GAO examined a nongeneralizable sample of 178 polling places during early in-person voting and on Election Day 2016. At these polling places, GAO examined a number of features outside and inside the voting area. Outside the voting area, GAO was able to examine features at all 178 polling places and found that 60 percent (107) had one or more potential impediments. The most common were steep ramps located outside buildings, lack of signs indicating accessible paths, and poor parking or path surfaces.

Ferida Wolff writes: The more I observe nature, the more I realize that everything has intelligence. Plants do. Insects do. Animals and birds are pretty darn smart. It may differ from how we think but it is functional for how to survive. If we diminish anything in nature we lessen our own understanding of life.

From Prof. Billingham's essay: "I'm told that when men meet women, they sometimes rate each other on a scale of 1 to 10. Of course, mathematicians are far too intelligent and sophisticated do this. We rate people on a scale of 0 to 1. In our original mathematical model, all we could do was compare one possible frog with another. The numbers didn't mean anything in themselves; they just told the princess whether one frog was "better" than another. Let's change the fairytale slightly so that the 100 frogs are now labelled with numbers drawn randomly from those that lie between 0 and 1, with the handsome prince having the highest number. What's the princess's best strategy now?"

As her husband lay moaning in pain from cancer riddling his body, Patricia Martin searched frantically through his medical bag, looking for a syringe. She had already called the hospice twice, demanding liquid methadone to ease the agony of Dr. Robert Martin, 66. But the doctor in charge at Mat-Su Regional Home Health & Hospice wasn?t responding. Staff said he was on vacation, then that he was asleep. Martin had waited four days to get pain pills delivered, but her husband could no longer swallow them. Now, they said, she should just crush the drugs herself, mix them with water and squirt the mixture into his mouth. I thought if I had hospice, I would get the support I needed. They basically said they would provide 24/7 support, she said, shaking her head in disbelief, three years later. It was a nightmare.

Approximately 25 sculptures and works on paper by Rodin from the Fine Arts Museums’ collection will provide visual dialogues with the works by Klimt. The exhibition is thematically arranged around the Vienna Secession, Rodin's 1901 exhibition in Vienna, Rodin’s 1902 visit to Vienna, Klimt's landscapes and Rodin’s surfaces, and the depiction of women for both artists an eternal source of inspiration exploring shared touch points and developments in the two artists' practices throughout.

According to the JFK Assassination Records Collection Act, all records previously withheld either in part or in full should be released on October 26, 2017, unless authorized for further withholding by the President of the United States. The 2017 date derives directly from the law that states: Each assassination record shall be publicly disclosed in full, and available in the Collection no later than the date that is 25 years after the date of the enactment of this Act, unless the President certifies, as required by this Act, that – (i) continued postponement is made necessary by an identifiable harm to military defense, intelligence operations, law enforcement or conduct of foreign relations; and (ii) the identifiable harm is of such gravity that it outweighs the public interest in disclosure.

Rose Madeline Mula writes: The woman on that screen would one day become my friend — we would correspond, chat on the phone, and even visit each other's homes. The glamorous Joan Fontaine of Hollywood, California, did meet and befriend the shrinking violet from Waltham, Massachusetts. Both events occurred many years after that day in 1940 when Rebecca captured my soul and took up permanent residence there as my favorite movie of all time. Surprisingly, it is the least loved work of its beautiful star, even though it had won her an Oscar nomination.

"Our primary interest was really in the patterns of people’s answers to these questions," Kara Weisman said. "So, when a certain person thought a robot could think or remember things, what else did they think it was capable of doing? By looking at the patterns in people’s responses to these questions, we could infer the underlying, conceptual structure." Those patterns resulted in three main clusters of mental capacities: body (physiological sensations, like hunger and pain), heart (social-emotional abilities, like guilt and pride) and mind (perceptual and cognitive abilities, like memory and vision).  

Americans across demographic and partisan groups agree that women should have equal rights with men. About eight-in-ten Americans (82%) say it is very important for women to have equal rights with men in our country, and another 14% say this is somewhat important. Just 4% of Americans say gender equality is not too or not at all important. Asked whether the country has gone too far, not gone far enough or been about right when it comes to giving women equal rights with men, half of the public says the country still has work to do, while 39% say things are about where they should be; one-in-ten Americans believe the country has gone too far in giving women equal rights with men. These views differ by gender, education and, most of all, partisanship.

Testimony of Antonella Pianalto before the House Small Business Subcommittee on Health & Technology October 12, 2017: Women receive just 7% of venture capital funds and less than 5% of conventional business loan dollars, despite making up more than a third of all businesses. At the US Small Business Administration (SBA) flagship 7(a) lending program, only 17% of loans go to women-owned firms... if American women business owners were their own country, they would have the 10th largest GDP in the world, outstripping entire nations like Canada, Mexico and even Russia.

Using examples from Evans' most notable photographs ? including iconic images from his work for the Farm Security Administration (FSA) documenting the effects of the Great Depression on American life; early visits to Cuba; street photography and portraits made on the New York City subway; layouts and portfolios from his more than 20-year collaboration with Fortune magazine and 1970s Polaroids ? Walker Evans explores Evans' passionate search for the fundamental characteristics of American vernacular culture: the familiar, quotidian street language and symbols through which a society tells its own story.

"I have spoken about some of the uncertainties associated with the inflation outlook in particular, and we will be paying close attention to the inflation data in the months ahead. But uncertainty about the outlook is by no means limited to inflation. As always, the Committee will adjust the stance of monetary policy in response to incoming economic information and the evolution of the economic outlook to achieve its objectives of maximum employment and stable prices. Moreover, we are mindful of the possibility that shifting expectations concerning the path of US policy can lead to spillovers to other economies via financial markets and the value of the dollar."

Remembering Joan L. Cannon: I write because I can't help it. A better question would be why can't I help it? First, I need to find out what I know; second, I need to discover what I don't know; third, I need to note what I must not forget. I’m an indifferent amateur painter, and the other visual arts are beyond my talents altogether; I can't perform music. I find I can put words on paper. They can do for me what nothing else can.

President Trump's Executive Order threatens the continued existence of comprehensive health insurance coverage. Once Trump's Executive Order is implemented by federal agencies, those who are sick may no longer be provided coverage that meets their health care needs. Health insurers may sell across state lines today, but Trump's Executive Order is intended to allow the sale of products across state lines without requiring compliance with the consumer protection laws of the state in which the product is sold. This change in the long-standing state-based regulatory approach is very harmful to consumers.  

Jo Freeman writes: Constance Baker Motley was the first black woman to be appointed as a federal judge. But it was what she did before becoming a judge that warrants this biography. For twenty years she was on the front line of the legal assault on segregation, arguing dozens of cases as the only female attorney on the staff of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund. I knew Pauli Murray and I met CBM, at a conference in 1998. I would love to hear a debate between the two of them on race and gender. Ford does an excellent job of describing CBM's impressive life and work. Maybe he should write his next book on Pauli Murray.

The Trump Administration has issued new regulations that significantly broaden employers’ ability to be exempt from the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) contraceptive coverage requirement. The regulation opens the door for any employer or college/ university with a student health plan with objections to contraceptive coverage based on religious beliefs to qualify for an exemption. Any nonprofit or closely-held for-profit employer with moral objections to contraceptive coverage also qualifies for an exemption. Their female employees, dependents and students will no longer be entitled to coverage for the full range of FDA approved contraceptives at no cost.

This study estimates the impact of Missouri’s 2007 repeal of its permit-to-purchase (PTP) handgun law on states’ homicide rates and controls for changes in poverty, unemployment, crime, incarceration, policing levels, and other policies that could potentially affect homicides. Using Uniform Crime Reporting data from police through 2012, the law’s repeal was associated with increased annual murders rates of 0.93 per 100,000 (+16%). These estimated effects translate to increases of between 55 and 63 homicides per year in Missouri.

As the US population ages and more people opt for home health care services instead of lengthy hospital and nursing home stays, the number of Americans who rely on the electrical grid to power life-sustaining home devices is soaring. Hurricane Sandy, which hit the East Coast in 2012, caused prolonged power losses for millions of residents in 17 states and sent hundreds of medically fragile people to hospital emergency departments to plug in their devices. At the same time, people with life-threatening injuries were crowding the same hospitals, creating chaos and death. That’s when the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services decided to help states locate and care for electricity-dependent residents during natural disasters. Using Medicare claims data, the agency created a database of people who use home medical equipment paid for by the federal insurance program for the elderly and disabled.

Elaine Soloway writes: I figured that the straw hat, with a weave that allows air to flow through, would not create the heat generated by a baseball cap. Perhaps, my disappearing shoots would magically reappear. So although the Fedora was purchased as sort of a prescription, I soon found that it was bringing me other benefits: people were stopping me on the street, or calling out from cars with, "Hey, I like your hat!" I raised [my daughters] without judgment because I wanted to do the opposite of my mother. Their grandmother undoubtedly loved me, but her criticism of my weight, my slouch, and other attributes that reminded her of my father, who she nagged often, wounded me.

During the recent UK broadcast, The Telegraph (London) was delighted to find that "Corfu was still sun-drenched, the titular family of lovable eccentrics remained in perpetual chaos and ... the tone was, as before, one of warm nostalgia and deep, abiding silliness." And The Guardian (London) hailed Season 2 as "sweet, and charming, and pretty, and funny…. [It's] that rather nice thing: Sunday night family drama entertainment."

Breast cancer is the most common form of cancer in the United States. The National Cancer Institute at the National Institutes of Health estimates approximately 252,710 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer this year, and 40,610 will die of the disease. Approximately 72 percent of patients with breast cancer have tumors that are HR-positive and HER2-negative. The safety and efficacy of Verzenio in combination with fulvestrant were studied in a randomized trial of 669 patients with HR-positive, HER2-negative breast cancer that had progressed after treatment with endocrine therapy and who had not received chemotherapy once the cancer had metastasized.

Jeanne Hubbell Asher wrote: The thrill of the hunt, beating the system, however one defines it, tag sale fever abounds in the New York suburbs and, for that matter, around the country whether on the scene or over the Internet. By any name, be it tag sale, garage sale, yard sale, they're all means of getting rid of things you no longer want or need. It's like cleaning house and getting paid for it. These are high-energy events: quick decisions, brisk sales, in and out and on to the next sale. For the faithful, sales are not only a part of their vocabulary but, indeed, an essential part of the fabric of their lives.

A bill to provide for activities to increase the awareness and knowledge of health care providers and women with respect to ovarian and cervical cancer; A bill to modify the determination of earned income for purposes of the earned income credit and the child tax credit for individuals in the Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma disaster areas.