"Hillary's appeal is particularly prevalent in cultures where the man's role is rather insignificant, and where not much is expected of him - -these communities form the core of Democratic party: Jews, Blacks, Portuguese, Irish..."

A couple of weeks ago, a well known linguist and a cognitive and brain scientist, George Lakoff, the co-author of a highly popular 1980 book, Metaphors We Live By, decided to use his extensive expertise to answer the question, Why Trump?

His conclusion is rather disappointing in its banality: those who are attracted to Trump and to the Republican party in general, are those who are yearning for a strong, authoritative father-figure:

"What do social issues and the politics have to do with the family? We are first governed in our families, and so we grow up understanding governing institutions in terms of the governing systems of families. In the strict father family, father knows best. He knows right from wrong and has the ultimate authority to make sure his children and his spouse do what he says, which is taken to be what is right. Many conservative spouses accept this worldview, uphold the father's authority, and are strict in those realms of family life that they are in charge of."

Thus, Trump insistence on winning, his moral certainty, his simplistic understanding of direct economic causality, his anti-PC rhetoric are all made to appeal to disgruntled white males who are rapidly losing grounds in today's complex world, but who grew up with the ideal of a authoritarian family. And, according to Lakoff's foray in psychology, these values are so much ingrained even in people who might first appear as moderate or even progressive, that someone like Trump rapidly triggers and re-activate the "inner authoritarian" world view. Consequently, the more shrill Trump's campaign becomes, the more supporters he gets.

Inspired by this bold analysis, and its cavalier manipulation of psychology, sociology, linguistics, and politics, I propose to offer a counter - argument.

Trump likes to turn on his opponents by saying that they've started it. Well, Professor Lakoff started it. So let me use a similar flight of imagination and insight and try to answer an equally relevant question: Why Hillary?

On the surface of it, Hillary Clinton's candidacy should hardly succeed with US voters: she is a legacy, heritage candidate in traditionally democratic society; she is mired in scandals, she is in cahoots with corrupt lobbyists and bankers, her belligerent foreign policy is pushing US closer and closer to the brink of the next world war. So why is she winning some many primaries? What's there to like? Here are my answers clearly inspired by Mr. Lakoff's analysis.

Austria is planning to draft a law allowing the state to seize the birthplace of Adolf Hitler, about 71 years since the end of World War II.

The proposal to take ownership of the unmarked building is still being negotiated, New York Times reported, but is expected to head to Parliament by this summer.

Part of the decision to push for government seizure of the property is reportedly due to the occasional reoccurrence of Neo-Nazis who use the it as a focal point. Some fear if left alone, the property may become a shrine to the leader, who was the cause of millions of deaths during the Holocaust.

"We have seen in recent years that expropriation is the only way to prevent the house being used for the purposes of Nazi revivalism," Karl-Heinz Grundböck, an interior ministry spokesman told a local newspaper.

Other reasons stem from an ongoing dispute between the building's owner and Austrian government regarding the building's renovation, according to the BBC.

Hitler was born in Braunau am Inn, Austria in April 1889 in an apartment in the higher levels of the building, the bottom floor of which was then a tavern. He and his family moved to Germany when he was three years old.

The deteriorating building is now owned by a descendent of the original owners, Gerlinde Pommer. The Austrian government has leased the building since 1972 to keep Neo-Nazis from occupying the space.

The building is mostly unremarkable in appearance but does don a single stone sign, a marble slab bearing an inscription translated as "For Peace, Freedom and Democracy/Never Again Fascism/Millions of Dead Warn."

Close to 35 restaurants in China have been found to be spiking their food with opiates, including morphine and codeine. There is currently an investing to find out exactly how these establishments have been doing it.

Food that has been found to have been laced with opiates include noodles, hotpot and lobsters, according to local news, and 5 of the 35 restaurants under investigation are currently being prosecuted.

A newly proposed program by the Obama administration would lower the profits doctors currently see when prescribing expensive drugs and increase earnings from generic ones, but the potential move has cancer doctors and drug companies up in arms.

Under a revised Medicare payment scheme, the government is looking to test the effects of reducing the amount of money it pays doctors who choose to treat patients with expensive drugs rather than cheaper, generic ones that are also clinically effective. Both doctors and pharmaceutical companies have criticized the five-year proposal, arguing that it would hurt the business of small clinics and also have negative consequences for patients.

According to a new study from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, the proposal would indeed decrease the profits doctors see from prescribing expensive drugs. However, the amount of drugs affected by this plan is small, and the payments doctors would receive from choosing generic drugs would increase.

A Texas high school teacher was taken into custody Friday after video was posted online showing her repeatedly slapping a black student as he sat at his desk trying to cover up.

According to KHOU, Mary Hastings,63, a teacher at Ozen High School near Beaumont was arrested for assault.

In the video — shot by another student, — Hastings can be seen repeatedly hitting the student as he sits at his desk, calling him an "idiot ass," then mocking him afterwards when he asks, "Why'd you do that?"

According to a statement from Beaumont school district, the video of Hastings was then given to BISD police and school administrators.

The geometry teacher posted a bond of $2,500 in the misdemeanor assault charge at the Jefferson County jail and was released.

The school district stated that she has been placed on administrative leave during the investigation.

Watch the video below via KHOU:

Fearful that their children have been "brainwashed" by Scientology, two Hollywood parents erected billboards begging their children to call their parents. The $8,000 crowd-funded sign is near Los Angeles' Dodger Stadium.

It bears the simple message "To my loved one in Scientology... call me" with faces of hundreds of individuals that have been lost to Scientology's practice of "disconnection" from non-Scientologists.

Anti-#Scientology billboard finally up in Los Angeles https://t.co/6SO7dJHaW1 via@pagesix pic.twitter.com/IMQ1KUn9CG
— IndieScientologyNews (@IndieScieNews)April 5, 2016

Phil and Willie Jones are both ex-Scientologists and like most who leave the church, they've been ostracized by their loved ones, including three children, who are still members of the church. According to an interview by the Hollywood Reporter, it has been three or four years since they have seen their children and over two since they've talked to them.

Mrs. Jones says that they were drawn into Scientology as teenagers by "hypnotism," "brainwashing," and "mental conditioning." Mr. Jones says that they have given as much as $150,000 of their income to Scientology, but most end up giving more. His eldest child is higher up in the leadership of Scientology and likely has a cell phone but they still haven't heard from her.

"My son and daughter joined the Sea Organization, which is the full commitment," Mr. Jones said. "That's where you sign a billion-year contract... you work 100 hours a week for 10 cents an hour. It's just brutal."

Their youngest son Michael had dreams of being a guitar player but Scientology put him working in the "Celebrity Centre" instead. "They convinced him the music industry is insane and that he could only play guitar once the planet was 'clear,'" his parents explained.

They were asked why they don't just break into the compound and get their children back but the Joneses explained that most are so "brainwashed" that they actually want to be there enduring the harsh treatment. "Because they are so conditioned mentally, they will not want to go.

Wearing a traditional headdress and a white vest woven from the bark of an Amazonian tree, Manari Ushigua held a megaphone to his mouth to denounce Ecuador's latest oil deal: A multi-million dollar contract that will allow oil drilling on his tribe's territory for the first time in four decades.

"We don't want oil drilling in our lands," said Ushigua, one of the most well-known leaders of Ecuador's tiny Zapara tribe. "Our culture is at risk of disappearing; so is our language and our way of relating to the rainforest."

For several years Ecuador has been trying to increase oil production by inviting foreign companies to drill in the Sur Oriente, a largely untouched area of the Amazon rainforest that's about the size of Massachusetts and considered one of the most biodiverse places on earth.

On Jan. 25, the government signed one of the first concessions in this remote area: A four year deal that allows Chinese consortium Andes Petroleum to operate on two parcels of the jungle covering 45% of the Zapara's ancestral lands.

People can't live good lives without enough energy to heat their homes, cook their meals and power their appliances. Cold homes have a terrible effect on our mental wellbeing and physical health, and London is at the forefront of a fuel poverty crisis.

Excess winter deaths in the capital spiked to 4,000 in 2014/15 - the highest level for 15 years - and in fuel poverty hotspots such as Newham, more than 1 in 7 households are unable to meet their basic energy needs. Last winter, 2 in 3 Londoners turned off or hesitated from using their heating due to high bills.

In a rich society like the UK this is an outrage. The experiment with a privatised energy system has failed us - the profit-driven Big 6 energy supply companies have ripped us off, evaded their social and environmental obligations and left people disillusioned. The time has come to look to the alternatives, of which there are many.

Public energy offers possibilities that the privatised Big 6 never can. Local governments are increasingly realising that not only can they play a role in expanding renewable energy capacity and investing in home insulation, but they can also reduce our energy bills at the same time.

Lindsey Gordon, 24, was laying out, sunbathing on the beach this week when an out of control cop in his police cruiser came barrelling down the sand and ran her over.

Gordon, who merely wanted to catch some sun with her friend, is now hospitalized in critical but stable condition with a shattered pelvis and internal bleeding.

According to FOX 8, Gordon and her friend were sunbathing around 3:15 Thursday afternoon as Grand Isle Police Officer Norris Esponge was patrolling the beach in a marked police unit, an F-250 truck. Gordon's friend was able to move out of the way, but Louisiana State Police say Officer Esponge rolled over Gordon.

The man responsible for the deadly shooting at Lackland Air Force Base last week has been identified as Steven D. Bellino.

A statement from the Air Force identified the deceased as Tech. Sgt. Steven D. Bellino and Lt. Col. William A. Schroeder. They did not name Bellino as the shooter. However, a federal official close to the investigation, speaking anonymously, told the Associated Press that Bellino opened fire at the Air Force base on Friday.

"The 37th Training Wing mourns the loss of our airmen and family members," Brig. Gen. Trent H. Edwards, commander of the wing, said in a statement Saturday, according to CBS affiliate KENS. "Our primary focus at this time is to take care of the family and the men and women who are grieving our losses."