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On Tuesday, the Vatican released its first public tally of priests it has laicized (defrocked) or otherwise sanctioned for sexually abusing children. Over the last 10 years, Archbishop Silvano Tomasi said, the Holy See has defrocked 848 priests and otherwise punished another 2,572. These are just the cases handled by the Vatican, not individual diocesan tribunals, so the actual global number of sanctioned priests is higher.
The occasion for this exercise in transparency? Tomasi, the Vatican ambassador to the U.N., was appearing before the U.N. committee overseeing how signatories of the U.N. anti-torture treaty — including the Vatican — are implementing that treaty. The committee is considering trying to classify the rape of minors as torture, a decision that, among other things, could provide another potential avenue for litigation by victims of clergy sex abuse.
The lesser penalties the Vatican hands down to accused priests can include a lifetime of penance and prayer in an isolated facility with no contact with children — a sanction, The Associated Press says, that is typically reserved for elderly or infirm priests. Abuse victims' groups welcomed the new numbers, but said they also want names and locations.
"Given where the church came from — with the pendulum swung squarely to the side of the accused priest whose explanations were almost always believed — this is a move away from that and more toward giving credibility to victims, which is progress," Nicholas Cafardi, a canon lawyer who led the U.S. Catholic bishops' abuse-monitoring board, tells the AP. "Maybe not perfect progress, but progress." Peter Weber
Former child star Justin Bieber reportedly rejected an offer of $5 million to perform at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland this month. The pitch came from GOP donors who presumably wanted to match the saturation of Hollywood stars at the Democratic National Convention the following week.
Though an event coordinator suggested Bieber's appearance would be "not political," TMZ reports that Bieber's manager, Scooter Braun, a Hillary Clinton backer, believed it would be "100 percent political."
Though the offer would have been Bieber's largest single payday ever, perhaps it's a good thing the deal never materialized given the GOP's choice of Donald Trump for its presidential nominee. After all, Bieber is an immigrant from Canada, and if he can be taken as a representative figure, it really seems like "they're not sending their best," as Trump himself would say. Bonnie Kristian
A hot air balloon carrying at least 16 people caught fire and crashed into a pasture in Texas Saturday morning, federal officials told the Associated Press. The crash happened near a small city called Lockhart in Caldwell County south of Austin around 7:40 a.m. Central time. There were no survivors.
Terrible. TX authorities say - no survivors of a hot air balloon crash in #Lockhart. 16 people on board. #breaking pic.twitter.com/38S0B0YDyM
— Alexa Conomos (@WFAAalexa) July 30, 2016
The Texas Department of Public Safety initially announced multiple fatalities, and Caldwell County later confirmed all the passengers were killed. "Investigators are determining the number and the identities of victims at this time," said the local sheriff, Daniel Law. Agents of the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board are headed to the site of the incident.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott released a statement Saturday morning extending his "deepest condolences" and asking his state to join in prayer for those who were lost.
This post has been updated throughout. Bonnie Kristian
About two years after Russia's much-disputed annexation of the Crimean Peninsula of Ukraine, the Ukrainian parliament passed a "de-communization" law which changed a number of location and street names from their Soviet-era titles. The law included Crimea, even though many now regard it as de facto Russian territory.
But on Thursday, Google Maps decided to take Ukraine's side, switching out names of Russian origin for the traditionally Crimean labels. Inevitably, the Russians noticed — and they were pissed.
The staff of Google Maps "suffer from topographical cretinism," charged Dmitry Polonsky, deputy chair of the Russian Council of Crimean Ministers, while Crimean Prime Minister Sergei Aksyonov of the Russian Unity Party accused Google of being "Russophobic." More seriously, Russian Communications Minister Nikolai Nikiforov suggested Moscow might "not allow [Google] to effectively conduct business" in his country if the names weren't switched back.
And the next day, they were — for the Ukrainian and Russian versions of Google Maps alike. Google confirmed the reversal to the press but did not offer any explanation. Bonnie Kristian
Researchers from Britain have taught an 11-year-old orangutan named Rocky at the Indianapolis Zoo to imitate human speech in a conversational context. This is the first time an ape has demonstrated such ability, and the scientists involved say Rocky's skills could offer important insight into the development of human language.
"This opens up the potential for us to learn more about the vocal capacities of early hominids that lived before the split between the orangutan and human lineages," said lead researcher Adriano Lameria. While it was previously assumed great apes could not intentionally modulate their sounds, Lameria said, this "research proves that orangutans have the potential capacity to control the action of their voices."
Watch a video of Rocky "talking" below, but don't expect Shakespeare: His vocabulary appears to be limited to one word, "hi," and it sounds more like "huh." Bonnie Kristian
Nearly 4,300 firefighters on central California's Big Sur coast continue to battle the Soberanes Wildfire, a raging blaze that has spread to cover about 50 square miles (or 32,000 acres).
The fire began last Friday and is mostly located in the drought-ridden Los Padres National Forest, but it has destroyed 57 homes and caused multiple parks to close. As of Saturday, the fire is just 15 percent contained as "high temperatures [and] rugged, steep terrain" make firefighters' work difficult.
Watch a time-lapse video of the Soberanes Wildfire's spread below. Bonnie Kristian
1 week time lapse of the #SoberanesFire - now larger than the city of San Francisco at 31,386 acres. pic.twitter.com/P9p7bLMel9
— CAL FIRE (@CAL_FIRE) July 29, 2016
Representatives of billionaire industrialist brothers Charles and David Koch continue to turn down meeting requests from major fundraisers of the Donald Trump campaign, even after Trump formally claimed the Republican nomination for president.
A pro-Trump cadre reportedly lobbied for a conversation between the brothers and their candidate on Friday, when all three happened to be in Colorado Springs at once, but the Kochs firmly declined. Their disinterest is not surprising, as an unnamed senior Koch official predicted in February that should the election come down to Trump vs. Hillary Clinton, the Kochs might well sit this one out.
Indeed, the brothers have been consistently critical of Trump's candidacy, with Charles in April calling Trump's Muslim registry proposal "reminiscent of Nazi Germany," "monstrous," and "frightening." He has also described choosing between Trump and Clinton as picking "cancer or a heart attack" and labeled Trump's principles "antithetical" to his own. Bonnie Kristian
Republican Donald Trump took a six-point national lead over Democrat Hillary Clinton in at least two polls, from CNN and The Los Angeles Times, immediately following his nomination at his party's convention in Cleveland last week. But that polling bump has since evaporated, as a new Reuters survey finds Clinton is now six points ahead after her own convention.
Meanwhile, a Real Clear Politics average of multiple recent polls puts Trump and Clinton in a dead heat — each claiming 44.3 percent national support — as of Friday. It likewise records the disappearance of Trump's brief lead, which marked only the second time he has ever pulled into first place throughout the whole election cycle per that calculation. See the history of their matchup below. Bonnie Kristian


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Madden NFL 2003
- Released on Aug 19, 2002
- By Electronic Arts for PC, PS2, Xbox, GBA, GC
Madden NFL 2003 review
The good:
Madden 2003 delivers
-the all new Mini Camp feature which is the best addition to the Madden series in years
-being able to make your player perfect unlike in other sports games
-the soundtrack is cooler than it was before with many up to date hit songs.
-i would like to be able to feel a big hit more than you would in Madden to give a good feel about tacklingSummary:
Madden 2003 keeps up its title as the best Pro Football game series for now. Madden has done it again by adding Mini Camp giving you options that you simply could not duplicate in just practice. Running the ball is still the best enjoyable way of moving the offense but passing is becoming more fun that it used to be. A thing that i would like to see in the future is a greater tutorial on defense, the pass particularly since it is always tricky like when it is right to press a button and which ones. All in all this is a classic game and i hope Madden 2004 is just as good.
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