wonderful joke. after the riotous laughter had eventually subsided - leaving an aide of one of the crown princes dead from a myocardial infarction - because, seriously though, would YOU let women drive cars in your country? actually on the roads? oh, they can? and how does that work?!
there were a few relevant questions raised: who will teach them? no women are allowed to drive, and men cannot be alone with women. will there be official chaperones? will they follow the underwear businesses and only employ gay muslim men from Southeast Asia (even though officially homosexuality is punishable by public flogging or death and Mawlāi aren’t real muslims)? no one knows, but watching the crash compilation on YouTube is going to be AMAZING!

SAUDI ARABIA FEMALE DRIVERS LICENSE - ARTIST IMPRESSION

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EUROPE - UK: officially, the happiest place in Britain is Craven, North Yorkshire. this latest poll follows North Yorkshire's recent unexpected wins for the most number of: i) new mothers prescribed antidepressants and ii) people aged 15-45 on antidepressants in the country. the government says the drug supply and perceived happiness are unrelated. this most recent award is causing Yorkshire councillors concern though, with both camps fearing it could send the wrong message about their county as they argue about how to fit this “happiest place to live business” in. Yorkshire’s well-earned reputation is at stake, having, in just the last 24-months, finished in the top 3, often winning titles outright, in the fight for: more serious crime than parts of London, the second highest unemployment rate in the UK, the highest regional suicide rate, one of the highest rates of tuberculosis in the country, more incest than the rest of England, the highest rate of sudden unexplained infant deaths in the country; and, the big one - the highest level of child poverty in the UK. just because something is the happi-est, doesn’t mean it is actually happ-y.

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NORTH AMERICA - USA: PR-land Adidas are: "learning more [about] situation… unaware of any misconduct…will fully cooperate with authorities to understand more”. in real terms, Adidas head of marketing, Jim Gatto, takes the bullet for the clothing giant. he is facing fraud, bribery and corruption charges along with an increasing number of defendants including: former sports agent Christian Dawkins - fired after charging $42,000 in Uber rides to the credit card of an “NBA player”; former Nike-guy, Merl Code, now “linked to” (read: defected to) Adidas; non-profit - The League Initiative president Brad Augustine who has a “deep passion to see the lives of every young person grow exponentially" and a "resume as one of the nation’s top Player Development Coaches”.
academia is being less corrupt than big-business in shifting blame and to prove it, in every instance, ONLY assistant coaches are in the firing line. sounds like shenanigans to us, with the universities accused (Arizona, Auburn, Oklahoma State & USC) not even spiting on their staff before embarking on a gang-buggering so savage it is rarely seen outside the US penal system.
NCAA players cannot be paid to play or endorse brands, so instead all parties stand accused of siphoning via family members and making payments via non-profit organisations as a way to conceal bribes paid to players to join teams sponsored by the clothing manufacturer. these include:

i) paying family of a high-school basketball player $100,000 to sign with an unnamed Kentucky-based “public research university". co-incidentally, Louisville signed a $160 million sponsorship deal with Adidas in August.
ii) $150,000 to persuade a Florida student to switch teams and join one sponsored by Adidas instead. again, the university was not named. Miami did enter into a 12-year partnership with Adidas in 2015, however...

Adidas maintain corporate-level ignorance,with Gatto telling fellow defendants that payments were "on the books”, just "not on the books for what it's actually for”. of course they were/weren't.

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EUROPE(?) / MIDDLE EAST: The Most Glorious Nation of Kurdistan (unofficial) Turkey/Iraq (official) - Kurdish independence vote sparks furore with 93% pro-independence. @TMGNoK have now blocked @TheRealTurkey and Iraq on twitter. Turkey responded by blocking them on Facebook, Iraq aren’t allowed full social media access (they can only like, follow & RT) as part of the whole “WMD” thing. the Kurdish Peshmerga who have almost single handedly pushed ISIS out of their region of the world - remember those guys? the ones we gave as many guns as they could carry (and nearly enough ammunition), plus the occasional airstrike, “because ISIS”? well, now they have done that what we wanted, so they have requested a small concession in the form of a Kurdish state. so that they: “have somewhere to escape oppression, you know, like the one you [Britain & America] gave Israel in 1947? we read it on google”. it is unclear yet whether Kurdistan will be granted EU status in line with Turkey’s current standing, it mostly depends if we can be bothered to send our war machines back out there. thanks to their scarily-efficient PKK (boys) and YPJ (girls) we barely sent anyone. well anyway, those formerly “brave & valiant Kurds who deserve our full support” are now officially “those fucking bastard, Kurds!” and are accused by Turkey and Iraq of treason and state subversion. Erdogan, always the sore loser, is already threatening to, literally, turn off the gas and shut the supermarkets and has already started with rocket strikes and taking his guns back from the "terrorists". Iraq is mostly just moaning because it isn’t like they had control of the area before the Kurds took it from ISIS anyway. last time we had this kind of arrangement it was with some people called the Taliban - what could possibly go wrong?

have a sunny week :-D

HA

@humanauction