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January trip to Carpentaria State Beach finds Perch
In early January, my wife�����������������������������s sister invited us to join her hiking group for a few days of camping/hiking at Carpentaria State Beach just south of Santa Barbara near Highway 101. Having just read Jerrold Paul Sheldon’s article in California Fly Fisher magazine (Nov-Dec.2008) on fishing opportunities there, I was anxious to re-acquaint myself with the beach. The South facing sandy beach can provide ideal conditions for the wading fly fisher. Moderate wave action, a gentle slope, and a surf line mostly free of strong off shore currents allow fly fishers to cast accurately to fish holding areas. Barred surf perch, halibut, spotfin croaker, and corbina are caught here. In the winter months, perch are the most common fish in the surf here. At dawn on Wednesday January 14, 2009, I walked over the low bluff in back of the camping site to the beach. First- look at the waves for a few moments- nice and low -2-4 feet with lots of space between sets. The water is clear and no kelp! Now check for troughs, holes, currents and “Nervous water”. Troughs are flat areas between breakers. A hole can be identified as a calm place in an on coming breaking wave. Because waves normally break in shallow water, the calm area in the wave denotes deeper water. Troughs and holes can be identified by “Nervous Water”. This is a water surface condition that looks like tiny wavelets that don’t break but shimmer and shake. I cast my trusty Orange #6 Bristle Worm fly near some nervous water and it was immediately whacked by a scrappy 8 inch perch. I caught and released 6 fish over an hour’s fishing. The beach started to load up with joggers and visiting shell collectors. No need to start a major disaster with my back cast, so I went back to our camper for breakfast. The next morning I was up before dawn, and again found the surf perch eagerly biting my Orange Bristle Worm. Had 9 fish released by 9a.m. All fish caught over the 2 day trip were small-in 6-9 inch range. An unusual thing happened the second day. I got snagged in one of the holes where I had caught fish. Strange! I remembered what Ken Hanley said in his surf fishing class: “If you see lots of debris like kelp on the beach that is what is in the surf.” I checked the beach and there were lots of round rocks the size of softballs with air holes in them in the sand. The rocks had not been there the day before. Sure enough I casted again, and lo’ and behold, I pulled in a rock with my fly stuck in an air hole. Move down the beach!
Weather: always check your printed or computer source for the forecast. I don’t fish the surf if the breakers are 6 feet or greater.
Tactics: Fish dawn and Dusk. Fish can be caught off and on (all day), however the people load makes it a dicey situation. I fished low tide and had success.
Equipment: For the conditions, I was a bit overloaded with my 9wt. outfit. A 6-7 wt will do for the mild conditions there. Jerrold Paul Shelton used a 6 wt rod, large arbor reel, with a fast sinking 250 grain integrated shooting head which has a floating running line, and a 4 foot section of fluorocarbon tippet material for a leader. He has great success with the Razzler fly tied by Dean Endress. He also recommends Gary Bulla’s Gremmie fly. Anything orange or red should get you some action.
Logistics: Get off Highway 101 at Linden Ave, and follow the signs to the State Beach. Camping overnight with or without hookups. Reservations suggested. Santa Rosa section has hookups and quick beach access. Motel 6 is close (805-684-8602). Lots of restaurants and shops within easy walking distance. Winter mid-week is a good time. Also if you’re budget-minded, park on the city street, walk in and fish dawn or twilight.
Flies: (Gary Bulla.com) Gary has a wide selection of orange and red flies that work in the surf. Buy or get the recipe from the website and tie your own.
Recommended reading : Jerrold Paul Shelton “Carpenteria Beach” Nov-Dec. 2008 California Fly Fisher.
By Andy Malovos | <urn:uuid:45fefd4b-4879-4ade-8e51-528e767e3584> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.saltwaterflyrodders.org/report-2009-2.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944113 | 989 | 1.609375 | 2 |
The Maryland Public Policy Institute
In 2010, after grappling with a decade of structural deficits and two years of recession, Maryland's Spending Affordability Committee (SAC) questioned its 30-year record on limiting state spending.
This paper examines the primary taxpayer subsidies for the initial phase of Baltimore City’s State Center, a project proposed to replace the current state facilities in mid-town Baltimore bordering Preston Street. Led by a public-private partnership, the project envisions a mixed-use complex containing state and private office space, retail and dining space, mixed-income housing, and a parking garage. The project has attracted significant attention as well as litigation due to its scope and expense. Lost in the debate, however, is a careful accounting of the project’s potential cost to the public. In what follows, we estimate and report this cost.
A request from the Maryland Department of General Services and the Maryland Department of Transportation that we withdraw our State Center, Phase 1 report.
A response from Jeff Hooke and Gabriel J. Michael -- authors of the State Center, Phase 1 report -- to the letter from the Maryland Maryland Department of General Services and the Maryland Department of Transportation that we withdraw our report.
The nation's health care sector undertook a massive overhaul with the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) in early 2010. One of the areas ACA affected most was the sale of health insurance. The law imposes a variety of new regulations on the sale of insurance and also directs states to establish new marketplaces for consumer purchase of insurance. These new marketplaces, called health insurance exchanges, are supposed to be operational by 2014.
"The only two certainties in life are death and taxes."
Our current governor has paid no attention to the severe problem of youth unemployment in Maryland. The national rate of youth unemployment is about twice the general rate of unemployment, and the rate among blacks twice that among the total youth population: 40 percent, resembling London’s neighborhoods where there were major civic disturbances among the Afro-Caribbean population. The proposition that “idle hands do the devil’s work” is familiar: “flash mobs” have organized on the Internet in American cities like Philadelphia. | <urn:uuid:6f3eb867-c6ea-405c-a8fd-be18c29284e7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mdpolicy.org/maryland_journal/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940429 | 458 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Effective June 2009
CenturyLink values our website visitors and customer's security and wants to make their online experience safe and enjoyable. While CenturyLink takes immense precautions in monitoring, preventing and identifying fraudulent behavior related to its website, please be aware of the possibility of fraudulent online activity. One recent form of online fraud is called "phishing" and it is affecting many companies. Phishing is a form of Internet fraud whereby a person or persons, masquerading as a legitimate organization, obtains an individual's confidential information through electronic means such as websites or e-mails. The unsuspecting individual merely believes they are complying with a request from a business that they are currently doing business with or wish to do business with. Unfortunately, the individual may not know their confidential information has been "stolen" for many days. Please remember that CenturyLink will never contact you via email or phone to get your personal information, including your social security number or your credit card account information.
Please review the following information as to the precautions you should take when conducting business online:
- If you visited a website to which you did not intend to navigate, it may have been such a phishing website.
- If you responded to an email asking to confirm confidential or personal information about your account, or with an urgent request for financial assistance, it may have been phishing.
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If you believe you have been contacted by someone posing as a CenturyLink employee or have given personal information through a fraudulent website posing as a CenturyLink website, please contact CenturyLink immediately. Residential customers please call 800.366.8201, and business customers please call 877.365.0045. | <urn:uuid:f15c4b20-4aed-4be1-964a-d1a4bd704920> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.centurylink.com/Pages/AboutUs/Legal/onlineSecurity.jsp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943808 | 441 | 1.710938 | 2 |
On February 21st, about a few weeks before Vladimir Putin won his third presidency, a group of women in a band called Pussy Riot, boldly barraged into Christ the Savior cathedral in Moscow, Russia, and performed a “punk prayer” while holy services were going on. They sang lines that outraged both the Orthodox church and the Russian authorities:
“Virgin Mary, Become Feminist / Virgin Mary, Hash Putin Away.”
We might view the incident with Pussy Riot as anti-religion. It might be anti-fundamentalism, but it’s not anti-religion. Madonna wrongly thought she was supporting the cause of the band by writing the group’s name on her back and stomping on a cross while on stage at a performance in Russia. Ukrainian feminist group FEMEN, who are anti-religion, misrepresented their support as well by cutting a cross in half with a chainsaw. I myself thought that Pussy Riot did not have an ounce of righteousness in them, but I misunderstood. The people who support the Free Pussy Riot movement might have different perceptions of the band’s motives and goals, but they all agree on one thing—the severity of their punishment was unjust.
Besides reading the news articles, I have read what the women in the band had to say. I read their lyrics and their letters. I was impressed. It wasn’t just their intellect that interested me, or the way they articulated their thoughts, but it was the irony that these women talked more about Christ than Russia’s Patriarch Kiril.
On March 24, Patriarch Kiril delivered a speech that said,
“These days we are observing Lent. The devil has had a good laugh over us, having brought us so many sorrows in the days when we should be distancing ourselves from worldly worries, when we should be deep in prayer, observing Lent, confessing our own sins. But perhaps the Lord is making us go through such tribulations in the holy days of Lent so that we all become conscious of our responsibility for our land, for Holy Russia, and for the Orthodox faith. For the Orthodox believer this sense of responsibility is expressed primarily through fervent prayer to God. These other people do not believe in the power of prayer. They only believe in the power of propaganda, lies and slander, in the power of the Internet, in the power of media, in the power of money and weapons. We believe in the power of prayer. And I urge the entire Russian Church to pray fervently and diligently about our country, about our faith, about our people, so that the Lord will absolve us of our sins and once again fill us with His grace, strengthen us with the Divine Grace of the Holy Spirit, so that, having gone through temptations, we have emerged from them cleansed, stronger, and capable of arranging our future in conformity with God’s commandments and human conscience.”
Pussy Riot responded by saying,
“Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Your Holiness, Patriarch-
A fervent and sincere prayer can never be a mockery, no matter in what form it occurs, therefore it cannot be said that we jeered at, or mocked, the shrine.
We are plagued by the thought that the very shrine, which you consider so defiled, is inseparably linked to Putin, who in very words, brought it back to the Church. And because the [sic] of our prayer, asking our Holy Mother to drive out those who defile the brightest ideals of human life in Russia and all possible precepts of the Orthodox Faith, you are perceived as a mockery of the sacred.
In prayer it is evoked that, as millions of Christians were seriously grieved that you allowed the Church to become a weapon in a dirty campaign of dirty intrigues, urging the faithful to vote for a man whose crimes are infinitely far from God’s Truth. We simply cannot believe the representative of the Heavenly Father if he acts contrary to the values for which Christ was crucified on the cross. As said by Pushkin, “ It is impossible to pray for King Herod; the Mother of God forbids it.”
You were endlessly wrong in saying in your sermon that we do not believe in the power of prayer. Without belief in the power of prayer and of words, we would never have offered our prayers so desperately and fervently, in anticipation of the serve persecution that could be dealt to us and our loved ones. The repressive powers that simply waited for the right moment to take revenge on our group for our tough Civic positions we have taken with our art. The power and truth of our prayer did not shame the Faithful, for surely the faith of a true believer, as the feelings of Christ, are too deep and universal—too filled with love—to be shamed. Our prayer shamed only Putin and his henchmen, and now three women have been thrown in prison, taken away from their young children, and now daily calls for arrests and punishments are issued forth from the higher bureaucracies. It is Putin—not a believer—who, through domination and division, needs to keep the women in jail.
You say that we believe only in propaganda, the media, lies and slander, money and weapons, but we don’t have faith in any of those things, as we have no faith in anything entity equal the brute powers of King Herod. You encouraged the Russian people to vote and pray for these powers, in whose name you have tried to link with prosperity of the Russian land.
First the pervasive and false propaganda on state television wrested from the people a victory for Putin. Now, through outright falsehood opposition and detractors at least is trying to assure the people that women with young children should be kept in the custody for “for violation of the laws of the Church.” On whose side are propaganda, media, lies and slander? On whose side is the belief in money? On which side are the performers of Pussy Riot, whose lives are close to the asceticism necessary for any creative thinking? Or is the belief in money on the side of those who invested the empty values of unprecedented governmental luxury in the code of conduct for any high-ranking man? Who has faith in weapons? Perhaps those who call for the killing in the name of religious feelings? On whose side were the dozens of armed men who, shouting and wielding their weapons, commanded a raid on March 3rd, having been sent to arrest two women suspected to have been in the temple- suspected of having asked Mother of God, loudly, get rid of Putin?”
Perhaps it was the way they presented their message and the choice of venue which shocked the Christians and delighted all others into thinking they were mocking God. Both groups did not seem to see the irony in which they performed the “punk prayer” at Christ the Savior cathedral in Moscow. However, I am not necessarily saying that the band claim to be Christians themselves. Certainly, some of the things they believe in I do not agree with. I cannot write them off, however, by saying that they are of the devil, which is what the patriarch was implying. I also do not condemn them for their choice of venue, now that I have a clearer picture of the possible corruption within the Russian Orthodox Church and their special connection with Putin. As a National Reviewer writer said in a follow-up article realigning his original Pussy Riot article, “the Pussy Riot girls are seeking to protest not oppression by religion but the oppression of religion by the Russian state.”
The battle between all that Pussy Riot represents and Putin’s network does not necessarily belong in the same arena with the conflict between atheists or feminists and Christianity. Therefore, the cross stomping/halving misrepresents what the whole thing is about. If anything, the misconstruing of the intent of the band’s protest is a representation of how tense and in the forefront the issues between liberal and conservative Christians—gay marriages, abortion, traditional views and roles of women, etc—happen to be at this very moment. Scandals involving those issues happen every day within America. More than anything, corruption was at the center of the Pussy Riot protest. It doesn’t seem like Pussy Riot’s international supporters really understand that. Many people jump to the conclusion that Pussy Riot must have been oppressed by religion itself, because perhaps that is how these observers from afar personally feel about religion. We all usually have the tendency to have our beliefs polarized by supporting what we think already supports our belief—not to mention projecting and applying specific connotations and intents to radical actions taken by others. Many seem to have perceived that Pussy Riot, by performing seemingly anti-God statements in a church, were espousing and enacting an anti-religious agenda. What happened to our keen sense of irony detection?
So, if someone wants to “free Pussy Riot,” as the movement touts, then he or she must also believe in the band’s true, unadulterated cause, and not an incorrectly interpreted general anti-religious sentiment. He or she must believe that corruption must end. Of course, the band, through their “hooligan” antics (they were actually ultimately charged with hooliganism) of disrupting a church service, has lent to this sentiment that they are anti-religion, but if we believe their claim that the church is corrupt and under sway of a corrupt official, Putin, then really the “attack” on conservatism and religion should not be the issue. If supporters of the FPR movement wanted to do their part, they would be doing research on the corruption of Putin and his relationship with the church that was protested. And they should then do their part to try and seek his removal from office. I’m not exactly sure how international supporters could do this, but that’s really the most logical reaction—along with speaking out to free or lessen the severity of the band members’ punishment. If Putin is using people’s faith in the church and paying the church to sway votes in his direction, then action should be taken, and PR’s message and freedom should be supported.
Below is a video put together by The Guardian with the band’s new single, “Putin Lights Up the Fires.” | <urn:uuid:b21b9cfc-67d3-480f-bdd7-dfec2a9933af> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://alamodest.com/2012/08/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974968 | 2,164 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Apple Inc (AAPL) licensed its prized design patents to Microsoft Corp (MSFT) but with an “anti-cloning agreement” to prevent copying of its iPhone and iPad, an Apple executive said on Monday.
The testimony from Apple patent licensing director Boris Teksler came in one of the most closely watched technology trials in years. Apple is accusing Samsung Electronics Co Ltd of copying its iPhone and iPad, while the Korean company says Apple infringes several of its wireless technology patents.
Apple had reached out to Samsung in 2010, hoping to strike an agreement with its rival on patent licensing before their dispute hit the courts.
Teksler testified that Apple offered a clutch of patents for licensing but, crucially, viewed patents related to what he called the “unique user experience” as a highly protected category.
Those included design patents at issue in the lawsuit, covering the look and feel of the iPhone and iPad. Teksler told jurors last week he could count on “on one hand” the instances Apple has licensed those patents.
Negotiations between Apple and Samsung did not produce a licensing agreement, and Apple filed a lawsuit in federal court in San Jose, California, in April 2011.
Apple’s decision to license its design patents to Microsoft was consistent with its corporate strategy, Teksler said, because the agreement prohibited Microsoft from manufacturing copies.
“There was no right with respect to these design patents to build clones of any type,” Teksler said.
The case in U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, is Apple Inc v. Samsung Electronics Co Ltd et al, No. 11-1846.
(Reporting By Dan Levine and Edwin Chan; editing by Jeffrey Benkoe) | <urn:uuid:f100375d-42b3-4ef6-88c7-320c85d59f1f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ourbusinessnews.com/apple-has-licensed-design-patents-to-microsoft | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960116 | 363 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Prompted by James Propp's recent question about surreal numbers, I was wondering whether anyone had investigated the idea of describing surreal numbers (as ordered class) in terms of a universal property, roughly along the following lines.
In categorical interpretations of type theories, it is common to describe inductive or recursive types as so-called initial algebras of endofunctors. The most famous example is the type of natural numbers, which is universal or initial among all sets $X$ which come equipped with an element $x$ and an function $f: X \to X$. In other words, initial among sets $X$ which come equipped with functions $1 + X \to X$ (the plus is coproduct); we say such sets are algebras of the endofunctor $F$ defined by $F(X) = 1 + X$. Another example is the type of binary trees, which can be described as initial with respect to sets that come equipped with an element and a binary operation, or in other words the initial algebra for the endofunctor $F(X) = 1 + X^2$.
In their book Algebraic Set Theory, Joyal and Moerdijk gave a kind of algebraic description of the cumulative hierarchy $V$. Under some reasonable assumptions on a background category (whose objects may be informally regarded as classes, and equipped with a structure which allows a notion of 'smallness'), they define a ZF-structure as an ordered object which has small sups (in particular, an empty sup with which to get started) and with a 'successor' function. Then, against such a background, they define the cumulative hierarchy $V$ as the initial ZF-structure, and show that it satisfies the axioms of ZF set theory (the possible backgrounds allow intuitionistic logic). By tweaking the assumptions on the successor function, they are able to describe other set-theoretic structures; for example, the initial ZF-structure with a monotone successor gives $O$, the class of ordinals, relative to the background.
Now it is well-known that surreal numbers generalize ordinals, or rather that ordinals are special numbers where player R has no options, or in different terms, where there are no numbers past the 'Dedekind cut' which divides L options from R options. In any case, on account of the highly recursive nature of surreal numbers, it is extremely tempting to believe that they too can be described as a recursive type, or as an initial algebraic structure of some sort (in a background category along the lines given by Joyal-Moerdijk, presumably). But what would it be exactly?
I suppose that if I knocked my head against a wall for a while, I might be able to figure it out or at least make a strong guess, but maybe someone else has already worked through the details? | <urn:uuid:fa36e13e-5319-4b3e-a8a0-257e466acc5e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mathoverflow.net/questions/63375/surreal-numbers-as-inductive-type/87127 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944836 | 607 | 1.703125 | 2 |
One of the oldest homes in Grapevine went up in smoke early Friday morning, but fortunately, no one was injured.
Firefighters responded about 4 a.m. to a fire in the 500 block of Wildwood Dr. The couple who lived there managed to get out safely, but the house was burning fast.
As firefighters poured water onto the flames, the roof collapsed. The house appears to be a total loss.
According to the fire department, the house was built in the 1860s and used to be the home of the first postmaster in Grapevine.
Investigators are working to figure out why it caught fire.
KDFW FOX 4400 N. Griffin StreetDallas, Texas 75202
Main Station Directory:(214) 720-4444News Fax:(214) 720-3263 or (214) 720-3333 | <urn:uuid:45b42ce3-3b39-4943-8807-2f9c4ba94c82> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.myfoxdfw.com/story/20561762/historic-grapevine-home-destroyed-by-fire | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934969 | 172 | 1.8125 | 2 |
About Personal Democracy Media
Welcome | Manifesto | Staff | Contact Us | Disclosures
Technology and the Internet are changing democracy in America. This site is one hub for the conversation already underway between political practitioners and technologists, as well as anyone invigorated by the potential of all this to open up the process and engage more people in all the things that we can and must do together as citizens. We value your input and ideas.
Democracy is changing.
A new force, rooted in new tools and practices built on and around the Internet, is rising alongside the old system of money intensive broadcast politics.
Today, for almost no money, anyone can be a reporter, a community organizer, an ad-maker, a publisher, a money-raiser, or a leader.
If what they have to say is compelling, it will spread.
The cost of finding like-minded souls, banding together, and speaking to the powerful has dropped to almost zero.
Networked voices are reviving the civic conversation.
More people, everyday, are discovering this new power. After years of being treated like passive subjects of marketing and manipulation, citizens want to be heard.
Members expect a say in the decision-making process of the networked organizations they join. Readers want to talk back to the news-makers. Citizens are insisting on more openness and transparency from government and from corporations too.
All the old institutions and players - big money, top-down parties, big-foot journalism, cloistered organizations - must adapt fast or face losing status and power, and some of them are. That evolution is happening as some governments, political organizations, businesses and nonprofits begin to embrace participation and transparency.
The realization of “Personal Democracy,” where everyone is a full participant, is coming.
Since 2004, Personal Democracy Media has helped nurture a world-wide conversation about technology’s impact on government and politics, and society - providing a place to meet the people who are making that change happen, discover the tools powering the new civic conversation, spot the early trends, and to share in understanding and embracing this dynamic new force. Many of those who are challenging the status quo, learned what they know, or found people to collaborate with, by being a part of Personal Democracy Media.
Now as Personal Democracy Media, that effort will grow as we work to contribute authoritative news, tools and resources focused on adapting to and thriving in a world where together we are building and fulfilling the promise of a 21st century democracy. (Updated January, 2011)
Micah L. Sifry
Chief Operating Officer
Operations and Events Director
Sarah Lai Stirland
Senior Staff Writer
Senior Editor, WeGov
Assistant Editor, International News
Andrew Rasiej, Founder & Publisher
Andrew Rasiej is an entrepreneur and technology strategist. He's counseled national and international political leaders, government officials, academics, and heads of nonprofits and foundations on issues related to civic engagement, technology, transparency, digital diplomacy and campaign strategy. Andrew got his start working at the intersection of technology and politics in 1999 offering early new media advice to leaders like Hillary and Bill Clinton, Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, and Congressional Minority leader Dick Gephardt. In 2003, presidential candidate Howard Dean and his campaign manager Joe Trippi named him chairman of the Technology Advisory Committee for the Dean for America Campaign which demonstrably moved all political campaigns into the future—by pioneering tactics in constituency development, community building, and networked political fundraising that used digital media in strategically orchestrated and thoughtful ways.
After the 2004 presidential campaign, Andrew founded Personal Democracy Forum, the international cross-partisan conference series that examines and analyzes how technology is impacting the evolving global political landscape while illuminating how activists, organizers, technologists, journalists, politicians, and government officials are advancing democratic ideals, using digital media to facilitate a more participatory, connective and transparent world. In 2007, he co-founded techPresident, an award-winning group blog that covers how activists and candidates are using the web. His commitment to finding and promoting digital solutions for a more open and accountable government extends to his position as senior technology advisor to the Sunlight Foundation, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization founded in 2006, which works to use the power of technology and citizen use of the internet to promote greater government transparency and accountability.
To help demonstrate the potential of the technology to empower local communities, in 2005 Andrew ran a highly publicized campaign for the office of New York City Public Advocate promoting many ideas now being championed by politicians in NYC and elsewhere such as inexpensive public WiFi, using social media to report potholes and other local infrastructure issues, and connecting citizens to each other to improve their neighborhoods and communities.
Andrew's belief that technology could empower citizen engagement originally took hold in 1997 when he founded MOUSE.org (Making Opportunities for Upgrading Schools and Education), a nonprofit helping under-served public school students to become technology leaders in their schools. Today, the MOUSE program is active in 10 states and 58 countries worldwide.
In the wake of the September 11 tragedy he mobilized dozens of volunteers to aid in relief and recovery efforts and subsequently proposed creating a national emergency technology corps to be organized for future natural disasters or terrorist attacks. After his lobbying, and with the help of Senator Ron Wyden, Congress voted 97-0 to create the National Emergency Technology Guard (NET Guard) in 2002, which was later incorporated into the law creating the Department of Homeland Security.
In 2010 Andrew was named chairman of the New York Tech MeetUp, an organization comprising more than 18,000 entrepreneurs, technologists, venture capitalists, and other professionals engaged in the tech start-up renaissance driving innovation and investment in New York.
Prior to a life in politics and education, Andrew founded several music-focused enterprises including: Irving Plaza, the world-famous Gramercy Park/Union Square music ballroom; Digital Club Network, the first live music streaming and archiving channel on the internet; and, Plug-In, the first conference focused exclusively on the future of digital music distribution. While operating Irving Plaza he also founded the New York Night Life Association to promote the hundreds of clubs and live music venues in New York City as an integral part of its economic vibrancy and cultural scene.
He is a graduate of the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, an alumnus of the prestigious David Rockefeller Fellowship Program administered by the New York City Partnership, and a member of the Board of Directors of PopTech. Andrew lives and works in New York City.
Micah L. Sifry, Editorial Director
Micah L. Sifry is co-founder and editorial director of Personal Democracy Media, which produces the annual Personal Democracy Forum conference on the ways technology is changing politics, and techPresident.com, an award-winning blog on how politicians are using the web and how the web is using them. In addition, he consults on how political organizations, campaigns, non-profits and media entities can adapt to and thrive in a networked world. He is a senior technology adviser to the Sunlight Foundation, which he helped found in 2006, and also serves on the board of Consumer Reports. He is the author or editor of six books, most recently Wikileaks and the Age of the Transparency (OR Books, 2011), and in the spring of 2012 he began teaching at Harvard’s Kennedy School.
From 1997-2006, he worked closely with Public Campaign, a non-profit, non-partisan organization focused on comprehensive campaign finance reform, as its senior analyst. Prior to that, Micah was an editor and writer with The Nation magazine for thirteen years. He is the author of Spoiling for a Fight: Third-Party Politics in America (Routledge, 2002), co-author with Nancy Watzman of Is That a Politician in Your Pocket? Washington on $2 Million a Day (John Wiley & Sons, 2004), co-editor of Rebooting America (available online for free download at rebooting.personaldemocracy.com), and co-editor of The Iraq War Reader (Touchstone, 2003) and The Gulf War Reader (Times Books, 1991). His personal blog is at micah.sifry.com and you can follow him on Twitter at @mlsif.
Jennifer Vento, Chief Operating Officer
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I’ve been thinking about hyper-linked writing for some time. I love the idea of associative thinking and in particular, how poetry might fit into that concept. But I haven’t dipped my toes into that water until now. First, Paul Allison and Susan Ettenheim at Teachers Teaching Teachers did a recent show on composing with hyperlink that was quite interesting. The show featured a site called Hypertextopia, which is being developed by a graduate student. Paul thinks it has echoes of StorySpace.
And, of course, it is Poetry Month, and over at Two Writing Teachers, there is a one-week poetry marathon of sorts going on.
All of these events moved me towards composing something a little bit different and results of that effort is a poem cycle for Web 2.o that I am calling: Capturing Myself in Hyperlink: A Poem of Connections .
In spare moments here and there during the course of a few days, I wrote this entire poem cycle. I really got into how the smaller poems informed the larger one and how the pieces could connect, if you took a wide enough angle. However, I also wanted each poem to work on its own, too. It’s like wedges into the mind.
Here is the main branch of the poem:
Capturing Myself in Hyperlink
Is this the way in
or the way out
of this wireless space of thoughts
and shouts that echo beyond the screen.
In-between is the reality.
There is movement among the letters:
nothing is stagnant;
nothing is still; nothing is shattered until the cursor moves
and then the path is forged fast-forward
into parallel words of perpendicular thoughts.
I write from inside out, not from left to right,
as if this composition were a new language being invented
by turning the world upside down,
with meaning embedded deep down below the surface.
What you see is not what you get.
What you see is what you should forget
when meaning is captured in html.
Perhaps you’ll dance with me here
and follow my movements on this virtual stage,
even as you most likely reach for the curtains
and turn down the lights for the night.
My act lives on in space.
There are two full versions of the poem cycle right now.
First, you can go to the first version I did as a free-standing website. This was the original version that I continue to tinker with. That can be accessed here.
Or, you can go follow a concept map that I created in Bubble.Us and click on the parts of the poem. This map gives another entry into a second version of the poem cycle — including a background image of the concept map — and shows the connections of the parts to the whole. (I also embedded the map down below).
I will be doing a longer reflection on the process of composing the poem and the construction of the entire piece tomorrow, and I hope to get into some possibilities for bringing this idea into the classroom, too.I would love to get some comments or suggestions on the poem cycle.In particular, does either version stand out as better than the other? Does the concept map make the poem more associative in thinking or just plain confusing? Which version gives you, the reader, more freedom to follow your own path?Peace (in poems), | <urn:uuid:03c5741b-0b8c-4cce-bcb0-041cab325ffe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://dogtrax.edublogs.org/2008/04/12/capturing-myself-in-hyperlink-a-poem-of-connections/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96107 | 701 | 1.71875 | 2 |
Photograph: cc Lisa Jane Persky
When I come upon a bad assonance or a repetition in my sentences, I'm sure I'm floundering in the false. By searching I find the proper expression, which was always the only one, and which is also harmonious. The word is never lacking when one possesses the idea. Is there not, in this precise fitting of parts, something eternal, like a principle? If not, why should there be a relation between the right word and the musical word? Or why should the greatest compression of thought always result in a line of poetry?
— Flaubert, letter to George Sand
Though I don't think of myself, touch wood, as a blocked writer, I will admit that the spells of sputter and balk — of hesitate, delete, and pause — have increased over the last decade, and the anxiety that is their shadow has grown accordingly. This is painful, as the vocation has over the years become ever more identified with the inner life. I watch myself closely. I see that even in productive periods, when I feel I am making honorable headway on some project and have earned the right to exist, the day's work seems to take more build-up — me trying to maneuver myself into the right "state" — and the intervals between good sessions get longer and longer. At the same time, I believe that I am, by whatever personal standards, a better writer than I was when I had no such anxieties. The radius of my available experience is greater than it has ever been. I understand things more deeply.
But tell that to the man mired in a thought-trance in front of his illuminated screen. Coach and lecture myself as I will, it avails not. No smart idea, no heaps of notes, and certainly no earned satisfaction from previous work can hold a plea when I am here, undisturbed and caffeinated, and the spark just will not cross the gap. It's all irrational, and I know it works both ways. Aches and money woes and the aggravations of an over-crowded calendar are as nothing whenever the signal comes clear and I feel the agitating stir of words and phrases.
Writing can't be planned for or predicted, and when it happens, when the surge begins, it brings a satisfaction like nothing else. There are finer sensualities, sure, and basic emotions that give joy or connection when released, but as far as giving me a sustained sense that this is who I am, this is what I do, a full-fathom immersion in writing is the ultimate verification. Alone at my attic desk, catching the flow of words, when the flow is there to be caught — or generating it when it is there to be generated — I break with my more tentative self, claim some more necessary seeming "I." The change has everything to do with finding words and their sequence. The joy prolongs itself for a short time after I stop — a resonance, a psychic afterglow — then it tapers away, the other life resumes. But I am already thinking toward the next occasion.
The memory of the best of the best writing moments haunts, most grievously when the desire is there but the impulse is absent, or when the impulse flickers and sputters but doesn't catch, when the words — which I believe are right there, as if on the other side of the sheerest membrane — will not come. The good runs are not a fortifying memory but a reproach. My younger self — it is always, necessarily, the younger self — mocks me. It's not just writing at stake, but everything. The worth I felt when I worked, when I was young — even if that was only yesterday — is gone. This is now and henceforth the way of things; this is the new reality.
My reaction is extreme, I know. I tap my available anxiety far too readily, ignoring common sense and all that I've learned about writing. The situation is hardly ever that polarized — fully engaged intensity versus utter paralysis. There are distinctions and nuanced gradations everywhere, and these can be parsed to reveal a more accurate relativism, though I have to say that with the restoration of more objectified shades of grayness, some defining absolutism is lost. It may just be that in those paranoid summonings of the void — the glaring page empty forever, the fingers immobilized over the keyboard — I have a truer insight into what writing is. I see better how I have set it up to be the measure of all things.
Where did it start, this bizarrely complex meshing of my sense of self-worth with my ability to express myself in writing? I don't remember any classic "aha" moment — I don't think it happened at a stroke. But I do know that early on, as far back as my earliest school years, I hit on a pleasure unlike any I'd known when I wrote papers or assigned "creative" pieces for my English teachers. Hunched over my school binder, instigating with my bad pencil-grip the ugly callus I have to this day, I had my first sensations of words coalescing into sentences I liked. My sounds were loud and distinct in my mind as I worked, almost a kind of voice-over, and they made me think of things I liked to read. That was the other thing: I was a reader. And my reaction when I read anything I liked, whether it was John Steinbeck or William Golding, was pure greed. I wanted the things I'd read to have come from me; I wanted to find the trick to make that happen. There was so much imitation in those first compositions, but also audial bursts of what I would call my own sound, sensations of having almost caught something. What pleasure! Certain sentences felt like they were alive and writhing when I wrote them out on my notebook pages. I was in close and everything seemed so immediate. How lucky I was that my teachers were kind. The papers I wrote usually came back with good grades and now and then a comment that nothing in later life has trumped.
In seventh grade our English teacher gave the assignment to create a description of a family member. I picked my grandfather. With a concentration I still remember, I worked up a one-page sketch about being a young boy and sitting in his lap while he smoked his pipe and told me stories. I went on and on about his long white beard, how I tugged at it while he told me about his younger days, the war. What on earth compelled me? My grandfather, who had died the year before, had been clean-shaven and pipeless; he had also been as reticent as a man could be. But through that wishful triggering, whatever it was, I was for the first time made ecstatic by my own phrase-making. I felt myself at the helm of some new power as I added one phrase to another, finishing each sequence with a period at what I knew was just the right moment.
But I am not after autobiography here. I am only making the point that the business goes way back, the joining of language, pleasure and self-recognition, and that the very same elements are in play — or in dire disconnect — fifty years later. Writing, not writing; satisfied self and self-loathing golem. And everything in between. For of course the whole identity- and ego-fraught business — and I have to now distinguish between writing and "writing" — unfolds along an extensive continuum. I have never been afflicted with such paralysis that I could not produce a cogent letter of recommendation, or a thoughtful response to a student paper. Prose of that sort can be, often must be, generated on command, but I am not very much interested in it as prose. The writing that matters, that defines me to myself, that injects me with affirmation when I amable, and every sort of self-depreciation when I am not, is precisely the writing that I cannot command. Its attainability is the result of an array of factors and I conjure the variables incessantly.
Mood is relevant, certainly, but it is not sufficient. Mood, the vibration of one's psychological state — the momentary expression of the felt relation to the world. It is as all-determining and elusive as weather. I have sat myself down many times feeling alert, rested, unanxious, confident that I know exactly what I want to write about — the scene I will evoke, the connection I will make between two ideas — but for whatever reason, the words just will not come. I mean the right words. And just like that I feel the universe of possibility fold in on itself, all that "I" suddenly reduced to a point. What can possibly be the matter? Why am I frozen here? I arrived at my desk with a head full of notions. But I know that notions themselves are not the problem — notions are not deal-breakers. The problem is the words. It's the matching of impulse to expression, the bringing together of intent and execution, that not-to-be-counterfeited alignment that depends on diction, rhythm, and who knows what else, and the signature of which is a sensation, almost physical, of rightness.
I think back to Coleridge's deceptively succinct definition of poetry as "the right words in the right order," and from all my years of wrestling the language — never mind that my medium is prose — I get to what feels like his deeper meaning, which I believe is apt for all more lyrically expressive kinds of writing. "The right words in the right order" is, beyond its almost foursquare obviousness, a way to talk about the elusive and very unfoursquare ideas of inevitability and artistic inspiration. It not only raises the question of where the words we assemble originate — how they originate — but also whether there might actually exist ideal expressions that have vital purchase on the essential nature of the thing expressed. We are in the contested realm where people are forever shouting "define your terms!" And we cannot.
Coleridge, we know, wrote not only the early poetry for which he is remembered, but later prose of different descriptions, including the Biographia Literaria, one of the founding documents of literary criticism. In Coleridge's case 'blockage' was a relative diagnosis. Though he wrote his superlative prose for decades after the poetry stopped, that production was no recompense. For him there was no comparing the "rightness" that he had experienced in the seizure of poetic composition to what he achieved in the other medium — neither in terms of personal gratification, or ultimate value. Coleridge lived under the banner of Romanticism, upon which was inscribed Shelley's rallying assertion that "The poet is the unacknowledged legislator of the world." Through the language of poetry — language in its highest incarnation — are the ultimate truths made manifest. It is not given to the essayist or critic to draw that deeply from the wells of inspiration.
I am not a poet. Nor do the poets I know feel themselves to be marching behind any higher In hoc signo. But I nonetheless connect with certain implications of that rightness, making my own strong distinction between writing that attains a redeeming expressiveness and writing that either falls short or serves other ends altogether. What is this redemption? How is it that two centuries later, moving about in a signal-saturated universe, I can still equate the production of my best writing with a sense of being in a deeper accord with existence? And why do I suffer in my innermost nervous core when I cannot get the words to come the way I feel they must?
Writer's block — or, maybe more accurately, a writer's expressive frustration — has many presenting symptoms and many causes, but it is at root language-related. Versions of creative stasis may afflict those who practice in other fields — painters and composers can find themselves short of ideas or inspiration — but the situation is not quite the same. Certainly we never hear anything comparable affecting statesmen, lawyers, coaches, electricians or pastry chefs. This affliction afflicts self-anointed users of language, writers, and because their medium of choice — or compulsion — happens to be the universal medium of consciousness and communication, it takes on a metaphysical inflection. If language is the distinctive human feature, its single greatest evolutionary feat, then writers are in a most privileged and vulnerable situation. In the movement from ape to apex, the engaged — successful — use of language, literary expression, represents the latter. It follows then that a frustration or failure in its use must be seen as something more sweepingly indicative as well. The fact that any true success is rare and difficult is not consoling to the person who is failing in the attempt.
Reason naturally persuades otherwise, but for many of us the deeper superstitions rule. Though the writer may believe that the finest productivity is fickle and cannot be willed, arriving on itsterms, not his, he might still blame himself for productive lack. For he has the idea — I do, certainly — that inspiration has something to do with being in the right relation to things, and if arrival of words is out of his control, the achievement of that relation is not. If he has not made himself a worthy vessel, he has in the largest sense failed. Call it complete and utter nonsense, but when it eludes you — the tone, or the feeling of surprise, the current you can feel when the circuit is complete — when you know what that's like and don't have it — then such repudiation is useless. The psyche is irrational.
Define your terms! All this said, we need to acknowledge how little of what makes up a writing life, even a productive one, is actual point-of-contact writing of any kind, and how much is the inner self-maneuvering (actions and choices in all aspects of living) that would make those right words possible. The fingers hover over the keyboard, the pen twirls this way and that in the fingers. I hum, I tap, I stroke my eyebrow, the side of my nose. The emphasis falls — again — squarely on the adjective 'right.' For according to the writer's tyrannical conscience, a faculty developed over a lifetime of expression and attempted expression, the placement of words that are only well-meant approximations onto a page or a screen is not necessarily writing. It may even count as a movement in the other direction, away from writing. Rightness is, to torque Shakespeare slightly, all. And so the deeper philosophical question about writing is really a question about what is right. Not only what matters in terms of the subject matter — the thing one is disposed to say — but what matters in the specific language, in the words, pauses, cadences, and inflections in which that saying happens. Style.
Style, I'll define here, for my selfish purposes, as the verbal/lexical confirmation that I'm in the right relation to my impulses, my so-called material. "The right words in the right order": style is the outer face of the inner impulse, its realization. It is not a frippery, an adornment, an excess. Style is the how of the what. "By searching I find the proper expression, which was always the only one...." And what an arduous business it is, getting to the "proper," the "right." For years I tormented myself with the possibility that there was a single inevitable order, an absolute objective arrangement. I heeded Coleridge, and I likewise took seriously Flaubert's famous self-castigating agonies over "le mot juste" — as if behind or beneath each of the configurations of our common reality lay a paradigm, a kind of Platonic form, and that for this there was but one true verbal equivalent. Reading the finest stylists can create that impression, for their peak expressions do get us saying "Yes! That's it!" Still, I had somehow not considered what those 'best words,' that 'exact word,' might mean for the writer, and that they might in fact represent the embodiment of that relation I'm talking about. The "best words," might in fact signify not a universal attainment but a personal one. In other words, the momentum that brings the words in shapely patterns is not tuned to some imprinted common reality, but, rather, configures our unique relation to the world around us. For a writer the signature, the embodiment, of that relation is style. So many great writers, so many inimitable styles.
How readily and forgivably we limit the idea of style to its outermost — obviously ascertainable — manifestations. One person's style said to be "florid," another's "austere." But the business is much deeper than that. Those designations are nothing more than caricatures, ways of remarking a salient attribute — like saying such and such a person is "conceited" or "solid." Style is as much a totality as personality, and is no more accurately served by pot-shot adjectives.
As a totality, style is implicated at every level in these other explorations. What we call writer's block can be seen, in these terms, a failure to achieve style, by which I mean an inability to find the relation — a paralysis of that inner negotiating by which my expressively ambitious self hits on what feels like an accuracy of representation. When I experience this inability — this crackling static in the brain — when nothing I do can make my words feel true, as if they are embodying what I'm after, it's almost never for a more general lack of ideas. There are always things to say. It's the idea as it impinges upon language. "The word is never lacking when one possesses the idea." Not just any idea, but the true idea. Without this, I can't find the words that will call forth other words in a way that lets me know I'm in sync with what I'm after. The approximate rendition, an approximate style, will not do. Anything short of rightness, getting it — which is registered intuitively, almost bodily — is worthless. I am out of phase with my subject. Therefore I am out of phase with myself.
Writing is in large part the struggle to achieve the state of mind that would make writing possible, and therefore it permeates my life, from my first waking moments to my last flickering efforts before sleep to secure the feeling, as if I could insure its availability for the next day. This permeation of impulse and need makes the question "what is writing?" all but impossible to answer. So what is the nature of this state I'm talking about? What is it that I would bring to the desk? How could I ever catch hold of what I'm calling my relation to the world in a way that would give me access to expression? Or — or — is there something about the writing itself, about using language, that brings about that connection? I think of E. M. Forster's famous question: "How do I know what I think until I see what I say?" Here again we find the perspective of the language mystic, a version of the Heideggerian idea that "language speaks man." Here is the most vexatious philosophical conundrum, one that the writer engages not through metaphysical speculation but in the dynamic act of putting words to paper. Are those words being thought to the page, produced in composition, or do they already somehow exist in resonant sequences? How could they? Do we know and possess more than we imagine we do? If not, why do the best writing moments have a power and necessity that feels almost separate. As if, to quote Rimbaud, "I is another." And it's true: to be frozen, blocked, kept from writing, is to feel marooned in the mere self.
What is the nature of the desired condition? How does the writer know it? Does it forecast itself somehow, send a signal? I know it when I feel it, and that's it. I can't think of it as something that exists ahead of, or separate from, any actual writing, though the actual writing requires it. More likely there is some kind of relational mutuality. The readiness brings the words, the words act upon and confirm the readiness. I don't know that I have ever taken my place at any desk, in front of any pad, typewriter or laptop, with clear confidence about what would happen next. Sure, it happens with certain projects when the work is so far along, its tone and development so clear, that I can reliably find my place and push on. But this is only the case with writing that is directly thematic, or follows an argument. With work of a more lyric sort, where the "how" matters as much as the "what," there has never been guarantee, and mind-states outwardly similar can produce radically different yields. One day it's a house on fire, the next an Eliotic blight, where I "can connect nothing with nothing." Stranger still is the fact that on occasion the least propitious approaches — when I am exhausted, hung over, set upon by distractions — can with an unexpected triggering of syllables throw the gates wide open.
About thumb twiddling impasses and initiatives that come to nothing there is not much to be said. All failures of ignition are the same failure. But what of the other times? What of the less dramatic, more ordinary — and far more common — instances? When a paragraph or two finds its way out, laboriously, but still registering its own perceptible pulse — prose that does not feel finished, but that has something in the phrasing, the pace, a few of the sentences, that I sense can be developed, and yet so very different from the very rare flights, the releases, when for an hour or two the sentences just arrive, sense neatly bundled in sound, phrases nipping after one another with an almost musical rightness, with what feels like a rhythmic logic just behind the accruing prose. How to account for it? I have not yet found the neuropsychological explanation that would do justice to the uncanny synthesis of sound and sense, music and meaning, the compositional experience of which is at least as gratifying as any result it generates. "Why should there be a relation between the right word and the musical word?" There are moments when the act of writing is at one and the same time an intuitive heeding, a listening-in on oneself, and an action, a pressure of thinking. The process is active and passive, though I would hasten to qualify passivity as itself active, a most heightened sort of reception.
This has everything to do with style. Style, which is a totality, a dizzyingly complex confabulation of language patterns, a sui generic collection of tendencies and defaults which has over time crystallized into an expressive mode as singular as a fingerprint, a mode that not onlyfeels unique to oneself, but may also be perceived as such by others. We think of Updike's style, David Foster Wallace's style, Alice Munro's style — the myriad choices of perspective, cadence, diction, and syntactical orchestration that create in their sum an authorial personality. Who will argue that all writers don't, once they have found their expressive agendas, reveal themselves in distinctive ways?
As a writer I believe myself to have a style, if only because I feel so vague to myself, so inwardly pained, when I can't reach it, when my sentences, however clear and articulate, give me no feeling of connection. It's not enough to say something well, I must say it well in the way that is uniquely mine. What is the secret? Some days I arrive at my desk and it's as if I have an appointment with myself — it's almost that easy. Other times I could put a gun to my head and there would still be nothing but smudges. But it can also sometimes happen that I move by stages into my expression. I can, if my stars are kind, write myself into my style — recovering a trace of the original inspiration and then my rhythm, my phrasings. I can recover flow, resume my position, retrieve my verbal relation to my subject matter. There is the confidence that the launch of a sentence already contains its destination. I feel myself moving toward something that already exists around the next bend in the road.
Self-conception and writing are so intimately joined that they can feel merged. And what a cloud of superstition surrounds the whole business. I wrote of stars being 'kind': as if it were a matter of luck, of juju, being in cahoots with the Muse. Unable to control the sources of our own craft, many of us externalize and mystify. We have as many occult private rituals as gamblers or baseball pitchers. As if the rotten apples in the drawer or the alignment of sharpened pencils, or the muttering of mantras could affect the process. But of course these are just tokens of a reverence before what must remain the unknown. The stakes could not be higher. Success in expression is the crowning affirmation of self — ask any writer. Failure is confirmation of an ultimate unworthiness. Ask any writer. To undertake to write is to actively court the unknown; it is to put oneself at the mercy of a power that may be external, may be internal, but is, either way, not subject to volition.
On the days when nothing will kindle, there is no use pretending, I just know. When I was younger, I might have stayed in my chair, tried anyway, but now I know better. Forcing myself to use words when I'm in this state guarantees not only self-reproach, but a larger questioning of the uses of anything. Far better on such a day to do busy work or read. Other times it's not so clear. I assess my energy, willingness; I exert myself to call vividly to mind whatever project is at hand. It can happen that the mind will fasten onto something, start up a kind of friction. Other times, no adhesion. Every thought is a distraction from the subject — it's almost fascinating. How not to be superstitious — if not about writing, then the ways of the psyche itself?
I will never stop hoping. If I have any inkling — my wetted forecasting finger extended — that the breeze may come, I will go up to the desk, and since simple inert sitting is too overt an advertisement of incapacity, I will, without investing deeply, try out a few words. Maybe they will yield something, a combination that flashes. It does happen. But far more often I find myself going dully back and forth, Penelope at her shuttle, weaving and unweaving, moving the cursor to the right and watching as the words materialize behind it, and then moving it back the way it came, watching how something comes back to naught, trying not to draw larger human inferences from the action. I will do this until I'm sure, until the feeling of a larger failure threatens. At that point I snap off the desk lamp and take up whatever rationalizations will get me through the rest of the day. Because if I have achieved nothing here, the odds of finding pleasure in anything else are slim. Best then just to do something — straighten up my shelves, sort through old papers. Though even these can turn fraught. Straightening, I have to confront my various masters, the ones who saw the job through; sorting papers there is every danger that the eye will alight on some piece of writing that once caught the real spark. Which will never come again...
But — oh — it does. And when the moment comes, I don't pause to reflect on causes or contributing factors. I have the words, I feel them. Here they are, almost physical. I feel them as shapes, vibrations, valences.... Sometimes they will start to agitate me before I get to paper or screen. They are like the first kernels popping in the pan, words turning into phrases. I feel suddenly rushed, anxious not to lose anything. I get more phrases, and — rarely but best of all — an initiating line, a sentence or run of words that I know right away holds in its rhythm, in its bit of structure, a whole unfolding. Everything feels musically — rhythmically — touched, and it's all I can do to bring the two lines together, the line of the music and the line of sense. There is urgency, syncopation, a movement forward from one thing to the next, the specific rhythm so integral that there is risk in stopping. These visitations, when they come, last for a few hours at most. And just as I had sensed the onset, so I sense the tapering off, and now some other superstition keeps me from trying to push it to the limit. I remember Hemingway's advice — always stop when you know what you will say next. Bank the ember with warm ash. Whatever.
After such a session, I don't look back: I never read over what I've just written. I will check in later. But my life feels worthy to me again. Whatever vague and unproductive sloughs I have been through, whatever disconnects I've known, all of my failures to be adequate to a situation or fellow soul — they have in a stroke all been turned to the good. All things are now subsumed, part of this other thing, this capture. The true redemption. If only it could last, but it doesn't. A day or two at most. By the third my title to existence is less secure — no matter how well I wrote. Art may be long, but not for the maker. Said Frost, nothing gold can stay, and though his saying has stayed, I'm sure that for him it was not enough.
Where else do we see in such stark, concentrated terms the intersection, or collision — or collusion — of volition and that which is beyond the reach of volition, what feels like the action of a power that can give and take away? As Alice Flahery documents in her searching study, The Midnight Disease: The Drive to Write, Writer's Block, and the Creative Brain, much work is currently being done in neuropsychology and neurophysiology on these very questions. Scans and experiments can now tell us exactly which areas of the brain are active in various kinds of creativity, and they have shown with great precision how chemical and electrical influences can trigger and heighten that activity, though to my knowledge no one yet has been triggered to create anything we would consider lasting art or literature.
Still, the question has been raised, and it is a specific instance of a much larger question having to do with sources and origins. Are we en route to uncovering the physiological causality that, when fully understood, will confirm that the so-called mysteries of creativity have merely been an insufficient command of the facts? Or will the breakthroughs and syntheses finally prove asymptotic, describing a line of a curve that approaches but never intersects the line of the axis? It could be that the closer we get to understanding the process, the more vexing will become the remaining unknowns. If we were to find the specific region of the brain that governed a moment of poetic production, could we also account for "bare ruined choirs where late the sweet birds sang"? Possibly not. But even if we could, would we ever be able to say why those specific words in their place in the sonnet have a beauty that, at our most receptive moments, we feel down into our very breathing?
Flaherty takes as one of the two epigraphs to her book Roland Barthes' observation: "A creative writer is one for whom writing is a problem." This takes us right to the heart of the business. Writing is a problem. One does not write if there is not somewhere a wound or a loss or a grievance of soul to redress. And where there is hurt of any kind, there are bound to be resistances, difficulties of access, of aptness of language, of volition. To heed Barthes here is to push right past the preposterous notion that creative expression is governed by some kind of on/off switch, so that — as the pop culture mythos would have it — the writer is either pouring forth, giving vent to the sublimities of the inner self, or else stalled, on hold, staring at the empty page like Stephen King's character in The Shining. The truth is in between and everywhere else. We can allow the extreme cases — abundance, immobility — sure, but most writing, as experienced in the subjectivity of the writer herself, is experienced differently. It is fitful and labored; it describes a constant movement between output and inhibition, release and constraint.
And what we address in speaking of the whole work, we might also address at the level of the smallest units. In the incremental making of sentences, but also in the arduous progress that is the completion of a page of prose. Both at times require a straight-up rock-face exertion; there are long racking stops and there is much trial and error. As compensation are the breakthrough rushes, words coming to the page as fast as the fingers can type. It is almost never just one or the other. There are infinite varieties of stasis and release. The play of opposites can be an intimate dynamism, where the tension of blockages presages creativity. Voice and style are lost and found and lost again — reminding us that we do not inhabit the world effortlessly as just ourselves, but are constantly digressing from center and then returning. Silences precede storms, and follow them as well. Who are we to imagine, to presume, that expression is any kind of constant, or that words are simple servants to the will?
I described this fascination, this vexation, to a friend. Himself a writer, he knows well the embattled contradictions of any day's work — I am writing; I am written. I command the expressions of my deepest self; I am nothing — and the other day he e-mailed me this little poem by Randall Jarrell. "Why am I so sure it's about writer's block?" he asked.
What a girl called "the dailiness of life"
(Adding an errand to your errand. Saying,
"Since you're up ..." Making you a means to
A means to a means to) is well water
Pumped from an old well at the bottom of the world.
The pump you pump the water from is rusty
And hard to move and absurd, a squirrel-wheel
A sick squirrel turns slowly, through the sunny
Inexorable hours. And yet sometimes
The wheel turns of its own weight, the rusty
Pump pumps over your sweating face the clear
Water, cold, so cold! you cup your hands
And gulp from them the dailiness of life.
I was primed and the lines hit me straight on in the moment. Yes, I thought, it is about many things, but it is absolutely about creativity. About how with a breathtaking turn our inner nature can unexpectedly over-ride all obstacle — "and yet sometimes/ the wheel turns of its own weight" — conferring upon this often bitter undertaking what feels like grace, a surplus in the world. Inspiration still keeps that sense of externality, and that surprise; it remains, in the experience, a token of the unknown. | <urn:uuid:8f5f7822-a1a0-4ebd-8e19-e2860cd1a4ff> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://lareviewofbooks.org/article.php?type=&id=39&fulltext=1&media= | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967249 | 7,398 | 1.601563 | 2 |
Questions and Answers about Headlights
Q: What are Projector Headlights?
A: Projector Headlights feature a special lens that projects the light much farther down the road. The beam of light is more concentrated than the typical headlight beam.
Q: What are Euro Headlights?
A: Euro Headlights are a clear lense design light the is cleaner and brighter than factory lights. The back part of the headlight housing is designed to reflect more light with diamond angles.
Q: What does CCFL mean?
A: Cold cathode fluorescent lamps. CCFLs use a discharge in mercury vapor to develop ultraviolet light, which causes a florescent coating on the inside of the lamp to make a visible light. This means it is a brighter and more even light. This technology is used in the Halo or Angel Eye rings on many of the lights that we sell.
Q: How hard is it to install headlights in my car?
A: It is the same as changing out a factory headlight. Most vehicles only require the removal of a few screws and clips and then you unplug the factory light and reverse the steps to install the new lights.
Q: Do I need to cut or splice wires to install Projector or Euro Headlights?
A: No. The Headlights that we sell have the factory harness connector so they are just plug and play.
Q: Are Projector Headlights legal?
A: Yes all of the headlights that we sell are DOT approved. | <urn:uuid:bd2bf5d6-010b-48e3-b9f6-e9047b3bc7e8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.slickcar.com/accessories/2000_gmc_denali_projector_light_conversion.asp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934788 | 310 | 1.625 | 2 |
For the Novice: Finding Inspiration All Around You
Discover endless speech topics
in life’s everyday sources.
By Joel A. Pogar, CC
As the president of a growing Toastmasters club, I watch our members go from nervous newbies to confident speakers. Observing this transformation is a rewarding experience. I also get to see what people struggle with in their journey to becoming a Competent Communicator. Some achieve their CC very quickly, while others have a great deal of difficulty.
What’s interesting to me is the reason for success or failure. In my opinion, it’s inspiration. When you’re speaking, you have to be inspired about your topic...you have to believe in it and want to talk about it. The members on the fast track in our club – Parker Toastmasters in Parker, Colorado – are not necessarily the “best” speakers, but they are inspired to speak. They have something to say and want to tell others about it.
What is inspiration and how do you get it? I wish there was an exact recipe I could give, but short of that I’ll offer you the guidance I give new members in our club. I have given speeches on a variety of topics, and I’m often asked by new members, “Where do you get the material for your speeches? Where do you find the inspiration to write them?”
In actuality, getting the material to speak about is the easy part. Look into your own life, the daily experiences and the people who are important to you. Surely there’s material in there just begging to be spoken about. Think about your job, kids, spouse or hobbies. The list is actually endless. Let me walk you through a real-life scenario that led to one of my most popular speeches. You’ll see just how easy it is to find inspiration.
As the director for a technology company in Denver, Colorado, hiring new talent is one of my responsibilities. Last fall, I had a position open for more than 90 days because we just couldn’t find the right person for the job. While interviewing a crowd of candidates, I came across people who had lied on their resumes, failed the pre- employment drug test or even mysteriously disappeared.
An Idea Hits – Literally
The worst part of the hiring nightmare happened on one particularly bad day. A job candidate was so nervous during an interview that I thought he was going to faint. When he made it to the end of our session without passing out, I congratulated him. Too quickly, as it turned out. As I was shaking his hand by the door, he threw up on me.
I couldn’t pass up a golden opportunity to talk about the experience. With a little ingenuity, I turned that terrible day – and its frustrating background – into a comical speech that I delivered to my Toastmasters club. I called it “How Not To Get Hired.” With a little organization, vocal variety and humor, it turned out to be one of my funniest speeches ever. And it took me less than 30 minutes to write, because I really enjoyed venting about what happened.
So finding inspiration for a speech is not as difficult as it sounds. I often coach new members through their first speech, and when they tell me they have nothing to write about, I simply ask them three questions:
- What did you do today?
- What did your kids or pet (whichever applies) do today?
- What happened at work today?
After going through this exercise, people are usually surprised at the number of speech topics we uncover. This method has never failed to produce a great speech for a new member. Between your life, family and job, there’s got to be a speech in there somewhere!
Joel A. Pogar, CC, is the president of Parker Toastmasters in Parker, Colorado. He is a professional speaker, as well as a coach and club mentor. Reach him at email@example.com. | <urn:uuid:8c4488b1-1fb3-4c5a-be55-af8ddc69e92c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.toastmasters.org/ToastmastersMagazine/ToastmasterArchive/2010/January/Departments/Inspiration.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975866 | 841 | 1.835938 | 2 |
While we quietly try to digest exactly what it is that our President is doing in India three days after his Democratic Party took a hit in the midterm Congressional election, we should become more knowledgeable about some of the big lobby organizations here at home that funneled money into GOP campaign war chests. It’s important that everyone know who these movers and shakers are who control and direct where millions of dollars of influence-peddling money will go.
We’ve already discussed at length the huge impact that the Koch brothers have had on our political landscape through think tanks, such as the Cato Institute, and 501(c) organizations that have been unleashed on us by the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v. FEC. (And let us never forget that it was a very narrowly decided and hotly debated decision.)
A very influential group that we have been hearing more and more about is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Its head is Tom J. Donahue, President and CEO. Bloomberg BusinessWeek has had a cover story on Mr. Donahue this week, [Here] titled “Tom Donahue: Obama’s Tormentor.” I certainly don’t know how true the "tormentor" part is (or was), but it makes good copy, doesn’t it? And the piece gives Mr. Donahue even more public exposure which he doesn’t seem to mind. He claims that the more press he gets, the more businesses and corporations are apt to give money to the Chamber.
Bloomberg reports that the Chamber spent $32 million in what it called “issue” advertising, criticizing Obama and his Congressional supporters. It gave millions more to individual campaign funds. The Chamber’s partner in this last campaign was Karl Rove’s lobbying group, the conservative American Crossroads. Both organizations admit that they meet regularly to plot strategy and to make sure that they do not duplicate their efforts.
According to the Chamber’s own accounting, it was successful in 38 of the 59 electoral races that it supported. Bloomberg quoted [Here] David Donnelly the director of Public Campaign Action Fund’s Campaign Money Watch as saying:
The chamber can walk into any office on Capitol Hill and the first thing the member of Congress will think about is the $50 million that the chamber spent in this election for them or against them. That's an incredible amount of clout to throw around.
It most certainly is!
And until we address this fundamental flaw which now exists in our political life, our Congress is up for sale and so is our democracy.
Bloomberg cited a dinner party that Donahue hosted for some lobbyists and attorneys from the drug industry and the media which included News Corp. (NWSA), NBC Universal, Walt Disney (DIS), Merck (MRK) and Johnson and Johnson (JNJ). The major discussion was pirating our goods and ideas here and in China. Donahue kept the conversation and the wine flowing and talked about opponents' funding efforts against the Chambers’ plans for globalization. He told everyone that most of the anti-globalization funding came from one source, and later admitted that it was George Soros...
Donahue is a Brooklyn boy and was educated at Adelphi, but has certainly lost any identification with the Brooklyn of his childhood. He’s anti-regulation, pro-globalization and pro-big business. I’m sure we could add anti-union and anti-tax to that list without having to do much further digging. [Here]
Do these positions strike any bells?..... | <urn:uuid:28e70033-6049-479c-a633-0011826bc198> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://whatsleftisleft.blogspot.com/2010/11/tom-donahue-of-uscc.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976581 | 746 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Lagos — For some time now, intelligence gathering has become very fundamental more than ever before to the international community, especially with the pervasive insecurity all over the world created largely by terrorism and trans-national criminal activities.
Hence the developed world, particularly countries like Britain and United States of America have fortified the MI5 and MI6, the CIA and FBI respectively. Perhaps, this is the time to actually appreciate our own, the National Intelligence Agency (NIA), which has existed in the past twenty (20) years.
Created in 1986 by Decree 19 of June 5, 1986, now known as Cap.278 of the laws of the Federation, from the ashes of the defunct National Security Organisation (NSO), the NIA has over the years stood the test of time, moving gradually from a perceived government agency with intent to do its masters bidding, to the status of a professionally driven and responsible security organisation.
Saddled with the responsibility of keeping watch over security threats to the nation, along with other security agencies, the NIA since inception has had the primary responsibility of gathering and analysing international intelligence information about Nigeria, as well as working with the local intelligence organisations, to ensure that there is peace and stability in our country.
Promulgated by the military administration of President Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, the Decree 19 of 1986 created three new security and Intelligence Agencies, namely the National Intelligence (NIA), the State Security Services (SSS), and the Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA). And since two decades of its inception the NIA, like the other agencies, has concentrated on its area of core competence, exhibiting absolute professionalism in intelligence gathering, and also collaborating with strategic and friendly international partners to secure the peace and stability of Nigeria, including its immediate neighbours.
Before the establishment of the NIA, the evolution of the Intelligence Service in Nigeria dated back to the establishment of the Nigeria Police Force (NPF) by the British Colonial Administration. However, in 1958, the Special Branch, known as the "E" Branch, was created within the NPF and charged with the responsibility of gathering overall intelligence. Similarly, in 1960, the Research Department of the Ministry of External Affairs was created and saddled with the specific responsibility for the procurement of external intelligence. This arrangement was retained until 1976 when the then Government of General Olusegun Obasanjo established the NSO, to take charge of both domestic and external intelligence, which later gave birth to the NIA. Since then, the agency has been responsible for the maintenance of the security of Nigeria outside the country.
Though, the 1986 Decree setting up the NIA did not spell out in great details its functions, the government of General Abdulsalami Abubakar in 1999 sought to remedy this and signed the NIA Instrument No.1 of 23rd May 1999, spelling out in greater details the duties and obligations of the Agency. The Instrument states that "without prejudice to the generality of the provision relating to the duties of the NIA set out in Section 2(2) of Decree No. 19, the objective for the Agency shall include the protection, promotion and enhancement of Nigeria's security, national interest, the economy and government's policy objectives outside Nigeria."
Under the direct supervision of the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, the agency carries out its daily function, in conjunction with the National Security Council (NSC), Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), the Intelligence Community Committee (ICC) and the Joint Intelligence Board (JIB). Since it was found in 1986, the NIA has been headed by five Directors-General, namely, Chief Albert K. Horsfall (1986-1990), Brigadier-General Haliru Akilu (Rtd) (1990-1993), Ambassador Zakari Y. Ibrahim (1993-1998), Ambassador Godfrey B. Preware (1998-1999) and Ambassador Uche O. Okeke (1999 till date).
The various Director-Generals have, in the intervening years, made immense contributions to the growth and development of the Agency. Despite the enormous contributions of the various intelligence chiefs to the security and stability of our nation, the general public cannot actually assess them, since they are the unseen hands silently driving the security needs of our nation. The success story of the Agency cannot, therefore, be complete without giving due credit to each and everyone of them. The roll call of honour very appropriately should start with Chief Albert K. Horsfall, a doyen of Nigerian Security and Intelligence establishment who, as the pioneer Director-General, conceptualised the framework and philosophical foundation on which the Agency is built.
Next is Brigadier-General Haliru Akilu, a strict disciplinarian who brought his military discipline to bear on the operations of the agency. We must also recognise Ambassador Zakari Y. Ibrahim, a consummate administrat or and welfarist, who steered the affairs of the Agency with great zeal. On his part, Ambassador Godfrey B. Preware, a fine diplomat, strategic planner and thinker, was noted for his methodical and conciliatory approach to issues of the day. Since June 1999, the mantle of leadership of the NIA has fallen on the shoulders of Ambassador Uche Okeke, a fine gentleman, visionary leader. With these arrays of tested leaders, it is therefore little surprise that the agency has continued to function in the best traditions of a professional intelligence service.
Operating from a magnificent edifice in Garki II, Abuja, there is no doubt that in the last 20 years, the agency has recorded a number of successes, but because the business of security and intelligence is almost usually conducted and shrouded in absolute secrecy, it is very difficult, especially for an outsider, to be able to assess in absolute terms the performance index of the NIA without compromising its operations.
Conducting its affairs strictly under the principle of "the need to know" you only know what they want you to know. It is only when things go wrong that the public begins to hear of intelligence failures, but when things are right, you hardly hear or know about the delicate endeavours of the security and intelligence agencies. It is, therefore, within that context that one can assess the performance of the Agency in the last 20 years.
One can safely say that the Agency has excelled and has contributed a lot to the relative peace in the polity, which ranges from the excellent relations existing between Nigeria and its neighbours, the reasonably strong performance of Nigeria's economy, the giant strides Nigeria is making on the world stage, the curbing of religious fundamentalism and terrorism in all their forms to the fight against drug trafficking. Others include the fight against human trafficking, as well as the successful fight against economic and financial crimes, including "419" and cyber crimes.
Furthermore, the vision and foresight of the current leadership of the NIA was the main driving force that led to the establishment of the Committee of Intelligence and Security Services of Africa (CISSA) in August 2004. CISSA is the first bold Pan African initiative for the pooling of resources and sharing of intelligence among African countries. Thanks to the pioneering effort of the current Director-General of National Intelligence Agency (NIA), CISSA is today an organ of the African Union. Again, the NIA successfully pioneered the establishment of the NEPAD Intelligence and Security Committee. | <urn:uuid:fd34c769-8ce0-468b-9a00-6602c2463f06> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://allafrica.com/stories/200606230466.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953554 | 1,520 | 1.828125 | 2 |
The Brother of the Smallest One
Lecture of the Master Beinsa Douno, given on January 1, 1917, in Sofia
"Sanctify them in the truth" John 17:17
In the archetypal language, the language of the Virgin Divine Spirit - the highest in the hierarchy of the angels - God gave man a different name, not the one we know now. This happened at the council of Gods, chaired by the Lord Jesus Christ, called the Saviour of Humanity. This council discussed the creation of man and defined his name. The name man has been incorrectly translated, but let's be content with it for the present. By man we mean a rational being.
At this stage of evolution man's reasoning takes two directions - ascending and descending. The descending reasoning functions to create the human personality and the human body with its seven invisible enveloping sheaths. The Eastern and Western esoteric lodges differ in the classification of the enveloping sheaths but these classifications refer only to the external, visual aspect of these teachings. Essentially there is in fact no difference between them. According to the inner meaning of Christ's teaching, we have three essential unalterable bodies and seven enveloping sheaths. Theosophical literature mentions the seven enveloping sheaths of the body, but the three unchangeable bodies are only hinted at. The enveloping sheaths are called bodies. But they are not bodies. Enveloping sheaths is a better name for them. In reality, the human world is transient, and the evolution of the world is a divine process. From the Divine viewpoint, the aspiration of the human spirit is to attain the three unchangeable bodies. This idea is so vast and boundless that even men of genius, the great minds of science and of the occult, the upper hierarchies of the angels, and even the upper hierarchies of the gods past and present are unable to comprehend it completely.
By gods do not mean The One God but the supreme members of the angelic hierarchies. Today however, the meaning of the word God has lost its essence through its application to beings which are not gods but which deceive people. There is nothing divine in them. Free yourselves of this misconception of God. The word God had a special meaning in the archetypal language.
Today the concept is distorted. With this distortion of the concept the human mind has also become distorted. In order to formulate the right concept and understanding of God, we must return to our primary state. There are many who think of God as a being which changes several times a day, as humans do. Even some Western mystics think likewise. This is not meant as a reproach. It is the result of conflict between the two lodges - the white and the black - which exist in the world. They have divided humanity into two opposing camps. They are the cause of the discord and strife which exist in politics, society, families, individuals, and even in religion and science. These two influences have split human minds. For wherever there is division or duality the Divine Spirit is inactive. As soon as one is divided in one's own mind and succumbs to strife, God is absent. This is a psychological law.
When I speak to you about man, you must concentrate on, you must imagine the man created in the image and after the likeness of God, that is to say of truth and love. This man never desecrated the name of God. Moses, one of the great initiates, said, "Thou shall not take the name of the Lord, thy God in vain". This is a commandment of the first mystic who sought to study the great divine teaching. He sought to sanctify the name of God. This is what it means to be a true human being. Until you begin to sanctify the name of God in its profound meaning, handed down by the virgin divine spirits, you cannot rise to a higher spiritual plane than that upon which you stand now.
Often enough I have observed how people in Bulgaria and elsewhere divide themselves into great and small, open and narrow-minded, black and white. They say, "We are open and not as narrow-minded as the others". It is all too well being open, but be sure you are not formless, lacking of ideas. Going abroad among the mystics, among the theosophists, one observes that these are followers of the White Brotherhood who are working towards the renewal of human thought, so that in the future a new impulse, a new activity of the Divine Spirit may flow. Today the theosophists are divided into those following Besant and those following Steiner-anthroposophists. In reality both groups are anthroposophist. Yet as people they don't get along well either. The followers of Besant are women, those of Steiner, men. Both argue among themselves. All spiritual movements of the Eastern School are led by women, and those of the Western School, by men. This division is remarkable, but is only an external aspect. Whoever is not enlightened may be tempted by them, and whoever is tempted cannot understand Christ. Just as in Christ's time some people were tempted, so are people tempted today.
Ever since man sinned and in this way distorted the name of God, he has always fallen into temptation. Those of us who are tempted cannot rise to the position of thinking people, cannot understand the inner, fundamental laws governing the human spirit. In order to change our individual and social life, as well as that of the whole of humanity, we must understand the great laws of Divine thought.
The theosophists call the superior (higher) mind the superior manas. The natural or lower mind they call the inferior manas, but there is no mention of the middle mind, middle manas, which is the most important. The lower mind is the foundation upon which human consciousness is built. This means that it is the soil of the world of thought. If you are familiar with the make up of this soil, you will know what seeds to plant in it. Every thought contains a seed of action. To learn to think correctly means to know what seeds to plant in the different seasons of the year. It has been said in Scripture, "Whatsoever a man sows, that shall he reap". What is meant here is the sowing in the mind. There are so many false concepts and misdoings between people that if they do not listen to the Great Teacher they will exterminate each other. He says, "From now on I will permit no one to take one step ahead, if you does not change your thinking, if you do not sanctify the name of God, woe unto you. You may knock at my door for thousands years You will reap the fruit of your karma gathered over the millennia" What is karma? - the consequence of all bad fruit, planted in the past. Christ came to Earth with one purpose only - to redeem humanity. By redeeming 1 mean teaching people how to sanctify the name of God in themselves as well as in the world. The foundation of our existence rests upon this name. The sanctification of the name of God is the greatest thing. It represents the philosophy of the future.
Some of you complain that no secret knowledge has been revealed to you. What do you want? - to be given a weapon to kill each other? In Western Europe there are various teachings and brotherhoods whose members aspire to uncovering the secrets of nature. In this respect they resemble women who avenge themselves on their lovers with vitriol. Why do they take on against them? Because they have been unfaithful. Once they have deformed their lovers these women are satisfied and say, "Now that he cannot be mine, he cannot belong to any woman." There are men who behave in the same way, as well as some religious people. Christ is grieved by the acts of people. God has decided to punish them if they do not mend their ways. No longer may one go against Divine Law. People must forsake their old ways, for the new epoch, the new uplift is now commencing.
The Virgin Divine Spirit descends in a circular wave through seven fields, that is to say through seven worlds. During the period of Saturn the Virgin Divine Spirit descended to the mental world and formed the mind or mental body of man. During the second period, the Sun period, the Spirit descended to the astral world, creating the body of desire. During the third, the period of the Moon, the Spirit descended to the etheric field of the physical world, creating the etheric enveloping sheaths of man. In the fourth, the Earth period, the Spirit descended to the lower field of the physical world and created the physical body. In each period of descending and ascending the Spirit passed through spiritual day and night. In the first period, when the Divine Spirit worked to create man in the image and after the likeness of God, man did not know sin. In the second period man started to fall. In the third period man came to full degradation. In the fourth, the Earth period of descent, the fall reached its end.
Why it is necessary for man to descend and sink into a world of matter? - so that he may clothe himself in all the enveloping sheaths, each successive one more dense, at which point the rising and acquiring of higher forms begins. During each period there is partial rise and descent in an oscillating curve. The final movement will be rising. Anyone who has no desire to come in contact with God will be tossed out of the common flow of the divine day, and will have to wait for another period of descent and ascent, for another wave. Unlike all those moving upwards towards God will enter heaven, they will remain below, outside of God. The gates will be closed for them and they will hear God's voice saying., "I do not know you". One day, when Christ comes to knock at their door, those who tend only to their own affairs, who do trivial things, will find themselves without oil in their lamps. Then will they come to their senses, but the divine ship will have left, without waiting for anyone. Therefore everyone must be ready to board the ship on time.
Talking like this I do not wish to moralize, only to explain what the law is, what God speaks. God will not stop the ship for anyone.
And so, the wave proceeds, and today you are fortunate to have the most favorable conditions for spiritual growth. When an evil thought enters your mind, remember that it comes from your distant past - it is not a thought of the present, it is a strange foundling dropped at your door. I do not want you to bring abandoned children to me. As a Teacher, my mission to Earth is not to raise and educate such children. To raise a sinful person is one thing, but to bring up an illegitimate child is quite another. If sinners come to their senses and regrets their sins, they can be saved. They make an effort to do God's will. Christ came down to save such people. Everybody can be saved except for illegitimate foundlings, for they are snakes which grow stronger the more they are fed. One day they will coil around you and will crush your bones. For you personally, for your future blessing, you should nourish only the great thoughts which God implanted in you at the beginning of time through the Holy Spirit. Do not nourish the negative thoughts implanted in you by the Black Lodge. A mother says, "I have a hard time with this child, he causes me great headaches and worries, but one day he will take care of me". No, one day this child will, like a snake, crush your bones and throw you off the rising wave.
"Sanctify them in the truth; thy word is truth". No one can learn Divine Law before they hallow God's name. When you hallow God's name your thoughts become pure and luminous. With them may develop the enveloping sheaths, where the body of truth that shall free you will be conceived. Truth is the first body which must be developed. In it lives the human soul. Without truth there is no freedom. No matter how many tears you shed, you cannot be free if truth is not within you. Weeping cannot help you. Sometimes it is good to weep, but sometimes it is not. Weeping is like rain. If you have sown good seeds, when they grow and mature they will uplift you; but if you have sown thistles, in maturing they will suffocate you. If you weep for God, you are blessed; if you do so for the world, I pity you - it will be better to have drought than this. Luminous and kind thoughts, however will uplift you. With them you will enter the body of truth and be free. This way will you come to know Christ and he to know you.
Some people want to find Christ in me. No, you will find Christ in his teaching. If you wish to know who I am, I will tell you: I am the brother of the smallest ones in the Kingdom of God. I, the smallest one, wish to fulfill God's will as ordained, to sanctify His name as He has sanctified me. God has been so good to me that I, the brother of the smallest ones, wish to repay Him with all my gratitude. I wish that you also may follow my example. Some of you might be tempted to be greater than me, to take first place. This truly is a temptation. Christ said, "The disciple is like his master". I too do not wish anything more. This modest station is quite good enough for me. I would not exchange it for any other. The station one has is not as important as the way in which one fulfills one's obligations to God. Some of you want to be kings. It is not bad for one to be a king, but there is nothing worse. A king may accomplish thousands of good deeds. Whole societies, a whole nation, can benefit from his benevolence, but he can also bring them to ruin. This is why Christ said, "Of him to whom much has been given much is also expected".
If you want to become great, this goes to prove that there are feelings of pride and vainglory in you. Big businessmen operating with a capital of hundreds of millions also run up huge debts and sometimes bring their creditors to ruin. If you have hundreds of millions and you lose it all, you will experience great torment. I take the number one hundred for it represents an upper hierarchy ofangels. No words exist to describe the anguish of a businessman who has lost his one hundred million. The opposite is true also: there are no words to describe the joy of a man who has one hundred million at his disposal and knows how to use it wisely. The later is as great as the former is terrible.
"Sanctify us through thy truth". The first thing to learn from Christ's teachings is humility. Pride is the mother of temporary, transient knowledge. One may have great knowledge but if one also has pride, one is in the position of the deluded brothers of the black lodge. If on the other hand, you obey the divine laws, even if you are is among the smallest ones, you will rise. If people wish to call the attention of heaven and its blessing upon themselves, they must be humble in the highest sense of the word and not in the common sense that it is preached. Humility is a beautiful angel, a great spirit. Whoever has seen it has come to love it. All the divine virtues for which the human soul and spirit long are conceived in humility. The angel of humility is alive, bringing forth Charity - the child of Love, the youngest daughter of God. Love abides among the virgin spirits and promises a bright future for all humanity and all who seek it.
If you want Christ within you to be immortal and powerful enough to uplift you, you must give way to love in your soul. This means giving Christ the highest place in your soul and sanctifying his name in your heart. Some people think that they are close to Christ. Closer to Christ is the one who has learned the art of being small. You say that you wish to be like Christ, but at the same time wish to make demands. In order to be like Christ and to be close to him you must learn the rule of selfless service, you must learn to think right, to answer hatred with love, and Evil with Good. Then it will not matter whom you serve, this person or that, you will be serving God. The names matter in as much as they correspond to their content. The name Christ is not singular, but collective. It is like air and light, everybody is entitled to benefit from it. Learn to think rationally, philosophically. Do not become confused by the external form of things, nor by words. Seek the inner meaning of words. If I had been thinking the way you do, I would have fallen from high position a long time ago.
"Sanctify them through thy truth". I want you now to move upwards in a straight line, to sanctify the name of God in yourselves. This name will uplift you to be, as Christ has said, co-heirs and co-participants. Today I wish to implant in your minds and in your hearts the Divine light through which you can free yourselves from evil impulses. The sword of the Spirit is raised and woe unto those who are enemies of the Truth. We must fight with the weapons described in 2 Corithians 10: 4-5: "For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of God". This is theosophy, esotericism, spirituality, Divine wisdom.
I would like you to take the following verse as a motto: "The weapons of your warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God". Only in this way can you free yourselves of the intentions of the lower manas, of sin, to which even today people pay tithes. Christ said, "Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's".
The lower manas is the Caesar in man. This verse means: While you pay dues to the lower manas, do not forget to pay your dues to the higher manas. What does it mean to "Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things which are God's"? It means to destroy the harmful germs so that they may no longer grow, to free yourselves of all impure thoughts, and to say, "Here, Caesar, take what is yours", then to take high Divine thoughts and store them in the Divine granary of your soul, saying. "Here, God, take what is Yours" - and then you will enter your secret chamber and say a prayer to God without mixing the things which belong to Caesar with the things which belong to God. Mixing these two does not make for a good prayer. Only when the heart is pure and surrenders completely to God can a prayer be strong. As long as the fire in the human heart does not burn strongly the prayer cannot reach God. Can you imagine what the state of your mind will be when you feel the Divine warmth penetrate your hearts?
An American once listened to Camila Rousso, a pupil of Paganini, playing "The Dream of Life" and said, "At that moment I was ready to make peace with the whole world, to forgive all my enemies". The American had heard many prominent preachers in his time, but no one had moved him as did Camila Rousso. Therefore, when humility penetrates your hearts say, "Lord, we are ready to make peace with all people". I ask you, have you heard the voice of humility? I have. I do not know any music more beautiful than the song of humility. What harmony exists in humility! What love wells from the heart of humility. This love embraces with its rays the hearts of all people. It sends forth every day its kindly thoughts and comfort to all suffering and burdened people, to all humanity. It says. "Be hopeful. I will help you sanctify the name of God in your minds and hearts. I will give you all my blessing". At present God wants to unite all brotherhoods and religions in the whole world. That is why you should refrain from taking the liberty of condemning people; you do not know' the profound reason behind everything.
"Sanctify them through thy truth". How does God work for our uplifting? Through sorrow and joy. I have walked the path of all human life; I have listened to the sublime divine spirits; and from the experience acquired I have come to the understanding that all people must go through joys and sorrows. There is no better path than this. Who dares to doubt this? The path is not rough but most people have served and still serve Caesar.
A woman complains of her husband, saying, "I don't love him any more, he has made me unhappy", - Then leave him. "But who is going to support me'?" No, this is no longer marriage, this is concubinage. Marriage is a sacred institution. If you wish to enter the Kingdom of God, you should not complain that God has given you a seemingly bad husband. If you complain, God will tell you,"You have chosen this husband yourself, I did not give him to you. You want me to improve your husband while you are not trying to improve yourself". When I say this I have in mind a conceptual woman, I have no definite personalities in mind. For me every woman and every man are rays, parts of the whole. I use these concepts as real facts from life itself.
And so, the path of joy and suffering is the path that leads to the attainment of patience. One who has patience gains great experience and inner wealth. This is the only way for one to understand God's great ways as well as God's great providence for humanity's future blessings.
If you wish to progress this year, never complain. I know that there is much noise around you, and by saying that you should not complain, I mean you should not permit these noises to penetrate you deeply. Your heart must remain calm and silent. It is not your fault that someone is throwing stones and breaking windows But if you yourselves throw stones and break a window in your own home I say, "Friend, you have not learned to serve God; you have not yet learned to render the things that are Caesar's unto Caesar". Anyone can ruin the lives of thousands of beings. Do you know how many centuries it takes to correct people's mistakes? Sometimes the desire for revenge surges up in you. You tell yourself, "I will smash its head, I will put it under my feet that it may know who I am". No, you ought to calm down, focus yourself, and say, "The spirit that has entered me is evil. I will catch it and command it to be silent; I will order it out of my sanctuary. It ought not to desecrate the image of God". You say to someone, "I cannot think well of you". Well, I pity you. If you cannot think well of your neighbor, you cannot think well of God, in which case how do you expect to have love of God?
There are three paths you can follow: the path of Love, the path of Wisdom, and the path of Truth, the last being the narrow path of life. Christ said, "Narrow is the way and few there be that find it", yet everyone can find the path of Love. If you cannot find the path of Wisdom, take the path of Love. If you cannot find that path, then take the path of Truth. Therefore the paths of Love, Wisdom, and Truth are the three paths you must walk. Do not be upset if no one else is following your path. Just go ahead. All three paths will bring us to the same point. The difference is only in the turns each of them makes. This is what Christ taught when he was on Earth; this is what he teaches today. If you are unable to comprehend earthly affairs how can you comprehend heavenly ones? If you are unable to understand the easy things, how can you understand the difficult ones?
"Tell us something great". This is the greatest thing that the brother of the smallest ones, the brother of your angels, who lead you in the right direction, can tell you. You say, "You are our brother". If you think that I am your brother in flesh, you are mistaken; but if you think that I am your brother in spirit, you are right. "You do not love us." If you speak of earthly love, I do not love you; but if you say that I do not love you as your angels love you, you are mistaken. There is no man on Earth who loves your souls more than I do. I wish that you also would love human souls in the same way. Do you understand? I know that your angels are very glad for you today. Do you understand? I wanted to do you a favour. I came to Earth to serve the angels and you. When I finish my work you will say that I went away somewhere. Where will I go? No, I will go nowhere. I will return to Him who has sent me and will ask, "Did I fulfill the assignment that was given to me"? If there is still something that I have not finished, I will come again. If I do not finish my work the second time, I will return yet again, I will return until at last I am told, "You have done your work well". This is the law for the little brother of heaven.
Let us do what God has demanded of us. This is the great teaching which you have not heard until now. Never before have you experienced what you are feeling now. Why have you heard it so late on? Because this teaching is the teaching of the small angels which have come to Earth to uplift humanity.
Now, I will not bless you. I do not do that. Why? If I send my blessing and there are still weeds in you, they will flourish too. I act rationally according to God's law. When they see that you have sown good seeds, all heavenly brothers will send their blessings so that these good seeds may come to grow and give good fruit. With this fruit let God come to grow and be resurrected in you, and may you sanctify God's name! This will be my joy because you will be close to God. I proclaim this to you for the New Year - I have not finished, I have only just started. You must realize that. What I tell you is the beginning. How many more things there are greater than this! If you listen to what these small ones are telling you, you will experience God's power. Wisdom will come to you, your will-power will be strengthened and the affairs in the world will improve.
Great work is awaiting the small ones. The teaching about the small ones is great. It fits you best. It is the basis of what the future holds in store for your soul. It is the divine thought for 1917. I do not speak now about the earthly but about the Divine year. I am starting with 1914, 15, 16, and 17 which form the new epoch. These are four Divine years, forming a cycle of the Divine blessing. The number one in 1917 implies the principle of fairness, and the seven, the law of repose and of blessing.
I will leave you now to think about humility, patience, and love. Through these, try to smooth out the rough surfaces in you which interfere with the Divine harmony in your lives. Let every one of you, with the help of your angel, call to God in yourself and ask Him, "Lord what shall ! do for the triumph of the Kingdom of God on Earth and for the glorification of Thy name among the people?" The first thing you will be told is, "Reconcile!" This was Christ's message. Read the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. In them it is said, "If you bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that your brother has fought against thee, leave there your gift before the altar and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift. If he refuses to reconcile, take two more people and go back to him". The ones that go to the altar must make peace with everybody. No one can go to the altar if he has not reconciled beforehand. You say of some people, "Let's go and reconcile them". How can you reconcile people if they refuse to go to the altar? You must reconcile! You will say, "Brother, let us reconcile"! If he refuses, go with two more men. If he refused again, take two more men. If he still refuses to listen to them, go with the whole community. If he refuses even then, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector; he doesn't know any better (Math 17:18). This is Christ's teaching. The squahhlcs that exist at present are not compatible with this teaching.
I have no desire to judge anyone. To me you are all equal. I tell you now, if you do not accept this teaching, the result will not be good. Why should unnecessary suffering be caused in this world? The sufferings of the past are sufficient. Let joy and blessing come to humanity from now on. What I say to you today is being spoken everywhere: God speaks it, the angels are saying it, and all their servants on Earth are preaching it; Christ speaks it too. I believe that this will come to pass. This has been said; it will come to pass and there is not a shadow of doubt about it. We will all meet one day; naturally, not in the same' situation as today, but ten times better than this, and still here on Earth. After ten years we will be a hundred times better off, after another ten years - a thousand times better. After another ten years, we will be ten thousand times better; after another ten years - one hundred thousand times better; after another ten years - one million times better; after ten more years - ten million times better; after another ten years - one hundred million times better. And at the end of this period, or at the beginning of the next, we will be one with God.
My peace be with you. | <urn:uuid:0bb2178e-2c77-4cb2-9732-f4df73aa811c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.clubconspiracy.com/forum/showthread.php?p=78907&mode=linear | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966539 | 6,384 | 1.617188 | 2 |
Welcome to Week #8 of the New York Beauty Quilt-Along. I'm going to take you through Block 4 today. Visit Sara at Sew Sweetness to see all of the previous blocks and more details on the QA.
Block 4 is a fun one—there isn't as much paper-piecing involved as in other blocks, but there are plenty of curves to sew!
Click here to download the block pattern. If you want to make the complete circle, you'll need 4 printouts (of the paper-pieced section, at least). Be sure to print the pattern at 100% size, no scaling! Check the 1-inch marker on the pattern to make sure you've printed it at the correct size.
(all sizes listed below assume my freezer-paper templating method described below)
Center circle (I used white)
1 block: 3" square
4 blocks (to make a complete circle): 6" square
Inner ring (hot pink with green polka dots)
1 block: 3" x 6.5"
4 blocks: 10" x 6.5"
Outer ring (hot pink with smaller white dots)
1 block: 5" x 13"
4 blocks: 16" x 13"
Background (green rings)
1 block: 9" square
4 blocks: 18.5" square
Rays, color 1 (lime green)
1 block: (4) 1.5" x 3.5"
4 blocks: (16) 1.5" x 3.5"
Rays, color 2 (darker green)
1 block: (4) 1.5" x 3.5"
4 blocks: (16) 1.5" x 3.5"
Background for rays (aqua polka dot)
1 block: (3) 3" x 3.5", (2) 2" x 3.5"
4 blocks: (12) 3" x 3.5", (8) 2" x 3.5"
Since we've already had some great paper-piecing tutorials by Kim, Sara, Jeni, Katy, and others, I'm just going to give you a few of my own tips, especially when it comes to curves (although I am by no means a curve-sewing expert!)
Before you do any cutting, press the freezer paper, shiny side down, onto your fabric to adhere it. Then just cut on the lines (you can use your ruler and rotary cutter on the straight lines if you prefer). Voila! Perfectly perfect pieces with minimum effort.
And here's how I got perfect straight-grain background pieces. Fold your 18.5" square in half on the diagonal, as shown, and press. It's important here that you start with a piece that is exactly square, and that all edges are aligned when you fold it in half. (If you only have a fat-quarter or a half-yard of fabric, you might be able to make do with an 18" square—in fact, that's what mine is here. A few corners got chopped off, but nothing that didn't end up hidden in the seam allowances.)
Next, tear off a piece of freezer paper at least 18" long. Place your freezer paper over the background piece, lining up the natural straight edge of the freezer paper with the angled inner seam line, as shown. Then trace around the other three sides of the shape (making sure to trace the outer line, not the inner line). You don't need to worry about the other half of the background section. If you're making a full ring, trace four copies of the background piece in the same way, making sure the pieces are as close together as possible along the edge of the freezer paper. Mine were actually touching at their widest points.
Once your shapes have been traced, press the freezer paper onto your folded background fabric. Line up the edge of the freezer paper (which serves as the angled edges of your shapes) with the fold, and cut through both layers of fabric.
Ta-da! Unfold the cut-out shape, and you have perfect straight-of-grain background pieces. This was important for me, because I wanted the print I was using to be straight and square. And you even end up with a crease right in the middle of the section, which is helpful when we piece the curves later.
Now go ahead and paper-piece your ray sections, using all the great tips that we've learned in the past 7 weeks.
My one tip here involves trimming the excess after sewing a seam. To save time, I don't worry about flipping back the paper and rotary-cutting the excess, the way many tutorials show. That involves getting up from my chair and walking to my cutting board—that's far too much work and effort! I bring my scissors and a wastebasket to my sewing machine and just snip off the excess after each seam. I just eyeball the quarter-inch seam allowance—even if it's not exactly 1/4", it's always close enough, and I've never had any problems with less-than-precise seam allowances.
Once you're done with the paper-pieced sections, it's time to piece the curves. I fold each section in half and finger-press to mark the center. I put one pin at the center of the seam I'm about to sew, and another pin at each end. Then I pin the rest of the seam, working from the center out.
And there you have it—one cheerful, sunny New York Beauty block.
If you make four of these blocks, you'll have a complete 16"-square New York Beauty, perfect for a mini quilt or a pillow. I took my block and added it to the two others I made previously, and ended up with a fun springtime table runner. (I had originally planned to make a full-size quilt, but these three just begged to be a runner!)
I took my cue on the quilting from Kati's stunning New York Beauty mini. This runner will make great table décor in future years for Easter and my youngest daughter's birthday (she turned 3 yesterday!). It's made in Laurie Wisbrun's delightful Modern Whimsy collection, plus various bright stash prints.
I think that does it for Block 4. Now go make one of your own! And come back next week, when Amy of amylouwho will be taking us through Block 2. | <urn:uuid:54842013-f3bf-4ff6-b7c1-17a19d46e9a9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.freshlypieced.com/2012/04/new-york-beauty-quilt-along-block-4.html?showComment=1335196658273 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948623 | 1,355 | 1.507813 | 2 |
April 6, 2012
Easter Fun: Chocolate Covered Peeps and Kool-Aid Dyed Eggs!
It's that time of year again, I'm not sure how we're back here but we are, it's Easter! Today I'm sharing a couple of fun little things to do, that aren't complicated, and the kids will love. So break out the Peeps and get ready to color some eggs. It's time to have some fun!
Oh and don't forget to check out a few links at the bottom for egg salad and deviled eggs so you'll have something to do with those eggs after you're done dying them.
Let's get our Easter on!
What You'll Need for the Chocolate Covered Peeps:
Peeps (Note: Preferably bunnies)
1 package of chocolate chips (Note: I used semi-sweet, but you could use dark or milk chocolate instead.)
2 tablespoons of coconut oil
Place chocolate chips and coconut oil in a glass bowl. Microwave for one minute and then stir. Next microwave on 20 second intervals, stirring between each round, until chocolate is melted and completely smooth.
Place a Peep on a bamboo skewer. You want to push the skewer all the way up in to the bunny to its ears. When you put chocolate on the Peep it's going to get heavy and if you don't push the skewer all the way in it will fall off in to your chocolate with the weight.
Dip the Peep in Chocolate and use a spoon to cover the bunny completely with chocolate:
Hold chocolate covered Peep over a plate and sprinkle with your choice of sprinkles.
Carefully lay the chocolate/sprinkled Peep on a baking sheet that has been lined with a silicone baking mat, or wax paper and let chocolate harden.
Notes: These are good as is, or you can dip them into hot chocolate. Yum!
What You'll Need for the Kool-Aid Dyed Eggs:
White eggs, boiled and cooled
Kool-aid packets (Note: We use Tropical Punch, Pink Lemonade, Grape, Orange, Lemon Lime and Lemonade. They all worked except for the Lemonade. There isn't enough color in the mix to work.)
1/2 cup of water for each packet of Kool-Aide
Narrow glasses (Note: You want them to be narrow enough so that the liquid will cover an egg entirely, but not too narrow or the egg won't fit.)
First you want to boil your eggs. You've probably boiled eggs before, but I'm going to tell you right now how to boil the perfect egg.
Gently place eggs in a pot and cover with water until there is 2 inches of water above the top of the pile of eggs. Add in two tablespoons of sea salt, cover the pot and bring eggs to a boil. As soon as the pot begins a rapid boil turn off the heat and let the pot sit for ten minutes covered.
At the end of 10 minutes gently drain the pot and cover the eggs with cool/cold water. Let eggs sit for another 5 to 10 minutes.
Remove eggs from the cool water and let them cool completely to room temperature. At least an hour. (Note: This is only for coloring eggs. If you're using the eggs to cook with once they've had the cool water bath they're ready to go, or you can store them in the fridge for up to a week.)
When you're ready to dye your Easter eggs here's what you do...
Add Kool-Aid Powders to separate glasses (see note above about glasses) and then pour 1/2 cup of water in each glass. Stir to mix.
Using a spoon gently lower eggs down in the glass. Make sure to let the spoon rest under the egg so it won't get stuck in the glass. Let the eggs sit for a few minutes, or as long as you like, until the egg reaches the desired color.
Place eggs in a carton to dry. The eggs with darken in color as they dry.
Repeat the process until all the eggs are dyed.
Notes: The Kool-Aid has citric acid in it so that is why you don't need to add that or vinegar in to the glasses.
Posted by Dianne at April 6, 2012 3:28 PM
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This is so cool! But it makes you wonder what's in koolaid that you can dye egg shells with it...
Posted by: Ben at April 6, 2012 3:42 PM
Some serious food coloring! Jamison was joking about what it would do to your stomach given how vivid the eggs turned out! LOL
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A while ago I wondered how long MySpace could hang on to its visitors. The demographics of those visitors aren’t particularly clear – it may be that a larger proportion of MySpace visitors are adults who really should get out more – but we know at least that many are kids, and as I wrote then, kids are notoriously fickle. This is not a news flash, or at least, by now it shouldn’t be.
Now WaPo suggests that some teens are so over MySpace:
Teen Web sensation MySpace became so big so fast, News Corp. spent $580 million last year to buy it. Then Google Inc. struck a $900 million deal, primarily to advertise with it. But now Jackie Birnbaum and her fellow English classmates at Falls Church High School say they’re over MySpace.
“I think it’s definitely going down — a lot of my friends have deleted their MySpaces and are more into Facebook now,” said Birnbaum, a junior who spends more time on her Facebook profile, where she messages and shares photos with other students in her network.
and in a perhaps more compelling comment:
From the other side of the classroom, E.J. Kim chimes in that in the past three months, she’s gone from slaving over her MySpace profile up to four hours a day — decorating it, posting notes and pictures to her friends’ pages — to deleting the whole thing.
“I’ve grown out of it,” Kim said. “I thought it was kind of pointless.”
From the mouths of babes. (Adult MySpace fans, take note). This is good news for the Facebooks of the world; for the next big thing – for a while, anyway (and hopefully – for the sellers anyway – until the liquidity event). One classroom does not a trend make, of course, and one should be wary about drawing any conclusions, but still – isn’t this exactly the kind of behaviour we expect from kids? It also occurs to me that the recent hubbub over MySpace’s demographics – research, questioned at the time, suggested an older demographic than one might have supposed – might have been an early indication that young visitors to the site are starting to get their kicks elsewhere.
If this is in fact what’s happening, it should not come as a surprise – we learned all of these lessons in Web 1.0, when the adjective of the day was “stickiness”. And of course, we should have expected this kind of teen mob behaviour even then – the sudden wild popularity of a trend, followed soon after by its disappearance into oblivion, is one of Web 1.0′s lingering memories, to the chagrin of many. I haven’t heard the word “stickiness” for years now – maybe it merits a return to the Web 2.0 vocabulary. For the life of me, I can’t think of a single site in that class – feel free to chime in if I’m missing the obvious – that is still around from Web 1.0, or that even survived more than 2 or 3 years (even 1 year?) after the high-water mark of Web 1.0.
But in the modern mythology of Web 2.0, News Corp’s acquisition of MySpace for $580 million last year is still being touted by many as an exemplar of genius, and as a financial benchmark for the next big deal (and the bar will no doubt remain at least there until that next big deal – Google and YouTube, perhaps – ratchets it upward). Perhaps that will turn out to be the sane way to look at it; perhaps MySpace will be successful, and its acquisition will be seen as an act of genius. Or perhaps it should already be seen that way; Google’s $900 million deal with News Corp. over MySpace was seen by many as validation of the acquisition.
But of course that $900 million (which is only a “guaranteed minimum”) is “based on Fox achieving certain traffic and other commitments” and the money isn’t in the bank yet – it’s “expected to be made over the period beginning in the first quarter of 2007 and ending in the second quarter of 2010″. And as this WaPo piece suggests, it’s still early days – if kids are becoming less interested in MySpace, I have to think the demographic they leave behind – 35-55 year old shut-ins – will be much less appealing to Google and to advertisers.
Update: Cynthia Brumfield looks at the issue and asks whether hot web sites are like TV shows. The point she’s making seems to be two-fold. First, even temporary hot-ness can be profitable; in TV for example, it can produce scads of ad revenue (though not necessarily initially for the producer). (Obviously, ditto in fashion, and in just about everything else that is subject to mass market taste and preference). So, to paraphrase, be assured that even if MySpace is a passing fad there is still money to be made. I suspect that you won’t find too many people who would disagree with that, but for myself the issue is how much money, and at what price it ought to be bought and sold when BigWhatever gets interested. And I suspect that valuations – from Skype through to YouTube, and inevitably onto Facebook – have been and will be predicated on a vision of the audience being much more durable than it may well turn out to be (But on the bright side, at least no one has to worry about predicting and discounting far in the future cash flows.)
Second, like TV producers do, the trick for the News Corps of the world “is figuring out where they go from here. They can’t just sit back and expect to rake in the dough, hoping that their hit sites stay hot. They have to move forward and leverage their hits to create the next big thing.” That’s an interesting idea, although I suspect that the process of ‘innovating’ (if that’s what it is) from a “Cheers” to a “Frasier” is considerably easier than innovating from a Web 1.0 hit to a 2.0 hit, or from a Web 2.0 hit to a 2.1 hit. After all, the notion of taking a popular actor (to use the Kelsey Grammar example) or story line (to use the Dick Wolf example), from one hit show to create another seems pretty darned obvious (very TV 1.0), and is more akin to merely knowing that if people dig peach-scented shampoo, they might also dig apple-scented shampoo. It’s not that hard to do if you already know how to make shampoo. And with the exception of a few serial entrepreneurs (who often move serially through quite unrelated ventures) I can’t think of one successful effort by anyone to parlay one hit web phenom into another – at least not on a notable scale. I may be wrong here, but if I’m not, I think it’s because the second kind of innovation (the web) is much harder than the first (related TV shows), and also because fundamentally the web audience – or at least this web audience – is just not portable in that way. For example, when Flickr breathes its last breath, where will its successor come from – the bowels of Yahoo!, or the basement of a 20-something who has very creatively – perhaps even Darwinianly from among the 50 other people who have also been trying to improve upon Flickr since it was released – happened upon ‘the next great thing’? As my friend Mathew notes, at least with social networking sites, success is very difficult to manufacture.
And of course, that’s presumably why the News Corps of the world don’t generally innovate or even create on the web – they buy others who do. | <urn:uuid:403a10de-dc20-4cb6-a7f2-add2509f78a1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.robhyndman.com/2006/10/29/more-questions-about-myspaces-prospects/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965453 | 1,700 | 1.703125 | 2 |
4:1 When therefore the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John
4:2 (although Jesus himself baptized not, but his disciples),
4:3 he left Judea, and departed again into Galilee.
4:4 And he must needs pass through Samaria.
4:5 So he cometh to a city of Samaria, called Sychar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph:
4:6 and Jacob's well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour.
4:7 There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water: Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink.
4:8 For his disciples were gone away into the city to buy food.
4:9 The Samaritan woman therefore saith unto him, How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, who am a Samaritan woman? (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.)
4:10 Jesus answered and said unto unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.
4:11 The woman saith unto him, Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep: whence then hast thou that living water?
4:12 Art thou greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his sons, and his cattle?
4:13 Jesus answered and said unto her, Every one that drinketh of this water shall thirst again:
4:14 but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall become in him a well of water springing up unto eternal life.
4:15 The woman saith unto him, Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not, neither come all the way hither to draw.
4:16 Jesus saith unto her, Go, call thy husband, and come hither.
4:17 The woman answered and said unto him, I have no husband. Jesus saith unto her, Thou saidst well, I have no husband:
4:18 for thou hast had five husbands; and he whom thou now hast is not thy husband: this hast thou said truly.
4:19 The woman saith unto him, Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet.
4:20 Our fathers worshipped in this mountain; and ye say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship.
4:21 Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, shall ye worship the Father.
4:22 Ye worship that which ye know not: we worship that which we know; for salvation is from the Jews.
4:23 But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth: for such doth the Father seek to be his worshippers.
4:24 God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship in spirit and truth.
4:25 The woman saith unto him, I know that Messiah cometh (he that is called Christ): when he is come, he will declare unto us all things.
4:26 Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am `he'.
4:27 And upon this came his disciples; and they marvelled that he was speaking with a woman; yet no man said, What seekest thou? or, Why speakest thou with her?
4:28 So the woman left her waterpot, and went away into the city, and saith to the people,
4:29 Come, see a man, who told me all things that `ever' I did: can this be the Christ?
4:30 They went out of the city, and were coming to him.
4:31 In the mean while the disciples prayed him, saying, Rabbi, eat.
4:32 But he said unto them, I have meat to eat that ye know not.
4:33 The disciples therefore said one to another, Hath any man brought him `aught' to eat?
4:34 Jesus saith unto them, My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to accomplish his work.
4:35 Say not ye, There are yet four months, and `then' cometh the harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields, that they are white already unto harvest.
4:36 He that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal; that he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together.
4:37 For herein is the saying true, One soweth, and another reapeth.
4:38 I sent you to reap that whereon ye have not labored: others have labored, and ye are entered into their labor.
4:39 And from that city many of the Samaritans believed on him because of the word of the woman, who testified, He told me all things that `ever' I did.
4:40 So when the Samaritans came unto him, they besought him to abide with them: and he abode there two days.
4:41 And many more believed because of his word;
4:42 and they said to the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy speaking: for we have heard for ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Saviour of the world.
4:43 And after the two days he went forth from thence into Galilee.
4:44 For Jesus himself testified, that a prophet hath no honor in his own country.
4:45 So when he came into Galilee, the Galilaeans received him, having seen all the things that he did in Jerusalem at the feast: for they also went unto the feast.
4:46 He came therefore again unto Cana of Galilee, where he made the water wine. And there was a certain nobleman, whose son was sick at Capernaum.
4:47 When he heard that Jesus was come out of Judaea into Galilee, he went unto him, and besought `him' that he would come down, and heal his son; for he was at the point of death.
4:48 Jesus therefore said unto him, Except ye see signs and wonders, ye will in no wise believe.
4:49 The nobleman saith unto him, Sir, come down ere my child die.
4:50 Jesus saith unto him, Go thy way; thy son liveth. The man believed the word that Jesus spake unto him, and he went his way.
4:51 And as he was now going down, his servants met him, saying, that his son lived.
4:52 So he inquired of them the hour when he began to amend. They said therefore unto him, Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him.
4:53 So the father knew that `it was' at that hour in which Jesus said unto him, Thy son liveth: and himself believed, and his whole house.
4:54 This is again the second sign that Jesus did, having come out of Judaea into Galilee.
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Courtesy of Kesov Ministry | <urn:uuid:9d712852-3f8e-42e9-b8b9-8acbbaec5c6a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kesov.org/bible/asv1901_bible/43_004.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973115 | 1,681 | 1.664063 | 2 |
The euro is "irreversible" and authorities will do whatever is necessary to preserve the monetary union, Europe's top central banker said Thursday.
At a press conference explaining the European Central Bank's decision to hold steady on interest rates, ECB President Mario Draghi assured that policy makers "will consider undertaking further non-standard measures" if conditions deteriorate.
The European Central Bank may craft plans in the coming weeks to make outright purchases of bonds, Draghi said, while warning the ECB cannot act alone to drive down borrowing costs.
"The Governing Council, within its mandate to maintain price stability over the medium term and in observance of its independence in determining monetary policy, may undertake outright open market operations of a size adequate to reach its objective," he said.
However, political leaders in the euro area need to push ahead with fiscal consolidation, structural reform and European institution-building "with great determination," Draghi said. "The ECB cannot replace governments."
The ECB refrained from announcing any major changes to monetary policy this morning. Following a modest rate cut at the previous meeting the central bank left its benchmark interest rate unchanged at 0.75 percent. The decision was in line with economists' expectations.
Voting members discussed another interest rate cut at this week's meeting, but decided to take a "wait-and-see" approach. The decision to stand pat was not unanimous, Draghi said.
Spain and others have achieved "significant progress" on fiscal reforms, but European governments must stand ready to activate the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), he added.
The EFSF is a multi-billion fund to combat the sovereign debt crisis that threatens to spark a global recession.
by RTT Staff Writer
For comments and feedback: email@example.com | <urn:uuid:39cf627e-a450-4063-949f-6b1adb988fab> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rttnews.com/1938100/draghi-ecb-may-undertake-bond-buying-program.aspx?type=fts&SimRec=1&Node=B3 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933034 | 367 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Sometimes you find that a road less traveled holds true to Robert Frost's promise: it does make all the difference. Other times, you discover that the road is less traveled because it's a bad road. Belize, a tiny country with a ribbon of beaches running along the Caribbean Sea, is not a place you visit for its infrastructure. But the country is one of the few places that's as jungly as it is sandy, and despite its accessibility, it still retains a palpably exotic air. My curiosity about Belize's wildlife (more than 500 species of birds and the world's largest jaguar population) and its ancient Mayan ruins led me to travel there last fall. I planned to crisscross the country by car—rather than flying on eight-seater airplanes.
You see, I'd heard that Belize has some of the best roads in Central America. And even though the country was under British occupation for more than 150 years, back when it was called British Honduras, Belizeans drive on the right side of the road. Also, English is the nation's official language, which I presumed meant that signs would be readable and directions easy to ask for.
Eager to trade the clogged freeways of Southern California for a road trip through Belize's rain forest and down its coast, I packed three bathing suits and insect repellent. I also brought along a driving buddy, my old friend Ron, a rugged Midwesterner who can maneuver large farm equipment and who insisted that my pampered, urban, Saab-driving ways would render me useless on rocky Central American highways.
Day 1: Belize City to Maruba Resort Jungle Spa 100 miles
At the airport in Belize City, we rent a cell phone and a Suzuki Jimmy, a small jeep whose shock absorption on these roads is along the lines of a mail truck's. That was perhaps my first mistake. By mile five, I'm praying we can avoid getting a flat tire (it's no surprise that nearly every billboard we see is an advertisement for tires). We merge onto the Northern Highway and by mile 10 I'm wishing I'd worn a sturdier bra. If these are the best roads in Central America, I can only imagine what the highways must be like in Guatemala.
Don't get me wrong, this is a paved road. All of the five major highways in Belize are paved, yet they come with a generous supply of speed bumps, potholes, and local drivers who make a sport of passing on curves as though they're en route to the emergency room, only to pull over at a barbecue stand a mile ahead. But getting to just about any destination here requires taking access roads that make the surface of the moon look like a freshly Zambonied ice rink.
It doesn't help that we've only been in Belize a few hours and I've already managed to take us in the wrong direction. We were ostensibly on our way to the Maruba Resort Jungle Spa, about 33 miles north of Belize City—but somehow we've missed it. To our dismay, we now must take the Old Northern Highway, traveling south by southeast—30 miles in exactly the direction we came from.
The road is treacherous, and Ron, who hours earlier had mocked my supposed fear of the outdoors, is convinced we'll pop a tire at any moment and end up spending the night in the Jimmy without adequate "rations." He has a point. Night has fallen, there's no cell phone signal, and a constant swarm of insects veils our headlights. The only thing more primitive than the villages we passed an hour ago is my map, a colorful children's cartoon with more drawings of animals than names of towns. I'd assumed we could pick up a better map at the airport or rental car office, but every time I asked for one, a friendly Belizean would look at mine and say, "You won't find a better one than that. Where'd you get it, anyway?"
Just when Ron has begun to plan the intervals during which one of us will sleep while the other stands guard against jaguars, we see a pair of gates in the distance, flanked by two men and two giant tiki torches. Eureka! (Unless this is a mirage.) Sweaty and exhausted, we climb out of the Jimmy and are greeted by an attractive woman in a sarong, who ushers us into the reception area. With its thatched roof and vehemently "tropical" design, the place would be all very native and primal, except that the guests are dressed in formal (although, for the women, alarmingly skimpy) clothing and we're all illuminated by a black light. Any trace of white fabric is glowing fluorescently, including the lint on my shorts. | <urn:uuid:472a1a2a-e378-4d08-8ee3-0cad99669cc8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.travelandleisure.com/articles/lost-highway | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967928 | 986 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Energetx Composites was able to purchase equipment such as this mold for utility-scale wind turbine blades thanks to a Recovery Act grant that matched the company’s $3.5 million investment. | Photo Courtesy of Energetx |
Near the eastern shore of Lake Michigan, there's a shift taking place.
Tiara Yachts makes fiber composite structures for boats. Now the Holland, Mich.-based company is transforming part of its factory and using its 30 years of expertise in composites to establish a new company - Energetx Composites - that will produce commercial-sized wind turbine blades.
The effort to produce wind turbine blades at Energetx is funded in part by the U.S. Department of Energy's State Energy Program, which provided a $3.5 million grant through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Energetx provided a matching investment of $3.5 million. The money is being used to retool portions of Tiara's existing plant to manufacture utility-scale wind turbine blades.
Change in the wind
Vice President of New Product Development Kelly Slikkers says the birth of the new business is part of a vision the officials has had for a few years now.
"Our yachts business is just as viable today as it has always been, and we're still committed to the marine market," he says. "But we also have always tried to look at diversification as a way to provide more products that fit in with our expertise and that can put more Michigan people to work."
"We found we can use our core competencies in composites skills in other industries too," Slikkers says. "Because we have 50 years of experience in composites, we're known for being very good at what we do, so when people were at wind conferences or supply chain events, they always came back and told us all they could think about was us - we investigated the industry and decided to run with it."Because yachts are considered luxury products, Slikkers says business goes away somewhat if the economy has a down year, which impacts the lives the company's workers and their families. To address this issue, top executives met three years ago in a planning meeting to find ways to spark growth during those less-productive years.
The Recovery Act funding is helping Energetx with the upfront costs of retooling some of the company's manufacturing capabilities for wind industry products. Specifically, the mold sets for large wind blades are very costly.
Energetx also needs more hands on deck to ramp up production of its new product. They've already begun hiring more employees and training them for wind blade manufacturing, and the company is also looking for professional personnel in fields such as quality control and engineering to support Energetx's efforts. The company currently has 23 employees but expects to be about 160-strong by summer 2011.
The manufacturer has also partnered with Grand Rapids Community College to develop a composites technician program from which it can recruit new employees. The company hired nine graduates of the program's first class.
Slikkers expects Energetx to release its first prototype blade, currently in the engineering phase, later in 2010. The blade will be constructed and sent to a laboratory for testing early next year, and then the company expects to see its first sets of blades installed during spring 2011, which will provide them with a functional model to show customers as Energetx goes to market with its blades - a market Slikkers believes Michigan has the foundation in place to contribute to for years to come.
"I believe there's a good opportunity here," he says. "I believe the renewable energy market will be a strong one, and I think Michigan has huge potential in it. The U.S. needs a strong energy policy that drives sustainability, and I think we have the resources - the people - here who can play a major part in the clean energy economy."
This project was highlighted in the Vice President's report on 100 Recovery Act Projects That Are Changing America | <urn:uuid:248c6272-65cc-4436-80f5-c4f4a903d55e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rw.doe.gov/articles/vp-100-retooling-michigan-yachts-and-watts | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971745 | 830 | 1.523438 | 2 |
A common value every corner of our society shares is service. Every group within the human family benefits from leadership. Every decision a leader makes is influenced by the quality of their character. Pivotal Directions students form an alliance and work toward this common vision of leadership, service, and character. A Pivotal Directions student is known for raising the bar of excellence. They are young people committed to learning about leadership and character, developing themselves, and celebrating the act of service. High schools, faith-based organizations and colleges require service hours, but who is managing that process? Who is giving our young people, our future leaders, direction? Who is assisting parents and their teens in the documentation process for future resumes, scholarship and college applications? Pivotal Directions will act as a guide to help your student chart their course. Pivotal Directions offers a comprehensive service-learning program for students who are looking for an edge in our competitive world. Let us pick up where other areas of our society leave off. Our children only know what they have been exposed to. Pivotal Directions expands the knowledge base of life experience. Whether it is the experience gained in hands-on service learning or learning from the diverse life-experience of the Pivotal Directors who walk with you in one of our journeys, we help chart your direction. Each of us, if asked, could chart "pivotal moments" along our lifeline that helped form who we are. Some we control, and some we do not. Pivotal Directions puts the control into your hands to intentionally create an experience, a "Pivotal Moment" that allows character to develop through the act of leadership and service. The control piece is whether or not you hear the call to serve, engage in the experience, and then how you respond. On our path in life we are faced with many challenges, many of which take root in our teenage years. Strong character can overcome complacency and strengthen decision-making. Building character, however, does not come naturally. It takes work, commitment, dedication and sacrifice. We must seek opportunities to step out of our comfort zone, to discover what hidden qualities exist as diamonds in the rough. Reaching out to those in need in the act of service can uncover leadership skills, provide perspective on what we have been given, and motivate us to make a difference. Pivotal Direction's unique program has proven that it can help the individual forge character that will have life-long implications. I hope you spend some time looking around our website and learn about how your child can set a new standard in his or her life. Your support of our programs is an investment in the future!
Jeff Wenzler, M.Ed., Executive Director & Founder of Pivotal Directions, Inc. | <urn:uuid:cba3f34c-81bf-4b04-8429-3b0a10ee8825> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pivotaldirections.org/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960483 | 564 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Early last month the Google Blog released a video regarding privacy. On Monday they released a second video this time specifically discussing privacy as it pertains to personalized search.
Once again support engineer Maile Ohye offers some clear explanations
I still have reservations about personalized search. I appreciate the ability to turn your search history on and off as well as the ability to remove specific sites from your history or clear the whole thing. I doubt most people will ever know they can control their search history to any degree let alone be aware their searches are being stored.
Realize that Google would like to better understand whether you want to know about fishing or musical instruments when you type ‘bass’ and your search history will tell them which is more likely what you’re seeking. But I think personalization based on your past searches can lead to you seeing an ever shrinking corner of the web in search results.
Personalized search isn’t going anywhere and we need to understand the seo implications of personalization. As long as Google doesn’t rerank things too much I’m fine with the idea of personalization and see how it can deliver better results. I still wonder if there’s a danger with personalized search in keeping many people from expanding on their current knowledge.
The privacy issues with your search history should be of concern as well. Yes Google does give you the ability to turn that on and off, but your history will still reside on Google servers after you’ve paused things. They may not be tied to your email address, but having them all tied together through a common IP has been shown not to be a reliable source of maintaining your privacy.
Have a look at the video. If you understand how personalized search works you probably won’t find a lot new in it, but you might be interested to know Google’s public stance on privacy. If personalized search is just a term you’ve seen others talking about and if you’ve never seen your search history you should check out the video. Its a quick and clear explanation of what personalization’s all about and how it affects your privacy.
Whether I agree or disagree with Google’s stance I appreciate their willingness to be more transparent on the issues of both privacy and personalized search. | <urn:uuid:72c302ce-de01-431e-ba03-cefa58bc576c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.vanseodesign.com/google/google-video-privacy-and-personalized-search/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949734 | 471 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Marjorie Perloff. American Critic
From The Encyclopedia of Literary Critics and Criticism, Edited by Chris Murray. (Fitzroy Dearborn, 1999)
Marjorie Perloff is one of the foremost American critics of contemporary poetry. Her work has been especially concerned with explicating the writing of experimental and avant-garde poets and relating it to the major currents of modernist and, especially, postmodernist activity in the arts, including the visual arts and cultural theory. She took her first degree at Barnard College, New York, followed by an M.A. and Ph.D. (in 1965) at CUA (Catholic University of America) in Washington DC. CUA also provided her first teaching post (as assistant and then associate professor) from 1966 to 1971. She moved to the University of Maryland as full professor in 1971, remaining there five years before moving to California in 1976. She has been a professor at Californian universities since 1976, with ten years at the University of Southern California, till 1986, and since then at Stanford University, becoming Sadie Dernham Patek Professor of Humanities in 1990. Her immense energies and enthusiasm as a writer and teacher have been devoted to creating a public for the work of writers whom many others have wanted to dismiss as too difficult, obscure, or marginal. Her own writing is always anything but that; as Frank Kermode has said, Marjorie Perloff is fun to read. She has never been a critic who wraps her insights in a daunting verbal carapace which only the truly intrepid can penetrate. She writes to explain, and always communicates her insights through vivid juxtapositions, formulations, and examples.
While the American mainstream of academic poststructuralist theory in recent years has concentrated its efforts chiefly on such areas as Renaissance drama and modern prose fiction, partly in reaction against the New Critical generation’s stress on poetry, Perloff has never wavered from her commitment to modern and contemporary poetry, a commitment which constantly seeks to extend her generation’s “New Critical” enthusiasm for major modernist poets like William Butler Yeats, Ezra Pound, and T. S. Eliot, taking in the postwar tradition of American poetic innovation which runs through the Black Mountain Poets, the New York Poets, the Beats in the 1950s and 1960s, and through to the Language Poets of the 1980s and 1990s. (Language Poetry, a key interest of Perloff’s, is a radical form of poetry which arose in the 1970s in the United States, especially in San Francisco and New York. In its “pure” form it rejects “reference” out to an objective world beyond the page, so that the poem is not “about” anything — it is simply the “actuality of the words.” It also rejects the “tyranny” of the lyrical “I” whose experience is narrated or explored through poetry. Instead, it focuses attention on sentence, phrase, linguistic register, and verbal patterning. Prominent practitioners are Charles Bernstein, Lyn Hejinian, and Bob Perelman.) Perloff’s strong interest in related “avant-garde” poetry activity in Britain (and, indeed, in Canada and in the rest of Europe) from the 1970s onward marks her out as highly unusual among major American critics. Indeed, it would be true to say that the major academic and commercial success of contemporary avant-garde poetries in the United States is partly due to the succession of lively, lucid, and enlightening critical books and articles which she has produced since the early 1980s. Likewise, the comparative obscurity which remains the fate of the related British “experimental” poetries can be said to be due to the continuing absence from the critical scene of a “British Perloff.”
Perloff’s three earliest books are her only ones devoted entirely to a single poet, but each marks a step closer to the field which she made her métier. They are Rhyme and Meaning in the Poetry of Yeats (1970), The Poetic Art of Robert Lowell (1973), and Frank O’Hara: Poet Among Painters (1977). This sequence of books also suggests a gradual “Americanization” of her interests, and perhaps also hints at her refusal to be bowled over by deconstruction. Her book on the New York poet Frank O’Hara sees his work as part of a matrix of related cultural and artistic activity, rather than isolating it, in the New Critical fashion, as a uniquely supercharged variety known as “literature.” Placing poetry within a cultural continuum in this way quickly becomes the keynote of her approach. Instead of reading the “words on the page” she reads the words (as she has said) off the page and into the immensely active urban and technological cultures from which innovative poetries invariably arise. As she says in the Preface to Radical Artifice: Writing Poetry in the Age of Media (1991), “There is today no landscape uncontaminated by sound bytes or computer blips, no mountain peak or lonely valley beyond the reach of the cellular phone and the microcassette player. Increasingly, then, the poet’s arena is the electronic world.”
In 1981 Perloff produced her first book in what became her settled manner of dealing with a broad range of modern and contemporary culture and treating poetry “within the arts,” under the title The Poetics of Indeterminacy: Rimbaud to Cage, a book which sees broad lines of continuity between modernist and postmodernist culture. This project of establishing a network of interconnections between modernism and postmodernism is characteristic of Perloff’s mature project, in sharp contrast to that of her contemporary, and rival, the critic Helen Vendler, whose consistent line has been to elevate the status of classic modernists like T. S. Eliot and Wallace Stevens while seeming to denigrate that of the present-day avant-garde. Vendler has, it is true, singled out specific contemporary poets as exemplary (such as John Ashbery) but she has never “endorsed” a whole body of varied work by different figures in the way that Perloff, for the past decade and a half, has engaged with the work known as Language Poetry. Where Vendler searches for the individual heirs to the literary heroes of the recent past, Perloff is fascinated by the intense debates about language, poetry, culture, and the self which cluster about the Language Poets. The Poetics of Indeterminacy is also the first of Perloff’s books to emphasize the importance of the musician and cultural theorist John Cage, a figure on whose exemplary centrality she becomes increasingly insistent. The other three books in this “middle” phase of her career are The Dance of the Intellect: Studies in the Poetry of the Pound Tradition (1985), The Futurist Moment: Avant-Garde, Avant-Guerre, and the Language of Rupture (1986), and Poetic License: Studies in Modernist and Postmodernist Lyric (1989), all, again, establishing deep-level connections and affinities between modernism and postmodernism.
But it should be emphasized that Perloff’s notion of the postmodern takes up early definitions of it by critics such as Ihab Hassan in the 1970s. Hassan’s The Literature of Silence (1967) made a case for a new kind of post-Holocaust, post-Hiroshima writing which rejected traditional Western literary-aesthetic norms, resulting in texts which were either violent or obscene, like those of Henry Miller and Norman Mailer, or else reticent, randomized, and indeterminate, like those of Samuel Beckett and John Cage. This critical approach responded to the well-known pronouncement of Theodor Adorno that “After Auschwitz . . . to a write a poem is barbaric.” Such notions of silence, randomness, and openness seemed to posit the possibility of a “post-aesthetic” kind of writing which acknowledged the failure of the century’s high culture to prevent a return to barbarism. “Postmodernism” in this sense represented a literature which recognized the failure of “high culture,” even that of the great modernists like Pound, Eliot, Rainer Maria Rilke, and Thomas Mann, so that the anti-elitism, anti-authoritarianism, and anarchism of this kind of postmodernism had what Perloff calls a “cutting edge” — it was polemical and political, and had not yet been formulated primarily as “play.” But 1967 was also the year of the three books which brought Jacques Derrida to fame, and marked the beginning of the rise of poststucturalism in the United States. Derrida’s seminal essay “Structure, Sign, and Play” had first appeared in 1966, and very quickly the notion of “semantic instability” became dominant in the humanities, not as the specific quality of the postmodern “open text,” but as the necessary linguistic condition of all texts. Thus, in its later phase, postmodernism becomes “play” rather than “anarchy,” celebrating what Jameson called “a new depthlessness,” and “a waning of affect.” Perloff sees the shift in emphasis from “openness” to “depthlessness,” in discussions of postmodernism between the 1970s and the 1980s, as symptomatic. The “dissolution of the subject,” favored by 1980s postmodernism and poststructuralism, far from being something to celebrate, is actually the state of mind that engendered Stalinist purges, the Holocaust, and Hiroshima. Perloff, of course, offers no neat solution to this contradiction, but she points out that many of the classic modernists had already lost faith in those “metanarratives” before their demise was proclaimed in the 1980s. Perloff’s point is that unless we reappraise modernism, we cannot understand postmodernism, or will at best be left with a deracinated version of the phenomenon in which we are compelled to relive the, after all, quite recent past, without being aware that that is what we are doing. Perloff, then, is far from accepting the dominant notions of postmodernism uncritically. She asks of postmodernism what might be called “developmental” questions, such as “How did we ever get ourselves into this mode of critical thinking?” This is not a rhetorical question, and she means to stimulate us into retracing the process step by step, a proceeding which is conspicuously free of the poststructuralist queasiness about considering questions of origin and development.
One of Perloff’s great strengths as a critic and theorist, then, is that while her career reaches its highpoint as deconstruction sweeps the board in America, her work retains its independence and is not swept along with it, whether in the form of extreme partisanship or extreme opposition. Instead of reacting, as so many American critics did, by developing an exaggerated horror for the New Critical “formalism” of the previous generation, she retains many elements of this native American product and refuses to trade it in for the new European model of literary study. Hence, all her essays at some point reproduce a poem, or a substantial proportion of one, and enter into close critical engagement with it. The difference between hers and the typical New Critical essay is that the poem is not isolated as a “verbal icon” detached from every other aspect of life. Rather, she is likely to relate poems to broader (and often interlocking) cultural contexts, such as aspects of business and commercial culture (for example, the way messages are conveyed by iconographic business calling cards, as in Radical Artifice) and the close textual explication is placed within a generously panoramic literary context, with a clear and sharp line of argument which maps a large expanse of literary territory in a memorable way. A classic example of this kind of broad contextualizing is her essay “After Free Verse: The New Non-Linear Poetries,” which argues that while free-verse was speech-based, image-based, and individually expressive writing which centered on the line as its unit, there is now a new kind of “post-linear” writing, represented by Language Poetry, which centers on “the word as such,” or on the “aphoristic fragment,” and is designed for the eye (it is “page-specific”) more than the ear. A formulation of this kind seems to empower the reader in a dramatic way with a new and comprehensive way of seeing a major segment of twentieth-century poetry — what more could be asked of a literary critic and theorist? Such mappings and formulations, of course, always prove too rigid once we actually get into the field and begin to encounter the examples in quantity. But the point is that they send us into the field with some confidence, and with a hypothesis to test, and Perloff herself makes the point earlier in the essay about the necessary crudeness of our literary maps by presenting five American poems, without at first naming the poets, and asking us to decide in which of the well-known camps (“Beat,” “Black Mountain,” “Deep Image,” and so on) each poet belongs. The answers, of course, are surprising, but this does not prove the categories to be meaningless: it simply means that the test will often (as it should) modify the hypothesis.
Perloff’s best-known and most influential book is Radical Artifice: Writing Poetry in the Age of Media, which appeared in 1991 and is very much the best starting point for readers new to her work. The book seeks to situate the flight from “transparency” (that is, language which aims to look and sound “natural,” to sound like “real” talk) to “artifice” (that is, poetic language which foregrounds its own artificiality, for instance, by arranging itself in a series of blocks or clusters on the page). This shift is characteristic of the modernist and postmodernist writers she most admires today, who write within “the discourses of art and the mass media,” for it is naive to suppose that “a ‘poem’ could exist in the United States today that has not been shaped by the electronic culture that has produced it.” The book maps the transition from “free verse” (where the line was the unit) to “post-linear,” “post-subjective” poetry, where the operative unit is “the word as such,” and the page itself as a visual and spacial entity. The notion of “procedural play” is also introduced, whereby the artist works within a grid of strictly regulated randomness (for instance, by allowing word occurrence in the text to be decided by an a priori mathematical sequence). Such procedures bring us full circle, imposing restrictions on “self-expression” which are as fundamental and pervasive as the old iambic metrics abandoned by the modernists. The final chapter in the book is on the musician and theorist John Cage, whose work supplied explicit theoretical formulations of “procedural play.”
Her next book, Wittgenstein’s Ladder: Poetic Language and the Strangeness of the Ordinary (1996), takes another major cultural figure from the mid-century period who is not himself a poet, but whose work provides ways of understanding and situating poetry, the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein. As she writes, “I am less interested in ‘influence,’ always a nebulous quality, than in analogue. It is fascinating to see that Wittgenstein’s stringent and severe interrogation of language has provided an opening for the replacement of the ‘autonomous,’ self-contained, and self-expressive lyric with a more fluid poetic paradigm — a paradigm based on the recognition that the poet’s most secret and profound emotions are expressed in a language that has always already belonged to the poet’s culture, society, and nation, the irony being that this ‘belonging’ need not make the poetry in question — Robert Creeley’s and Rosmarie Waldrop’s, Ron Silliman’s and Lyn Hejinian’s, the Fluxus box or the Joseph Kosuth ‘investigation’ — any less moving.” This encapsulates the rationale for her whole approach to poetry: in spite of the long tradition of rhetorical criticism which has emphasized the separateness of poetic language, Perloff emphasizes that poets do not invent language, but share it with the rest of society, including artists, philosophers, political activists, and business people. As she says in the quotation above, this does not make the poetry any less moving, for avant-garde techniques are not just cerebral — which is always, and only, the way they look at first sight — they are also emotive and humanizing, and this fact counters the “depthlessness” and the “waning of affect” which are so prominent in more dominant accounts of postmodernism. Again, then, Perloff is a theorist whose work has maintained its distinctiveness in the face of the rapid homogenization of literary criticism and theory by such all-embracing concepts as poststructuralism and postcolonialism. We need her distinctive voice more than ever as literary theory (which was instigated by Aristotle) enters its third millennium. | <urn:uuid:d7c484fb-6c0f-4912-bb6e-c0b16853c144> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://marjorieperloff.com/about-2/american-critic/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960865 | 3,771 | 1.71875 | 2 |
Putting all of his China-bashing aside for a moment, Mitt Romney announced the following in a speech on Monday:
I will champion free trade and restore it as a critical element of our strategy, both in the Middle East and across the world. The President has not signed one new free trade agreement in the past four years. I will reverse that failure. I will work with nations around the world that are committed to the principles of free enterprise, expanding existing relationships and establishing new ones.
The point about President Obama not signing “new” free trade agreements is kind of a technicality. He did sign some, but the negotiations originated with the Bush administration, so they weren’t “new,” according to Romney.
But I’m more interested in Romney’s “championing” of free trade. Which nations will he be negotiating with? He mentions countries that “are committed to the principles of free enterprise.” That kind of sounds like the language used by California Rep. Devin Nunes, which I mentioned last week. Nunes proposes starting free trade negotiations with the EU and Brazil. Is this what Romney has in mind as well? As noted in my earlier post, I’m pretty skeptical of the chances of success for both of these. But Romney doesn’t get that specific in terms of trading partners, so I’m not sure exactly what he intends. Even more reason to be skeptical. | <urn:uuid:f7b52b2b-19af-4741-8a5a-23ff95a45dde> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cato.org/blog/mitt-romney-will-champion-free-trade | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956373 | 301 | 1.523438 | 2 |
Adored by celebrities including Renée Zellwegger, Kim Cattrall and Kerry Washington, Murad Skincare was the world’s first line of doctor-branded, clinical skincare when it launched in 1989 and has since gone on to become the #1 selling skincare line in department stores across the globe.
[Related article: Post-summer skincare tips]
We sat down for a chat with its founder and CEO, Dr Howard Murad, to discover his top tips for perfect autumn skin.
Should people change their skincare routine in autumn?
Certainly, because in the winter you tend to be drier, so you need a richer moisturiser than you’ve been using. Also, it’s important to eat certain foods. I like walnuts. I also like fish oil as an ingredient, because they actually hydrate you from within.
Most people think ‘what I put on my skin is going to take care of me’, but the truth is, what you eat can have a significant impact on your appearance.
What are five top foods for great skin?
• Goji berries are amazing – they’re the most nutritionally dense food on the planet.
• Pomegranates have the most amazing antioxidants. We at Murad were able to prove that they improved the SPF of sunscreens, if you just took them by mouth.
[Related article: Superfoods for beautiful skin]
• Walnuts have all kinds of amino acids, which are important to build collagen. They have anti-oxidants, anti-inflammatories and are full of good omegas, so if you don’t like fish, you can certainly have those instead.
• Watermelon is very water rich, so when you’re thirsty, it’s ideal to have a slice of watermelon, because, besides the water you get, you also get all kinds of vito-nutrients, anti-oxidants and it alsoimproves the SPF of sunscreens.
• Tumeric is one of my favourite seasonings. Studies have shown it may help reduce cancer, plus some people think it makes you think better
You have a lot of celebrity fans, whose skin looks amazing. What’s their secret?
The secret is that they take better care of their skin. They make sure that they take the time to have a massage or a facial, they use proper skincare, they use good cleansers - things like that make a difference. You don’t have to be a celebrity to do that, it doesn’t have to be expensive, it’s important to basically understand that overall health is part of skincare.
[Related article: Wrinkle-busting wonder products]
We all know that we should eat more fruit and vegetables, we all know that we should sleep better, we all know it’s important to put on sunscreens, so doing that on a regular basis is critical. All the celebrities do that, and everybody should do that as well. It doesn’t cost that much to take care of your skin.
We’re off to buy a packet of walnuts and a rich moisturiser, ASAP. | <urn:uuid:3f786bf8-78ca-47bc-9e0e-4d0e5d5f2c45> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://uk.lifestyle.yahoo.com/hollywood-dermatologist-reveals-secrets-of-celebrity-skin.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964007 | 686 | 1.539063 | 2 |
It's always something with taxes, isn't it?
While the IRS gets kudos for so quickly revamping the federal withholding tables to align with the recently enacted American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, there are still some issues a bit up in the air.
One is in connection with state income tax withholding. This is something, as noted in my earlier post on the short-term hold put on Kansas refunds, that workers in taxpayers in 41 states and D.C. have to worry about.
In an interview with Tax Analysts, a spokesperson for the payroll service Paychex noted that additional IRS guidance would be helpful when it comes to the states that base their withholding on the federal process.
Those states, Michael Trabold told Tax Analysts, "are going to have to decide how or if they want to do anything to change that. For those impacted states, it adds an additional level of complexity."
Ah, yes, the old unintended consequences issue rears its ugly head again.
As I suggested earlier,check with your payroll manager and/or your state tax department about how this might affect your state tax withholding amount.
Off the state withholding hook: FYI, the nine states that don't tax wage income are Texas, Florida, Alaska, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Tennessee, Washington and Wyoming.
And yes, I disrupted the alphabetical listing to put the two states where I've lived first. | <urn:uuid:aa6cb0af-7d9f-42e8-9bde-d03d6756529f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://dontmesswithtaxes.typepad.com/dont_mess_with_taxes/2009/02/state-withholding-and-the-stimulus.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961138 | 297 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Even though she will go down in history as a British icon, Margaret Thatcher should be remembered for the legacy she leaves in the United States as well.
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, who oversaw a moratorium on offshore drilling after the BP oil spill and promoted alternative energy sources throughout the nation, will step down in March.
It is becoming more and more clear that it was liberal-leaning politicians who threw her under the bus and they are also the ones who are keeping her under the bus.
The newspapers that are not endorsing President Barack Obama are extremely brave. They are to be positively recognized for their courage to stand up against the onslaught of the liberal media which refuses to speak in the best interest of the country as the presidential election nears.
When the storm and its headlines have passed, however, the questions about the Benghazi tragedy should continue full force as November 6 continues to near. During the much-needed questioning and impending investigation, it would be grand if President Obama would remain presidential throughout the process.
By now it’s obvious that Obama and his administration did not handle the situation correctly. Rather than taking a presidential stance during the horrendous incident, Obama kept his mind and actions on his 2012 reelection campaign and tried to alter the obvious reasons for the deadly attack.
Hillary Clinton is a glowing example of the heights women are reaching in the United States in recent times. She contradicts the notion thrust forth by President Obama and his political party that there is an alleged-“War on Women”.
With Americans watching the nearing of the date September 11, 2012 on the calendar for weeks – if not months – and dreading the stark reality that something disastrous may happen to innocent Americans again, the president and his political cronies refused to believe what happened.
As unfortunate as the events are, Romney’s comments about Obama ring true. Prior to the tragic event and even after, President Obama appears to excuse and apologize for the horrendous events that take place in the world – including those against Americans.
What a difference four horrendous years makes. Thinking back to the Democratic National Convention of 2008 and now seeing what’s going on in Charlotte, North Carolina this week at the Democratic National Convention of 2012 shows stark differences. The Democrats have no star power and pale in comparison to the Republicans’ star-packed convention in Tampa.
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- Broncos Rookie Minicamp Clear Creek Zipline Colorado Rockies 2013 YouReport Gallery, Spring 2013 | <urn:uuid:7d9ec78e-1b14-4fca-9138-0dd3657361af> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://denver.cbslocal.com/tag/hillary-clinton/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953831 | 566 | 1.757813 | 2 |
Time to pull out that over-stuffed tackle box inside the shed and untangle the fishing line on your rod and reel. Saturday marks the opening day of the 2012 lowland lakes season and anglers can expect to reel in trout that decidedly bigger this year.
With opening day approaching, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) has released 3 million hatchery-reared trout averaging 11 to 13 inches – three inches longer than the fish that were released last year.
Those fish will join millions of other trout that were stocked last year and have grown to catchable size in lakes around the state. Many of those lakes have also been stocked with triploid and jumbo trout weighing a pound and a half to 11 pounds apiece.
“We have made some changes in our trout hatchery rearing programs in response to the feedback we heard from anglers who really enjoy catching larger fish,” said WDFW Director Phil Anderson. “With these fish, our state’s biggest fishing day of the year just got better.”
At least 300,000 anglers typically turn out for the first day of the lowland lakes season, which remains open into the fall. Although many state waters are open year-round, the April opening marks the start of the state’s most popular fishery.
To participate, anglers must have a current Washington freshwater fishing license valid through March 31, 2013. Licenses can be purchased online at fishhunt.dfw.wa.gov, by telephone at 1-866-246-9453 or at hundreds of license dealers across the state. For details on license vendor locations, visit wdfw.wa.gov/licensing/vendors/.
Freshwater fishing licenses cost $27.50 for resident adults 16 to 69 years old. Fifteen-year-olds can buy a license for $8.25, and seniors 70 and older can buy an annual fishing license for $5.50. Children 14 years of age and younger do not need a fishing license.
“Our license fees are lower this year for youth, seniors and people with disabilities,” Anderson said. “So, whether you fish from the bank, a pram, or a boat, this fishery is tailor made for a great family outing.”
Because of the popularity of trout fishing in Washington, WDFW put a higher priority on its trout-rearing program over the past year, said Chris Donley, the department’s Inland Fish Program Manager.
“For one thing, we invested in more hatchery feed to grow our fish larger,” he said. “We hope anglers see the increase in the quality of our catchable trout on opening day.”
Hatchery crews also spent the past year stocking lakes across the state with more than 10 million fry and fingerlings, which have grown to eight to 12 inches in length.
“With all of these fish ready and waiting in statewide lakes, everyone has an excellent chance of catching some nice fish,” Donley said. “Come on out and join the fun of opening day.”
The fishing should be solid at lakes around Federal Way starting Saturday. Steel Lake was stocked with 8,500 rainbow trout eight- to 12-inches long earlier this month, Lake Geneva got 5,500 rainbows, Five Mile Lake got 3,200, Lake Killarney received 3,500 and Lake Fenwick was stocked with 2,000 trout. Other area lakes that will be open Saturday will be North Lake, Lake Holm and Star Lake.
“With our biggest fishing crowds out on this opener, it’s especially important for everyone to be patient and safe at boat launches and docks,” Donley said. “Everyone in boats, and all children on shore, should use personal flotation devices.”
Anglers parking at WDFW water-access sites are required to display on their vehicle the WDFW Vehicle Access Pass that is provided free with every annual fishing license purchased. The passes are transferable between two vehicles. Anglers who use Washington State Parks or Department of Natural Resource areas need the $30 annual or $10 daily Discover Pass. | <urn:uuid:a4124bfb-6d6b-4dd3-a563-3ea23e340549> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.federalwaymirror.com/sports/149085875.html?mobile=true | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948476 | 878 | 1.648438 | 2 |
Pursuing a Vocation in Austrian Economics
Notes from the Mises Institute Summer Fellowship Program 2009
The Summer Fellowship Program has grown by leaps and bounds since its founding by Professor Guido Hülsmann in 2000. This year the program includes eighteen young men and women from the United States, Canada, Germany, Spain, France, Turkey, Denmark, Poland and the Czech Republic. Their disciplines range across the social sciences from economics and history to political science and sociology, although most of the fellows are pursuing graduate degrees in economics and aspire to a vocation of teaching and writing Austrian economics at an academic institution. What is especially interesting and instructive is that they have adopted widely divergent educational strategies in fulfilling their aspirations. Here are three examples.
Dave Howden is in his second year as a Mises summer fellow. He is a Canadian who majored in finance as an undergraduate. After graduation, he began work with a mutual fund, and later, with a currency-trading company in Canada. He soon found that there was limited scope for the concepts that were taught in his mainstream economics and investment classes. It was during this time that he started a more intense study of Austrian business-cycle theory in his spare time, in the hope of gaining an understanding of the seeming anomalies in the investment environment that could not be explained by most mainstream analysis. His reading included Jesús Huerta de Soto's Money, Bank Credit, and Economic Cycles and he was profoundly impressed by its comprehensive and integrated analysis of Austrian monetary, banking, and business-cycle theory.
In fact Dave was so inspired that he sent an email to Huerta de Soto to express his great pleasure in reading the book. He was delighted when Huerta de Soto replied cordially and eventually invited him to study in the new masters and PhD programs at the Universidad Rey Juan Carlos, in Madrid, Spain. Impressed that the programs placed a heavy emphasis on Austrian economics, Dave decided to quit his job and leave Canada for Spain to pursue his studies.
Looking back on his choice from the perspective of an ABD who will soon go on the job market, Dave has no regrets but understandably is experiencing some trepidation regarding his employment opportunities in North American academia. However, because fluency in Spanish is a requirement of the Rey Juan Carlos program, Dave is also able to take of advantage of academic employment opportunities in Spain and other Spanish-speaking countries.
Dave points out that, in addition to the uncertain employment situation and the necessity of attaining fluency in Spanish, English-speaking students who follow his strategy should expect other hardships. In particular there is little scope for funding for European graduate students, so there is the financial burden to be considered. Fortunately tuition rates are among the lowest in the world, making this burden much more manageable.
Nevertheless, Dave considers the benefits of his choice to far outweigh the costs and enthusiastically endorses the program, stating:
In Madrid, I have found a home among the greatest core of Austrian economists in existence. Not since the Vienna circle of almost a century ago have this many common minds been linked together to further our science. I am exposed to cutting-edge ideas on a daily basis, and the program is receiving increased recognition — something which I am more than ecstatic to be a part of. In addition to the academic program, I have had access to the wonderful free-market oriented think tank Instituto Juan de Mariana, as well as European conferences that are quite sympathetic to Austrian ideas. My future may be highly uncertain, but in the meantime, there is much to be enjoyed in the present. Thankfully, time preference is always greater than zero.
Although it may not work for everyone, the strategy Dave chose to pursue his vocation in Austrian economics has, up to this point, paid handsome dividends. He has won first prize in the oral examination at Mises University in 2008 and has won a number of first- and second-place awards sponsored by Austrian scholarly societies for graduate research papers. He has published three articles in refereed journals and has received revise-and-resubmits for two others. He is currently writing his dissertation, "The Efficient Market Hypothesis and the Capital Asset Pricing Model: New Perspective on Old Theories," in which he applies insights of Mises and Shackle to develop an alternative to the risk/reward-trade-off view underlying all standard financial models. He is already a creative and productive Austrian economist, one that many senior Austrians consider to be in the top two or three of the up-and-coming generation.
Like Dave, Edward Perry is also a Mises summer fellow for a second year. Ed received his BA in economics with a minor in mathematics at St. Norbert College in Wisconsin. After graduation, he enrolled in the two-year master's program in applied economics at Marquette University, which he completed in May of this year. The primary focus of this program was econometrics with core courses in micro and macro as well.
It was not until his first semester in the master's program in a microeconomics course that he stumbled upon Mises and Austrian economics — as a result of a discussion of a formula connected to Say's Law. Interested in learning more about this law, Ed began reading some of Say's works, both at the library and on the Internet, and eventually discovered the Austrian School and Mises.org. Since then he has immersed himself in reading Austrian literature and identifies Menger's Principles of Economics and Rothbard's Man, Economy, and State as having had the greatest influence on his development as an economist.
The discovery of Austrian economics intensified his interest in pursuing economics as a vocation, so he decided to apply to PhD programs in economics rather than search for a job in the area of applied business economics. Given his prodigious math skills, Ed chose the strategy of enrolling in a standard economics program. He applied to and was accepted by a few very good economics programs and, after weighing his options, he decided to enroll in the PhD program at Indiana University in Bloomington. Although the program does not have an especially free-market orientation, Ed was impressed by the fact that it was academically solid and active and its faculty genuinely interested in their students' welfare.
Ed's current interests include money, capital theory, and calculation problems. This summer he is investigating whether certain problems called "NP-Complete" problems — a large class of problems treated in computer science whose optimal solution for large amounts of inputs is undiscoverable — can be related to the problems of calculation that a central planner would experience in a socialist economy (even assuming the planner had at his disposal the value scales and know-how of all the individuals in his domain). His aim is to show that even if a central planner had god-like omniscient powers, it would still be beyond his ability to rationally allocate resources in such a way that the allocation would come anywhere near replicating the allocation automatically arrived at by a freely adjusting price system under the institution of private property. Ed's ambitious and progressive research program demonstrates the hollowness of the claim made by some that the praxeological economics of Menger, Mises, and Rothbard is a "closed system" and that research in Austrian economics should be restricted to applying and illustrating theory in the form of historical case studies.
Josh McCabe is a first-time Mises summer fellow, who did his undergraduate work in political science at Emmanuel College in Boston. He characterizes himself at the time as a typical left-liberal college student until a friend introduced him to Capitalism and Freedom by Milton Friedman. Friedman's book deeply impressed him with its lucid writing and logical arguments. His first introduction to the Austrian School was by way of Murray Rothbard's America's Great Depression and he became fascinated with macroeconomics for a short time, but eventually became much more interested in the micro aspects of economics. He considered switching his major to economics, but since he was graduating early he would not have had enough time to make up the coursework required for an economics major. However, because he was always intrigued by race and ethnic relations he wrote his senior thesis on the economics of discrimination based on the works of Gary Becker.
Josh decided his vocation was to teach and research at the university level, but he was unsure of which route to take. He found that economics as a mainstream discipline was much too mathematical for his tastes, so he began looking into political science once again. He applied to several programs and ended up enrolling in an interdisciplinary masters program in regional economic and social development at the University of Massachusetts Lowell, because it offered him generous financial aid. At UML, most of the faculty were very open to his viewpoint and actively engaged him. In particular, two courses in sociology piqued his interest. The first was an organizational-theory course with William Lazonick. Despite the fact that Lazonick was dismissive of Austrian economics, the readings in his class gave Josh the idea that one could pursue economic scholarship through alternative fields such as organizational theory. The second course was a directed study in urban sociology with Chris Tilly (son of the late Charles Tilly, a famous Marxist-oriented sociologist). It was in Tilly's class that Josh learned to ask leftist questions and look for libertarian answers. He thus decided that sociology as a discipline provided the questions that held the most interest for him. Josh responded to one of these typical leftist questions with a libertarian answer in his master's thesis, "Black Railroad Workers 1890–1960: A Critical Reassessment."
Josh was a little intimidated when he began applying to PhD programs in sociology. As he puts it, "More than one professor told me that a working-class white guy with an interest in race, labor, and Austrian economics would have trouble in many programs. I applied to two top schools and four middle-range schools, but didn't hold my breath since I had such a low (50th percentile) GRE math score. To my surprise, I was accepted to my top choice (SUNY-Albany, ranked 25th) with full funding."
Although Josh will not begin the program until the fall, he has already visited and talked with many faculty members and discovered that scholars in the better schools tend to be open to ideas from all over the spectrum, including the libertarian end, as long as they are presented in a scholarly manner. As with any discipline, he has come across intolerant ideologues or narrow-minded "activists" in sociology, but he has found that the stereotype of the mushy-brained left-wing sociologist was false.
More importantly, for students whose aim is to pursue economics as an academic vocation but whose aptitude or disposition prevents them from surmounting the entry barrier of mathematics, Josh advises,
economic sociology has become one of the major subfields in the discipline in recent years with its own rankings in US News & World Report. Unlike economics, which is dominated by the neoclassical framework, sociology is open in terms of framework and methodology…. Cross-citations in both fields are not uncommon today. There has even been talk of economic sociologists being top contenders for the Nobel Prize in economics.
Josh's academic background in economic sociology has led him to investigate the economics of discrimination from an alternative perspective to the standard Beckerite treatment. He has just completed a draft of a paper on "The (Austrian) Economics of Discrimination," in which he frames racial discrimination as a Hayekian knowledge problem as it relates to network theories.
Dave, Ed, and Josh are following different paths in their pursuit of the same goal, a vocation in Austrian economics. These paths have been little traveled up to now and are strewn with obstacles, hazards, and uncertainties. The Mises Institute's Summer Fellowship Program exists to assist these young trailblazers in successfully completing their journeys and to lend support to the many others who will follow them.
Working closely with other fellows and resident Mises faculty, sharing concerns and solutions, networking as a Mises summer fellow is a big leg up for the young Austrian in meeting the challenge of launching a successful career in an academic world that is again growing increasingly hostile to the market economy and society. | <urn:uuid:d9558cb0-2aa6-48ec-9258-0fb6548df76c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mises.org/daily/3523/Pursuing-a-Vocation-in-Austrian-Economics | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981014 | 2,504 | 1.710938 | 2 |
The pepperminty sweetness of the cloudy greenish concoction was the first sensation to hit my palate. Next came the burn of the 124-proof liquid snaking its way down my throat. As the hairs on the back of my neck stood to attention, I shifted on my bar stool at The Oceanaire Seafood Room, where I'd come to sample absinthe—newly legalized in the United States—and waited for the hallucinations to kick in. But visions of little green fairies sauntering through the streets of Harbor East never did materialize.
Centuries old and often stigmatized, the legend of absinthe has been fueled through the years by its prohibition. An anise-flavored spirit distilled from herbs, including wormwood (purported to contain psychotropic effects), absinthe is served with grandeur to match its reputation. A sugar cube is placed on a slotted spoon that rests above a glass, an ounce-and-a-half of the spirit is poured over the cube, and then set on fire. After the fireworks die down, a water-tower spigot dispenses water to dilute the drink. When its tint turns milky green, it's ready to down. I savored Kubler, a 106-proof absinthe made in Switzerland since 1863, and the stronger French product, Lucid–and lived to tell this tale. | <urn:uuid:7bb285a2-d2c8-4147-ba31-277e163cfdf5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.baltimoremagazine.net/food-and-dining/2008/08/mystique-of-absinthe?mini=events%2Fcalendar%2F2013-01 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950974 | 287 | 1.710938 | 2 |
I've never really used a microframework in PHP before. I used Flask for a Python project that I did to experiment with using Google App Engine. The principles seem to be quite similar (although I will admit that having decorators in PHP would be ineresting) but the trade-off with a microframework is that you usually have to figure out an application layout for yourself.
He also uses the Pimple dependency injection container, Twig templating and Composer for package management. He describes how he got it all set up - organizing the code so Composer could understand it, creating the Twig templates directory and creating some of his default routes. | <urn:uuid:3385be9c-b5c7-4c92-9c92-f0a52ef60538> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.phpdeveloper.org/news/17542 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955174 | 135 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Ben Bernanke meets with Reserve Bank of India Governor Duvvuri Subbarao in Mumbai on Wednesday, marking the first time a serving Fed chairman has visited the Indian central bank.
Economists say the two should have lots to talk about.
In a speech Tuesday at a banking summit in Mumbai, India’s central bank governor stopped for a moment to make an “important announcement.”
Revealing some sense of humor, Duvvuri Subbarao gave the impression he was about to close a debate on a very serious issue: whether India will do away with its cash reserve ratio.
Can India’s economic data be trusted? Economists and investors say they are finding it increasingly hard.
Frequent and sharp revisions in inflation and factory output data—key determinants of monetary policy—have confounded experts in recent months.
The governor of India’s central bank is trying to get it out of his hair, but the problem appears to be particularly sticky.
Mr. Subbarao is scratching his head to try and figure out why his barber charges him 150 rupees (nearly $3) for a haircut, compared to 50 rupees a decade earlier.
RBI to FinMin: The ball’s in your court.
The Reserve Bank of India’s unexpectedly sharp cut in a benchmark interest rate Tuesday silenced the pro-growth campaigners who felt the central bank was being too hawkish on inflation while being indifferent to economic expansion. And it cheered stock and fixed-income markets.
But it also left many scratching their heads: Was this a step too large too soon?
“If inflationary pressures resurface, the RBI will be left with little room to cut rates further. In that case, Tuesday’s rate cut could turn out to be the last one in this year,” rating agency Crisil said in a note.
Economists, and industrialists are eagerly awaiting for the Reserve Bank of India to cut interest rates Tuesday when it unveils its annual monetary policy, but that’s far from a done deal.
The central bank had been raising rates since March 2010 in a bid to lower inflation, but has kept rates steady in its last three meetings as India’s economic growth has slowed down.
The Indian economy grew 6.1% year-on-year in the October-December quarter, its slowest expansion in more than two years.
By Alex Frangos
There’s been a lot of talk about the Reserve Bank of India’s recent stance that it can’t cut interest rates until the government presents a solid plan for reducing the fiscal deficit.
But there’s something else that could dash India Inc.’s hopes for easier credit: the price of oil.
After India announced that headline inflation for May had reached 9.06%, economists were appalled. Credit Suisse bank, in a research note, called India’s May inflation print a “horror show.”
Will this force Reserve Bank of India Governor Duvvuri Subbaro to spring for a larger interest rate increase at the central bank’s monetary policy review on Thursday?
Reserve Bank of India Governor Duvvuri Subbarao said a few weeks ago that “hopefully, sooner rather than later” there will be national rules governing microfinance institutions that would trump the law imposed by Andhra Pradesh last year that has gutted the business model of private microcredit companies.
Investors dropped banking stocks like hot potatoes ahead of the Reserve Bank of India’s monetary policy review Tuesday, and judging by the outcome of the rate-setting meeting, that pessimism was justified.
The increase in policy rates was sharper than most expectations, and other measures such as the higher savings deposits interest rate will also make life more difficult for banks, analysts say.
India Real Time offers analysis and insights into the broad range of developments in business, markets, the economy, politics, culture, sports, and entertainment that take place every single day in the world’s largest democracy. Regular posts from Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires reporters around the country provide a unique take on the main stories in the news, shed light on what else mattered and why, and give global readers a snapshot of what Indians have been talking about all week. You can contact the editors at email@example.com.
Check out the main contributors to the blog and their bios here.
Managing consultant Harshdeep Rapal shares some tips for entrepreneurs looking to raise investment for startups.
Today’s rollercoaster economic environment presents a challenge to entrepreneurs. But it’s still possible to successfully launch and develop a business, particularly if you stick to a few key principles, says Avi Basu, founder of Connectiva Systems.
Leadership training programs tend to focus too much on soft skills like psychological attitudes and not enough on boosting a firm’s financial performance, writes Ariff Kachra.
Not by flooding them with newsletters and calling them three times a day. Here are a few tips from Milind Mody, CEO of eBrandz.
Pravin Lal, director at Sapient Global Markets, says the proposed Dodd Frank Act presents an opportunity for Indian IT companies. | <urn:uuid:ea87c837-083e-4322-be2c-af7c1e1ebf44> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/tag/duvvuri-subbarao/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951719 | 1,100 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Cost/Platforms: Free on Android and Apple devices.
Lots of function for nothing:
Fun and easy to use:
Solves travel need or challenge:
Snap a photo, and let Google go to work.
Why we like it -- Goggles is essentially a visual search service, available as a standalone Android app or from within the Google Mobile app for Apple devices. (It's not yet available for BlackBerry.) Point your camera toward something and snap a "picture," and Google retrieves information about that image.
For travelers, perhaps the best feature of Goggles is its ability to translate signs so you can navigate an area. The app's foreign-language translation isn't perfect, but it is a great place to start (provided you have a data connection and a reasonably priced usage plan while you're on the road).
The app can also sometimes retrieve information about famous landmarks, thus saving you the hassle of typing in a name. If you snap the photo of a building's sign, that picture will yield a list of search results associated with the place.
Improvements we'd like to see -- Since "visual search" is in its infancy, approach it with modest expectations so you won't be disappointed. The app will often fail to recognize buildings or objects, and translations can be flawed.
More app reviews >> | <urn:uuid:1a704c79-db13-4b48-9134-d809627928c0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.travelchannel.com/interests/gear-and-gadgets/articles/google-goggles-review | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.93022 | 271 | 1.5 | 2 |
While you are in a treatment program, the Judge, prosecutor, your lawyer and your case manager will monitor your progress in treatment. Your case manager will be in constant contact with your treatment program staff.
After you first meet, your Case Manager will develop a Treatment Plan. Your Treatment Plan will explain the following things:
Attendance at a substance abuse treatment program
Regular drug and alcohol testing Medical screening
Attendance at an educational/vocational program Participation in self-help groups
Your Case Manager will also help you with other areas of your life according to your individual needs. | <urn:uuid:4c6823cf-2726-4edf-ac1a-fc85f54b2685> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://nycourts.gov/courts/nyc/drug_treatment/step/staff.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.931611 | 119 | 1.515625 | 2 |
's polished fusion of funk, jazz, and urban soul helped the soprano saxophonist become one of the most popular contemporary jazz performers of the '80s and '90s. Since he concentrated on groove and overall sound instead of improvisation,
never received much attention from jazz critics, but he retained a large audience well into his second decade of performing.
began his musical career in the late '70s. He received his first break when Grover Washington, Jr.
, one of his musical idols, invited him on a tour in 1979. The tour helped establish Howard
's name, and in 1982 he released his debut album, Asphalt Garden
, on Palo Alto. The record was a moderate hit, as was its follow-up, 1984's Steppin' Out
. It wasn't until the 1985 release of Dancing in the Sun
earned a large audience. The album reached number one on the contemporary jazz charts. Following the release of Dancing in the Sun
, he moved to MCA, where he issued A Nice Place to Be
, and Love Will Follow
. All four records were considerable successes on the charts.
In 1991, Howard
signed to GRP, releasing his label debut, Love and Understanding
, that year. It was followed by Do I Ever Cross Your Mind
in 1992 and When Summer Comes
in 1993. A Home Far Away
was released in 1994, and Attitude Adjustment
was issued in 1996. All of his GRP recordings were quite successful, confirming his place among the most popular contemporary jazz performers of the '90s. His first five years with GRP, plus a selection of his MCA recordings, were summarized on 1997's The Very Best of George Howard
returned to recording with Midnight Mood
, which was released in January 1998. Sadly, it was the last record he would release in his lifetime. He died unexpectedly on March 29, 1998. A few months later, his last recording -- a version of Sly Stone
's There's a Riot Goin' On
, which was conceived as part of Blue Note's cover series -- was released. | <urn:uuid:19e5fb87-2ded-4418-a04f-1753fed0b003> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.am650radio.com/Music/Artist.aspx?id=6772 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.989441 | 437 | 1.742188 | 2 |
How do I handle this situation using Positive Discipline?
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ignoring me - what do I do?#112-09-2010, 08:43 PMI'm trying to implement Positive Discipline in our home, as we have grown so frustrated with other strategies. My daugher is almost 4 and very spirited. One problem I'm having is that she just flat out ignores me. Sometimes when I ask her to do something she will sit there doing whatever she's doing, obviously ignoring me because she's smirking and laughing without looking at me, or she will get riled up and run away from me. One example is when it's time to get her pj's on, but this happens with lots of things. I get very frustrated having to repeat my request multiple times.
How do I handle this situation using Positive Discipline?Tags: None
#212-10-2010, 08:13 AMPower struggles are SO common for this age! And that is what's happening, although it's a passive one. Children are learning about their developing sense of autonomy and initiative...what they can do and what they will do. Hang in there...she will grow out of this! There are a few things you can try to get through this age with kindness and firmness...
Give a time warning--This is the classic 5-minute or 1-minute warning, just so she has time to wrap her mind around what you're telling her and make transitions smoother.
Give choices--This is about less telling and more asking. It may be helpful if you find you're often telling her what to do, what's happening, why you're doing things, etc. "What is the first thing we should do now?" "Would you like 2 more minutes or 3 more minutes?" Or just ask curiosity questions to engage her: "I wonder how you're feeling when I tell you what to do?" You might throw in some silly choices; ones that would get her attention and add some fun to the task: "Would you like to sleep naked or sleep in your clothes?"
Have a routine chart--these are great for clarifying certain times of day when there's always lots to do, like getting ready in the morning, meal times, or getting ready for bed. Children can be involved in helping to make the chart which helps give them a sense of ownership. Then, it's easier to let the chart be the boss. "What does the routine chart say we should be doing right now?" "What comes next?" Again, one more thing you can ask her instead of tell her.
Act without talking--Disengage from the power struggle by simply taking her hand and leading upstairs to get ready.
Decide what you will do--you can decide what you will do and leave the rest up to her. You can give the 5-minute warning, you can ask her for pj preferences, you can turn the task into something fun, you can ask her what should be happening according to the routine chart...but if she's still not acknowledging you, just let her know what you'll be doing. "Your bedtime story will begin in 5 minutes. I'll meet you in your room."
#312-10-2010, 02:24 PMThanks for the reassurance that this is just another phase. And thank you for all the great suggestions! I do give her time warnings, but I could be better about giving her more choices. And I'll get us started with a chart too.
I have a question regarding the hand-holding suggestion. I can definitely do that, but what do I do if I take her hand and she starts throwing a fit? Do I pick her up, kicking and screaming, to continue our journey or have a time-in?
And also, if I've done all these things and she is still standing there refusing to cooperate with getting her clothes changed, do I pick her up silently and change them myself? Would that be appropriate PD?
Thanks again for the help!
#412-12-2010, 12:40 AMIt's up to you what to do if she has a fit...I know I've carried my son before, when he's not cooperating and we don't have any other options. But there might be some other things you could try first, like asking, would you like me to carry you upstairs or would you like to walk? My husband always has some good choices to offer for carrying. He'll say, would you like me to carry you like a football or a sack of potatoes? Or, another one the kids like is when he pretends to be some kind of vehicle and he'll say, woukd you like to ride a motorcycle or a monster truck? And he'll turn the carry into a fun game. By giving her a choice of how she wants to get upstairs, you're also letting her know that not going upstairs is not an option. But at least it can be fun!
And as for the changing, if she's not doing it herself, that's her choice (as long as she is old enough and capable of doing it if she wants to). You could always continue with your part of the bedtime routine, give her the opportunity to change in to her pjs, and if it's time for the bedtime story and she's still not in her pjs, read it anyway. You could either say something like, I see you're sleeping in your clothes tonight. Or don't say anything and see what she says/does as you continue with the routine like normal.
It's tough because at this age, it can be a fine line between helping and enabling. You definitely want to offer her support, ancouragement and help when she needs it, without doing something for her that she was expected to do for herself.
I love the Positive Discipline books by Jane Nelsen, and I recommend them all the time! I think you would get a lot out of Positive Discipline for Preschoolers.
#512-14-2010, 07:49 AMThanks! I'm definitely encouraged because I DO give her the choice to walk or be carried quite often and I'm reading Jane Nelsen's Positive Discipline right now I'll see if I can get her preschool book from my library as well!
#612-16-2010, 01:23 AMHave you tried the ASK, TELL, ACT method?
It's just as it sounds. You ASK once in a normal tone. You wait 10 seconds (to see if she's going to do as told). You then move into her space and TELL her what you want in a firm tone. You wait 10 seconds. Then you ACT by moving her gently, but firmly on to a chair or against a wall. She can ONLY come out of that space to do what is asked of her.
During the ACT stage, once she's in position, don't watch her..in fact it will work much quicker if you pretend you are looking the other way - even change your stance so that your body is facing away from her and where she needs to go... this tells her that you expect her to do as she is told. If you watch her, you are telling her you expect to have to ask again.
This way she has to decide to do what she is told. She takes responsibility and you just wait. If she comes out and doesn't do as told...gently but firmly put her back in the action spot. You might have to do so several times the first few weeks.
Good luck, the spirited ones are...spirited!
kloppenmum.wordpress.comLast edited by kloppenmum; 12-16-2010, 02:01 AM.
#712-16-2010, 11:48 PMOriginally posted by kloppenmum View PostThen you ACT by moving her gently, but firmly on to a chair or against a wall. She can ONLY come out of that space to do what is asked of her...During the ACT stage, once she's in position, don't watch her..in fact it will work much quicker if you pretend you are looking the other way - even change your stance so that your body is facing away from her and where she needs to go... this tells her that you expect her to do as she is told...This way she has to decide to do what she is told. She takes responsibility and you just wait. If she comes out and doesn't do as told...gently but firmly put her back in the action spot. You might have to do so several times the first few weeks.
This is an exerpt from "The Case Against Time Outs," by Peter Haiman:
"When time-out is used, parents first firmly demand that their child stop misbehaving and be quiet. The child is then usually required to go and sit alone in a room, away from parents, and admonished not to come out of the room until they are sure that they can control their behavior. Being placed in time-out prolongs the time that a child must endure the frustrated need that caused their misbehavior. Thus, unmet normal needs become increasingly uncomfortable as the time-out continues. Young children depend upon, want to be with, love, and need their parents."
It can be difficult to switch mindsets litke this, but there is some great reading material this is helpful. I recommend "Positive Discipline," by Jane Nelsen, as well as "Unconditional Parenting." by Alfie Kohn. They are excellent for understanding the essence of positive parenting!
#812-17-2010, 04:00 PMThe point of ASK TELL ACT is that the child is in charge. They get to choose to comply. Or wait. There is no adult timing or punitive action other than they have asked for something to be done, and expect it to be done.
I completely agree - Time Outs are not helpful or positive.
#912-17-2010, 06:20 PMOriginally posted by kloppenmum View PostThere is no adult timing or punitive action other than they have asked for something to be done, and expect it to be done.
And the punishment is in the form of "Go sit in this chair/ stand against the wall." It's a consequence that is unrelated to the initial behavior. To me, any kind of imposed consequence like that is punitive.
Genuinely positive discipline is a "working with" approach, rather than a "doing to" approach to helping children with their behavior.
#1012-18-2010, 03:16 AMI think we have crossed wires.
However, in the best interests of the forum I am happy to end the discussion here.
Thanks for your input, Kelly.
#1112-18-2010, 10:28 AMNo problem. I agree. I'd be happy to chat offline, too!
New Forum Member
- Dec 2010
#1212-21-2010, 09:00 AMMy eldest used to do this with me at that age. Boy, that wa a struggle. I took a different approach that he quickly learned ignoring would trigger. I would pretend to sneak out of the room quietly. Then I would go into thier bedroom and replace his blanket with this really scratchy one he absolutely hated. There were a few tears initially, but the ignoring quickly stopped after 2-3 nights with a scratchy blanket.
Lesson number 1: Don't ignore dad or he will act like you cant see him messing with your bedsheets!
#1312-21-2010, 09:37 AM
Positive discipline can be a very different way of thinking about disciplining kids...I totally get that! For most of us, it goes against our natural instincts for teaching kids appropriate behavior...until we fully understand the concept of what makes positive discipline "positive" and can develop new instincts.
I strongly recommend Positive Discipline by Jane Nelsen, as well as Unconditional Parenting by Alfie Kohn.Last edited by Kelly; 12-21-2010, 09:43 AM. | <urn:uuid:c3b896ec-6c59-411f-85c9-19d8d2fde081> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://attachmentparenting.org/forums/forum/principle-specific-forums-los-ocho-principios-forum-espec%C3%ADfico/positive-discipline-disciplina-positiva/6925-ignoring-me-what-do-i-do?postcount=7&p=50593&s=c675f703ef34e00766556d05c1625809 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971429 | 2,526 | 1.625 | 2 |
<THE RULE MAKER PORTFOLIO>
by Rob Landley (TMF Oak)
AUSTIN, TX (May 21, 1999) -- The Coca-Cola Co. (NYSE: KO) has not been having a fun year. This is the only stock in our portfolio that's down from where we bought it a year ago, and there's a reason: Coke made LESS money in the first quarter of 1999 than in Q1 1998. Ouch. Add to that the unfavorable currency translations that turn weak foreign currencies into strong U.S. dollars, and Coke's most recent 10-Q is not a pretty sight. (You might want to open that link in another window and follow along with the class.)
First quarter fully-diluted net earnings per share fell to $0.30 from $0.34 a year ago. In the "Results from Operations" section (part of the "Management's Discussion and Analysis"), Coke states bravely, without even asking for a blindfold or a last cigarette, that it sold 6% fewer gallons of concentrated Coca-Cola syrup this quarter than the same quarter last year. The only defense poor old Coke can offer is this: "The decrease in volume is primarily a result of the impacts of difficult economic conditions in many parts of the world." Outside of the U.S., the worldwide economy is not happy, so people there simply have less money with which to buy Coke.
Fallout From Asian Economic Crisis
One big reason for this is the "Asian Economic Crisis" (bump-bum-baaaaaah!!!!), which if I understand correctly (this is not guaranteed) is the old Savings and Loan crisis after ten years of compounding. Prepare yourselves for Massive Oversimplification (tm):
Ten years ago, the U.S. confronted the "Savings and Loan Crisis" (bump-bum-baaaaaah!!!!), and our government, who art in debt, spent sagans of dollars bailing out hundreds of near-bankrupt financial institutions. These savings and loans (and a lot of large banks too) had taken advantage of poor government oversight and misguided deregulation to speculate in the booming real estate market. They didn't always do it directly, but they gave a lot of loans and mortgages to people who did, without asking too many questions about "collateral" and "solvency" and "how much money do we still have in the vault?" Then, when the bottom suddenly dropped out of the real estate market in the late '80s, they found themselves holding a lot of bad debt owed to bankrupt developers. The S&Ls were forced to foreclose on land they couldn't sell for even half of the mortgage owed on it. While they had millions of dollars on paper, in reality if their customers tried to withdraw too much money from their checking accounts the bank would run out of cash!
When the full extent of the problem became apparent, the U.S. government stepped in and fixed everything with a time tested technique called "throwing money at the problem." Uncle Sam bailed out the banks, making sure the U.S. financial industry remained solvent and in business, and that depositors didn't lose their federally-insured savings. A lot of voters were remarkably peeved about this, and there was plenty of political fallout. But it blew over in a few years, and they changed a lot of laws to try to prevent it from happening again.
In Asia, things were different. Just like the U.S., they got themselves hip-deep in real estate during the boom years of the '80s, with Japanese investors buying Rockefeller center in New York and thousands of acres of Hawaii land. But when the crash came there was honor at stake, and bankruptcy is dishonorable. Admit to bad business decisions and the firm loses face. Foreclosing on a business partner isn't just a matter of money, but relationships. Elsewhere in Asia, rich families oftentimes not only owned the banks, but also had done the speculating, and would be foreclosing on their own family members.
So most of Asia swept their financial problems under the rug. With "easy payment terms," bad debt with insufficient collateral doesn't have to be recognized. Land currently selling for $1000/acre is still worth $3000/acre until you try to sell it. They kept bad debt on the books, used recent deposits to fund recent withdrawals, and hoped everything would sort itself out in the end.
After a decade of this, the bad debt ballooned until it popped, and the entire Asian economy suddenly collapsed. When a bank ran out of money, it had to try to cash in the bad debt, and there was nothing there. Next, homes and business were foreclosed on, throwing successful professionals out of work and into the streets. But this didn't help the bank get cash because everybody else was doing the same thing and there was nobody to sell the repossessed property to. When the banks went under, people who had money stored in that bank were suddenly penniless, and the spiral continued downwards until there was rioting in the streets.
The reality of what happened was of course INSANELY more complicated than that (I didn't even mention the Korean stock market or the yen/ringit exchange rate), and played out over a period of several months, with "better late than never" intervention from just about every governmental agency on at least three continents. But the moral of the story is that if you have a big, evil problem that gets worse the longer you wait, sweeping it under the rug is probably not the smart move.
Opportunity for Coke
So meanwhile, The Coca-Cola Company is trying to sell all these people Coke -- trying very hard, I might add. And suddenly, there's a whole bunch of dirt cheap real estate for sale. What does Coke do? It BUYS it! In the first quarter of this year alone, Coke spent half a billion dollars either investing in bottling companies or purchasing property, plant, and equipment. (You still have that 10-Q open in another window, right? Check the cash flow statement under "Investing Activities".) For the past year, Coke has been able to buy Asian bottling plants for pennies on the dollar, and tap into a huge pool of skilled but unemployed labor that it can put to work making and distributing Coke. If you page back down to "Results of Operations," there's the bit about "Operating Income and Operating Margin," which states that Coke recently acquired bottling operations in India and vending operations in Japan.
Coca-Cola has done a good job investing in Asian assets, and in fact, net revenue from the Middle and Far East group is up 13% from the same quarter last year. (Go to Note F, "Operating Segments", see table.) Unfortunately, revenue from Africa, Europe, and Latin America was all down. Economic trouble spreads, and many parts of the world's economy seem to have noticeably slowed over the past year. Still, that's just more opportunity to buy production and distribution assets low, and sell Coke beverages high whenever these economies finally rebound. Coca-Cola's management has never taken a short-term view, but rather a long-term ownership position in the beverage consuming habits of the world at large.
Coke is good at taking lemons and making lemonade. After all, it owns Minute Maid. Coke still has a very healthy positive cash flow, and it's making the best use of it that it knows how. For investors who believe Coke's management knows what it's doing, hard times are an opportunity to buy in cheap. For those who believe their money is better invested elsewhere, Coke has a stock buyback program, funded from the healthy profits it still makes, that would be happy to take their excess shares out of circulation.
On Monday, Tom will kick off our week on pharmaceutical companies.
Have a great weekend,
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Day Month Year History R-MAKER -1.02% -4.61% 6.92% 35.29% S&P: -0.64% -0.37% 8.54% 34.27% NASDAQ: -0.84% -0.87% 14.96% 52.51% Rule Maker Stocks Rec'd # Security In At Now Change 2/3/98 48 Microsoft 39.13 77.56 98.20% 6/23/98 34 Cisco Syst 58.41 113.25 93.89% 5/1/98 55 Gap Inc. 34.37 61.56 79.12% 2/13/98 44 Intel 42.34 57.00 34.63% 2/3/98 22 Pfizer 82.30 110.25 33.96% 2/17/99 16 Yahoo Inc. 126.31 151.31 19.80% 5/26/98 18 AmExpress 104.07 120.25 15.55% 2/6/98 56 T. Rowe Pr 33.67 37.50 11.36% 8/21/98 44 Schering-P 47.99 48.50 1.06% 2/27/98 27 Coca-Cola 69.11 68.00 -1.60% Foolish Four Stocks Rec'd # Security In At Value Change 3/12/98 20 Exxon 64.34 82.75 28.62% 3/12/98 20 Eastman Ko 63.15 73.00 15.60% 3/12/98 17 General Mo 72.41 83.31 15.06% 3/12/98 15 Chevron 83.34 93.44 12.11% Rule Maker Stocks Rec'd # Security In At Value Change 6/23/98 34 Cisco Syst 1985.95 3850.50 $1864.55 2/3/98 48 Microsoft 1878.45 3723.00 $1844.55 5/1/98 55 Gap Inc. 1890.33 3385.94 $1495.61 2/13/98 44 Intel 1862.83 2508.00 $645.17 2/3/98 22 Pfizer 1810.58 2425.50 $614.92 2/17/99 16 Yahoo Inc. 2020.95 2421.00 $400.05 5/26/98 18 AmExpress 1873.20 2164.50 $291.30 2/6/98 56 T. Rowe Pr 1885.70 2100.00 $214.30 8/21/98 44 Schering-P 2111.7 2134.00 $22.30 2/27/98 27 Coca-Cola 1865.89 1836.00 -$29.89 Foolish Four Stocks Rec'd # Security In At Value Change 3/12/98 20 Exxon 1286.70 1655.00 $368.30 3/12/98 20 Eastman Ko 1262.95 1460.00 $197.05 3/12/98 17 General Mo 1230.89 1416.31 $185.42 3/12/98 15 Chevron 1250.14 1401.56 $151.42 CASH $70.09 TOTAL $32551.40
Note: The Rule Maker Portfolio began with $20,000 on February 2, 1998, and
it adds $2,000 in cash (which is soon invested in stocks) every six months. | <urn:uuid:a4b8c7dc-46f2-446e-ba04-0259101aef9e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.fool.com/portfolios/rulemaker/1999/RuleMaker990521.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953519 | 2,400 | 1.59375 | 2 |
DNS doesn't exist!
HI-TECH AUTO REPAIR LLC's Maintenance Tips
How often should I have my engine oil/filter changed?
According to automotive experts, regularly scheduled oil/filter changes are the single most important item for prolonging engine life. Most new vehicles have recommended oil/filter change intervals of 7,500 miles and some new vehicles have recommended oil change intervals of 11,000 to 15,000 miles under normal operating conditions, with ""normal"" operation described as the operation of the vehicle for at least 20 minutes at a medium speed, with a steady throttle and in a clean driving environment.
Short hops to the store, stop-and-go rush hour driving, driving on dirt roads and inclement-weather operation are all considered severe operating conditions that can cause impurities to build up quickly in the oil, resulting in increased wear and tear on internal parts. That is why most owner's manuals and mechanics recommend changing the oil and filter every three months or 3,000 miles (whichever comes first) to assure that maximum engine lubrication occurs while a minimum of impurities are suspended in the oil. To find out what the recommended oil change frequency is for your vehicle, check your owner's manual or talk with your automotive service professional. | <urn:uuid:903c1ff3-e8a6-48b8-9359-da081a660f40> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.procarcarezone.com/topshop/web/web_template/questions/question3.asp?id=117845 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948294 | 259 | 1.820313 | 2 |
"I can't get over you being pregnant. I can't get over your having a baby."
Kelly Bottom says she thought her stomach was hurting, so she went to her bathroom. "I realized it was more than just pains. So then I laid on the floor and I had him. Two pushes and I had him."
He is Brian Sims, now five days old. "I knew I had to cut the umbilical cord and I was trying to clean myself up, and then he had to get out of school and I had to go get him."
He is James Sims, age seven, who says he nearly passed out when his mother came to pick him up with a newborn in her car.
Kelly says she knows some people won't understand how she didn't realize she was pregnant until it was time to deliver. "I lost a bunch of weight and I thought I was gaining all that back."
Or why she did the job herself. "I just done what I thought I should do. I didn't know." "Why didn't you call 911?" "I just wouldn't -- I guess I just wanted to do it by myself, I don't know. "
Mother and baby went to the hospital late that afternoon. She was still bleeding, and he needed an incubator and blood work. Five days later, both are fine.
And big brother James already has big plans. "How long do you think it'll be before you can play with him?" "About a week."
That would be a surprise. But so was Brian Keith Sims, to his father, who calls him a miracle, and his mother, who says she hadn't planned on another child. "But now he's here and I wouldn't take nothing else for him. Would I?"
An article by a childbirth expert about the dangers of not knowing you're pregnant suggests it's more common than you think. Robin Weiss says one in almost 2,500 women fit that profile, which makes them three times more common than women who give birth to triplets. | <urn:uuid:358cf02d-106f-4b8f-99ce-35d83d5374cd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wbko.com/news/headlines/87292307.html?storySection=story | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.997194 | 422 | 1.617188 | 2 |
There are a few questions that I had decided not to discuss on this blog because I think they are very simple and many of us know it. Many times, I even receive not-so positive notes from several readers when I am writing something simple. However, assuming that we know all and beginners should know everything is not the right attitude.
Since day 1, I have been keeping a small journal regarding questions that I receive in this blog. There are around 200+ questions I receive every day through emails, comments and occasional phone calls. Yesterday, I received a comment with the following question:
What are the differences between Left Join and Left Outer Join? Click here to read original comment.
This question has triggered the threshold of receiving the same question repeatedly. Here is the answer:
There is absolutely no difference between LEFT JOIN and LEFT OUTER JOIN. The same is true for RIGHT JOIN and RIGHT OUTER JOIN. When you use LEFT JOIN keyword in SQL Server, it means LEFT OUTER JOIN only.
I have already written in-depth visual diagram discussing the JOINs. I encourage all of you to read the article for further understanding of the JOINs:
Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) | <urn:uuid:04d2dd16-203f-4250-919b-f3a0ed2ca3fe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.sqlauthority.com/2011/01/22/sql-server-differences-between-left-join-and-left-outer-join/?like=1&source=post_flair&_wpnonce=7bb050e7a3 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956005 | 265 | 1.804688 | 2 |
Both of the reactor units at the Comanche Peak nuclear plant near Glen Rose are back to 100 percent output, according to a spokesman.
“Unit 1 resynchronized to the grid (Sunday) afternoon; Unit 2 returned to 100 percent from its down power (Sunday) afternoon as well,” said Ashley Barrie, corporate communications manager for Luminant Generation Co., which operates the Somervell County plant, just south of the Hood County line.
Unit 1 had been manually shut down since Nov. 2 for maintenance after high temperatures were detected in a reactor coolant pump motor bearing.
Power was temporarily reduced on Unit 2 because of a tube leak on an auxiliary condenser on the plant’s non-nuclear side.
The initial report on Unit 1 on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission website said it was a “non-emergency” incident, and that “all safety systems functioned as designed.”
Category: News Archived | <urn:uuid:b67c8744-2a43-4f55-a260-261bd5f02923> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://hcnews.com/pages/archive/news-archive/nuclear-plant-back-at-full-power/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954148 | 197 | 1.742188 | 2 |
This obituary is a sad story of a child who apparently came to spend the summer with her grandparents, when she took ill and very quickly died. Thankfully such deaths in this age of antibiotics and x-rays are much less common.
From the 23 August 1917 Fremont Times Indicator:
PASSES AWAY WHILE VISITING RELATIVES
Miss Edra M. Cooper of Columbus, Ind., Died Sunday Morning of Acute Tuberculosis
Miss Edra M. Cooper of Columbus, Ind., who came here eight weeks ago to visit relatives, passed away early Sunday morning at the home of her grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Aaron Baker, after a three days' illness of acute tuberculosis. Miss Cooper had been in delicate health for some time but her condition did not become serious until Thursday evening when she suffered a hemorrhage which was followed during the next two days by several others. She was nineteen years of age.
Miss Cooper was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Stanley J. Cooper of Columbus, and was born April 11, 1898 in Greentown, Ind. When five years of age her parents moved to Louisville where they made their home for one year. They then moved to Columbus and have since resided there. During the past fourteen years Miss Cooper has visited Fremont several times and had many friends here.
Mr. and Mrs. Cooper were sent for Friday the latter arriving here Saturday, the former Sunday evening. The body was taken to Columbus Monday evening accompanied by Mr. and Mrs. Cooper and Mrs. Ernest Rasey, a cousin of Miss Cooper. The funeral service will be held in Columbus this afternoon.
Such a sad story. Only 19. It is certainly sad the way a life could be snuffed out when there were no modern medicines. It makes you appreciate the opportunities we have today. | <urn:uuid:96aa09fd-55ec-4bb5-bf00-26b78da23ce2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://cemeterydivas.blogspot.com/2010/09/obituary-miss-edra-m-cooper.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.984068 | 375 | 1.679688 | 2 |
'New' name for Huangyan Island sparks fury
Updated: 2012-05-08 03:02
By Zhang Yunbi and Zhou Yan (China Daily)
Beijing slams Manila as oil rig launch in South China Sea looms
Beijing on Monday slammed Manila's attempt to "rename" Huangyan Island as China is set to launch its first deepwater oil rig in the South China Sea.
Manila declared on Thursday that it would "rename" Huangyan Island as Panatag Shoal, and is considering removing signs on the island related to China.
Manila also planned to involve other countries and organizations in the dispute by raising the issue before international tribunals.
The Foreign Ministry warned on Monday that Manila's actions targeting Huangyan Island are "illegal and invalid", and will not change the fact that the island belongs to China.
"We strongly urge the Philippines to return to diplomacy," and any remark or move that complicates or intensifies the situation is nonsensical, Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said at a news conference in Beijing.
Beijing's stance in resolving the situation through diplomacy is "unchanged," Hong added.
Huangyan Island has been an integral part of China's territory for centuries.
The Philippines did not challenge China's sovereignty over the island until 1997.
Manila's latest actions over Huangyan Island have incited a nationalist fervor among the Philippine public, Yang Baoyun, a professor of Southeast Asian studies at Peking University warned.
A Philippine warship entered the island's territorial waters on April 10, and dispatched personnel to harass Chinese fishing boats and attempted to detain Chinese fishermen.
The move infringed sovereignty. Two Chinese patrol ships in the area came to the fishermen's rescue, and the warship left.
But the impasse continues as Philippine vessels were reported still to be in China's territorial waters on Monday.
In-depth oil drills
Meanwhile, China's first home-made deepwater rig will formally start operations on Wednesday in the South China Sea.
The move is widely expected to pave the way for mutually beneficial cooperation with neighboring countries.
China National Offshore Oil Corp, owner and operator of the platform, said on Monday that deep-sea equipment, capable of operating at depths of 3,000 meters, will drill the first well 320 kilometers southeast of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.
It demonstrates China's technological capacity to explore and develop oil and gas resources in the South China Sea, said Zhou Shouwei, an academic at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Tian Ling, a member of the French National Council for Diversity, agreed that Hollande will seek to foster smooth trade and investment relations with China.
"He is unlikely to clash with China on ideological issues but rather he will be pragmatic as he is a smart politician. However, it will take time for Hollande and his team to get to know more about China and Chinese policymakers, so there is still a question mark around his policies," Tian said.
Hollande did not fully elaborate his policies during the campaign, Zhang Jinling, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said.
Former Chinese ambassador to France Cai Fangbo told Chinese media that the partnership between the two countries would continue moving forward, but the Taiwan and Tibet questions remained red lines for China.
Sarkozy was the first French president since Valery Giscard d'Estaing in 1981 not to be re-elected and the 11th eurozone leader to be ousted from office since the beginning of the sovereign debt crisis.
US President Barack Obama on Sunday congratulated Hollande.
European leaders also scrambled to congratulate Hollande. German Chancellor Angela Merkel extended an invitation to him in a phone call on Sunday night to visit Berlin.
Contact the writers at firstname.lastname@example.org, email@example.com and firstname.lastname@example.org
AFP and Tan Xuan in Brussels contributed to this story. | <urn:uuid:d0f5ed94-fcc9-45f9-a341-138f172ec60a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2012-05/08/content_15230342.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945619 | 817 | 1.59375 | 2 |
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Breaking! E-books at last recognize stanzas and line breaks
Publishers Weekly reports on an amazing new development in e-book formatting: actual line breaks and properly delineated stanzas. BookMobile has already been providing production and distribution for small and academic presses for years—the ones most likely to not only publish poetry in general, but the most challenging poetry with the most difficult layouts. So it’s fitting that they would work out a way to transfer their design sensitivity and expertise to the cold, uniform, gray boxes wreaking havoc on poets’ intentions line by line.
BookMobile CEO Don Leeper told PW that the company has been looking for ways in which customers who are poetry publishers can take full advantage of the e-book revolution without losing the integrity of their book design. “It’s frustrating that e-books don’t support books where the design is an integral part of the text,” Leeper said, recalling that last year, Coffee House Press wanted to produce 2010 National Book Award finalist Karen Tei Yamashita’s I Hotel in an e-book format. “We struggled,” Leeper explained, “It was an absurd task to make it into an e-book because of the book design. I Hotel has poetry, notations, and there are a lot of special layouts.” In the end, Coffee House and BookMobile gave up on that project.
BookMobile’s new application, Ampersand, creates PDFs from the published books themselves and will “enable e-readers and other electronic devices to display poetry without inappropriate line breaks and arbitrary indents.” Now if only they could do the same thing for digital poetry as a whole, perhaps we could do away with arbitrary ads. | <urn:uuid:4f02822c-a406-4f03-a2d2-b97b1adaa386> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2011/02/breaking-e-books-at-last-recognize-stanzas-and-line-breaks/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941044 | 377 | 1.570313 | 2 |
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THE GRAND IMPERATIVE
ABOLISH EMPIRE & ESTABLISH EARTH COMMUNITY
Zevin x. cruz
(A Participant of Occupy Cortland & Occupy Ithaca, NY)
A PERSONAL PROPOSAL FOR THE ONE GLOBAL DEMAND
THE GRAND IMPERATIVE
A SPECTRE is spooking the global economy—the Specter of a Second Great Depression. Or is it a “Greater Depression?” Perhaps hyperinflation is on the horizon or worse yet, a combination of both—the return of stagflation from the stifling seventies? Could this be the crumbling of capitalism as foretold by Karl Marx? Or is this much more monumental in scope—the collapse of complex industrial societies in Western Civilization due to transgressing earth’s dynamic equilibrium as a result of our ecological exploitation? Has Mother Nature reached a tipping point due to our unsustainable cultural, economic, political and social system predicated on the maladaptive paradigm of infinite growth through corporate globalization? And if so, is this the final fate of our over-reliance on fossil fuels as peak oil crashes the economy? Or has this financial fiasco been allowed to occur to clandestinely curb our consumption of energy? After all, people who are out of work don’t go on vacations, don’t fly, don’t commute long distances to a job they no longer have. Worst yet, was it an orchestrated crash in a controlled demolition manner in order to mitigate the perilous consequences of climate change and the dramatic declines of global oil production through “demand destruction?” All the while the global financial elites profit from the aftermath in what has become known as “disaster capitalism,” as described by Naomi Klein’s landmark book—The Shock Doctrine. Is this predatory capitalism’s last gasp for survival? If so, this global cadre of corporatists will not go down without a fight because those in power will do anything to remain in power.
We, as Human Beings, regardless of race, gender, ethnicity, religion, sexual preferences or orientation—all comprise this one living organism we call planet Earth. As such, our single overriding purpose, for the sake of all life on this planet, now and in the future, is best expressed as a Grand Imperative—“ABOLISH EMPIRE AND ESTABLISH EARTH COMMUNITY!” This is our ultimate goal—THE ONE GLOBAL DEMAND. It succinctly synthesizes what we are against and what we are for in one short, uncomplicated yet all-encompassing sentence. “Look still further upstream beyond Wall Street—even beyond the money-is-wealth illusion—and we find the yet bigger picture—a five-thousand-year history of rule and expropriation by rulers intent on securing their privilege and pampering their egos by any means,” this according to David C. Korten in his book AGENDA FOR A NEW ECONOMY: From Phantom Wealth To Real Wealth. He elaborates: “In an earlier time, rulers were kings and emperors. Now they are corporate CEOs and hedge fund managers. Wall Street is Empire’s most recent stage, and hopefully the last in this tragic drama. Five thousand years is enough. This is an epic moment. We now have the imperative and the means as a nation and a species to end the era of Empire and liberate ourselves from a needless tragedy.”1
In the grand narrative of human history, October 15, 2011, will mark the millennial moment of epic convergence as the “Occupy Wall Street” movement that began on September 17, by 2,000 people and 150 youths camped out at “Liberty Plaza,” officially went global as 1,500 cities in over 82 countries from around the world continued to expand a cultural and spiritual awakening indicative of the outrage approaching a tipping point. According to the United For #Global Change, “people from all over the world will take to the streets and squares. From America to Asia, from Africa to Europe, people are rising up to claim their rights and demand a true democracy. Now it is time for all of us to join in a global nonviolent protest. The ruling powers work for the benefit of just a few, ignoring the will of the vast majority and the human and environmental price we all have to pay. This intolerable situation must end. United in one voice, we will let politicians, and the financial elites they serve, know it is up to us, the people, to decide our future. We are not goods in the hands of politicians and bankers who do not represent us. On October 15th, we will meet on the streets to initiate the global change we want. We will peacefully demonstrate, talk and organize until we make it happen. It’s time for us to unite. It’s time for them to listen. People of the world, rise up….” 2
THE FIRST ORDER
On October 15, 2011 the global power elites took notice. However, to date, the Occupy Movement has retreated from Adbusters’ initial rallying call to come up with one simple demand. A lot of legitimate reasons for this were given but basically it comes down to one: it has become increasingly clear that every aspect of the system is problematic and that all the problems are interrelated; therefore, no single demand, (it is mistakenly thought) could encapsulate the enormity of the crisis at hand. But as I have suggested on behalf of the 99% within S3K, it is possible. We understood that the first order of business was to identify the true source of our social problems so that our future demands, plans, goals, objectives and tactics are to be strategically directed at the appropriate targets that yield the maximum impact with the greatest number of people. This was how The Grand Imperative—ABOLISH EMPIRE & ESTABLISH EARTH COMMUNITY—was developed as the suggested one global demand for the October 15 worldwide occupations. It accurately aims at the root cause of our current condition, rather than proposing symptoms-oriented-solutions. “The source of most of the economic, social, and environmental pathologies of our time—including sexism, racism, economic injustice, violence, and environmental destruction—originate upstream in institutions that grant unaccountable power and privilege to the few and assign the majority to lives of hardship and desperation,” this according to David C. Korten’s book, The Great Turning: From Empire To Earth Community. The origins of such pathological pursuits of money and power is the CULTURE of Empire, in other words, the dominant society’s mode of thought and way of life, which consist of the worldview, values and lifestyle of western industrial civilization predicated on infinite economic growth, monopoly capitalism, extreme competition, excessive individualism, survival of the fittest, materialism, exploitation, hierarchy, violence, and the imperial pursuits of domination by the power elite and wealthy ruling class through global financial institutions like the WTO, IMF and World Bank led by the Bilderberg Group, Trilateral Commission, Council On Foreign Relations and the Federal Reserve. They accomplish this through financial weapons of mass destruction, enslaving nations and individuals with debt by utilizing central banking, fiat currency, fractional reserve financing and compound interest within the monetary-market system. Although elite factions might engage in ruthless competition with one another, they generally aligned in common cause to secure the continuity of the institutions of their collective privilege, often using intermarriage as a mechanism of alliance building. If many of the patterns associated with ancient kings, pharaohs, and emperors seem strangely familiar to our own time of the democratic ideal, it is because…the dominator cultures and institutions of Empire simply morphed into new forms in the face of the democratic challenge—[today in the form of] a “constitutional plutocracy with an agenda of imperial expansion.” 3
According to John Perkins, The Secret History of American Empire, the United States exhibits all the characteristics of Empire, which he defines as a “nation-state that dominates other nation-states and exhibits one or more the following seven traits:
- Consumes large quantities of resources; amounts that are disproportionate for the size of its population relative to those of other nations. (The United States represents less than 5% of the global population yet it consumes more than 25% of the world’s resources.)
- Exploits resources from the lands it dominates. (The United States is able to consume disproportionally more resources to a large degree through the exploitation of the developing world by way of “Free-Trade” agreements, outsourcing jobs to third world countries for cheap labor and global financial institutions like the WTO, IMF and the World Bank.)
- Maintains a large military that enforces its policies when more subtle measures fail. (The United States maintains the largest and the most sophisticated military in the world. Although this empire has primarily been built through financial means (like the use of Economic Hit Men), world leaders understand that whenever other measures fail the military will step in as it did in Iraq.)
- Spreads its language, literature, art and various aspects of its culture throughout its sphere of influence. (The English language and American culture dominate the world.)
- Taxes not just its own citizens but also people in other countries. (Although the United States does not tax countries directly, the Corporatocracy does impose a subtle indirect global tax due to inflation and the dollar as the standard currency for global commerce.)
- Imposes its own currency on the lands under its control. (Although the US dollar has not replaced other monies in local markets it is the world reserve currency. Initially through the gold standard after World War II then as the petro-dollar on August 15, 1971, when the Nixon Administration dropped the gold standard altogether due the French demand to redeem their dollars for gold. Washington scrambled to convince the world to continue accepting the dollar as standard currency. Under the Saudi Arabian Money Laundering Affair (SAMA), which John Perkins help engineered in the early 1970s, the royal House of Saud committed to selling oil for U.S. dollars. Because the Saudis controlled the petroleum market the rest of the Organization of Petroleum Export Countries (OPEC) was forced to comply. As long as oil reigned as the supreme resource the dollar’s domination as the world reserve currency was assured and the indirect tax would ensue.)
- Ruled by an emperor or king, who has control over the government, the media and is not elected by the people, is not subject to their will and whose term is not limited by law. (The appearance that we live in a democracy is illusionary. The U.S. is ruled by a group of people who collectively act very much like a king. They run our very large corporations and through them our government. They cycle through the revolving door, back and forth between business and government. Because they fund political campaigns and the media, they control elected officials and the information we receive. These men and women, the Corporatocracy [corporate consolidation of power and wealth], are in charge regardless of whether Republicans or Democrats control the White House or Congress. They are not subject to the people’s will and their terms are not limited by law.)
This modern empire has been built surreptitiously, most of its own citizens are not aware of its own existence, however, those exploited by it are and many suffer from extreme poverty. On average twenty-four thousand people die of hunger and hunger-related diseases every day. More than half the planet’s population lives on less than two dollars a day—often not enough to provide the basic amenities, and about the same in real terms as they received thirty years ago. For us to live comfortable lives, millions must pay a very high price. While we have become aware of the environmental damage engendered by our consumptive lifestyles, the majority of us are either oblivious to or in denial of the costs in human suffering. Our children, however, will have no choice but to take responsibility for the imbalances we have created.
In the process of building this empire, we in the United States have managed to discard our most fundamental beliefs, those that in the past defined the very essence of what it is to be an American. We have denied ourselves and those we colonize the rights so eloquently expressed by our Declaration of Independence. We have forfeited the principles of universal equality, justice, and prosperity.
History teaches that empires do not endure; they collapse or are overthrown. Wars ensue and another empire fills the vacuum. The past sends a compelling message. We must change. We cannot afford to allow history to repeat itself. The power base of the corporatocracy is its corporations. They define our world. When we look at a globe we see the outlines of slightly less than two hundred countries. Many of the boundaries were established by colonial powers and most of these countries have minimal impact on their neighbors. From a geopolitical viewpoint this model is archaic; the reality of our modern world might better be represented by huge clouds that encircle the planet, each symbolizing a multinational corporation. These powerful entities impact every single country. Their tentacles reach into the deepest rainforests and to the most remote deserts.
The corporatocracy makes a show of promoting democracy and transparency among the nations of the world, yet its corporations are imperialistic dictatorships where a very few make all the decisions and reap most of the profits. In our electoral process—the very heart of our democracy—most of us get to vote only for candidates whose campaign chests are full; therefore, we must select from among those who are beholden to the corporations and the men who own them. Contrary to our ideals, this empire is built on foundations of greed, secrecy, and excessive materialism.
All of this comprise the stratified social system of oppression that we live under as wage slaves indentured to debt but disguised as the free-market, while falsely believing we live in a democracy when our politicians are bought and sold to the highest bidder in the legalize system of bribery, otherwise known as lobbying.
Where does that leave us?
THE EARTH CHARTER
The predominant purpose for all the people throughout the planet is to abolish Empire and establish Earth Community. Once again, Korten describes Empire as “the destructive and oppressive nature of the global corporate economy,” which is “merely one manifestation of […] ‘Empire’: the organization of society through hierarchy and violence that has largely held sway for the past 5,000.” Korten elaborates on this concept of Empire and offers an alternative option of Earth Community:
Empire organizes by domination at all levels, from relations among nations to relations among family members. Empire brings fortune to the few, condemns the majority to misery and servitude, suppresses the creative potential of all, and appropriates much of the wealth of human societies to maintain the institutions of domination.
Earth Community, by contrast, organizes by partnership, unleashes the human potential for creative cooperation, and shares resources and surpluses for the good of all. Supporting evidence for the possibilities of Earth Community comes from the findings of quantum physics, evolutionary biology, developmental psychology, anthropology, archaeology, and religious mysticism. It was the human way before Empire; we must make a choice to re-learn how to live by its principles.
Developments distinctive to our time are telling us that Empire has reached the limits of the exploitation that people and Earth will sustain. A mounting perfect economic storm born of a convergence of peak oil, climate change, and an imbalanced U.S.economy dependent on debts it can never repay is poised to bring a dramatic restructuring of every aspect of modern life. We have the power to choose, however, whether the consequences play out as a terminal crisis or an epic opportunity. The Great Turning is not a prophecy. It is a possibility.4
Over the past 50 years, since the start of the sixties, there has been a cultural and spiritual awakening occurring that is now beginning to approach a critical mass, which is needed before any profound economic and political redesign of our global system could occur. This happens when a change of consciousness—a profound paradigm shift—occurs that leads to comprehensive cultural change that prepares to institute Earth Community which is: “a life-centered, egalitarian, sustainable way of ordering society based on democratic principles of partnership” through the equitable distribution of economic power—a democratic economy—that is an essential foundation of political democracy. This simple phrase: “Abolish Empire and Establish Earth Community” should be clearly understood and ingrained in each and every one us as our absolute endgame. And no other document epitomizes the values of Earth Community than the Earth Charter. “Often referred to as a people’s Declaration of Interdependence, The Earth Charter elaborates four overarching principles of Earth Community: 1) respect and care for the community of life; 2) ecological integrity; 3) social and economic justice; and 4) democracy, nonviolence, and peace,” this according to Korten. “It is also a declaration of universal responsibility to and for one another and the living Earth.” 5
On Sunday, May 8, 2011, during the “May 1st” week of International Workers Day, The Neo-Transcendentalists for The Society of the Third Millennium (S3K) signifying both the name of the art collective and the cohesive vision, presented the unveiling of an outdoor, site-specific, guerrilla art project called “THE MONOLITHIC MILESTONES, 2010-2011: A Declaration Of Interdependence Through The Integral Vision, Grand Unified Strategy & Philosophical Pillars Of Neo-Transcendentalism At The Georgia Guidestones.” It was unfurled as the peoples’ response to any purported agenda put forth by the Neo-Fascists Corporatism of the global power elites. These “Transformative Tenets of Integral Activism” that was written in white paint on the black fabrics of each individual side of the granite pillars of America’s most mysterious monument in northeast rural Georgia, represents a succinct synthesis of some of the most important Cultural Creatives’ ideas to date. From the works of Ken Wilber’s “Theory of Everything” encompassed by his “Integral Operating System (IOS)/AQAL model” (represented on the granite covered center cap as “I,” “WE,” “IT,” “ITS,”) to going as far back to the 1830’s with the start of the American Renaissance by the original Transcendentalists. The following is just one of the philosophical pillars of Neo-Transcendentalism that serves as our common and unifying grand imperative of what we are fighting for as expressed by the Earth Charter.
THE DECLARATION OF
THE EARTH CHARTER AS ONE OF THE TEN PHILOSOPHICAL PILLARS OF NEO-TRANSCENDENTALISM
Guerrilla Art Installation By Zoren X. Cross And The Society Of The Third Millennium (S3K) (Photo Courtesy Of Asym Brahms)
THE MONOLITHIC MILESTONES PROJECT, 2010-11
(Site-Specific Guerrilla Art Installation, Integral Art of Neo-Transcendentalism, Elberton, Georgia)
ELBERTON, GA—“An organization known as ‘The Neo-Transcendentalists For the Society of the Third Millennium (S3K)’ sent an email to The Elberton Star [news], claiming credit for this ‘artwork,’ at the Georgia Guidestones. Elbert County Sheriff Barry Haston said there is a complete video of the group that performed the ‘renovation’ at the site in the pre-dawn hours on May 8. The Elberton Star received the email claiming credit for the project. To see the organization’s web-site, go to www.S3K.org [...].” 6
We stand at a critical moment in Earth’s history, a time when humanity must choose its future. As the world becomes increasingly interdependent and fragile, the future at once holds great peril and great promise. To move forward we must recognize that in the midst of a magnificent diversity of cultures and life forms we are one human family and one Earth community with a common destiny. We must join together to bring forth a sustainable global society founded on respect for nature, universal human rights, economic justice, and a culture of peace. Towards this end, it is imperative that we, the peoples of Earth, declare our responsibility to one another, to the greater community of life, and to future generations.
Earth, Our Home
Humanity is part of a vast evolving universe. Earth, our home, is alive with a unique community of life. The forces of nature make existence a demanding and uncertain adventure, but Earth has provided the conditions essential to life’s evolution. The resilience of the community of life and the well-being of humanity depend upon preserving a healthy biosphere with all its ecological systems, a rich variety of plants and animals, fertile soils, pure waters, and clean air. The global environment with its finite resources is a common concern of all peoples. The protection of Earth’s vitality, diversity, and beauty is a sacred trust.
The Global Situation
The dominant patterns of production and consumption are causing environmental devastation, the depletion of resources, and a massive extinction of species. Communities are being undermined. The benefits of development are not shared equitably and the gap between rich and poor is widening. Injustice, poverty, ignorance, and violent conflict are widespread and the cause of great suffering. An unprecedented rise in human population has overburdened ecological and social systems. The foundations of global security are threatened. These trends are perilous—but not inevitable.
The Challenges Ahead
The choice is ours: form a global partnership to care for Earth and one another or risk the destruction of ourselves and the diversity of life. Fundamental changes are needed in our values, institutions, and ways of living. We must realize that when basic needs have been met, human development is primarily about being more, not having more. We have the knowledge and technology to provide for all and to reduce our impacts on the environment. The emergence of a global civil society is creating new opportunities to build a democratic and humane world. Our environmental, economic, political, social, and spiritual challenges are interconnected, and together we can forge inclusive solutions.
To realize these aspirations, we must decide to live with a sense of universal responsibility, identifying ourselves with the whole Earth community as well as our local communities. We are at once citizens of different nations and of one world in which the local and global are linked. Everyone shares responsibility for the present and future well-being of the human family and the larger living world. The spirit of human solidarity and kinship with all life is strengthened when we live with reverence for the mystery of being, gratitude for the gift of life, and humility regarding the human place in nature.
We urgently need a shared vision of basic values to provide an ethical foundation for the emerging world community. Therefore, together in hope we affirm the following interdependent principles for a sustainable way of life as a common standard by which the conduct of all individuals, organizations, businesses, governments, and transnational institutions is to be guided and assessed.
RESPECT AND CARE FOR THE COMMUNITY OF LIFE
1. Respect Earth and life in all its diversity.
a. Recognize that all beings are interdependent and every form of life has value regardless of its worth to human beings.
b. Affirm faith in the inherent dignity of all human beings and in the intellectual, artistic, ethical, and spiritual potential of humanity.
2. Care for the community of life with understanding, compassion, and love.
a. Accept that with the right to own, manage, and use natural resources comes the duty to prevent environmental harm and to protect the rights of people.
b. Affirm that with increased freedom, knowledge, and power comes increased responsibility to promote the common good.
3. Build democratic societies that are just, participatory, sustainable, and
a. Ensure that communities at all levels guarantee human rights and fundamental freedoms and provide everyone an opportunity to realize his or her full potential.
b. Promote social and economic justice, enabling all to achieve a secure and meaningful livelihood that is ecologically responsible.
4. Secure Earth’s bounty and beauty for present and future generations.
a. Recognize that the freedom of action of each generation is qualified by the needs of future generations.
b. Transmit to future generations’ values, traditions, and institutions that support the long-term flourishing of Earth’s human and ecological communities. In order to fulfill these four broad commitments, it is necessary to:
5. Protect and restore the integrity of Earth’s ecological systems, with special concern for biological diversity and the natural processes that sustain life.
a. Adopt at all levels sustainable development plans and regulations that make environmental conservation and rehabilitation integral to all development initiatives.
b. Establish and safeguard viable nature and biosphere reserves, including wild lands and marine areas, to protect Earth’s life support systems, maintain biodiversity, and preserve our natural heritage.
c. Promote the recovery of endangered species and ecosystems.
d. Control and eradicate non-native or genetically modified organisms harmful to native species and the environment, and prevent introduction of such harmful organisms.
e. Manage the use of renewable resources such as water, soil, forest products, and marine life in ways that do not exceed rates of regeneration and that protect the health of ecosystems.
f. Manage the extraction and use of non-renewable resources such as minerals and fossil fuels in ways that minimize depletion and cause no serious environmental damage.
6. Prevent harm as the best method of environmental protection and, when knowledge is limited, apply a precautionary approach.
a. Take action to avoid the possibility of serious or irreversible environmental harm even when scientific knowledge is incomplete or inconclusive.
b. Place the burden of proof on those who argue that a proposed activity will not cause significant harm, and make the responsible parties liable for environmental harm.
c. Ensure that decision making addresses the cumulative, long-term, indirect, long distance, and global consequences of human activities.
d. Prevent pollution of any part of the environment and allow no build-up of radioactive, toxic, or other hazardous substances.
e. Avoid military activities damaging to the environment.
7. Adopt patterns of production, consumption, & reproduction that safeguards Earth’s regenerative capacities, human rights, and community well-being.
a. Reduce, reuse, and recycle the materials used in production and consumption systems, and ensure that residual waste can be assimilated by ecological systems.
b. Act with restraint and efficiency when using energy, and rely increasingly on renewable energy sources such as solar and wind.
c. Promote the development, adoption, and equitable transfer of environmentally sound technologies.
d. Internalize the full environmental and social costs of goods and services in the selling price, and enable consumers to identify products that meet the highest social and environmental standards.
e. Ensure universal access to health care that fosters reproductive health and responsible reproduction.
f. Adopt lifestyles that emphasize the quality of life and material sufficiency in a finite world.
8. Advance the study of ecological sustainability and promote the open exchange and wide application of the knowledge acquired.
a. Support international scientific and technical cooperation on sustainability, with special attention to the needs of developing nations.
b. Recognize and preserve the traditional knowledge and spiritual wisdom in all cul- tures that contribute to environmental protection and human well-being.
c. Ensure that information of vital importance to human health and environmental pro- tection, including genetic information, remains available in the public domain.
SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC JUSTICE
9. Eradicate poverty as an ethical, social, and environmental imperative.
a. Guarantee the right to potable water, clean air, food security, uncontaminated soil,
shelter, and safe sanitation, allocating the national and international resources required.
b. Empower every human being with the education and resources to secure a sustainable
livelihood, and provide social security and safety nets for those who are unable to support themselves.
c. Recognize the ignored, protect the vulnerable, serve those who suffer, and enable them to develop their capacities and to pursue their aspirations.
10. Ensure that economic activities and institutions at all levels promote human development in an equitable and sustainable manner.
a. Promote the equitable distribution of wealth within nations and among nations.
b. Enhance the intellectual, financial, technical, and social resources of developing na- tions, and relieve them of onerous international debt.
c. Ensure that all trade supports sustainable resource use, environmental protection, and progressive labor standards.
d. Require multinational corporations and international financial organizations to act transparently in the public good, and hold them accountable for the consequences of their activities.
11. Affirm gender equality & equity as prerequisites to sustainable development and ensure universal access to education, health care, & economic opportunity.
a. Secure the human rights of women and girls and end all violence against them.
b. Promote the active participation of women in all aspects of economic, political, civil, social, and cultural life as full and equal partners, decision makers, leaders, and bene-
c. Strengthen families and ensure the safety and loving nurture of all family members.
12. Uphold the right of all, without discrimination, to a natural and social environment supportive of human dignity, bodily health, and spiritual well-being, with special attention to the rights of indigenous peoples and minorities.
a. Eliminate discrimination in all its forms, such as that based on race, color, sex, sexual
orientation, religion, language, and national, ethnic or social origin.
b. Affirm the right of indigenous peoples to their spirituality, knowledge, lands and re-
sources and to their related practice of sustainable livelihoods.
c. Honor and support the young people of our communities, enabling them to fulfill
their essential role in creating sustainable societies.
d. Protect and restore outstanding places of cultural and spiritual significance.
DEMOCRACY, NONVIOLENCE, AND PEACE
13. Strengthen democratic institutions at all levels, and provide transparency and accountability in governance, inclusive participation in decision making, and access to justice.
a. Uphold the right of everyone to receive clear and timely information on environmental matters and all development plans and activities which are likely to affect them or in which they have an interest.
b. Support local, regional and global civil society, and promote the meaningful participation of all interested individuals and organizations in decision making.
c. Protect the rights to freedom of opinion, expression, peaceful assembly, association, and dissent.
d. Institute effective and efficient access to administrative and independent judicial procedures, including remedies and redress for environmental harm and the threat of such harm.
e. Eliminate corruption in all public and private institutions.
f. Strengthen local communities, enabling them to care for their environments, and assign environmental responsibilities to the levels of government where they can be carried out most effectively.
14. Integrate into formal education and life-long learning the knowledge, values, and skills needed for a sustainable way of life.
a. Provide all, especially children and youth, with educational opportunities that em-
power them to contribute actively to sustainable development.
b. Promote the contribution of the arts and humanities as well as the sciences in sustainability education.
c. Enhance the role of the mass media in raising awareness of ecological and social challenges.
d. Recognize the importance of moral and spiritual education for sustainable living.
15. Treat all living beings with respect and consideration.
a. Prevent cruelty to animals kept in human societies and protect them from suffering.
b. Protect wild animals from methods of hunting, trapping, and fishing that cause ex- treme, prolonged, or avoidable suffering.
c. Avoid or eliminate to the full extent possible the taking or destruction of non-target- ed species.
16. Promote a culture of tolerance, nonviolence, and peace.
a. Encourage and support mutual understanding, solidarity, and cooperation among all
peoples and within all nations.
b. Implement comprehensive strategies to prevent violent conflict and use collaborative
problem solving to manage and resolve environmental conflicts and other disputes.
c. Demilitarize national security systems to the level of a non-provocative defense pos-
ture, and convert military resources to peaceful purposes, including ecological restora-
d. Eliminate nuclear, biological, and toxic weapons and other weapons of mass destruc-
e. Ensure that the use of orbital and outer space supports environmental protection and
f. Recognize that peace is the wholeness created by right relationships with oneself, oth-
er persons, other cultures, other life, Earth, and the larger whole of which all are a
THE WAY FORWARD
As never before in history, common destiny beckons us to seek a new beginning. Such renewal is the promise of these Earth Charter principles. To fulfill this promise, we must commit ourselves to adopt and promote the values and objectives of the Charter.
This requires a change of mind and heart. It requires a new sense of global interdependence and universal responsibility. We must imaginatively develop and apply the vision of a sustainable way of life locally, nationally, regionally, and globally. Our cultural diversity is a precious heritage and different cultures will find their own distinctive ways to realize the vision. We must deepen and expand the global dialogue that generated the Earth Charter, for we have much to learn from the ongoing collaborative search for truth and wisdom.
Life often involves tensions between important values. This can mean difficult choices. However, we must find ways to harmonize diversity with unity, the exercise of freedom with the common good, short-term objectives with long-term goals. Every individual, family, organization, and community has a vital role to play. The arts, sciences, religions, educational institutions, media, businesses, nongovernmental organizations, and governments are all called to offer creative leadership. The partnership of government, civil society, and business is essential for effective governance.
In order to build a sustainable global community, the nations of the world must renew their commitment to the United Nations, fulfill their obligations under existing international agreements, and support the implementation of Earth Charter principles with an international legally binding instrument on environment and development.
Let ours be a time remembered for the awakening of a new reverence for life, the firm resolve to achieve sustainability, the quickening of the struggle for justice and peace, and the joyful celebration of life.7
THE GRAND NARRATIVE
For some, the Great Depression of the 1930s marked the start of this long and gradual demise of the monetary-market system. Its downward spiral then can be perceived today as an inevitable collapse of “capitalism” that has been occurring over a period of several decades while going through its cycles of booms and busts. Others go centuries back, espousing that the fatal fate of “phantom wealth creation” began with the early years of our country’s founding when Thomas Jefferson admonished “I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country […]. I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a moneyed aristocracy that has set the government at defiance. The issuing power (of money) should be taken away from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs.” 8 Today, as a collective people, we are witnessing our failure to heed Jefferson’s words of warning. However, as discussed before, this struggle spans 5,000 years, this according to David Kortens’ book AGENDA FOR A NEW ECONOMY: From Phantom Wealth To Real Wealth. “Here is the larger story of what is at stake.”
By the accounts of imperial historians, civilization, history, and human progress began with the consolidation of dominator power in the first great empires. Much is made of their glorious accomplishments and heroic battles as imperial civilizations rose and fell.
Rather less is said about the brutalization of the slaves who built the great monuments, the racism, the suppression of women, the conversion of free farmers into serfs or landless laborers, the carnage of the battles, the hopes and lives destroyed by wave after wave of invasion, the pillage and gratuitous devastation of the vanquished, and the lost creative potential.
In The Beginning
According to the cultural historian Riane Eisler, “One of the best-kept historical secrets is that practically all the material and social technologies fundamental to civilization were developed before the imposition of a dominator society.”(2) By her account, early humans evolved within a cultural and institutional frame that nurtured a deep sense of connection to one another and to Earth. They chose to cooperate with life rather than to dominate it.
The domestication of plants and animals, food production and storage, building construction, and clothing production were all discoveries and inventions of what Eisler characterizes as the great partnership societies. These societies also developed the institutions of law, government, and religion that were the foundations of complex social organizations. They cultivated the arts of dance, pottery, basket making, textile weaving, leather crafting, metallurgy, ritual drama, architecture, town planning, boat building, highway construction, and oral literature.(3) Indeed, without these accomplishments, the projection and consolidation of imperial power would not have been possible.
The Dynamics of Power
Then, some five thousand years ago, our ancestors in Mesopotamia, the land we now call Iraq, made a tragic turn from partnership to the dominator relationships of Empire. They turned away from a reverence for the generative power of life, represented by female gods or nature spirits, to a reverence for hierarchy and the power of the sword, represented by distant, usually male, gods. The wisdom of the elder and the priestess gave way to the arbitrary rule of powerful, often ruthless, kings. Societies became divided between rulers and ruled, exploiters and exploited.
Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Rome were three of history’s most celebrated empires. Each had its moments of greatness, but an enormous cost in lives, natural wealth, and human possibility, as vain and violent rulers played out the drama of Empire’s inexorable play-or-die, rule-or-be-ruled, kill-or-be-killed competition for power. The underlying dynamic favored the ascendance to power of the most ruthless, brutal, and mentally deranged.
Rule by Psychopaths
Social pathology became the norm as the god of death displaced the goddess of life and as the power of the sword triumphed over the power of the chalice. The creative energy of the species was redirected from building the generative power of the whole to advancing the technological instruments of war and the social instrument of domination. Resources were expropriated on a vast scale to maintain the military forces, prisons, palaces, temples, and patronage for retainers and propagandists on which imperial rule demands.
Great civilizations were built and then swept away in successive waves of violence and destruction. Once-great powers, weakened by corruption and an excess of hubris, fell to rival rulers, and the jealous winners sought to erase even the memory of those they vanquished. The sacred became the servant of the profane. Fertile lands were converted to desert by intention or rapacious neglect. Rule by terror fueled resentments that assured repeating cycles of violent retribution. War, trade, and debt served as weapons of the few to expropriate the means of livelihood of the many and reduce them to slavery or serfdom.
The resulting power imbalances fueled the delusional hubris and debaucheries of psychopathic rulers who fancied themselves possessed of divine privilege and otherworldly power. Attention turned from realizing the possibilities of life in this world to securing a privilege place in the afterlife.
Ruling elites maintained cultural control through the institutions of religion, economic control through the institutional of trade and credit, and political control through the institutions of rule making and organized military force […].
A NEW NATION IS BORN
More than two millennia passed between the end of the early democratic experiment of ancient Athens in 338 BCE and the beginning of the West’s next democratic experiment, marked by the signing of the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America in 1776.
An Inauspicious Beginning
The realities of life in the English colonies on the Atlantic coast of what was to become the United States of America were not auspicious for democracy. The earliest settlements were operated as privately owned company estates ruled by overseers accountable to British investors. Many of the subsequent settlements were organized as parishes ruled as theocracies by preachers who believed democracy to be contrary to will of God. The colonial economies depended on slaves and bonded labor, and the family structure placed women in a condition of indentured servitude. The lands the colonies occupied were acquired by the genocidal elimination of Native Americans, and the social structures embodied deep racial and class divisions.
The diversity of circumstances, interests, races, values, religious beliefs, and national origins of the people who made up the new nation speaks to the ambitious nature of the attempt to unite the original thirteen colonies into a great experiment in democracy. Precious little beyond a shared antipathy to British taxes and corporate monopolies bound the people together. They were accustomed to arbitrary rulers at liberty to abuse, or even kill, others with impunity. Most had no particular reason to consider the law as anything other than a means by which the few exploited the many.
When the People Lead, the Leaders Follow
It is axiomatic that democracy cannot be imposed from above or abroad. True democracy is born only through its practice.
It is a remarkable fact that the American Revolution did not start as an armed rebellion. It originated in a process that looked rather more like a raucous social movement. For all their diversity and lack of experience with organized self-rule, the grassroots rebels who initiated and led the revolution in its earliest manifestations demonstrated a capacity to express the popular will through self-organizing groups and networks—one of democracy’s most meaningful and effective forms of expression.
When the British changed the rules of engagement from nonviolence to violence, the rebels felt compelled to respond in kind.
As the violence escalated, it created a situation that both allowed and compelled the elites of the Continental Congress to assert their authority by raising an army that assumed control of the rebellion and restored imperial order under a new command.
Once independence was won, the colonial elites who had inserted themselves to take control of what was a self-organized rebellion turned their attention to securing their hold on the institutions of government. The human rights that had been carefully delineated in an earlier Declaration of Colonial Rights, and the principle so elegantly articulated in the Declaration of Independence that all men are created equal and enjoy a natural right to life, liberty, and the pursuit, happiness, fell by the wayside.
The focus shifted to securing the interests of industrialists, bankers, and slave-owning plantation owners and to assuring that the powers of government would remain in the hands of white men of means. Empire morphed once again into a new form, but it remained true to the essential organizing principle of domination. Genocide against Native Americans continued, as did the enslavement of blacks, the denial of the basic rights and humanity of women, and the denial of a just share of profits to those who toiled to make capital productive.
What the founders brought forth is best described as a constitutional plutocracy with an agenda of imperial expansion. The British lost to the rebels in the American Revolution, but Empire remained robust in a new nation that ultimately became the greatest imperial power the world has ever known.
The new nation joined together the peoples of thirteen colonies settled on a narrow bit of land along the east coast of North America. This land had been taken by force and deceit from its indigenous inhabitants, and much of it continued to be worked by slaves.
When its leaders decided the lands they occupied were insufficient to their needs, they supported an imperial westward expansion, using military force to expropriate all of the Native and Mexican lands between themselves and the far distant Pacific Ocean.
Global expansion beyond territorial borders followed. The United States converted cooperative dictatorships into client states by giving their ruling classes a choice of aligning themselves with U.S. economic and political interests and sharing in the booty or being eliminated by assassination, foreign-financed internal rebellion, or military invasion. Following World War II, when the classic forms of colonial rule became unacceptable, international debt became a favored instrument for gaining leverage over local economies. Subsequently, economies were forced open to foreign corporate ownership and control through debt restructuring and trade agreements.
THE LONG STRUGGLE
The ideals set forth in the stirring rhetoric of the Declaration of Independence, a revolution, and the U.S. Constitution all failed to bring democracy to North America. They did, however, inspire and lend legitimacy to a long popular struggle of more than two centuries, a global movement that gradually narrowed the yawning gap between reality and ideal in the face of determined and often bloody elite opposition. Within the larger historical context, the accomplishments of the American Revolution, though incomplete, were monumental.
Power of the People
Monarchy became little more than a historical curiosity. In the United States, a clear separation of church and state secures freedom of religious conscience and worship. A system of checks and balances has for over two centuries successfully barred one elite faction from establishing permanent control of the institutions of government. Active genocide against Native Americans ended, and genocide against any group is universally condemned. Slavery is no longer a legally protected institution and is culturally unacceptable.
Native Americans, people of color, people without property, and women have the legal right to vote and to participate fully in the political process. Pervasive though it remains in practice, open discrimination to deny the political rights of any group is culturally unacceptable.
Our taking these accomplishments for granted underscores how far we have come.
A Taste of the Possible
Many of us who grew up in the United States in the post-World War II years came to accept democracy and economic justice as something of a birthright secured by the acts of the founding fathers. We were raised to believe that we were blessed to live in a classless society of opportunity for all who were willing to apply themselves and play by the rules.
The experience of the middle class in those years seemed to confirm this story. Those of us who were a part of it, and I explicitly include myself here, were inclined to dismiss people who spoke of issues of class as malcontents who would rather promote class warfare than accept responsibility for putting in an honest day’s work.
Sure, there had been problems in the past, but thanks to America’s intellectual genius and high ideals, we had resolved them and rendered them irrelevant to our present. In our arrogance we even believed it our responsibility to make the rest of the world more like us. During my own years of work in Africa, Asia, and Latin America in service to this agenda, I came to realize how wrong we were.
The middle-class ascendance in post-World War II America was an extraordinary demonstration of the possibilities of a democracy grounded in the belief that everyone should share in the benefits of a well-functioning society. Unfortunately, it turned out to be only a temporary victory in the war of the owning class against the rest.
All the disparate popular struggles of our history to achieve justice for workers, women, and people of color, as well as the struggles for peace and the environment, are subtexts of a larger meta-struggle against the cultural mindset and institutions of Empire [emphasis added].
Divided We Fall, United We Stand
The owning classes have long recognized that any political unification of the oppressed places their imperial class privilege at risk. The separate claims of identity politics based on race, gender, and occupational specialization are tolerable to Empire, because they emphasize and perpetuate division. Discussion of class, however, is forbidden, because it exposes common interests and unifying structural issues around which a powerful resistance movement might be built [emphasis added].
To raise healthy children we must have healthy, family-supportive economies, and that can be achieved only by stripping imperial institutions of their unaccountable power and bringing about an equitable redistribution of real wealth. The struggle for the health and well-being of our children is potentially the unifying political issue of our time and an obvious rallying point for mobilizing a political majority behind a New Economy agenda.
It is fortuitous that at the precise moment we face the imperative to do so, we humans have achieved the means to make a collective choice as a species to free ourselves from Empire’s seemingly inexorable compete-or-die logic. Three events have created possibilities.
- The United Nations was established in 1945. For the first time in human history it was possible for representatives of the world’s nations and people to meet in a neutral space to resolve differences through dialogue rather than force of arms.
- The first human ventured into space in 1961, allowing us to look back and see ourselves as one people sharing a common destiny on a living spaceship.
- In the early 1990s, our communications technologies gave us for the first time the capacity to link every human on the planet into a seamless web of nearly costless communication and cooperation.
Geographical isolation once served well Empire’s need to keep us divided. No more.
The world’s estimated 1.5 billion Internet users, 22 percent of all the people in the world, are learning to function as a dynamic, self-directing social organism that transcends boundaries of race, class, religion, and nationality to serve as a collective political conscience of the species.(4) On February 15, 2003, more than 10 million people demonstrated the power and potential of this technology when they took to the streets of the world’s cities, towns, and villages in a unified call for peace in the face of the buildup to the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
A unified demonstration of political sentiment on this scale and geographic scope would have been inconceivable prior to the Internet. This monumental collective action was accomplished without a central organization, budget, or charismatic leader, through social processes never before possible. It was not only a demonstration of the transformative power of our newly acquired technologies, but also an expression of the awakening of a new human consciousness of our shared interests and common destiny—and a foretaste of the possibilities for new ways of organizing human affairs
[…Our social problems originate upstream from the cultural mindset and institutions of Empire] that grant unaccountable power and privilege to the few and assign the majority to lives of hardship and desperation. The history of the United States demonstrates a simple but profound truth: economic democracy—the equitable distribution of economic power—is an essential foundation of political democracy.
Among the founding fathers of the United States, Thomas Jefferson sought to close the divide between owners and workers by making every worker an owner. Alexander Hamilton sought to secure the position of an elite ruling class by assuring that ownership was firmly concentrated in its hands. Hamilton served as the first secretary of the treasury and laid the foundation of the financial system we now know as Wall Street.
Jefferson had it right, but the Hamiltonians have been winning. Fortunately, the struggle is not over and the financial crash creates a rear opening to rally around the Jefferson ideal of a middle-class economic democracy.
The façade of political democracy has cloaked the extent to which Wall Street financial interests rule our lives and our government. Economic transformation is an essential foundation of the larger political and cultural turning we must now navigate.
It is within our means to create economies that serve rather than exploit. We can have economies that support strong families and communities, afford parents time to give their children loving care, provide high-quality health care and education for all, keep schools and homes commercial free, keep the natural environment healthy and toxin free, and support cooperation and sharing among nations to secure the common good. It is about renewing the democratic experiment, liberating the creative potential of the species, and rediscovering what it means to be fully human.9
Once again, The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community, Korten elaborates on our present epic opportunity and the Cultural Creatives as the vanguard for the cultural evolution of humanity.
[…] Culture is the system of customary beliefs, values, perceptions, and social relations that encodes the shared learning of a particular human group essential to its orderly social function. The greater the individual and cultural learning components of the brain’s interpretive mechanism, as contrasted to the genetic component, the greater the capacity of the species to adapt rapidly to new circumstances.
In the case of humans, the individual and cultural learning components are substantial, which gives us an unequaled capacity to adapt and innovate through individual and shared learning. The greater our conscious awareness of culture as a social construct subject to critical examination and intentional choice and the greater our capacity to communicate with one another, the greater our capacity to choose our future.
Culture shapes our perceptions mostly at the unconscious level. It rarely occurs to us to ask whether the reality we perceive through the lens of the culture within which we grow up is the “true” reality. As evolution biologist Elisabet Sahtouris observes,
Until the last half century before the new millennium, it did not occur to people that they could have anything to do with creating their worldview. All through history, people thought the way they saw the world was the way the world really was—in other words, they saw their worldview as the true worldview and all others as mistaken and therefore false.(4)
In our first encounters with people from different cultures, we are likely to experience them as weird, difficult to understand, and possibly dangerous. Through extended intercultural experience, however, we come to see the deeper truth of culture as an organizing construct that defines a shared worldview essential to social coherence. Coming to understand the nature of culture is the essence of the critical transition from Socialized Consciousness to Cultural Consciousness is of particular importance to us in this time of rapid change in the human circumstance. It is essential to our ability to live on a small planet in peaceful and mutually beneficial relationship with peoples of cultures different from our own; to identify and change those aspects of human culture that are actively self-destructive; and to consciously bring forth a new culture of Earth Community.
For five thousand years, successful imperial rulers have intuitively recognized that their power rests on their ability to fabricate a falsified culture that evokes fear, alienation, learned helplessness, and the dependence of the individual on the imperial power of a great ruler. The falsified culture induces a kind of cultural trance in which we are conditioned to deny the inherent human capacity for responsible self-direction, sharing, and cooperation that is an essential foundation of democratic self-rule. The trance creates an emotional bond with the leader, alienates us from one another and the living Earth, erodes relations of mutual self-help, and reduces us to a state of resigned dependence.
In the United States, an important step in the awakening to the role of culture as a social construct came with the civil rights movement in the 1950’s and ‘60s. Participation in that movement awakened many people to the truth that relations between races are defined by cultural codes that have little to do with reality. Once people learned to recognize the difference between reality and an unexamined belief system in reference to race relations, it became easier to see similar distortions in the cultural codes that define the relations between men and women, people and the environment, heterosexuals and homosexuals, and people and corporations.(5) The civil rights movement thus prepared the way for the social movements that followed.
Globally, a rapid increase in international travel, exchange, and communication has exposed millions of people to sometimes unsettling but usually enriching has exposed millions of people to sometime unsettling but usually enriching encounters with cultures not their own. That experience has opened many to viewing their own culture and the larger world in a new light. The experience of cultural awakening has become a contagious, liberating process of global scale that involves hundreds of millions of people and transcends the barriers of race, class, and religion.
Each of the world’s many cultures captures some elements of a deeper truth, yet represents only one of many possible ways of interpreting the data generated by the human senses. Sustained cross-cultural experience can break the cultural trance and awaken a new consciousness of and appreciation for the varieties of the human experience and potential of the species […]. The communications of revolution of the last half of the twentieth century created conditions conducive to an accelerated liberation of the human consciousness.
An awakened Cultural Consciousness is relatively immune to the distorted cultural conditioning promoted by the corporate media, advertising, and political demagogues. Racism, sexism, homophobia, and consumerism are more easily seen for what they are—a justification for domination, exploitation, and violence against life—and a barrier to realizing the possibilities of Earth Community. An implicit underlying cultural premise of all the great progressive movements of our time is that a partnership world is possible.
The same shrinking of geographic space that is accelerating the awakening of Cultural Consciousness is also accelerating the step to Spiritual Consciousness. Those who travel the world to engage in the life of the peoples and places they visit experience both the vitality of the world’s cultural diversity and the beauty of the planetary web of life. The iconic image of planet Earth taken from space gives visual expression to the profound reality that the world’s people are one people sharing a common destiny on a solitary living spaceship alone in the vast darkness of space.
From a recognition of the interconnectedness of life it is only a short step to an encounter with the yet deeper truth that all life flows forth from the same spiritual source and that Empire’s war against life is a war against ourselves. This awakening of a spiritual consciousness has profound practical implications, as it is the foundation of the cultural turning:
- From a belief that Earth belongs to humans and is ours to consume as suits our fancy to an understanding that Earth is our sacred home and that it is our responsibility to be respectful partners.
- From a belief that we humans are by nature incapable of responsible self-governance to an understanding that our nature embodies many possibilities, including the potential for responsible self-governance and democratic citizenship.
- From a belief that those who differ from us pose a threat to our security and way of life to an understanding that all persons are born of the same sacred spirit with an equal right to respect and the pursuit of happiness and that cultural and racial diversity is a source of learning and creative potential.
- From a self-justifying belief that those who align with us are the champions of good and those who oppose us are evil enemies to an understanding that we are all both victims and perpetrators of the violence inherent in the structures of Empire.
A Global Phenomenon
Evidence of a spreading awakening of Cultural and Spiritual Consciousness comes from a variety of sources, including the work of values researcher Paul Ray and feminist author Sherry Anderson. They report data from U.S. values surveys showing that a growing segment for the U.S. adult population is embracing a new culture that values social inclusion, environmental stewardship, and spiritual practice. They call the holders of the new culture Cultural Creatives and estimate that in the late 1990s there were 50 million Cultural Creatives in the United States, roughly 26 percent of adult Americans—compared with less than 5 percent in the early 1960s. They further estimate there are another 80 to 90 million Cultural Creatives in the European Union.(6) Essentially those whom Ray and Anderson are calling Cultural Creatives are people who from their survey responses appear to have attained a Cultural Consciousness; many have achieved a Spiritual Consciousness.
International polling data suggest that hundreds of millions more Cultural Creatives are spread throughout the world. A 1993 Gallup International “Health of the Planet Survey” covering twenty-four nations found a substantial concern for the environment among people of both industrial and developing nations, with majorities agreeing that protecting the environment is more important than economic growth.(7)
The World Values Survey, which gathered longitudinal data from forty-three countries from 1970 to 1994, found that residents of countries that achieve significant economic security show a strong inclination to challenge traditional sources of authority, including government, science, and organized religion, in favor of greater freedom of self-interest in the quality of life relative to pursuit of material gain, and an increasing sense of the importance of family life to individual and community well-being. Although the survey reports that church attendance is generally falling, it found an increase in the percentage of people who report that they often think about the purpose and meaning of life.(8) These findings are all consistent with a spreading awakening of Cultural and Spiritual Consciousness.
Ray and Anderson estimate that roughly half of all Cultural Creatives combine a deep commitment to social and environmental values with some form of spiritual practice—embracing an integral spirituality that connects them with the whole of Creation in both its inner and outer manifestations[…]. The Spiritual Creatives, who have achieved a Spiritual Consciousness. Ray and Anderson call them Core Cultural Creatives. Affirming the importance of a spiritual awakening to the Great Turning, they conclude from their research that virtually all the leaders of progressive social movements in the United States are Core Cultural Creatives. My own experience with many hundreds of movement leaders suggests that this assessment in largely valid both domestically and internationally.
According to Ray and Anderson, Cultural Creatives come from all races, religions, classes, and political parties. The only clear demographic predictor is gender. Sixty percent of all Cultural Creatives are women. Sixty-seven percent of Spiritual Creatives are women.
Spiritual Creatives are not only leading the growing resistance against the global violence and economic injustice of Empire. They are also leading the proactive work of growing the imaginal buds of Earth Community. Leadership in the pro-democracy, peace, environmental, human and civil rights, economic justice, gender equality, holistic health, gay rights, organic agriculture and voluntary simplicity movements come from within the Spiritual Creative ranks. Together they are creating a new politics of partnership centered on a spiritually grounded affirmation of peace, justice, democracy, and life. Although many of these leaders have no formal religious affiliation and few speak openly of their spiritual orientation, a substantial proportion are deeply spiritual and approach their work as a form of spiritual practice.10
The Ascendency Of The Cultural Creatives
As The Pioneers Of The New Integral Culture
We are a country within a country. And as Cultural Creatives, we may sometimes feel like strangers in a strange land but this is not the first time inhabitants of a continent have felt such a cultural divide from the prevailing paradigm of an old world order. Parallels can be drawn from our current predicament to the origins of our country. “Never was such a valuable possession so stupidly and recklessly managed than this entire continent,” wrote Benjamin Franklin in 1776. “Our industries discouraged, our resources pillaged and worst of all, our very character stifled,” contemporary American politics make this eerily familiar. Franklin went on to conclude: “We’ve spawn a new race here […] rougher, simpler […] more enterprising, less refined. We are a new nationality—we require a new nation.” 11 Such characterizations of the early colonists by one of our most prominent founding fathers rings as true today as it did back then when the “liberty bell,” so-to-speak, rang in the American Revolution. And so it is today, with the Cultural Creatives of America that the bell tolls again….
Once again, PhD Sociologist Paul H. Ray and PhD psychologist Sherry Ruth Anderson identified this “invisible subculture” in their landmark book, The Cultural Creatives.
There is a new country the size of France that has emerged within the United States. It is vastly rich in culture, with new ways of life, values, and worldviews. It has its own heroes and its own vision for the future […] but no one sees it. It takes shape silently and almost invisibly, as if flown in under the dark of night. But it’s not from somewhere else. This new country is decidedly American. It is emerging not only in the cornfields of Iowa but on the streets of the Bronx, all across the country from Seattle to St. Augustine. It is showing up wherever you’d least expect it: in your brother’s living room and your sister’s backyard, in women’s circles and demonstrations to protect the redwoods, in offices and churches and online communities, coffee shops and bookstores, hiking trails and corporate boardrooms.
Since the 1960s, this subculture has made a comprehensive shift in their worldview, values, and way of life—their culture, in short. These creative, optimistic millions are at the leading edge of several kinds of cultural change, deeply affecting not only their own lives but our larger society as well. We call them the Cultural Creatives because, innovation by innovation, they are shaping a new kind of American culture for the twenty-first century […].
What makes the appearance of the Cultural Creatives especially timely is that our civilization is in the midst of an epochal change, caught between globalization, accelerating technologies, and a deteriorating planetary ecology. A creative minority can have enormous leverage to carry us into a new renaissance instead of a disastrous fall.12
As mentioned before, Ray and Anderson drew upon thirteen years of survey research studies on more than 100,000 Americans, plus more than 100 focus groups and dozens of in-depth interviews to identify this “undiscovered country.” Since then, ten years later, this new sub-culture has grown to 35%—80 million Americans in 2010—but still lack a collective self-awareness of themselves and continues to goes unnoticed by mainstream America and the rest of the world. This is not surprising considering there was a lack of individual identity and conscious alignment to such a large subculture that is growing globally every year since the 1960s.13
We, the millions of millions of Cultural Creatives in the United States and around the world, adhere to an alternative worldview, culture and values to create a new resilient, sustainable and integral culture that can bring together “the traditional and the modern, the planetary and the local, inner and outer change, the secular and the spiritual, the material and the metaphysical, the arts and the sciences.” However, we do not want to achieve this through conventional means that have proven to be grossly ineffective by applying doomed-to-fail, symptom-oriented-solutions to our social problems. Instead, we seek to create new social institutions and build intricate networks in the United States and around the world. We want, “a cultural ‘New Deal,’ a chance to remake our lives and our social structure around deeper values. In short, we wish to redesign every aspect of our culture to be more than environmentally conscious but instead be ecologically sound. That means: how our cities and towns can be laid out; how our transportation system could work; how new technology can be used in products, business, and industrial processes; how business can be organized; how we measure the value of a company or the cost of a government project; how we live in our homes; how we can get our clubs, associations and organizations involved in a new way of life; how we live in community, or fail to; and how we participate in civic culture. Without making these technological and cultural changes, we believe, even being in charge of the political machine would be pointless.”14
It an effort to mend any fragmentation of citizen activists, I recommend that Cultural Creatives, New Progressives, Millennials, Libertarians and green, socially concerned Conservatives who are part of the 99% and subscribe to such a comprehensive approach as to abolish Empire and establish Earth Community assume a more unifying designation that represents common values that omit poor and middle-class racists who are also part of the 99% like anti-Semites, Nazis, xenophobes. As much as we may aspire for full inclusiveness these elements in our society will only prove to be counterproductive, therefore, I suggest we begin to formulate a collective identity that espouses a common vision, values, worldview, culture and principles. One such new designation that has gain acceptance among a small group of guerrilla artists like S3K is the Neo-Transcendentalists. Neo-Transcendentalism, as I am defining it but still open for continual development, refers to a lot of things, among them, an adherence to a new cosmology of “Conscious Evolution” as described by author Barbara Marx Hubbard and what Cultural Creative philosopher Ken Wilber calls an “Integral Worldview.” He also describes the process of the Kosmos in his landmark book, A Brief History Of Everything, “[…] evolution is in part a self-transcending process—it always goes beyond what went before. And in that novelty, in that emergence, in that creativity, new entities come into being, new patterns unfold, new holons issue forth. This extraordinary process builds unions out of fragments and wholes out of heaps [all of which will be explained later]. The Kosmos, it seems, unfolds in quantum leaps of creative emergence […]”15
THE FIRST WAVE: The American Transcendentalists
As The Original Counter-Culture In The United States
The Neo-Transcendentalists align themselves with the rich heritage of the original American Transcendentalists. The following is a summary of its origins and their lasting legacy.
Transcendentalism is a term derived from the “transcendental” philosophy of Immanuel Kant that characterizes a broadly related cluster of ideas that emerged as a part of the American Renaissance. Proponents of this way of thinking emphasized the divine in nature, the value of the individual and of human intuition, and an ideal spiritual reality the “transcends” sensory experience and provides a better guide for life than narrowly empirical or logical reasoning. The term refers to a cluster of concepts set forth by a number of individuals, rather than a fixed or formal philosophy.
Few movements in American social and intellectual history have been as influential as the cluster of ideas we have come to call Transcendentalism. From Ralph Waldo Emerson’s “self-reliant soul” and Henry David Thoreau’s “different drummer” to modern ideas about individualism and democracy, Transcendentalism has had a powerful impact on central aspects of American life. In addition to familiar names, such as Emily Dickinson and Frederick Douglass [there were] a number of less well-known American originals: Margaret Fuller, William Ellery Channing, A. Bronson Alcott, and Jones Very[—all participated in this] wide-ranging movement, [and made valuable] contributions to American politics and society […and] world culture.16
Ralph Waldo Emerson, the single most important figure behind American Transcendentalism and Henry David Thoreau, Emerson’s most influential disciple, became the crux of this powerful intellectual movement that they both helped to found and foster. They were the first of many that would follow turning the United States during the early to mid-19th century into an American Renaissance.
[…] Indeed, the decades from 1830s through the 1860s saw a flowering of ideas that shaped new ways of thinking. Like such categories as Romanticism or the Enlightenment, however, a single term such as Transcendentalism resists easy definition. Suffice it to say that the search for a truth that might be true at all places, the belief that evidence for such a spiritual truth might be found in and through the physical world, and the idea that each individual has the capacity to experience this truth in a personal way produced a series of writings and beliefs whose powerful currents can still be felt today.
[Such] major texts, include[ed] Emerson’s Nature and “Self-Reliance,” Thoreau’s Walden, Fuller’s Women in the Nineteenth Century, and Whitman’s Leaves of Grass. [There were also] crucial historical events [that shaped the movement]: John Brown’s raid, the Civil War, the rise of industrial New England, and the decline of the agricultural South […]. Transcendentalism as a movement not only shaped the 19th century but also continues to have a powerful influence on our own era. From passive resistance of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr., to increased gender equality, from the role of liberal denominations in American religion to emphasis on global understanding and cooperation, Transcendentalism continues to shape a uniquely American way of viewing ourselves and our place in the wider world.17
THE SECOND WAVE
The Sixties’ Counter-Culture
In the 1973 book Comparative Studies In Society And History Martin Schiff echoes such sentiments in a section entitled, “Neo-Transcendentalism in the New Counter-Culture: A Vision of the Future Looking Back.”
The student movement of the 1960s has been characterized as the dawn of a new national consciousness and a new counter-culture, ‘the passionate revolution of creative in-telligence’, and ‘the saving vision our endangered civilization required’. The New Left spokesmen for the movement have proclaimed themselves the vanguard of a unique cultural and political rebellion against what they consider the evils of capitalist-pluralist America. They present their arguments in Hegelian terms as a new and profound synthesis of the progressive elements embodied in America’s political and intellectual history. Yet a more pro-bing analysis of American history indicates that the values inherent in the New Left counter-culture are not very new at all. In fact, apart from their rhetoric, the New Left cultural and political attitudes bear a striking similarity to certain nineteenth-century Utopian outlooks. The most direct antecedent of the modern counter-culture appears to be the New England transcendentalist movement which emerged in the 1840s. This relationship between a New Left counter-culture, credited by its supporters with messianic characteristics for national sal-vation, and a nineteenth-century utopianism that made no significant impact on the unfold-ing of history raises many questions about the credibility and future of the counter-culture.18
Of course, I take issue with such a conclusive assessment of the counter-culture because it’s an ongoing process in a long continuum of social change endeavors.
THE THIRD WAVE: The Neo-Transcendentalists As The
New Converging Constituency For Comprehensive Change
The Cultural Creatives of Neo-Transcendentalism, adhere to a lot of the same values, principles and central ideas of those who went before us but at the same time transcended their limitations to evolve into a new form of Transcendentalism outlined on “The Monolithic Milestones Project, 2010-2011,” the guerrilla art installation that unfurled “the Integral Vision, Grand Unified Strategy & Philosophical Pillars & Transformative Tenets of Integral Activism,” (described in detail in THE GRAND SYNTHESIS book to be released on November 5, 2011). Once again, Korten elaborates:
Call those of us on the side of Earth Community [Neo-Transcendentalists]—[Neo-Transcendental] conservatives and [Neo-Transcendental] progressives liberals. Although we have our differences, we share a commitment to creating a society governed by ordinary people and dedicated to the ideals of liberty, justice, and opportunity for all. We are driven by principle rather than ideology, and we deal in reality rather than delusion. We have no more in common with the ideological extremists of the Far Left who seek violent revolution and state control of every aspect of life than we do with the ideological extremists of the Far Right who pursue imperial wars abroad, a theocratic state at home, and freedom for themselves to oppress the rest.
A politics of mature citizenship properly honors both the [Neo-Transcendental] conservative values of freedom and individual responsibility and the [Neo-Transcendental] liberal values of equity and justice for all. It brings together a [Neo-Transcendental] conservative concern for community and heritage with a [Neo-Transcendental] liberal concern for inclusiveness and the creation of a world that works for the whole of life and children yet to come. It recognizes the importance of local roots combined with a global consciousness. In the mature human mind, these are complementary values that call us to a path of spiritual health and maturity.
[Neo-Transcendental] Progressives of all stripes act from deeply shared values that resonate with the most basic of Christian values—do not kill, do not steal, love thy neighbor as thyself, and do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Yet just as these are not exclusively liberal or conservative values, neither are they exclusively Christian values. They are universal human values shared by believers in Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Native spirituality, among others. From this foundation, we can pull back from the extremes to find common ground even on those issues that presently are the focus of intense political acrimony, including abortion, gay rights, gun control, and the teaching of evolution. For too long we have allowed extremists on both sides to define these debates in all-or-nothing terms that drive out the search for common ground based on shared moral principles.
Beneath the political stresses in United States that at times threaten to tear our nation apart, we can see the emergent outlines of a largely unrecognized consensus that the world most of us want to bequeath to our children is very different from the world in which we live. [Neo-Transcendental] Conservatives and liberals share a sense that the dominant culture and institutions of the contemporary world are morally and spiritually bankrupt, unresponsive to human needs and values, and destructive of the strong families and communities we crave and our children desperately need. Deceived by the divide-and-conquer tactics of imperial politics, each places the blame on the other rather than forming a united front to reject Empire’s lies and unite in a stand against the [Business Conservatives'] war against children, families, and communities.
Most people are stretched far too thin to spend the time it takes to sort out the competing arguments on whether global warming is taking place, why gas prices are so high, or why the Iraq war turned out to be such a terrible mess. What they know very well, however, is that their lives are stretched to the breaking point; their children suffer from asthma, obesity, and a continuous bombardment of sex and violence on TV and of ads promoting junk food; and they are unable both to keep bread on the table and to supervise their children. To raise healthy children we must have healthy, family-supportive economies we must have healthy, democratically account-able political systems responsive to the needs and values of people, families, and communities. The struggle for the health and well-being of our children is potentially the unifying political issue of our time and an obvious rallying point for building an Earth Community political majority.
It is within our human means to create a world in which families and communities are strong, parents have the time to love and care for their children, high-quality health care and education are available to all, schools and homes are commercial free, the natural environment is healthy and toxin free, and nations cooperate for the common good. It is about renewing the democratic experiment, liberating the creative potential of the species, and coming home to life. It is an idea whose time has come and the foundation of a true political majority.19
Such unifying aspirations make a Neo-Transcendental alliance among progressives and conservatives not only possible but inevitable based on our common opposition towards following six solidarity issues of unity: 1) the gradual dissolution to the Contract of Adhesion (which means losing our access to the courts), 2) an overblown military budget, 3) the criminal undeclaration of wars, 4) the freedom restricting Patriot Act, 5) the debt enslaving Federal Reserve, and 6) the sovereign-shredding jobs from transnational institutions of corporate globalization like NAFTA and WTO.
It is for these reasons I suggest, once again, jettisoning the old left and right labels that the power elite use to divide us and assume a new and more positive and accurate designation—The Neo-Transcendentalists. However, mainstream activism from both the conventional Right and Left will feel their old identities threaten and rail against it. We should nevertheless, proceed forward because they have failed to resolve the root causes of our societal ills through its short-sighted, short-term “incremental” steps, “realistic” approaches and “practical” measures all equated to working within the social system and preserving its status-quo approach of symptoms-oriented-solutions. This form of “pragmatism” has failed, time and time again and now plainly self-evident in the current collapse of western industrial civilization. Today’s band aid approach by main-stream activism only serves to perpetuate the system by trying to keep the dysfunction in check through charity groups, non-profit organizations and social agencies that are controlled or confined through the financial mandates made by foundations, grant awards and government funding—all of which, ultimately goes against solving the profound problems plaguing our society.
As Neo-Transcendentalists we seek to end this co-dependent cycle of activism through a profound paradigm shift by disengaging from the dysfunctional economic system through the relocalization of all of our basic needs: food, water, clothing, shelter, energy and the means of exchange—all leading to the creation of a new sub-economy of self-sufficiency and community resiliency in preparation for a post-carbon society. We desire to go beyond the antiquated “left-right” paradigm—transcend—“politics as usual” and transform, not reform, all levels of our society, particularly the political system to reflect the values of the “integral worldview” and “evolutionary wisdom culture.” Our “most important issues are all ‘outside the box’ to Washington politics.” We want profound participation in the transformation of our societal structure. We desire to develop political campaigns at various levels through a new way of connecting the networks for social change and use the fast spreading movement of “self-organization and integration which is neither Left nor Right but Forward, Upward and Whole.” “We transcend the ‘mushy-middle” and represent an untapped voter population that will bring back people power to create a new political world. We transcend any identification with the Left or its language and will seek to galvanize Spiritual Progressives, Millenials, Libertarians, religious, socially conscious, green Conservatives. We transcend description by the corporate-controlled news media, conventional pollsters and soulless advertisers. We transcend nationalist interests with planetary issues and concerns. We transcend sentimental environmentalism with community resilience. We transcend patriarchal hierarchies with egalitarian feminism. We transcend personal ambition with personal growth and progressive spiritualism. We transcend the futility felt in participating in the sham political process by changing the culture. We transcend inauthentic, psychologically primitive and spiritually empty conventional politics of violent imagery, hatred, conflict-driven, blaming, shaming and posturing—all bereft of innovation or win-win ideas. We transcend old Left or Right political rhetoric that no one believes any more with interest in rebuilding community. We transcend the Moderns’ political positions among Business Conservatives and the conventional liberal Left with being “in-front” or “moving forward.” We transcend “the old boxes, to create new kinds of political culture and new institutions, beyond playing with policy alternatives.” And ultimately, We will transcend the globalizing mega-corporations by getting big business money out of politics.20
And with 80 million Cultural Creatives in the United States, approximately 100 million in Europe and about 20 million in Canada, a global core constituency of at least 200 million and counting are awaiting the ultimate millennial moment of epic convergence. And the new rallying call for these “Neo-Transcendentalists” will not be Marx’s “working men of all countries, unite,” but instead, I proclaim:
Cultural Creatives of the earth—CONVERGE! If we are to survive the Great Unraveling and transition into the Great Turning, then the next global revolution must be the cultural evolution of humanity by abolishing Empire and establishing EARTH COMMUNITY.
- David C. Korten, Agenda For A New Economy: From Phantom Wealth To Real Wealth
(San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2009), 82.
- United For Global Change, www.october15.org, 2011
- David C. Korten, Agenda For A New Economy: From Phantom Wealth To Real Wealth
(San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2009), 95-101.
- David C. Korten, The Great Turning: From Empire To Earth Community
(San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2006), 32-33.
- Elberton Star News (Georgia: May 10, 2011)
- The Earth Charter, 2001
- Thomas Jefferson
- David C. Korten, Agenda For A New Economy: From Phantom Wealth To Real Wealth
(San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2009), 79-91.
- David C. Korten, The Great Turning: From Empire To Earth Community
(San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2006), 32-33.
- Benjamin Franklin
- Paul Ray & Sherry Anderson, The Cultural Creatives: How 50 Million People Are Changing The World (California, 2000) 62-65.
- Ken Wilber, A Brief History Of Everything (California: Shalala Publishers, 1999) 34-42.
- Professor Ashton Nichols, The Teaching Company’s Great Courses Series entitled “Emerson, Thoreau and the Transcendentalists Movement.”
- David C. Korten, The Great Turning: From Empire To Earth Community
(San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2006), 13-33.
- Paul Ray, “The New Political Compass, 2003
- Zevin X. Cruz, The Grand Synthesis: A Cohesive Vision & Grand Unified Strategy of Social Change
(Ohio: 48hrs Publishing, 2011), 12-13. | <urn:uuid:07986990-dd2a-494d-a875-aa250288984b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nycga.net/group-documents/the-one-global-demand/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937312 | 18,196 | 1.5 | 2 |
Foodbank needs to expand to keep up with demand
By Prue_Reid | Friday, February 22, 2013, 13:56
A FOODBANK in Weston-super-Mare is to expand following a demand for its services.
Could you help the foodbank meet a growing demand?
The town's community foodbank launched in August 2011 and is run by the Lighthouse Project and supported by the resort's Churches Together Group and the Trussell Trust which supports foodbanks across the UK.
The initiative was set up after it was identified that there are large numbers of people, including the elderly, homeless and vulnerable, living in poverty in the seaside resort.
It is run by local residents Ian and Sarah Frazer who moved to Weston in 2011 and who soon realised there were large sections of the community struggling to make ends meet.
Last year the foodbank, which is based in the former Bakers Dolphin ticket office at Pier Square, helped an average of 25 families and individuals a week, handing out an average of one tonne of food a month.
But over the last three months as belts continue to tighten, the demand on the service has increased and in December last year it handed out 1.5 tonnes of food to 190 people and in January gave out two tonnes of food to 176 people.
Mr Frazer said he expected demand on the service to continue to mount, particularly when welfare reforms come into force in April and many people will see their benefits reduced.
Mr Frazer said: "We are seeing more and more families and individuals referred to us and anticipate the demand may more than double again by April with the welfare reforms.
"It could be possible that we could be handing out up to four tonnes of food a month.
"There are already a lot of people struggling to make ends meet and we have already outgrown our capacity of where we are currently based.
"We have been searching for new premises but they need to be in the town centre and accessible to people."
The foodbank opens on a Monday, Wednesday and Friday between 12noon and 2pm and is run by a team of volunteers.
Volunteers work with partner organisations, such as Age Concern, social services, drug and alcohol support groups, Citizens Advice and North Somerset Housing, to identify individuals and families in need.
People in need of help are issued with a voucher by one of the agencies which they can take to the Foodbank three times a year in exchange for groceries.
Food collections are carried out by local churches and schools and at supermarkets across the town.
People can donate items such as
pasta, rich, tea, coffee, soup, tinned food such as beans and fruit and long life milk as well as sugar, cereal, concentrated juice and tinned meat.
Donations can be taken to local churches including Milton Baptist, St Paul's Church, Worle and the foodbank itself.
Anyone who wants to help or who has a larger premises for the foodbank can call Mr Frazer
on 01934 625418. | <urn:uuid:852f2034-e97c-431f-808a-d209be54c9e7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.westonsupermarepeople.co.uk/Foodbank-needs-expand-demand/story-18222661-detail/story.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975894 | 630 | 1.59375 | 2 |
The BBC is in talks with the Pope for him to give the Thought of the Day on Radio 4′s Today programme.
The Pope is to visit the UK in September and BBC director-general Mark Thompson, a devout Catholic, is understood to have visited the Vatican to discuss BBC coverage of the trip.
The daily message can be given by people of any faith and serves to reflect on issues of the day with a religious slant.
Mark Damazer, the controller of Radio 4, has long hoped to secure the Pope for Thought of the Day.
The Daily Telegraph reports that he said: “Mark [Thompson] knows of my aspiration and we have spotted the coincidence between my desire to have the Pope and the Pope being here.”
Mr Damazer said he was not involved in asking the Pope to record the message.
He added: “I think Mark Thompson is better qualified than me on two grounds: being director-general, and his religion.”
News of the Pope’s visit has provoked anger from gay and secular campaigners who have criticised his record of outspoken remarks.
In the last few years, the Pontiff has attacked gay marriage, abortion rights, euthanasia and the use of condoms to prevent AIDS.
He also took the opportunity to criticise the UK’s equality legislation recently, saying it violated “natural law” and urging bishops to stand up against it.
The National Secular Society argued that the Pope should be questioned about his views by Today presenter John Humprys.
President Terry Sanderson said: “The Pope will have a three minute slot to lecture us about morality, but no-one will be able to challenge anything he says. Why won’t he be invited to take the 8.10am interview slot on the Today programme with John Humphrys? And let’s have a bit of finger-wagging the other way.
“Perhaps the BBC could ask listeners to send in the questions they’d like the Pope to answer – about the Vatican’s shameful cover up of child abuse by its priests and its cruel ban on condoms in the fight against AIDS, for instance. There are a lot of questions to be answered, but all we’re going to get from the BBC is propaganda.”
In the last few years, the BBC has rejected calls to allow secular voices on Thought for the Day.
Enjoyed this article? Add Pink News to your Facebook news feed | <urn:uuid:b079e6fe-6823-4c7a-b65f-71b0de17c568> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2010/02/17/pope-may-be-invited-on-bbcs-thought-for-the-day/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966177 | 512 | 1.570313 | 2 |
Potential 2016 presidential candidate Chris Christie may be able to take the punch lines about his waistline. The popular New Jersey governor made light of his weight in an appearance on "The Late Show with David Letterman" Monday night.
"I'm basically the healthiest fat guy you've ever seen in your life," Christie joked.
But one medical expert on presidential health cautioned Christie's obesity is no laughing matter.
"I'm worried he may have a heart attack. I'm worried he may have a stroke," former White House physician Connie Mariano, M.D. said in an interview with CNN.
And, in fact, Christie acknowledges as much as recently as Tuesday when asked about his Late Show appearance.
"I have been remarkably healthy. My doctor continues to warn me my luck is going to run out relatively soon. So, believe me, it is something that I am very conscious of," Christie said.
Mariano, who served nine years as a doctor in the White House medical unit said Christie's obesity would certainly become an issue should he run for the presidency in 2016. She warned a future President Christie could suffer from potentially deadly complications from diabetes, sleep apnea, and heart disease.
"It's almost a like a time bomb waiting to happen unless he addresses those issues before running for office," Mariano said.
During the 1990's, Mariano helped then-President Bill Clinton in his own struggles with losing weight. She recalled how Saturday Night Live once lampooned Mr. Clinton as an insatiable junk food addict, pounding Big Macs from McDonalds.
After Clinton stumbled on some steps and tore a quadriceps tendon, Mariano said she worked with the White House chef and a personal trainer to help the president lose nearly 30 pounds. | <urn:uuid:fa549627-8bf5-46a0-8697-0eed9d01ea15> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wlwt.com/news/politics/Doc-on-Christie-I-m-worried-about-this-man-dying-in-office/-/9837768/18420818/-/item/0/-/4hqf1c/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976702 | 364 | 1.703125 | 2 |
20th May 2011
The Gotham Book Mart
Forget CBGBs, if we ever make it to New York it’ll be Gotham Book Mart‘s sad demise that we’ll be sobbing over. A Manhattan institution from 1920 to 2007,this weekend is the anniversary of its untimely closure.
Although all the other places we’ve featured in this series (such as Swan & Edgar, The Library Hotel and La Belle Juliette) have been ones you can snoop around for yourselves, we couldn’t resist the opportunity to pay tribute to such an iconic literary landmark.
Founded by Fanny Steloff, the independent bookstore was home to several cats and a warren of labryinthine cellars of bookshelves known as ‘the catacombs‘. Before long, it was also home to all sorts of literary salons and societies, and a reputation as a treasure trove of rare, out-of-print and avant-garde titles, as well as several books that had been banned (such as Lady Chatterley’s Lover and Anaïs Nin‘s scandalous diaries).
Similar to the infamous Chelsea Hotel, Gotham Book Mart was a hub for authors, artists, bohemians, beatniks and assorted other iconoclasts. Allen Ginsberg and Tennessee Williams both worked there (although the latter lasted less than a day), and Patti Smith wrote about reading her poetry there in her brilliant autobiography Just Kids. Other famous patrons and customers included Charlie Chaplin, Andy Warhol, Gertrude Stein and Katherine Hepburn.
But after a change in ownership, relocation and an eventual lapse into debt, by the beginning of the 21st century, it was no longer feasible for it to remain open. On May 22nd 2007, the city auctioned off the inventory. The following year, more than 200,000 items from that inventory were donated to the University of Pennsylvania as an anonymous gift.
Did you ever get to visit Gotham Book Mart? What was it like? Which other literary landmarks would you like to see featured in this series? Tell us your ideas in the comments! | <urn:uuid:1cc4e747-e6a1-4bf2-8ff6-1938184c49ca> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://forbookssake.net/2011/05/20/the-gotham-book-mart/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965637 | 449 | 1.835938 | 2 |
versión impresa ISSN 0256-0100
S. Afr. j. educ. v.32 n.1 Pretoria 2012
Changing perceptions of teachers regarding the importance and competence of their principals as leaders
Bernardus GroblerI; Thomas BisschoffII; Amrat BeekaIII
IDepartment of Education Leadership and Management, University of Johannesburg firstname.lastname@example.org
IIDepartment of Social Justice and Education, Birmingham University, UK
IIIMpumalanga Department of Education
We examined the perceptions of teachers on the importance and competence of principals as leaders before and after an intervention programme on holistic leadership. The research was quantitative and contextualized in the Secunda region of Mpumalanga province in South Africa. The methodology followed a literature study and an empirical investigation in the form of a pre- and post-test experimental-type design. A structured questionnaire was administered to 400 teachers in 40 randomly selected schools divided into two groups. One group of 20 principals was provided with an intervention programme regarding the dimensions of holisticleadership. The other group of 20 principals was not exposed to the intervention programme. The perceptions of teachers from their schools were probed using a pre-post-test design. The intervention programme and biographic variables served as independent variables whilst the seven factors of holistic leadership formed the dependent variables. Principals who were exposed to the intervention programme were perceived by their teachers to be more competent than their counterparts who were not exposed to the programme.
Keywords: educational change; head teachers; leadership; school principals
Education reforms in South Africa, as in other parts of the world, are accompanied by increased responsibilities and accountabilities for everyone working in schools, including the principals. The changing role of leaders within a reform environment has spawned much research, especiallyaround principalship. An increasinglyimportant sub-theme in this research focuses on the desirability of the principalship as a career and, more precisely, the question of why there are so few aspirant principals in some countries (Gronn & Rawlings-Sanaei, 2003).
The research sought to probe an aspect of this lack of aspirant principals from the perspective of the teachers. If the perceptions of teachers regarding the importance and the competence of their principals can be positively changed it can indirectly address the shortage of aspirant principals.
The researchers probed the perceptions of teachers in Mpumalanga province as to the importance and present competence of their leaders regarding certain dimensions of holistic leadership (Grobler & Van der Merwe, 1996). A structured questionnaire containing items that operationalised the seven dimensions as defined by Grobler & Van der Merwe (1996) (professionally inviting culture; effective communication; ethical foundation; vision of excellence; empowerment of followers; personal mastery and authentic collaboration) was used in a pretest, followed by an intervention programme and the post-test.
Beeka (2009) identified numerous challenges faced by school principals in Mpumalanga province such as new forms of advocated leadership, HIV/AIDS awareness, povertyalleviation and the plight of rural and township schools. There also appears to be a dearth of espoused policies concerning the transformation of leadership from one of a bureaucratic nature to a more collaborative form of management. Leading the way in South Africa are the so-called "Batho Pele Principles" (people first) which have their roots in a series of policies and legislative frameworks. The principles are ideals from the South African Constitution (SA, 1996) and Public Service and Administration website for the Department: Public Service and Administration: consultation; setting service standards; increasing access; ensuring courtesy; providing information; openness and transparency; redress and value for money. The legislative framework is provided by Section 32 of the Constitution of South Africa (SA, 1996), the White Paper on the Transformation of the Public Service of 1997, the Public Service Regulations of 1999 and 2001 and the Administrative Justice Act of 2000. These legislative frameworks seek to transform a culture of Public Service delivery from prescribing service packages to citizens, to putting citizens at the centre of service delivery. Accordingly, all government departments both national and provincial are compelled to align their service deliverymandates and service delivery improvement plans with the overall service delivery priorities of the government based on the needs of the citizens. They call for the setting up of service standards, defining outputs and targets, and benchmarking performance indicators against international standards.
Educators are also public servants in the South African context and all Education Departments in South Africa have issued circulars to public schools informing them about the implementation of the Batho Pele principles. Principals as leaders of their schools are therefore supposed to transform their "old and redundant" leadership forms, discard them and adopt more collaborative forms of leadership. It is a relatively simple matter to "espouse the ideal" of collaboration in the form of mandates far removed from the reality of the school situation. The question still remains "how does one implement collaborative forms of leadership in a bureaucratic system" characterized by mandates? Furthermore no forms of collaboration have been modelled and little to no training has been provided to school principals to assist them in order to "deliver service to their clients". The literature provides no answer to "mandated collaboration" and although leadership models do addresscertain aspects of collaboration there is no empirical model in South Africa that can serve as a guide to school principals regarding collaborative forms of leadership that considers the various contextual issues present. Political realities and social issues, among many other things, all influence leadership in some way or other and it seems as if a holistic approach to leadership could assist in alleviating some of the above realities. Thus, one of the problems that a school principal in South Africa faces is the gap that exists between the ideal or espoused forms of leadership and that which is practised in the system.
Statement of the problem and purpose of the study
The purpose of the study is to examine the perceptions of teachers on the importance of specific aspects of holistic leadership and the competence of principals as leaders, before and after an intervention programme on holistic leadership. This paper does not describe the design and development of the intervention programme as such as these details are available in the study of Beeka (2009:125-142). However, the main aspects pertinent to adult learning were built into the intervention programme (Paauwe & Williams, 2001). The research is quantitative in nature and is contextualized in the Secunda region of Mpumalanga province, South Africa.
The overriding research question is thus two-fold:
What are the perceptions of teachers on the importance of the seven aspects of leadership?
What are the perceptions of teachers on the competence of their principals on each of the seven aspects before and after an intervention programme on holistic leadership?
Relevant literature on educational leadership
It appears that educational leadership is a confusing concept that seems to be characterised by a multitude of theories and models. Furthermore, the educational leader has a multitude of goals that he or she has to strive towards with the primary goal being that of "teaching and learning". Thus, while many of the dimensions of leadership are generic to leadership in general, the educational leader is also concerned with an ideological dimension as well as formal prescriptions and other norms that attempt to regulate social behaviour.
Although the literature on leadership abounds with possible leadership constructs, there are not many that attempt to guide the educational leader through the quagmire of how to lead teachers and learners amidst the many complexities present in a bureaucratically mandated education system. Furthermore, theories from organisational leadership seem to apply to most of what educational leaders are supposed to do and there seem to be many dimensions of leadership that overlap with one another without being exclusive. It is amidst the context of "these muddy waters" (Phillips, 2006) that we attempt to clarify the role of the school leadership.
A brief survey of the literature indicates that the earliest leadership studies focused on physical, sociological and psychological traits of the leader (Litterer, 1993; Sikula, 1993; Modiba, 1997). The personal-behavioural approaches in turn suggested that leaders should consider situational variables such as the expectations, skills and previous experience of their followers (Hersey & Blanchard, 1989; Beare, 2001; MacBeath, 2007). If leaders were not able to change these variables then they should change their leadership styles. The contingency theory, on the other hand, attempts to explain the importance of leader-member relationships, structure of the task at hand and the use of positional power (Nxumalo, 2001).
More recent approaches to the explanation of leadership tend to concentrate more on the skills and knowledge needed to involve followers in decision-making. Then again numerous models and theories such as instructional leadership (McEwen, 2003), charismatic leadership (Pounder & Coleman, 2002), transactional leadership and transformational leadership (Burns, 1978; Sergiovanni, 1990; Pounder & Coleman, 2002; Clarke, 2007) have emerged from research into leadership. They all contribute to school leadership in some or other unique way.
Fullan (2005), in turn, believes that the answer to school effectiveness lies in what he terms 'sustainable leadership'. He espouses eight elements of leadership that act in a three-tier contextual fashion: Public service with a moral purpose, a commitment to changing contexts, lateral capacity-building through networks, intelligentaccountability and vertical relationships, deep learning, dual commitment to short- and long-term results, cyclical re-energizing and the long-arm of leadership (Fullan, 2005). Caldwell (2006), in contrast, acknowledges the suggestion of leadership that is sustainable but makes out a case for re-imagining educational leadership as the present leadership theories and models have failed to meet the expectations that the stakeholders have of them. Brauckmann and Pashiardis (2011) advocate the use of various leadership styles within a holistic leadership framework and conclude that leadership is a complex mixture of the five styles they explored. They contend furthermore that the various sets of leadership perceptions, behaviours and practices influence the main purpose of a school's mission which is enhancing student learning. Moller (2005:47) also postulates that leadership must go beyond dedication, skills and leadership styles by promoting a moral enterprise which develops people by fostering the acceptance of group goals that can be translated into improved learner performance underpinned by moral imperatives. The presence of a firm ethical foundation (Northhouse, 2004) thus seems to be a moral imperative for school leaders as each of the other dimensions is directly or indirectly influenced by this ethical foundation (see Figure 1).
It is with these aspects in mind that we attempted to change the perceptions of an important group of stakeholders, namely, those of educators, about the competence of school principals with respect to certain important dimensions regarding the holistic leadership of school principals.
What is clear from the above brief exposition of leadership is that the role of the school principal as a leader has become extremely complex. South African public schools are also part of a bureaucratic system where command and control strategies, resulting from the numerous mandates, are in conflict with the espoused collaborative approaches that are advocated. Furthermore, the various terms that characterize educational leadership theories and models such as elements, aspects, dimensions, strategies, characteristics, traits, components, key lessons, keyfactors, competencies and a host of other terms to describe leadership bring confusion to the debate about effective school leadership. The researchers believe that each model has some unique features but that parsimony is needed as many of the models and theories are advocating the same things but using different terms to describe them.
This research will investigate the possibility of a holistic approach to school leadership that is participatory, collegial and committed to the teacher, learner and school community (Dzvimbo, 1996). School principals should develop an approach to leadership which will create an open school climate and team-spirit as this could assist teachers in developing positive perceptions of school leadership. However, despite years of reform efforts, South Africa continues to lag behind when it comes to international comparisons and has failed to raise performance of historically disadvantaged learners (Taylor, Muller & Vinjevold, 2004; Soudien, 2007). According to Scheerens and Bosker (1997) and Sergiovanni (2005) research has identified a range of factors associated with effective leadership. These factors, however, need to be synthesized into a holistic model that could assist principals in moving away from the, antiquated bureaucratic and authoritarian leadership practices to a more democratic approach that has the possibility of enhancing positive perceptions among educators regarding school leadership. The existing hierarchy must somehow be incorporated and utilized to produce system improvements (Edwards & Lawler, 1994; Gilbert, 1993).
This particular research project investigates the holistic approach advocated by Grobler and Van Der Merwe (1996) and further explored by Beeka (2009). This approach was selected as the seven dimensions involved in the approach cover key variables considered important for a dynamic holistic leadership model and can be applied in differing contexts. A key variable was the perception of teachers as followers as it was believed that their perceptions would be more accurate than the self-perception of their leaders (Charlton, 1993). A wider study that may include the perceptions of people outside the school can be considered, but the present conversation worldwide is still about moving to 'shared professional leadership' with the emphasis on sharing amongst teachers rather than 'shared community leadership' with others outside the school. As persons outside the school do not have the knowledge or the exposure that teachers have regarding the leadership abilities of principals it was decided to elicit the perceptions of teachers. We consider this a strong and unique aspect of the research design.
Therefore, to summarize the above introductory comments, it seems that one of the main challenges to school principals is to use the various dimensions of leadership in a more holistic way. Another challenge is that the education system in South Africa is part of a bureaucratic structure that is not conducive to taking rapid decisions that are necessary when large scale change is introduced. This structure does not facilitate teamwork as power levels present in the hierarchical structure are not helpful for promoting the trust that is needed when shared decision-making is important. Hence a new leadership model, that will assist principals to manage large change processes while still maintaining high teacher and learner productivity to facilitate school effectiveness, is needed. To this end, the holistic model of leadership will be further researched. It involves seven dimensions of leadership and could possibly provide a more holistic and dynamic view regarding school leadership. The seven dimensions were named:
The creation of a professionally inviting culture;
An ethical foundation;
A vision of excellence;
Empowerment of followers;
This research attempted to address the leadership development of school principals in that an intervention programme was given to a group of principals in an attempt to see whether the perceptions of their teachers could be changed regarding the dimensions of holistic leadership. It should, however, be kept in mind that the intervention will probably not resolve all the current challenges facing the school principal as leader.
Although the literature review put forward reports on what different writers regard as their contribution to the ongoing debate, an attempt is made to indicate a shift from a bureaucratic to a holistic model in local school governance. This is the reason why the study elicits the perceptions of teachers on the leadership behaviour of their principals and not the community's perceptions. Although discussion of the terms 'charismatic leadership', 'transactional leadership' and 'transformational leadership' do not always shed light on this 'bigger picture' distinction and trend in the two extremes, it clarifies the conversation that is taking place.
There are clear differences between the leadership required (in importance and competence) in the case of bureaucratic and holistic leadership. Bureaucratic leadership involves ensuring clear focus and communication, strong and accurate information systems so that each level in the organisation is aware of and adhering to the organisational objective. Holistic leadership requires negotiation of meaning; securing compromises; maintaining alliances and mutual tolerance and encouraging collaboration. All this as previous research (Grobler & Van der Merwe, 1996) has indicated, culminates in the seven aspects of holistic leadership, namely: the creation of a professionally inviting culture; effective communication; an ethical foundation; a vision of excellence; the empowerment of followers; personal mastery and authentic collaboration.
One of the main ethical considerations was that the researcher would respect the dignity of the people involved and would not expose them to intentions and motives not directly related to the research project. Respect for the autonomy of the participants required that the participants were treated as unique human persons within the context of his or her community system. Freedom of choice was safeguarded by only involving principals who agreed to participate. It is also important that the questions asked were valid and reliable. To this end the researchers first conducted a pilot survey in order to determine the clarity of the questionnaire items and whether they could validly and reliably discriminate between the participants on the variables under scrutiny (Heiman, 2001). The content validity was checked by handing the questionnaire to 20 school principals who were not part of the research and the reliability of their answers was determined using the Cronbach Alpha reliability measure. The wording in five of the items was adjusted because of the feedback received from the principals. The confidentiality of the respondents was respected. The research findings and conclusions were made available to the respondents of all schools in the province. Furthermore a covering letter was included with the questionnaires, informing the respondents that their anonymity would be maintained and respected and the findings and conclusions would be stated in such a way that no school would be identified. Respondents were requested to provide honest responses so as to ensure the authenticity of the research. Finally, consent and approval by the Mpumalanga Department of Education were obtained.
The intervention programme
Leadership development is a complex process because individual adults learn in many different ways, consciously or unconsciously, in an unmanaged, self-managed or another-personmanaged way (Baldwin & Patgett, 1994). The model of Beeka (2009) indicates that the seven factors in educational leadership function in a holistic way.
With respect to the model in Figure 1 the ethical foundation influences effective communication, personal mastery and authentic collaboration in a direct way, where direct refers to a single arrow with no intermediary dimension in between (Arbuckle, 2007). This indicates the importance of an ethical foundation as it involves elements of trust, mutual respect and doing that which you espouse to be doing. All these elements need to be present if effective communication is to occur. Further to this direct influence of an ethical foundation a professionally inviting culture is in turn influenced by effective communication (an intermediary) in an indirect way and authentic collaboration and a professionally inviting culture both also influence the empowerment of educators indirectly. Empowered educators and effective communication indirectly influence the achievement of a vision of excellence which includes the moral imperative of enhancing student learning. This indicates that the seven factors involved in educational leadership influence one another in a holistic way and one needs to consider this when designing an intervention model for school principals. In the light of the above finding the ethical foundation was used as a basis and multiple modes of presentation such as group work and self-reflection strategies were used in the intervention programme (Paauwe & Williams, 2001). During the intervention the 20 principals involved completed both sections of the questionnaire regarding the importance of and their perception of their present competence regarding holistic leadership before the intervention programme. The principals completed both sections of the questionnaire independently of one another regarding the importance and their perception of their present competence regarding holistic leadership. The principals were then divided into seven groups and each group was then given an opportunity to name one of the groups of questions belonging to a particular dimension. For example, every five questions were grouped according to the seven factors found by Grobler and Van Der Merwe (1996) and provided with a suitable name. In the original research, questions 11 to 15 were named an ethical foundation but the principals involved in the training suggested numerous alternative names. This gave rise to intensive debate and reflection on the part of the principals as to the importance of an ethical foundation with respect to leadership. Once the names for the seven factors had been considered, the 20 principals were asked to indicate possible causal links between the seven factors using only the latent factors as represented by the model in Figure 1. This was done because there are a large number of possible causal links and this allowed principals to consider, for example, whether one could communicate or collaborate effectively if one does not have a moral basis for doing so. The various alternative models suggested by the principals were then compared to the model of Beeka (2009) as this model was confirmed (CFA) using structural equation modelling. The model as a whole displayed suitable fit indices (Arbuckle, 2007:586-592) with all pathways being statistically significant. To improve the fit of the model two error terms were allowed to co-vary. The various measures of fit used are provided in Figure 1. In the final stage, the principals completed the questionnaire again and then scored themselves with respect to the seven factors for both importance and competence to compare their pre-and post intervention scores.
The intervention programme and the biographic variables served as independentvariables and the mean scores on the seven factors were dependent variables. The hypothesis was that the intervention programme would cause a statistically significant change in the mean scores between the pre-and post-tests of the group of principals as perceived by their teachers with respect to their competence in these seven aspects of holistic leadership.
In the research, the quantitative method of research was utilized. Creswell (2003) and Mc-Millan and Schumacher (2004) maintain that quantitative research is concerned with establishing relationships and giving a possible explanation of the causes of changes in the perceptions of various groups involved. The researchers also used multivariate analysis of variance to probe possible relationships and differences between the various independent groups among the teachers but this is not reported in this article due to limitations of length. This research used a literature survey to elucidate and determine the essence of holistic leadership and guided by the model of Beeka (2009) designed a pre- and post-test intervention programme to determine whether a possible change in teachers' perceptions towards their principals' dimensions of leadership could be realized.
One can argue that a limitation of this study is the relatively short period between the training and the gathering of data from the teachers. It is however important to realise that the trend towards perceptions of enhanced leadership are clearly gleaned from the data and a follow-up project may be designed to establish to what extent the training enhances sustained leadership development in the behaviour of principals over a longer period.
Description of the sample
The schools in the province are spread over a wide geographic area and are divided into 10 districts. We selected three districts and 40 schools were randomly chosen from these districts. The principals had only limited occasion to receive training as their schools could not afford to have them away from school - the Department of Education had strict regulations regarding absence from school to receive training of any kind. Also, the more schools involved in the training the better. Because we wanted to obtain the perceptions of the teachers regarding the principals' leadership in an experimental design, we had to make use of the same respondents on two different occasions.
The wide geographic distribution of schools also complicated the sample and schools that were mostly classified as urban were involved as the training centre was situated in an urban area. Respondents from 22 secondary and 18 from primary schools were involved. The researchers went to each of the 40 selected schools personally and asked the principal's permission to involve each school. The researchers made use of the staff enrolment lists and selected 10 permanent teachers from each school and handed out questionnaires to complete after explaining the ethical considerations carefully. These questionnaires were personally collected by the researchers one week later from the respondents in a sealed envelope. The researchers used a code which only they knew to assist them to identify the same respondents a second time. At the same time the 20 selected principals were invited to attend a training programme in one month's time and they formed the experimental group. Due to logistic, economic and other regulatory reasons, the intervention programme could only last one day. However, the researchers were able to have one more workshop with the 20 principals, two weeks after the initial training, where group discussions and reflection about leadership dimensions were interrogated. The researchers also took time to oversee the distribution of the questionnaires for the pre-tests. Four hundred (400) questionnaires were distributed in this manner. For the pre-test 360 were returned and could be used for analytical purposes. One hundred and ninety (190) were from the experimental group and 170 from the control group of schools. Therefore, the response rate was 90% and these data were submitted for analysis to the statistical consultancy (STATKON) of the University of Johannesburg. Approximately two months after the training programme had taken place the researchers again visited the schools and handed the same questionnaire to the same respondents to complete and place in a sealed envelope. This involved travelling and effort but the co-operation of the educators was excellent and a good return was assured. Of the 400 questionnaires, 350 had data that could be used, representing a return rate of 87.5%. The researchers then used only the 350 respondents who had completed both pre-and post-tests. Of the 350 respondents, 190 were from the schools whose principals had been trained while 160 were from the control group whose principals were not trained.
Both pre-test and post-test data were analysed using the SPSS 15.0 (Field, 2009) programme. Both sets of data were subjected to factor analytic procedures and in both pre- and post-tests the data reduction resulted in the same factors. Because both pre- and post-tests gave rise to the same factors, it was decided to use only the results of the post-test in describing the bio-and demographic characteristics of the sample.
Analysis of the biographical data from the questionnaire
The various biographic details are now briefly discussed.
The sample of 350 respondents consisted of 79 (22.6%) male and 271 (77.4%) female respondents. The ratio of male to female educators in Mpumalanga is about 1:3 (Department of Education, 2006) hence this sample (1:3.4) can be said to be representative of gender of teachers for Mpumalanga. Fifty-five (55) (15.7%) were deputy principals and 295 (84.3%) were educators. The ratio of management (deputy principals) to educators should be about 1:5 and hence this sample (1:5.4) also represents management to educators in Mpumalanga. The sample had 110 (31.4%) educators with less than 10 years teaching experience and 240 (68.6%) with 10 or more years teaching experience. The majority of the sample thus consisted of educators who could be classified as experienced teachers. Of the 350 respondents, 296 (84.6%) had male principals and 54 (15.4%) had female principals. Schools in Mpumalanga have never had sufficient female principals and this legacy of the past appears to have remained. Males are still over-represented with respect to gender of school principals. Of the 350 respondents, 279 (79.7%) perceived their learners as belonging to the average and below average and poor socio-economic groups and 71 (20.3%) perceived their learners as belonging to the above average socio-economic group. This is fairly representative of socio-economic status of learners in Mpumalanga. One hundred and eighty-seven (187) teachers (53.4%) were from secondary schools and 163 (46.6%) from primary schools. The sample was selected as 55% secondary schools and 45% primary schools and this is representative of the selected sample. The sample is, however, over-representative of secondary schools in Mpumalanga (DoE, 2006).
Further analysis of the data from the questionnaire: analysis of the pre- and post-test results
There was a vast amount of data and researchers had to select relevant data for analysis. In order to follow the analysis more clearly the original categories were collapsed and recoded. The original six-point scale was collapsed to a four-point scale with 1 being equal to 'not important at all' to 'relatively unimportant' and 'totally' to 'partially incompetent' and 4 as representing 'very important' and 'extremely competent'.
The items in the questionnaire for both pre-and post-tests were subjected to a factor analytic process and in both pre- and post-tests seven factors were obtained. The reliability coefficients obtained are summarized in Table 1.
As all reliability coefficients were above 0.7 and 74.05% of variance could be explained by these factors, it was decided that these seven factors could be used in the pre- and post-test analysis. If the hypothesis is correct then the post-test group which followed the intervention programme should show a significant difference in their competence mean scores with respect to the dimensions of holistic leadership, as perceived by their teachers. A simplified diagram of the process followed is provided in Figure 2.
The data in Table 2 indicate no statistically significant differences between any of the seven factors between experimental and control groups on the pre-tests regarding their perceived importance. The respondents had the perception that the seven factors were important for school principals. However, on the post-tests there was a statistically significant difference between the teachers' perceptions of the competence of their principals in the experimental group only. The teachers' perceptions regarding the importance with respect to the seven leadership dimensions showed no statistically significant differences on any of the leadership dimensions. The teachers of the principals who were exposed to the intervention programme and belonged to the experimental groups thus had the perception that the competence of their principals regarding the dimensions of holistic leadership had improved. The teachers belonging to the control group had no such perception. It thus appears that the intervention programme resulted in a significant improvement in the perceived competence in the seven leadership dimensions of the 20 principals who were exposed to the intervention programme.
Using R2 for interpretation of pre- and post-test results
The coefficient of determination (R2) is a measure of the amount of variability in one variable that is explained by the other (Field, 2009). This is best shown by plotting the pre-test mean scores of the importance and post-test categories using a scatter-plot as is shown in Figure 3:
The R2 value of 0.994 indicates that 99.4% of the variance in the pre-test importance means can be explained by the post-test importance means. The two variables are highly correlated (r = e0.994 = 0.997). The perceptions of the respondents therefore did not change significantly between the pre-and post tests regarding the importance of the dimensions of holistic leadership. If one assumes that all the independent variables in Section A of the questionnaire remained more or less the same (the respondents were the same and the time period was relatively short) then the respondents' perceptions about the importance of the holistic leadership on pre-and post-test remained virtually the same.
When one plots the competence means of pre- and post-tests then the scatter plot in Figure 4 is obtained.
The R2 value of 0.070 indicates that only 7% of the variance in the pre-test competence means can be explained by the post-test means. Hence 93% of the variance in the post-test had to be due to other variables. As the respondents for pre- and post-tests were the same then it is likely that the intervention programme had a significant influence on the respondents' perceptions about their principals' holistic leadership. The research hypothesis is thus accepted. Note that it is not stated that the intervention programme was the cause of the change but only that the substantive effect (effect size) of the pre-competence test on the post-competence test was not important and one is thus to a large extent eliminating the influence of the one competence test on the other. To change the perceptions of the same teachers on the same principal's holistic leadership in such a short period of two months may indicate that the intervention programme was the independent variable mainly responsible for this.
One of the most pertinent findings of this research was that principals who were exposed to the intervention programme regarding the seven dimensions of holistic leadership were perceived by their teachers to be more competent than their counterparts who were not exposed to the programme. These principals thus have a greater probability of impacting positively on their schools.
The holistic model presents a schematic representation and the various pathways give a visual portrayal of the relationship among the dimensions investigated. Such a model is a powerful mnemonic. One of the leaders of a group involved in the intervention programme worded it rather well when she indicated that it seemed to them that
"if a vision of excellence is based on an ethical foundation of improving learner achievements, a leader will need to effectively communicate such a vision to all concerned. A leader cannot achieve a vision of excellence on his/her own and hence the creation of a climate conducive to professional development and collaborative efforts to enhance commitment from all teachers is important if one is to empower your followers towards a common goal. In all of this the leader must use the personal mastery skills and utilize the passion and teaching skills that elevated him/her to the leadership position in the first place. Leadership is more than just the sum of is constituent pathways".
The holistic model presented is a good starting point as it can be contextualised to the school where the leader is situated. However other possible pathways between the various dimensions need to be investigated.
The follow-up research to establish the sustainability of the training on the performance of principals, as viewed by teachers over a longer period, is another area for further investigation.
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Taylor N, Muller J & Vinjevold P 2004. Leadership behaviour of the high school principal and assistant principal for instruction. The High School Journal, 78:172-182. [ Links ] | <urn:uuid:d9675d73-5512-486b-ac34-6d194dc59526> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0256-01002012000100004&lng=es&nrm=iso&tlng=en | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952158 | 8,152 | 1.828125 | 2 |
Abstract: The strong focus of recent High End Computing efforts on performance has resulted in a low-level parallel programming paradigm characterized by explicit control over message-passing in the framework of a fragmented programming model. In such a model, object code performance is achieved at the expense of productivity, conciseness, and clarity.
This paper describes the design of Chapel, the Cascade High Productivity Language, which is being developed in the DARPA-funded HPCS project Cascade led by Cray Inc. Chapel pushes the state-of-the-art in languages for HEC system programming by focusing on productivity, in particular by combining the goal of highest possible object code performance with that of programmability offered by a high-level user interface. The design of Chapel is guided by four key areas of language technology: multithreading, locality-awareness, object-orientation, and generic programming. The Cascade architecture, which is being developed in parallel with the language, provides key architectural support for its efficient implementation. | <urn:uuid:756480b2-ee1d-4b31-a0c6-61208d7ee7aa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://chapel.cray.com/publications/hips04.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940349 | 204 | 1.835938 | 2 |
Twitter can now take down a tweet in one country while leaving it available for the rest of the world to peruse at leisure.
"Censorship!" screamed the more excitable members of the media. "It's SOCIAL SUICIDE!!1!"
But cool your jets and consider: over 250 million tweets are posted each day and much as I like to think that everyone on the internet is a decent sort of chap, I've been on YouTube so I know this isn't true.
It doesn't seem fair for Twitter to be drawn into huge legal battles that will cost the free service millions of pounds because some people have used it to do bad stuff. And by bad, we mean illegal because Twitter's only taking down tweets that are actually illegal in a specific country.
To punish Twitter for what its users say is like making the whole class stay behind because whoever put a drawing pin on the teacher's seat won't own up.
What's more, Twitter is a free service. None of us pay for it, and it's struggling to make money as it is, so if this new granular process will save it from buckling under the weight of IP lawsuits and the like, then that's a good thing.
So I'm all for Twitter being able to geographically remove tweets when they infringe on copyrights and break laws in some countries but not in others – and you can scream censorship all you like, but keeping the tweets available elsewhere, notifying users, explaining why and making it clear that a tweet has been removed doesn't sound like straight up censorship to me.
Perhaps Twitter's mistake was in not making it clear exactly how and when tweets will be taken down.
I spoke with a representative of the company who explained that takedowns will only happen in reaction to valid legal process: "we won't do anything proactively".
That's where Chilling Effects comes in – you can easily look through the cease and desist orders sent to Twitter, see what tweets they're in reference to and specifically why it's been requested that they be taken down. So if you're concerned about this specific kind of "censorship" you need to look at the rights' holders and their motives, not Twitter's.
Twitter also confused the issue a little by saying, "[Some countries], for historical or cultural reasons, restrict certain types of content, such as France or Germany, which ban pro-Nazi content."
It was fair to assume that pro-Nazi tweets are going to be removed in Germany and France because they're legally banned, so how will Twitter police this? Short answer: it won't. We asked if there was any automated filtering and received the following response:
"We will not do any proactive filtering or moderation of content. We will only respond, reactively, to a valid legal request."
So that satirically pro-Nazi joke you're about to make will, theoretically, be available in Germany until a legal request is made for it to be taken down.
Some companies may well be out to get you – but Twitter isn't one of them. It has proven time and again to be on the side of free speech and on the side of its users.
Crying censorship may make life a bit more exciting and accusing Twitter of social suicide sure makes for a nice sibilant headline, but it's just another storm in a teacup. | <urn:uuid:02eccbef-ba5c-494e-9c4f-5d2b65a9445b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.techradar.com/news/internet/twitter-tweet-takedowns-censorship-or-sensible-1058152 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964928 | 692 | 1.742188 | 2 |
I'm a developer in a company whose products are deployed overseas. When a support team comes in asking about a problem definition, my only tools for diagnosis are my log files and a copy of the customer's database. Using the database and my development environment, I have the opportunity to reproduce the erroneous case, because I log the incoming data to my module and the related actions. If I can reproduce the error with the help of the data I gather, then I can fix it with debugging. If I had no log files, then I would have to depend on the customer's or the support team's description of what happens in what case (which has a big chance of misleading).
Secondly, logging gives me the chance to detect the bottlenecks of my module at the deployed site, since I log the date&time of certain actions and then I can have a look at which action consumes how much time.
In addition to that, suppose our solution consists of 6 modules and I'm seeing error logs in my log files about database timeouts. If these errors are logged in 5 of the other modules too, then the probability that this is an SQL server related issue gets bigger. If this is logged only in my module, then the probability that my queries are buggy gets bigger. I think these kinds of things are useful indicators.
About what kind of data I see in my log files depends on the configuration of the log level. If this is a new product, we set the log level to "All" to gather as much data as we can. But when we improve the product, we may prefer to keep the log level at "Error" to log only the error, but not the information level logs, etc... | <urn:uuid:5a10ed0e-5b72-4f32-8e95-a0f9c6727733> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/37294/logging-why-and-what/37682 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939538 | 349 | 1.585938 | 2 |
A Winning Resume for Online Students
February 10th, 2012 by Dr. Bruce Johnson
As a student working toward your career goals, you may be ready to start sending out your resume to potential employers. One of the challenges you will face is getting your resume noticed – at least long enough for a recruiter or hiring manager to become interested enough to call you. As you enter a tough job market it is important for you to stand out from other candidates by demonstrating skills you’ve acquired throughout the learning process – in a way that stands out from other potential candidates.
In my last post, Can a Badge Certify Your Academic Credentials?, I talked about the development of digital badges for use in higher education as a means of documenting your skillsets. The purpose of these badges is to demonstrate that learning occurs inside and outside of the classroom, and more importantly, it is meant to show that you have valuable skills to offer a potential employer. However, I have raised several questions about the use of badges. What will employers accept outside of the formal classroom learning environment as valid evidence that you are ready for the workplace? For example, if you had a badge that represented a skill such as leadership, would it indicate that you are ready to begin leading a team?
Through completion of a degree you acquire a specific knowledge base and developed a set of academic skills, which can transfer to the workplace. Students may not know how to present these skills in a manner that an employer can relate to when reviewing their resumes for a job opening. I have been involved in the process of resume writing and career coaching for several years and understand the potential obstacles that students face when they write their own resumes.
Recently I taught my marketing students how to write a winning resume because a resume represents the ultimate marketing tool for them My approach to resume writing involves the development of a skillset-based resume (sometimes referred to as a functional resume) instead of a chronological-based resume, which takes the emphasis off of your current employment status and focuses instead on the skills you’ve acquired from your degree program, including skills acquired from any other jobs you’ve worked along the way.
Developing a Structure
One of the first changes I make with the development of a skillset-based resume is to change the format of the traditional resume (referred to as a chronological resume). The Purdue Online Writing Lab, which is a popular academic writing resource, lists the following categories within the Resume Presentation section: Contact information, Objective, Education, Experience, Honors, and Activities. The recommended length for a traditional resume is one page.
In this traditional/chronological approach, I recommend eliminating the objective section. This will open up additional space on your document and avoid giving the impression that you have decided this is the only career or position you are seeking, which may also indicate inflexibility or an unwillingness to consider other options. In addition, your cover letter is the place to identify the position you are applying for, which negates the need to state it again on the resume.
In a resume that focuses on skillsets, I recommend the following categories: Contact, Professional Summary, Skillsets, Education, Experience, Honors, and Activities. Most students will have a completed resume that is one to two pages in length because of inclusion of these sections; therefore, it is important to use clear and concise statements – instead of long paragraphs. Monster.com provides an example of a skillset-based resume (referred to as a functional resume) that is somewhat similar to the approach I recommend. When you view the sample you can visually assess how skillsets are put together.
Formatting the Resume
A winning resume needs to be easily readable because most recruiters or hiring managers will quickly scan through the document to determine if your background is a match for the position. Use an easy-to-read font such as Arial 10 point or 11 point, along with short bulleted statements that contain action words and power phrases – which is likely to keep the reviewer interested in reading the rest of the resume as it better describe your achievements and potential. Another important aspect is to avoid the use of over-utilized, cliché phrases such as “thinking outside of the box” or being a “team player” as they have become almost ineffective in their meaning. Demonstrate, through the use of your words, what skills you possess rather than state general job descriptions.
Professional Summary: This section should contain bulleted statements that present an overview of your characteristics, strengths, or qualities that represent you and your background. Think about those qualities that you want a prospective employer to know about first and consider how you would summarize them. Be sure that what you list is relevant to the career or job you are interested in.
Skillsets: For this section, I recommend you develop two to three specific sections that are related to your targeted career. For example, if you are targeting a sales position, you may want to develop the following skillset sections: sales, customer relationships, communication, and/or new business development. The way to craft each section is to examine your background, previous jobs, and skills you’ve acquired through your classwork, along with participation in class discussions.
Action Words: This is the start for transforming statements within your resume into powerful skill set summaries. For example, you can take a statement such as “I was a sales person” and transform it with the use of an action word, turning it into “Negotiated sales contracts.” This is a very basic example; however, it demonstrates the power of our word choices. Here is a list of actions words to help get you started: acquired, administered, allocated, analyzed, assessed, coached, conducted, designed, developed, evaluated, facilitated, implemented, increased, maintained, negotiated, operated, organized, performed, planned, prepared, presented, processed, recruited, reviewed, scheduled, trained, and wrote.
Power Phrases: This is the final step for the development of skillset statements. Take action words and make each statement you write very specific. For example, transform “negotiated sales contracts” into “successfully negotiated sales contracts and exceeded all sales quotas.” This is a very effective method of demonstrating your skills, abilities, and talents.
Education: What I recommend for inclusion in this section, in addition to your degree program, are any courses, classes, workshops, or seminars that are related to your skillsets – to further demonstrate what you have learned. This approach provides support for the power phrases listed. When listing your degree it may be helpful to include course titles that are directly related to your targeted job. This will further document the career-specific knowledge you’ve acquired.
Experience: Avoid the inclusion of lengthy job descriptions in verbose paragraphs. Once again, utilize short, concise, bulleted statements that provide essential elements for each position as a means of demonstrating skills in action. Also include accomplishments and achievements to strengthen your value and document your contributions to the success of the company.
What I’ve provided is an alternate approach for development of your resume, one that is especially helpful for online students who need to document knowledge and skills acquired throughout their degree programs. A skillset-based approach puts the emphasis on what you have acquired, which will increase your confidence when you are talking to a potential employer. Whether or not you are currently working in the career you have targeted, you possess transferrable skills and this resume format will help to highlight them.
What resume challenges have you experienced? Share your feedback via Twitter @DrBruceJ.
Photo © Kate Kunz/Corbis | <urn:uuid:7fe4f3b0-436c-4707-9377-b07a872bde04> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.onlinecollegecourses.com/2012/02/10/a-winning-resume-for-online-students/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95659 | 1,575 | 1.671875 | 2 |
High: 84°F ~ Low: 66°F
Tuesday, May 21, 2013
Don't forget the three CsPosted Wednesday, February 23, 2011, at 1:09 PM
Guess I didn't follow the three "C" rule to prevent flu and other maladies, or maybe someone else didn't follow the rules, because some kind of epizootic got hold of me last week and knocked me for a loop.
The three "C" rules are Clean, as in washing your hands frequently, and Cover, as in cover your coughs and sneezes, and Contain, as in contain your own germs by staying home if your are sick.
In my case, it wasn't a stomach thing but bronchial and I didn't even have a smidgeon of a cold or congestion before the body ache and the coughing and wheezing hit overnight. Wham. Not been that sick for a long, long while -- I was out for a week. Wasn't much of a vacation. It was so severe I thought I was cracking ribs -- still sore when I headed back to work on Monday.
All this, and I had my flu shot last fall so thought I was immune to whatever came around. Not so. Mine was apparently not a viral but a bacterial thing because the antibiotics worked and helped me turn the corner to kick it -- so happy I have a wonderful family doctor.
As I write this, I'm getting ready to head back to the courthouse to do a lot of catching up, and I'm happy to be out and about again.
Others in my family were sick with the same thing too and it made us painfully aware that we need to step up our habits to try and prevent the spread of things in the house. When one of us goes down, we all go down.
So here's some of the usual tips and reminders for prevention of bad bugs (specifically the flu but these tips are good for bacterial bugs too) from the Indiana Department of Health:
Healthy Habits and Virus Prevention
Every individual shares the responsibility for reducing the spread of the influenza virus. Keeping healthy through proper hygiene, social distancing, covering one's cough, and isolation when illness does occur goes a long way towards reducing the rate of infection in the community. Educating others helps minimize the spread of influenza as well.
Good Health Habits Can Help Stop Germs
Avoid close contact with people who are sick. When you are sick, keep your distance from others to protect them from getting sick too.
Stay home from work, school, and errands when you are sick. Keep sick children at home. You will help prevent others from catching the illness.
Cover your mouth and nose with a tissue when coughing or sneezing. Throw the tissue in the trash after you use it. Then wash your hands.
Washing your hands and the hands of your children often will help protect you from germs.
Avoid touching your eyes, nose or mouth. Germs are often spread when a person touches something that is contaminated with germs and then touches his or her eyes, nose, or mouth.
Practice other good health habits. Get plenty of sleep, be physically active, manage your stress, drink plenty of fluids, and eat nutritious food.
It is important for people living in the affected areas to take steps to prevent spreading the virus to others. If people are ill, they should stay at home and limit contact with others, except to seek medical care. Healthy residents living in these areas should take the everyday preventive actions listed above.
People living in affected areas who develop an illness with fever and respiratory symptoms, such as cough and runny nose, and possibly other symptoms, such as body aches, nausea, or vomiting or diarrhea, should contact their health care provider. The health care provider will determine whether influenza testing is needed.
Anna is a staff writer at the Greene County Daily World and can be reached by calling the office at 847-4487 or by sending an email to firstname.lastname@example.org .
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TheParanormalSarah, on Dec 25 2010, 08:38 PM, said:
EVP is still what you refer to when discussing what you find as 'evidence' from the Frank's Box or Shack Hack. Electronic Voice Phenom is perhaps what some believe to be conscious energy MANIPULATING energy from the Electromagnetic spectrum to communicate with us (the living).
Researchers do not believe the voices aren't possibly radio stations; in fact you try and measure the sweeping to see what the possible sentence link would be. YOu also try and rationalize with logic how intelligent and/or responsive the results are to your questions to rule out chance. No radio is designed to speak with the dead but the hacks are designed in order to try. With sweeping, removing the mute pin and enhancing the white noise you are trying to provide opportunity.
Why use this form? Because intent has a lot to do with intelligent communication. When researchers arrive, announce their presence and bring a tool that provides opportunity, well... logic tells us that you use the easiest means necessary. Conscious energy or what I call 'ghosts' do the same.
If one considers this as a viable method then it also is a requirement to understand the exact method such "white noise" and portions of sentences are manipulated. That includes the precise voltage requirements to select the desired station these boxes tune to at the precise instant needed to assemble the desired phrase.
Digital tuning is done by placing a DC voltage on the tuning input of a chip which sets the frequency of the local oscillator. In AM this frequency is hetrodyned, or beat against the radio station frequency of the desired station. A difference, or IF frequency, is derived, amplified and detected. In a nutshell, this is how modern radio works.
Now if the spirit is to cause a reception of a particular station it must be able to place the precise DC voltage on the tuning pin needed to get the desired station. Plus it must do so without error and only for the time period required to pick up the phoneme or phrase it wants, then immediately switch to the next station by seamlessly changing the DC voltage on the tuning input. Since most phonemes of speech last from 50 - 200 msec. this is the rate that the spirit must select phonemes. If one can explain how the spirit is able to control the tuning voltage with this level of precision then an argument might be made for a ghost box.
But there is yet one more vital factor to consider as evidenced from the above paragraph. Even if the spirit were able to achieve this level of control, it still has to know WHICH station to select. That means it has to listen to all available stations AND know what the announcer is going to say before he says it! Otherwise how can the spirit choose a station?
Like most ITC methods this is fraught with problems. But you are correct in one aspect. If a spirit wishes to communicate it will use the easiest method available. That would be simply physical manipulation of something present. Or possibly causing an electrical disturbance which can be directly picked up and amplified. After all if this hypothetical spirit can manipulate a DC control pin on a chip it must be able to generate an electrical signal. So rather than add a bunch of garbage in the form of white noise or other interference, why not use a good high gain amplifier and a quiet environment so that the spirit need not generate such a high level signal to get over our noise? Everyone knows we can hear better in a quiet room than in a noisy environment, so why not make it easy for the spirit to be heard? | <urn:uuid:10a66b89-f89e-4066-b8c7-529f4dd085b6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ghostvillage.com/ghostcommunity/index.php?s=08bdfee5d1fa099108682427353b3222&showtopic=23532&st=15&p=542818&forceDownload=1&_k=880ea6a14ea49e853634fbdc5015a024 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941983 | 736 | 1.648438 | 2 |
By Dabney Miller, WLP Associate Director
Philadelphia is finally getting a new Family Courthouse. Construction reached the topping off point on May 2, 2013, when dignitaries, advocates, and construction workers signed a beam, which was then hoisted to the top of the sixteenth floor, amid cheers from the crowd. Ten years ago, the Women’s Law Project released Justice in the Domestic Relations Division of Philadelphia Family Court: A Report to the Community. Our lead recommendation was a new courthouse; we argued that critical concerns about safety, openness, and the fair dispensing of justice could not be addressed in the current building, which is a labyrinth of crowded, narrow halls, courtrooms too small for observers, and waiting rooms where conflict plays out. Our report became a rallying cry, and we are delighted to have been part of the Topping-Off Ceremony for the new Family Courthouse, which will also unify the juvenile and domestic relations divisions.
Much remains to be done, however. Tens of thousands of people come to this Court each year to resolve personal and intimate family matters involving domestic violence, child support, child custody, divorce, and dependency. Profound and life-altering decisions are made in the Court about where and with whom children will live, when and under what circumstances parents may see their children, and who will make decisions about the education, health care, and religious upbringing of children. Its judges have the awesome responsibility of issuing orders to protect people from violence and stalking. It is imperative that those coming to the new Courthouse find justice after they arrive. Above all else, the courthouse must be a place that litigants can come and go without fear and where children and parents may have safe and supervised visits when required by the law. Second, the court must be open to the public consistent with constitutional standards. The bright light of open courts always leads to fairer processes and outcomes. Third, this courthouse must be accessible to those Philadelphians who may not be able to read or understand legal processes. Ninety per cent of Family Court litigants cannot afford lawyers, so they must advocate for themselves in an intimidating system, often at a time of crisis in their lives. Many technologies now exist to assist them in completing forms and filing petitions. These technologies, along with trained staff who are motivated to help, will make all the difference for Philadelphia’s families. Finally, the court must be adequately staffed so that judges, masters, conference officers, and other individuals who work with the public have time to handle their cases in a way that assures the litigants that their positions are heard and carefully considered. | <urn:uuid:9fa83667-7b5d-4e23-8210-9ea3cef5cc32> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://womenslawproject.wordpress.com/tag/womens-law-project/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964814 | 539 | 1.5 | 2 |
Best Partnership Finalists: WellPoint with Boys & Girls Clubs of America
WellPoint’s healthcare expertise, industry insights, employee talent, public policy advocacy, and charitable contributions are all being leveraged to change the course of an important health issue in the United States. The linkages are strong between the value of the company and the health and wellness of its customers. To be a healthy company, WellPoint is making it a point to support healthy individuals. What better partner than Boys & Girls Clubs of America to arm youth today with the tools and knowledge they need to make healthy decisions for a lifetime.
One-third of American children are considered overweight or obese – triple the rate from one generation ago. Overweight adolescents have a 70% chance of becoming overweight or obese adults; untreated, childhood obesity can lead to serious health consequences, including diabetes, heart disease, cancer, asthma, depression, and other life-threatening illnesses. Obese patients spend an average of 42% more for medical care than those within a normal weight range. Additionally, obesity costs the U.S. healthcare industry approximately $147 billion annually.
Triple Play was launched with support from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and aligns with its Steps to a Healthier U.S. initiative.
Triple Play is the largest wellness endeavor undertaken by Boys & Girls Clubs.
WellPoint Inc., one of the nation’s largest health plan providers, formed a partnership with Boys & Girls Clubs of America to expand the nonprofit organization’s “Triple Play” program, a wellness initiative to show youth how eating right, keeping fit, and forming positive relationships add up to healthy lifestyles. WellPoint supports Triple Play through a $5 million multi-year grant, employee volunteerism, and leadership and healthcare expertise that benefits the program’s development.
The goal of the Triple Play program is to improve young people’s knowledge of healthy habits, increase the number of hours per day they participate in physical activities, and strengthen their ability to engage in positive relationships.
The Triple Play program has identified numerous best practices that are producing the greatest results, which it shares across other Boys & Girls Clubs locations. Best practices include:
- Educating children and families about healthy food choices and portion control
- Introducing nutritious daily snacks and water in place of sugary treats and drinks
- Distributing healthy recipes on a weekly basis
- Teaching members how to read ingredients on nutrition labels
- Replacing the kinds of food and drink choices in onsite vending machines
- Partnering with local food banks to provide healthy food for Boys & Girls Clubs members
- Introducing a new fruits, vegetables and sports to children each week
- Initiating a daily “Power Hour” that utilizes high-yield physical activities
What the Partnership Has Accomplished
To date, Triple Play has helped more than 1 million kids learn the importance of physical activity and proper nutrition. Promising Practices Network (PPN) validated and named Triple Play a “Program that Works.” PPN offers research-based information to validate the effectiveness of programs that improve the lives of children, families, and communities and is referred to as a “best practices” resource. PPN-listed programs have met high standards of scientific credibility, objectivity, and clarity. The network is led by the RAND Corporation, one of the world’s premiere research organizations.
Why It Makes Sense
Individually, WellPoint and Boys & Girls Clubs have strong national networks. WellPoint serves 34 million people through its health plans and another 65 million people through its subsidiaries. It has 37,000 employees in U.S. communities. Boys & Girls Clubs extend across the United States and have established relationships with key stakeholders such as parents, health providers, schools, governments, and other nonprofits. Together, these partners are capable of creating a movement that reaches into households and makes a lasting impact against the obesity epidemic. | <urn:uuid:49ba6613-b495-44c2-9e84-bc44de9603ea> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://bclc.uschamber.com/citizens2012/best-partnership-finalists-wellpoint-boys-girls-clubs-america | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939246 | 817 | 1.640625 | 2 |
By Molly Redfield
In our new Saturday Series, we interview inspiring people our readers have nominated. These people are working on the frontlines to improve the global food and agricultural systems. Want to nominate someone? E-mail your suggestions to Danielle Nierenberg!
Name: Katie Martin
Affiliation: M·CAM/Heritable Innovation Trust
Bio: Katie Martin graduated in 2011 from Christopher Newport University with a BA in history. Many of her classes not only documented world history, but also analyzed oral history and other oral traditions. In 2008, Katie interned for M·CAM’s Heritable Innovation Trust (HIT). Now she is a program coordinator with HIT and travels with the organization documenting traditional practices and processes of communities across Papua New Guinea, Mongolia, and Ecuador.
Can you tell me about the “Heritable Knowledge Framework and the Development of Communal Innovation Trusts” document and how it contributed to the founding of the Heritable Innovation Trust?
The Heritable Knowledge Framework sets out the specific methods for engaging groups that want to work with us. The document states how we should approach communities (they invite us), what artifacts or processes constitute heritable knowledge, and how we should present this knowledge. The document defines heritable knowledge as relating to a continually used item or process that is adapted to an environment or circumstance. Furthermore, heritable knowledge is culturally present through mediums like dance or painting, is valuable to the community, and belongs to not one individual, but the group as a whole. The Heritable Knowledge Framework then tells us what we can do with the knowledge we acquire. With all of our documents we want to respect those who have provided us with their knowledge, honor their traditions, and adjust our actions to their expressed needs.
HIT works around the world in places like Mexico, Papua New Guinea, and Mongolia. Can you describe where exactly HIT has expanded into and why HIT works in these countries?
We started off in Papua New Guinea. The idea for HIT came through a partnership with Theresa Arek in 2008. She is a very dedicated woman with a passion for preserving heritable knowledge. The communities we come to work with don’t use traditional property based system. We offer a way for them to be able to engage the global community. Much of our interactions are through information sharing. We want to find a way for people living in more remote areas to participate in a global community. After our initial trip in Papua New Guinea lots of different communities started asking us to come. Papua New Guinea, now in its 4th iteration, is our most expansive and developed program. In 2010, we expanded and made partners and contacts in Mongolia and Ecuador. We want to continue to go to many places and build up HIT. In the very near future, we’ll be starting to send groups to Nepal, Mexico, and Peru with partnerships we have already formed.
What kind of groups and communities does HIT work with and why?
We only go to places we have been invited. We don’t seek out communities. They get in contact with us. Typically we work in some of the most remote communities. They hear of us just through word of mouth. We have so many contacts in the countries we work in. We also have a number of people who work with us as part of our internship program. Thus far, we have worked with an incredible group of university interns, between three and five each year. Working with us gives these students rich experiences with engaging others, especially in situations that are new and perhaps uncomfortable to them. For the communities that we work with, on the other hand, we adapt business strategies that adhere to their values. We work closely with them and increase their connection to the global world. In Mongolia, for example, we provide resources about nomadic communities to the Mongolian government. That way the government can be more familiar with the lives of some of their more remote constituencies.
HIT’s goals are to encourage economic empowerment and community engagement. How does the organization do this?
The heritable knowledge we collect enters into a trust document. Each entry describes the object or process and suggests possible areas of utilization. Many times items and processes have a lot of characteristics that could be adapted for use in other technological arenas. These suggested aligned (similar market) or non-aligned (different market) areas of utilization are presented in a section of the document we refer to as Global Market Consequence. The list of possible markets is endless. The suggestions found in this section are merely a cross-section of possible partnerships. With HIT all information is held under contract law. There’s a set of agreements that people using the information we post subscribe to in order to use it. We have an open flow of values. And people who use HIT have to contribute back to those who shared their heritable knowledge, whether through economic engagements, acknowledgements of credit, or some other forms of reciprocity. HIT works to show that this knowledge is valuable.
What kind of success has HIT had in communities around the world, particularly relevant to food and agriculture?
Our main successes are in regards to food and agriculture. The majority of places that we go are agricultural communities. We have brought a lot of awareness to how communities grow and sustain themselves on various corps and agricultural methods. Different places do agriculture in different ways and our program brings to light these different manifestations. Each community that we go to or spend time in gets a copy of our report afterwards. It is interesting for them to see how other communities do agriculture and this creates a huge database of information sharing. They can then use this knowledge and apply it to problems that they may face.
What future do you imagine for HIT. Additionally, how can governments and other large decision making bodies include heritable knowledge and support (as well as involve!) the indigenous groups that are upholding it?
HIT is relatively new and not that well known. I would like to see it grow. I want to see it expand as a program framework that can be adopted by people anywhere in the world. HIT can also be used to address world issues in ways that people haven’t thought about before. It sheds so much light into areas that are not well known. I see HIT being this huge network that assists communities in helping themselves solve their own problems. So far Mongolia is the best example of a government using HIT. Our work with heritable knowledge helps the Mongolian government see how certain communities have their own unique set of problems and, furthermore, the ways these communities address them. HIT also allows governments to see where communities may need a little bit of extra help and support.
Molly Redfield is a research intern with the Nourishing the Planet project.
To purchase State of the World 2011: Innovations that Nourish the Planet please click HERE.
- Saturday Series: An Interview with Ken Dabkowski
- Saturday Series: An Interview with Nicole Wires
- Saturday Series: An Interview with Sarah Alexander
- Saturday Series: An Interview with Howard Hinterthuer
- Saturday Series: An Interview with Shirley the Baglady
- Saturday Series: An Interview with Bruce Melton
- Saturday Series: An Interview with Aturinde Emmanuel
- Saturday Series: An Interview with Mary McLaughlin | <urn:uuid:a2e495f4-848d-4fbd-a52c-3d4fdc943c78> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.worldwatch.org/nourishingtheplanet/saturday-series-an-interview-with-katie-martin/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950126 | 1,490 | 1.804688 | 2 |
Pacific Heights Residence Design in San Francisco, California
Pacific Heights Residence is a project of Cory Covington for his client withheld. The residence is located in San Francisco, California and completed in 2006. This Project is the Joining and remodel of two adjacent row houses in the Pacific Heights neighborhood of San Francisco.This building consists of three floors, garage on first floor, living room, family room, dining room and kitchen on the second floor and third floor could be used for a private room.
The dominant exterior materials are Neoparies, a crystalline glass wall panel from Japan; Basaltina, a charcoal colored slab stone used on both the façade and exterior paving; and matte finished stainless steel railings and windows. The front façade is dominated by a 30-foot tall vertical “airfoil” fin, which is actually a structural column, and is also made of stainless steel. The circular stair – a dramatic sculpture of stone and stainless steel – is a sensuous ribbon whose effect is heightened by the contrast to the overall rectilinear geometry of the architecture. The interior floors are either wenge hardwood or Brandy Crag, a bluish/gray English stone. | <urn:uuid:4b5c28b9-56cd-4514-819f-4f8ef20d08dc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://bhousedesain.com/residential-design-ideas/pacific-heights-residence-design-in-san-francisco-california.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940617 | 249 | 1.523438 | 2 |
Santa Fe teacher accused of dragging student
Posted at: 12/03/2012 6:21 PM
By: Jill Galus, KOB Eyewitness News 4
Surveillance video that shows a teacher dragging a 6-year-old student on his back down the hallway inside Gonzales Community School in Santa Fe has her on administrative leave, police said.
In the video, the special education teacher, who is not being identified, grabs the boy, who is blind, by his ankles and begins dragging him down the hallway when another teacher joins in and takes him by the other leg. Meanwhile, a third person watches. Helpless, the boy does not struggle or fight back.
The first teacher who laid her hands on the student told police the boy did not want to go to another classroom, and this was her way of getting him there.
"We don't believe the teacher was intentionally trying to hurt the child, but our problem is the blatant neglect for his safety," Sgt. Andrea Dobyns, of the Santa Fe Police Department, said.
Repeated calls to Santa Fe Public Schools were not returned to KOB Eyewitness News 4 for comment Monday.
The student complained his head hurt after being dragged, police said. Officers are still investigating and will speak with the boy's parents to see if there is any history of this sort of discipline with this particular teacher.
"The boy's parents like this teacher. This teacher has been working with their child for quite some time," Dobyns said.
Both teachers seen dragging the boy in the video will be facing child abuse charges. The case will be forwarded to the district attorney's office for review, police said.
The witness could possibly face charges for not reporting the incident, which is required under state law, police said. | <urn:uuid:cdcaddda-86fe-4178-b22d-a5cd63bcb145> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kob.com/article/stories/S2854233.shtml?cat=11687 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.980289 | 367 | 1.539063 | 2 |
by Willy - 7/2/12 10:54 AM
In Reply to: Thanks all for reply by beqqje
Even though the ram slots are 1-4, they're actually known as "banks". There are 2 pair or banks,, as 1 bank = 2 slots. Notice that the ram slots are colored to better ID the bank pair when ram is installed. It's best to install as a pair in order to use the DDRx method of ram use. It may not readily seen if all ram slots are used with similar ram sticks. i still don't see just what ram is allocated in the system, all I saw was slot 1. I like to see full report of all slots. Also, I did see the 512mb for ram, yet I didn't see the 256mb if that what it suppose to be. all, I can say for now, that if that mtrbd. allocates system ram for video use, then that's not the norm for an installed video card. That could be a solution they provided at the time when ram costed $ and/or to better the mtrbd. specs. Either that or your version cpu-Z just confuses the issue.
Was this reply helpful? (1) (0) | <urn:uuid:73081b0c-d2cc-48ab-a5e3-abb6ff6f656e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://forums.cnet.com/7723-7591_102-566962/my-gpu-started-to-use-ram/?messageId=5330237 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963607 | 259 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Most Active Stories
It's All Politics
Tue November 6, 2012
GOP Eyes Gains As Voters In 11 States Pick Governors
Originally published on Tue November 6, 2012 8:03 pm
Voters in 11 states will pick their governors tonight, and Republicans appear on track to increase their numbers by at least one, with the potential to extend their hold to more than two-thirds of the nation's top state offices.
Eight of the gubernatorial seats up for grabs are now held by Democrats; three are in Republican hands. Republicans currently hold 29 governorships, Democrats have 20, and Rhode Island's Gov. Lincoln Chafee is an Independent.
Polls and race analysts suggest that only three of tonight's contests are considered competitive, all in states where incumbent Democratic governors aren't running again: Montana, New Hampshire and Washington.
While those state races remain too close to call, Republicans are expected to wrest the North Carolina governorship from Democratic control, and to easily win GOP-held seats in Utah, North Dakota and Indiana.
Democrats are likely to hold on to their seats in West Virginia and Missouri, and are expected to notch safe wins in races for seats they hold in Vermont and Delaware.
Holding Sway On Health Care
While the occupant of the governor's office is historically far less important than the party that controls the state legislature, top state officials in coming years are expected to wield significant influence in at least one major area.
And that's health care, says political scientist Thad Kousser, co-author of The Power of American Governors.
"No matter who wins the presidency, national politics is going to be stalemated on the Affordable Care Act," says Kousser, of the University of California, San Diego.
A recent U.S. Supreme Court decision giving states the ability to opt out of the law's expansion of Medicaid, the federal insurance program for poor, disabled and elderly Americans, confers "incredible power" on the states and their governors, Kousser says.
Just look at what happened when the Obama administration in 2010 offered federal stimulus money to states to begin building a high-speed rail network. Three Republican governors, including Rick Scott of Florida and Scott Walker of Wisconsin, rejected a share of the money citing debt and deficit concerns.
"A [Mitt] Romney victory would dramatically empower Republican governors," Kousser says.
North Carolina: One-term incumbent Democratic Gov. Beverly Perdue, the first woman to hold the state's top office, announced in January that she would not seek re-election after polls showed her with high disapproval ratings and trailing Republican candidate Pat McCrory.
The seat is expected to be won by McCrory, a former Charlotte mayor, who is facing Perdue's lieutenant governor, Walter Dalton. McCrory lost a close race to Perdue in 2008, when then-presidential candidate Barack Obama became the first Democrat to win North Carolina in more than three decades. The Real Clear Politics average for the race has McCrory maintaining a 14.3 percentage point lead.
Montana: Popular Democratic Gov. Brian Schweitzer — he won his last election with 65 percent of the vote — has reached his two-term limit. The state's Democratic Attorney General Steve Bullock is trying to keep the seat in his party's column by associating himself with Schweitzer's legacy. He's in a tough race with former two-term GOP Rep. Rick Hill.
New Hampshire: Former Democratic state Sen. Maggie Hassan has also promised a continuation of the policies of her predecessor, retiring Democratic Gov. John Lynch. Her opponent is lawyer Ovide Lamontagne, a Tea Party conservative who ran unsuccessfully for governor in 1996 and for the U.S. Senate in 2010. The national parties have invested in the campaigns, which have focused on fiscal and women's health care issues.
Washington: The state's governorship has been in Democratic hands for 32 years, and former U.S. Rep. Jay Inslee is in a dead-heat battle to keep it that way. His opponent is the state's Republican Attorney General Rob McKenna. McKenna has a proven ability to win statewide, but working in Inslee's favor are Obama's poll numbers. The Real Clear Politics average shows Obama with an average 13.6 percentage point lead over Romney; Inslee is leading McKenna by an average of 1 percentage point.
Pretty Much Sure Things
Republican Govs. Jack Dalrymple in North Dakota and Gary Herbert in Utah, and GOP Rep. Mike Pence in Indiana are expected to win. So are Democratic Govs. Peter Shumlin in Vermont and Jack Markell in Delaware.
Democrats are also hoping to hold on to the governorship in Missouri, where Jay Nixon is running for a second term against Republican Dave Spence; and in West Virginia, where Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin, former state senate president, is running for his first full term after winning a special election in 2011. GOP businessman Bill Maloney is his opponent, as he was last year.
Nixon has been consistently outpolling Spence by an average of about 7 points in Missouri. Tomblin is seen as likely to retain his seat, even in a state where Romney is leading Obama by double digits. | <urn:uuid:4342b805-5d32-424c-a791-d3c42ba87e1f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kcur.org/post/gop-eyes-gains-voters-11-states-pick-governors | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965873 | 1,077 | 1.679688 | 2 |
The Black Cat
|For the most wild, yet most homely narrative which I am about to pen, I neither expect nor solicit belief. Mad indeed would I be to expect it, in a case where my very senses reject their own evidence. Yet, mad am I not --and very surely do I not dream. But tomorrow I die, and to-day I would unburthen my soul. My immediate purpose is to place before the world, plainly, succinctly, and without comment, a series of mere household events. In their consequences, these events have terrified --have tortured --have destroyed me. Yet I will not attempt to expound them. To me, they have presented little but Horror --to many they will seem less terrible than baroques. Hereafter, perhaps, some intellect may be found which will reduce my phantasm to the common-place --some intellect more calm, more logical, and far less excitable than my own, which will perceive, in the circumstances I detail with awe, nothing more than an ordinary succession of very natural causes and effects.|
|From my infancy I was noted for the docility and humanity of my disposition. My tenderness of heart was even so conspicuous as to make me the jest of my companions. I was especially fond of animals, and was indulged by my parents with a great variety of pets. With these I spent most of my time, and never was so happy as when feeding and caressing them. This peculiar of character grew with my growth, and in my manhood, I derived from it one of my principal sources of pleasure. To those who have cherished an affection for a faithful and sagacious dog, I need hardly be at the trouble of explaining the nature or the intensity of the gratification thus derivable. There is something in the unselfish and self-sacrificing love of a brute, which goes directly to the heart of him who has had frequent occasion to test the paltry friendship and gossamer fidelity of mere Man.|
|I married early, and was happy to find in my wife a disposition not uncongenial with my own. Observing my partiality for domestic pets, she lost no opportunity of procuring those of the most agreeable kind. We had birds, gold fish, a fine dog, rabbits, a small monkey, and a cat. This latter was a remarkably large and beautiful animal, entirely black, and sagacious to an astonishing degree. In speaking of his intelligence, my wife, who at heart was not a little tinctured with superstition, made frequent allusion to the ancient popular notion, which regarded all black cats as witches in disguise. Not that she was ever serious upon this point --and I mention the matter at all for no better reason than that it happens, just now, to be remembered. Pluto --this was the cat's name --was my favorite pet and playmate. I alone fed him, and he attended me wherever I went about the house. It was even with difficulty that I could prevent him from following me through the streets.|
|Our friendship lasted, in this manner, for several years, during which my general temperament and character --through the instrumentality of the Fiend Intemperance --had (I blush to confess it) experienced a radical alteration for the worse. I grew, day by day, more moody, more irritable, more regardless of the feelings of others. I suffered myself to use intemperate language to my wife. At length, I even offered her personal violence. My pets, of course, were made to feel the change in my disposition. I not only neglected, but ill-used them. For Pluto, however, I still retained sufficient regard to restrain me from maltreating him, as I made no scruple of maltreating the rabbits, the monkey, or even the dog, when by accident, or through affection, they came in my way. But my disease grew upon me --for what disease is like Alcohol! --and at length even Pluto, who was now becoming old, and consequently somewhat peevish --even Pluto began to experience the effects of my ill temper. One night, returning home, much intoxicated, from one of my haunts about town, I fancied that the cat avoided my presence. I seized him; when, in his fright at my violence, he inflicted a slight wound upon my hand with his teeth. The fury of a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul seemed, at once, to take its flight from my body; and a more than fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrilled every fibre of my frame. I took from my waistcoat-pocket a pen-knife, opened it, grasped the poor beast by the throat, and deliberately cut one of its eyes from the socket! I blush, I burn, I shudder, while I pen the damnable atrocity.|
| When reason returned with the morning
--when I had slept off the fumes of the night's debauch
--I experienced a sentiment half of horror, half of
remorse, for the crime of which I had been guilty; but it
was, at best, a feeble and equivocal feeling, and the
soul remained untouched. I again plunged into excess, and
soon drowned in wine all memory of the deed.
In the meantime the cat slowly recovered. The socket of the lost eye presented, it is true, a frightful appearance, but he no longer appeared to suffer any pain. He went about the house as usual, but, as might be expected, fled in extreme terror at my approach. I had so much of my old heart left, as to be at first grieved by this evident dislike on the part of a creature which had once so loved me. But this feeling soon gave place to irritation. And then came, as if to my final and irrevocable overthrow, the spirit of PERVERSENESS. Of this spirit philosophy takes no account. Yet I am not more sure that my soul lives, than I am that perverseness is one of the primitive impulses of the human heart --one of the indivisible primary faculties, or sentiments, which give direction to the character of Man. Who has not, a hundred times, found himself committing a vile or a silly action, for no other reason than because he knows he should not? Have we not a perpetual inclination, in the teeth of our best judgment, to violate that which is Law, merely because we understand it to be such? This spirit of perverseness, I say, came to my final overthrow. It was this unfathomable longing of the soul to vex itself --to offer violence to its own nature --to do wrong for the wrong's sake only --that urged me to continue and finally to consummate the injury I had inflicted upon the unoffending brute. One morning, in cool blood, I slipped a noose about its neck and hung it to the limb of a tree; --hung it with the tears streaming from my eyes, and with the bitterest remorse at my heart; --hung it because I knew that it had loved me, and because I felt it had given me no reason of offence; --hung it because I knew that in so doing I was committing a sin --a deadly sin that would so jeopardize my immortal soul as to place it --if such a thing were possible --even beyond the reach of the infinite mercy of the Most Merciful and Most Terrible God.
| On the night of the day on which this cruel
deed was done, I was aroused from sleep by the cry of
fire. The curtains of my bed were in flames. The whole
house was blazing. It was with great difficulty that my
wife, a servant, and myself, made our escape from the
conflagration. The destruction was complete. My entire
worldly wealth was swallowed up, and I resigned myself
thenceforward to despair.
I am above the weakness of seeking to establish a sequence of cause and effect, between the disaster and the atrocity. But I am detailing a chain of facts --and wish not to leave even a possible link imperfect. On the day succeeding the fire, I visited the ruins. The walls, with one exception, had fallen in. This exception was found in a compartment wall, not very thick, which stood about the middle of the house, and against which had rested the head of my bed. The plastering had here, in great measure, resisted the action of the fire --a fact which I attributed to its having been recently spread. About this wall a dense crowd were collected, and many persons seemed to be examining a particular portion of it with every minute and eager attention. The words "strange!" "singular!" and other similar expressions, excited my curiosity. I approached and saw, as if graven in bas relief upon the white surface, the figure of a gigantic cat. The impression was given with an accuracy truly marvellous. There was a rope about the animal's neck.
| When I first beheld this apparition --for I
could scarcely regard it as less --my wonder and my
terror were extreme. But at length reflection came to my
aid. The cat, I remembered, had been hung in a garden
adjacent to the house. Upon the alarm of fire, this
garden had been immediately filled by the crowd --by some
one of whom the animal must have been cut from the tree
and thrown, through an open window, into my chamber. This
had probably been done with the view of arousing me from
sleep. The falling of other walls had compressed the
victim of my cruelty into the substance of the
freshly-spread plaster; the lime of which, had then with
the flames, and the ammonia from the carcass,
accomplished the portraiture as I saw it.
Although I thus readily accounted to my reason, if not altogether to my conscience, for the startling fact 'just detailed, it did not the less fall to make a deep impression upon my fancy. For months I could not rid myself of the phantasm of the cat; and, during this period, there came back into my spirit a half-sentiment that seemed, but was not, remorse. I went so far as to regret the loss of the animal, and to look about me, among the vile haunts which I now habitually frequented, for another pet of the same species, and of somewhat similar appearance, with which to supply its place.
| One night as I sat, half stupefied, in a
den of more than infamy, my attention was suddenly drawn
to some black object, reposing upon the head of one of
the immense hogsheads of Gin, or of Rum, which
constituted the chief furniture of the apartment. I had
been looking steadily at the top of this hogshead for
some minutes, and what now caused me surprise was the
fact that I had not sooner perceived the object
thereupon. I approached it, and touched it with my hand.
It was a black cat --a very large one --fully as large as
Pluto, and closely resembling him in every respect but
one. Pluto had not a white hair upon any portion of his
body; but this cat had a large, although indefinite
splotch of white, covering nearly the whole region of the
Upon my touching him, he immediately arose, purred loudly, rubbed against my hand, and appeared delighted with my notice. This, then, was the very creature of which I was in search. I at once offered to purchase it of the landlord; but this person made no claim to it --knew nothing of it --had never seen it before.
| I continued my caresses, and, when
I prepared to go home, the animal evinced a disposition
to accompany me. I permitted it to do so; occasionally
stooping and patting it as I proceeded. When it reached
the house it domesticated itself at once, and became
immediately a great favorite with my wife.
For my own part, I soon found a dislike to it arising within me. This was just the reverse of what I had anticipated; but I know not how or why it was --its evident fondness for myself rather disgusted and annoyed. By slow degrees, these feelings of disgust and annoyance rose into the bitterness of hatred. I avoided the creature; a certain sense of shame, and the remembrance of my former deed of cruelty, preventing me from physically abusing it. I did not, for some weeks, strike, or otherwise violently ill use it; but gradually --very gradually --I came to look upon it with unutterable loathing, and to flee silently from its odious presence, as from the breath of a pestilence.
| What added, no doubt, to my hatred of the
beast, was the discovery, on the morning after I brought
it home, that, like Pluto, it also had been deprived of
one of its eyes. This circumstance, however, only
endeared it to my wife, who, as I have already said,
possessed, in a high degree, that humanity of feeling
which had once been my distinguishing trait, and the
source of many of my simplest and purest pleasures.
With my aversion to this cat, however, its partiality for myself seemed to increase. It followed my footsteps with a pertinacity which it would be difficult to make the reader comprehend. Whenever I sat, it would crouch beneath my chair, or spring upon my knees, covering me with its loathsome caresses. If I arose to walk it would get between my feet and thus nearly throw me down, or, fastening its long and sharp claws in my dress, clamber, in this manner, to my breast. At such times, although I longed to destroy it with a blow, I was yet withheld from so doing, partly it at by a memory of my former crime, but chiefly --let me confess it at once --by absolute dread of the beast.
|This dread was not exactly a dread of physical evil-and yet I should be at a loss how otherwise to define it. I am almost ashamed to own --yes, even in this felon's cell, I am almost ashamed to own --that the terror and horror with which the animal inspired me, had been heightened by one of the merest chimaeras it would be possible to conceive. My wife had called my attention, more than once, to the character of the mark of white hair, of which I have spoken, and which constituted the sole visible difference between the strange beast and the one I had y si destroyed. The reader will remember that this mark, although large, had been originally very indefinite; but, by slow degrees --degrees nearly imperceptible, and which for a long time my Reason struggled to reject as fanciful --it had, at length, assumed a rigorous distinctness of outline. It was now the representation of an object that I shudder to name --and for this, above all, I loathed, and dreaded, and would have rid myself of the monster had I dared --it was now, I say, the image of a hideous --of a ghastly thing --of the GALLOWS! --oh, mournful and terrible engine of Horror and of Crime --of Agony and of Death!|
| And now was I indeed wretched beyond the
wretchedness of mere Humanity. And a brute beast --whose
fellow I had contemptuously destroyed --a brute beast to
work out for me --for me a man, fashioned in the image of
the High God --so much of insufferable wo! Alas! neither
by day nor by night knew I the blessing of Rest any more!
During the former the creature left me no moment alone;
and, in the latter, I started, hourly, from dreams of
unutterable fear, to find the hot breath of the thing
upon my face, and its vast weight --an incarnate
Night-Mare that I had no power to shake off --incumbent
eternally upon my heart!
Beneath the pressure of torments such as these, the feeble remnant of the good within me succumbed. Evil thoughts became my sole intimates --the darkest and most evil of thoughts. The moodiness of my usual temper increased to hatred of all things and of all mankind; while, from the sudden, frequent, and ungovernable outbursts of a fury to which I now blindly abandoned myself, my uncomplaining wife, alas! was the most usual and the most patient of sufferers.
| One day she accompanied me, upon
some household errand, into the cellar of the old
building which our poverty compelled us to inhabit. The
cat followed me down the steep stairs, and, nearly
throwing me headlong, exasperated me to madness.
Uplifting an axe, and forgetting, in my wrath, the
childish dread which had hitherto stayed my hand, I aimed
a blow at the animal which, of course, would have proved
instantly fatal had it descended as I wished. But this
blow was arrested by the hand of my wife. Goaded, by the
interference, into a rage more than demoniacal, I
withdrew my arm from her grasp and buried the axe in her
brain. She fell dead upon the spot, without a groan.
This hideous murder accomplished, I set myself forthwith, and with entire deliberation, to the task of concealing the body. I knew that I could not remove it from the house, either by day or by night, without the risk of being observed by the neighbors. Many projects entered my mind. At one period I thought of cutting the corpse into minute fragments, and destroying them by fire. At another, I resolved to dig a grave for it in the floor of the cellar. Again, I deliberated about casting it in the well in the yard --about packing it in a box, as if merchandize, with the usual arrangements, and so getting a porter to take it from the house. Finally I hit upon what I considered a far better expedient than either of these. I determined to wall it up in the cellar --as the monks of the middle ages are recorded to have walled up their victims.
| For a purpose such as this the cellar was
well adapted. Its walls were loosely constructed, and had
lately been plastered throughout with a rough plaster,
which the dampness of the atmosphere had prevented from
hardening. Moreover, in one of the walls was a
projection, caused by a false chimney, or fireplace, that
had been filled up, and made to resemble the rest of the
cellar. I made no doubt that I could readily displace the
at this point, insert the corpse, and wall the whole up
as before, so that no eye could detect anything
And in this calculation I was not deceived. By means of a crow-bar I easily dislodged the bricks, and, having carefully deposited the body against the inner wall, I propped it in that position, while, with little trouble, I re-laid the whole structure as it originally stood. Having procured mortar, sand, and hair, with every possible precaution, I prepared a plaster could not every poss be distinguished from the old, and with this I very carefully went over the new brick-work. When I had finished, I felt satisfied that all was right. The wall did not present the slightest appearance of having been disturbed. The rubbish on the floor was picked up with the minutest care. I looked around triumphantly, and said to myself --"Here at least, then, my labor has not been in vain."
| My next step was to look for the beast
which had been the cause of so much wretchedness; for I
had, at length, firmly resolved to put it to death. Had I
been able to meet with it, at the moment, there could
have been no doubt of its fate; but it appeared that the
crafty animal had been alarmed at the violence of my
previous anger, and forebore to present itself in my
present mood. It is impossible to describe, or to
imagine, the deep, the blissful sense of relief which the
absence of the detested creature occasioned in my bosom.
It did not make its appearance during the night --and
thus for one night at least, since its introduction into
the house, I soundly and tranquilly slept; aye, slept
even with the burden of murder upon my soul!
The second and the third day passed, and still my tormentor came not. Once again I breathed as a free-man. The monster, in terror, had fled the premises forever! I should behold it no more! My happiness was supreme! The guilt of my dark deed disturbed me but little. Some few inquiries had been made, but these had been readily answered. Even a search had been instituted --but of course nothing was to be discovered. I looked upon my future felicity as secured.
| Upon the fourth day of the assassination, a
party of the police came, very unexpectedly, into the
house, and proceeded again to make rigorous investigation
of the premises. Secure, however, in the inscrutability
of my place of concealment, I felt no embarrassment
whatever. The officers bade me accompany them in their
search. They left no nook or corner unexplored. At
length, for the third or fourth time, they descended into
the cellar. I quivered not in a muscle. My heart beat
calmly as that of one who slumbers in innocence. I walked
the cellar from end to end. I folded my arms upon my
bosom, and roamed easily to and fro. The police were
thoroughly satisfied and prepared to depart. The glee at
my heart was too strong to be restrained. I burned to say
if but one word, by way of triumph, and to render doubly
sure their assurance of my guiltlessness.
"Gentlemen," I said at last, as the party ascended the steps, "I delight to have allayed your suspicions. I wish you all health, and a little more courtesy. By the bye, gentlemen, this --this is a very well constructed house." (In the rabid desire to say something easily, I scarcely knew what I uttered at all.) --"I may say an excellently well constructed house. These walls --are you going, gentlemen? --these walls are solidly put together"; and here, through the mere phrenzy of bravado, I rapped heavily, with a cane which I held in my hand, upon that very portion of the brick-work behind which stood the corpse of the wife of my bosom.
| But may God shield and deliver me from the
fangs of the Arch-Fiend! No sooner had the reverberation
of my blows sunk into silence than I was answered by a
voice from within the tomb! --by a cry, at first muffled
and broken, like the sobbing of a child, and then quickly
swelling into one long, loud, and continuous scream,
utterly anomalous and inhuman --a howl --a wailing
shriek, half of horror and half of triumph, such as might
have arisen only out of hell, conjointly from the throats
of the damned in their agony and of the demons that exult
in the damnation.
Of my own thoughts it is folly to speak.
Swooning, I staggered to the opposite wall. For one
instant the party upon the stairs remained motionless,
through extremity of terror and of awe. In the next, a
dozen stout arms were tolling at the wall. It fell
bodily. The corpse, already greatly decayed and clotted
with gore, stood erect before the eyes of the spectators.
Upon its head, with red extended mouth and solitary eye
of fire, sat the hideous beast whose craft had seduced me
into murder, and whose informing voice had consigned me
to the hangman. I had walled the monster up within the
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It doesn’t make sense to carry a full pack on a day hike. The extra weight and bulk of the pack would become a burden. Day packs carry the essential gear and their smaller sizes are appealing. Day packs range in size from a little over a thousand to about 2500 cubic inches. Choose a pack that is large enough for the extra gear that you may need, such as a raincoat. Most day packs are made for school use; they have multiple compartments and places to organize small items. They’re ideal to carry fishing tackle, photography equipment, food, water and an extra fleece jacket. Day packs lack rigid frames and fit more easily into an airline’s carry on compartment. Use care in packing a day pack with a heavy load. If this load is unbalanced, your back will soon become uncomfortable. My day pack has a hip belt that is well formed; it also has thick padded shoulder straps. There are extra places to lash on added gear. Day packs are usually made in a tear drop shape.
When purchasing a day pack, look for following features: durable bottoms because they better support the heavier weights, and secure shoulder straps because it is here that a day pack is most stressed. Look for extra reinforcement where these straps connect to the bag. Padding at the back of the pack keeps you from becoming poked by the small objects in your pack. There should be additional lashing points to tie on extra gear. Compartments should be large enough to organize both your large and small items. | <urn:uuid:a663c06c-b633-4dae-97c5-1b3c74ce9a27> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.lovetheoutdoors.com/camping-adventures/Day-Packs.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965895 | 312 | 1.617188 | 2 |
When Hollywood made King of Kings in 1960, it decided it couldn't be too careful
with the first talking film about the Son of God. Test screenings were held for
carefully selected representative preview audiences to garner their reactions to
the film. Would audiences find the idea of a celluloid Christ shocking? Would
they be offended at the idea of Hollywood packaging and glamorizing the story of
salvation? Would they be appalled at the vivid scenes of Christ on the cross,
one of the most sacred images of the Christian religion?
The answer was no. Audiences were ready for a talking version of the story of
Jesus. But there was one thing that bothered the audience. It was Jeffery
Hunter's hairy chest. For some strange reason, this composite group of American
citizens found the idea of Christ having a hairy chest disturbing. Hollywood,
which was wary of crossing boundaries at the time, complied with the objector's
wishes and Jeffery Hunter's chest was shaved and the scenes were re-shot.
This seemingly insignificant moment in film history tells us a lot about the
relationship of Christianity to Hollywood, and indeed, to popular culture as a
whole. I think it tells us a lot about why, for the past 30 years, the
representations of religion in film have been so extremely unsatisfactory to
Christians. Consider the following points:
most films that include religion as their subject generally display respect for
an all-inclusive, generic, non-denominational faith that is extremely tolerant
of diverse paths towards spirituality-- the kind of religion (now known as "New
Age"), in short, that most people don't believe in.
Christians are generally portrayed as either well-meaning but misguided fools
(Father Mulcahy in M*A*S*H, the Anglican priest praying impotently in Titanic
(1997), or as dangerous intolerant fanatics (Flynt, The Guyana Tragedy, The
Crucible). Sincere, orthodox religious faith is almost always represented as associated
with destructive fanaticism (Shine, Sybil).
Christian leaders are often revealed as charlatans and frauds (Elmer Gantry).
But by far, the most insistent complaint from the average Christian is that
religious values are rarely depicted at all, even though a substantial majority
of the population consistently tells the pollsters that they take religion very
seriously, and anywhere from 1/3 to 1/2 of the North American population attends
church on a regular basis. Furthermore, Christians complain that not only do
movies generally omit references to "real" religion, they positively glorify
anti-religious values and lifestyles, displaying--allegedly with
approval--excessive violence, sexuality, drug abuse, homosexuality, and assorted
To some extent, the complaint is exaggerated. I have a feeling that most people
are really thinking of television when they make those complaints, and they are
probably right about television. And no doubt most Hollywood movies deal badly
with religion, but then, most Hollywood movies deal badly with everything. But
as I scan a list of movies I have seen in the past five years, a surprising
number of them include significant subplots or themes that dwell on religious
issues. Consider Shawshank Redemption, Breaking the Waves, Best Intentions,
Paradise Lost, Wings of Desire, City of Hope, Crucible.
The point is that Hollywood doesn't deal with religion very well. And part of
the reason for that goes back to Jeffrey Hunter's hairy chest. The problem is
that many Christians don't really want Hollywood to deal seriously with
religion. If Hollywood started to deal seriously with religion, it would have to
start producing movies that actually say something meaty and interesting about
the religious experience, with the result that many Christians, ensconced in
their comfortable chairs and surrounded by lavish material goods, might actually
take offense… the way they took offense with Jeffrey Hunter's hairy chest.
If you want to believe that Hollywood has set out to deliberately undermine the
moral values of the country, you would have to demonstrate that Hollywood cares
more about ideology than money, and that would very difficult to prove.
What most Christians really want are movies that show that Christians always end up happy and rich and sinners always end up unhappy and poor. This was the formula followed by Cecil B. De Mille, who had a lot of success with movies like The Ten Commandments. Unfortunately, De Mille discovered that Christians-- like everyone else--liked their movies to include some titillation-- as long as the sinners were punished in the end. Thus he rather graphically illustrates the Israelites fall into paganism in the desert, before Moses Heston comes down the mountain with the stone tablets. We want propaganda for our side. We confuse propaganda with art.
One of the things about modern movies that greatly distress Christians is the
fact that the heroes sometimes fail, and that villainy sometimes triumphs. It is
hard to appreciate this sentiment when it is so readily apparent from any daily
newspaper that villainy triumphs more often than good. Complicating the matter
is the fact that the most critically acclaimed films of our time often present
pessimistic views of reality: Midnight Cowboy, Heavenly Creatures, the Sweet
Hereafter, Carnal Knowledge, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest….
In other words, "we have met the enemy and he is us". Like most North Americans, we Christians want to be entertained first, and edified last. We find the sweetness and syrupy sentiment of The Sound of Music very appealing, even though the film has nothing meaningful to say about Nazis or nuns. We feel edified after seeing The Shawshank Redemption even though the movie consists largely of antiseptic mush. We don't mind if our kids watch Clint Eastwood or Sylvester Stallone glorify vigilantism and mindlessly cut dozens of cardboard cutout villains to shreds, as long as they don't see a single naked bosom. We adore Disney's shallow confections even though they subtly affirm hackneyed stereo-types.
We build grand, expensive churches with cushioned seats, and demand that the
sermon affirm that we are essentially good even though, in our daily lives, we
have adopted the same materialistic and consumerist values of the majority of
Americans. We don't want those values questioned.
The Christian community acts as if it has supported good film-making all along
and now feels betrayed because our celluloid children have turned their backs on
our values. The truth is that we told Hollywood we didn't want anything serious,
and Hollywood has given us exactly what we wanted. We wanted the government to
give us unfettered free enterprise, and Hollywood has said "amen" and now
produces whatever will sell. The trouble is, we thought Disney would live
forever, but Disney's children don't care about story or dialogue or plot: they
just want action and flesh.
What does the Christian community have to do to reclaim a voice in culture?
The Full Monty, is about a group of down-on-their-luck laid-off workers whose self-confidence has been steadily eroded. They decide to do a striptease as a way of earning some money. A striptease? Shocking and exploitive? Hardly. In the process of trying to reclaim their dignity, the men teach each other-- and us-- a lot about mutual respect, self-confidence, and self-worth. It actually has a more wholesome message than, for example, Not Without My Daughter, a bigoted, shallow, self-righteous film.
That said... we might eventually progress to the point where we realize that "The Full Monty" really is exploitive in it's own way: it's a contrived pastiche of self-conscious enlightened attitudes, patting it's audience on the back for allowing itself to be manipulated into approving of a strip show, without actually featuring any nudity. It's titillation. It allows half-backed progressive women to feel that they are "naughty" and fun-loving because they "approve" of the strip show because it's for a good cause and because it is allegedly about personal confidence. But frontal nudity would genuinely offend them, so that is left out. I would have found it less offensive if it had had the guts to actually show "the full monty", or stop claiming that it was about tolerance and broad-mindedness.
We've got to shake off the attitude of the National Federation of Decency, which
actually tabulates the number of profane words used in a television show and
rates the program accordingly. This is stupid.
If I sound harsh it is only because I think that one of the worst things that
has happened to culture in North America is the way that Christians have
consciously forfeited their influence on it. The Christian community has
consistently indicated a preference for art that is shallow, trivial,
commercial, derivative, and phony. I still read "reviews" by Christians that
endorse the strategy of many Christian musicians to deliberately copy styles
originated and developed by other "mainstream" artists, while substituting
Christian lyrics. We are saying to our kids: You like Alanis Morrisette? Here's
a girl who sounds just like her. But aren't these same parents telling their
children to do their own school work? By any standard, copying someone else's
style is contemptible.
These "artists" don't copy the good mainstream artists: they copy the popular
mainstream artists. What they don't realize is that while Celine Dion and George
Michaels may sell more records than Joan Osborne or Jewel or Sarah McLachlan or
Leonard Cohen, they are not nearly as influential. While we are busy copying,
others are innovating, and they are the artists who will determine what we will
listen to tomorrow.
My mini-reviews go on the assumption that God gives the rain to fall on
believers and unbelievers alike-- and lately, He's been giving more rain to the
unbelievers. There are no films in my top 25 that could be construed as
"Christian" in an overt sense (The Third Man, written by Graham Greene, a Roman
Catholic, is probably closest). But are these films worth seeing? You bet. These
films are not just about faith, though faith (or non-faith) plays a role in
every film. They are also about compassion and passion, truth, violence, fear,
community, happiness, joy, and everything else that matters to all of us. They
are worth seeing.
There is good news. In my opinion, we are seeing more well-made, interesting
films in the past few years than in any decade since the 1960's. And many of
these films are not shy about dealing with spiritual issues, even if their
conclusions can sometimes prove unsettling (like Breaking the Waves). I also
believe that more and more Christians are watching better and better movies, and
exercising more discernment in their choice of entertainment. More people I know
are less and less hung up on the question of nudity or swearing and more
interested in what a movie has to say to them about life.
This web-site is my small contribution to the discussion. I can't possibly hope
that you'll agree with all my judgments, but I hope they will at least prod you
to watch some important films and give serious consideration to what they mean,
what they tell us about the people in the world today. | <urn:uuid:ac25d473-17c3-4aec-8450-a738286c5061> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.chromehorse.net/movies/menus/christ_movies.asp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95706 | 2,445 | 1.820313 | 2 |
Flashpoint / Evan Kohlmann
San Diego native Jehad Marwan Mustapha, at right, is believed to be the disguised English speaker who appeared in a recent video produced by the Somali Islamic terrorist group al Shabab.
The suicide bombing last weekend in Mogadishu – allegedly by a Somali American from Minnesota – has highlighted the important role played by U.S. citizens in the operations of al-Shabab, the Islamic terrorist organization battling the government in the war-torn east African nation.
An FBI handout photo shows Abdisalan Hussein Ali, a Somali American who was 19 when he disappeared from Minnesota in November 2008. It is now suspected that he carried out a suicide attack against an African Union base in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, on Saturday.
If it is confirmed that Abdisalan Hussein Ali was one of two suicide bombers who attacked an African Union base, killing themselves and eight others, it will have been the third suicide bombing carried out in Somalia by Americans since 2008.
And U.S. officials tell NBC News that at least two members of the al-Shabab hierarchy are American-born, 20-something college dropouts, one of whom may be in the group’s “inner circle.”
U.S. officials and counterterrorism analysts estimate there are at least 40 Americans fighting with al-Shabab in Somalia, as well as another 200 with passports that would permit them to enter the U.S. without a visa.
Many of the al-Shabab soldiers are Somali-Americans, many of them from the Minneapolis area, like Ali. The two leaders are not. They are Arab-Americans who traveled to Somalia in the latter part of the last decade and began rising in the ranks of the al-Qaida-linked terrorist group.
Feisal Omar / Reuters file
American born Islamic militant Omar Hammami, now known as Abu Mansoor al-Amriki, vows to avenge the death of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden at a news conference at a news conference farm in southern Mogadishu's Afgoye district on May 11, 2011.
One — San Diego-native Jehad Marwan Mustapha — is believed to be part of the group’s senior leadership. The other, Omar Hammami, is a unit commander.
Hammami's role has long been known. The 27-year-old from a suburb of Mobile, Ala., was profiled in the New York Times Sunday Magazine last year and has appeared in a number of al-Shabab videos, including one where he rapped an English-language recruiting pitch.
Hammami, whose father is Syrian, joined al-Shabab in late 2006 and took the name “Abu Mansoor al-Amriki,” or Abu Mansoor the American.
He was interviewed in October 2007 by al-Jazeera, which identified him as a spokesman for the group, then indicted two months later by a federal grand jury on charges of material support for terrorism. He has since released four video and audio messages, most recently in April, when he mocked reports of his death and made his hip-hop recruiting pitch.
Mustapha, 29, is less well-known and has a less public role in al-Shabab, but is likely more influential in the terrorist group, according U.S. officials and Evan Kohlmann, an NBC News terrorism analyst.
“Though his name is perhaps lesser known than that of American national Omar Hammami, Jehad Mustapha is nonetheless reputed to be among the very top leaders of the foreign jihadists fighting alongside Shabab al-Mujahideen in Somalia under the banner of al-Qaida,” Kohlmann said.
One U.S. counterterrorism official, who like the others in this article spoke on condition of anonymity, referred to Mustapha as a “pretty bad dude” who has been with al-Shabab for “several years … long enough to be a significant commander … a senior player in the organization.”
Al-Shabab recently released video of a heavily masked, blue-eyed man speaking in American-accented English at a charity event in southern Somalia, and identified him as a representative of al-Qaida. Officials believe that the man could be Mustapha, who was indicted in the U.S. in August 2010 on charges of providing material support to terrorists.
In Somalia, Mustapha served under Saleh Nabhan, a senior al-Qaida and al-Shabab operative killed in a Navy SEAL operation in September 2009.
There are conflicting reports on whether he had contact with Anwar al-Awlaki, the late New Mexico-born leading member of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, who was killed by a U.S. drone strike in Yemen in September.
Mustapha lived in San Diego through his late teens, when al-Awlaki was preaching in the city and is known to have had contact with other young jihadists, including two 9/11 hijackers, before leaving San Diego in 2002.
One U.S. official who spoke with NBC News said there is evidence to suggest contact, while declining to characterize it. A second official said he was unaware of any such connection.
Kohlmann said he also had no information indicating a connection, but added, “It’s not the most far-fetched thing I've ever heard.”
Before he was radicalized, Mustapha was working through his way through the University of California, San Diego, by manning the front desk at an auto repair shop.
By all accounts the son of working-class parents was responsible and easy-going. He was interested in business, majoring in economics.
Then, after marrying a Somali woman, he picked up and headed for her homeland. Now, say U.S. officials, when suicide bombers are dispatched to carry out their attacks, it's likely Mustapha is aware of it. | <urn:uuid:07ef351b-fe3f-4f51-9a8e-15dfe2398795> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://openchannel.nbcnews.com/_news/2011/11/02/8585706-born-in-the-usa-but-now-among-somalias-islamist-terrorists?lite | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972388 | 1,257 | 1.695313 | 2 |
Posted at 4:52 PM on March 3, 2013
by Jon Gordon
From MPR News weather editor Steve Nelson:
In less than a month, the Minnesota Twins will open their regular season at Target Field. However, over the next 48 hours, the season of winter is the one Minnesotans will be keeping an eye on. We're scheduled for a snowy double header that could dump six to 10 inches in parts of the state including the Twin Cities. Here's how things are shaping up:
As you can see, a winter storm warning is posted for much of Minnesota. In the Twin Cities, it goes into effect at 9 p.m. tonight and runs through 6 p.m. Tuesday.
Snow has already started in the northwestern part of the state. Through the night, this first of two bands of snow will move to the east. In the metro area we should see snow overnight and into Monday morning. Then things may ease up a bit during the afternoon, with the second band expected to hit Monday night into Tuesday morning.
The slow moving storm will generally produce light to moderate snow, with occasional short periods of heavy snow, said National Weather Service Meteorologist Shawn DeVinny. "Six to 10 inches is a good bet for area we've outlined in our warning right now," he said.
A few isolated areas could see as much as 12 inches.
Was I totally imagining things when I was listening to MPR a couple of hours ago and I heard about 1" tonight and maybe another 2" tomorrow? | <urn:uuid:4ed3383a-c859-48a4-807e-761527a63cf1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://minnesota.publicradio.org/collections/special/columns/updraft/archive/2013/03/lets_play_two_winter_storm_wil.shtml?refid=0 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966011 | 314 | 1.625 | 2 |
Reageer op reactie
More than 1 Million Participate in Friends of Live Earth events in India
Despite our decision to cancel our Live Earth India event in December 2008 because of the Mumbai terrorist attacks, we were thrilled that so many of our community partners in India decided to continue with the "Friends of Live Earth" events they had already planned. Live Earth continues to work for solutions to the climate crisis for the good of the people of India and around the world. We were inspired by the enthusiastic response to the "Friends of Live Earth India" program we have received from environmental, educational, corporate, and other organizations throughout India and internationally, and we welcomed the opportunity to reach individuals, students, and employees through the "Friends" events, creating a lasting legacy of awareness and change. We felt that the Friends of Live Earth Program was one of the best ways we could continue to support our mission after the cancellation of our concert event.
STRATEGIC PARTNER IXORAA MEDIA IN ASSOCIATION WITH CEO: Lakshmi Pratury | Project Lead: Manju Seal Project Timeline: September 2008 to April 2009 Photos/Video copyright Manju Seal. All rights reserved.
For copyright permission for FOLE photos and video write to email@example.com.
Best of Friends of Live Earth Photos 2009
Click on "Notes" for a description of each photo in the slideshow
Ixoraa Media facilitated several Friends of Live Earth events in India between December 2008 and February 2009 in association with the following entities:
Inclusive MELA (fair) with a thousand kids, at ADAPT, Mumbai
Inconvenient Truth Screening at Maharana Mewar Public School, City Palace Complex, Udaipur
Dainik Bhaskar, Udaipur, 22nd January 2009
Saving the Planet is Necessary
(Hindi Newspaper Article)
Meet on Climate Change in Udaipur - With FES and SPWD
Date: January 19th, 2009, afternoon
NGOs Program Contact: Yash Sethia
Cleaning up Lalbag with Parikrma School Kids and Parents (Bangalore)
GREEN IBM - Kickoff Event 2009
GO GREEN with Akshaya Patra and a million kids!
Date: January 15th, 2009 City: Bangalore Participation: 5000 Schools, 1 million children over India Program Contact: Thirumala Rao We specially designed a school activity for climate crisis in English which any school across the globe can use. It has been translated into two Indian languages (Hindi and Kannada) for non-English medium schools in India. We also partnered with Gupshup and are hosting a national sms eco-quiz contest.
Go Green Eco-Quiz | <urn:uuid:67219e98-4a90-43d8-9478-771b4119a306> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://liveearth.org/nl/comment/reply/3823 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930978 | 571 | 1.5 | 2 |
The 100 Moments of TSU Athletics presented by Taco Bell® series continues by paying homage to some of the greatest supporters of athletics in Tennessee State history.
With the start of football season just days away, it is fitting that this moment honors the hard work and dedication put in by the Aristocrat of Bands and the TSU Spirit Squad.
In the fall of 1946, after six weeks of practice, a 100-piece marching band took to the field at Tennessee State University and a tradition of excellence was born.
The idea for a show band at TSU originated with its second president- the late Dr. Walter S. Davis. President Davis selected J. D. Chavis to serve as the first band director. Under Chavis' leadership, the marching band grew and developed into a premier university band that gave spectacular performances in parades and half-time shows at football games.
In 1947 and 1948, the marching band performed in the Washington Classic in Washington, D.C., where top historically black colleges and universities competed for national championships.
Chavis' tenure as band director ended in 1951 and the baton was passed to Frank T. Greer. Tennessee State University's distinctive style was further developed under Greer.
Four years after Greer began his work, the TSU band was invited to perform during the half-time show of a Chicago Bears and Los Angeles Rams professional football game. The performance was the first of a series of nationally televised half-time shows for the band. It was also the first time a historically black university band had appeared on national television.
Between 1956 and 1978, the TSU band performed half-time shows for nine professional football games, including the 1963 National Championship game between the New York Giants and the Chicago Bears at Wrigley Field in Chicago, IL. Reportedly, it was during one of these half-time performances that a sportscaster called the marching band from Tennessee State University "The Aristocrat of Bands".
"The Aristocrat of Bands" has also appeared in the Coca' Cola Circle City Classic in Indianapolis, the Atlanta Football Classic in Atlanta, the Orange Blossom Classic in Miami, the Heritage and Blues Bowls in Memphis and the Grantland Rice Bowl in Wichita Falls, Texas.
For the Spirit Squad, Tennessee State University Cheerleaders encourages Big Blue spirit by pumping-up the crowd at home football and basketball games and representing TSU at local and national cheerleading competitions.
The cheerleaders work alongside other on-campus spirit organizations to ensure that Big Blue Pride is abundantly felt by deserving student-athletes, alumni, and community.
TSU Cheerleading adds an element of enthusiasm and excitement unique among traditional spirit organizations.
Dwight Pope is in his 18th season as head coach for the Tennessee State University Cheerleaders under the department of Student Activities. He holds his AACCA and NCSSE certifications in cheerleading. Along with his many tasks at the university he is also a camp manager for the National Cheerleading Association (NCA), Cheerleading Coordinator for the Tennessee Rattlers Semi-Professional Football Club and founder of the Back to Basics Cheer Camps.
The 100 Moments of TSU Athletics presented by Taco Bell® highlights some of the greatest moments in honor of Tennessee State's centennial celebration. A new moment will be released each weekday for a total of 100. These moments were chosen by the TSU 100 Moments committee, which consists of alums from various departments. TSU has so many great moments, not all can be represented in these 100.
Follow TSU Athletics on Facebook.com/TSUTigers and Twitter @TSU_Tigers.
-- TSU TIGERS --
Tiger Vision users
returning customers, please login here. | <urn:uuid:f6a3dba6-6f54-4af4-9c2b-87986bb36c30> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.tsutigers.com/acctshare/MyAccount.dbml?ATCLID=205668731&SPID=98095&DB_LANG=C&DB_OEM_ID=19600&db_oem_id=19600 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955589 | 771 | 1.5 | 2 |
Just watched a fascinating video about something I've always noticed, but have always dismissed - chemtrails.Click below for a trailer:
What the hell is going on? That is insane.I wish I could go back to being a mindless 12 year old.
Yeah. This is the kind of video that can really ruin your night.I agree. Life was a lot cooler when you heard your folks talking about stressful stuff and you were happy to just not understand.The first documentary by these guys is called What in the world are they spraying?" and it's all about what they're finding in the rainfall and the soil. And how there are patents out for spraying aerosols in the air. And things like govt documents on controlling the weather and all that crap.The best scene in that first doc is when some geoengineers are boasting about spraying aluminum in the atmosphere and some guy in the audience asks if they've ever tested the effects of aluminum particles being breathed in by humans. The engineer pretty much squirms and reluctantly admits nothing has been studied and it's not even part of the plan to give a crap about the effects on humans.
Oh, good grief, I'm gonna have to reign this one in. No way the chem trail thing makes sense. All people would be subject.
I'll respectfully disagree.If there's one thing that corporations, industries, the wealthy, and governments do it's make decisions that benefit a small handful of people with total disregard for the effects on the rest of us, and on the world.The entire field of geoengineering proposes exactly what these people are saying is currently occurring. In fact, Bill Gates is in the mix now:"So the Microsoft (MSFT) billionaire and philanthropist has stepped into the breach to become the world's leading funder of research into geoengineering -- deliberate, large-scale interventions in the earth's climate system intended to prevent climate change and its repercussions. Since 2007, Gates has given about $4.6 million of his money to Caldeira and Keith for geoengineering research. Intellectual Ventures, a private company funded in part by Gates, has explored such technologies as building an 18-mile-long hose, tethered by balloons, that would spray tiny particles into the stratosphere to block the sun's rays. Gates has even attached his name to a patent application for ocean-churning technology designed to sap the strength of hurricanes, which appear to be getting fiercer because of global warming."http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2011/10/07/the-business-of-cooling-the-planet/So the chem trail thing makes sense to these people. It's just a question of whether or not they're doing it now. I happen to think they are.At the absolute very least, they're PLANNING to do it, if they aren't already doing it. Geoengineering is real. And putting particles into the atmosphere is pretty much the singular method they intend to use.So it's just a matter of when.And these folks who made this film believe it's happening now.
Omg with the global warming. Our climate is changing there's no doubt about that. BUT, it's changed before...that's what it does. It's not a constant. There are deserts now where there used be oceans. I'm not saying that we aren't taking a toll on our enviroment...because I do believe that we are. But I certaintly don't think that we are causing a climate shift. Maybe helping it along...but this would be happening regardless. As far as the chem trails...I haven't watched the trailer yet but I remember hearing about this when I was younger. Scary for sure. Even scarier that this would be done to try and control the weather. Seriously?
I share similar views in regards to global warming. yeah, the entire notion of geoengineering as a human answer to controlling the weather is perhaps the singular most arrogant concept ever.Yeah, that won't have consequences.The first film "WHAT IN THE WORLD ARE THEY SPRAYING?" features some great scenes from a conference of geoengineers which demostrates the arrogance perfectly.I think recently Gates was going to fund a test where they dumped particles into the air above New Mexico or Arizona. How come they never do that stuff above THEIR homes?So much stuff out there about the desire to dump stuff into our atmosphere without considering that the stuff eventually comes back down to the ground:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratospheric_sulfur_aerosols_(geoengineering)Then there's the military document i've posted on this blog before..about controlling the weather being a goal by 2025:http://csat.au.af.mil/2025/volume3/vol3ch15.pdfGreed and arrogance.Very sad.
Hey guys, can we stick to Halloween and Horror stuff? The chemtrail "conspiracy" is an urban myth. They are just contrails. And global warming is real, and caused my human actions, although the effects are sometimes overstated by people misusing the science for their own agenda.
Scott, Feel free to discuss anything you like on your own blog.This is entirely in the scope of my usual range of blog material.
I always remember a clip of a local weatherman referencing a cloud band saying it was the military spraying participles..he knew because he had been in the air force and used to do it. He specifically mentioned aluminum...then he went on with the rest of the forecast.
Thanks for bring this to my attention Rot.I have never heard of chem trails. I know I have seen them but I had no idea what they were spraying,I am not surprised just disapointed.
It's a weird topic. And there are plenty of sites refuting the claims in this video.I guess it's like anything else...somewhere in the middle is the truth.And just knowing that geoengineering proposes exactly what they are talking about in this video is enough for me to at least start to question if it's happening now.Something to research further.
I'm in the same camp as Goneferal. Though I haven't done any private research to dispel these theories, I just cannot imagine that there would not be a much broader impact than what testing would see over a specific area.Take it from us Idahoans who have so much smoke in the air right now we can hardly see the sun. Today it is from local fires, but just a couple weeks ago it was from fires in Nevada and California. Smoke travels fast and far once caught in the jet stream, and those are particles which are emitted from ground level. I can't imagine how far they would travel if dumped high up into the atmosphere.I don't doubt that big money people use more money than us little ones can even fathom to do strange things just to see what happens to society, but I just can't imagine it going this far.As far as global warming goes, blame over population and the extreme popularity to breed, breed, breed........ why must everyone have children?
I just recently listen to an interview with the makers of this film on the Alex Jones Show. Pretty scarey stuff. They have been spraying aluminum, barium salts and likes for sometime now in our atmosphere. As far as global warming goes(now called climate change) as far as humans causing it. Yeah we might be helping it along. But the only thing constant on this planet is change. The weather and warming and cooling periods have been happening for millions of years. The elites care not what happens to us regular folks. They only want to destroy and deindustrialize the US. Here is some interesting reading for you. Look up Agenda 21. That is when it really gets scary. The movie the Hunger Games. That is how they want it to be.
Also Scott. They are not contrails. Contrails do not disperse the way the chemtrails do. Conspiracy theory it isnt. Conspiracy fact it is.
Very scary. Those time lapse images of the chemtrails taken by satellite cameras? That's what made me go hmmmmmm.
I was going to post this link today, but figured no one was still reading this old post...This story was on the front page of weather.com today:http://weather.yahoo.com/sunshade-fight-climate-change-costed-5-bln-232835149--business.html
Post a Comment | <urn:uuid:40316c77-9e6a-4806-8c98-58f13b2d64e3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://pumpkinrot.blogspot.com/2012/08/why-in-world-are-they-spraying.html?showComment=1345662245009 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967127 | 1,759 | 1.554688 | 2 |
The Age featured a subcultural fashion article today, written as part of their series on Alternative fashion and subcultures, Melbourne Tribes by The Age Fashion editor Janice Breen Burns. Breen-Burns does a pretty good job of delving into subcultures, getting at what makes them work, while still treating them with respect..... not something that every journalist writing on subcultures has been known to do! In this the second series on Melbourne's fashion trubes, she looks at Deathrock, Mods and Reggae. Breen-Burns also does a great job of helping out the people she is interviewing by listing their clubs, bands and includes their URLs in the article, and links on the website version of the article, something that is very important to small scale subcultural events.
Some great pics of the Deathrock crew, and the text about them was well written, didn't notice any major errors. The Deathrock pics were probably the most artistic (though I may be biased!), and the fashion is probably the most sophisticated and visual out of the three subcultures. Deathrock fashion is more DIY than a lot of Subculture fashion, parralleling the original punk scene DIY fash in the late 1970's....you made your own fashion because there was nothing to buy. In the interview, Lyle Blakemore makes a point about Deathrock being more about dressing up and having fun...which interestingly contrasts with a lot of the seriousness of traditional goth, and other subcultures. Some well deserved focus on the Blakemore's being the driving forces behind Deathrock in Melbourne, with their club 1334.
The mod stuff is very visual, and brings with it the tradition of pop art, 60's photography style, and fashions experimentation with new colours and materials. The article discusses the 60's scene in Melbourne, which seems relatively lively with at least 5 club nights and a radio show, and a number of live bands. However, to an extent, the article doesn't differentiate between 60's, 70's and true British mid 1960's Mod fashion. A fair bit of the article discusses Tim Stoekle's experience with Dandyism, which I find interesting in that it actually transcends the mod era, dandyism being a broader concept that can be a part of many different era's of fashion.
The reggae girls are probably more into their music than their fashion, so the article delves into their music and subculture which interestingly discusses the influence of rasta philosophy on their group. While they are not necessarily rastas, as a subculture (?) the reggae girls are influenced by religion, which is very rare. While there are a few influences from Reggae branding (eg the Ethiopian flag, and its colours) the fashion they wear is pretty much mainstream streetwear, with camo colouring, with the Ethiopian colours tossed in....and one of the girls looked suspiciously goth (once again highlighting the borrowing nature of subcultural fashion). The interviewees are all girls, which was interesting in that it gave a gender based perspective on subcultures and subcultural fashion, which isn't too often addressed in discussion about subcultures.
Edward - Pic by Simon Schulter from the Age website
Rachael - Pic by Simon Schulter from the Age website
Clint - Pic by Simon Schulter from the Age website
Article printed in The Age, A2, Saturday April 12, 2008. | <urn:uuid:6e2989f1-1a5a-4e5d-b914-a119d8c22258> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://altfashion.blogspot.com/2008_04_01_archive.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96627 | 712 | 1.515625 | 2 |
YOUNGSTOWN - Opponents and supporters of leasing city-owned property for natural gas and oil drilling had another chance Tuesday evening to speak out at a public hearing on the controversial topic.
But even if Youngstown City Council passes the measure on third reading tonight, the question still remains whether drillers will even seek the mineral rights.
On Tuesday, council members heard from concerned citizens, scientists and state legislators for and against fracking within city limits during a public hearing.
Most of those in attendance used their two minutes to speak against the legislation, with 15 to 20 stepping up to the microphone.
"It is untested, deregulated, dangerous. Do your research,'' Youngstown resident Lynn Anderson said. ''It's not about money, people. This is democracy. You're going to kill your citizens.''
A few folks among the crowd of about 65 do support leasing mineral rights to the energy companies. Among them was Tony Paglia of the Youngstown-Warren Regional Chamber. He said money generated from drilling could be used for demolition, which is something Youngstown Mayor Chuck Sammarone has said he also supports.
Fourth Ward City Councilman Mike Ray said, "I think they support it as a form of economic development. Again, I support all forms of reasonable economic development, and I think we need to proceed with caution.''
Ray said he believes there's enough support on council to pass the ordinance and at least listen to proposals from oil and gas companies.
But so far, many drilling companies exploring options in the Mahoning Valley have been passing on the opportunity to purchase mineral rights in heavily developed metropolitan areas like Youngstown, Austintown and Boardman, opting instead for more rural areas of Trumbull and Mahoning counties.
Curtis L. Thomas, Director of Government and Public Affairs for BP in Ohio, the company that has leased more than 80,000 acres of mineral rights in much of rural Trumbull County, said drillers often attempt to avoid downtown areas and neighborhoods because of the truck traffic and smaller parcels of land.
Still, it depends on where the most productive portion of the Utica Shale, or so-called "sweet spot," turns out to be, explained Michelle Chippas, a spokeswoman for the Ohio Petroleum Council and Ohio Energy Resource Alliance. If that turns out to be in an urban area, then drillers certainly will do what they have to do to access it.
''Gas companies want to be good community neighbors,'' Chippas said.
Brian Hickman, communications director and governmental affairs manager for the Ohio Oil & Gas Association, pointed out that any drilling in the Utica Shale Play right now is still exploratory.
''They are testing the acreage right now,'' Hickman said. And until the companies determine the location of that sweet spot, companies most likely will stay in areas where they have larger spans of uninhibited acreage.
''Some of these companies may not have the acreage required to get drilling permits right now, so they might be testing the acreage they have," Hickman said.
And whether interest shifts to more urban areas will depend on the results of the early and exploratory drilling, Hickman and BP's Thomas said.
The Youngstown council legislation set for a third reading during council's regular meeting tonight would authorize the Board of Control to seek competitive proposals and enter into a contract to lease city-owned land for oil and natural gas extraction.
The proposal brought about in recent months by Sammarone was met with opposition and urging to delay any vote until there is more research.
State Rep. Bob Hagan, D-Youngstown, urged council to proceed with the ''utmost caution and vigilance in order to best protect our families, communities and environment.''
On Tuesday, he asked council members, "What studies have you used? What have you done? I'd like you to tell the public exactly what studies you're using that make a decision about fracking in the city of Youngstown.''
Sammarone had proposed the idea as a method to generate revenue that he suggests be used to demolish vacant and blighted properties inside city limits.
Proponents of drilling maintain that there isn't any correlation, and that this type of drilling has been going on for decades without contamination problems.
WYTV 33 News contributed to this report. | <urn:uuid:dbe27834-3e8e-4582-90c7-4d37506246bf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.tribtoday.com/page/content.detail/id/577947/Drillers-aren-t-flocking-to-Youngstown.html?nav=5358 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95594 | 888 | 1.703125 | 2 |
posted on September 24, 2004 00:00
DEM ANNOUNCES SMALL GAME HUNTING SEASON DATES AND LIMITS
PROVIDENCE - The Department of Environmental Management's Division of Fish and Wildlife announces that Rhode Island's small game hunting season opens on October 18. Beginning on that date, all users of state management areas, and all hunters statewide, must wear at least 200 square inches of solid daylight-fluorescent orange material through the end of the season, February 29. The fluorescent orange has to be worn above the waist, and must be visible from all directions. Hunters during the shotgun deer season (November 29 through December 14) must wear a total of 500 square inches of fluorescent orange.
Small Game Hunting
The legal shooting hours for most small game, which includes partridge (ruffed grouse), ring-necked pheasant, bobwhite quail, rabbits, hare, squirrel, and fox, are sunrise to sunset, except on October 18, when legal shooting hours begin at 7 a.m. There are also other exceptions. Hunting hours for coyotes, which have no closed season, are one-half hour before sunrise to one-half hour after sunset. The raccoon season opens on October 1 at 6 p.m., with no restricted hours.
Season end dates differ. For ruffed grouse, ring-necked pheasant and bobwhite quail, the end date is December 31; for rabbits, hare, squirrel and fox, February 29, 2004. The small game hunting season will be closed in Providence, Kent and Washington counties during some or all of the shotgun deer season, beginning on November 29. Small game season resumes on state lands on December 8 and on private lands on December 15.
Daily bag limits for small game are consistent with previous years: pheasant (2), bobwhite quail (3), ruffed grouse (1), rabbits (3), hare (2), and gray squirrel (5). There is no bag limit for fox or raccoon.
New Pheasant Permit, Extended Stocking
Pheasant hunting requires the purchase of a new pheasant permit at a cost of $15.50, which will be used to enhance the existing pheasant stocking program and allow for an extended season for pheasant stocking, until January 19, 2004. Hunters can purchase up to two permits, each containing six pheasant tags that allow hunters to harvest six pheasant, which must be tagged immediately.
According to Brian Tefft, principal wildlife biologist with the Division of Fish and Wildlife, the Division will release about 5,500 Ringneck pheasants at wildlife management areas from opening day through January 19, representing a 57 percent increase over last year's stocking. About 4,500 of the pheasant will be stocked during October and November, nearly 30 percent more than were stocked during the same period last season. Pheasant stocking will occur at Arcadia, Great Swamp, Carolina, Durfee Hill, Black Hut, Buck Hill, Sapowet, Nicholas Farm and Big River and Eight-Rod Farm. In Tiverton, both Sapowet and Eight Rod Farm wildlife management areas are closed to Sunday hunting.
Upland Migratory Bird Season
Season and bag limits for Rhode Island migratory game birds are established in accordance with guidelines set by the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The first segment of the mourning dove season will open on September 27 and will run until October 13, with shooting hours from noon to sunset. The dove season will reopen on October 18 and run until November 23 and again from December 31 to January 14, 2004, from sunrise to sunset, except on October 19 when it begins at 7 a.m. The daily bag limit for dove is 12 birds.
Woodcock hunting opens on October 30 and closes on November 28, with a daily bag limit of three birds. The season for rails, already open, runs to November 14. The snipe season, also already open, runs to November 14.
Federal law requires migratory bird hunters to use a shotgun capable of holding no more than three shells. Federal law also requires all hunters to carry a Migratory Bird Harvest Information Program (HIP) permit while hunting migratory game birds. HIP permits are available at all hunting license vendors in the state at no cost.
Check Stations Open
To assist DEM in gathering information on hunter effort and game harvested, all hunters using Arcadia, Great Swamp, Carolina and Durfee Hill Management areas on weekends through November 9 must check in and out of check stations at those management areas and record their harvest. Special permits are required to hunt the Great Swamp and Burlingame North Camp areas.
Hunting licenses, pheasant permits, and abstracts that summarize the hunting and trapping seasons and bag limits by species, are available at various license vendors throughout the state and at DEM's Licensing Office at DEM Headquarters, 235 Promenade Street in Providence. The abstract is also available on DEM's website, www.state.ri.us/dem, by clicking on Fish and Wildlife on the Regulations page. The fee for a resident hunting license has been increased to $18, with all money collected going into a special restricted account used specifically to fund the state's wildlife restoration program. These funds benefit both game and non-game species. Hunters are advised to check with local authorities before hunting in unfamiliar areas, as municipalities may impose additional restrictions on hunting within their boundaries.
Hunters may contact the main office of DEM's Division of Fish and Wildlife in Wakefield at 789-3094 or the Division's Great Swamp field office in West Kingston at 789-0281 for further information. | <urn:uuid:d9f65095-20e9-41b7-81c2-04141ea4ad56> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gamebirdhunts.com/Resources/PheasantHuntingNews/tabid/77/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/147/DEM-ANNOUNCES-SMALL-GAME-HUNTING-SEASON-DATES-AND-LIMITS.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951529 | 1,173 | 1.632813 | 2 |
What are the precautions one should take when running in wintertime (-2 to -10 Celsius, 28 to 14 F)? I want to know in terms of clothing: what is the most appropriate? Should I end a run close to home so I do not catch a cold due to heavy sweating? Is there a list of what to avoid and what to follow when running in winter?
When running outside in the winter/cold weather you should keep couple of things in mind.
1) Firstly cold weather is really bad for your joints. If you expose them for a prolonged periods of time to cold they will eventually start hurting you. With that said make sure you put some warm clothes on yourself. You must consider the fact that there might be wind outside and as you run you are going to sweat. If there's wind and you are sweaty, the wind is going to literally pierce through your body. So look for a wind-proof jacket, usually any skiing jacket will do the to work. And make sure you don't overdo the clothing so you don't sweat more than it is needed or you will feel at discomfort. Don't forget wearing a hat, you lose most heat going off from your head.
2) When you run you inhale the air deeper. And cold air is really bad for your lungs and overally for your respiratory system. That's why what you can do is wrap a scarf around your face so that it will keep the area warmer and just warm the air more as you inhale it.
3) The surface where you run might be icy so look for shoes that are going to handle slippery surfaces. Also they must keep you feet warm and be at least slightly comfortable(for winter running shoes).
Finishing your run close to your place is a very good idea indeed. Make sure you take a warm shower/bath right after you are done with your run so you can stsabilise the temperature of your body. I hope this helps, if I think of anything else I will add it up.
Besides the excellent advice in the other responses, I would like to add some points:
First, only run when it is cold if you really have to, for example, Sunday January 13th, in Stockholm it was -9 Celcius (C) (16 Fahrenheit (F)) (-15 C considering the wind chill factor). A warmer Sunday, you would see lots of people running at the popular city parks Djurgården and Gärdet. That day, you hardly saw anyone. So even when you have a large population used to cold weather & snow & ice , most of them avoid intense outdoor exercise in the cold. The key reasons are that it is difficult to breathe (even if you are used to cold air) and the risks of falling. As a guideline, youth cross country skiers are not allowed to compete under -15 C (5 F), primarily because of the breathing and frostbite risks. Outdoors ice hockey games are cancelled if the temperature is below, -18 C (0 F). In both of these contexts, the participants are used to cold weather and in excellent shape.
Screen shot from Wolfram Alpha 2013-01-13
So if you really want to run, here are some additional things to consider:
The cause for a common cold are viruses, not temperature. It is a misconception that the cold is caused by cold weather, it definitely puts more stress on a human body and makes it more vulnerable to already present viruses, but if you are healthy you shouldn't have to worry that much. (see Wikipedia: Common Cold)
My last run was one of 30 minutes at 0°C at night when it was raining. I wore shorts, a t-shirt and had a headscarf around my arm that I later put on my head. I always wear my biking gloves when running, they leave the fingertips free but I tend to freeze on my knuckles. And they are a blessing when I blow my nose.
Watch for ice. If you encounter slippery surfaces slow down, be careful, there is no need trying to break your records and end up in the hospital. | <urn:uuid:455acff8-c0b5-464e-9ceb-bc03c077e344> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://fitness.stackexchange.com/questions/10355/what-precautions-to-take-when-running-in-wintertime | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963068 | 846 | 1.75 | 2 |
You see, truly wealthy people... I'm talking about the ultra-rich... don't think like most ordinary Americans. Because they don't think in ordinary ways, that also means they don't do the same things with their money as "normal" folks do.
It's all about protecting and building capital. And they take steps to avoid what I call "capital killers" -- conventional habits that can have devastating effects on long-term wealth building.
Here's a simple example of what I'm talking about...
If you have money in a regular bank, let's say one of the "too big to fail banks," your capital is being eaten away in fees. I'm talking about the wealth-killing fees they charge you every single day. On checks. On ATM usage. On balance requirements. And on dozens of other bogus "services."
These fees are "capital killers." And without capital, it is almost impossible to create lasting wealth.
If you don't have capital, you end up on a treadmill... always trying to keep enough cash coming in to pay the bills. That's where 90% of American households are. You need to avoid it.
This is why I urge you to do everything possible to get out of their clutches now. Giving away free money to the "too big to fail" crowd may be OK for some folks. But serious wealth builders NEVER allow their costs to drain their capital.
Instead, they continually reinvest their capital in new business or investment profits. Capital is the key to creating lasting wealth. Reinvesting your profits and keeping your costs low is the way to build capital.
Bank of America, for example, charges a $12 monthly fee for a standard checking account, subject to conditions such as direct-depositing your money or maintaining a balance above $1,500.
Then you pay $2 each time you use a non-Bank of America ATM. It's $10 if you need to visit a branch for a cashier's check. You pay $5 if your card gets cracked or stops working.
Individually, none of these fees will sink you. The fees your bank charges you are nickel and dime size. But they mount up.
Consider too that you're also not making anything on your deposits (which are essentially loans to your bank). If you have a common yield-bearing checking account, you make pennies per year. If you're lucky.
A "Tiered Interest Checking" account with Bank of America pays you 0.02% on deposits between $10,000 and $99,999.
One step you can take to free yourself of these wealth killers is to switch to a credit union.
Credit unions are member-owned. Members elect the directors. The directors set rates and fees. With a credit union, you're dealing with a local institution. Not a faceless corporate board on Wall Street.
I found a credit union near where I live offering accounts that pay 0.15%. That's seven times the interest a "too big to fail bank" like Bank of America will pay you.
You will also save money on fees. For example, some credit unions reimburse your ATM fees. The one I found has none of the "account minimums" that tend to trip extra fees in banks.
Credit unions also have far fewer "nickel and dime" fees than banks: no check fees, overdraft protection, free online bill pay.
And depending on the credit union you find you're eligible to join, you could receive discounts on homeowners or auto insurance.
You could also be eligible for special deals on rental cars or accidental death and dismemberment (AD&D) insurance. Taking advantage of these local "ins" will save you even more money.
It took me only a few minutes to find a way to save myself hundreds of dollars a year and make over seven times the interest on my deposits than I'd get with Bank of America.
You can do the same by investigating a local credit union today.
In future dispatches, I'll show you more ways to rid yourself of hidden wealth killers and switch from conventional to unconventional ways of building wealth.
As Bonner & Partners chairman and colleague Bill Bonner puts it, "You're either a contrarian or a victim." And that goes for the way you bank too. | <urn:uuid:8e3640d8-2ad4-4ef2-91d0-0cd2a7f86cde> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gurufocus.com/news/207838/how-to-earn-7-tmes-more-interest-on-your-savings- | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951857 | 890 | 1.757813 | 2 |
Socializing for businesses is becoming at least as important as it is for individuals. What I refer to as "socializing" is effective usage of the available social media and online tools.
In order to make the most of social media, a company must have clear goals. A goal will help you to keep your focus and to use the available tools efficiently to work for your particular requirements. Without focus and a clear definition of what you are aiming for, you can easily lose a lot of time jumping from one link to another and getting nowhere. It is a good idea to limit the amount of time you spend promoting your business online so that you spend your time effectively with the right balance.
I am a big follower of LinkedIn and currently participate in tens of networks on various topics from books to embedded hardware and software development. The benefits of LinkedIn go well beyond expanding your existing networks of people. Recently, I was sent a complimentary copy of a technical book that a fellow LinkedIn user did not need anymore. In order to receive that book, all I needed to do was write a couple of lines to indicate my interest. From a business perspective, besides expanding your existing network, you can use LinkedIn to create groups for your particular niche interest.
Forums are great places to exchange ideas on specific topics where you can get expert opinion. You should remember that making a contribution is at least as important as getting information in any forum. Therefore, try to answer questions from others to provide assistance where you can, and share your knowledge and experience as much as possible. Active contributions made by the users are the cornerstones of a popular forum. The more popular a forum is, the better it can help your business. Provision of feedback and making contributions also increase your exposure on the forums and allow you to establish a base of followers.
From personal experience, I found forums also give a great opportunity to read about alternative solutions to a particular problem. I see forums as "organic" sources of information that expand and evolve. Therefore, it is beneficial to pay a visit to your selected forums every so often to see what is new. Also, getting automatic email notifications on topics that you are interested in will save you time while keeping you up-to-date.
The Internet provides access to a global market at our fingertips. This factor alone is a huge benefit for businesses. When combined with tools such as Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, marketing a product, an idea, or a solution becomes much easier with the increased exposure online. In layman terms, the key idea is to increase the exposure of what you are trying to sell by mentioning it in different places and getting other people to talk about it as much as possible.
When you add Search Engine Optimization (SEO) into the mix, you can further increase your chances of selling your product by improving your ranking on popular search engines such as Google. I must highlight that putting a lot of effort into SEO is far less important than actually creating solid content that provides useful information. At the end of the day, a solid content will always be better appreciated by the target audience.
Creating blogs about your business and products is a great way to do marketing and to get feedback from potential clients. Most comments you receive from interested parties will actually provide you with at least one tip to improve your business or product in some way. Depending on how your blogs are structured, it may be possible to attract the attention of investors and potential partners. It is also important to create links between your blogs and other social media tools such as Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
Most online businesses ask you to register in order to collect your email address. A collection of email addresses provides a great way to reach out to many potential clients with a single email. If you plan to use this method, always respect the privacy of your registered users and do not disclose their emails to third parties or bombard them with spam. Too much of anything is bad for you, and this also applies to frequent promotional emails. If you fail to strike a healthy balance with the volume and the frequency of your promotional emails, this can do more harm than good to your business.
Conveying information visually is always more effective than providing a piece of text. That is why we often see video content on almost any topic these days. This strategy is particularly effective if you are describing the features of a product you want to sell. When people actually see a product in action, they usually have more confidence in it than when you are just talking or writing about it. Video content gives you this edge. I often visit YouTube in order to watch technical tutorials on research topics as well as new products. If you have never prepared a video content for your business before, I strongly recommend that you watch a few sample videos on YouTube first for insight into how to do it right.
As with most things in life, persistence, patience, and commitment are the key prerequisites to success in improving your business with online tools. Although most people will agree to the usefulness of social media and online tools for businesses, not many will actually be doing it. My suggestions here are not exhaustive. If you have creative ways to use social media and online tools for business purposes, please share them in the comments below. | <urn:uuid:1c3a1091-a962-49fb-a6d5-374aafc942fa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ebnonline.com/author.asp?section_id=1784&doc_id=243649&piddl_msgid=639885 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962179 | 1,063 | 1.617188 | 2 |
It’s amazing to realize that it was just 10 years ago that the Women’s Health Initiative results were released with extraordinary media brouhaha, causing as many as 70% of women who were taking menopausal hormone therapy (usually Prempro) to cease and desist…and in many instances flush, flash and lose sleep. But with time, additional studies and empathy, the experts (members of the North American Medical Society, gynecology department heads at major universities, and editors of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine and The Endocrine Society to name just some) now agree on key points regarding the safety and efficacy of hormone therapy in menopause. And since the following is generally what I tell my patients, I am delighted to recap the recommendations just published in several of the major journals.
In a overview, they agree that systemic therapy is an “acceptable” option for relatively young (up to 59 or within 10 years of menopause) and healthy women who are troubled by moderate to severe menopausal symptoms. There is no one therapy fits all, and consideration should be given to a woman’s quality- of- life priorities as well as her risk factors such as age, time since menopause risk of blood clots, heart disease, and stroke and breast cancer. Their consensus then deals with individual issues
Hormone Therapy Risks
Vascular risks Although both estrogen and estrogen with progestogen increase the chance of clots (deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism as well as certain types of strokes) the risk is rare in the 50- to 59- year old age group. Moreover, observational studies have found that transdermal estrogen therapy ( with patches, creams, and sprays) and lowdose oral estrogen therapy have been associated with lower risks of these type of clot caused events.
An increased risk of breast cancer is seen within 5 years or more of continuous estrogen and progestogen therapy. The risk is not great and risk declines after hormone therapy is discontinued. There is even less risk for women who have had a hysterectomy and don’t need to add progestogen to their estrogen therapy. Use of estrogen alone for a mean of 7 years does not seem to increase risk of breast cancer.
Duration of therapy
This is where everyone sites the same sentence: ” The lowest dose of therapy shouldbe used for the shortest anoint of time to manage menopausal symptoms.” they thenadd that duration should be individualized. I add that if more or longer therapy is neededto achieve quality of life, the patient and her physician should discuss this laststatement. And estrogen therapy alone, allows more flexibility in duration. There arereports of increased risk after 10 or 15 years of use in large observational studies.
Evidence is lacking that custom compounded bio identical hormone therapy is safe oreffective. Many medical organizations and societies agree in recommending againsttheir use, particularly given concerns regarding content, purity and labeling. Finally thereis a lack of safety data supporting the use of estrogen or estrogen and progestogentherapy in women who have had breast cancer.
Leading medical societies devoted to the care of menopausal women agree that the decision to initiate hormone therapy should be for the indication of menopause-related symptoms.
Bottom line: there is no question that hormone therapy plays an important role in
managing the symptoms so many women experience during menopause. As usual, we
all recommend that therapy be individualized. So talk to your doctor!
Our new address is:
2080 Century Park East, | <urn:uuid:c33b3fb8-9263-45cc-814d-f475a91a8c48> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://judyreichman.com/category/menopause/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946142 | 739 | 1.804688 | 2 |
Working paper series / Johann-Wolfgang-Goethe-Universität, Institute for Law and Finance
Who should make corporate law? : EC legislation versus regulatory competition
- This paper makes a case for the future development of European corporate law through regulatory competition rather than EC legislation. It is for the first time becoming legally possible for firms within the EU to select the national company law that they wish to govern their activities. A significant number of firms can be expected to exercise this freedom, and national legislatures can be expected to respond by seeking to make their company laws more attractive to firms. Whilst the UK is likely to be the single most successful jurisdiction in attracting firms, the presence of different models of corporate governance within Europe make it quite possible that competition will result in specialisation rather than convergence, and that no Member State will come to dominate as Delaware has done in the US. Procedural safeguards in the legal framework will direct the selection of laws which increase social welfare, as opposed simply to the welfare of those making the choice. Given that European legislators cannot be sure of the ‘optimal’ model for company law, the future of European company law-making would better be left with Member States than take the form of harmonized legislation. | <urn:uuid:6525d3be-ba65-432d-8a2b-eb85eaded901> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://publikationen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/solrsearch/index/search/searchtype/series/id/16125/start/0/rows/10/yearfq/2005/subjectfq/European+law+ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949301 | 252 | 1.640625 | 2 |
Editor's note: David Frum, a CNN contributor, was a special assistant to President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2002. He is the author of six books, including "Comeback: Conservatism That Can Win Again," and is the editor of FrumForum.
(CNN) -- Immigration is the only issue where a political candidate can totally do the bidding of the K Street lobbyists and still be hailed as compassionate and humane.
At CNN's Republican National Security Debate this past Tuesday, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich reconfirmed his longstanding immigration policy:
-- A commitment to enhanced border security
-- A guest worker program
-- Individual hearings for each of 12 million or so illegal aliens, at which those with long ties to the country will gain residency rights
-- No citizenship for illegal entries
On its face, this program is unworkable. Examine each piece in turn:
Why the border?
The border is the wrong place to stop illegal immigration, if only because tighter security wouldn't stop the up to 45% of the illegal population who enter the country legally, then overstay their visas, as estimated by the Senate Committee on Homeland Security.
The right place to stop illegality is the workplace. If employers faced an effective requirement to hire only legal workers, and meaningful penalties for breaking the law, we'd change the incentive structure that creates the problem in the first place. As is, employers are punished only if they can be shown to have employed illegal labor "knowingly," meaning that so long as the employee produces a valid-seeming Social Security number, the employer goes scot-free. Even if somehow caught, the fines are small. Under those circumstances, you could deploy the whole U.S. Army on the Mexican border and hardly make an impact on the problem.
Immigration enforcement inescapably impinges on employers, especially employers in low-wage industries such as restaurants, hotels, groundskeeping and meatpacking, whose voices are heard through those K Street lobbyists.
Border security is the policy you endorse if you don't want to impinge on employers. Which means that border security is the policy you endorse if you don't want your immigration enforcement to succeed.
Why guest workers?
The United States in 2011 does not exactly suffer from a labor shortage. The unemployment rates for the most recent immigrants are particularly bad: the Latino unemployment rate is almost 12%, the unemployment rate for people without a high school diploma is almost 14%. How can you imagine that the US needs an even larger population of low-skilled labor?
When most Americans hear the phrase "guest worker," they think "agricultural labor." But past guest worker proposals have not been so limited. Such proposals generally provide that when employers cannot attract labor of a specific type at a specific wage, they may import that labor from abroad, and not only from Mexico (a middle-income country by world standards), but from genuinely poor countries such as Indonesia, Egypt or Vietnam. The only requirement is that guest workers be paid above the U.S. minimum wage.
Employers in difficult or dangerous industries such as nursing homes or garbage recycling can find Americans today who will do very hard work at very low wages. But such employees will not necessarily be grateful for the opportunity, and they will know that they can quit the job without forfeiting their right to remain in the country.
Guest working is the policy you endorse if your labor market priority is a cheaper and more pliable work force.
Gingrich had a good applause line about uprooting the illegal alien who has sunk 25-year roots in the country and has citizen children and grandchildren.
But how do you tell the difference between that person and between the illegal alien who has been present for 20 years? Or two years? Or two months? Gingrich proposes individualized hearings by citizen courts. But 12 million hearings? Really? Even if we could somehow complete a hearing an hour, you are talking about 1.5 million person-days, or 5,769 person-years.
And that's assuming the courts approved the concept, which they very well might not.
The idea is unworkable on its face. It would rapidly disintegrate into something very like blanket approvals of whole categories of illegals -- in other words, into some kind of qualified amnesty.
Hearings are the policy you endorse if your real goal is to find a way to represent amnesty as something other than amnesty.
Why not citizenship?
Gingrich proposes to confer on much of the 12 million illegal population the right to live and work in the United States, but not citizenship. That is, not the right to vote.
At a stroke, the measure would create a huge class of subordinated workers in this country.
But it would also do something else, something very politically ingenious. The newly legalized residents of the United States would no longer have reason to hide from the Census Bureau. They'd be enumerated just in time for 2020. Immigration magnet states such as Texas, Arizona and Florida would gain increased representation in Congress and greater clout in the Electoral College. But because those new residents would not be able to vote, the clout would be exercised only by the state's older citizen population, and it would be that way for years to come. (Of the top 10 illegal immigration states, only four are blue states: California, New York, Illinois and New Jersey.)
Were illegal aliens to gain the franchise, they'd likely vote overwhelmingly Democratic. Even in the Republican year 2004, the Democrats swept voters with incomes of less than $15,000 by a 63% to 36% margin, and voters with family incomes of $15,000-$30,000 by a 57% to 42% margin.
As noncitizens, the former illegals would not vote at all.
Noncitizenship is the policy you advocate if you want to expand the low-wage work force while tamping down the number of low-wage Democratic voters.
Is there a better way? There is, and it's the way advocated by Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.
1: Enforce the immigration laws at the workplace, removing the magnet that draws new illegal workers and encouraging the existing illegal population to return home. Yes, that population includes people who have been present in the country for more than 20 years and won't return. It also includes people who have been in the country less than 20 months and might well return if they cannot find work in the U.S.
2: Pause to assess. See how much an enforcement-first policy reduces the illegal population. The best estimates suggest that the recession of 2008-2009 sent perhaps 1.7 million illegals back home.
A prolonged period of enforcement -- and the removal of the offer of early amnesty -- would likely reduce the illegal population even more.
3: Debate and decide on any future amnesty proposal after enforcement has taken effect, not before.
If any approach to immigration deserves to be described as "humane," it is the approach that begins with concern for the stagnating wages of American workers.
Follow @CNNOpinion on Twitter
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of David Frum. | <urn:uuid:45e45c9f-a260-43a1-ab89-b398fac5b2a0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://edition.cnn.com/2011/11/28/opinion/frum-gingrich-immigration/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958314 | 1,470 | 1.78125 | 2 |
Every once in a while, there are moments in Houston that provide a vivid glimpse of the city that was, that aggressively entrepreneurial, insanely individualistic and relentlessly optimistic place of legend. Such a moment was visible the night of September 18th, when the Texas Heart Institute celebrated its 50th anniversary by honoring its founder, Denton A. Cooley, whose name is almost always accompanied by the modifiers “world famous heart surgeon.”
Much time has passed since Cooley performed America’s first successful heart transplant in 1968; so, too, that period in the early seventies when Tommy Thompson wrote Hearts, the bestselling book about the titanic feud between Cooley and Michael DeBakey, his fellow world renowned surgeon, a dispute that stemmed from an accusation that the former stole that artificial heart from the latter.
But in Houston, within the two segments of the populace that know Cooley best—the medical community and old line Houston society—he remains at 93 a towering hero, not just because of what he accomplished for humankind, but because of what he did for the city’s image as a global medical mecca. Hence this valedictory lap—one that also included the publication of Cooley’s book, 100,000 Hearts: A Surgeon’s Memior, earlier this year—held in a Galleria hotel ballroom that was barely big enough for the crowd of nearly 800 well wishers.
Lyle Lovett was the surprise musical guest and there were videotaped tributes from former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. But the evening really belonged to the kind of Houstonian rapidly disappearing from the scene, local members of the greatest generation who put the nation’s fourth largest city on the map with their smarts and with the kind of outsized personalities that could only have thrived in a place where people have always been allowed to make their own rules.
Even as a nonagenarian, Cooley remains a poster boy for this cohort, possessing all the qualities essential for membership: a distaste for conventional wisdom, a disregard of limits, a lack of pretension commensurate with a lack of fear. This was, after all, a man who fashioned an early version of the heart/lung machine from pieces cobbled together from a coffee pot. This same man once thought it was a great idea to take his colleague Christiaan Barnard—the South African surgeon who completed the world’s first heart transplant—water skiing on the San Jacinto River. And more recently when two of his Texas Heart Institute protégés, Bud Frazier and Billy Cohn, implanted the first continuous flow artificial heart in 2011, Cooley made a cameo in the patient’s room, on his scooter.
The crowd at the 50th anniversary celebration reflected that old line Houston ethos more than a stuffy Royal College of Surgeons confab or a more aggressively glitzy local event like the Houston Grand Opera ball. There were more pearls than diamonds and more men who wore cowboy boots with their tuxes as a sign of rebellion than irony.
The emcee of the event was Don Evans, the former commerce secretary, and one of the tributes came from former Secretary of State James Baker—“Jimmy” in this crowd—who, while praising Cooley’s many “firsts,” also noted that he, Baker, had “run presidential campaigns against Democrats, negotiated with the Soviets and the Chinese during the Cold War and helped force Saddam Hussein to remove his troops from Kuwait. But none of this compares with having a $1 golf bet with Denton.” Not only does Cooley hate to lose, Baker said, he hates to lose a dollar.
Cooley’s son-in-law, Charles Fraser, described meeting Cooley in 1982, as a second-year medical student and as a suitor of Cooley’s daughter Helen: “I entered the Cooley family library to find perhaps the most famous surgeon in the world, sitting in a worn out easy chair, eating his supper on a TV tray after a grueling day in the operating rooms. In another awesome display of surgical dexterity, he had in one hand the TV remote control as he shuttled between various sporting events and in the other, he wielded his fork, which he used to alternately feed himself and his close pal the family dog, Atticus Finch—from the same plate I might add.”
Cooley took it all in with the modesty of a benevolent pasha. Though frail, he still has it going on, the charm still effortless and the smile—the one that snowed everyone from scrub nurses to Princess Grace—still brilliant. His voice was soft with gratitude as he began his own speech, but took on strength as he reflected on some of his more fantastic accomplishments including the fact that he has operated on roughly 100,000 people, about the same number of folks, he noted, it takes to fill the football stadium of the University of Texas, his alma mater. Finally, Cooley displayed that forgive and remember streak so common to Houston’s most successful: After a few minor digs at DeBakey, he celebrated their famous rapprochement of 2007, which drew thunderous applause.
It was an evening of nostalgia for a younger, brasher Houston.
Later, in a phone interview, Cooley said of his earliest days: “We were in exploration mode. We didn’t have that much restriction on what we were able to do. That’s the natural process of advances, to have critics and skeptics, and they all have to be addressed.”
Yes, but on some other night. | <urn:uuid:a73a323b-80ef-44d4-96e9-dedfcf90e5a7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.texasmonthly.com/story/celebrating-denton-cooley-and-old-houston | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973555 | 1,186 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Game of Thrones at TIFF Bell Lightbox: a survival guide
By Brianne Hogan
Richard Madden as Robb Stark in Game of Thrones (all images courtesy HBO Canada)
Starting this Friday, HBO Canada teams up with TIFF Bell Lightbox to bring a free 10-day exhibit based on the hugely popular show, Game of Thrones. Wannabe residents of the fictional kingdom of Westeros can peruse costumes, props, weaponry and photography from the Emmy-award winning series. Haven’t watched the show yet but want to storm the gates anyway? We break down the significance of the most important props on display. Try to keep up.
The "hand of the king" badge
This ornament identifies the wearer as the "hand of the king." The hand is considered the second most powerful person in the kingdom, and is someone the king trusts above all others. The hand's purpose is to carry out the administrative duties of the king, allowing him to enjoy himself (like all kings should). Basically, the hand does all the hard work. When the king is absent, the hand sits on the king's throne because, well, who wouldn’t? Sometimes the king's hand becomes too powerful, and is either dismissed or possibly executed.
The stag crown
The crown belongs to Robert Baratheon (played by Mark Addy), the usurper, and the first Baratheon to rule Westeros after generations of Targaryens. (We warned you this would be confusing.) The stag is the symbol and coat of arms of House Baratheon, and Robert designed his crown in its image. The previous rulers, the Targaryens, typically wore crowns with a dragon motif. Each of the major families of Westeros has its own sigil, often an animal, and it stands to reason that each would shape their crown in its image, if given the opportunity.
The Iron Throne
The granddaddy of thrones, the Iron Throne is the seat of kings in the Seven Kingdoms (which represent the nine regions in Westeros) and is the ultimate symbol of authority. The throne is made of swords to remind supplicants that their peers were vanquished.
There are three dragon eggs owned by Danaerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke), one of two surviving members of the former Targaryen rulers. The eggs were a wedding gift celebrating her betrothal to a warlord who promised her brother he would restore the Targaryen family to the throne with the help of his army. Their significance lies in the history of the Targaryens, who were reputed to have ridden dragons when they originally conquered the Seven Kingdoms. The majority of the populace believes the tales of dragons to be myths, but those who seek to gain power regard the eggs as priceless because, apparently, if the eggs were to hatch, the super powerful dragons would elevate their masters to near invincibility.
Game of Thrones: The Exhibition, TIFF Bell Lightbox, 350 King St. W. March 9-18. | <urn:uuid:22f24d01-7ae0-4c6c-adc5-10927e35a3fe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://postcity.com/Eat-Shop-Do/Do/March-2012/Game-of-Thrones/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960587 | 619 | 1.648438 | 2 |
Two companies, AT&T and Microsoft, helping to underwrite President Obama’s Jan. 21 inaugural festivities have multimillion-dollar contracts with the federal government, and a third stands to benefit financially from the new federal health care law being implemented during his second term.
A long-standing U.S. law bars federal contractors from spending to influence presidential and congressional elections, but few limits are imposed on post-election fundraising to pay for swearing-in festivities.
After refusing corporate money for his first inauguration, Obama reversed course last month and has taken donations from seven corporations, according to a list the inaugural committee recently posted to its website. They are a tiny fraction of the 417 inaugural “benefactors” announced to date, but include some big corporate figures.
Telecom giant AT&T, which spent more than $14 million lobbying Congress and federal agencies during the first nine months of 2012, has been awarded more than $101 million in federal contracts in the current fiscal year, federal contracting data show.
Microsoft, which spent nearly $5.7 million on lobbying, has been awarded nearly $4.6 million in technology contracts with Homeland Security, the White House and several other agencies so far during this fiscal year.
Public Citizen, a liberal-leaning watchdog group, has sharply criticized Obama’s decision to take corporate money. “Such donations are more troubling when they come from companies that have significant ongoing business with the federal government,” said Robert Weissman, the group’s president. “They will expect a very good hearing regarding any concerns, complaints or aspirations they might have.”
In a statement, inaugural spokeswoman Addie Whisenat said the donations “fully comply with the laws governing contributions to an inaugural committee” and noted that Obama has imposed other restrictions not required by law, such as refusing donations from lobbyists and political action committees.
In addition, companies that took federal bailout money under the Troubled Asset Relief Program can’t donate unless they have repaid federal funds.
Microsoft officials declined to comment. Officials with AT&T did not return telephone calls Monday. Its political action committee donated to Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s campaign.
Another corporate donor, Centene Corp., manages health insurance programs for more than a dozen states. Those programs include Medicaid, the federal-state health insurance system for the poor, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program. The Congressional Budget Office estimates insurance coverage will be expanded to 7 million more Americans in both programs next year as the new federal health care law takes effect.
Centene President and CEO Michael Neidorff donated more than $66,000 in the 2012 election to Obama and the Democratic National Committee and $25,000 to the Republican National Committee. Company officials did not respond to telephone calls and e-mails Monday.
Another company with health care interests, Genentech, a subsidiary of the Swiss drug firm, Roche, also donated.
“Genentech works proactively to ensure that the company plays a positive role in the communities in which we live and operate,” the company said in a statement. “Genentech is proud to provide support for the presidential inauguration.”
Inaugural officials have not said how much the corporations and individuals have donated, but must publicly release that information 90 days after the event in a report to the Federal Election Commission.
In the meantime, the committee has voluntarily released an initial list of donors, which includes anyone who has contributed at least $200. It includes wealthy Democratic contributors, such as Alida Rockefeller Messinger, a Standard Oil heir who last year donated $1 million to a pro-Obama super PAC.
The other corporate donors listed by the committee: Financial Innovation, a political mass marketing firm run by Mark Weiner, an Obama fundraiser; Stream Line Circle; and Whittier Trust Co., a California investment management firm. Steve Anderson, a Whittier executive, said the firm did not donate but handled a contribution for a client, whom he declined to name.
Inaugural committee officials say they will release the names of additional donors on a regular basis.
Obama is seeking big donations for the inaugural event, which includes the traditional parade down Pennsylvania Avenue and inaugural balls. Companies and institutions that give $1 million will be rewarded with tickets to VIP receptions, reserved bleacher seats from which to watch the parade and four inaugural ball tickets. Perks for corporate donors at the $100,000 level include two tickets to the ball.
Fredreka Schouten reports for USA Today. | <urn:uuid:1bf39dbc-02f7-49d5-8558-0d0c01276d2a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.federaltimes.com/article/20130108/AGENCY04/301080002/1001 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952869 | 938 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Minnesota Girls Are Not For Sale, a campaign in its first of a five-year campaign dedicated to ending underage prostitution in Minnesota, is leading a delegation early next week to Washington, where it hopes to bring more attention to child prostitution.
The Women's Foundation of Minnesota, which runs the campaign, told Whispers it will meet with members of the Department of Justice, Health and Human Services, and congressional delegations from Minnesota.
Child prostituion already has the attention of the State Department, which last week a released a global study focused on human trafficking titled "Trafficking in Persons." One angle the study focused on is child prostitution in America, finding that 83 percent of girls prostituted in the U.S. are born in the country.
The issue also has the attention of the FBI, which has said Minnesota is a magnet for child prostitution, naming the Twin Cities as one of the nation's biggest centers of the activity.
According to the Minnesota Girls Are Not For Sale campaign, about 213 underage girls are sold every month in the state, which on average, means up to six times every day.
But with five years and $5 million, the campaign hopes to change all that, by redefining prostituted girls in the state as victims, not criminals, and by decreasing demand for child prostitution with better law enforcement targeting of pimps.
The campaign also hopes to attract change on the federal level.
Lee Roper-Batker, president and CEO of the Women's Foundation of Minnesota, tells Whispers that the campaign has already seen progress.
A Minnesota man was charged with four felony counts Thursday of buying sex with two teenage girls under Minnesota's new sex trafficking law. Roper-Batker calls it a "sea change" in terms of punishment for a customer of a child prostitute.
"Major highways run through our state in all directions, where girls are trafficked across state lines. Many of them are vulnerable in poverty and homelessness," Roper-Batker told Whispers. "We're seeing changes happening... But Washington needs to be part of the solution."
- State Department: U.S. Needs To Do Better On Human Trafficking
- The SuperFreakonomics of Prostitution
- Check out U.S. News Weekly: an insider's guide to politics and policy. | <urn:uuid:ab0e4192-f2c0-4638-b467-394ef5da3bac> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2012/06/22/anti-child-sex-trafficking-group-comes-to-washington-to-say-minnesota-girls-are-not-for-sale?s_cid=related-links:TOP | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953261 | 476 | 1.601563 | 2 |
Last weekend, Comcast offered a free HBO preview. This gave Pax Arcana a chance to DVR the first two episodes of the most talked-about miniseries of 2008: “John Adams.”
We like the show. Really, we do. But Pax Arcana is a stickler for historical detail. Nothing drives us up a wall faster than a filmmaker who thinks that historical events need to be embellished to suit the tastes of modern audiences.
In that sense, the show leaves a bit to be desired. Here are the top five historical inaccuracies we spotted in the first two episodes of “John Adams”:
5. No monocles or butter churns. Everyone who’s ever been to Colonial Williamsburg knows that the women of the colonial era spent a majority of their time either gathering eggs or churning butter in large, rickety wooden contraptions — while wearing low-cut blouses. The men of the time, we know, all wore either monocles or those glasses-on-a-stick devices. All are pointedly absent from the John Adams miniseries.
They’re glasses. On a stick. And they belong in our history.
4. Sam Adams was sober the whole time. Samuel Adams, a cousin of John Adams, plays a large role in the first episode of the miniseries. He is presented as a dead-serious agitator for colonial independence and a firebrand who hurls old-timey insults like “toss-pots” at passing redcoats. However, as anyone who went to college knows, Sam Adams was a kick-ass homebrewing homey who always had a tankard in his hand and a lass in his lap. He invented beer pong and high-fiving, bitches. Look it up.
Frank ye Tanke
3. No treasure. It’s clear the U.S. government has no interest in revealing the truth about the founding fathers and the piles of gold they stashed deep in a cavern in Northern Virginia. And I guess HBO will just kowtow to the government’s wishes. I suppose it’s just as well, since publicizing this fact would only inspire more treasure hunters who would eventually stumble upon the lock box in the classical archive room at the Boston Public Library where I… I… I’ve said too much already. Forget you ever saw this.
I will find you, Cage. I will. You owe me $9.
2. No sexy Indians. With the exception of the mulatto Boston Massacre casualty Crispus Attucks, all of the characters in the first episode of “John Adams” are white-bread whiteys. While it’s true that most colonists viewed themselves as English — and therefore white — I think it’s safe to say there was more than a little Wampanoag tail making its way around the outer walls of old Beantown. Is it too much to ask that the filmmakers venture into the woods and let the cameras follow a saucy squaw as she cleans her nearly hairless body in the river? For history’s sake.
Now that’s what I’m talkin’ about. Succotash!
1. Where are the flying hatchets? I’m not sure what the budget was on this miniseries, but I suppose I can give the makers the benefit of the doubt when it comes to the fight scenes. The fighting in John Adams is slow and plodding, with a bunch of guys getting shot in the thigh and shin and whatnot. Perhaps it was too expensive to include long tracking shots of a renegade guerilla dodging redcoat bullets while flinging hatchets, Gibson-style, through a dense forest — landing them blade-side down in some crumpet-eater’s spine. Then he approaches another officer silently from the rear and — oops! — snaps his neck! Fucking British soldiers.
America, fuck yeah.
Nota Bene: It really is a good show, and if you’re interested in nitpicking the historical details, you should go here. | <urn:uuid:11eaf89f-438f-4e2a-9c88-dd6e18c594c5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://paxarcana.wordpress.com/tag/hollywood/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949548 | 879 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Will YOU Answer the Call?
In Chetan Bhagat’s One Night at the Call Center, six Indian coworkers share their life stories while working together during one night at Connexions. Due to their hours, the story begins with Shyam Mehra (Sam Marcy) missing a family wedding. Over the course of the narrative, each team member reveals various secrets, dramas and personal traumas. Issues from arranged marriage to relations between genders and generations were all pertinent issues dealt with in this novel. At one point, on the verge of personal and physical disaster, the team is asked, “Are you going to answer the call?”
One team member, Vroom, answered, “I want to have a life with meaning.” He must alter his life by giving up meaningless work and quit the call center. “Calling is not my calling,” he pronounced. “Each of us must decide when to listen to the inner voice and when to make a change to begin the life we have always wanted,” he adds. Shyam admits, “I want to be worthy of someone like her and I want to be successful too.” All the characters realize they need to focus on themselves and are told: “Never be afraid of failure. If it has come your way, it means I want to give you a real shot at being successful later.”
The team members from One Night at the Calling Center would urge you to go for it. As John Wooden, the infamous UCLA Basketball Coach used to say, “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”
In The Impact Equation: Are You Making Things Happen or Just Making Noise?, Chris Brogan and Julien Smith stated that, “Writing is now one of the few skills you must have –and we really mean “must” here for the twenty-first century.” It is something we all must practice. Each of us must be ready to share our stories and realize: “We consume more written media than we ever have in history…it’s time for all of us to become master copywriters.” Answer the call and contribute.
“The reality is that we are the first generation of people on this planet to be not only media consumers and media creators. We are all media owners as well.”Continued on the next page | <urn:uuid:0c0bd7a1-0162-46f2-9bd8-2160c22049b1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://technorati.com/lifestyle/family/article/will-you-answer-the-call/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+trarticles+%28All+articles+at+Technorati%29 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969582 | 504 | 1.828125 | 2 |
WASHINGTON, D.C. (BNO NEWS) — The U.S. military has made a secret request for additional funding to upgrade its largest conventional bomb because it is not yet capable of destroying Iran’s most heavily fortified underground facilities, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday.
The 30,000-pounds (13,600-kilograms) Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) is the deepest penetrating ‘bunker buster’ currently in the U.S. arsenal, specifically designed to take out the hardened fortifications built by Iran and North Korea to cloak their alleged nuclear weapons programs.
But experts at the U.S. Department of Defense no longer believe the weapon is capable of destroying some of Iran’s key facilities, most notably the Fordow fuel enrichment plant near the city of Qom. The facility is buried in a mountain complex and is surrounded by anti-aircraft batteries, making it a difficult target.
The U.S. military spent about $ 330 million to develop about 20 MOPs, but the U.S. Department of Defense has now submitted a secret request to U.S. Congress for another $ 82 million to enhance the bomb’s ability to penetrate deeper into rock, concrete and steel before exploding, according to U.S. officials who spoke to the Wall Street Journal.
U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, in an interview with the newspaper, said the bomb could cause “a lot of damage” to Iran’s underground nuclear facilities, but confirmed that it would not necessarily destroy them outright. “We’re developing it. I think we’re pretty close, let’s put it that way,” he said. “I’m confident, frankly, that we’re going to have that capability and have it soon.”
It was not immediately clear if U.S. Congress approved the additional funding, but the fact that the request was made outside the normal budget request process suggests the U.S. government deems the upgrade to be a matter of urgency as tensions between Iran and the West continue to rise. U.S. officials have previously said no option would be taken off the table to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon.
The mountain above the Iranian enrichment site at Fordow is estimated to be at least 200 feet (61 meters) tall. The MOP is designed to penetrate up to 200 feet underground before exploding, but factors such as soil density and the types of stone and rock could decrease this dramatically. Some experts believe a tactical nuclear weapon may be the only option to completely take out the facility.
International concerns regarding Iran’s nuclear activities have been increasing for decades. And while Iran has repeatedly stated that its nuclear program is for the peaceful purpose of providing energy, many countries contend it is seeking to develop nuclear weapons and may be close to obtain them.
On Monday, the Council of the European Union (EU) announced broadened restrictive measures against Iran by banning crude-oil imports and a freeze on Iran’s central bank assets. As part of the toughest sanctions yet against Iran, the EU also banned imports of petrochemical products from Iran into the EU as well as the export of key equipment and technology for this sector to Iran.
During U.S. President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address earlier this week, Obama said the world now ‘stands as one’ to deal with Iran’s nuclear program. “The regime is more isolated than ever before; its leaders are faced with crippling sanctions, and as long as they shirk their responsibilities, this pressure will not relent,” he said.
Obama added: “Let there be no doubt: America is determined to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and I will take no options off the table to achieve that goal. But a peaceful resolution of this issue is still possible, and far better, and if Iran changes course and meets its obligations, it can rejoin the community of nations.” | <urn:uuid:0f9e65f4-068d-4b7c-9155-9e0aa0b1f179> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://news.rickey.org/wsj-u-s-military-seeks-more-powerful-bomb-against-iran/6581 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962534 | 837 | 1.640625 | 2 |
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Mon May 7, 2012
Saluting Michigan's fallen police officers
The haunting sounds of bagpipes echoed in the halls of the state capital this evening.
Police officers from across the state gathered inside the capital rotunda for the 19th annual Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Service.
The ceremoney honored a half dozen police officers from Michigan or with ties to Michigan who died in the line of duty last year. Nationwide, 163 law enforcement officers were killed on the job last year. Already this year, 2 Michigan law enforcement officers have died on the job.
“The loss of these officers is a testament to the dangers and realities of police work," says Colonel Kristie Kibbey Etue, the director of the Michigan State Police.
National Police Week begins May 13th. | <urn:uuid:cf2b0eea-a056-4cf5-a84d-20bb791a7261> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.michiganradio.org/post/saluting-michigans-fallen-police-officers | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956705 | 171 | 1.773438 | 2 |
Kevin Koshiol of Hebron takes aim with a handgun at Shooters Supply and Sporting Goods in Independence.
The Newtown, Conn., tragedy and other shootings across the nation have sharply increased debate about stricter gun laws, but they won't likely change Kentucky's status as one of the most lenient states for gun laws.
Both Democrats and Republicans in Kentucky said they don't foresee anyone proposing any stricter gun laws in the upcoming session starting Jan. 8. Some, however, want to discuss the issue of allowing teachers to carry weapons in schools or increasing the number of school resource officers.
Kentucky's gun laws were ranked as less restrictive than those in most states, ... | <urn:uuid:52456ab3-197d-4c08-90ec-0a27d98b30d7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://news.cincinnati.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/AB/20130103/NEWS010802/301030023/&nclick_check=1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957743 | 136 | 1.601563 | 2 |
Abuse survivor hopeful over European ruling05/03/2013 - 15:00:42
A survivor of abuse has said she is hopeful European judges will move to protect children in her battle to hold the Irish state liable for her suffering at school.
If successful, a lawsuit by Louise O’Keeffe, 46, could spark a raft of claims from people denied compensation because abuse occurred in church-run or independent schools.
“I’d be hopeful, and I have a belief that even this would be my last step that I can go,” she said.
“It will be that rights will come right and the wrongs will be punished, and I’d hope the European courts will see my case for what it is and give me the judgment that is right – not just for me, but for every child that has been abused within the school system in Ireland.”
Ms O’Keeffe’s case is being heard by judges at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg tomorrow.
It is almost 15 years since she began her action against the State.
“At that time I never expected to be appealing to Europe to right the wrongs that happened to me as a child, as an eight-year-old in school,” she said.
Ms O’Keeffe had feared at one point that her marathon legal battle could leave her in financial ruin and homeless.
She was abused at Dunderrow primary school in Cork in 1973 by then principal, Leo Hickey.
She sued the State, claiming the Department of Education was liable as it paid the teacher’s wages, supervised the curriculum and inspected the classrooms, but lost in the High Court in Dublin and subsequently the Supreme Court.
The State used the defence that the school was run by an independent board of management.
Ms O’Keeffe said she was not thinking of failure on this occasion.
“What I believe in has not changed. I believe children in schools should be protected and the State has continually reneged on their responsibility of protecting children in schools,” she said.
“I’m confident in taking these steps that we will win this case. This is the rights of children; children must be looked after.
“They must be protected and the State must be held responsible and must account for that responsibility. For me, this is a must-win.”
Ms O’Keeffe took a civil action against retired principal Hickey and was awarded a monthly payment of about €400.
He was jailed for three years in 1998 after being convicted of indecently assaulting a number of girls in the 1970s.
It is understood about 200 other abuse victims have either dropped or postponed their actions in the wake of the Supreme Court judgment against Ms O’Keeffe.
A ruling from the European Court is not expected for months.
more stories like this:
- once per day, no spam. | <urn:uuid:f30facb8-72c2-4b0f-bd93-20611e741db1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/abuse-survivor-hopeful-over-european-ruling-587003.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.980308 | 625 | 1.71875 | 2 |
The MKK Nair Smrithi Sangam prepares to organise a meeting to commemorate M.K.K.Nair's 92nd birthday.
That the late M.K.K. Nair was a multi-faceted personality whose varied pursuits had helped shape the history of Kerala, especially central Kerala, is rather well known. What is probably forgotten is the trials and tribulations that the veteran civil servant, art-lover, educationist and management expert had to undergo.
Even as the MKK Nair Smrithi Sangam prepares to organise a meeting to commemorate the late visionary’s 92nd birthday on Wednesday, his son Gopinath Krishnan has alleged that two CBI officials involved in framing false charges against his father did so owing to the pressure from political leaders in a casteist society. The mental harassment meted out to his father contributed to the worsening of his health that ultimately claimed his life, he said.
On Wednesday, Union Minister for Overseas Indian Affairs Vayalar Ravi will inaugurate the meeting to commemorate M.K.K. Nair at Changampuzha Park, while K.G. Poulose, former vice chancellor of Kerala Kalamandalam Deemed University, will deliver the commemorative lecture. Senior mediaperson K.M. Roy will preside.
M.K.K. Nair entered the scene at a time when the industrial graph of Kerala showed little signs of progress. People who had seen the rise and fall of the gigantic figure in the industrial, social and cultural arena recall that FACT became a nationally or even internationally known fertilizer unit after he assumed charge.
The senior IAS officer, with stints at the Bhilai steel plant and Central government administration in New Delhi, was primarily responsible for establishing major infrastructure facilities for fertilizer units at Ambalamedu and Udyogamandal. FACT, with its own school and hospital, was one of the first industrial units that Kerala could boast of in the sixties and seventies.
His penchant for art and culture reflected in the formation of a cultural wing at the industrial unit, setting a perfect ground for Kathakali and other art forms to flourish. Hyderali, the legendary singer of Kathakali padams, was invited to become a faculty at the cultural wing. Kalamandalam Embrandiri, Kalamandalam Kesavan and Nambisan were among the other artistes who were given much needed inspiration and help. Performances by artistes of international repute at the FACT auditorium were a common affair. A host of other notable institutions such as Bharaitya Vidya Bhavan, Ernakulam, owes their origin to the man who could be called the Bhishmacharya of industry in Kerala.
His unparalleled management skill and initiative also brought enemies to the fore. They did succeed in getting charges framed against him by the CBI. Amassing wealth disproportionate to his income and misuse of official machinery were the key charges.
The man who was the pillar of the establishment had to retreat, with the Central government transferring him to New Delhi. Later, he was given a suspension order. There was a move to arrest him on his arrival from New Delhi, but a close friend managed to secure a bail on his behalf.
The charge-sheets were subsequently dismissed by two judges of the trial court. Nevertheless, the turn of events had taken a heavy toll on his health and ultimately resulted in his untimely death at the age of 67, a close aide of his told The Hindu.
It was a gratuitous society that threw him away in a bid to settle personal scores, the close aide said. The trade union movement too played an unworthy cause which has never been highlighted and is perhaps little known to the outside world, he added.
Nair had to bow out after the machinations of a political group succeeded in its attempts, a functionary of the MKK Nair Smrithy Sangam said. A political leader wanted a few of his nominees to be recruited in the company. The enmity between the leader and Nair began when the latter failed to toe the former’s line, he said. | <urn:uuid:c113a096-7b4d-44d1-b7d6-83167dc99f45> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Kochi/remembering-a-visionary-not-forgetting-his-many-trials/article4264540.ece | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.983406 | 864 | 1.632813 | 2 |
|For somebody who's so biased towards classic music as I (nowadays) am, world music should be a forbidden area. And believe me, I wouldn't trespass into something that is so far from my minuscule competence unless there was this:
G'ganggali ging g'gang, g'gung g'gung!
Giigara-Lina Wiiy Rosina.
G'ganggali ging g'gang, g'gung g'gung!
Rittara-Gritta, d'Zittara witta.
G'ganggali ging g'gang, g'ung g'gung.
Giigaralina, siig'R a Fina.
G'ganggali ging g'gang, g'ung g'gung!
Fung z'Jung, chung d'Stung.1
Many years ago on my way back home to Finlandia, I decided to check on the Museum of Fine Arts in Bern/Switzerland. It's a great museum in that even if the temporary exhibition turns out a failure, they have a meaty collection of Paul Klee there (as well as Kandinsky and Picasso). One of the best I know of in fact.
|So in I went. And came out ... well, a changed man. I had seen some of these paintings before in the Collection de l'Art Brut, Lausanne. I had been browsing what Jean Dubuffet and Michel Thevoz had written on their maker. But I wasn't prepared for this shock. I was haunted.
I saw about a hundred -- perhaps more -- paintings or drawings if you like, filled with circles, ovals, stars, notation lines, zigzag lines, spirals, squares (mostly not), small figurative spots etc. structured by means of horizontal, vertical and diagonal ornamental strips, animal forms, letter forms, geometric forms, mandala forms, the whole often framed with running decorative bands, sometimes symmetrically composed, but more often the compositional structure simply making way for the stupefying ornamental fireworks; largish, mostly pencilled on a brownish paper, some colored charmingly, some collages.
It was great, extraordinary in fact, but I didn't know right off the bat what to think about it. I felt a helplessness that soon turned to irritation when my intellect worked out to say something but the mind was fed up with concepts and dull adjectives.
Adolf Wölfli was a painter (1864-1930), a manic one at that with 1400 separate drawings, each of which would require a month's intensive work by an average person - plus 1500 collages. But he was also a writer and poet, with 20,000 hand-written and drawn pages in a series of vast hand-bound books; a mathematician creating his own algebra; and an explorer who made frequent trips to remote regions, which he describes in his Scientific Voyages, Hunting Expeditions, Casualties, Adventures, and other experiences of one gone astray on the whole earth globe; Or, a servant of God, without a head, is poorer than the poorest wretch, one of the many startling travel books he wrote.
Wölfli was also a composer and musician. In one sense, music had a more significant role in his life and cosmology than images or words. He wrote songs, polkas, mazurkas, waltzes and marches in the style of folk music. He performed his music by blowing into paper horns whose sound contemporaries compared to country brass-band music.
|Wölfli lacked any kind of musical training. That didn't prevent him from writing a body of extraordinary musical scores. Notations with common and mysterious signs appear in his numerous drawings and texts. The canonical view has been that Wölfli's musical notes mainly serve symbolic and decorative purposes but are musically illegible - "tending toward, but not quite attaining, full musical sense" as one commentator puts it. More recent studies show, however, that at least some of Wölfli's scores make musical sense. Streiff and Keller, for example, claim that his choice of musical pitches hardly was a matter of sheer coincidence.2
|There have been very few efforts to interpret Wölfi's music. A very rare LP Gelesen und vertont exists in which this has been attempted. I'm a happy owner of one. It tells much about the project's difficulty in that only a few purely instrumental pieces have been included in the LP, the rest being more like song poems. This doesn't matter, however, as in Wölfli's poetry words were chosen not primarily for their meaning but rather their rhythmic and sonorous effects. Words are split into syllables and letters and then combined into often senseless neologisms. Rhythm and repetition are essential to Wölfli's music - as well as art in general.
|In addition to the LP, there presumably are only two CDs containing Wölfli's music. In one of them, several experimental artists, fascinated by Wölfli, pay tribute to the composer. The other is by Graeme Revell who, based on the study by Streiff and Keller, creates his own interpretation of Wölfi's music ["Necropolis, Amphibians & Reptiles - The Music of Adolf Wölfli"].
Just like Wölfli's drawings and paintings have inspired many famous painters (e.g. Andre Breton), and his texts famous poets (e.g. Rilke), the musical undercurrent of Wölfli's art has stimulated many contemporary composers (e.g. Wolfgang Rihm, Per Nørgård and Terry Riley). One of the presentations in a recent Nordic Musicological Congress held in Helsinki was devoted to music brut and works based on Adolf Wölfli texts. Furthermore, some commentators have paid attention -- without claiming a causal connection -- to the fact that many of Wölfli's musical experimentations were explored in later 20th century music: folk music (Bartok), aleatoric music (Cage), birdsong (Messiae), graphic scores (Stockhausen) and architectonic ideas (Xenakis).
|Yes, Wölfli was a schizophrenic. He suffered from hallucinations (voices) and frequently behaved violently. Most of his adult life was spent in Waldau, an asylum near Bern. It was there where his artistic career developed slowly.
There are many aspects of his art that have to be seen against his illness: his fear of empty space or dead time expressing itself in his hyperbolic use of numbers, music (melomania), words (logorrhoea) and images (iconophilia) and tending toward extension to infinity; the interplay of harmony (cosmos) and chaos (catastrophic destruction of the cosmos) etc. These are all means of reducing the anguish and holding one's identity together. It is therefore important to not to forget that Wölfli's music and art, just like his everyday life, are "ruled by the particularities of his paranoid thought" and "split" soul.
Despite all this, it would be a misjudgment to refuse seeing the artistic value of Wölfli's creations. His drawings, for instance, have obvious aesthetic qualities which are easy to appreciate irrespective of the knowledge of his metal condition. Beyond this -- and without falling into the trap of romanticization and idealization -- one can also take Wölfli's work as confronting the essential questions of art and philosophy. What Wölfli is saying with his example goes deeper than the skin of his often complex and puzzling paintings, writings or compositions.
First, he teaches us genuine enthusiasm. I'm not talking about the obsessive behavior one frequently comes across in our audio hobby. I'm talking about the great seriousness and wholeheartedness with which he went about every project of his, the quotidian and spiritual being always united. In the Ancient Greek, "enthusiasm" meant "inspired by God". Perhaps that would do justice to Wölfli's unrelenting creative drive. What he accomplished has a certain true greatness in it, not that of the great men of the history books but of the potential for creative greatness in all of us.
Secondly, he urges us -- again indirectly -- to dump many of those silly and small-minded distinctions with which we chain our life. No fear of being a dilettante, for example: "From now on the geographically described regions will be praised musically", he once wrote and so went for making music. No fear for showing child-like artistic impulses and so on.
|Raw art -- Art Brut or Outsider Art, one of the greatest representatives of which Adolf Wölfli is now acknowledged to be -- is sometimes defined as art which owes nothing to tradition or fashion. A point is thus made on its divergence from the institutions of fine or beaux arts; no pleasing of galleries, museums, generally accepted tastes or any prior notions of what art is.
But there seems to be more at stake here than the mere freedom from the culturally indoctrinated ways of doing art. It concerns itself over freedom from everything that is seeded in us ever since we were born, through socialization, cultivation and the massive whip of civilization. It is this freedom that seems to be intimately linked to the very process of creation itself and at the root of appreciating art in the first place. If Adolf Wölfli is to believed, to be free from all the inhibitions and social conditioning, one needs to turn one's eyes inward and listen to the deep music of one's soul. It is tempting to think that it is this fundamental music of our inner world that ultimately makes us appreciate the music of other people and cultures.
Allen S. Weiss writing on Wölfli's magnum opus, The Funeral March, says: "We can never know the full meaning of The Funeral March, for it was sung by Wölfli alone, for Wölfli alone, a sort of autistic music. And yet, is it not precisely in such works that autism becomes communicative and that we reach the inner recesses of another's soul? Is it not only in such extreme cases that we can even begin to imagine the depths of another's soul, as well as of our own? How, indeed, do we sing? For whom? And against what?"
1 Allen S. Weiss, Shattered Forms, Art Brut, Phantasm, Modernism, State University Of New York Press, 1992. This story has benefited from the insights given especially in the chapter "Music and Madness".
2 Peter Streiff and Kjell Keller, Adolf Wölfli, Composer, in Adolf Wölfli (Adolf Wölfli Foundation, 1976) | <urn:uuid:7a306cf3-6da3-47de-a59a-a7f76571880a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://6moons.com/industryfeatures/innerworld/innerworld.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96553 | 2,272 | 1.601563 | 2 |
That sentiment was foreshadowed in the frustration over the down-to-the-wire, partisan political maneuvering as the last Congress sought to avert the fiscal cliff's steepest domestic spending cuts.
Obama appeared to prevail on that skirmish, delivering on a promise to raise tax rates on wealthy Americans -- although he shifted his definition of "wealthy" from those making $250,000 or more to those making $400,000 and up.
According to Pew Research Center and Gallup polls, Americans were none too impressed with how lawmakers handled the negotiations or the deal that was struck.
Some 41% of those polled disapproved of the deal, according to Pew, and 52% thought the deal would hurt people like them. In the Gallup poll, 67% - disapproved of congressional Republicans' handled the negotiations while 55% disapproved of how Democrats performed.
Still, partly due to deliberate redistricting to protect -- or create -- more partisan congressional districts, American voters continued to elect or re-elect safe representatives to do their bidding in Congress. For instance, most of the 435 members of the House of Representatives -- Republicans and Democrats -- faced little real opposition on Election Day in 2012.
Other battlegrounds: Sequester, gun control, immigration
But the next battle looms. Just weeks after Obama takes his oath of office, a new Congress will be tasked with addressing the automatic spending cuts, or sequester, that were kicked down the road in order to pass a smaller deal at the end of the year.
The new Congress will also consider raising the nation's debt ceiling, or the ability of the U.S. Treasury to borrow money to pay America's bills. Most agree that defaulting on the nation's obligations would be disastrous for America and the global economy, but some Republicans in Congress are starting to hint that they may be prepared to let that happen anyway if large spending cuts are not secured.
And after that, the fight over gun control, a high priority for the White House in the aftermath of the Connecticut school massacre, will pit the president against many members of the House and Senate from safe districts with high ratings and big-dollar donations from gun rights advocates.
The president and vice president unveiled a major plan on Wednesday that included 23 executive actions the president has ordered on his own, while urging the new Congress to take on the meaty issues of an assault weapons ban, limits on the number of bullets a gun magazine can hold, and other sweeping reforms the gun lobby and others say would gut the constitutional right to bear arms. | <urn:uuid:295beab2-4104-4a9d-8286-68ad3cc2c226> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wyff4.com/news/politics/The-reset-America-Obama-s-second-chance/-/9324082/18165988/-/item/3/-/sa4xtp/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960095 | 516 | 1.6875 | 2 |
Peter Lynch, the famed investor and former portfolio manager of the Fidelity Magellan Fund, often said that investors should "invest in what you know." Few Americans know more about an individual company or investment than they do about their current employer.
Although recent trends suggest fewer employees are purchasing employer stock in their 401(k) plans, assets in employer securities in 401(k) plans are significant. Roughly 8% of the $3 trillion in 401(k) assets are currently invested in company stock according to EBRI.
Holding employer securities in a 401(k) plan poses a significant retirement risk. One of the most common examples cited is Enron. At Enron, more than half of 401(k) plan assets were invested in company stock, which lost almost all its value when the company collapsed in 2001. Not only did Enron employees lose their jobs, many lost a significant portion of their retirement savings, if not their entire balance.
While Enron's eventual demise may seem obvious with the benefit of hindsight (as do other market collapses, like the technology bubble and the real-estate bubble), before its demise Enron had been heralded by Fortune magazine for six straight years as "America's Most Innovative Company."
Individual stocks have historically had about twice the volatility of a diversified portfolio of similar stocks. For example, the annual standard deviation of the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index /quotes/zigman/3870025 SPX -0.87% from 1997 to 2011 was 19% versus 37% for the median large-cap stock.
This higher level of risk has a significant impact on the returns realized by an investor, something also known as the "geometric return." For example, assume a security returns 100% in the first year and then loses 50% the second year. While the arithmetic, or simple, average return over the two periods is 25% ( (100% - 50%) / 2 = 25%), the compounded, or geometric, return is 0% ($1 would grow to $2 in the first year and then drop back to $1 in the second). Since individuals stocks are riskier than a diversified portfolio, the risk is going to be higher and the expected return is going to be lower, a lose-lose for investors.
Getting back to the Enron example (a common whipping boy for anyone noting the potential risk of holding employer securities, although there are numerous other examples), when Enron employees purchased Enron stock, they placed their human capital (i.e., their job) in the same basket as their financial capital (i.e., their 401(k) plan assets). When Enron went bankrupt, the employees lost not only their jobs (a shock to their human capital) but many also lost significant financial capital (i.e., their entire retirement savings).
When we run simulations on the impact of holding employer securities on retirement wealth we find that the less you hold the better the potential outcome (i.e., none is best). The implications associated with holding some employer securities (e.g., 10% of an account balance) aren't generally significant, but higher levels of employer stockholdings (e.g., over 25%) can significantly reduce the likely 401(k) balance at retirement. I find employer stock just generally isn't worth the risk.
Before concluding, however, it is important to note that there are two potential reasons to purchase employer stocks or to continue holding it: discounts and tax benefits. In some instances it's possible to purchase employer securities at a discount. This could be advantageous depending on the holding period requirements and the level of the discount. The second reason is potential tax benefits, something known as net unrealized appreciation (NUA).
With an NUA strategy, individuals can request a distribution of employer stock from their qualified plan be moved into a taxable account, at which time ordinary income tax is due on the basis of the shares. The difference between the cost basis and the market value of the securities is what's known as net unrealized appreciation (NUA) and is taxed at long-term capital gains rates when the stock is sold, regardless of the holding period. This results in more favorable tax treatment, since some of the potential gains in the employer securities are taxed at long-term capital gains rates versus ordinary income rates. NUA is a complex strategy, though, that should only be made after consultation with an experienced financial planner, accountant, or tax attorney.
In closing, while holding employer securities in a 401(k) plan may feel like a safe investment, I feel it's generally not a good idea. If your goal is to create a pool of money to use to fund your retirement (which is the fundamental purpose of a 401(k)), you're going to be better served with a more diversified portfolio.
Most 401(k) plans today offer a target-date fund or managed accounts. While these professionally managed options aren't for everyone, they are at least a great place to start when thinking about how to invest for retirement. | <urn:uuid:3de37892-116e-4f2b-8a1a-22481fd034b7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.marketwatch.com/story/employer-stock-in-a-401k-caveat-emptor-2013-02-15?link=kiosk | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959877 | 1,035 | 1.796875 | 2 |
Filed under: maritime | Tags: Class Afloat, Concordia, safety at sea, sail training, tall ships
- Personal – I spent my high school years on a tall ship called Tabor Boy and launched The Tabor Boy Project, a website/living history project/social network, about that experience. So as a product of a long established, successful sail training program, I passionately believe in the power to transform young lives.
- Professional – I was the executive director of the American Sail Training Association from 2001 to 2008. During that period I had the opportunity to work with hundreds of different sail training vessels and tall ships from around the world.
- Professional/Personal – When speaking with the public or media at big tall ships events, I was invariably asked which was my favorite. As ASTA executive director, the only answer could be that “Like parents love their children, I love them all equally.” (politically correct) However, each sail training vessel and tall ship is unique in its own way and back on April 2, 2008, I wrote “I had the great fortune to spend my 4 years of high school sailing on a tall ship. If there was one educational sailing experience I could be jealous of, this (Class Afloat on Concordia) would be it.” By the way, I still feel that way today.
- Leadership – Over the years, I had the opportunity to work with Class Afloat’s founder Terry Davies and believe that it would be difficult to find another educational leader more professional and caring about young people and more knowledgeable about ships. Similarly, my experience working with various captains and crew members of the Concordia was always very positive. Leadership defines the success of a program and Terry Davies charted a proper course for Class Afloat.
- Reference – Today modern technology and media allow information to be distributed fast, far and wide. Unfortunately, accuracy isn’t always one of the characteristics but that might be a fair trade under many circumstances. Over time, inaccurate reports are generally weeded out and tossed aside. I’ve attempted to collect as many of the stories told to and by the media as possible. Going back later and trying to find this kind of information would be a gargantuan task. Doing it in real time is slightly easier. This is the web and many of these links will die but overall the post can serve as a pretty comprehensive reference for anyone interested in learning more about the casualty.
- Lessons to Be Learned - The Concordia sinking is a sad story with a happy ending. And while it’s very early days in the investigation, it presents a great opportunity to try to figure out what happened without the usual high emotion that surrounds an incident involving casualties or fatalities. In some respects, this is similar to the Miracle on the Hudson. As Sergeant Joe Friday used to say, “All we want are the facts” and there are more than 64 individual stories that can be told today but which over time will consolidate into one overall narrative from which we will hopefully learn some valuable lessons for the future.
Up to this post, I’ve avoided editorializing, analyzing or making any judgement about what actually happened on the Concordia on February 17, 2010. I think that I’ll continue to leave the technical analysis to the professional investigators and others with more direct experience and knowledge about these things. I will continue to collect links about the sinking but anticipate (and hope) the pace of stories slows down so that I can get back to Sea-Fever’s regularly scheduled programming. I will also try to interpret/translate some of the technical findings so that non mariners can get a better understanding of the issues. I believe my Tabor Boy and ASTA experiences leave me well suited to the task. Finally, I will continue to champion sail training because I believe more than ever that there is no greater teaching platform than the tall ship and or campus than the sea.
Filed under: Education, maritime, maritime heritage, sail training, tall ships | Tags: Erie Maritime Museum, maritime heritage, Mystic, tall ships, US Brig Niagara
Some very bad news for tall ships, maritime heritage preservation and professional mariners today.
Plans for U.S. Brig Niagara’s sailing season could be sunk by Kevin Flowers for the Erie-Times News March 25, 2009 (download copy)
I’ll be writing more about this later.
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Filed under: Education, maritime heritage, sail training, tall ships | Tags: American Sail Training Association, Barclay Warburton III, Education, maritime heritage, Newport, Oliver Hazard Perry, Rhode Island, sail training, tall ships, Tall Ships Rhode Island
While the title of this post sounds a bit like a children’s story, it’s really all big business.
On January 23, 2009, Ariana Green wrote an article in the NY Times titled In Rhode Island, Hoping a Tall Ship Can Help a Sagging Economy about a nonprofit organization, Tall Ships Rhode Island, purchasing a less than half finished tall ship from a foundering Canadian organization with the hopes boosting their tiny states economy, among other things.
Tall ships in America got their start in Newport, RI back in 1973 when Barclay Warburton III, along with a group of like minded maritime enthusiasts including Bart Dunbar, also member of the current group, established a new nonprofit to advance the concept of sail training and organize the US Bicentennial Tall Ships Celebrations in 1976. The American Sail Training Association was founded and over the years has grown to become a national and international nonprofit whose mission is to “encourage character building through sail training, promote sail training to the North American public and support education under sail.” (I was the executive director of the ASTA from 2001 through 2006.)
Warburton and the ASTA founders actions were very important to the local community because up until 1973 Newport was a Navy town. However, in that year, the fleet left, the base was downsized significantly and Newport was left pondering a potentially dismal economic future. Tall Ships and the Americas Cup would end up saving the day by transforming the city into one of the sailing capital’s of the world and a maritime heritage tourism destination.
Fast forward 36 years and can the current group pull another miracle out of their duffle bag? Green writes:
As Rhode Island struggles with one of the nation’s highest unemployment rates, city and state officials hope that turning the hull into a tall ship will create jobs, attract tourists and spur interest in the state’s maritime history.
“Today cities realize they benefit from having a flagship for their community,” said Timothy Walker, who teaches maritime history at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth. “It’s a way to be really visible and make an impression that can travel. It can literally fly the flag for a community.”
But not everyone is aboard with an optimistic assessment:
But Jeff Bolster, a professor of maritime history at the University of New Hampshire, said officials should not overestimate the economic contribution a ship project would make.
“A vessel of this scale is not going to be a huge help to the ailing economy,” Mr. Bolster said. “It has a modest operating budget, so it alone can’t solve the state’s fiscal problems in a major way.”
It will be all very interesting to watch. This is a very experienced group being led by Captain Richard Bailey who for years ran popular sail training programs aboard the HMS Rose until to she was sold to Fox to star in Master & Commander as the HMS Surprise. Today the Rose/Surprise is part of the San Diego Maritime Museum’s fleet of historic ships.
On the downside is that the Oliver Hazard Perry is a very large ship, second only to the USCGC Barque EAGLE in the United States. Ships this size are very costly to run and often difficult to fill. While nearly anyone who has sailed aboard a tall ship will vouch for it’s power in being a life changing experience, marketing the concept to wider public has always been challenging. The current projected cost of the project is $5 million and her scheduled launch is 2011, but I have yet to see a ship of this scale come in on budget and on time. Tall Ships Rhode Island has always been good at raising money and in this economy and for the foreseeable future, they have to really count on all of the contacts, connections and tricks they can pull out of their ditty bags.
This is a very exciting project for the City of Newport, the State of Rhode Island, the entire region and even the nation. While it seems pretty ambitious in scale, it’s no less so than what Barclay Warburton III pulled off in the early 1970’s. I bet he’s looking down and giving Tall Ships Rhode Island a big Huzzah for their efforts.
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Filed under: maritime, Sea(cret) Santa | Tags: Jack Tar Magazine, Sea(cret) Santa, tall ships, tallships, Women of Maritime
Sea(cret) Santa is pleased to report that there is no recession in the North Pole and he and the elves have been busier than a crew of one-armed sailmakers. Unfortunately, his Internet connection has been down for a few days so he’s been unable to post some of his favorite maritime gift suggestions. But here’s one that should make up for the silence.
As CEO of Christmas, Santa uses new and old technology to make things run as smooth as possible. One of his favorite old school tools is the simple printed calendar and this year he’s found one that’s sure to bring a smile to every mariner’s face. And have no worries, even Mrs. Claus approves of Women of Maritime Calendar put out by Jack Tar Magazine (Rated PG-13). Take it from Sea(cret) Santa, there’s no better way to keep track of your most important dates than having a good old calendar you want to keep coming back to. Here’s who’s inside:
January - Kim Carver of Bill of Rights, Lady Washington, Manitou and others
February – Hilary of Seaward, Corwith Cramer, Robert C. Seamans, Harvey Gamage Spirit of Massachusetts
March – Jen of HMS Bounty, Highlander Sea
April – Alysia of Hawaiian Chieftain, Lady Washington
May – Rosemary of Tole Mour, Mystic Whaler, Exy Johnson and Irving Johnson, Hawaiian Chieftain, Lady Washington
June – Cher of Lady Washington and others
July – Abigail M, works for NOAA, mostly in Alaska
August – Anne Catherine Kruger of Robert C. Seamans, Corwith Cramer, Catalyst
September – Elaine Eno of Lynx, Exy Johnson and Irving Johnson, Lady Washington, Amistad, Hawaiian Chieftain, Californian, Seaward, Bill of Rights, Kaisei
October – Cass of Zodiac, Adventuress, Lady Washington
November – Suzanne, works for fisheries, mostly in Alaska
December – Lia, a fisheries researcher
Since you probably want to learn a little more about the Women of Maritime and Jack Tar, here’s an interview with founder, managing editor and January Woman of Maritime, Captain Kim Carver…
Filed under: Education, Experiential education, life, maritime heritage, sail training, storytelling | Tags: sail training, storytelling, Tabor Academy, tall ships, The Tabor Boy Project
We’ve just tacked over at The Tabor Boy Project with a new masthead (above) and color scheme. While you’re there, check out all of the great new content too!
Filed under: Education, Environment, Experience, Experiential education, Leadership, life, maritime, Oceans, sail training, sailing, tall ships | Tags: college, SEA, Sea Education Association, study abroad, tall ships
If you are a college student, or know one, who wants to make the most out of your college experience, you (they) have to check out SEA, which stands for Sea Education Association. At SEA, not only will you study “overseas” you’ll study in them too!
Located in Woods Hole, MA, USA, SEA offers semester long college accredited programs on 2 tall ships in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans that challenge you intellectually and physically by combining a sailing adventure of a lifetime with the study of the deep ocean. I could go on and on about the benefits of this experience but SEA president John Bullard already made a most persuasive case here.
If for some crazy reason John hasn’t convinced you, maybe these short videos shot by program graduates will.
Take your academic career to new heights, literally! Better than looking at a blackboard all day in the middle of January!
YouTube – Sailing the Pacific- 3
Imagine challenging yourself to do something outside your comfort zone and making some amazing friendships in the process.
YouTube – Aloft
How about learning from touching something alive that you actually caught?
YouTube – Squid Jigging on SEA Semester
YouTube – SEA Semester class S213′s Jumbo Squid
And who said school can’t be fun? I guarantee that in the future you will think of the SEA experience more fondly than that Political Science lecture every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon.
YouTube – S-199
Now, if you need a reason for why this might be important to you and the rest of the planet, you have to watch this video of Dr. Bob Ballard’s presentation at the February 2008 TED Conference. There is a whole new world for you to explore and there’s no better opportunity to do so than aboard an SEA tall ship.
YouTube – Robert Ballard: Exploring the ocean’s hidden worlds
Finally, some sound advice from Mark Twain:
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”
Launch your SEA adventure here!
|Share this post :| | <urn:uuid:678a982a-dfdf-413d-8c1f-57542fc2db1d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://sea-fever.org/tag/tall-ships/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942105 | 2,999 | 1.75 | 2 |
Geoffrey Rush: The Reason ‘The King’s Speech’ Was Made
First Published: February 28, 2011 12:24 AM EST Credit: The Weinstein Company
LOS ANGELES, Calif. -- “The King’s Speech” just picked up the Best Picture Oscar at the Academy Awards on Sunday night, but it might not have happened had it not been for one of its stars, Geoffrey Rush.
“This project started on your doorstep…. It was a play and you said, ‘This should be a movie!’” Access Hollywood’s Billy Bush asked Geoffrey on the red carpet before Sunday’s big event in Hollywood.
“I think sometimes you have those little creative moments,” Geoffrey told Billy of how the film started.
“I’m reading the play thinking, ‘Do I want to do a play in London? That would mean a long time away from my family,’” Geoffrey recounted. “I was intrigued by the historical storyline. I knew all about George VI and the stammer and the abdication [of King Edward VIII]. I had no idea about Lionel Logue, the speech therapist, which is why I think they sent it to me, they wanted to alert me to the fact that this Australian character existed.”
Geoffrey said he read the materials and immediately took action.
“I got on to my agent and said, ‘I imagined this only as a film when I was reading it,’ you know, even though I knew they were presenting it as a play. I said, ‘It’s film,’” he explained
The Best Supporting Actor nominee revealed that once he pushed it as a motion picture, people got on board.
“It’s just seemed to attract the right ingredients at the right rate and it moved forward fairly quickly,” he said. “It suddenly became a film that people would want to go and see a couple of times.”
In addition to taking home the statue for Best Picture, Geoffrey’s co-star, Colin Firth, won the Best Actor trophy, while Tom Hooper won Best Director.
Copyright 2013 by NBC Universal, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. | <urn:uuid:73c87621-3075-4493-8230-e6eced382143> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.accesshollywood.com/geoffrey-rush-the-reason-best-picture-the-kings-speech-was-made_article_44498 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970464 | 493 | 1.835938 | 2 |
Sun, March 06, 2011 | The Rubin Report | By Barry Rubin
Barack Obama and the Cavalcade of Naivete
President Barack Obama told Democratic Party contributors in Miami:
“When you look at what’s happening around the world what’s happening in the Middle East, it is a manifestation of new technologies, the winds of freedom that are blowing through countries that have not felt those winds in decades, a whole new generation that says I want to be a part of this world. It’s a dangerous time, but it’s also a huge opportunity for us.’’
Obama also said that the United States should not be “afraid” of change in the Middle East. Well, that depends on the kind of change, doesn’t it? I wouldn’t be afraid if Iran, Syria, and the Gaza Strip had revolutionary upheavals that installed moderate democratic govenrments, for example.
But let me remind you once again, my theme from the first day of the Egyptian revolution has been that I’m worried because others aren’t worried. The more they show that they don’t understand the dangers, the greater the dangers become.
President Franklin Roosevelt said about the Great Depression that there was, “Nothing to fear but fear itself.” That is, Americans should be confident about their abilities to solve problems. But he didn’t say, when German forces seized one country after another, that Americans shouldn’t be afraid of change in Europe. Nor did he say, as the Japanese Empire expanded, that Americans shouldn’t be afraid of change in Asia.
President Harry Truman didn’t say that Americans shouldn’t be afraid of change in Eastern Europe when the Soviets gained power over the governments there or China became Communist.
These (Democratic) presidents recognized the danger and worked to counteract it as best as they could under the circumstances.
In contrast, while giving lip service to the idea that it’s a “dangerous time,” Obama never points to what the dangers are because, frankly, he has no idea. All the points he makes about these changes are positive, cheerleading.
Yet if he’s right on what basis does the United States not want some regimes–Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Morocco, the Palestinian Authority–to be overthrown? Why does he not make a differentiation between America’s enemies and America’s friends?
To show who is really being naive, he added:
“All the forces that we see building in Egypt are the forces that should be naturally aligned with us. Should be aligned with Israel.”
All the forces “should be” aligned with the United States and Israel! Well, maybe they “should be” but they aren’t. In fact, it is the exact opposite: all the forces that we see building in Egypt are forces that in fact are not aligned with the United States and Israel. Here we see the arrogance of someone who tells people in other countries what they should think instead of analyzing what they do think.
Of course, what happens — and we see this quite vividly — is that the intellligence agencies and media rewrite reality to say that these people are moderate because that’s what the president expects.
Here are some historical parallels to Obama’s statements (I made them up):
1932: Germany should be aligned with the Western democracies and the United States because that is the way it will achieve prosperity and stability in Europe, two things that German desperately needs. Only 14 years ago (1918), Germany lost a long, bloody war (WWI). Surely, the Germans have no desire to fight again and repeat their mistake of trying to conquer Europe!
1945: The Soviet Union should be aligned with the Western democracies and the United States because we have just been allies in a great war. Moscow must understand that the United States has no desire to injure it, wants to live in peace, and respects Soviet interests. Surely, Stalin will put the emphasis on rebuilding his country and not on expansionism abroad!
1979: The new Islamist regime in Iran should be aligned with the West and the United States because they accept the revolution there, want good relations, and are the customers for Iran’s oil exports.
1989: Saddam Hussein and his Iraqi regime should be aligned with the West and the United States because they backed him in his recent war with Iran and he fears the spread of revolutionary Islamism. Saddam will cause no trouble and will put the priority on rebuilding his country after a bloody eight-year-long war with Iran and providing better lives for his people.
1993: Yasir Arafat and the Palestinians should be aligned with the United States and eager to make a comprehensive peace with Israel since that is the only way they can get a state. Now that they are going to have elections and be responsible for administering the West Bank and Gaza Strip certainly the PLO will cease to be revolutionary or terrorist.
Get the picture?
And so when Obama says:
“I’m actually confident that 10 years from now we’re going to be able to look back and say that this was the dawning of an entirely new and better era. One in which people are striving not to be against something but to be for something.”
Remember those words. He has absolutely no understanding of the Arabic-speaking world, the Muslim-majority world, or the Middle East whatsoever. How are these new regimes going to stay in power, smite their rivals, and make up for not delivering the material goods to their people? What is the world view of these forces? How do they perceive America, the West, and Israel? These are the questions that should be asked, and answered, in order to understand what the world will look like in a decade.
About the author,
Barry Rubin is Director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His books include Islamic Fundamentalists in Egyptian Politics and The Muslim Brotherhood (Palgrave-Macmillan); and The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East, a study of Arab reform movements (Wiley). GLORIA Center site: http://www.gloria-center.org His blog, Rubin Reports, http://www.rubinreports.blogspot.com. | <urn:uuid:fcfa4afb-ad45-44be-9754-3205f3b03151> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.crethiplethi.com/barack-obama-and-the-cavalcade-of-naivete/islamic-countries/2011/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951058 | 1,346 | 1.515625 | 2 |
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