Latest news with #Malinowski
Spectator
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Spectator
9 August 2025
After an enjoyable week playing in the European Transnational Championships in Poznan recently (the Mixed Teams), I had time to spare before catching my flight home. The Open Teams had just begun, so I decided to kibitz for a while. I chose to sit behind the iconic Swedish player Peter Fredin, who I've been following keenly ever since he opened a strong No Trump against me with nul points many years ago. My partner and I never guessed we were cold for a grand slam. I soon found out that he was famous for his uncanny ability to read both cards and players. Opponents aren't even safe saying 'Thank you' when dummy goes down: he'll glean some information from the way they say it. He was partnering Artur Malinowski, another player with fantastic imagination and flair. It was a promising combination, and I wasn't disappointed. On this deal, Malinowski was South. Put yourself in his shoes: Being green vs red, you'd like to make a Michaels cue-bid showing both majors – but not at the seven-level. Most other Wests also opened 5♣️, quite a few Easts raised to 6♣️, and in both cases, the majority of Souths passed. Some Souths doubled, but were left regretting it when their partners passed (6♣️ was cold). One South bid a fearless 6♥️. Malinowski's choice? A brilliant 6♦️! He knew he'd be doubled. His plan was to redouble. He was confident that Fredin would be on the same wavelength, and realise it was an SOS, showing the other two suits. He was right: West doubled, Malinowski redoubled, and Fredin pulled to 6♥️, which East doubled. Three down was -500, a great score compared to -1370. Only one other brave South (a top Swedish player) bid 6♦️, but when he then redoubled, his partner passed. Minus 4000 is a score neither will forget in a hurry.
Politico
29-07-2025
- Politics
- Politico
How the War of the Words in Gaza Makes It Harder To Save Lives
Under President Joe Biden, when the U.N. and partner agencies appeared close to declaring a famine had taken hold in Gaza, the U.S. officials who wanted to push Israel to limit its attacks and let in more humanitarian aid would get the edge in the debate, two former U.S. officials familiar with the conversations told me. The new pressure on Israel would work, and more food would reach Palestinians. But it meant there was no famine declaration. That then gave the upper hand in the debate to more hawkish U.S. officials, who used the absence of the 'famine' label to argue for going easier on the Israelis. The cycle would then repeat itself, the former officials said. I granted anonymity to many of the people I spoke to so they could be candid about sensitive deliberations and because, in some cases, they need to keep good relations with various governments involved in conflicts. The use of the word 'genocide' in the Gaza conflict has been especially fraught. Almost since the start of the war, pro-Palestinian activists have accused Israel of committing genocide against the people in Gaza. In the many months since, even some genocide scholars have come to the same conclusion. This week, two Israeli human rights groups made the same allegation. 'Genocide' is a legal concept defined by international agreements and, in some countries, national laws. It is generally considered the gravest offense humans can commit against other humans. The intent of an accused perpetrator is a critical factor taken into consideration when jurists try to determine if a genocide took place, and traditionally, the bar has been high for groups to be labeled as victims of genocide. In recent years, however, many groups who have suffered atrocities have laid claim to that word. They include the victims of the Islamic State, the Uyghurs in China, and the Rohingya of Myanmar. Some Ukrainians have alleged Russia is pursuing genocide against them, while Russia counters that Kyiv has engaged in genocide against Russian speakers in eastern Ukraine. Activists who push to use the term 'genocide' often seem to suggest that if any label short of that is used, it means that a group's suffering doesn't matter. This is unfortunate, Malinowski and others say, because other legal terms that could apply, such as 'war crimes' or 'crimes against humanity,' are still very grave offenses whose perpetrators should be held accountable. A government's decision to accuse another country of genocide often comes down to politics. Israel has far broader, deeper support in Washington than countries such as Myanmar or China. It also bears the history of the genocide of the Holocaust, one reason Israeli leaders are infuriated at growing claims that they are waging genocide against the Palestinians. Israeli leaders argue that Hamas' desire to wipe out Israel is itself an attempt at genocide of the Jewish people. Israel also says it is not deliberately attacking the Palestinian people as a whole. But that becomes harder to argue when civilians are dying both from hunger and what critics say is excessive use of force.
Press and Journal
10-07-2025
- Press and Journal
Teen drug-driver pulled into pregnant woman's path on A96
A teenager who pulled into the path of a pregnant driver on the A96 was under the influence of drugs at the time. Fabian Malinowski failed to stop his car at Inverness' Barn Church Road junction, causing a crash with a vehicle doing 60mph and being driven by a mother-to-be. When police arrived at the crash scene, they noted Malinowski's glazed eyes and slurred speech and carried out a drugs wipe. It came back positive for cocaine. Malinowski, now 22, appeared at Inverness Sheriff Court for sentencing having previously admitted causing serious injury by dangerous driving as well as two drug-driving charges. Fiscal depute Pauline Gair told the court that it was around 8pm on January 14 of 2023 when Malinowski picked up a female front-seat passenger at her home in his white Vauxhall Astra. The pair had collected friends of Malinowski and travelled to Nairn and then back to Inverness, dropping them off before collecting another rear seat passenger. At the same time, a pregnant woman was travelling east on the A96, driving her partner and friends home from a night out in a VW Tiguan. On the approach to the Barn Church Road she spotted Malinowski's car travelling toward the A96. 'She believed the accused's vehicle would come to a stop as it was required to, so she continued travelling at 60mph,' Mrs Gair told the court. Malinowski's car, however, did not stop and 'drove into her path', resulting in a collision that activated both cars' airbags and caused substantial damage. Malinowski and his front-seat passenger were both knocked out by the impact. He was found in the driver's seat of the Astra with his seatbelt fastened. When approached by police officers, Malinowski's eyes were glazed and his speech was slurred. He 'kept asking if he had crashed'. His rear seat passenger was able to extract himself from the vehicle, but the female in the front seat had blood on her face and had suffered three broken bones in her pelvis. A number of the occupants of the other vehicle reported symptoms as a result of the crash and were taken to Raigmore Hospital, but were not seriously injured. The 26-week pregnant driver underwent an emergency scan as a result of the crash. The charge details that subsequent testing showed Malinowski to have 59 microgrammes of the cocaine metabolite Benzoylecgonine, and 37 microgrammes of methylamphetamine in his system. This exceeded the respective drug-drive limits of 50mcg for the former and 10mcg for the latter. Solicitor advocate Shahid Latif, for Malinowski, told the court that his client's behaviour at the time had been 'impulsive and reckless' – highlighting that Malinowski had lacked maturity and consequential thinking. He said: 'At the time of this offence he was 19 years old- he is now 22.' Mr Latif said Malinowski had since 'shied away from the use of intoxicants' and had 'expressed the appropriate sentiments'. He said: 'He has come to realise, frankly, that he is fortunate that the consequence of his conduct wasn't much more serious than it was.' Sheriff David Harvie told Malinowski: 'You are incredibly fortunate that you are in this court and not in the High Court and that no one was killed. 'Driving as you did that day, under the influence, is of the utmost seriousness.' 'People were seriously injured and, as I said, you were very lucky that they weren't killed.' He placed Malinowski on a community payback order as a direct alternative to custody. The order requires that he complete two years of social work supervision and 300 hours of unpaid work in the community. He is further required to submit to an electronic curfew to remain within his home address from 7pm to 7am for three months. Sheriff Harvie also banned Malinowski from the roads for three years, after which he will need to sit and pass the extended test before getting back behind the wheel.
CNBC
24-06-2025
- Business
- CNBC
This summer expense could cost you around $200 a month—6 tips to save
A rise in natural-gas prices and other factors will make air conditioning particularly pricey for Americans this summer, according to the Energy Information Administration's Short-Term Energy Outlook. The surge is expected to bring AC costs up by about 4%, costing the average American home around $186 a month, according to The Wall Street Journal. New England residents are expected to face even higher charges, the Journal reports, with average monthly bills reaching around $200. A higher-than-expected AC bill can sneak up on you. And while this summer's 4% uptick may not seem significant in comparison to other prices on the rise, it can interfere with your plans to allocate your summer spending elsewhere. Experts say there are ways to save while still staying cool this summer. Here are their top tips. Hot air seeping inward and cool air leaking outward can "destabilize the whole system," says Piero Caballero, senior product manager at Johnson Controls, a technology and energy company. To prevent leaks, Caballero suggests scanning your doors and windows to look for gaps and cracks where air could potentially get through — especially if you live in an older home. Tapes designed to seal those leaks can be a quick, cost-effective solution, Caballero says. For a more comprehensive fix, "the best thing" homeowners can do is pursue a professional home energy audit for a thorough assessment of cracks, gaps and leaks, says Matt Malinowski, building program director at the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy. The price of an audit typically ranges from $300 to $500, but varies greatly depending on the size and location of your home as well as the type of test needed, Malinowski says. You may also be eligible for a $150 tax credit to help cover the costs, he added. Using a fan to make yourself feel cooler can allow you to reduce the temperature on your thermostat during peak hours of the day, Caballero says. Fans don't use as much electricity as an AC system, Caballero says, so you don't need to worry that plugging one in will drive up your bill. Malinowski adds that it's important to remember "fans don't cool space, they cool people," so they should always be switched off when you leave a room. Just like a car parked in the sun on a hot day, your home can heat up if you don't close your blinds while you're away, Malinowski says. If you're a homeowner with long-term environmental and budget sustainability goals, you may also want to consider planting trees that can provide natural shade and reduce heat, he adds. Major appliances like your dryer, oven and dishwasher may produce more heat than you realize, Malinowski says, so it's best to keep them off during the hottest hours of the day unless you want your AC to work overtime. Instead, consider cost-effective methods that leverage the summer heat — like using a clothesline instead of the dryer, Malinowski says. You can help your AC system work most optimally by changing the filter on it every one to three months, depending on the specific system's needs, Caballero says. "If you have a filter that is not clean it's going to put a lot of stress on your system," Caballero says, which means the AC will consume more energy and the system won't last as long. Adding a visit from a professional technician to your annual maintenance checklist can also help you address system issues preemptively, Caballero says, preventing major breakdowns. Smart thermostats can "do the work for you" by programming to turn on and off based on your schedule, Caballero says. If you have the option, you can purchase a smart thermostat for anywhere between $100 and $150, Malinowski says. If you're moving into a new home and shopping around for heating and cooling systems, Malinowski suggests heat pumps as an alternative to central AC systems. Heat pumps "can run in both directions," Malinowski says, providing you cooling in the summer and heating in the winter. Although they usually come with higher upfront costs than air conditioners, combining both your heating and cooling into one system can save you money long-term, he adds. Heat pump systems are also more eco-friendly, Malinowski says, which can be a plus for those looking not only to save money, but also to live more sustainably.
Technical.ly
29-05-2025
- Business
- Technical.ly
This founder believes Ukraine is the place to soft-launch a prosthetic knee
/ As the war rages on in Ukraine, a founder from Northern Virginia is raising money to launch her prosthetic knee technology in the country. Sarah Malinowski, 27, is the founder and CEO of Seamless Transition in Rosslyn. She's developing prosthetic knees that resemble the curvature of human ones to mimic natural movement, unlike the standard prosthetic that allows for limited motion and can cause pain. In 2023, Malinowski met with staff at the Virginia Innovation Partnership Corporation, who asked if current wars still cause lower leg amputations. She didn't immediately know the answer, but decided to meet with refugees in Poland to learn more. After an old friend got her across the border to Ukraine, where she spoke with hospitalized warfighters, she quickly learned the necessity of what she was building. 'It was a weird, unfortunate, right time-right place,' Malinowski told 'But if this is a way that we can help them, then I'm all for it.' Although she registered the product in the US with the Food and Drug Administration, Malinowski, who started Seamless Transition in 2022, is planning a soft launch in Ukraine later this year. To make it happen, she's raising $250,000 starting in June. For latest edition of How I Got Here, Malinowski outlined her inspiration for Seamless Transition, reasons for soft-launching in a war-plagued country and advice to fellow founders. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity. How did your career begin? I have my undergrad in mechanical engineering, and while I was doing that bachelor's in Minnesota, I was working at a prosthetic clinic. That's what inspired me to do this prosthetic: All these people came in and kept telling me all the ways that it didn't work, even though they were wearing the top-line things. As the engineering student, I was like, 'This can be fixed. This is the 21st century.' I worked in industry for about a year, and then I want[ed] to do what I've been so passionate about doing. I started my master's degree at George Washington University in biomedical engineering, and dedicated the thesis to the design of this prosthetic. What was your first job in tech? During my undergrad, I did internships at a foundry in Minnesota, in the small town of Le Sueur, and we did aluminum castings. It was really cool to see the manufacturing side, which definitely helps me now when we're talking about manufacturing this device. I know hands-on what goes into creating these types of products. How did your company start? The inspiration came from when I was an undergrad, meeting these people. I've always maintained that passion. Then, when I came to GW, I was actually doing interviews. I didn't even know that customer discovery [was] a thing you do in business. I just thought, 'Let me interview some veterans.' One of them told me, 'Hey, you should check out the Office of Innovation Entrepreneurship, you should talk to one of the mentors. You should get involved.' I started meeting with Bob Smith, who's now the head of that department, and he helped me all the way through the idea phase. I got about an entire year to get the idea and concept really molded before I jumped in and started doing the design and research on my master's thesis. I went through their pitch competition, their new venture competition, where I won $27,000 — that was a great start. Where are you now with Seamless Transition? We have the initial prototype completed. We have the MVP, which is great. What we're working on doing is a soft launch in Ukraine. We have all of the computer testing data. We are FDA-registered as a Class II device, 510(k)-exempt. It doesn't have any claims on it yet because we haven't done any clinical trials on it. In Ukraine, we're unable to do anything that would be FDA-approved, as far as we wouldn't be able to submit it for approval because it's not in America. But we would like to do small-scope testing in Ukraine [to confirm] all of the numbers that are true on the computer are true in real life, donate those 10 [devices] to those people for their time, and then continue a sale with that hospital that helped us — giving them a discounted price, that kind of thing. The goal would then be to have contract manufacturing in Ukraine. That way, we're not having to pay for the tariffs and the shipping, and keeping it as low-cost as possible for the Ukrainians. Why Ukraine? The initial people that I talked to and met back in my undergrad, when I was first meeting all these amputees, 90% of them were veterans. That really kind of hit a soft spot with me, with both my grandparents serving, a lot of great uncles serving. It hit a soft point where they would come to me and they're crying and saying that they can't go on a walk with their daughters in the woods. I was like, 'Oh my gosh, this is too much.' [My family's] originally from Poland, so I went to Poland [and] thought I would interview a bunch of the refugees. When I touched the ground there, I was at the airport, and one of my friends calls me and he's like, 'Hey, I was actually in Ukraine for the past six months teaching them medical skills. Why don't I help you? I have a great family. You can see [if] they can help you get into all these hospitals.' The next day, I was on a bus, and I walked across the border into Ukraine. That is where I met the family that has been so nice, and met other people at hospitals. What else does your day-to-day in this job encompass? It's the beginning process of raising money [for this soft launch]. I feel like this is the point of a startup that no one likes to talk about. So it's me, and I have a COO named Ash Asher. We have so many things to do all the time. I am trying to get our slide decks ready for the raise, and want to make sure that we have all of our verbiage correct. I'm just going through all the stacks, making sure it makes sense in English and Ukrainian, making sure that the hospitals understand what we're asking from them and what they're receiving from us — and being very clear on those things. It's a lot of jumping from hat to hat and switching what my role is for the day, but always maintaining connections with people. That's something almost every day — having quick touchpoints with certain people, just making sure they know that I haven't forgotten about them, that it's going to take me a little bit longer than it would if I had a team of 20 people to get this raise started. What advice do you have for fellow founders, specifically in medical technology? Meet people. Meet other people who are in the same space that can either sit with you and cry about the same things, because it's all very hard, or people who might inspire you or give you some contacts. There are hard days and there are really great days. Sometimes it'll be at noon, and you feel like you're on top of the world, and at 5 p.m., an email comes through, and now you're staying up until midnight trying to fix it. So it's a lot of high highs and low lows, but it's all worth it. What else is coming up with Seamless Transition? We've also applied for the SBIR with NIH. With that, our partners, if we get it, would be George Washington University along with the Walter Reed facility. That would be huge for us here in America. We're trying to get to market in Ukraine, but we're trying to solidify all those testing and regulation requirements here in the US through that. Having those partnerships with Walter Reed and GW would be crucial for that.
