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California’s Utility Regulator Forces the Private Sector to Maintain Increasingly Obsolete Landline Networks

California should lift this antiquated regulatory burden on our nation’s telecommunications sector..

While all 50 states are currently working with the federal NTIA to implement a historic $42.45 billion in taxpayer funds bringing high-speed broadband internet service to all Americans, California regulators are forcing one telecom provider to stick with outdated 20th century tech in perpetuity.

Under California law, AT&T is currently designated as a Carrier of Last Resort (COLR), meaning the company is mandated to maintain traditional copper-line telephone service in areas where there are no alternative providers of voice service. The California Public Utility Commission (CPUC) rejected AT&T’s attempt to transition most of its legacy, copper-line telephone networks to contemporary broadband networks—powered by fiber and novel solutions such as Fixed Wireless Access .

Decades ago, when the technology for mobile phones and the modern internet was only beginning to get off on the right foot , the incumbent local exchange carrier was often by definition the sole provider of telephone service. In 2024, however, Californians have access to a growing number of alternatives competing with traditional voice service, including mobile networks and voice over IP (VoIP) delivered through the internet. As AT&T noted in its application to the CPUC, 99.7% of the population within its California service territory has access to at least three alternatives to landline phone service.

USA Today reported that at least 20 states have already taken steps to reform or eliminate COLR requirements, rightly pointing to data showing fewer and fewer households with landline connections. In the few remaining regions where copper landlines remain the sole option, AT&T has pledged to maintain their legacy service until modern networks are developed, ensuring no communities are left behind.

California should lift this antiquated regulatory burden on our nation’s telecommunications sector. The Legislature should keep its eye on the ball and focus on ensuring the billions in taxpayer funds earmarked for broadband are not squandered and actually reach these unserved areas.

• Published: June 26, 2024
• Issues: Communications and Technology

In Depth: Communications and Technology

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Behind Closed Doors, US Reporter Gershkovich to Go on Trial in Russia

FILE PHOTO: Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, who is in custody on espionage charges, stands behind a glass wall of an enclosure for defendants during a court hearing in Moscow, Russia, April 23, 2024. REUTERS/Tatyana Makeyeva/File Photo

By Mark Trevelyan

LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. journalist Evan Gershkovich will stand trial for espionage in Russia on Wednesday in a court whose proceedings are classified as a state secret.

No reporters, friends, family members or U.S. embassy staff will be allowed into the courtroom in the city of Yekaterinburg where Gershkovich, 32, faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.

Russian prosecutors say the Wall Street Journal reporter, arrested in March last year, had collected secret evidence about a Russian tank manufacturer on the orders of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.

Gershkovich, his newspaper and the U.S. government reject the charges. U.S. President Joe Biden called his detention "totally illegal".

Closed trials are standard procedure in Russia for cases of alleged treason or espionage involving classified state material. The Kremlin says the case, and the arrangements for it, are a matter for the court, but has stated - without publishing evidence - that Gershkovich was caught "red-handed".

"The only people present in the court will be the judge, state prosecutor, the defendant, his lawyer and a clerk. Filming and audio recording are forbidden," said lawyer Evgeniy Smirnov of Pervy Otdel (First Department), an association that specialises in helping defendants in such cases but is not involved in Gershkovich's.

The nature of the proceedings imposes an additional psychological burden on the accused person, he said.

"For the defendant, this is always hard. An open trial means the chance to appeal to the public, the chance to receive support and the chance to see your loved ones at a difficult moment in your life," he told Reuters.

"Deprived of all this, a person is forced to concentrate only on his own defence" and, in Gershkovich's case, to count on U.S. political support and attempts to negotiate his freedom, Smirnov said.

Almar Latour, CEO of Dow Jones and publisher of the Wall Street Journal, said the trial, whether open or closed, was not to be taken at face value.

"It's a sham trial, it's fake charges. However that's served up, that doesn't change those underlying facts," he told Reuters in a telephone interview.

"Fake charges brought by an autocratic regime that is waging a war on journalism and reliable information at home and abroad. However the trial will take place, it doesn't take away the outrageous underlying assault on free press and on Evan's freedom."

REPORTING ASSIGNMENT

Many Western news organisations pulled staff out of Russia after it launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and passed laws soon afterwards that set long prison sentences for "discrediting" the armed forces or spreading false information about them.

Gershkovich was among those who stayed. He was on a reporting assignment to Yekaterinburg in Russia's Urals region when he was arrested by the FSB security service on March 29 last year while eating in a steakhouse.

Latour declined comment on the purpose of the trip or on the prosecutors' allegation that Gershkovich was trying to gather information on Uralvagonzavod, a supplier of tanks for Russia's war in Ukraine.

Asked whether Gershkovich had made an error of judgment by going there and whether the paper should have sent him, knowing the risks reporters face in Russia, Latour said: "We won't speak specifically to the reporting assignment, but we take the safety and security of our employees and our reporters very, very seriously and have an apparatus in place and protocols in place to make sure that our reporters are safe."

"He was there as an accredited journalist, doing his job," Latour said.

POSSIBLE SWAP

Imprisoned for nearly 16 months in Moscow's Lefortovo prison, Gershkovich joined a list of Americans held in Russia at a time when relations between Moscow and Washington are at their most confrontational in over 60 years.

They include Russian-American journalist Alsu Kurmasheva and Paul Whelan, a former Marine who is serving a 16-year spying sentence and, like Gershkovich, has been designated by the State Department as "wrongfully detained".

President Vladimir Putin has said Russia is open to the idea of a prisoner swap involving Gershkovich although the Kremlin says his case is a purely legal matter. The U.S. has accused Moscow of holding him for the purpose of "hostage diplomacy".

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said last week "the ball is in the U.S.'s court" and Russia was awaiting a response to ideas it presented regarding a possible trade.

The lawyer Smirnov, who is based outside Russia, said such a trial would typically last two to three months.

He said there was no precedent in Putin's Russia for a defendant in a spying case to be acquitted at trial but the ultimate outcome for Gershkovich would be determined elsewhere.

"There is no doubt the Russian authorities initiated this case solely for political reasons," Smirnov said. "And Evan's eventual fate will be decided not in the courtroom but in the high offices of politicians."

(Reporting by Mark Trevelyan; Editing by Tim Heritage)

Copyright 2024 Thomson Reuters .

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Russia offers china a river to the sea in the pacific.

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Panic seized the community of international geo-strategy observers recently when it seemed Chinese ships would start sailing a remote strip of water near the Sea of Japan. The Moscow Times reported i mpending deals between Russia-China-North Korea to allow that to happen - as proposed by the Kremlin. Here's a map showing the region and the focus is on the Tumen river. The reader will note that the river meanders northwards as a border between China and North Korea takes a right turn and just before it reaches the sea, China drops out and the Tumen becomes a border between Russia and North Korea. There's a point at which Russia-China-North Korea borders meet and then the Tumen becomes a Russia-NK river some ten miles before the Pacific coast. In other words, China has no access to the sea in that region, and now it might, if Putin can be believed. What does it mean and why all the geostrategic excitement?

First, you should know that your intrepid columnist, in 2009, visited the Tumen river itself and the exact spot where Russia-China-North Korea meet, and wrote two columns. It was a desolate, searingly cold, largely abandoned zone, 18 below zero at the time of visiting. Here is one of the columns - about the region's commerce, history, ethnic make-up and strategic import. Not mentioned until a later column, until after I had left the area, is the experience of crossing the frozen river on foot alone into North Korea. I did so in the footsteps of two Korean-American journalists working for Current TV (then associated with Al Gore) who got arrested, taken to the capital Pyongyang and were later freed by a visit from Bill Clinton. That incident was the area's only claim to fame from WW2 - until now.

By all accounts, some things have changed since my visit - the Russian side is still largely neglected but for a border post village, the China side is full of activity and commerce, and the North Korea side has developed in areas where the Chinese do business. That is especially true on the coast, in North Korean territory, where the port of Rasin or Rachin largely built and run by the Chinese, offers China an outlet to ship its trade out to the world. In DPRK territory, subject to Kim Jong On's whims. All the Chinese goods cross the Tumen by bridge and travel by road to the Rasin port. So the idea of allowing China to sail directly out to the Pacific coast via the Tumen river would make that port superflous. The DPRK would lose a lot of revenue thereby. Plus, making the Tumen navigable by big ships would require massive dredging and widening. Putin's purported idea of restoring Chinese access seems like a fantasy, an implausible one.

Why then has he floated the idea? That stretch of coastal access was ceded to Russia by the Ching dynasty in the 19th century and the PRC has wanted it back for decades. Putin is running out of incentives to offer Beijing for supporting his Ukraine war. Making such an offer plays well with the Chinese public - but causes fury in Moscow among the Putin regime's supporters seething with Great Russia fanaticism. From the latter's perspective, first you let the ships sail and soon the Chinese will claim it outright. But Putin is making a particular point - if Beijing gets direct access to the Sea of Japan, the strategic equation will change radically. At the moment, the Chinese navy has to sail all the way around the Korean peninsula to that area. Suddenly Beijing will be able to threaten Japan (and various disputed islands) directly. The burden will spike on US and allies to stretch naval projection, protection, readiness and resources.

This is part of Putin's game of global geostrategic pressure on the West and its allies - if they continue to defy him on Ukraine. Cuba, Europe, the Middle East (via Iran) and now the Far East are all pressure points he is exploring. Moscow would like to reconstitute the old anti-Nato communist bloc world-wide. By dangling the Tumen river coastal access to China, he might get the PRC to sign on. Thus far, China doesn't think it's worth risking Western sanctions. Beijing sees no reason to divide the world and limit the range of its exports only to Russia's allies, which are not in the best of health economically. Furthermore, using a DPRK port like Rasin allows China to dodge existing sanctions when it wants by relabelling its goods as Korean before they go out to the world. Having its own access to the sea via Tumen river would preclude that. So, no, nobody is buying Putin's gesture - for now.

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What would a press secretary in a Russian embassy in the west be forwarding to the Kremlin these days? The question was posed to me by a German official early in Ukraine’s counteroffensive. I was reminded of this during the Nato summit last week — and even more so after the revelation of talks between former US officials and Russian diplomats.

As Nato debated the future of Ukraine, the British media were so obsessed with a scandal involving a BBC presenter that the summit barely made a front page. So yes, happy times for Russian diplomats in London keen to relay to the Kremlin the message they know it wants to hear of a distracted, narcissistic UK.

The German official was being playful but making an essential point: it is all too credible to picture Vladimir Putin still being fed self-reinforcing lines. What mileage is there for an aide to tell him the truth?

And this is where the disclosure of April’s talks between American former national security officials and Russian diplomats, including foreign minister Sergei Lavrov, comes into play. After months of the two armies slugging it out at terrible cost with few changes to the frontline, it is all the more important for the west to be able to seek to influence Moscow’s mindset by delivering hard truths.

The revelation by NBC of the talks — in New York and including Richard Haass, the outgoing head of the Council on Foreign Relations — prompted accusations of betrayal. For many in Ukraine, the idea of contact with representatives of a state which has unleashed such slaughter is unconscionable. Others fear that indulging any contact is to fall into a Russian trap leading to a shabby deal in which Ukraine’s interests will be betrayed by western realpolitikers just keen to see the war end.

The latter concerns are only natural. The Minsk accord of 2015 that ended the first phase of Russia’s invasion faced that very charge. The 1995 Dayton deal after the Bosnian war is also salutary. It carved up Bosnia and Herzegovina in a way that in effect rewarded the aggression of the Bosnian Serbs.

Ukraine’s fear is that it will end up being steamrollered into a grand bargain in which it has to abandon its formal goals of defeating Russia and regaining control over all its territory including Crimea. Some officials in Europe cite Finland’s ceding of 10 per cent of its land to the Soviet Union after the 1939-40 Winter War as an analogy for a deal.

So yes, those engaged in back-channel talks will be all too aware of the danger of unintentionally being sucked into an “understanding” of Russia’s position that veers close to appeasement.

And yet the holding of secret talks and at multiple levels is essential. The April talks are just one of a number of back-channels and not the most significant, not least given that Lavrov is not a key Kremlin player.

For now, neither Ukraine nor Russia is remotely ready to consider a settlement. The war will probably not end in the next year, warns a European government minister. The west is still hoping for a breakthrough via the counteroffensive, slow as progress has been so far. It is worth remembering that after D-Day, allied troops fought for more than two bloody months in Normandy before surging through the German lines. It is just possible that Russian troops will suddenly, wonderfully, crack: as the late military historian John Keegan stressed, never underestimate the importance in battle of morale. As for Russia, it will be pinning its hopes on the counteroffensive failing, and thinking it should wait to see how Donald Trump fares in the 2024 US election cycle. 

But whether there is a Russian rout or a stalemate, as increasingly Ukraine’s backers fear is the most likely scenario, at some stage negotiations are all but inevitable, and the more contacts there are in advance the better. 

Throughout history such an approach has been contentious. The secret talks over South African apartheid in the 1980s would have appalled many on both sides if divulged, but they helped pave the way for democracy.

The uncertain terrain of Russian politics makes this all the more imperative. Given the bloodbath he presides over, Putin’s opponents are understandably affronted by the argument that we should be wary of a post-Putin order lest his successor is worse. Of course, ideally for the west a Russia would emerge freed from Putin’s kleptocracy.

But there are also real concerns about what might happen in the event of a dissolution of his regime. On the minds of western officials is how a collapse of the Russian state could lead to mayhem akin to the collapse of Yugoslavia.

The west needs to let Moscow know how serious we are in our resolve. It also needs to work out who to talk to and who to trust, after long years in which the value of Russia expertise has been downgraded in western foreign ministries.

In recent history, time and again autocrats have shown a stunning capacity for misreading their enemies’ intentions, and vice versa. Slobodan Milošević and Saddam Hussein spring to mind. Somehow the west has to pierce the self-delusion shrouding Putin’s court.

I may of course be underestimating the spine of Russia’s press secretaries. But even if so, we need more not fewer back-channels.

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Election latest: Rishi Sunak accused of 'behaving badly' in final debate - as he and Keir Starmer get brutal audience question

Follow reaction and fallout from the final head-to-head between the prime minister and Labour leader ahead of polling day on 4 July.

Wednesday 26 June 2024 23:00, UK

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Thanks for joining us for an extremely busy night here in the Politics Hub, including for the final debate between Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer before the general election next Thursday.

You can scroll through the page to catch up with the highlights.

And we'll be back from 6am with all the very latest.

Until then - read all the latest from Sky News below:

By  Tim Baker , political reporter, in Nottingham

One of the more amusing moments of the debate tonight was Robert, who told Rishi Sunak he was a "mediocre" prime minister and said Sir Keir's strings were being pulled by senior members of the Labour Party.

He is brought into the spin room by BBC production staff for journalists to talk to.

He tells us that he is a life-long Conservative voter - but at the moment is undecided.

Robert says he has recorded the debate and will be watching it again when he gets home.

However, he reckons he is leaning towards the Conservatives - believe Sir Keir has an "undeclared agenda".

Daisy Cooper, the deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats, has said the UK "deserves so much better" than the leaders' debate held tonight.

Reacting to the clash between Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer, she said: "Tonight the audience spoke for the nation when they asked: is this really the best we've got?

"Our country deserves so much better than what we watched this evening.

"Liberal Democrats are listening to you and fighting hard for the issues that matter to people. 

"From the NHS to tackling the cost of living, we want a fair deal for our country.”

A Conservative win would mean "five more years of chaos" and Rishi Sunak has shown tonight "just how out of touch he is", Labour's campaign coordinator has said.

Reacting to the leader's debate, Pat McFadden said Sir Keir Starmer "exposed the Tory manifesto as unfunded".

"Keir Starmer and Labour will return politics to public service, putting country before party in stark contrast to partygate and dodgy COVID contracts," he said.

"On 4 July, we have a chance to turn the page and start to rebuild with Labour."

Tonight was an "important moment" for Rishi Sunak as he put his opponent "on the spot", says our deputy political editor Sam Coates .

Coates says he thinks the prime minister would have been "very happy" with his performance - and adds that some of his aides were even "punching the air" after the debate.

It was a performance Mr Sunak "desperately needed earlier in the campaign", he adds.

He says Mr Sunak had a "clear strategy... to demand answers from Keir Starmer on tax and whether it will go up, on welfare and how you get people off benefits, on 'smashing the gangs' and whether the Rwanda policy is needed..."

Coates says Sir Keir provided a "range" of answers as the prime minister sparred with him.

"Sometimes he had specifics, sometimes he did not," he says.

"That strategy, although executed in a way I think that the Conservative Party tonight is very happy with, has nevertheless been judged not decisively in Keir Starmer or Rishi Sunak's favour," says Coates, referring to the YouGov poll showing there was no winner in the final debate of the election (see 21.38 post).

The final TV clash of the election campaign was an ill-tempered shouting match, at least from Rishi Sunak. 

Sir Keir was more measured. More prime ministerial, perhaps?

As he had to as the underdog, Mr Sunak went on the attack from the start until the very end and unveiled a new campaign slogan: "Don't surrender…"

He said it no fewer than 15 times during the 75-minute debate. That’s once every five minutes.

But just like the England-Slovenia Euros match 24 hours earlier, the result was a draw: 50%-50% exactly, according to pollsters YouGov.

At the outset, the PM served notice that he wanted to talk about tax, while Sir Keir wanted to talk about politicians gambling. 

As Mr Sunak read out prepared lines, it was a smart ad lib from Sir Keir that won the first round of applause.

"If you listened to people in the audience a bit more you might not be so out of touch," he said, in a familiar Labour attack line.

But the PM was strong and came out on top in exchanges on illegal migrants crossing the Channel.

One of the best moments came when a member of the audience, Robert, asked a devastating question: "Are you two really the best we’ve got to the next prime minister of our great country?"

By the end, the debate closed out as it began - with Mr Sunak shouting over the Labour leader. It wasn't a good look.

And as the debate ended, there was no handshake between the pair, which is unusual for these TV clashes. 

At least party leaders pretend to be civilised towards each other usually.

There's clearly no love lost between these two - and it showed.

Darren Jones, shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, is among the Labour representatives in the spin room this evening.

He's asked first about his leaked comments that Labour's target for decarbonising the economy will cost "hundreds of billions" of pounds.

Sir David Davis, who sticks around for this encounter, asks why Mr Jones's party "downgraded" their net zero plans.

"Because you guys crashed the economy," the shadow chief secretary responds.

Sunak 'behaved badly' in debate

On the leader's debate, Mr Jones says Sir Keir Starmer came across as "clearly more prime ministerial" - and adds that he thinks Rishi Sunak behaved "quite badly".

"He didn't answer questions that were put to him and was constantly speaking over Keir and Mishal [Husain, the BBC host]."

He denies Sir Keir's remarks that Mr Sunak is out of touch were "below the belt".

"Rishi Sunak is going around the country telling everyone that they've never had it so good... they crashed the economy, people at home know that because they paid the price for it."

Up to spin for the Conservatives is ex-minister David Davis.

"This debate was very important," he says, noting it's the final one before the public decides who to back.

He was a fan of Rishi Sunak's new attack line - the repeated pleas to voters not to "surrender" their borders or finances to Labour. 

"[Sunak has] faced a once-in-a-generation issue in terms of a war in Europe, he's faced a once-in-a-century issue in terms of a pandemic, and he did it with an economy from which we'd inherited massive debts in the past," he adds.

After all that, "he managed to get inflation down from 11% to 2% in six months". 

"The public will look at this and say: 'We've got a difficult world, all sorts of disruptions at home and abroad, who will deal with it the best of these two'?" he says.

"I know who I'll be voting for."

With minutes to go, a group of smiling Labour spinners arrived to watch the final summations.

Darren Jones - under fire for his comments about the cost of going for net zero, revealed in The Telegraph - tells Sky News it's clear who was more prime ministerial during the debate.

He and the other Starmer backers then burst away to the various cameras and microphones to talk up their leader.

Meanwhile, serious faced Conservatives enter from the other end of the room to give their verdicts. 

Tory candidate - and former minister - David Davis says he thinks Rishi Sunak's repetition of the "surrender" phrase will have gone down well.

This just in from YouGov - which has found there was no winner in tonight's BBC leaders' debate, the last of the general election campaign.

Asked who performed best - the results came in exactly 50/50.

Our deputy political editor Sam Coates says there will likely be disappointment in the Conservative ranks over this result.

"Neck-and-neck polling doesn't seem to me like it's going to change the race," he says.

"I think there's a really interesting question about Rishi Sunak's tactics, in my view, watching that, he was effective in highlighting the choice - the policy difference between the two men.

"I wonder looking at that poll whether that's what the public are really looking for."

However, there were distinctions when viewers were asked who performed better on certain topics.

Rishi Sunak came out on top on immigration and tax, while Sir Keir Starmer performed better on welfare and the UK's relationship with the EU.

Labour also just edged ahead on the economy - with 47% saying they performed better, and 43% backing the Tories.

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How alec used miles & points to save $3,000+ on his honeymoon.

December 15, 2018 by Nate 5 Comments

A couple of months ago Alec posted the message below in our Facebook Group, and it made my entire week! The private Facebook group is a place where members can ask questions, share strategies, and celebrate miles and points wins like this one!

This one was too good to keep private. So, I asked Alec if he’d be willing to share the exact strategies he used to save over $3,000 on his recent honeymoon!

Enter Alec:

Hi, I’m Alec. I’m 27 years old from a small town in Indiana (1,200 people). I just got married on November 10th 🙂

I started using miles and points last year before I got engaged. I knew I wanted to plan a great honeymoon for my now wife, and I don’t make that kind of money to afford anything fancy and out of the county. We both love to travel and I wanted to do something special. I emailed Nate about it and told him why I wanted to take the course and if it was right for me. After he assured me that it would help out, I signed up for the class and started studying everything I could about miles and points. I signed up for the Chase Sapphire Preferred® card to use to buy the engagement ring.

I was a little hesitant about starting because I didn’t think I would be able to gain enough points to actually do anything meaningful, but Nate made me feel better through his email. The class showed me how to gain points quickly and efficiently.

I am currently on the trip that I booked with miles and points. For our honeymoon, we went to Greece. We flew from a small airport 20 minutes from my house to Athens with American Airlines. American Airlines runs offseason point discounts so it made the most sense to fly with them.

A round-trip ticket from Fort Wayne, IN to Athens, Greece would’ve cost $1,500 each. Each of our tickets cost 45,000 AA points + $150 for ROUNDTRIP!! So it cost me 90,000 AA points and $300 for both tickets instead of $3,000.

Nate’s Note: You could easily earn 90,000 American Airline miles by signing up for 2 credit cards. There are currently multiple credit cards offering generous welcome bonuses worth 50,000+ points ( more details here ). Plus, these points could be earned even quicker if both Alec and his wife signed up for the cards separately. Click here to learn how couples can maximize their miles and points.

I also signed up for the IHG One Rewards Premier Credit Card  for our time at Athens. I used 75,000 IHG points to get 4 free nights in the Crowne Plaza in Athens, and I have lounge access due to my status from that card. One night in this hotel is about $110 so I saved another $440 using points. In the Philadelphia airport, we got to experience our first ever airport lounge because the United Mileage Plus card gives 2 free one time passes. We have been very spoiled on this trip for sure.

I earned a lot of my American Airlines points between two cards: The Citi American Platinum card and the Barclays Red Aviator, and also the IHG card from Chase.

Nate’s Note: These Citi and Barclays cards no longer accept applications, but you can find other cards I highly recommend here: Top 10 Personal Travel Rewards Credit Card Offers

I earned most the points just from everyday spending and paying bills. Also, since we were planning a wedding, there were other things to buy for that. I earned most of my IHG points while booking our fancy hotel in Santorini and the flights to Santorini and back to Athens.

I redeemed the points for the flights through the AA website and same with the IHG points. For anyone looking to take a similar trip, I’d like to think the way I did it was fairly smart and the right way to do it. It was with very little out of pocket. I also have a lot of United/Chase points sitting around so if you were just to do one trip, then focus on one airline and get miles for that. I made sure I had enough for the trip and have been saving up for future trips as well.

If you want to follow my travels or just talk you can find me on Instagram @the.alec.betz .

I want to publicly say a huge thank you to Alec for taking the time to write this up and share his exact strategies with you! Hopefully, this has inspired you to start planning a trip of your own!

Reader Interactions

December 16, 2018 at 7:27 am

Enlightened

December 16, 2018 at 8:09 am

Way to go Alec and congrats on your nuptials!!

December 17, 2018 at 7:04 pm

I’m from IN as well.

How long did it take you to save up the points you used on this trip? And, were you and your wife earning the points simultaneously?

January 3, 2019 at 1:24 pm

Hey Jeff, only took me a couple months but I had an engagement ring to buy and a hotel on Santorini to buy so it helped me hit the minimum spending really quick. Your results may vary. And no it was just me earning the points. My wife didn’t know I was travel hacking to this extent until right before the honeymoon when I gave her the run down.

March 26, 2019 at 2:18 pm

Love this and am trying to plan for my honeymoon in Bali in September right now! My only hesitation is this: what does this do to your credit score? Getting all the perks seems amazing, but having however many credit cards seems like it will have a detrimental effect on your score… no?!

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Alec Burden

Profession Actor

Alec Baldwin attorneys argue damage to gun during testing was unacceptable destruction of evidence

Alec Baldwin 's defense attorneys argued Monday that damage done during FBI testing to a revolver that killed a cinematographer on the set of the Western “Rust” has stripped them of the ability to put on a proper defense at the actor's forthcoming trial, and asked a New Mexico judge to dismiss the involuntary manslaughter charge against him.

"They understood that this was potentially exculpatory evidence and they destroyed it anyway," Baldwin lawyer John Bash said during a virtual court hearing. “It’s outrageous and it requires dismissal.”

Prosecutors argued that the gun breaking into pieces during testing was “unfortunate” but that Baldwin's team still has plenty of evidence for a defense and did not meet their burden for having the case thrown out.

Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer said she expects to issue a ruling on the motion to dismiss on Friday.

During the fatal rehearsal on Oct. 21, 2021, Baldwin was pointing the gun at Halyna Hutchins on a movie-set ranch when it went off, killing her and wounding director Joel Souza , who survived.

Sheriff's investigators initially sent the revolver to the FBI only for DNA testing, but when an FBI analyst heard Baldwin say in an ABC TV interview in December that he never pulled the trigger, the agency told the local authorities they could conduct an accidental discharge test.

The FBI was told to go ahead, and tested the revolver by striking it from several angles with a rawhide mallet. One of those strikes caused the gun to break into three pieces.

The FBI had made police and prosecutors aware that the test could do major damage to the gun, which hadn't been tested by the defense, but the authorities went ahead with the test without bothering to disassemble it and photograph its parts first, thus eliminating their most critical evidence in the case, Baldwin's lawyers argued.

“We can never use our own expert to examine that firearm,” Bash said.

The prosecution argued that the gun was not destroyed as the defense said.

“The parts are still available,” special prosecutor Erlinda Johnson said. "The fact that this gun was unfortunately damaged does not deprive the defendant of ability to question the evidence."

But Baldwin's lawyers said the damage done to the top notch on the revolver's hammer rendered the most important testing impossible.

They argued that if Marlowe Sommer declined to throw out the case, she should at least not allow any of the technical gun analysis to be presented at trial.

Baldwin's attorneys gave long and probing cross-examinations to the lead detective, an FBI forensic firearm investigator and the prosecution's independent gun expert in testimony that was likely a dress rehearsal for the high profile trial, where Baldwin, who was not on the online hearing, will be appearing in person.

The special prosecutors running the case argued that those cross-examinations proved that the defense has plenty of gun evidence to work with at the trial.

“They have other reasonable available means to making their point,” Johnson said.

She added that all available evidence, from witness testimony to video of Baldwin firing the gun in movie footage, showed that the gun was in good working order on the day of the shooting, and that police had no reason to believe its internal workings could provide exonerating evidence.

Prosecutors plan to present evidence at trial that they say shows the firearm “could not have fired absent a pull of the trigger” and was working properly before the shooting.

Defense attorneys are highlighting a previously undisclosed expert analysis that outlines uncertainty about the origin of toolmarks on the gun’s firing mechanism.

Baldwin has pleaded not guilty to the involuntary manslaughter charge, which carries a maximum sentence of 18 months in prison.

Armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed was convicted in March of involuntary manslaughter for her role in the shooting and was sentenced to 18 months in prison.

On Friday, the judge denied prosecutors’ request to use immunity to compel testimony from Gutierrez-Reed at Baldwin’s trial. Her statements to investigators and workplace safety regulators will likely feature prominently in Baldwin’s trial.

Last year, special prosecutors dismissed an involuntary manslaughter charge against Baldwin, saying they were informed the gun might have been modified before the shooting and malfunctioned. But they pivoted after receiving a new analysis of the gun and successfully pursued a grand jury indictment.

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17 iconic actors who have never been nominated for Academy Awards and what they should've won for

• Donald Sutherland died in June 2024. He was 88 years old.
• Although he appeared in dozens of iconic films, he was never nominated for a competitive Oscar.
• He was in good company. There are many talented actors who have never been nominated.

Being nominated for an Academy Award is one of the highest honors an actor could receive, and winning one is a whole new level.

But there are plenty of actors who have never received an Oscar nomination, even though their work has spanned decades, is consistently great, or made hundreds of millions of dollars at the box office.

Donald Sutherland, for example, appeared in numerous Oscar-quality films throughout his career before his death in June 2024. But he only received an honorary Oscar in 2017.

He's not the only A-lister who was never recognized by the Academy.

Donald Sutherland, who died in June 2024, won an honorary Academy Award before his death but was never nominated for a competitive award.

Sutherland died at the age of 88 on June 20, 2024, just a month shy of his 89th birthday. He made his film debut 61 years ago in an uncredited role in the 1963 film "The World Ten Times Over."

Sutherland went on to appear in dozens of films, giving Oscar-worthy performances in movies like "MASH," "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," "Klute," "JFK," "Ordinary People," "Six Degrees of Separation," "Pride and Prejudice," and any of the "Hunger Games" installments — the list goes on.

Sutherland was nominated for nine  Golden Globes over the course of his career, but never an Oscar, though he was awarded an honorary Oscar in 2017.

John Goodman was nominated for a Golden Globe for "Barton Fink," and that easily could've netted him an Oscar nomination, too.

Goodman, 72, has been one of our most reliable actors for the last few decades, whether you checked in every week on " Roseanne " or stuck to his big-screen exploits.

"Barton Fink," the 1991 black comedy about a screenwriter (John Turturro) and his next-door neighbor who sells insurance (Goodman), written by the Coen Brothers, was recognized by the Academy for supporting actor, art direction, and costume design. But Goodman's turn as what you think  is Barton's nice neighbor, only to be revealed as something much more sinister, deserved more awards attention.

Goodman has also been nominated by various critics associations for "The Big Lebowski," "Argo," and most recently "10 Cloverfield Lane," which all feasibly could have earned him a nomination.

If "Crash" was always going to win best picture, the Academy could've at least nominated Thandiwe Newton.

"Crash," released in 2004, is one of the most infamous (and perhaps undeserving) best picture winners of all time. The Independent called it an "utterly tone-deaf, cloyingly sentimental ensemble film," as it only engages with racism in the most surface-level way.

So, why should Newton, 51, have been nominated? Because she plays a young Black woman who is sexually assaulted by a white racist cop played by Matt Dillon — but only Dillon was nominated for an Academy Award, even though most of the emotional burden of the film rests on Newton's shoulders.

She received many other precursor awards for the film, including a BAFTA, an Empire Award, and multiple other nominations.

But, if you want to forget "Crash" exists altogether, Newton could've also been nominated for "Beloved," "The Pursuit of Happyness," or even 2022's "God's Country."

David Oyelowo's snub for "Selma" still stings, 10 years later.

That Oyelowo, 48, wasn't even nominated  for playing Martin Luther King Jr. remains one of the biggest Oscar snubs of all time, as he had been nominated for a Critics' Choice Award, a Golden Globe, an Independent Spirit Award, and a Satellite Award, and won an NAACP Award, for his performance as the activist.

But Oyelowo has turned in multiple other exemplary performances over the years, including in "The Butler," "Queen of Katwe," and "Middle of Nowhere."

It takes a lot for a rom-com to be recognized at the Oscars, but at least two of Meg Ryan's rom-com roles are Oscar-worthy.

" When Harry Met Sally... " is arguably the first modern romantic comedy, and anything that's come after has been in its shadow. Much of its enduring power comes from the sparkling screen presence of Ryan, who plays Sally across a decade of her life, from recent college grad to disillusioned single 30-something New Yorker.

After she was snubbed for that, Ryan, 62, appeared in "Sleepless in Seattle" and " You've Got Mail ," which also depend on Ryan's likability to really work.

But if rom-coms aren't your speed, she also appeared in "Courage Under Fire," which is classic Oscar-bait, and Ryan's performance could've been recognized.

Ryan's "When Harry Met Sally..." co-star Billy Crystal has never been nominated either, though he's hosted the show nine times.

Crystal is an iconic comedian and actor. He's won five Emmy Awards from dozens of nominations, has a Tony Award, and multiple Grammy and Golden Globe nominations. He's also universally acknowledged as one of the best hosts of the Academy Awards , a role he's had nine times.

However, he's never been nominated for an Oscar himself. If Meg Ryan deserved an Oscar nomination for "When Harry Met Sally...," so did Crystal, 76.

Crystal also could've credibly been nominated for "City Slickers" or even " Monsters, Inc. " if the Academy recognized comedy and voice-over performances the way they should.

Daniel Craig is two-for-two on Golden Globe nominations for playing Benoit Blanc, but he still hasn't secured an Oscar nomination.

Craig's iconic Southern accent is Oscar-worthy enough, but in "Knives Out" and " Glass Onion " the 56-year-old is basically unrecognizable as the same guy who played James Bond for 15 years. He also pretty much holds both films together as an audience surrogate, peering into the lifestyles of the rich and famous, while simultaneously trying to solve a murder.

But, Craig arguably could've scored a nod from the Academy for 2006's "Casino Royale" as well, ushering in a new era for 007 and starring in a legitimately terrific film to boot.

Danny Glover won an honorary humanitarian award from the Academy in 2021, but his acting deserves recognition, too.

Realistically, Glover, 77, was never going to win an Oscar for playing Roger Murtaugh in the "Lethal Weapon" franchise, even if he probably deserves it.

But he's been in  so many  phenomenal movies over the course of his career, including "Dreamgirls," "The Last Black Man in San Francisco," "Beloved," "To Sleep with Anger," "The Royal Tenenbaums," "Sorry to Bother You," "The Dead Don't Die," and more. We're so lucky to have Glover as a movie star — the Academy should take notice.

Somehow, Isabella Rossellini has never been nominated for an Oscar.

If the Oscars created an award for voice acting, perhaps the 72-year-old would've made it a few years ago for her heartbreaking performance as Connie in "Marcel the Shell with Shoes On." But alas, they don't have that category yet.

But Rossellini should've been celebrated for other roles, like her iconic performance as the mysterious lounge singer Dorothy in " Blue Velvet ," or even in the camp classic "Death Becomes Her."

We'd say Ewan McGregor's biggest snub is for "Trainspotting," though the Scottish actor has proven himself a movie star time and time again.

McGregor has two Golden Globe movie nominations under his belt, for "Moulin Rouge!" (which also could've been an Oscar-nominated role) and for "Salmon Fishing in the Yemen."

But we'd say McGregor, 53, deserves the Oscar for bursting onto the scene in 1996 playing heroin addict Mark Renton in " Trainspotting ." If "Trainspotting" had been released in 2024, McGregor would've arguably made the cut, but the film was a little too indie, nihilistic, and ahead of its time to get recognized.

Somehow, Martin Sheen has never been nominated for an Oscar nor did he win an Emmy for "The West Wing."

We'd contend that Sheen, 83, should've been nominated for the Vietnam War epic " Apocalypse Now ," for which he was nominated for a BAFTA. Sheen basically carries the movie, as he plays Captain Benjamin Willard, whom the movie follows as he makes his way through Vietnam on a mission.

He's also great in "The Departed," which is full of A-listers like Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Alec Baldwin, Vera Farmiga, and Jack Nicholson. You even could've thrown him a supporting nod for stealing scenes in "Catch Me If You Can," which also stars DiCaprio, alongside Tom Hanks.

While Sheen's biggest contributions now are on TV, between " The West Wing " and "Grace and Frankie," he's had a successful movie career and deserves recognition.

Claire Danes provided an Oscar-worthy performance in "Little Women" as Beth.

Danes, 45, is also predominantly a TV star now after "Homeland," "The Essex Serpent," "Fleishman Is in Trouble," and even "My So-Called Life," but she was turning in solid performances in the '90s on screen, most notably in the 1994 remake of "Little Women" — only Winona Ryder as Jo was recognized by the Academy — and the 1996 Baz Luhrmann adaptation of "Romeo + Juliet."

Idris Elba deservedly had Oscars buzz for "Beasts of No Nation" in 2015, but his performance didn't make the cut.

Elba, 51, is a star. He was a star on "The Wire," in "Luther," and even in terrible horror movies like "Prom Night."

But in 2015, when he starred in "Beasts of No Nation," a film about a young African boy who becomes a child soldier in his country's civil war, it seemed like the Academy should take notice. He was nominated for a Golden Globe, a SAG Award, and a BAFTA, but Oscar voters snubbed him.

Since then, Elba has continued to generate buzz, for appearances in films like "Molly's Game," "The Harder They Fall," and "Three Thousand Years of Longing," but "Beasts of No Nation" remains his peak.

We're still upset Pam Grier was snubbed for "Jackie Brown."

Grier has had a decades-long career in Hollywood, first appearing in many blaxploitation films in the '70s before being truly celebrated for her talent in Quentin Tarantino's love letter to blaxploitation in 1997's "Jackie Brown."

Grier, 75, plays the title character Jackie, a smuggler and flight attendant who is not  to be messed with. While she and her costar Samuel L. Jackson were both nominated for Golden Globes, this was before every Tarantino movie was nominated for at least two or three Oscars, and the two were snubbed.

Like Meg Ryan, Hugh Grant wasn't nominated for any of the three iconic rom-coms he starred in.

"Notting Hill," "About a Boy," and "Four Weddings and a Funeral" are all some of the best examples of romantic comedies ever. But Grant's performances were snubbed by the Academy, whether he played the nerdy (yet sweet) owner of a travel bookstore, a womanizing man-child who bonds with an actual  child, or a hopeless romantic who keeps trying to run into a specific woman at various weddings.

Both " Four Weddings and a Funeral " and "About a Boy" were nominated for other Oscars, but Grant was snubbed.

Grant, 63, also should've been nominated for his iconic performance in "Paddington 2," but we digress.

It's hard to believe Jim Carrey wasn't nominated for "The Truman Show," "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," or "Man on the Moon."

You might be racing to Google to double-check that Carrey, 62, has never been nominated for an Academy Award. You're probably thinking that surely he was nominated for playing Truman Burbank, the unsuspecting reality star who begins thinking his entire life is a lie — he definitely deserved a nomination for that, if not a win.

But, somehow, it's true. Although Carrey took home back-to-back Golden Globes for "The Truman Show" and the Andy Kaufman biopic "Man on the Moon," he didn't receive a nod from the Academy for either.

His "Eternal Sunshine" co-star Kate Winslet received an Oscar nomination for the film, but Carrey was once again snubbed.

Jennifer Lopez should've been nominated for "Hustlers," period.

Lopez is one of Hollywood's truest triple threats: She can act, sing, and dance. But while she's been nominated for multiple Grammys and danced her way across the stage at the Super Bowl Halftime Show, the 54-year-old has never been nominated for an Academy Award.

That should've changed with 2019's "Hustlers," in which Lopez plays Ramona, a veteran NYC stripper who begins an operation of ripping off her rich clients by drugging and then stealing from them. She received tons of Oscar buzz , plenty of precursor nominations and wins, including a Golden Globe nomination, but she didn't make the final five that year.

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Moscow’s industrial heritage 'at risk' in rush to redevelop old Soviet sites

The former ZiL car factory is the latest to undergo a major redevelopment as part of a city-wide project to transform derelict industrial areas – but campaigners are concerned their unique architectural heritage is under threat

A warning scrawled on a wall in the dismantled press shop of the former ZiL auto factory still reads: “Don’t smoke, fine 100 roubles.”

This wall is all that’s left to remind visitors of when the press shop, built in 1935, was part of the 400-hectare Soviet industrial hub – a “city within a city” which enjoyed its own cafeterias, barber shop, bus line and fire department. At one point, 100,000 proletarians laboured here to put together trucks that could be found at almost every collective farm, as well as deluxe armoured limousines that carried the Soviet leadership.

After falling into debt and disrepair in the past two decades, part of ZiL will once again become a city within a city ; only this time one of upscale apartment blocks, boutique shops, schools, a riverside park, concert hall and branch of St Petersburg’s famous Hermitage museum. It will all be designed by leading Russian and foreign architects and integrated into wider Moscow by 26 new streets.

This 65-hectare ZiLArt project is part of a push by the Moscow government to encourage redevelopment of industrial zones, which make up 13% of the city’s territory.

Though these projects are vital to making the city more comfortable for living, some architects, historians and activists have raised concerns about preservation at ZiL and other sites, since many Soviet factory structures were built by groundbreaking constructivist architects or have historical significance. Only the five-storey facade of the press shop – notable for a grid of small glass planes contrasting with its four looming concrete entrances – will be retained. The Meganom architectural bureau will build four 20-storey glass residential towers behind it.

According to Marina Khrustalyova, coordinator of the preservation group Arkhnadzor , nine-tenths of the historic buildings in the ZiLArt part of the industrial area are being torn down. Developer LSR Group said the fire station and the facades of the press shop, and possibly other buildings along Vesnin Brothers Prospect, which ZiLArt renamed for the pioneering constructivist architects who designed ZiL general plan, will be saved.

“It’s this kind of compromise, and you can say there’s some preservation, but it’s not real local memory, it’s not real preservation,” Khrustalyova said.

The largest city in Europe, Moscow is infamous for its traffic jams, expensive housing and crowded public transport. It ranked 167th out of 230 cities in this year’s quality of living index by the consulting firm Mercer. And at the heart of its terrible congestion is the fact that up to 45% of workplaces are located in the city centre, which is surrounded by a “rust belt” of little-used industrial areas and then an endless sea of residential high-rises.

This summer, Moscow began a 120bn-rouble (£1.4bn) renovation of a million square metres of streets, and it plans to build more than 70 new subway stations by 2020. But to truly free up the gridlock, it will also have to develop new business hubs and transportation options outside the downtown.

Redeveloping Soviet industrial zones in particular will “deconcentrate the centre and create a multifunctional urban plan”, Moscow chief architect Sergei Kuznetsov said on an excursion during the Moscow Urban Forum in June. To this end, the city is spending 100bn roubles on the Moscow Ring Railway project to repurpose railroads between the rust belt factories for public use, which will open this autumn.

“There’s no transport [in industrial zones], they aren’t working, there aren’t good roads there, no workplaces, they aren’t paying much in taxes, so it’s a wasteland and a burden on city,” said Marat Khusnullin, deputy mayor for urban development and construction.

Of 9 million square metres of real estate put into exploitation in Moscow in 2015, 2.2 million was in former industrial areas, according to city hall. At least 2 million more will be built in these areas in 2016. The biggest project under way is the redevelopment of the Hammer and Sickle , a former steel factory that at 87 hectares is twice the size of the Vatican, by a consortium of Dutch and Russian architects. It will be mainly new construction, although the architects have promised to preserve the street network and some of the factory buildings.

The most celebrated redevelopment projects, such as the Sulzerareal former steel plant in Winterthur, Switzerland, or London’s Tate Modern , hinge on the “adaptive reuse” of existing structures, rather than demolishing them. Several such projects in Moscow have become creative clusters and nightlife hotspots in recent years, including wine factory Winzavod , pressure gauge manufactory Artplay, and chocolate factory Red October. Rem Koolhaas’ Garage Museum of Contemporary Art in Gorky Park set a new high point for adaptive reuse last year, covering a voluminous Soviet restaurant with a shimmering polycarbonate skin while preserving mosaics, tiles and brick inside.

But due to their gigantic size, reviving the Soviet-era industrial zones in the rust belt will require more time and money.

Other potential complications include ground pollution – ZiLArt representatives said they had to remove at least two metres of contaminated topsoil – and corruption, for which the real estate business is notorious. In addition, obtaining legal permission for large, complex redevelopment projects has been problematic in the past. Yet Khusnullin said a law passed in June, which allows the authorities to confiscate any industrial zone if at least 50% of the territory holds unapproved structures or is not being exploited for its original purpose, will alleviate this.

The biggest concern by far is preservation. Cavernous Soviet factory buildings don’t typically lend themselves to new uses without significant reconstruction, tempting investors to knock them down and build something more profitable in their place.

Moscow already has a poor track record in this area, and Soviet avant-garde architecture is especially under threat. Most recently, the Taganka telephone exchange building, a constructivist landmark from 1929, was torn down to make way for a luxury flat and hotel complex despite local protests and international condemnation .

LSR Group is now tearing down more structures after purchasing two large sections of ZiL from the city to build ZiLArt, which will include apartment blocks designed by several architectural bureaus, as well as a 140,000 sq ft Hermitage branch and a 490 ft retail and residential tower designed by New York-based Asymptote. The city is financing infrastructure like a metro station, schools and a reconstruction of the bank of the Moscow river that will open it for public use. LSR Group will invest 135bn roubles in the project.

Eugene Asse, the founder of the March architecture school, called ZiLArt an “attempt at a good compromise” between preservation and profit, but highlighted doubts about how much will be preserved.

“It’s indeed more destructive than expected,” he said. “The developer always wins even though it seemed at beginning that culture would win, but we’ll see.”

Asymptote’s Hani Rashid said the ZiLArt project honoured Soviet constructivism without taking the “Disneyland approach” of total preservation.

“An intelligent respect is needed to convert these buildings, reconstructing them but not making them relics, and integrating them into the city,” he said.

Meganom’s Yury Grigoryan said that the press shop was “difficult to save” due to bad materials and weak construction, but argued that keeping parts of it intact could encourage preservation as more of ZiL is developed. Already the factory’s fire station is planned to be converted into a kindergarten by acclaimed architect Alexander Brodsky.

“There’s lots of glass, so there isn’t much body to the building. We took it to show that we can preserve the facade,” Grigoryan said. “People should like the result, we hope then there will be more enthusiasm to preserve buildings.”

Khrustalyova gave Grigoryan credit for saving at least the facade of the press shop, but argued the demolition of ZiL structures against preservation promises made during public hearings about the territory’s development, which were held by the city before LSR’s ZiLArt project appeared. According to her, part of Moscow’s heritage has been lost.

“The fact they tore them down is not against the law, but everyone involved in this project knows that from experts’ point of view these buildings had architectural and historical value, and it was possible to implement adaptive reuse,” she said.

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