Tag: social media

Tennessee Republicans Have Mass Shootings All Figured Out: More Guns, Everywhere, Always

Post By Politics , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Following the latest mass shooting by a responsible gun owner — the killer had no criminal record and purchased at least two of the guns legally in Nashville — Tennessee Republicans are offering the expected prayers and thoughts, although none of the thoughts include reducing the nation’s ample supply of firearms.

As Yr Wonkette noted earlier, brand new member of Congress Rep. Andy Ogles, who only won his seat thanks to Republican gerrymandering, is getting dragged a-plenty for his Christmas card demonstrating his family’s devotion to the Prince of Pieces. We’ll just add that the caption on that December 2021 image was all about the divine power of guns, and we are not making this up: “The very atmosphere of firearms anywhere and everywhere restrains evil interference — they deserve a place of honor with all that’s good.”

We aren’t sure it quite matches the meter of Mel Tormé’s “The Christmas Song,” but that’s certainly a Christmas wish! And it was so: The atmosphere of firearms anywhere and everywhere is with America not only during the Sacred Baby Season but also all year long.

While Ogles hasn’t been in Congress long enough to vote on any gun bills, in his previous job as mayor of Maury County, Tennessee, he signed a March 2020 resolution declaring the county a “sanctuary community” for the Holy Second Amendment. That doesn’t mean a damn thing at all in practical terms, but it’s a symbolic statement that if Tennessee ever passes a “red flag” law (it hasn’t), maybe the county would just let people making violent threats keep their guns. Stalkers need to defend themselves, too! And now, if Joe Biden tries to take all the guns, the guns can take refuge in Maury County, where people will presumably hide them just like Anne Frank’s family.

Ogles yesterday tweeted a brief statement saying, “My family and I are devastated by the tragedy” at the private Christian school in his district, with the usual thoughts and prayers and an assurance that he was “heartbroken by this senseless act of violence.” The replies were mostly pictures of the Christmas card, with a variety of commentary: “This you?” “We see you,” and the evergreen standby, “Fuck you.”

As it happens, then-mayor Ogles signed his 2021 gun sanctuary resolution just a day after Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee announced his own plan to allow all Tennesseans to carry handguns — openly or concealed — without a permit, meaning they’d no longer need to take a tyrannical safety class or pass any tyrannical criminal background check (other than the tyrannical federal one required to buy a gun). That law passed easily, and Lee signed it into law later in 2021, and now Republicans in the Tennessee Legislature are considering broadening it to allow open carry of all “firearms,” including assault rifles, instead of just handguns. Very important for the atmosphere of firearms to include people walking around on the sidewalk with AR-15s at the ready.

Lee tweeted an inspiring suggestion that Tennesseans join him in prayer, for all that’s worth.

Lee has been very busy protecting Tennessee children this session — not so much from being shot at school but from seeing drag shows and also criminalizing gender affirming healthcare for trans kids so they can be forced to go through puberty as the gender they don’t identify with, which will make them stop being trans anymore (except for how that doesn’t work). Research keeps showing that when trans and nonbinary youth receive gender-affirming medical care, the appallingly high suicide rate among trans kids can be reduced by as much as 73 percent. But as long as they ignore all the warnings, forcing unwanted puberty on trans youth probably won’t have any risks that Republicans would worry about.

As ever: If you are having thoughts of suicide or self harm, call the national Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988.

Sen. Marsha Blackburn, who’s benefited from more than $1.3 million in total spending by the National Rifle Association over her House and Senate career, did a routine “heartbroken” tweet, thanking first responders, but without “thoughts and prayers,” possibly for the sake of avoiding cliché.

Parkland school shooting survivor David Hogg offered a thoughtful revised version for Blackburn, a sort of “War Prayer” explication of the unspoken half part of her tweet:

Let me re write that for you.

Chuck & I are heartbroken to hear about the shooting at Covenant School in Nashville that was enabled by NRA puppets like me who are willing to let kids be fucking slaughtered so long as the NRA continues giving me millions.

Singer Roseanne Cash offered her own thoughts for Blackburn. Her tweet lacked any prayers:

Don’t even. You vote against every common sense gun control bill that comes across your desk, you’ve taken over $1 million from the NRA and you rank 14th in all Congress for NRA contributions. Spare us the hand-wringing @MarshaBlackburn

Possibly the most honest reaction to the shootings came from Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tennessee), who told reporters at the US Capitol what he and fellow Republicans would do to solve gun violence: Not a damn thing, because criminals will always find a way to get guns, like walking into a firearms dealer and buying one.

“It’s a horrible, horrible situation,” Burchett said. “And we’re not gonna fix it. Criminals are gonna be criminals and my daddy fought in the second world war, fought in the Pacific, fought the Japanese.” From that, the elder Burchett’s taught his son that “if somebody wants to take you out and doesn’t mind losing their life, there’s not a heck of a lot you can do about it.”

We aren’t sure whether Burchett is depressed or just lazy, since he didn’t even invoke the mythical “good guy with a gun.” He’s certainly not going to try to stop the massacres anyway, because government and laws are useless. Quite the argument to keep him in the lawmaking business, no?

No, there’s nothing Congress can do either, don’t be silly, because criminals are unstoppable lawbreakers: “I don’t see any real role that we could do other than mess things up.” He did point out that there’s one way to end mass shootings, though:

You gotta change people’s hearts. You know, as a Christian, as we talk about in the church, and I’ve said this many times, I think we really need a Revival in this nation.

That said, Rep. Burchett has an “A+” rating from a leading anti-abortion group, because you can definitely legislate away women’s reproductive freedom without waiting around for the filthy sinning strumpets to find Jesus and mend their ways.

Oh, and as for the safety of his own children, Burchett explained that’s not a problem, since his daughter is homeschooled and will never have to worry about her safety. Rest of you people are on your own, the end.

[Daily Herald / Tennessean / NBC News / Brennan Murphy on Twitter]

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Joe Tacopina: Trump’s Newest Bad Lawyer

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It’s either because he’s a terrible client or never pays his bills or no one wants to be on the losing side, but Donald Trump has an uncanny ability to pick out the worst attorneys to ever pass the bar. His latest legal draft pick: Joseph Tacopina, who appeared on this Sunday’s “Meet The Press” with Chuck Todd.

Similar to an infamous appearance by Rudy Giuliani, Chuck Todd’s oft-suppressed journalistic instincts awakened when given such an incompetent target. The trouble for Tacopina began when Todd asked why Trump got the media and the right-wing into a lather about his impending arrest last week. Tacopina, because he couldn’t just say his client is a bullshit artist who is willing to incite dumbasses to protect his own hide, tried to blame others.

TACOPINA: No, he didn’t make it up, he was reacting towards a lot of leaks coming out of the district attorney’s office. There had been a leak, Chuck, that Monday, the day before that Tuesday, there was a law enforcement meeting, including Secret Service and NYPD, that was going to go through the logistics of the arraignment. […] So he just, I think he just assumed based on those leaks that that’s what was going to happen.

As
Lemony Snicket once wrote, “Assumptions are dangerous things to make, and like all dangerous things to make — bombs, for instance, or strawberry shortcake — if you make even the tiniest mistake you can find yourself in terrible trouble.” Neither Tacopina nor his client have ever learned this lesson, which is why the rest of Tacopina’s answers to Todd’s questions came off as a series of unfortunate events for his credibility. When Todd read some of Trump’s public statements on social media, specifically targeting Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg, Tacopina attempted to change the subject.

TACOPINA: So Chuck, as his lawyer, I want to dissect this case, because it’s a case that shouldn’t be brought and wouldn’t be brought if it were anyone other than Donald Trump, let’s be clear about that. Does anyone actually think […] that anyone else would be prosecuted for making a civil settlement in a hush money case with personal funds? Of course not.

Literally that was what Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, was prosecuted for and served federal prison time for. The crime, mind you, that was at the direction of and reimbursed by Donald Trump through his businesses and he’s currently being investigated for.

Todd, again, pressed Tacopina about Trump’s attacks on Bragg through social media and Tacopina deflected poorly.

TACOPINA: […] Again, I’m not his social media consultant. I don’t — I think that was an ill-advised post that one of his social media people put up, and he quickly took down when he realized the rhetoric in the photo that was attached to it. But that being said —

TODD: You’re only referring to the baseball bat.

TACOPINA: … I’m not here to defend or support —
TODD: He didn’t take down the other rhetoric. […]

Tacopina then reverted back to his only defense of Trump, mainly that this was “personal funds” and “would have been made payment irrespective of the candidacy or campaign,” which he views as bulletproof for his client. But when Todd pulled his best
Inigo Montoya impression about this “personal funds” argument, Tacopina made a colossal legal mistake that even Todd couldn’t ignore.

TODD: […] So you call it personal funds. It is, in a court of law, it’s been proven —
TACOPINA: It is personal funds.

TODD: — that it was Trump Organization funds.

TACOPINA: It’s personal funds. It was not funds related to the campaign. That’s the distinction —
TODD: But he used a Trump Organization check.

TACOPINA: It’s not campaign finance laws. But Chuck, that’s personal, that’s personal. It has nothing to do with the campaign —

TODD: So everything with the Trump Organization is Donald Trump the person?

TACOPINA: Let’s focus this —

TODD: I mean, you realize the door you’re opening there.

I don’t think Tacopina realized what he did there, Chuck, as his continued answer dug the hole deeper.

TACOPINA: […] These were personal funds. By all accounts, these were personal funds, not campaign funds. It’s personal or campaign – whether Trump Organization, Donald Trump the person, you know, Mar-A-Lago Corporation, whatever it is – they’re personal and not campaign funds. And that’s the key distinction here. If they were campaign funds, we’d be having a different discussion. […]

But, as Todd then pointed out, Tacopina’s client might not be facing campaign finance charges.

Tacopina basically admitted what everyone knows: The Trump family uses his organizations and corporations as their own personal piggy banks, much like they did with the Trump “charities.”

This makes DA Bragg’s case much easier … not that he needs help since he’s done this type of case many times before despite what Trump’s surrogates say.

TODD: But again, what this investigation may end up being is about the, essentially the falsifying business records. Which by the way, this prosecutor has brought over 60 – this one and the previous one – has brought over 60 times over the last four years. This is not an unusual crime to charge somebody with […]

When Todd brought up falsifying business records and ledgers to say the payments were “legal fees,” Tacopina outlined how somehow that was ok in what will probably be what he’s remembered for after all this.

TACOPINA: […] Seriously, what would he personal ledger? “Payment for hush money to quiet an affair that I claim I never had so my family doesn’t get embarrassed.” Is that what he should put in his ledger? There’s no, nothing wrong with putting whatever you want in your ledger […] You’re being petty. […]

Todd ended the segment these clips of a very familiar lawyer saying how this was crime when it was first reported in 2018.

We bet Tacopina wishes his reality show dreams hadn’t flamed out 5 years ago.

Have a week.

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TikTok CEO grilled by skeptical US lawmakers over national security threat

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A nearly six-hour grilling of TikTok’s CEO by lawmakers brought the platform’s 150 million US users no closer to an answer as to whether the app will be wiped from their devices.

US lawmakers on Thursday pressed Shou Zi Chew over data security and harmful content, responding skeptically during a tense committee hearing to his assurances that the hugely popular video-sharing app prioritises user safety and should not be banned due to its Chinese connections.

In a bipartisan effort to rein in the power of a major social media platform, Republican and Democratic lawmakers hurled questions on a host of topics, including TikTok’s content moderation practices, how the company plans to secure American data from Beijing, and its spying on journalists.

Chew spent most of the hearing attempting to push back assertions that TikTok, or its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, are tools of the Chinese government. But he failed to answer uncomfortable questions about human rights abuses committed by China against the Uyghurs, and seemed taken aback by a TikTok video displayed by one lawmaker that advocated for violence against the House committee holding the hearing.

The rare public appearance by the 40-year-old Singapore native comes at a crucial time for the company. TikTok has ballooned its American user base to 150 million in a few short years, but its increasing dominance is being threated by a potential nationwide ban in the US and growing fears among officials about protecting user data from China’s communist government.

There’s also symbolism for lawmakers in taking on TikTok, which has been swept up in a wider geopolitical battle between Beijing and Washington over trade and technology, as well as heightened tensions due to recent balloon politics and China’s relationship with Russia.

“Mr. Chew, you are here because the American people need the truth about the threat TikTok poses to our national and personal security,” Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers, a Republican, said in her opening statement.

Chew told the House Committee on Energy and Commerce that TikTok prioritises the safety of its young users and denied it’s a national security risk. He reiterated the company’s plan to protect US user data by storing it on servers maintained and owned by the software giant Oracle.

“Let me state this unequivocally: ByteDance is not an agent of China or any other country,” Chew said.

Nevertheless, the company has been dogged by claims that its Chinese ownership means user data could end up in the hands of the Chinese government or that it could be used to promote narratives favourable to the country’s communist leaders.

In 2019, the Guardian reported that TikTok was instructing its moderators to censor videos that mention Tiananmen Square and included images unfavorable to the Chinese government. The platform says it has since changed its moderation practices.

Concerns about the platform increased when ByteDance admitted in December that it fired four employees who accessed data on two journalists, and people connected to them, last summer while attempting to uncover the source of a leaked report about the company.

Aware of its weakness, TikTok has been trying to distance itself from its Chinese origins, saying 60% of ByteDance is owned by global institutional investors such as Carlyle Group.

“Ownership is not at the core of addressing these concerns,” Chew said.

But for many others, it is. The Biden administration has reportedly demanded TikTok’s Chinese owners sell their stakes in the company to avoid a nationwide ban. China has said it would oppose those attempts. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said at a separate committee hearing Thursday that he believes TikTok is a security threat, and “should be ended one way or another.”

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said “everyone was watching” Thursday’s TikTok hearing at the White House. But she declined to comment on specific actions the administration could take to address its TikTok concerns.

In one of the most dramatic moments of the hearing, Republican Rep. Kat Cammack played a TikTok video showing a shooting gun with a caption that included the House committee, with the exact date before it was formally announced.

“You expect us to believe that you are capable of maintaining the data security, privacy and security of 150 million Americans where you can’t even protect the people in this room,” Cammack said.

TikTok said the company on Thursday removed the video and banned the account that posted it.

Concerns about what kind of content Americans encounter online, or how their data is collected by technology companies, isn’t new. Congress has been wanting to curtail the amount of data tech companies collect on consumers through a national privacy law, but those efforts have failed.

At a news conference on Wednesday, Rep. Jamaal Bowman, a New York Democrat and one of the few allies TikTok seemingly has on the Hill, said lawmakers concerned about protecting users shouldn’t target TikTok, but must instead focus on a national law that would protect user data across all social media platforms. Chew also noted the failure of U.S. social media companies to address the very concerns for which TikTok was being criticized.

“American social companies don’t have a good track record with data privacy and user security,” he said. “Look at Facebook and Cambridge Analytica, just one example.”

Committee members also showed a host of TikTok videos that encouraged users to harm themselves and commit suicide. Many questioned why the platform’s Chinese counterpart, Douyin, does not carry the same potentially dangerous content as the American product.

Chew responded that it depends on the laws of the country where the app is operating. He said the company has about 40,000 moderators that track harmful content and an algorithm that flags material.

Wealth management firm Wedbush described the hearing as a “disaster” for TikTok that made a ban more likely if it doesn’t separate from its Chinese parent. Emile El Nems, an analyst at Moody’s Investors Service, said a ban would benefit TikTok rivals YouTube, Instagram and Snap, “likely resulting in higher revenue share of the total advertising wallet.”

To avoid a ban, TikTok has been trying to sell officials on a $1.5 billion plan, Project Texas, which routes all US user data to servers owned and maintained by the software giant Oracle.

As of October, all new US user data was being stored inside the country. The company started deleting all historic US user data from non-Oracle servers this month, in a process expected to be completed this year, Chew said.

Republican Rep. Dan Crenshaw noted that regardless of what the company does to assure lawmakers it will protect US user data, the Chinese government can still have significant influence over its parent company and ask it to turn over data through its national security laws.

Congress, the White House, US armed forces and more than half of US states have already banned the use of the app from official devices. Similar bans have been imposed in other countries including Denmark, Canada, Great Britain and New Zealand, as well as the European Union.

A complete TikTok ban in the US would risk political and popular backlash from its young user base and civil liberties groups.

David Kennedy, a former government intelligence officer who runs the cybersecurity company TrustedSec, said he agrees with restricting TikTok access on government-issued phones but that a nationwide ban might be too extreme.

“We have Tesla in China, we have Microsoft in China, we have Apple in China. Are they going to start banning us now?” Kennedy said. “It could escalate very quickly.”

(AP)

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Beware the budget butt lift, regulators warn amid social media-inspired boom | CNN

Post By Health , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

In hindsight, Nikki Ruston said, she should have recognized the red flags.

The office in Miami where she scheduled what’s known as a Brazilian butt lift had closed and transferred her records to a different facility, she said. The price she was quoted – and paid upfront – increased the day of the procedure, and she said she did not meet her surgeon until she was about to be placed under general anesthesia.

“I was ready to walk out,” said Ruston, 44, of Lake Alfred in Central Florida. “But I had paid everything.”

A few days after the July procedure, Ruston was hospitalized due to infection, blood loss, and nausea, her medical records show.

“I went cheap. That’s what I did,” Ruston recalled recently. “I looked for the lowest price, and I found him on Instagram.”

People like Ruston are commonly lured to office-based surgery centers in South Florida through social media marketing that makes Brazilian butt lifts and other cosmetic surgery look deceptively painless, safe, and affordable, say researchers, patient advocates, and surgeon groups.

Unlike ambulatory surgery centers and hospitals, where a patient might stay overnight for observation after treatment, office-based surgery centers offer procedures that don’t typically require an inpatient stay and are regulated as an extension of a doctor’s private practice.

But such surgical offices are often owned by corporations that can offer discount prices by contracting with surgeons who are incentivized to work on as many patients per day as possible, in as little time as possible, according to state regulators and physicians critical of the facilities.

Ruston said she now lives with constant pain, but for other patients a Brazilian butt lift cost them their lives. After a rash of deaths, and in the absence of national standards, Florida regulators were the first in the nation to enact rules in 2019 meant to make the procedures safer. More than three years later, data shows deaths still occur.

Patient advocates and some surgeons – including those who perform the procedure themselves – anticipate the problem will only get worse. Emergency restrictions imposed by the state’s medical board in June expired in September, and the corporate business model popularized in Miami is spreading to other cities.

“We’re seeing entities that have a strong footprint in low-cost, high-volume cosmetic surgery, based in South Florida, manifesting in other parts of the country,” said Dr. Bob Basu, a vice president of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons and a practicing physician in Houston.

During a Brazilian butt lift, fat is taken via liposuction from other areas of the body – such as the torso, back, or thighs – and injected into the buttocks. More than 61,000 buttock augmentation procedures, both butt lifts and implants, were performed nationwide in 2021, a 37% increase from the previous year, according to data from the Aesthetic Society, a trade group of plastic surgeons.

As with all surgery, complications can occur. Miami-Dade County’s medical examiner has documented nearly three dozen cosmetic surgery patient deaths since 2009, of which 26 resulted from a Brazilian butt lift. In each case, the person died from a pulmonary fat embolism, when fat entered the bloodstream through veins in the gluteal muscles and stopped blood from flowing to the lungs.

No national reporting system nor insurance code tracks outcomes and patient demographics for a Brazilian butt lift. About 3% of surgeons worldwide had a patient die as a result of the procedure, according to a 2017 report from an Aesthetic Surgery Education and Research Foundation task force.

Medical experts said the problem is driven, in part, by having medical professionals like physician assistants and nurse practitioners perform key parts of the butt lift instead of doctors. It’s also driven by a business model that is motivated by profit, not safety, and incentivizes surgeons to exceed the number of surgeries outlined in their contracts.

In May, after a fifth patient in as many months died of complications in Miami-Dade County, Dr. Kevin Cairns proposed the state’s emergency rule to limit the number of butt lifts a surgeon could perform each day.

“I was getting sick of reading about women dying and seeing cases come before the board,” said Cairns, a physician and former member of the Florida Board of Medicine.

Some doctors performed as many as seven, according to disciplinary cases against surgeons prosecuted by the Florida Department of Health. The emergency rule limited them to no more than three, and required the use of an ultrasound to help surgeons lower the risk of a pulmonary fat clot.

But a group of physicians who perform Brazilian butt lifts in South Florida clapped back and formed Surgeons for Safety. They argued the new requirements would make the situation worse. Qualified doctors would have to do fewer procedures, they said, thus driving patients to dangerous medical professionals who don’t follow rules.

The group has since donated more than $350,000 to the state’s Republican Party, Republican candidates, and Republican political action committees, according to campaign contribution data from the Florida Department of State.

Surgeons for Safety declined KHN’s repeated interview requests. Although the group’s president, Dr. Constantino Mendieta, wrote in an August editorial that he agreed not all surgeons have followed the standard of care, he called the limits put on surgeons “arbitrary.” The rule sets “a historic precedent of controlling surgeons,” he said during a meeting with Florida’s medical board.

In January, Florida state Sen. Ileana Garcia, a Republican, filed a draft bill with the state legislature that proposes no limit on the number of Brazilian butt lifts a surgeon can perform in a day. Instead, it requires office surgery centers where the procedures are performed to staff one physician per patient and prohibits surgeons from working on more than one person at a time.

The bill would also allow surgeons to delegate some parts of the procedure to other clinicians under their direct supervision, and the surgeon must use an ultrasound.

Florida’s legislature convenes on March 7.

Consumers considering cosmetic procedures are urged to be cautious. Like Ruston, many people base their expectations on before-and-after photos and marketing videos posted on social media platforms such as Facebook, Snapchat, and Instagram.

“That’s very dangerous,” said Basu, of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons. “They’re excited about a low price and they forget about doing their homework,” he said.

The average price of a buttocks augmentation in 2021 was $4,000, according to data from the Aesthetic Society. But that’s only for the physician’s fee and does not cover anesthesia, operating room fees, prescriptions, or other expenses. A “safe” Brazilian butt lift, performed in an accredited facility and with proper aftercare, costs between $12,000 and $18,000, according to a recent article on the American Society of Plastic Surgeons’ website.

Although Florida requires a physician’s license to perform liposuction on patients who are under general anesthesia, it’s common in the medical field for midlevel medical practitioners, such as physician assistants and nurse practitioners, to do the procedure in office settings, according to Dr. Mark Mofid, who co-authored the 2017 Aesthetic Surgery Education and Research Foundation task force study.

By relying on staffers who don’t have the same specialty training and get paid less, office-based surgeons can complete more butt lifts per day and charge a lower price.

“They’re doing all of them simultaneously in three or four different rooms, and it’s being staffed by one surgeon,” said Mofid, a plastic surgeon in San Diego, who added that he does not perform more than one Brazilian butt lift in a day. “The surgeon isn’t doing the actual case. It’s assistants.”

Basu said patients should ask whether their doctor holds privileges to perform the same procedure at a hospital or ambulatory surgery center, which have stricter rules than office surgery centers in terms of who can perform butt lifts and how they should be done.

People in search of bargains are reminded that cosmetic surgery can have other serious risks beyond the deadly fat clots, such as infection and organ puncture, plus problems with the kidneys, heart, and lungs.

Ruston’s surgery was performed by a board-certified plastic surgeon she said she found on Instagram. She was originally quoted $4,995, which she said she paid in full before surgery. But when she arrived in Miami, she said, the clinic tacked on fees for liposuction and for post-surgical garments and devices.

“I ended up having to pay, like, $8,000,” Ruston said. A few days after Ruston returned home to Lake Alfred, she said, she started to feel dizzy and weak and called 911.

Paramedics took her to an emergency room, where doctors diagnosed her with anemia due to blood loss, and blood and abdominal infections, her medical records show.

“If I could go back in time,” she said, “I wouldn’t have had it done.”

KHN (Kaiser Health News) is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues. Together with Policy Analysis and Polling, KHN is one of the three major operating programs at KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation). KFF is an endowed nonprofit organization providing information on health issues to the nation.

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Celebrities may have helped shape anti-vaccine opinions during Covid-19 pandemic, study finds | CNN

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CNN
 — 

Covid-19 vaccines are known to be safe and effective, and they’re available for free, but many Americans in the US refuse to get them – and a recent study suggests that celebrities may share some of the blame for people’s mistrust.

Celebrities have long tried to positively influence public health, studies show, but during the Covid-19 pandemic, they also seemed to have a large influence on spreading misinformation.

Decades ago, in the 1950s, people could see stars like Elvis Presley, Dick Van Dyke and Ella Fitzgerald in TV ads that encouraged polio vaccination. This celebrity influence boosted the country’s general vaccination efforts, and vaccination nearly eliminated the deadly disease.

In 2021, US officials used celebrities in TV ads to encourage more people to get vaccinated against Covid-19. Big names like lifestyle guru Martha Stewart, singer Charlie Puth and even Senate Minority Leader Mitchell McConnell showed up in spots that had billions of ad impressions.

The world isn’t restricted to only three TV networks any more, so celebrities like actress Hilary Duff, actor Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, singer Dolly Parton and even Big Bird also used their enormous presence on Instagram and Twitter to promote a pro Covid-19 vaccine message.

But social media also became a vehicle for celebrities to cast doubt about the safety and effectiveness of the vaccine and even to spread disinformation about Covid.

Their negative messages seemed to find an audience.

For their study, published in the journal BMJ Health & Care Informatics, researchers examined nearly 13 million tweets between January 2020 and March 2022 about Covid-19 and vaccines. They designed a natural language model to determine the sentiment of each tweet and compared them with tweets that also mentioned people in the public eye.

The stars they picked to analyze included people who had shared skepticism about the vaccines, who had Covid-related tweets that were identified as misinformation or who retweeted misinformation about Covid.

They included rapper Nicki Minaj, football player Aaron Rodgers, tennis player Novak Djokovic, singer Eric Clapton, Sen. Rand Paul, former President Donald Trump, Sen. Ted Cruz, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, TV host Tucker Carlson and commentator Joe Rogan.

The researchers found 45,255 tweets from 34,407 unique authors talking about Covid-19 vaccine-related issues. Those tweets generated a total of 16.32 million likes. The tweets from these influencers, overall, were more negative about the vaccine than positive, the study found. These tweets were specifically more related to antivaccine controversy, rather than news about vaccine development, the study said.

The highest number of negative comments was associated with Rodgers and Minaj. Clapton had “very few” positive tweets, the study said, and that may have had an influence, but he also caught flak for it from the public.

The most-liked tweet that mentioned Clapton and the vaccine said, “Strongly disagree with [EC] … take on Covid and the vaccine and disgusted by his previous white supremacist comments. But if you reference the death of his son to criticize him, you are an ignorant scumbag.”

Trump and Cruz were found to have the most substantial impact within this group, with combined likes totaling more than 122,000.

They too came in for criticism on the topic, with many users wondering whether these politicians were qualified to have opinions about the vaccines. The study said the most-liked tweet mentioning Cruz was, “I called Ted Cruz’s office asking to make an appointment to talk with the Senator about my blood pressure. They told me that the Senator was not qualified to give medical advice and that I should call my doctor. So I asked them to stop advising about vaccines.”

The most-liked tweet associated with Rogan was an antivaxx statement: “I love how the same people who don’t want us to listen to Joe Rogan, Aaron Rodgers about the covid vaccine, want us to listen to Big Bird & Elmo.”

Posts shared by news anchors and politicians seemed to have the most influence in terms of the most tweets and retweets, the study found.

“Our findings suggest that the presence of consistent patterns of emotional content co-occurring with messaging shared by those persons in the public eye that we’ve mentioned, influenced public opinion and largely stimulated online public discourse, for the at least over the course of the first two years of the Covid pandemic,” said study co-author Brianna White, a research coordinator in the Population Health Intelligence lab at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center – Oak Ridge National Laboratory Center for Biomedical Informatics.

“We also argue that obviously as the risk of severe negative health outcomes increase with the failure to comply with health protective behavior recommendations, that our findings suggest that polarized messages from societal elite may downplay those severe negative health outcome risks.”

The study doesn’t get into exactly why celebrity tweets would have such an impact on people’s attitudes about the vaccine. Dr. Ellen Selkie, who has conducted research on influence at the intersection of social media, celebrity and public health outcomes, said celebrities are influential because they attract a lot of attention.

“I think part of the influence that media have on behavior has to do with the amount of exposure. Just in general, the volume of content that is focused on a specific topic or on a specific sort of interpretation of that topic – in this case misinformation – the repeated exposure to any given thing is going to increase the likelihood that it’s going to have an effect,” said Selkie, who was not involved in the new research. She is an adolescent health pediatrician and researcher with UW Health Kids and an assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health.

Just as people listen to a friend’s thoughts, they’ll listen to a celebrity whom they tend to like or identify with because they trust their opinion.

“With fandoms, in terms of the relationship between musical artists and actors and their fans, there is this sort of mutual love that fans and artists have for each other, which sort of can approximate that sense that they’re looking out for each other,” Selkie said.

She said she would be interested to see research on the influence of celebrities who tweeted positive messages about the Covid-19 vaccine.

The authors of the study hope public health leaders will use the findings right away.

“We argue this threat to population health should create a sense of urgency and warrants public health response to identify, develop and implement innovative mitigation strategies,” the study says.

Exposure to large amounts of this misinformation can have a lasting impact and work against the public’s best interest when it comes to their health.

“As populations grow to trust the influential nature of celebrity activity on social platforms, followers are disarmed and open to persuasion when faced with false information, creating opportunities for dissemination and rapid spread of misinformation and disinformation,” the study says.



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#Celebrities #helped #shape #antivaccine #opinions #Covid19 #pandemic #study #finds #CNN

Matt Taibbi uses the latest #TwitterFiles to call out and EMBARRASS the mainstream media and OUCH

Post By Politics , , , , , , ,

At this point in the whole #TwitterFiles world, we’d be more surprised if Matt Taibbi or the other journalists involved WEREN’T exposing another Democrat who tried to use their office and authority to pressure Twitter into silencing/censoring the Right. It’s becoming a trend really.

And sure, the Left is shrieking about the Trump admin asking Twitter to remove a mean tweet Chrissy Teigen wrote (which was silly but whatever), and claiming this proves it’s not just Democrats doing this, but give us a break. Wanting Twitter to remove a tweet because it hurts your feelings or pride is VERY different from an elected official trying to silence an entire group of people based on a narrative they believe could hurt them politically.

Taibbi used this thread to mock, humiliate, and embarrass the media … and it’s a beautiful thing:

Don’t recognize this guy? Don’t feel bad, we didn’t at first either.

Keep going.

Which is really the big story BUUUUUT gosh, golly, and gee, the mainstream media just doesn’t want to cover THAT part.

Shocker.

A MEAN TWEET! TRUMP! REEEEE

Forget that Adam Schiff literally got a journalist kicked off Twitter in essence violating his First Amendment rights … TRUMP didn’t like a tweet from Chrissy Teigen and that’s the real news y’all.

We’re not holding our breath.

Angus King.

Alrighty.

Why would King care about someone being excited over a Rand Paul visit?

Don’t answer that.

Oh, and he wanted people his rival followed removed.

Wow.

Crickets this morning, FYI.

See, media. They’re even exposing a few Republicans who did stupid crap too.

Watch, this will be the one angle they cover other than Trump.

heh

You’d think?

Adam Schiff is by far the worse. The very worse.

So media are staying far, far away from that story.

This.

ALL of this.

Dangit, we’re not on the list so no t-shirt for us.

***

Related:

Pfizer thinks John Legend smiling at the camera pushing boosters is SMART (holy COW were they wrong!)

Rachel Levine emails reveal push to PROFIT on ‘gender clinics’ at Children’s Hospitals (damning thread)

WaPo LAHOO-ZAHER Philip Bump brings knife to a gunfight STILL pushing Russia collusion and HOO boy

***

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#Matt #Taibbi #latest #TwitterFiles #call #EMBARRASS #mainstream #media #OUCH

Daily Wire host’s thread takes deep, disturbing dive into Lia Thomas’ social media circle

Post By Politics , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Last year, University of Kentucky swimming star Riley Gaines spoke out about being displaced by trans UPenn swimmer Lia Thomas on the awards podium despite tying for fifth place in the NCAA women’s championship 200-meter freestyle race. Thomas received a trophy that day, while Gaines did not:

Speaking with The Daily Wire in a phone conversation, Riley Gaines said that as NCAA officials were handing out trophies on the podium following the race, he said:  “Hey, I just want to let you know, we only have one fifth place trophy, so yours will be coming in the mail. We went ahead and gave the fifth place trophy to Lia, but you can pose on the podium with the sixth place trophy.”

…

“I just want you to know that we respect you and admire your swim so much, but we just want Lia to hold the fifth place trophy,” the official responded, according to Gaines, who The Daily Wire said  “laughed incredulously… as she repeated his words.”

“I was probably running my mouth a little more than I should,” she said. “I told the guy, ‘I don’t think that’s that’s right, and I don’t think that’s fair. There’s no dispute that only one of us can hold the trophy, but I think given the circumstances, you’re just trying to save face a little bit.’”

Gaines went on to be increasingly outspoken about what she viewed — correctly — as an affront to women’s sports. She even got suspended from Twitter for a while for her vocal opposition to Thomas being allowed to compete as a woman despite being biologically male.

Lia Thomas was nominated last July for NCAA’s Woman of the Year. So was Gaines. But of the two of them, only Gaines had earned her nomination.

Gaines recently sat down for an interview on The Daily Wire’s sports-focused show “Crain & Company,” and apparently the interview lit an investigative fire under Jake Crain et al. In an extensive and disturbing thread, Crain reveals some of the material they found in their quest to learn more about Lia Thomas — and the company Thomas allegedly keeps:

You can read Wawro’s thread here. It’s quite disturbing in its own right.

Here’s the interview:

Now, to be clear, we’re not here to pass judgment on Lia Thomas’ or Gwen Weiskopf’s being trans. That’s their prerogative. But their decision to live their lives as trans women becomes a problem when it interferes negatively in the lives of other people, people like Riley Gaines. Thomas’ presence has disrupted Gaines and other elite female college swimmers’ athletic careers, not to mention made Gaines et al. feel physically uncomfortable and violated, as was the case when Thomas was allowed to change in the women’s changing room. The NCAA should take serious issue with that as well as with the troubling and genuinely problematic social media posts done by and involving Thomas.

Is Thomas really NCAA Woman of the Year material? Or would she be better intensive therapy material? It would appear that the answer can only be the latter.

The sooner, the better.

***

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I’m a parent with an active social media brand: Here’s what you need to check on your child’s social media right now | CNN

Post By Health , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Editor’s Note: Sign up for CNN’s Stress, But Less newsletter. Our six-part mindfulness guide will inform and inspire you to reduce stress while learning how to harness it.



CNN
 — 

If you follow me on Twitter or Instagram, you’ll know I wear a lot of hats: romance author, parent of funny tweenagers, part-time teacher, amateur homesteader, grumbling celiac and the wife of a seriously outdoorsy guy.

Because I’m an author with a major publisher in today’s competitive market, I’ve been tasked with stepping up my social media brand: participation, creation and all. The more transparent and likable I am online, the better my books sell. Therefore, to social media I go.

It’s rare to find someone with no social media presence these days, but there’s a marked difference between posting a few pictures for family and friends and actively creating social media content as part of your daily life.

With a whopping 95% of teens polled having access to smartphones (and 98% of teens over 15), according to an August Pew Research Center survey on teens, social media and technology, it doesn’t look like social media platforms are going away anytime soon.

Not only are they key social tools, but they also allow teens to feel more a part of things in their communities. Many teens like being online, according to a November Pew Research Center survey on teen life on social media. Eighty percent of the teens surveyed felt more connected to what is happening in their friends’ lives, while 71% felt social media allows them to showcase their creativity.

So, while posting online is work for me, it’s a way of life for the tweens and teens I see creating and publishing content online. As a parent of two middle schoolers, I know how important social media is to them, and I also know what’s out there. I see the good, the bad and the viral, and I’ve have put together some guidelines, based on what I’ve seen, for my fellow parents to watch for.

Here are eight questions to ask yourself as you check out your children’s social media accounts.

If you don’t, it’s time to start. It’s like when I had to look up the term “situationship,” I saw that ignorance is not bliss in this case. Or really any case when it comes to your children. Both of my children have smartphones, but even if your children don’t have smartphones, if they have any sort of device — phone, tablet, school laptop — it’s likely they have some sort of social media account out there. Every app our children wish to add to their smart devices comes through my husband’s and my phone notifications for approval. Before I approve any apps, I’ll read the reviews, run an internet search and text my mom friends for their experience.

Most tweens and teens use social media for socializing with local friends.

If I’m still uncertain about an app, I’ll hold off on approving it until I can sit down with my children and ask them why they want it. Sometimes just waiting and forcing a short discussion is enough to convince them they no longer want it. In our household, I avoid any apps that run social surveys, allow anonymous feedback or require the individual to use location services.

If you don’t have your family phone plan all hooked together with parental controls, I’d advise setting that up ASAP. Because different devices and apps have different ways to monitor and set up parental controls, it’s impossible to link all the options here. However, a quick search will give you exactly the coverage you are comfortable with, including apps that track your child’s text messages and changing the settings on your child’s phone to lock down at a certain time every night.

The top social media platforms teens use today are YouTube (95% of teens polled), TikTok (67%), Instagram (62%) and Snapchat (59%), according to the Pew Research Center survey on teens and social media tech. Other social media platforms teens use less frequently are Twitter, Reddit, WhatsApp and Facebook. Most notably, Facebook is seeing a significant downturn in teen users. This list isn’t exhaustive, however. I would check out your children’s devices for group chat apps (such as Slack or Discord) and also scroll through their sport or activity apps where group chat capabilities exist.

I’ve seen preteens and teens using their real names, birthdate, home address, pets’ names, locker numbers or their school baseball team. Any of that information could be used to identify your child and location in real life or using a quick Google search. All of that is an absolute “no” in our house.

I also tell my kids not to answer the fun surveys and quizzes that invite children to share their unique information and repost it for others to see. These can be useful tools for predators and people trying to steal your children’s identity.

What I do: I made the choice a long ago to withhold the names of my children and partner. It’s not an exact science, and I know some clever digging could find them. For my husband, it’s for the sake of his privacy and also the protection of his professionalism. Just because he’s married to a romance author doesn’t mean he should have to answer for my online antics, whatever they may be. For my children, I want to avoid anything embarrassing that could be traced back to them during their college application season.

Even if your children keep their social media profiles private (more on that later), their biographical information, screen name and avatar or profile picture are public information.

Do an internet search of your child’s name to see what’s out there and scroll through images to make sure there isn’t anything you wouldn’t want to be made public. In our household, I’ve asked my children to use generic items or illustrated avatars in their social media bios.

What I do: Parents who do have active social media accounts may want to do a search of their own names. When my first book was published in 2019, I did a search of my name and images and found many photos of my children that came directly from my social media pages. I hadn’t posted pictures of them, but I did use a family photo as my profile photo and those are public record. Once I deleted them, the photos disappeared.

Another “no” in our household is posting videos or photos of our home or bedrooms. Something that feels innocent and innocuous to your middle schooler may not feel that way to an adult seeking out inappropriate content.

I learned this from one of my children’s Pinterest accounts. My kid loves to create themed videos using her own photos and stock pictures, and she’s gained over 500 followers in a short period of time. She has completely followed our rules and I know, because I check and follow her myself — but it hasn’t stopped the influx of adult men following her content.

What we do: Over the holidays, I sat with her and went through each follower one by one and blocked anyone we decided was there for the wrong reasons. In the end, we blocked close to 30 adult men on her account. (I also know that some predators cleverly disguise themselves as children or teens, and we may not catch them all, but this is still a worthy exercise.)

We also talk to our children about how to protect themselves. They wouldn’t want those strangers standing in their bedroom; therefore, they don’t want to post videos of their bedroom or bathroom or classroom for strangers to view.

This is a tricky one for lots of reasons. For content creators to build their following, they need to remain public on social media. If your child is an entrepreneur or artist hoping to grab attention, locking down their account will prevent that from happening.

That said, a way around this is to have two accounts. First, a private one, locked down and only used for family and close friends, and second, a public one that lacks identifiers but showcases whatever branding the child is hoping to grow. I’ve come across some well-managed public accounts for children who have giant followings and noticed they are usually run by parents, who state that right in the profile. I like this. If your children want public profiles because they are hoping to catch the attention of a talent scout, having the accounts monitored by a responsible adult who has their best interest in mind is a healthy compromise.

This is the exception, however. Most tweens and teens today use their social media for socializing with local friends. The benefit of keeping their account as private (or as private as can be) is threefold. It allows them to screen who follows their content, thus preventing our Pinterest fiasco. It prevents strangers from accessing their content and making it viral without their permission. And it protects them from unsolicited contact with strangers.

Not all social media platforms have the option to make your account “private.” For example, YouTube has parental controls that can be adjusted at any time. TikTok and Instagram can be made private (which means users must approve followers) by making the change in the account settings. Once the account is private, a little padlock will show next to the username.

Snapchat allows users to approve followers on a case-by-case basis as well as turn off features that disclose a user’s location. Notably, Snapchat also informs users when another user takes a screenshot of their story, which is a feature other social media platforms don’t have yet.

Most group chat apps don’t have the ability to go private so much as they ask users to approve of follower requests. Take time to discuss with your children who they allow to follow them and what personal information they allow those followers to know. It’s also a great time to teach them the art of “blocking” those individuals who are unsafe or unkind.

My suggestion is to log in, scroll around and even ask your children to teach you about the platforms they use. Then, when they roll their eyes at you, go ahead and tell them about your first Hotmail email address and the way you picked the perfect emo playlist on your Myspace page … and when they’re bent over laughing, sneak a peek at their follower list. Trust me, it’ll be worth it.

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How to Start a Blog | Young Adult Money

Post By Money Making , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

 
In this post I explain how to start a blog. If you use my link to sign up you will not only receive the lowest possible price on Bluehost hosting, but you will also receive a FREE domain name.

I regularly check with a contact from Bluehost to ensure this post always has the lowest possible price. Use this link to start a blog on WordPress and follow the tutorial below to get started.

Since starting YoungAdultMoney.com eight years ago I have consistently made more than $10,000 a year on my blog.

It’s been a perfect side hustle to diversify my 9-5 income, pay down debt, and invest in the stock market.

The extra money I’ve made has not only allowed my wife and I to offset our $1,000/month student loan payment, but also to save more, invest more, and travel. It’s also landed me a book deal with a publisher, a dream of mine that literally would not have been possible without a blog.

In short, blogging has had a huge impact on my finances and my life. I am not the only one with a story like this. There are many people who are consistently making thousands of dollars a month from their blogs. Some have even decided to make it their primary income, abandoning their full-time jobs to blog full-time.

The one thing all these successful bloggers have in common is this: they started a blog. Without taking this critical first step it’s impossible to make money blogging. It’s easy to think about “someday” starting a blog, but honestly the sooner you start one the better. By starting a blog today you are already far ahead of the millions of people who like the idea of blogging but have not taken the critical first step of starting a blog.

There are free blog options such as “Blogger,” and many people make the mistake of starting a blog on one of these free platforms. The problem with free hosting options is that advertisers do not like them. They like the self-hosted blogs and do not take the blogs on free hosting seriously.

I’ve seen many bloggers go through the headache of transitioning from a free hosting platform to a paid, self-hosted one like Bluehost and some have spent an entire weekend going through the process and working out bugs. Don’t make that mistake! The process can be so complicated that I completely abandoned one of my Blogger blogs instead of go through the headache of transitioning to Bluehost.

I have started a number of websites over the past 10+ years and helped many others get started. Since switching to Bluehost for web hosting I have always recommended them to people who are looking to start a blog. They are highly rated, offer affordable pricing, and make starting a WordPress blog extremely easy with their 1-click WordPress installation.

Bluehost offers a free domain name – and the best possible price – when you register through my link.

If you want to start a blog that makes money you are going to want to start one on Bluehost. Bluehost offers many advantages, including:

  • Affordable – by using my link you get hosting for just $2.95 per month, which is less than $36 a year.
  • Free Domain Name – you will get a free domain name when you sign up for hosting on Bluehost using my link
  • Extremely Easy WordPress Installation – Bluehost has a “one-click” WordPress installation
  • 24/7 Tech Support – Bluehost tech support is available 24/7 and has been outstanding every time I’ve used them
  • Attractive to Advertisers – having a self-hosted blog is attractive to advertisers and will make it easier to make money blogging
  • 30-Day Money Back Guarantee – if you cancel within 30 days you receive a full refund on your hosting service
  • Extended Money Back Guarantee – if you cancel after 30 days you receive a prorated refund for the remainder of your hosting term

As you can see there are a ton of benefits of using BlueHost to start your blog. With their money-back guarantee there is very little risk of starting a blog through BlueHost, and so much potential for making money blogging.

 

1) Choose a Hosting Option

 
Once you have gone to BlueHost you will see the various hosting options. I highly recommend using the “Starter” package. Even though there are two higher-priced packages, there is nothing in the higher-priced packages that you need.

Bluehost basic web pricing cheapest price

Keep in mind that this option is very affordable for self-hosting a website and comes with a money-back guarantee. If you decide within 30 days blogging isn’t for you, you can get your full payment refunded. Even at 10, 11, or however many months in, if you decide you don’t want Bluehost web hosting you will get refunded for any months you paid for but haven’t used yet.

You can also always upgrade to the other accounts if you reach any of the space limits from the basic account.

 

2) Choose a Free Domain Name

 
When you sign up for Bluehost using my link you get a free domain name. This is an ~$15 value if you had bought the domain name.

Once you click on the Starter package in the previous step you will be brought to a screen where you enter the domain name you want.


Free Domain Name BlueHost Offer

I will be the first to admit it’s not easy to choose a domain name. I got lucky by finding Young Adult Money, as many domains with “money” in it are already taken. But even Young Adult Money isn’t a perfect domain name.

It’s easy to overthink a domain name, but in all honesty the value of your blog will not be in the name but in the content you put out. There are many hugely successful blogs out there with obscure domain names.

It will almost for sure take a few attempts to find a domain name that isn’t already taken. Think of something unique (or not unique – i.e. Young Adult Money haha) and once you find one that is not taken, grab it. Just think of something that sounds good to you and you are good to go!

Once you have a free domain, you simply need to complete your registration and you officially have a blog! I would choose none of the extras on the last screen as they are just going to increase the cost of starting a blog.

The only one that I would consider is the $0.50 a month for “Domain Privacy Protection.” It’s not necessary, but it does shield and protect your information as a website owner.

Note: you can skip the section below and go straight to “Install WordPress” if you are registering a free domain name.

Already have a domain name?

If you already have a domain name that you bought on a site like GoDaddy, it’s easy to connect your domain name to Bluehost. Instead of registering a new domain, just choose the second option on the page and enter the domain you would like to be linked to your Bluehost hosting.

Here are the directions for connecting your GoDaddy domain to Bluehost:

To modify, add, or delete name servers (DNS) for your domain(s):

  • Log in to the GoDaddy.com Account Manager.
  • Select Manage Domains from the Domain Names drop-down menu or the Manage Your Account list.
  • Select the domain name you wish to modify using the checkboxes and then click Set Name Servers.
  • Enter your updated name server information in the spaces provided under the blue Name Servers heading on the right side of your page and click Save Changes at the bottom. Your entries should look like this:
    ns1.bluehost.com
    ns2.bluehost.com

This can all be done within the cpanel once you have purchased hosting. If you run into issues do not hesitate to email me. When I first got BlueHost I already had a domain, so I’ve personally gone through these steps a few times.

 

3) Install WordPress

 
Once you have signed up for an account, login to your Bluehost account and go to hosting -> cpanel.

How to Start a Blog - BlueHost 5

Once on this page, scroll down to website builders and find the Install WordPress icon.

How to Start a Blog - BlueHost 4

Once you click the Install WordPress icon, you simply need to click install and choose the domain you are installing WordPress to. You will then set up your login information.

To log into your WordPress blog, go to your domain name and add /wp-admin to the end of the domain. This will pull up the user and password fields that allow you to log into WordPress.

Just like that you have a living breathing WordPress blog. Congrats!

Remember, if you have ANY questions at all do not hesitate to ask. I am happy to help you with any blogging questions just as I’ve helped many others set up a blog.

 

Blogging Tips for New Bloggers

 
As I said earlier, I have over 10 years of blogging experience and have made thousands of dollars blogging. I do not say that to brag, but to make it clear that I can attest to the fact that it is possible to make money blogging. If I can do it, you can too.

Here are area few tips I have for new bloggers:

  • Commit to 6 Months – While I don’t have a statistic to prove this, a common quote that floats around the blogosphere is “most bloggers quit within the first six months.” When you start your blog, consider making a a deal with yourself to blog for at least six months. If you still want to quit, you can, but at least you gave yourself a decent amount of time to build up content and truly give blogging a try.

    If you are hesitant about starting a blog on Bluehost because of the potential that you won’t like blogging, remember that they offer a refund for unused months that you already paid for. Even if you decide to quit after 3, 6, or any number of months you will get a refund for the remaining months you already paid for. There is very little risk in giving Bluehost – and blogging – a try.

  • Connect with other Bloggers – The biggest mistake new bloggers make is thinking that traffic will simply appear. The reality is that getting ranked in search engines is difficult for established blogs and unlikely for brand new blogs. The best way to get some initial traffic and links to your site is by commenting on other blogs in your niche. This is extremely important for new bloggers!
  • Plan ahead whenever possible – Many established bloggers do not write their posts on the fly. Instead, they plan their posts. This helps in situations where something unavoidable – an illness, a late night at the office, etc. makes it difficult to write a post the night before it goes live. Consider using an editorial calendar to plan posts in advance.

While this isn’t a comprehensive list of all the tips I would give to new bloggers, it should provide a good start for those who are looking to start a blog. Remember, it’s more important to actually start your blog than to have it be perfect from day one.

If you have any questions about Bluehost or blogging, do not hesitate to send me an email. I have been blogging for years and have helped many people start a blog, so I’m happy to help you as well.

 


 
 
Bluehost pricing plan cheapest possible price

 
 



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LeBron James and Billie Jean King lead tributes to American journalist Grant Wahl | CNN

Post By Sports , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,



CNN
 — 

The death of prominent journalist Grant Wahl at the World Cup in Qatar has led to an outpouring of shock and grief across the sports world, with NBA star LeBron James and tennis great Billie Jean King leading the tributes to the American.

Prominent American journalist Grant Wahl has died in Qatar after collapsing while covering the World Cup, sparking an outpouring of shock and grief across the sports world. He was 49.

King said Wahl’s death was “heartbreaking.”

“A talented journalist, Grant was an advocate for the LGBTQ community & a prominent voice for women’s soccer,” King tweeted Saturday. “He used his platform to elevate those whose stories needed telling. Prayers for his family.”

On Friday in Philadelphia, basketball star James said he had been “very fond of Grant.” While Wahl was at Sports Illustrated, he did a cover story on James when James was in high school.

“I’ve always kind of watched from a distance even when I moved up in ranks and became a professional, and he went to a different sport,” said James, speaking at a postgame press conference. “Any time his name would come up I’ll always think back to me as a teenager and having Grant in our building … It’s a tragic loss.”

Tyler Adams, the captain of the US men’s national soccer team, which was knocked out of the World Cup by the Netherlands in the last 16, sent his “deepest sympathy” to Wahl’s wife, Celine Gounder, and to those who knew him.

“As players we have a tremendous amount of respect for the work of journalists, & Grant’s was a giant voice in soccer that has tragically fallen silent,” Adams wrote on Twitter.

Qatar’s World Cup organizers said on Saturday that Wahl “fell ill” in the press area, where he received “immediate medical treatment on site.”

He was then transferred to Hamad General Hospital, said a spokesperson for the Supreme Court Committee for Delivery and Legacy, the body responsible for planning the tournament.

Wahl was treated in the stadium “for about 20-25 minutes” before he was moved to the hospital, Keir Radnedge, a columnist at World Soccer Magazine, told CNN Saturday.

“This was towards the end of extra time in the match. Suddenly, colleagues up to my left started shouting for medical assistance. Obviously, someone had collapsed. Because the chairs are freestanding, people were able to move the chairs, so it’s possible to create a little bit of space around him,” Radnedge said.

He added that the medical team were there “pretty quickly and were able to, as best they could, give treatment.”

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre reacted to Wahl’s death on Saturday, adding that senior State Department officials were in touch with Qatari officials and Grant’s family.

“Grant Wahl was an inspiration to many. Our thoughts are with his wife Dr. Céline Gounder and all those who loved him. State Department officials are in touch with Grant’s family and with senior officials in the government of Qatar to ensure his family gets the support they need,” Jean-Pierre wrote on Twitter.

“Only some days ago, Grant was recognized by FIFA and AIPS (the International Sports Press Association) for his contribution to reporting on eight consecutive FIFA World Cups,” said FIFA President Gianni Infantino in a statement.

Infantino and FIFA media director Bryan Swanson were at the hospital on Saturday to offer any kind of support needed for the family, friends, and the journalists who were also his housemates in Qatar.

The co-editors in chief of Sports Illustrated, the publication where Wahl spent the majority of his career, said in a joint statement they were “shocked and devastated at the news of Grant’s passing.”

“We were proud to call him a colleague and friend for two decades – no writer in the history of (Sports Illustrated) has been more passionate about the sport he loved and the stories he wanted to tell,” said the statement.

It added that Wahl had first joined the publication in November 1996. He had volunteered to cover the sport as a junior reporter – back before it reached the heights of global popularity it now enjoys – eventually becoming “one of the most respected soccer authorities in the world,” it said.

The statement said that Wahl also worked with other media outlets including Fox Sports. After leaving Sports Illustrated in 2020, he began publishing his podcast and newsletter.

Other current and former US soccer players, including Ali Krieger and Tony Meola, shared their condolences, as did sporting bodies such as Major League Soccer and the National Women’s Soccer League.

Wittyngham, Wahl’s podcast co-host, told CNN on Saturday the news of his death had been hard to fathom.

“For Americans, Grant Wahl is the first person you read covering soccer. He was kind of the only person for a while … Grant was the first person who really paid genuine attention to this sport in a meaningful way,” Wittyngham said.

Several journalists shared stories of reporting alongside Wahl, and having encountered him at multiple World Cups over the years.

“Before he became the best covering soccer he did hoops and was so kind to me,” wrote famed broadcaster Dick Vitale.

Timmy T. Davis, the US Ambassador to Qatar, tweeted that Wahl was “a well known and greatly respected reporter who focused on the beautiful game.”

“The entire US Soccer family is heartbroken to learn that we have lost Grant Wahl,” US Soccer said in a statement on its official Twitter account.

“Grant made soccer his life’s work, and we are devastated that he and his brilliant writing will no longer be with us.”

US Soccer praised Wahl’s passion and “belief in the power of the game to advance human rights,” and shared its condolences with Wahl’s wife, Celine Gounder, and his loved ones.

Gounder also posted the US Soccer statement on Twitter.

“I am so thankful for the support of my husband Grant Wahl’s soccer family and of so many friends who’ve reached out tonight. I’m in complete shock,” wrote Gounder, a former CNN contributor who served on the Biden-Harris transition Covid-19 advisory board.

US State Department spokesperson Ned Price said the department was in “close communication” with Wahl’s family. The World Cup organizers also said they were in touch with the US embassy “to ensure the process of repatriating the body is in accordance with the family’s wishes.”

Wahl wearing a rainbow-colored t-shirt while working at Qatar 2022.

Wahl had covered soccer for more than two decades, including 11 World Cups — six men’s, five women’s – and authored several books on the sport, according to his website.

He had just celebrated his birthday earlier this week with “a great group of media friends at the World Cup,” according to a post on his official Twitter account, which added: “Very thankful for everyone.”

In an episode of the podcast Futbol with Grant Wahl, published days before his death on December 6, he had complained of feeling unwell.

“It had gotten pretty bad in terms of like the tightness in my chest, tightness, pressure. Feeling pretty hairy, bad,” Wahl told co-host Chris Wittyngham in the episode. He added that he sought help at the medical clinic at the World Cup media center, believing he had bronchitis.

He was given cough syrup and ibuprofen, and felt better shortly afterward, he said.

Wahl also said he experienced an “involuntary capitulation by my body and mind” after the US-Netherlands game on December 3.

“This isn’t my first rodeo. I’ve done eight of these on the men’s side,” he said at the time. “And so like, I’ve gotten sick to some extent at every tournament, and it’s just about trying to find a way to like get your work done.”

He further described the incident in a recent newsletter published on December 5, writing that his body had “broke down” after he had little sleep, high stress and a heavy workload. He’d had a cold for 10 days, which “turned into something more severe,” he wrote, adding that he felt better after receiving antibiotics and catching up on sleep.

Wahl had made headlines in November by reporting that he was detained and briefly refused entry to a World Cup match because he was wearing a rainbow t-shirt in support of LGBTQ rights.

He said security staff had told him to change his shirt because “it’s not allowed,” and had taken his phone. Wahl said he was released 25 minutes after being detained and received apologies from a FIFA representative and a senior member of the security team at the stadium.

Afterward, Wahl told CNN he “probably will” wear the shirt again.



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