Wednesday, May 7, 2014


News Clips For The Day


Michael Jordan Admits Racism: 'I Was Against All White People' – NBC
BY NATALIE FINN, E! ONLINE
First published May 7th 2014

Michael Jordan didn't travel the easiest of roads en route to becoming a college basketball star and an NBA legend.

And certain obstacles put a chip on his shoulder that, while it long since seems to have vanished, helped shape the athlete's drive and competitive spirit moving forward, according to "Michael Jordan: The Life," a new biography about the six-time NBA champion by sportswriter Roland Lazenby that hit shelves Tuesday.

"I considered myself a racist at the time"

Per an excerpt from the book, Jordan told Lazenby that he was suspended from school in 1977 after throwing a soda at a girl who called him the N-word.

"So I threw a soda at her," Jordan's quoted as saying. "I was really rebelling. I considered myself a racist at the time. Basically, I was against all white people."

"I've been to North Carolina hundreds of times and enjoy it tremendously, but North Carolina was a state that had more Klan members than the rest of the Southern states combined," the author said. "As I started looking at newspapers back in this era when I was putting together [Michael's great-grandfather] Dawson Jordan's life, the Klan was like a chamber of commerce. It bought the uniforms for ball teams, it put Bibles in all the schools. It may well have ended up being a chamber of commerce if not for all the violence it was perpetrating, too. A lot of the context just wasn't possible to put it in a basketball book. A lot of it ended up being cut."

Jordan's story is "an economic story," Lazenby continued. "It's a black power story. It doesn't come from politics or protests, it comes right off the Coastal Plain of North Carolina and out of the African-American experience."

Following the release online of remarks made by L.A. Clippers owner Donald Sterling in which he told friend V. Stiviano that he didn't want her posting pictures of herself with black people on Instagram or bringing black people with her to Clippers games, Jordan quickly released a statement unequivocally supporting swift and decisive action from the NBA.

"As a former player, I'm completely outraged," the NBA Hall of Famer said. "There is no room in the NBA--or anywhere else--for the kind of racism and hatred that Mr. Sterling allegedly expressed. I am appalled that this type of ignorance still exists within our country and at the highest levels of our sport. In a league where the majority of players are African-American, we cannot and must not tolerate discrimination at any level."

After NBA Commissioner Adam Silver banned Sterling for life from further association with the league and encouraged other team owners to come together to force the 80-year-old real billionaire to sell the Clippers, Jordan applauded the "swift and decisive response."

The recently remarried father of five said: "[Silver] sent a powerful message that there can be zero tolerance for racism and hatred in the NBA. I'm confident that the league, our players and our fans will move on from this stronger and more unified."




"Michael Jordan: The Life," by Roland Lazenby is available in hard cover from Amazon at the price of $27.00. If that is too high, your public library will undoubtedly soon buy the book for their shelves. Personally, I'm going to wait for my library to stock it. According to Lazenby, Jordan told him that he “was suspended from school in 1977 after throwing a soda at a girl who called him the N-word”. Jordan said that he “'...was really rebelling. I considered myself a racist at the time. Basically, I was against all white people.'" It sounds as though he later learned that his opinion was unfair, and to accept whites as equals. He certainly hasn't been known for making racist comments or generally “acting out” in other ways like some sports figures do.

The trouble with the racial divide is that there is no one in this country, especially in the south, who is completely untainted by racism. People have to step aside from their group identity and face members of the whole human race as individuals rather than as group members, but doing that takes some maturity and experience. It also takes a commitment to the goal of peace between the races.

Author Lazenby says, “...North Carolina was a state that had more Klan members than the rest of the Southern states combined... As I started looking at newspapers back in this era when I was putting together [Michael's great-grandfather] Dawson Jordan's life, the Klan was like a chamber of commerce. It bought the uniforms for ball teams, it put Bibles in all the schools. It may well have ended up being a chamber of commerce if not for all the violence it was perpetrating, too.”

About Donald Sterling's comments, Jordan says, “I am appalled that this type of ignorance still exists within our country and at the highest levels of our sport. In a league where the majority of players are African-American, we cannot and must not tolerate discrimination at any level."

Both blacks and whites have to come up to the center line and face each other as potential friends, and then step across with our hands extended. Individuals are doing that now, and have been since the 1970's and before, but my years of experience with other races began in 1965 when I went to UNC-CH. My first personal talking relationship with a black person was a woman at the public library in Durham, NC where I was working. I quickly found that she was no different from myself.




U.S. Forming 'Coordination Cell' in Nigeria to Find Abducted Girls
BY HASANI GITTENS AND CATHERINE CHOMIAK— with NBC News' Robert Windrem and Frank Thorp, and Reuters
First published May 6th 2014

American military and law-enforcement personnel will coordinate with Nigerian officials in a stepped-up effort to find nearly 300 schoolgirls who were abducted by Islamic terrorists in the country last month, President Obama and John Kerry said Tuesday.

The United States first publicly announced an offer for help last week, but on Tuesday Kerry spoke with Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan and a plan was put in action.

“So what we've done is — we have offered, and it's been accepted — help from our military and our law enforcement officials,” Obama told NBC News’ Al Roker on Tuesday. "We're going to do everything we can to provide assistance to them."

“In the short term our goal is obviously to help the international community, and the Nigerian government, as a team to do everything we can to recover these young ladies,” Obama continued. “But we're also going to have to deal with the broader problem of organizations like this, that, uh, you know, can cause such havoc in people's day-to-day lives.”

Kerry on Tuesday spoke to the president of Nigeria and offered direct, concrete help in finding the girls kidnapped from their classrooms by Boko Haram, a terror group whose name means “Western education is a sin.”

Kerry said that a joint intelligence cell would be set up at the U.S. embassy in Nigeria and would begin work "immediately."

"Our embassy in Abuja is prepared to form a coordination cell that could provide expertise on intelligence, investigations and hostage negotiations and to help facilitate information-sharing and victim assistance."

"(Nigerian) President Goodluck Jonathan was very happy to receive this offer and ready to move on it immediately," said Kerry at the press conference in Washington, D.C., with E.U. foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton. "And we are immediately engaging in order to implement this."

He added, "we remained deeply concerned about the welfare of these young girls."

When asked later by NBC News why it has taken so long to mobilize the joint effort to find the abducted girls, Kerry bristled, saying "First of all we have been in touch from Day One and our embassy has been engaged and we have been engaged, but the (Nigerian) government had its own set of strategies in the beginning."

"I think now the complications that have arisen have convinced everybody that there needs to be a greater effort ... I think you’re going to see a very, very rapid response," he said.

The "complications" that have arisen could be the reports that the group that abducted the 276 girls, Boko Haram, isselling them into slavery across the borders of Chad and Cameroon.

A senior U.S. intelligence official confirmed to NBC News that Nigeria officially asked for help on Tuesday, through the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and the FBI has been tasked with the job. The ODNI could also help with satellite imaging and electronic eavesdropping, the official said.

A second senior U.S. official confirmed that there are already U.S. intelligence assets in the region.

Among the American assets in the region are bases from which unarmed drones could fly to hunt for the missing girls and their captors.

Both officials stressed that U.S. technical assistance would be no guarantee that the girls would be found.

Carl LeVan, an assistant professor at American University in Washington, D.C., who is an expert on Boko Haram – and who spoke to President Jonathan while travelling in Nigeria last month – said he believed the new air of cooperation could lead to positive results.

"Without knowing any additional details, I would say that the U.S. and other outside countries have relevant expertise to bring, and if they are willing partners of the Nigerian government, they certainly have technical capacities that aren't being used enough in the country.”

He pointed to the example of the Nigerian law-enforcement response to a bombing in the country just last month while he was there.

“The first thing that happened within 24 hours is they completely cleaned up the scene (with brushes and hoses),” said LeVan. “(But) you want to collect the evidence. And that’s what the FBI do really well. They can share lessons not just from the United States but from other parts of the world — and say 'this is how you treat this as a crime scene.'”

Meanwhile, just hours before Kerry spoke on Tuesday, a report was released that eight more girls have been kidnapped from a village near one of the Islamists' strongholds in northeastern Nigeria overnight, according to police and residents. The girls were aged 12 to 15.

Lazarus Musa, a resident of the village of Warabe, told Reuters that armed men had opened fire during the raid.

"They were many, and all of them carried guns. They came in two vehicles painted in army color. They started shooting in our village," Musa said by telephone from the village in the hilly Gwoza area, Boko Haram's main base.

The United Nations Children's Fund condemned the newest abduction, calling it "especially abhorrent" that the girls were taken to prevent them from attending school.

"UNICEF calls on the abductors to immediately return these girls unharmed to their communities, and we implore all those with influence on the perpetrators to do everything they can to secure the safe return of the girls-and to bring their abductors to justice," the group said in a statement.

Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau threatened in a video released to the media on Monday to sell the girls abducted from a secondary school on April 14 "on the market".
The kidnappings by the Boko Haram, who say they are fighting for an Islamic state in Nigeria, have shocked the world. But they have also embarrassed the government before a World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting on Africa, the annual gathering of the wealthy and powerful, in Abuja from May 7-9.

The United Nations warned Boko Haram that if they carried out their leader's threat to sell the girls, they would forever be liable to prosecution for war crimes, even decades after the event.

"We warn the perpetrators that there is an absolute prohibition against slavery and sexual slavery in international law. These can ... constitute crimes against humanity," U.N. human rights spokesman Rupert Colville said in Geneva.

The military's inability to find the girls in three weeks has led to protests in the northeast, Abuja and Lagos, the commercial capital. More are expected on Tuesday in Abuja, just as delegates will be collecting their badges to allow them entry to the hotel where the WEF will take place.

British Foreign Minister William Hague reiterated an offer of help to Nigeria on Tuesday, after calling the abductions "disgusting and immoral."

Also on Tuesday, U.S. lawmakers — including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) and Rep. Karen Bass (D-CA) — gathered together on the east steps of the US Capitol to participate in a moment of silence for the kidnapping victims in Nigeria.

"We refuse to be indifferent because God has entwined our destinies, and injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere," said the Reverend Barry Black, who led the politicians in prayer.



Goodluck Jonathan
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan, GCFR, BNER, GCON (born 20 November 1957)[1] is a Nigerian politician who has been President of Nigeria since 2010. Prior to his role as President, he served as Governor of Bayelsa State from 2005 to 2007 and as Vice-President of Nigeria from 2007 to 2010. Jonathan is a member of the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP).

Early and personal life

Jonathan was born in what is now Bayelsa State to a family of canoe makers.[1][2] Jonathan holds a B.Sc. degree in Zoology in which he attained Second Class Honours. He holds an M.Sc. degree inHydrobiology and Fisheries biology, and a PhD degree in Zoology from the University of Port Harcourt. Before he entered politics in 1998, he worked as an education inspector, lecturer, and environmental-protection officer.[3]
Jonathan and his wife Patience have two children. He is a Christian, and he comes from the Ijaw ethnic group.[4]





Boko Haram is a terror group whose name literally means “Western education is a sin.” Kerry has announced a “joint intelligence cell” to aid the Nigerian government in finding and freeing the Nigerian girls. When asked why he took so long to offer aid, Kerry said “the (Nigerian) government had its own set of strategies in the beginning...."I think now the complications that have arisen have convinced everybody that there needs to be a greater effort ... I think you’re going to see a very, very rapid response," Carl LeVan, an expert on Boko Haram “said he believed the new air of cooperation could lead to positive results.”

According to this article the girls are being sold into slavery in Chad and Cameroon. The FBI is going to be consulted and the ODNI will help with satellite imaging and electronic eavesdropping. “Bases” are already located in Nigeria from which drones can be launched for surveillance. LeVan said that the FBI would also give the Nigerian police force lessons in how to collect evidence at a crime scene rather than merely “cleaning it up.”

Meanwhile eight more girls between 12 and 15 were kidnapped from a village near the Boko Haram base at Warabe. Lazarus Musa, a resident said of the raid, “They were many, and all of them carried guns. They came in two vehicles painted in army color. They started shooting in our village.'” The UN meanwhile has “warned” Boko Haram that selling the girls into sexual slavery will make them liable for prosecution on war crimes charges for decades to come. The Nigerian government is said to be “embarrassed” by the failure to rein in Boko Haram. It is not said whether the government of Nigeria has Islam as its official religion. According to Wikipedia Islam was in Northern Nigeria by the 9th century AD but it is not the state religion of Nigeria. There is a strong Catholic and Protestant presence there as well. Goodluck Jonathan is Christian.





First time in 800,000 years: April's CO2 levels above 400 ppm
CBS NEWS May 6, 2014

Less than a year after scientists first warned that the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere could rise above 400 parts per million and stay there, it has finally happened.

For the first time in recorded history, the average level of CO2 has topped 400 ppm for an entire month. The high levels of carbon dioxide is largely considered by scientists a key factor in global warming, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Earth System Research Lab.

The Scripps Institution of Oceanography, a part of the University of California, San Diego, reported that April's average amount of CO2 was 401.33 ppm, with each day reading above 400 ppm, reports USA Today.

According to the Institute, CO2 levels have not surpassed 300 ppm in 800,000 years. It is estimated that during Earth's ice ages, the C02 levels were around 200 ppm, with warmer periods -- as well as prior to the Industrial Revolution -- having carbon dioxide levels of 280 ppm.

Past levels of CO2 are found in old air samples preserved as bubbles in the Atlantic ice sheet, according to Scripps.

Throughout the year, there are changes in CO2 levels that occur naturally from the growth of plants and trees. Carbon dioxide levels often peak in the spring due to plant growth, and decrease in the fall when plants die, according to NOAA. However, human CO2 production has exacerbated the effects, causing global warming and climate change.

Scientists have been measuring the levels of carbon dioxide over the past fifty years. Since 1958, the Keeling Curve -- named after developer Charles Keeling -- has been used to monitor the levels of greenhouse gasses atop Hawaii's Mauna Loa. When Keeling first started monitoring CO2 levels, the amount of carbon dioxide present in the atmosphere was 313 ppm.

After Keeling's death in 2005, his son Ralph, a professor of geochemistry and director of the Scripps CO2 Program, continued the measurements. In a statement last year, he warned that CO2 levels would "hit 450-ppm within a few decades."




The Scripps Institution of Oceanography reports that the average world CO2 level is at 401.33 ppm and that “CO2 levels have not surpassed 300 ppm in 800,000 years,” nor since the years prior to the Industrial Revolution at which point the carbon dioxide levels were at 280 ppm. Natural sources of CO2 don't account for most of the increase.

“...the Keeling Curve -- named after developer Charles Keeling -- has been used to monitor the levels of greenhouse gasses atop Hawaii's Mauna Loa since 1958, at which point it was already 313 ppm. Keeling's son Ralph warns that the reading will be 450 ppm “within a few decades.”

We absolutely do need to take action as a country to lessen greenhouse gasses and urge other countries to do so as well. According to wikipedia, “The primary greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere are water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and ozone.”They come from gasoline and diesel engines, power plants and other industrial operations.





Tillis win kicks off high-profile Senate race in Tar Heel state
By ANTHONY SALVANTO CBS NEWS May 6, 2014

Thom Tillis took the Republican Senate nomination in North Carolina on Tuesday night, easily gaining more than the 40 percent he needed to avoid a runoff and face incumbent Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan in November. 

Tillis' victory sets up one of most high-profile, tightest Senate races of 2014.

Republican establishment vs. tea party in North CarolinaThom Tillis captures GOP Senate nomination in N.C.

The night's outcome will be widely seen as a victory for the Republican establishment, although everyone in the race was, by most measures, a conservative. Tillis, the state House speaker, has a long record of conservative legislation. It was as much about whether the party's more traditional fundraising apparatus and business groups could back a primary winner, especially in the Senate race's much higher ad spending.

His primary win was coupled with other North Carolina congressional primaries in which tea party challenges fell short. Incumbent Rep. Walter Jones ,who was challenged in the 3rd District, moved on to the general election, as did David Rouzer in a bid for the Republican-leaning open seat in the 7th District.

Tillis has been polling about even with Hagan in what surveys there are so far. We can already see the contours of this one: Hagan and the Democrats will look to paint Tillis as too conservative, not just to try to persuade moderates, but also as a rallying point for Democratic base turnout. Without that base, a midterm electorate would otherwise be tilted in the GOP's favor. Tillis, as with fellow Republican Senate nominees in other red states, will try to tie Hagan to an unpopular president and health care law.




There seems to be a trend developing among moderate Republicans to separate themselves from the racist, sexist and economically right wing Tea Party. I think the government shutdown forced the moderates to rethink their blanket support of all people claiming the name of Republican. I'm sure there are also those who don't oppose, on principle, a black or woman president and some Republicans are even admittedly gay – the so-called “log cabin” Republicans. There are also some who don't want to see the US public school system “die on the vine,” and who approve some level of “social safety net.” I do hope this continues because fascist-leaning state or federal laws and gridlock in the legislature are becoming both obnoxious and boring.



http://www.logcabin.org/about-us/our-history/
Log Cabin Republicans
President Reagan Linked to Log Cabin Republicans’ Founding

Log Cabin Republicans got its start in California during the late 1970s. After several years of advances for the cause of gay and lesbian rights, a backlash was building. Singer Anita Bryant led a successful “Save Our Children” campaign to overturn an anti-discrimination ordinance in Dade County, Florida. The legislatures of Arkansas and Oklahoma had banned gays and lesbians from holding teaching positions. 
In California, Republican State Senator John Briggs, who had ambitions to be governor, proposed a statewide ballot initiative to prevent gay and lesbian people from teaching in public schools. The so-called Briggs Initiative also permitted the firing of any educator who was determined to be “advocating, imposing, encouraging or promoting” homosexuality. Briggs’ vicious campaign to “defend your children from homosexual teachers” seemed to be heading for victory. One poll showed support for the Briggs Initiative leading 61% to 31%.

Many prominent politicians in the Republican and Democratic parties were hesitant about standing up to the bigotry of Briggs and his allies. That’s when gay conservatives turned to former California governor Ronald Reagan. At the time he was preparing to mount a campaign for the 1980 Republican presidential nomination. His advisors all thought he was committing political suicide when he decided to be an outspoken foe of the Briggs Initiative. Reagan declared that the initiative “is not needed to protect our children — we have the legal protection now.” 

Reagan went further, detailing the dangers of passing such a measure. “It has the potential for real mischief,” the former governor explained. “What if an overwrought youngster, disappointed by bad grades, imagined it was the teacher’s fault and struck out by accusing the teacher of advocating homosexuality? Innocent lives could be ruined.”

 Reagan’s forceful opposition helped defeat the Briggs Initiative. In November 1978, voters rejected the Briggs Initiative by more than one million votes. 

The Briggs Initiative was the first statewide electoral victory for proponents of gay rights. Historian David Johnson argues that it was “the greatest electoral victory yet of the burgeoning gay rights movement.” Had Briggs passed in California, similar proposals would have been introduced around the nation.

In the wake of the Briggs campaign, gay conservatives in California formed the Log Cabin Republicans. Throughout the 1980s, gay Republicans continued working behind the scenes in Washington—as power players in Congress and during the Reagan Administration. Meanwhile, Log Cabin chapters sprang up around the United States as more and more people became involved in educating and lobbying the GOP on gay and lesbian issues.




Report Details Hundreds Of Complaints Against U.S. Border Agents – NPR
by BILL CHAPPELL
May 07, 2014

Physical abuse and excessive force top the list of hundreds of complaints filed against U.S. Border Patrol agents, according to a new report. The accusations include charges that agents kicked a pregnant woman, stomped on a man and physically forced a minor to sign a document.

Those accusations are in a report on government data about the complaints that was obtained by the advocacy group the American Immigration Council via a Freedom of Information Act request.

"Although it is not possible to determine which cases had merit and which did not, it is astonishing that, among those cases in which a formal decision was issued, 97 percent resulted in 'No Action Taken," the group reports.

From Tucson, NPR's Ted Robbins reports for our Newscast desk:

"The data cover 809 complaints over three years. Of those 809, only 13 resulted in disciplinary action against agents. Many cases were still under investigation more than a year after the complaint was made.

"Most of the complaints were in the busy Tucson, Rio Grande, and San Diego border patrol sectors. There is no unified system for people to file complaints, so the numbers don't represent all of the complaints made against Border Patrol agents."

Physical abuse and "excessive use of force" accounted for most of the complaints, representing a respective 40 percent and 38 percent of the filings.

The report's authors say the complaints give new detail to "a longstanding pattern of abuse and inaction" by border agents, along with a "lack of accountability and transparency" in U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

The complaints in the report were made between January 2009 and January 2012. The average time it took for the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency to make a decision on a complaint was 122 days, the report's authors say.

The American Immigration Council report was written by Daniel E. Martínez, an assistant professor of sociology at George Washington University, along with Guillermo Cantor and Walter A. Ewing of the advocacy group's research unit.




A report from the advocacy group the American Immigration Council alleges that Border Patrol agents “kicked a pregnant woman, stomped on a man and physically forced a minor to sign a document.” In 97 percent of those cases, “No Action Taken” was the conclusion. NPR's Ted Robbins states, of the report, that 809 complaints in a three year period were written up and only 13 – yes! Really! – resulted in any disciplinary action. This article goes on to state that “the numbers don't represent all of the complaints made against Border Patrol agents." Most of the claims charged “physical abuse” and “excessive use of force.” A "lack of accountability and transparency" are also claimed, plus “inaction” with 122 days being the typical length of time a decision took.

So here we go again – too much power in individual hands due to too little supervision by those who (surely) would be above such criminal behavior themselves. Still, with official actions against agents occurring in only 13 cases, it looks like the whole U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency needs to shaken up from the top down and some investigations begun by the legislature as well. It is under the control of Homeland Security. I have sometimes thought that there are too many things under that one heading. Maybe it's too much to take care of properly.




Listen To These Lovely Cats. No, Actually, Don't – NPR
by ROBERT KRULWICH
May 04, 2014

"Oh, evolution," writes Mara Grunbaum in her new, about-to-come-out book, WTF Evolution, "You were doing so well with the lynx. You made it a fierce and graceful hunter, you gave it a luxurious spotted coat, you gave it pretty yellow eyes and tufted ears — and then you made it sound like this ..."

What crazy evolutionary logic led to these vocalizations? The first lynx, the one facing the camera, sounds like a creaking door with squeaky hinges, the second one like an ambulance siren with a weak, failing battery. Close your eyes and you're in a zombie movie, with unearthly howls and strange, shared silences.

But, Why?

I looked up "lynx vocalizations" to find out why they sound like this. Apparently, explaining weird cat sounds is not yet a major scholarly pursuit. Mel and Fiona Sunquist, in their book Wild Cats of the World, say lynxes can "mew, spit, hiss and growl; they also yowl, chatter, wah-wah, gurgle, and purr." But the Sunquists don't say why. Another scholar, Gustav Peters, says lynx mating calls (Is that what we heard? Or was that just two lynxes yakking?) are "a series of intense mews." Intense, for sure. Mews? Those lynxes weren't mewing.

No, maybe it's as Mara supposes in her new book. Designers — be they all powerful, or natural selectors operating randomly — have their off days. How does Mara explain lynx vocalizations? This way: "Go home, evolution, you are drunk."




That range of vocalizations explains why the common house cat has so many different sounds, too. Siamese cats make the famous “baby crying” sound, which is just a very guttural and deep-throated meow. The first time I heard one I thought it might have rabies. I was assured that they all sound that way, so I adopted the cat and came to love her very much. She, like my calico, was decidedly “feisty” and I saw her jump almost 20 feet straight up when a dog came running through the yard. She landed on a pine bough overhead.

Then there are the full range of howls, yowls and screeches that fighting tom cats make. Too often I have been awakened at two AM by that sound. My calico Sally Petunia had to share the waiting room at the vet's with a playful 6 month German shepherd puppy one day. She literally snarled at him loudly, and he did back away very fast. His owner took control of him from then on. I have heard cats make sounds that are almost as if they are trying to talk like a human, which the “chatter” and “wah-wah” could describe. But of course, finally, there is the lovely sound – the purr. Even tigers and lions purr, I am told. I personally think all those sounds are “beautiful” in their way, as their menacing slinking motion forward is. Not every animal has to sound like a canary, after all. Cats are beautiful, but they are also predators. Predators aren't villains. That's just their role in nature.